Israel, Hamas and the Moral Low Ground

By Cernig

Glenn Greenwald begins his post today:

Opinions about the Israeli-Palestinian dispute are so entrenched that any single outbreak of violence is automatically evaluated through a pre-existing lens, shaped by one's typically immovable beliefs about which side bears most of the blame for the conflict generally or "who started it." 

It's so true that at least one A-list blogger I know tries not to write about Israel and its neighbourhood feuds because those with immovable beliefs will quickly swarm any such post's comments and he just can't be bothered with the spam and grief any more. Exactly the same attitude is apparent in spades today. Just look at Memeorandum - immovable beliefs galore. So I don't expect any of what I'm about to write to make any difference but:

Indiscriminate unguided rocket attacks on civilians and indiscriminate but deliberately targeted airstrikes on civilian infrastructure are both wrong. Collective punishment is collective punishment and is morally wrong no matter the relative intensity by which both sides pursue it or what has gone before in the way of provocation. Wrong (Strength 2) + Wrong (Strength 5) cannot ever = Right (Strength 7). All you can say is that one is less wrong but still ultimately morally reprehensible. You then (if you have any intellectual or moral integrity) have to open yourself to debate about how you weigh the relative wrongness of actions without retreating to strawman charges of anti-semitism or anti-arabism.

You'd think those who regularly decry relative descriptions of morality and demand that there are absolute moral truths would get that, but apparently not when they wish to mount a partisan defense of one side's morality

Update. Ezra Klein gets it, as does Zvi Barel writing for Haaretz.

Six months ago Israel asked and received a cease-fire from Hamas. It unilaterally violated it when it blew up a tunnel, while still asking Egypt to get the Islamic group to hold its fire. Are conditions enabling the return of a ceasefire no longer available? Hamas has clear conditions for its extension: The opening of the border crossings for goods and cessation of IDF attacks in Gaza, as outlined in the original agreement. Later, Hamas wants the cease-fire to be extended to the West Bank. Israel, for its part, is justifiably demanding a real calm in Gaza; that no Qassam or mortar shell be fired by either Hamas, Islamic Jihad or any other group.

Essentially, Israel is telling Hamas it is willing to recognize its control of Gaza on the condition that it assumes responsibility for the security of the territory, like Hezbollah controls southern Lebanon. It is likely that this will be the outcome of a wide-scale operation in the Gaza Strip if Israel decides it does not want to rule Gaza directly. Why, then, not forgo the war and agree to these conditions now?

And just for icing on the cake, Israel was planning this assault six months ago - even as it was negotiating the cease-fire it broke. That puts the lie to the tale that Israeli actions are simply retaliating for a later upswing in rocket attacks. "Proportionate response"? The Israeli action isn't in any sense proportionate to what are still entirely wrong Hamas attacks which nonetheless killed no-one - or, indeed, a "response" in any meaningful sense of the word.

Comments

[Peter G.]

I like to think that I am reasonably intellectually honest and open to persuasion yet I must reject the idea that parity in deaths inflicted somehow equates to moral parity. I think you have to judge intentions as well. Hamas would, if it were within their power, eradicate every Jew in the Middle East. While Israel enjoys some truly radical parties and individuals none are ever likely to form a government with a similar intention towards the Palestinian people.This does not give any Israeli government any license to unrestricted ferocity but a balance of death is not the one to use in measuring morality. I beg you to notice that I distinguish Hamas from the Palestinian people whose real interests they in no way serve.

[Steve Hynd]

Hi Peter G. You answer yourself with regard to intention's place in the logical equation. If you "distinguish Hamas from the Palestinian people whose real interests they in no way serve" and distinguish any Israeli "radical parties and individuals" who would do the same to all Palestinians from the Israeli whose real interests they in no way serve, then you've no recourse I see except to say "collective punishment is collective punishment". My assertion stands. For it to do otherwise you'd have to show that the vast majority of one populace intended the other's destruction. That doesn't fit the moral/logical fibs we humans like to tell ourselves, but that doesn't change it any.

Regards, C

[Charles]

I am with you, Cernig: discussing the conflicts of the Middle East and especially the Israel-Palestinian conflict is pure tsuris. Ironically, many-- perhaps most-- American Jews are sympathetic to Palestinian suffering and would like the state of Israel to stop using military force in densely populated areas.

It's really very hard getting excited about rockets that have killed a grand total of 20 Israelis in 8 years. Israelis are at more risk from snakebite or lightning storms. It is much easier to get excited about the health effects of a protracted lack of wholesome food and medical care on many tens of thousands of young children and elderly persons. Israel's policies long ago crossed the line of what is permissible to an occupying power. But one can say and say and say and say, and the people who need to hear are as deaf as stones.

[Peter G.]

Collective punishment is indeed collective punishment. I don't believe one could say the response Israel has made is proportionate if body counts are used to keep score but maintain that there is a qualitative difference between sending a suicide bomber into a crowded market place or an unguided rocket into a city as opposed to attacking a Hamas headquarters which is conveniently sited in a population center. Many people who suggest that rockets are no big deal are not on the receiving end nor are their children. I very much suspect that if they were they'd be the first howling for blood. As it happens I think the Israeli government is very foolishly playing into the hands of Hamas by stepping out as expansively as they have but I do not see this as principally a moral question. To my mind a more interesting question is how far one may go in protecting ones own polity at the expense of another . Building walls and limiting access may have secured Israel in large measure against suicide bombers and infiltration attacks but the disastrous consequences for the Gazans has fueled the hatred that is Hamas's best recruiting tool. Finally I must disagree with you about a key difference between Hamas and the Israeli government. Whatever extremists exist within Israel that would view a Palestinian genocide as a desirable end they have not a snowflakes chance in hell of forming a government unless Hamas and Hezbollah become a whole lot more efficient at killing Israelis then they currently are. Hamas was elected on a platform of genocide. There is a difference. I greatly fear what would happen to both sides of this conflict if some of the stupider ideas I have seen were put into effect. If you followed the argument at C&L on this topic you probably saw a lot of people floating the idea of arming Hamas with everything from tanks to nukes to give them negotiating parity. I have no solutions to offer but I do know a really stupid idea when I see one. If anyone has any idea how moderates on either side of this conflict can be brought into a leadership position without committing political suicide (on the Israeli side) or actual suicide (on the Palestinian side) I'd be keen to hear it.

[Peter G.]

A question for Charles. If as you say most American Jews (in fact most people) would like to see Israel desist in attacks in urban population centers perhaps you could suggest how this may be done when Hamas operational headquarters and their rocket launch sites are located only in such places. Of course one could go in with a ground offensive. A little house to house fighting as it were. I'm pretty sure the last time they tried that the consequences were worse.

[Peter G.]

Hi again Cernig

What the hell, as long as we're doing updates. I notice yours includes an assertion that Israel unilaterally violated the ceasefire when it attacked a tunnel Hamas was building into Israel to repeat the 2006 attack. I think building a tunnel into Israel would actually count as an attack. Flip a coin on this one. I find the other part of your update a little illogical. The Israelis military and security services actually engage in intelligence gathering so as to identify Hamas targets should it become necessary and this is somehow morally reprehensible? You're not suggesting that it would have been a more morally sound position to just randomly fire at whatever and hope you hit the right target? Surely you must know that every military organization makes contingency plans. They would have been guilty of dereliction of duty if they hadn't been gathering such intelligence.

Respectfully Yours Peter

PS Sorry if I'm being a pest but frankly I enjoy debating with someone who can articulate a position. If you've got the time and would prefer to exchange views off the board I'll gladly supply an e-mail address.

[Charles]

Peter, this is what is being written in Israel:

Once again, Israel's violent responses, even if there is justification for them, exceed all proportion and cross every red line of humaneness, morality, international law and wisdom.

What began yesterday in Gaza is a war crime and the foolishness of a country. History's bitter irony: A government that went to a futile war two months after its establishment - today nearly everyone acknowledges as much - embarks on another doomed war two months before the end of its term....

Israel did not exhaust the diplomatic processes before embarking yesterday on another dreadful campaign of killing and ruin. The Qassams that rained down on the communities near Gaza turned intolerable, even though they did not sow death. But the response to them needs to be fundamentally different: diplomatic efforts to restore the cease-fire - the same one that was initially breached, one should remember, by Israel when it unnecessarily bombed a tunnel - and then, if those efforts fail, a measured, gradual military response.

There is absolutely no justification for what Israel is doing. Israelis know it-- and are saying so.

[Guy Nesher]

I don't think anyone can argue that bombing civilians is good or right. The thing is that talks with Hamas are not progressing simply because Hamas refuse to acknowledge the right of Israel to exist.
While the talks are stuck Hamas continues to fire rockets at Israeli civilians (3000 +- rockets in 2008) and in this situation, I would rather be the aggrassor than the count my dead.

[Steve Hynd]

Peter G, I love debating with you and have no problem doing it here.

The Hammas tunnel: I can think of several better ways to have approached that. Once such a tunnel is no longer secret, it's useless. My fave would have been inviting the world's media to come see then parking an armored brigade on the terminus while inviting Hammas to destroy it themselves.

"Surely you must know that every military organization makes contingency plans. They would have been guilty of dereliction of duty if they hadn't been gathering such intelligence." There's a difference between intel gathering and actively planning how to break a deal while still engaged in negotiating it. The way you phrase your comment shows you're aware of that. And indeed the Haaretz article makes it very clear that the Israeli defense minister, for one, was not a good-faith actor and treated the ceasefire as simply a breathing space to prepare these fresh attacks.

Regards, C

[Charles]

Peter G. asks "If as you say most American Jews (in fact most people) would like to see Israel desist in attacks in urban population centers perhaps you could suggest how this may be done..."

Israel creates an intractable situation, a disaster that, like the invasion of Lebanon-- undermines its own security and isolates it from world opinion, and then I'm supposed to solve it? There's a simple solution: "Stop doing wrong; learn to do right." If Israel turned the situation around and imagined what it would do if faced with an immeasurably more powerful neighbor, trapped in a ghetto, with no work and inadequate medicine and food... then maybe it could imagine what that stronger neighbor should do to help prevent young men from becoming hopeless, desperate and violent.

[Peter G.]

Hi Cernig There is a difference between planning to break a truce and planning for the end of a truce. Your idea for exposing the tunnel to journalists and television cameras has a certain merit but one would have to be certain the thing was not a trap or not loaded with explosives before approaching it. The only safe relatively safe way to do that is while it's under construction. I sure wouldn't want to be the first person to walk into a Hamas tunnel. Can you think of a single reason Hamas would have been building that tunnel that had good intentions? As an aside to Charles: Where I fundamentally disagree with you is in suggesting that this intractable situation is the creation solely of Israel whereas it is ,in fact, the work of the more extreme elements on both sides of the conflict. I can readily imagine how terrible the deteriorating conditions in Gaza might be but regardless of what Israel did to alleviate those problems there'd still be extremists ready to use access to do suicide bombings or other operations. If you haven't any solutions to offer about how to deal with the situation then how do you justify blaming only one party to a conflict.

[Peter G.]

Hey We've got a thread going here. Cool. This place doesn't get nearly the traffic or commentary it deserves.

[Steve Hynd]

Peter has a point. Imagine for a moment one side got all it wanted - magically and overnight. Would its extremists be happy even then? Somehow I doubt it. Hamas extremists would still wish to eliminate all Jews as well as the now magically-disappeared Israel and would soon be picking fights with their other, non-Jewish, neighbours. Jewish extremists would still wish to expand their nation's borders beyond the new Greater Israel, pick fights with its new neighbours and treat all non-Jews as second class citizens.

That being said, while many assume that because Israel is a democracy it should be more able to restrain its own nutters, I don't think Israel has any better chance of reining in its extremists than Palestine does. Both sets have been using fear of "The Other" to bolster their power for too long now and they're utterly entrenched. But Charles is still correct, at least one side doing so is the quickest way out of the quagmire.

Regards, C

[Charles]

Cernig, how many extremists were there among the three and four year old children in the morgue in Gaza City?

This question is not posed to stir emotion. Whenever there is a wrong, the remedy for it must not be far worse than the original wrong. How many extremists are the fathers of children who died from lack of food, or are the sons of parents who died from lack of medicine, or are the brothers and uncles of women who died under the bombs? When a greater wrong is used to redress another wrong, violence is only amplified.

I agree that Hamas extremists are probably not going to settle for anything less than the destruction of Israel (and vice-versa with the Eretz Israel types). But in the US, there are white supremacists who would not settle for anything less than the destruction of all non-Caucasians. They are marginalized because most of us are interested in maintaining an orderly society. Extremists can only act when the society that maintains order collapses.

Therefore, the long-term goal of any effective counterinsurgency has to be to re-establish the conditions in which people desire to go about their ordinary lives. As you know, counterinsurgency doctrine therefore advises using indigenous forces to maintain order where opinion is against the insurgency, to use outside forces only in areas where it is necessary to contest the insurgency, and to put no forces whatsoever in the strongholds of the insurgency. If the insurgency has no legitimacy, it will collapse without any intervention. And if it has legitimacy, then attacking it is fundamentally unjust.

As for this tunnel, to call it, as Peter has, the equivalent of an attack on Israel is a perfect example of the mad logic that drives the attack on Gaza. A tunnel is a tunnel. It might have been used to smuggle food and medicine into Gaza, or drugs to eager Israeli buyers, or weapons to Hamas fighters, or all of the above or none of the above. But a tunnel is simply a tunnel.

[Peter G.]

As were the tunnels of Cu Chi. Just tunnels. I understand the Hamas FTD florists were having a helluva time getting their floral arrays across the border. It couldn't possibly have been intended as a replay of the 2006 adventure could it? No way. Of course your argument on tunnel use would apply to the smuggling tunnels on the Egyptian border. Hitting those tunnels as well as the university were very bad ideas and I can see no justification for it. That was a foolish move on Israels part. Lamentably the doctrine of Mutually Assured Stupidity is likely to remain in place for some little time.

[Charles]

Aw, c'mon, Peter. You concede that tunnels not far from the ones on the Israeli border were being used by smugglers. Do you really know what the tunnel Israel claimed was going to be used for abduction actually was for? According to Morgan Strong:

But other things happened that created great alarm to the Israelis. For one, Gaza became the hub of a stolen-car industry. High-priced automobiles were stolen in Israel and sold, or chopped up for parts, in Gaza.

And there was more. Drugs were being smuggled in from Egypt and elsewhere in the Middle East through tunnel’s dug from Gaza to the Sinai.

Israel had, and has, a drug problem among its population though we do not hear much about that in the United States. The Palestine Authority thugs frequently exchanged drugs in return for weapons with the Israeli soldiers who guarded them.

[lucklucky]

The reason that there is a disproportionate number o victims is the disproportinate behavior of Hamas(& Fatah) towards their civilians vs Israel and their civilians.

So i ask to include in Israeli victims tally, those that were saved by timely warnings of the system that Israeli put in place, those hit and saved by an efficent communication systems and that could reach in time to be saved by medical system and the great medical first teams that arrive to the scene.

I ask also to take out from Palestinians victims claims, those that were because Hamas fired or operated from near their homes, used house homes as weapons depots and
because made combat non-uniformed and the civilians deaths that occured because of that.

After this we can talk about proportionality.

"still entirely wrong Hamas attacks which nonetheless killed no-one"

You are a liar which you don't appear to be or you are completely misinformed about what happened in last 3 years and i am surprised that you feel entitled to give your opinion without enough knowledge. When you'll recheck your information about the 6300 rockets plus mortar rounds that were sent against Israel you certainly see deaths, lots of destruction and casualities.