Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on November 30, 2021

In his new book on last Mays chapter of Hamas long-running war against Israel, Gaza Conflict 2021, Middle East scholar Jonathan Schanzer points out this anomaly: Even as the historic conflict between Israel and her Arab neighbors shrinks, with new diplomatic relations expanding monthly, Irans proxy war against Israel is intensifying.

Schanzer, senior vice president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, details the threats posed to Israel by Hamas on its southern border and by Hezbollah on its northern one.

The estimated 4,350 rockets fired at Israeli civilian centers from the Gaza Strip in May were substantially all funded or fabricated by Iran. Hamas may have as many as 30,000 more, waiting to be used when it chooses. On the Lebanese border in the north, Hezbollah, a de facto unit of the Tehran government, has stockpiled 150,000 rockets, paid for and supplied by Iran which, like Hamas and Hezbollah, is pledged to Israels annihilation.

Another anomaly is that each time Hamas or Hezbollah fires barrages of rockets into Israel and Israel tries to defend itself from them, it is Israel that many American progressives condemn. When it comes to the left, the Jewish state finds itself caught in a vise between gullibility and hatred. The gullibility is old. The hatred is older. Though Schanzer doesnt put it quite this way, there are some on the left who do not know the Gaza Strip from the Isle of Wight, Hamas from Greenpeace. But bank on this: If Israeli civilians are under siege and their government tries to protect them, in these quarters it is Israel that will be denounced.

The May conflict began with the first of thousands of rockets being fired by Hamas at Israeli civilians, and ended with some on the left lamenting that Israel had defensive systems in place to try to intercept them, which kept Israelis from being torn to pieces. This was no one-off. Hamas did the same thing in 2008, 2012 and 2014. The 2021 conflict was the fourth war, Schanzer writes. There will be a fifth.

Of course there will. Each time Hamas tries to shred Israelis, it will be Israel that take a political hit in Europe, in academia and now in progressive circles, where the inanity when it comes to Israel grows more eye-rolling with each conflict.

To be sure, the Israel-as-human-rights-violator narrative has hit some speed bumps in the form of observations by experts who never got The Memo. After the 2014 installment of the conflict, when Israel absorbed 5,000 Hamas rockets, Gen. Martin Dempsey, President Obamas chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, spoke at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs. I actually do think that Israel went to extraordinary lengths to limit collateral damage and civilian casualties, said Dempsey. The Israel Defense Forces (are) not interested in creating civilian casualties. Theyre interested in stopping the shooting of rockets and missiles out of the Gaza Strip and into Israel.

The Gaza-based head of the U.N.s Palestinian refugee relief agency got himself into trouble in May when he praised Israel for the precision with which it managed to target Hamas military sites deliberately embedded within civilian areas, limiting harm to innocents. This displeased Hamas, and he was forced to hightail it out of Gaza for consultations.

A small but strident cohort within the Democratic Party insisted that it was Israels fault for trying to keep its civilians from being set on fire. We oppose our money going to fund militarized policy, occupation and systems of violent oppression and trauma, proclaimed Missouri Congresswoman Cori Bush, presumably referring to the Iron Dome interception system, which exists solely to prevent Hamas rockets from murdering innocent people.

The triumph of political fashion over reason is a storyline of the times. But the indulgence of Hamas and the demonization of Israel by progressives is in a head-scratcher category of its own.

Jeff Robbins is a Boston lawyer and former U.S. delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Commission

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Robbins: The Hamas caucus gets it wrong on Gaza - Boston Herald

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