The Israeli left-wing newspaper Haaretz, caused a stir and a lot of anger when it published on its front page, pictures of 67 children who were killed during the Israeli bombardments of the Gaza strip in the latest round of hostilities that ended a week ago. A valid point that was raised by critics of the newspaper was the absence of a picture of five-year old Ido Avigal, a toddler from Sderot, who was killed by shrapnel from one of the many rockets fired at the South of Israel by Hamas. His mother didn’t cry less than the 67 mothers in Gaza. And he deserved to live just like the 67 children who were more or less his neighbors. Another child that was killed in Israel, Nadine Awad, was hardly mentioned at all, but then she was not Jewish………..
In Israel it is being argued that Israel is only trying to defend itself and its people. More than four thousand rockets were fired at Israel, causing fear and havoc from the South to Tel Aviv and beyond. But Israel is a modern country that believes the protection of their citizens is a major priority and thus, with the help of its technological prowess, Iron Dome was developed, a mobile air-defense system that proved itself to be effective beyond expectations and brought down 90% of the rockets fired at Israel. Nevertheless, damage was caused and thirteen people were killed.
The destruction and death toll in Gaza shows a completely different picture. 219 people have been killed in the Israeli bombardments (even though in Israel the number mentioned is “only” 122 because the rest were terrorists!!), and enormous damage to buildings, roads and infrastructure has been proudly reported by the IDF. But Gaza children do not have the protection of an Iron Dome. They do not have bomb shelters, and most of all, they were not bombarded by rather primitive rockets, but by the most sophisticated American weaponry money can buy, and in quantities way more destructive that the rockets fired at Israel. The Israeli air force claims that they in many cases gave warnings to the inhabitants of houses, especially high rises and it was stressed again and again that the Israeli army is “the most Humane” army in the world (is there such a thing, a “Humane” Army?) and every effort was made to prevent civilian casualties. “Every effort was made”. Still, 67 children died.
Israel needs to defend itself. There is no argument there. And rockets on Israeli population centers cannot be tolerated under no circumstances. Even the incessant wail of the air alarm siren is traumatic. (the Gulf war is thirty years ago, but I remember the sirens in Ramat Gan like it was yesterday). But with respect to the Gaza strip, Israeli is way beyond defending itself. The hostilities with Hamas have long become a political tool in the hands of Israeli right-wing politicians, in particular Netanyahu. On one hand Hamas is condemned and vilified for the despicable terrorist organization that it is, but on the other hand Hamas is considered a convenient “No Partner for Negotiation”, who can be played out against the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah, allowing Israel the “luxury” of not negotiating at all. Not negotiating is the cornerstone of Israeli policy with regard to the Palestinians, knowing full well that the moment serious negotiations will take place, neither the Palestinians, nor the negotiators, being the U.S. or Egypt, or even the Emirates, will agree to anything less than a Palestinian State. And a Palestinian State is the worst nightmare of right-wing Israel today (and has been since 1967). For more than fifty years, the consequences of the occupation for a democratic Israel have been ignored and denied but they haven’t changed. Israel will be a racist state, an Apartheid state (nowadays it is called anti-Semitic to use the word “apartheid”, but then, anything the slightest against Israel today is called anti-Semitic), and the suppression of the Arab population will become more and more difficult and will require more and more violence. It doesn’t seem to deter Netanyahu or his racist allies.
Thus, the suffering of the Israeli population in the south has apparently been a reasonable price to pay for the success of the “No Partner for Negotiation” politics and I am afraid the tragic death of Uri is not going to change that, let alone the deaths of 67 Gazan children. While many voices in Israel, including from the South, have been calling for “annihilation” of Hamas and (renewed) occupation of the Gaza strip, everybody is aware that the cost in human lives (Israeli lives!) of such an undertaking would be immeasurably worse than the rocket attacks, and would be a major and protracted war which the world might not tolerate. And so, Netanyahu’s policy seems “the lesser evil”, even if it was never declared a policy as such.
The stunt with the 67 pictures of the Gazan children that Haaretz pulled, was presumably an attempt to show the Israeli population of the cost and of the futility of these repeated Gaza “operations”, but I doubt that the message was received. Not by Netanyahu and not by the population in the south, who surprisingly, keep voting for Netanyahu in large numbers.
So all that is left is the guessing game of when will be the next round, and how many rockets will fall on Tel Aviv then. Will we ever learn???
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