IMovedOn.org

By Robert Light

About this time during any Israeli attempt to deal with the barbarians which surround her, with the punctual precision of the precession of the earth about the sun bringing spring flowers, world leaders trot out the old tired indictment that Israel is guilty of using “disproportionate force”.

At first, it seemed as if this time it was different. Israel has been hammered with rocket fire from it’s neighbors in Gaza – the very neighbors that were given entire towns, entire industries, entire farms in which to feed themselves – Israel’s neighbors in Gaza repaid their unconditional withdrawal with a reign of terror and over 5,000 rockets and mortars.

These rockets are not of the “precision-guided-type” that Israel uses – the Gazans use exclusively the “hope-the-rocket-lands-somewhere-where-there-might-be-Jews-to-hit-type”.

I must admit that when someone I know uses the phrase: “disproportionate use of force”, my first impulse is to say something to the effect: “That’s the stupidest comment I’ve ever heard”.

Lately, however, I’ve started to actually listen to those who complain that Israel is using “disproportionate force”. French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who holds the rotating presidency of the European Union, condemned Israel’s "disproportionate use of force”.  The U.N. Secretary General condemned the excessive use of force that might lead to civilian deaths. Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights "strongly condemned Israel’s disproportionate use of force”.

Obviously, these people are not stupid. Behind the words renouncing “disproportionate force” is an entire world view that allows the speaker to say those words and yet not feel that they are speaking nonsense.

Words are indeed important – they are windows through which you can see the world through the speaker’s eyes. When a person uses such words as “disproportionate force”, on the face of it we can assume that he means that, in their view, Israel should use a smaller stick in their reaction to the incessant rocket and mortar fire coming from Gaza. In their calculation, those rockets and mortars fired indiscriminately into residential neighborhoods should be met with a softer response by Israel.

There are many, many professional legal evaluations of Israel’s actions over the many years and while there were uncountable accusations of “Israeli war crimes”, while not for the lack of trying each and every attempt has one thing in common – they have all failed.

So where do people who use the words “disproportionate response” come from? What is their world view that allows them to use those words and yet not feel that they are saying something “stupid”?

To understand this, we need to look at a situation where most would use the words “disproportionate response” and it would make perfect sense. The case I would like to present is one where a parent is disciplining their child or a teacher is reprimanding their student.

In the case where a parent is disciplining a child, a minor misdeed should invoke a gentle rebuke – a major misdeed, a more firm rebuke. When a parent invokes a “disproportionate response” we usually call it by what it is: child abuse. If a teacher used “disproportionate response” in disciplining a child, we would demand that the school fire the teacher.

It is my assertion that when people trot out the “disproportionate response” indictment against Israel, they are speaking principally like a therapist counseling a couple on how to heal their damaged relationship. They look at the relationship between the Arabs and Israelis as a dysfunctional relationship that needs to be “healed” in some way.

My criticism on this regard is not only of people such as the UN Secretary General or the French President, there are enormous numbers of very influential people in the Israeli political and intellectual communities who view the situation the same way – too many Israeli intellectuals feel that Israel needs to repair its relationship with the Arabs.

The problem looking at this as a “relationship problem” is twofold – first, there are few, if any, people in Gaza who see this as a “relationship problem” and secondly, there are many, many people in Gaza who simply want to annihilate the Jews.

In this “new-age” world, it seems as if we have lost our sense of propriety – we project solutions which may be appropriate for dealing with a difficult child or a conflict between spouses and use them at the level of international relations.

It was not long ago that when a country lobbed missiles onto a neighboring country – it was either “a regrettable mistake” or it was considered an act of war – there was no “in between”. The response to the act of war was usually a declaration of war. In those days of civilized behavior, the party launching the missile had better be ready to go to war – because they knew that they were initiating a war.

In the perverted world view of those who view this dispute as a relationship-gone-sour, the first missile attack should be interpreted as an expression of displeasure. After a few more missiles, it is an expression of anger. When hundreds or thousands of missiles and mortars are fired, it is an expression of extreme anger.

The realist in Israel is finally faced with the cold hard fact that his only choice is to stop trying to change the minds of those who lob missiles at their civilian populations. The realist must admit that their only choice is to change the demographics of the Gazan population and eliminate those who wish to have a relationship at gunpoint. The realist in Israel has to wake up to the fact that “peace” is not the absence of war but that although "war is hell", it is the completely moral, last-to-be-used tool for achieving “peace”.

If there are any Israelis left in the new-age, we-need-to-fix-our-relationship-with-the-Arabs-camp, they will have to face the fact that if a ceasefire is instituted before the Gazan demographics are such that only an insignificant, ignorable few of the Palestinians in Gaza advocate lifting an armed finger towards Israel – then Israel will continue to live with a gun pointed at it’s children.

The Israeli Defense Forces have stated their aim as “…force Hamas to stop its hostile activities against Israel and Israelis from Gaza , and to bring about a significant change in the situation in southern Israel.”

Is a “significant change” a reduction from 80 missiles per day to 40 missiles per day? How about only 20 missiles per day launched at Israeli population centers? Is a reduction to only 5 missiles per day “significant”?  How about only 1 missile every so often?

The criteria for a ceasefire should be simple: there are no longer individuals alive in Gaza who are willing to take up arms against Israel and a government is instituted in Gaza which has as its mission, to eliminate any who might, in the future, take up arms.

This is the criteria that the Allies used to define the end of World War II and this must also be the criteria for ending the war in Gaza whose elected government, Hamas, has decided to wage war on Israel.

The criteria for a ceasefire must be simple: total, unconditional, surrender.