Debbie Schlussel thinks not:
[...] There have been many of these occasion, temporary Israeli attacks on HAMAS or temporary blockades of funds or supplies to Gaza. And they are a waste of time because Israel doesn't mean business. Eventually, Israel backs down and stops and allows HAMAS to get "refueled" with supplies, money, etc. And yet the HAMAS attacks never end.You must ask yourself why Israel suddenly chose to strike back now after years of HAMAS sending these rockets to kill the poor, working-class Israelis of Sderot--most of them descendants of Jews expelled from their homes and property in Arab Muslim countries. Why did it not matter that HAMAS sent rockets every day to kill Jews during the faux-truce and before then? Why does it suddenly matter now? What was different about now versus two months ago or two months from now?...
Find out the answer at Debbie's site.
And see also this, from commenter Mega over at Pamela's place:
The pattern:
1) Israel starts out with an aggressive military response to the terrorists - the goals are somewhat fuzzy, but it does feel cathartic
2) The terrorists go to ground quickly after taking a minor hit to key forces and weaponry
3) The Arabs riot in the streets of Europe and across the middle east
4) Western govts get nervous and turn the screws on Israel to pull back and negotiate and make peace
5) The media reports it as a humanitarian tragedy story, complete with the pathetic pictures of Palestinian kids, leading to massive pressure on Israel to call it quits
6) Israel gets nervous and starts doing non-strategic things like flattening empty buildings, to avoid civilian casualties, while trying to figure out what to do next in the face of strong and (to them) unexpected international condemnation
7) The enemy, seeing that Israel has no real war plan, starts claiming victory, i.e. "survival" in the face of the onslaught of the world's 4th largest army blah blah blah, and uses some of its mostly-untouched forces and armaments, which were, of course, hidden beyond the IDF's reach
8) Israel calls it off and tells its citizens it won. Everyone knows otherwise.We seem to be roughly at stage 6 right now.
What a sad situation this is, the people of Gaza have so little; now they have even less.
Hamas will get small mauling yes, but Israel can never defeat Hamas; next time they will come back stronger.
This has been the pattern since the birth of Islam. We simply need to absorb into this pattern when we get fed up of the fighting.
Why can't they just go into Gaza and push all the pals into the sea? They did something similar to the Germans after WW II so there is plenty of precedent.
See under Benes decree but also happened in other countries.
The moslem countries have expelled lots of Jews and there was no compensation for lost land and property.
What makes the pals so inviolate? They keep attacking and attacking and have lost all rights to remain there.
Let them go to the countries that expelled Jews on a One-for-one basis. They can live in the homes stole from the Jews and the Jews can take over Gaza and the West Bank and live Happily Ever After.
FREE of islam.
The amazing world of political correctness. That's how Stalin killed a bunch of people. That's how Animal Farm became Manor Farm all over again. Political correctness is just a way to commit crimes and get away with it.
KILL FOR POLITICAL CORRECTNESS. NO SPEAKING AGAINST IT IS AGAINST FREEDOM AND EQUALITY BOOHOO.
"The key ingredient in this repetitive mobius strip of failure is the inability of Israel's government to correctly anticipate the global pressure it will be under to call it off before a successful conclusion. Israel keeps expecting the world to be sympathetic and supportive. Israel is delusional."
I don't share your pessimism on that particular point.
First, the timing should be noted: the sacro-sainct Christmas vacation when most UN diplomats and Western politicians are away on vacation and probably won't be back at their posts until next Monday at the earliest. This in itself suggests careful planning, nothing like the spur-of-the-moment decision to go to war against Hizballah in 2006.
Second, you see the Israeli viewpoint more aptly presented than in the past. It still leaves a lot to be desired, but this also suggests that they have anticipated a media backlash and that the world is not going to be sympathetic.
Third, Hudna is a two-way street.Hamas used the six months "truce" to build up strength -and has often bragged about it - and we are seeing that in the long-range missiles it has been using lately. They also spent those six months building a labyrinth of underground tunnels, which, by the way, are the target of Israeli airplanes at the moment.
But Israel has used those six months as well, gathering intelligence and training for an operation such as this.
Fourth, the lessons of 2006, compiled in the so-called Vinograd report, have been learned. Barak and Livni don't want to end up like Olmert, and Ashkenazi doesn't want to lose his job and leave in shame like his predecessor. So if
only for these reasons, I believe they'll stay the course.
Fifth, new elements have modified the global political picture. The conflict between Fath and Hamas as well as the wider intra-Muslim conflict are making an impact. Gulf and other countries with a sunni Muslim majority, threatened by the prospect of a nuclear Iran, against the axis Iran/Hizb/Syria/Gaza and their sunni allies, the Muslim Brotherhood of which Hamas is part. This is to say that I expect the largest Muslim protest to take place in places with a high concentration of Shias and Ikhwan. Other Muslim agitators and their Western allies will soon realize what is at stake so I expect they will wait it out.
Sixth, as far as supplies are concerned, trucks full of goods are making their way into Gaza while they are being shot at. Apparently, they thought about that too and are keeping the border crossings open despite the difficulties.
So,I wouldn't say that Israel hasn't anticipated correctly the global pressure. It seems to me that the above examples point exactly to the contrary.
From post above: This has been the pattern since the birth of Islam. We simply need to absorb into this pattern when we get fed up of the fighting.
'Absorb into'??? I don't intend to 'absorb into' anything Islamic.
If you would like to 'Absorb into' Islam, I'm sure there's a local Imam who could help you out.
I can't predict the future, but I hope Israel prevails. The only way to do that is to make it too costly for Hamas to continue. Israel can't do that if it quits or backs up.
Mega's analysis seems quite accurate--depressingly so.
"keeping low" is at it again:
"What a sad situation this is, the people of Gaza have so little; now they have even less."
Why is it that the Gazans "have so little"? They have received enormous amounts of aid. Perhaps we can start with the greenhouses that philanthropic American Jews bought for them to jump start their economy when Israel pulled out--those greenhouses were never used. Thy were looted for parts and then destroyed.
Most of the international aid seems to have gone into funding Hamas' war against Israel and their feud with rival Fatah, rather than any sort of building of a functioning Palestinian state.
more:
"This has been the pattern since the birth of Islam. We simply need to absorb into this pattern when we get fed up of the fighting."
More sly Taquiyya from "keeping low". What exactly does the above mean? Does it mean that we have to resignedly accept Muslim violence, or does it go further--is he urging us to convert to "the Religion of Peace" now, since it's inevitable, anyway?
I often agree with Debbie but maybe not this time. As the operation continues and refines itself, Hamas will just keep trying to fire more rockets at civilians and maybe a horrible suicide attack somewhere. They will just make themselves uglier and uglier in everyone's eyes. Politicans tend to want to keep doing whatever makes their approval ratings soar - in this case war on Hamas.
Just one devastating Hamas rocket hit, say a nursery school or such, with many casualties and there will be NO political way for a ceasefire, no turning back.
keeping low: Israel could wipe Hamas off the face of the earth if it waged total war. Regretfully, this will probably not happen. The Achilles heel of civilization, which paradoxically is also one of its greatest strengths, is its capacity for true compassion. And this often goes directly against the need to defeat the enemy utterly, especially dangerous when the enemy is a barbarian, like Hamas.
Too bad they didn't sink it.
http://www.military.com/news/article/ex-us-rep-on-damaged-gaza-bound-ship.html
It is very clear that Hamas has to go. Israel has to move forcefully with tanks and eliminate Hamas for good and the world mostly knows this even if they act otherwise out of some stupid habit. No cease fire, no truce, just total Islamic terrorist elimination and it is justified - it's the ONLY way.
Should encourage, as a bonus, second thoughts by militant Muslims about their Quran - it claims loudly, after all, that warring Muslims will always be winners with the infidels the losers. After all the centuries of being wretched losers maybe some of them, I hope, can finally take a pretty obvious hint.
"The Achilles heel of civilization, which paradoxically is also one of its greatest strengths, is its capacity for true compassion. And this often goes directly against the need to defeat the enemy utterly, especially dangerous when the enemy is a barbarian, like Hamas."
Wellington
Very well said. However, in the age of WMD's, this could also be lethal to a just society.
I agree with Debbie. Which is why this Israeli 'attack' has largely drawn yawns, as far as I'm concerned.
swilliams wrote:
"...But Israel has used those six months as well, gathering intelligence and training for an operation such as this..."
Israel did this knowing what was coming. That is not planning for offensive war. It is defensive.
Israel needs to clean up hammas before BO becomes president. they cannot stop now but keep up the bombing and clean up, send the pali refugess back to their homeland.
One of the ways Israel can nullify Hammas is by neutralising Iran's Nuclear facilities. Then Iran and Hammas are dead rid. What better way to do it than provoking Iran into supporting Hammas directly.
I like the 6-step program laid out there by Mega. But there's non-linear dimension to the pattern, too. It works by way of what's not said (or written) in our public discourse as the Israelis again belatedly defend themselves against the Jihad terror war that's been going in the Holy Land since the terror attacks started about this time of season in 1947.
What's not said?
* That most of the real estate deeds in Israel were obtained legally by a Jew purchasing the land from absentee Arab Moslem landlords, mostly Bedouins.
* That it is undisputed documented fact that Jihadists have always used civilians and mosques for military shields; not only does this give the Jihadis more ponits of attack, it always yeilds beaucoup points of victimist-whining; all sitting there for the Moslems to work verbally; always a bedrock ploy of the Cause in all its myriad battles conducted continuously at least one place on Earth at any given time, and usually more than one place over the past 1,386 years.
* That the "insurgents" operate from the psychological basis that they are striving in pursuit of specific goals preordained and commanded by Allah and the sunnah of Mohammed.
* That popular support for the "insurgents" (Hamas, in this case) among Moslems is, oh, I dunno, somewhere around 99.99%.
Stupid naseem. Nobody is going to absorb into anything. Go away.
nabi ZK (pbumadti)
keeping low,
Would it suprise you that Isreal has defeated Hamas, as soon as this war has started, Hamas got defeated because it only has guns, bombs, and those Kadussa rockets, no match to the high tech stuff Isreal. Face Hamas, you have been defeated by Isreal in full.
A small correction, " high tech stuff Isreal has".
Islam is going the of the dinosaurs, the dodo, and communism...
That sorry, delusional so-called religion is nothing but a self-destructive f***ing JOKE.
sorry to piss on your towels,
but accept it,
allah is dead!
ps. think he got any virgins?
Islam is going the of the dinosaurs, the dodo, and communism...
That sorry, delusional so-called religion is nothing but a self-destructive f***ing JOKE.
sorry to piss on your towels,
but accept it,
allah is dead!
ps. think he got any virgins?
sorry about the 2X post.
Isreal should just end it,
unwrap a nuke or two and
turn that gaza s**thole
into a sheet of glass...
No response, huh?
i had figured my incendiary and possibly uncalled for remarks might at least get a blip.
cowards in life,
cowards in death,
Mohammed was in the closet, you know.
Had a thing for young boys and sheep...
Feel free to blow yourself up.
It is so easy to be an arm-chair general behind a screen and blame Israel for holding back or leaving the job unfinished but the reality of war, diplomacy and politics is far more complex than the wipe 'em out Ramboism so prevalent among some posters here.
No amount of bombing even if unfettered and unhindered can `wipe out' a local guerilla group like Hamas or Hezbollah. Killed men are replaced with probably angrier new recruits who lost family and friends. New weapons are bought, built or repaired. New tunnels are dug. The whole thing starts all over again within weeks.
What will work is killing or otherwise ethnically cleansing the whole territory of Gaza. Militarily it is doable. The whole 1.5 million could be thrown out of Gaza within few months. But could Israel live with that morally and ethically? No. It will not be Israel if it did that . It would've sold its very soul to the devil.
So any air or land war by Israel has to to have a diplomatic end game. An ideal outcome will be an enemy so bloodied and bruised it sues for peace and refrains from attacking Israel in the future.
And seen from that context the 2006 Hizbollah war was a success as Hezb, despite all its fire-breathing fervour did not attack Israel since.
Hamas could be persuaded similarly. That is why decapitation of Hamas is particularly important because any leader who inherits the Hamas hot-seat would've witnessed the price paid for crossing Israel. Self-preservation is a great motivator.