Palestinians have fired more than 100 rockets during the eight months of the so-called cease-fire, including dozens of rockets in the last two weeks. But let’s just start with the order of recent events.
Israel discovers a tunnel that Hamas intends to use to kidnap more Israeli soldiers. The IDF goes in to destroy it, meets opposition from Hamas. There is a gunfight. Terrorists die, one soldier is wounded. Israel destroys the tunnel and the building it was dug from. Hamas responds by firing 35 rockets into Israel on November 4th.
Israel closes the Gaza crossings and refuses to allow in fuel and supplies. There is silence from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
On November 6th, more rockets are fired into Israel. There is silence from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
On November 7th, more rockets are fired into Israel. There is silence from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
On November 8th, more rockets are fired into Israel. There is silence from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
On November 9th, more rockets are fired into Israel. There is silence from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
On November 10th, more rockets are fired into Israel. There is silence from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
On November 11th, more rockets are fired into Israel. There is a brief mention of Gaza from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon during a press conference.
We were acutely conscious of the distressing conditions in Gaza. I call for Hamas and all Palestinian factions to respond positively to Egypt’s unity efforts. I call for the calm to be respected. And I call on Israel to ease the severe closure of Gaza by allowing sufficient and predictable supplies to reach the population, ensuring access for humanitarian workers, and facilitating stalled UN projects.
There is no mention of the rocketing of Israel’s civilian population.
On November 12th, more rockets are fired into Israel. There is silence from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
On November 13th, more rockets are fired into Israel. Israeli FM Tzipi Livni meets with Ban Ki-Moon and protests the barrage of rockets into Israel’s civilian areas. There is silence from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
On November 14th, more rockets are fired into Israel. The UN says they have to close down their food banks in Gaza (in spite of the fact that the very article on closing down the food bank says they have enough food to feed another 130,000 people for four weeks). Finally, after ignoring the dozens of rockets crashing into Israeli civilian areas in cities and towns, Ban Ki-Moon speaks. Or, well, issues a statement, anyway.
He calls for both sides to “exercise restraint.” Israel is killing only terrorists. Not a single Palestinian civilian has been harmed. Two Israeli civilians have suffered shrapnel wounds, and hundreds have suffered the terror of rocket attacks. And Ban Ki-Moon says that Israel should open the Gaza crossings, and supply her enemies with fuel and goods—including, I presume, the cement that Hamas is using to build the tunnels.
The Secretary-General is deeply concerned at the deterioration of the humanitarian and security situation in Gaza and southern Israel, and at the potential for further suffering and violence. He calls on all parties to uphold international humanitarian and human rights law.
The Secretary-General reiterates his condemnation of rocket attacks. He calls for an end to such attacks and urges full respect by all parties of the calm that has been in effect since 19 June 2008. The Secretary-General is concerned that food and other life saving assistance is being denied to hundreds of thousands of people, and emphasizes that measures which increase the hardship and suffering of the civilian population of the Gaza Strip as a whole are unacceptable and should cease immediately. In particular, he calls on Israel to allow urgently, the steady and sufficient supply of fuel and humanitarian assistance. He also calls on Israel to resume facilitating the activities of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) and all humanitarian agencies, including through unimpeded access for UN officials and humanitarian workers.
The “calm that has been in effect” is the calm that included dozens of rockets fired, one or two or three at a time, since June. It includes the re-arming of Hamas, the digging of tunnels, the import of weapons and ammunition, and the continued holding of Gilad Shalit as a hostage, without any regard to Geneva Conventions or the human rights of the prisoner. Ban Ki-Moon swore when he was first elected that he would work tirelessly for Shalit’s release. Yeah, how’s that coming, Ban?
Once again, Jewish blood is cheap. The world simply doesn’t care that Jews are at risk. Only that their precious Palestinians might have to use the supplies that Hamas has been smuggling in via the tunnels from Egypt.
Apparently, now Israel doesn’t even have the right not to arm and supply her own enemies with the very fuel that they use to make bombs to drop on her own citizens. That now falls under the rubric of “disproportionate response.”
Not a single Palestinian civilian has so much as chipped a fingernail this time around. And still, the world calls for Israel to stop killing terrorists and reopen their supply routes.
Screw the world. And most especially, the UN, led by Ki-Moon.
On the topic, these two quotes:
“When the Jewish people will trust in G-d, that the Land of Israel belongs unequivocally to them, and are willing to declare this openly to the nations of the world, then “No one will contest the matter, and you will not need to go to war.†In fact, even weapons will prove unnecessary…†The Lubavitcher Rebbe, (Likutei Sichos, vol. 34, p. 8)
All the nations are one day going to come together and start talking peace amongst themselves. This talk of peace will have one underlying goal: to destroy Israel. And their rationale shall be: because they [the Jews] established for themselves their own government; and though the Jews will be in tremendous danger at that time, nevertheless they will not be destroyed; in fact, from that very situation they will be saved.
Rabbi Moshe Cordevero (Ramak) on Zohar Bereishis, 199 – approximately 500 years ago
I’am with you.