XDA

Law Professor and LA Times columnist, Rosa Brooks, comes through again with the quintessential, a-historic, lefty take on Israel's recent self defense. Let's review the concept of morally and legally justified war first, starting with Iraq. Saddam Hussein's forces crossed a well established (since 1845) border with neighbor Kuwait nearly 20 years ago. We spearheaded a coalition with UN approval to kick his invading forces out of Kuwait. And we did, rather easily. The war Saddam started, however, did not end in a treaty, but in a cease fire (like the Korean War) with several requirements of Iraq's government. Iraq did not keep up many of these requirements, none over the long haul. Thus, any resumption of fighting against Iraq and the government of Saddam Hussein was both perfectly legal and morally justified. We didn't need any one's permission. The original causus belli survived through the cease fire promises broken. Our president asked for and received an authorization from Congress to use military force against Saddam (it had been established in 1998, under the previous administration, that regime change in Iraq was the official policy of the United States) which Congressional authorization satisfied the requirement in the Constitution that Congress declare war. We don't actually declare war any longer--haven't since 1941. So defense of another, in this example a sovereign nation invaded by a foreign power with no justification, is legal and moral justification for war, and it allows other nations to wage full, even total, war against the invader. It is even more justifiable to wage war against another nation who has attacked you without justification, that is, in self defense, say like when its citizens lob thousands and thousands of rockets and mortar shells over the border into the other nation. OK, background established.

What I call the lefty position on Israel is the idea that Israel cannot morally defend itself. That's it. I call it the lefty position because of all the lefties out there calling the Israeli Defense Force's actions reprehensible and wrong. That is opposed to the right wingers calling the same actions perfectly justified, and there are lots and lots of these opinions out there, even some from lefties. As final support, there is polling from Rasmussen. Nearly two thirds of right wingers support Israel's actions, while less than one third of lefties do. Indeed, only about half of Democrats polled consider Israel an ally. Could any difference between right and left be so clear?

So, what did Professor Brooks say? This:

In a strictly military sense, Israel will "win" this battle against Hamas. For all its threats and bravado, Hamas is weak, and its weapons -- terrorism, homemade rockets -- are the weapons of the weak. Since 2001, Hamas has fired thousands of unguided Kassam rockets at Israel, but the rockets have killed only a handful of Israelis.

Israel's military, in contrast, is one of the most modern and effective in the world (thanks in part to an annual $3 billion in U.S. aid). Israel can easily bottle up the tiny Gaza Strip and its 1.5 million people. On Saturday, the first day of the offensive, Israeli bombs killed at least 180 Palestinians. By Wednesday, the Palestinian death toll exceeded 390.

You see what's being set up there? There's no discussion of Hamas' war crimes (targeting civilians), it barely gets mentioned in passing. It is the difference in ability of the two political entities, the competent and civilized Israelis versus the blundering, criminal Hamas, which is the focus of the article. You could almost think that it wasn't fair for Israel to fight back and kill so many of Hamas illegal combatants (which the overwhelming bulk of the 390 are--Ms. Brooks fails to mention that somewhat important fact). To her credit, she did not actually misapply the proportionality argument, as so many of her ilk do. No, she skips over that to the "it's just so pointless" argument. Behold:

But if there is no reason to doubt Israel's ability to pulverize Gaza, there's also no reason to think this offensive will improve Israeli security. Destruction of Hamas' infrastructure may temporarily slow Hamas rocket attacks, but sooner or later they'll resume.

The Israeli assault may even strengthen Hamas in the longer run and weaken its more moderate secular rival, Fatah. As Israel should know by now (as we all should know), dropping bombs in densely populated areas is a surefire way to radicalize civilians and get them to rally around the home team, however flawed.

Oh, I get the picture. Not only is the bombing of Hamas fighters and rocket caches merely temporary but it is counterproductive as well, by rallying the Palestinians around the "destroy Israel" flag. Unremarked on is the reason the bombs are falling on densely populated areas. Hamas is committing another war crime in stationing its combatants and war materiel among civilians. The leaders of Hamas counted on Israel acting like the good nation it is and avoiding civilian casualties by not attacking at all. It worked for a long time. No longer. Although Charles Krauthammer lets us know the IDF soldiers still call up to warn the Arabs that bombs are coming to the apartment in which they dwell. Are the Israelis mensch or what? Yet of course Israel gets the bad press for killing a few unavoidably, which bad press should go to Hamas for its criminal act of putting its forces and rockets, etc, in the heart of a dense civilian population. (And Hamas seems to have avoided most of the bad press it deserved for the thousands of rockets it has sent to kill Israeli civilians. I guess we expect them to be criminal, evil. They certainly are).

But here is the sine qua non of the lefty view here:

There's just no clear route from bombardment to a sustainable peace.

Huh? While it is true that the bombardment of Germany and Japan 65 years ago did not 'break' the fighting spirit of the civilians and cause a collapse of their will to fight on, it did have a serious effect on their ability to fight. Indeed, in both theaters of the war the fighting ended about the time we ran out of targets to bomb. The destruction, from the air, of the means with which to produce and move about war materiel was essential to our rather swift victories in WWII. If history is any guide, you can achieve victory and a very sustainable peace through bombardment, and in Japan's case, through bombardment alone. Look at the former Yugoslavia, bombed into submission (of a kind) when President Clinton, without any UN or Congressional authorization, attempted to stop genocide from 20,000 feet.

Ms. Brooks and the other Hamas apologists, don't appear to know this central military fact of history, which ignorance makes their opinions rather worthless.

Labels: Arab Israeli Conflict; Gaza front