Martyrdom Opportunities Mulled
Israeli cabinet debates whether to finish the job in Gaza’s urban centers and honor Hamas’ deeply held shahid lust, or allow Hamas to live to fire missiles into Israeli neighborhoods another day. Roundup kicks off with Reuters:
JERUSALEM, Jan 7 (Reuters) - Israeli leaders will debate on Wednesday whether to order their armed forces to storm into the Gaza Strip’s urban centres, the planned culmination of a nearly two-week-old offensive, political sources said.
…
Postponing a final decision on the plan could allow Israel to keep its forces in readiness while maintaining leeway for any breakthrough in possible truce talks led by Egypt.
Reuters seems to think an urban assault is a bad idea. Providing Hamas with more martyrdom opportunities, not allowing Hamas to live to fire rockets another day, that is.
Military analysts believe Israeli forces would be severely challenged by combat in Gaza’s congested casbahs and alleyways, where much of their air support would be irrelevant and where Palestinian gunmen would be able to mount hit-and-run ambushes.
Based on the American experience in street fighting in Iraq, there should be about a 10-to-one death rate, in Israel’s favor. Given Hamas’ preference for fighting from schools full of women and children, it may be more like 10-to-50-to-one.
Conquering Gaza could amount to a reoccupation of a territory the Jewish state captured from Egypt in a 1967 war and quit in 2005. Israeli leaders have said they do not want to reoccupy Gaza or, for now, to topple the Islamist Hamas group.
I suspect they’ve thought it through a little further than that. Maybe even have ideas about someone else occupying Gaza. Some of the international ceasefire enthusiasts, maybe. Now, if Hamas is obliterated, that’s not exactly a “topple,” is it? There must be someone among all the earnest peace advocates who is willing to run that place. No? OK, back to the streetfighting.
According to one Israeli source with knowledge of the security cabinet’s discussions, the initial ground sweep was executed well but the military top brass was disappointed by what they saw as relatively little Palestinian resistance.
“The assumption was that our forces could draw out the enemy into open areas where they could be eliminated, but they didn’t come out in the number we expected,” the source said. “Taking the fight into the populated areas would be much tougher.”
Hamas spokesman Abu Ubaida said in a speech on Monday: “We have prepared for you, Zionists, thousands of tough fighters who are waiting for you in every street, every alley and at every house, and they will meet you with iron and fire.”
Good luck with that.
Meanwhile, AP reports the Gaza violence is starting to “spill over” into Europe, with attacks on Jews. It’s a slightly odd choice of words, as if criminals in Europe actually have anything to do with Hamas, as if Jews in Europe had somehow brought this on themselves, or as if Israel’s effort to stop indiscriminate rocket attacks was responsible for incidents of European arson, assault and vandalism. Daily Mail with more with anti-violence violence on British Jews.
NYT’s Friedman tries to make it simple with several convoluted analogies, but essentially lays out the argument for destroying Hamas. His argument falls apart in a couple of places, however, with the suggestion that “you have to hope for the weakening of Hamas” … come on, Tom, grow a set! … and his conclusion that this situation calls for a bold, uncompromising Kumbayah chorus:
Obama’s great potential for America, noted Indyk, is also a great threat to Islamist radicals — because his narrative holds tremendous appeal for Arabs. For eight years Hamas, Hezbollah and Al Qaeda have been surfing on a wave of anti-U.S. anger generated by George W. Bush. And that wave has greatly expanded their base.
No doubt, Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran are hoping that they can use the Gaza conflict to turn Obama into Bush. They know Barack Hussein Obama must be (am)Bushed — to keep America and its Arab allies on the defensive. Obama has to keep his eye on the prize. His goal — America’s goal — has to be a settlement in Gaza that eliminates the threat of Hamas rockets and opens Gaza economically to the world, under credible international supervision. That’s what will serve U.S. interests, moderate the three great struggles and earn him respect.
That pretty much means the elimination of Hamas, a Fatah government and Arab peacekeepers, but Friedman apparently doesn’t want to go there. Friedman’s spot on with the need to smack down Iran, but falls prey to the fallacy that placating the Arabs over Palestine is the key to stability in the greater Middle East. Anyone else notice that Iraq was stabilized and secured without an Israeli-Palestinian resolution? Someone tell the Iraq Study Group. Also, someone please tell Friedman that al-Qaeda, Hezbollah and Hamas are all severely diminished, because the Americans, Israelis and assorted allies have been killing them and politically and financially isolating them. With Arab assistance.
Jennifer Rubin at Commentary questions Friedman’s intellectual honesty … I dunno, the handwringing photo pretty much says it all.
What could be more honest than that? A picture’s worth a thousand words … or in this case, 844 of them.
Reuel Marc Gerecht at WSJ mulls Iran’s game. Thinks Israel may be playing into Iran’s hands but allows that it is “entirely possible that Tehran could overplay its hand among the Palestinians as it overplayed its hand among Iraqi Shiites, turning sympathetic Muslims into deeply suspicious, nationalistic patriots.”
Soccer Dad doesn’t like Fatah much better than Hamas, but hey, give peace a chance …
Gateway: Talk about martyrdom enthusiasm, “Death to America” from a top US Islamic cleric. Also, “peace protest” violence.
Israel Matzav, Muslim hit list on British Jews.
Topics: Israel, Palestinians
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 10:12 am on Wednesday, January 7, 2009
3 Responses to “Martyrdom Opportunities Mulled”
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January 7th, 2009 at 2:17 pm
I think Friedman is just dumb. Reading him drives me crazy. The man either cannot or will not think. It’s just stream of consciousness, he wanders about among his points, weaving things together at random.
He would be hell to edit. Can you imagine? Uh, Tom, can we go over this paragraph? “Obama’s great potential for America, noted Indyk, is also a great threat to Islamist radicals — because his narrative holds tremendous appeal for Arabs. ” Tom, you need to distinguish between what Indyk said and what you think—you’re blending the two together here. And it isn’t clear what “narrative” you are talking about. And it isn’t clear which Arabs you are talking about….”
January 7th, 2009 at 2:18 pm
Dang. Kill that last quote mark.
January 8th, 2009 at 12:44 am
AP’s report on violence on Jews in Europe should have been reported years ago. At least a decade ago, when muslims started to take over Europe their attacks on innocent Jews went unreported as a hateful crime.
Most violent assault and sad ones occurred in recent few years, in France, none have to do with Israel defending right to exist, just generations of muslim teaching of abhorrent hate-mongering.
As always the liberal media fail to report the facts.