Israel’s campaign to degrade Hamas’ military
What happened
Amid growing international calls for a cease-fire, Israel continued an offensive in Gaza this week to eradicate Hamas leadership and military capabilities, in response to a sustained barrage of more than 4,000 rockets fired at Israeli towns. “The shooting must stop,” said French President Emmanuel Macron, who drafted a cease-fire resolution for the United Nations Security Council. By midweek, the airstrikes had killed more than 225 Palestinians, including at least 64 children, displaced more than 58,000, and destroyed hundreds of buildings. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tweeted that the attacks would “continue as long as necessary to restore calm to the citizens of Israel.” Hamas-fired rockets that slipped past Israel’s Iron Dome defense shield have killed at least a dozen Israeli citizens, including two children. In response, Israel said, it had destroyed 60 miles of underground tunnels, struck 80 rocket launchers, and killed at least 130 Hamas militants.
The White House said that President Biden told Netanyahu he “expected a significant de-escalation today on the path to a ceasefire.” But Netanyahu declined. That prompted some Democrats to call on Biden to take a tougher stance. “The president needs to tell Netanyahu to stop,” said Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), and Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota said Biden should block a $735 million weapons sale to Israel. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell accused critics of Israel of engaging in “false equivalence between terrorist aggressors and a responsible state defending itself.” The U.S. must “stand foursquare behind our ally,” he said.
The Israeli bombardment created a growing humanitarian crisis in Gaza, where power lines were damaged, hospitals and schools were taken out of commission, fuel and water were in short supply, and a devastated sewer system flooded streets with wastewater. “We are tired,” said Haya Abdelal, 21, after the building next to her home was destroyed. “We need a truce. We can’t bear it anymore.”
What the editorials said
“The narrative is following a familiar script,” said The Wall Street Journal. Hamas fires rockets at Israeli civilians, and Israel strikes back at the source of the weaponry. Then “Hamas plays up the civilian casualties, and the world leans on Israel to stop defending itself.” As the fighting continues, “let’s hope this isn’t the trap the Biden administration falls into.” Israel has “an obligation to its own people to degrade the threat” with a sustained assault.
It’s time for Israel “to call a halt,” said The Washington Post. Yes, its targeted bombing “is not morally or legally comparable” to Hamas’ “war crimes.”
But as demonstrated by weekend bombings that killed 42 residents of a collapsed apartment building and destroyed offices for the Associated Press and other news organizations, Israel “is pushing the boundaries of legitimate military targeting.” With even some pro-Israel U.S. lawmakers expressing concern, “the collateral political and diplomatic damage to Israel is steadily growing.”
What the columnists said
The usual arguments about aggression and reprisal miss the point, said Shadi Hamid in TheAtlantic .com. This latest conflict began in East Jerusalem, when Israel tried to evict Palestinian families and then sent police to raid the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Israel’s defenders fail to acknowledge the “wildly unequal” power imbalance “in which Israel is the aggressor and Palestinians are the aggressed.” That imbalance provokes humiliated Palestinians to lash out over and over again, and gives Israel no incentive whatsoever to seek peace.
If you’re rooting for a Palestinian state, “you must also want Hamas to be humiliated and defeated,” said Bret Stephens in The New York Times. The sole objective of this terrorist organization has been to turn a “potentially negotiable” conflict into a “zero-sum holy war.” There’s no moral equivalent between Israel’s inadvertent killing of Palestinians and Hamas’ deliberate attacks on Israeli citizens—or its strategy of housing arsenals amid civilian populations so it can “reap the propaganda benefits” when Palestinian children are killed by defensive strikes. Hamas “must be routed.”