The news media are falling all over themselves to conclude that no matter what happens, Israel loses. When I woke up to NPR this morning, the first thing I heard was (paraphrasing) “Israeli forces haven’t stopped the rocket fire into southern Israel, with more than 20 rockets being fired today.”
CNN’s summary of their latest Israel piece:
NEW: Hamas rocket fire into southern Israel persists despite 10-day campaign
And the headline tells you the focus of the media:
Gaza death toll rises as Israel pounds Hamas
You see? No matter what Israel does, she loses. Might as well not even bother fighting. Hamas can’t be beaten.
What a load of crap. Of course Hamas can be beaten. Israel had the terrorists on the rope before, but then they granted them a truce. Every time Hamas is seriously wounded, it sues for truce. And Israel grants it. Why? Several reasons: Israel would rather not send her sons into battle to be hurt and killed if she can accomplish the same result through negotiations. (Of course, it doesn’t really work like that with terrorist groups. If you don’t kill them, they keep coming back at you. They’re like horror movie monsters.) And because Israel hopes against hope that the terrorists are people, too, and that all they really want is peace. They may be people, but they don’t want peace. Hamas has proven that, over and over again.
But the IDF can win this war. Hamas’ biggest boast: They will kill and kidnap Israel soldiers. But when boast became reality, here’s what happened:
A Golani soldier managed to single-handedly foil an attempt to kidnap him during nocturnal operations in the Gaza Strip overnight Sunday, Israel Radio reported.
[…] Upon entering the house, the soldiers discovered entrances to several tunnels, which the Hamas terrorists holed up in the house had used to escape underground to neighboring houses. According to the report, the terrorists were shooting into the building when the soldiers entered.
One of the soldiers reportedly followed the gunmen into a tunnel and managed to contain several Hamas fighters in an underground firefight, before teaming up with his comrades again. Two IAF helicopters were scrambled to support the infantrymen, Israel Radio said.
The military assessed that the Palestinian terrorists were trying to lure the soldier to go after them alone into the tunnel in an effort to kidnap him.
The IDF is poised to go deep into Gaza City tomorrow, Israel time. It’s going to get worse before it gets better. But I don’t see how it can get any worse in the media.
Someone might want to remind the headline writers that the Death Toll can _only_ rise. Although, if they’re relying on UNIFIL counts, I suppose it will inevitably shrink.
Clearly the News Media have learned well the lesson of Iraq: it is Inconceivable for a modern armor-and-infantry military to defeat a guerrilla force hiding among the civilian population. Inconceivable, I tell you!
Two words: Baghdad Bob.
I agree with Israel’s actions. They have been very patient with the Hamas’s actions. The Hamas and Palestinian’s have NEVER wanted peace only Israel’s destruction. The Hamas are cowards and hide behind women and children resulting in thier death then blame in on Israel and the news media feeds on it. Thankfully leaders and citizens of others countries see the truth that Hamas will destroy Palestine due to their firing of rockets into Israel. Once that stops and only then will Israel stop. They have my support.
I agree that fighting guerilla warfare in a populated area as Gaza will not bring quick results for the Israeli army, especially against a force that will willingly use their own people as human shields and not care to blow themselves up to hurt the enemy. But, I also believe the message needs to be made and whether it brings another fragile truce, Hamas should try to heed the message for the sake of Gaza and its people. There is really no need to continually propel rockets with limitless success to “disturb” Isreal and force this large scale “retaliation” as Israel calls it. It will only lead to unnecessary bloodshed and hardship to an otherwise decent and non-violent Palestinian people.
Hamas needs to be eliminated from the face of the Earth. It is an organization designed to deliver death, to Israelis and Palestinians, in its quest to incite a holy war against Jews. No compromise, concession, or unilateral withdrawal by Israel will quench Hamas’ thirst for blood. It uses its own people as political pawns, allowing them to die of treatable wounds in order to leverage the right to bring more missiles into Gaza from Egypt. These people are animals who are motivated by one thing: hate. Enough.
Israel can win if they muster up the needed will. They have the man power and materials to do it. They also need to counteract the massive propaganda machine by Islamists all over the world. Lies and sympathy for all they evil deeds. If Israel follows through, they will win. Break up the strip into slivers and take the slivers one at a time. Don’t believe the Islamists they only aim is to enslave the world in their version of it.
Palestinians brought this on themselves. They elected Hamas. Why are the biggest problems for palestinians in Gaza and not in the West Bank? Leadership.Once again Hamas leaders after they stir things up – typical.
Islamic terrorist killed inocentn people in mumbai…. who were waiting for train…
what do you expect…..
no sorry for PLO, HAMAS…
ISRAEL MUST BE STRONG..
ENEMY IS STRONG….
THEY ARE AGRESSORS… ANIMALS….
KILLERS….
DEATH TO KILLERS….
GO TO HELL HAMAS……..
Do not forget – Israel is what they are after now. If Israel would fall (which will not happen), Christians would be next.
They won’t stop until there are non-muslims left.
One more thing – you can’t fight a war with white gloves. So if civilians die, it’s sad, but it can’t be changed. Especially if Hamas intentionaly hides arms, rockets and their fighters in residential areas and mosques…Civilians should’ve left long time ago, and if they didn’t – it’s their choice.
Golly, Israel can’t end the problem, or at least reduce it to tolerable levels, by military means alone?
But I seem to remember not too many years ago people assuring Israel that they couldn’t suppress the intifada by military means alone and military means plus a fence did seem to do the trick.
The media is passing opinions as facts. Gaza represents a unique problem in that their leaders are willing to sacrifice their followers in order to fire rockets into Israel.
Eventually Israel can stop all the rockets, even if it means taking control of the entire territory again. Unfortunately Hamas may make that necessary if the citizens of Gaza can’t remove them from power.
The rest of the world may be sympathetic to the Gazans, but world opinion means nothing- only actions make any difference and no one is willing to come to the aid of Hamas.
I think it would be better for Gaza to reject Hamas and the new Israeli strategy is making the choice quite clear. Keep Hamas in power and consign your lives to perpetual war. Reject Hamas and live in peace.
Stupid, selfish, inconsiderate leaders should be removed, preferably by their former followers. That is how Fatah become peaceful. If I was in Gaza, I would think I got a raw deal, considering how prosperous the West Bank is getting!
I think the Bush and most arab state has done well to be patience with Israel to finish the job since Hamas want it this way.Its a shame that they are using civilian as shield so the world can think otherwise.
The westhern media are complaining that Israel didn`t allow them into Gaza but Israel has learn lesson from the past when they will keep track of Israelis army,giving their enemy the advantage.This time around Hamas and it supporter will not have their way.
The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the – Web Reconnaissance for 01/05/2009 A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day…so check back often.
What is up with our country? Must we continually kow-tow to those muslims who have the money to come to this country and leave their own countries behind only to protest here after having done nothing to improve their standing in the world? It’s always easy to protest from America. When 9/11 happened, America went so far as to launch a war on Iraq when it has never been proven that they had WMD’s or had anything to do with 9/11. Were innocent civilians killed in this war? Most definitely, and yet when Israel launches a defense against a barrage of visible missile attacks, the muslims of the world cry foul! Why is Israel to blame for defending itself? Are we trying to say that lives lost in Israel are not as important as lives in Gaza? Why don’t the people of Gaza try, for once, to gain respect in the region and turn their existence into something positive? Gaza is like the schoolyard bully who, when the tables are turned, go whining to their mothers about how they’ve been wronged! Can they convince us that they know nothing about terrorist groups in their territory who espouse violence from their schoolyard play structure training bases? Hamas and other terrorist groups are responsible for their bleak lives, not Israel and certainly not the rest of the world. Must we continually be told that the ways of the terrorist are not the ways of muslim teachings – this argument does not work considering the terrorist seems to be in control and their followers simply allow these ways to continue! To listen to any authorities of the muslim world, you would think that all was peaceful in their “shangrilas†until Israel fired on them. Awwwww! Go cry to your mothers or, better yet, throw some shoes – that really helps!
At least CNN hasn’t printed Hamas leaders obituaries yet, like the Guardian. Yet.
This is what Nizar Rayan, the recently killed Hamas leader in Gaza, said in an interview BEFORE the beginning of the current conflict:
“The only reason to have a hudna (cease-fire) is to prepare yourself for the final battle. We don’t need 50 years to prepare ourselves for the final battle with Israel. There is no chance that true Islam would ever allow a Jewish state to survive in the Muslim Middle East. Israel is an impossibility. It is an offense against God. … You (Jews) are murderers of the prophets and you have closed your ears to the Messenger of Allah. Jews tried to kill the Prophet, peace be unto him. All throughout history, you have stood in opposition to the word of God.â€
How do you negotiate real peace with an adversary like Rayan? It’s not possible. We are talking about a faction of Islam that has, for all intents and purposes, gone insane.
Eventually, when this fight will be over,
Hamas will declare victory.
no matter that there will be hundreds of Gazans dead and thousands will be wounded. Their homes will be destroyed infrastructures demolished.
They will still declare victory.
The world cares more about civilian lives in Gaza than Hamas.
the more civilians will die the more wounded there will be on their side the bigger their victory will be.
Because winning the war has different meaning to Hamas than the rest of the world.
Pity the Palestinians for having such leaders.
Any civilized society strives to protect their civilians from harms way, except Hamas.
another headline that shows exactly the angle the media is working at is the one i saw earlier today at Yahoo:
Israel ignores world calls for truce against “terror”
“terror”, eh? what, do they not believe its really terror? or do they think its really noble resistance, and are mocking the idea that firing rockets at civilians is really terrorism?
I read all the Anti Israeli remarks and I wonder why Hamas gets a pass on the daily killing, or the daily venom that they spew out of their mouths.
There is plenty of people talking about civilians being killed, or the school that got shot at, but what about the cowardly Hamas, or terrorist that are hiding among those civilians or hiding in that school using it as a shield, or a launching pad for their killing.
Do you think that the United States Military, or Israel would hide among it’s citizens? No they would evacuate any zone that was going to be a battle ground.
Israel is fighting an ugly enemy, with ugly tactics, so some nasty things are going to happen. If you want to kill the enemy, or flush them out you have to go where they are, if they are hiding among citizens, and they get killed because of that then it is Hamas’s fault, not Israels.