Israel Invades Gaza: What You Need to Know

WHAT'S GOING ON?

Hamas (which does not equal "the men, women and children of Gaza")... piss off Israelis with their evil terrorist tactics and they tell the people who are walled into the ghetto and getting the crap blown out of them by Israelis that it's the Zionists who are killing and starving their kids. When your kids all die while they are sitting in geography class because an Israel shell blew the flesh off their bones, that's a fairly plausible take on things. So Palestinians rally round Hamas. What conceivable reason have they to trust Israelis?

Mark Shea
Catholic and Enjoying It!, 6th January 2009

WHAT DOES ISRAEL REALLY WANT?

Does it really believe it can stop the rocket fire from Gaza when previous Israeli governments have tried and failed, using every military means?

[...]

Israel's politicians are pursuing a parallel campaign, too - an electoral one... The Israeli public has a generally low opinion about how their government has handled what they call "Hamastan" - Hamas-controlled Gaza. Until it started talking tough, the hawkish opposition leader, Binyamin Netanyahu, was leading in the polls. Now the gap has narrowed.

Katya Adler
BBC News, 27th December 2008

WHAT WILL HAPPEN?

What we’re talking about here, what the IDF has in mind, is more what the Romans called “decimation”: killing enough of the right people to make Hamas weak for five or ten years, which may, just may, be long enough to give Israel’s allies the PLO/Fatah the edge in the Palestinian Civil War. That’s what this is about, getting your guys to win that war.

Will it work? Depends on the time frame. For a few years, yes; in the long run, Hell no. But if you’re the IDF, there are no good options in the long term. Demographics, dude; no way out of that spiral. The short term is all you’ve got, and in the short term Hamas is going to find out why it’s not a good idea to pretend you’re Hezbollah when you can’t back it up.

The War Nerd
Hamas Ain't No Hezbollah, 6th January 2006

WHAT ABOUT AMERICA?

Americans shouldn't be in the position of endlessly debating Israel's security situation and its endless religious and territorial conflicts with its neighbors. That should be for Israeli citizens to do, not for Americans.

Glenn Greenwald
George Washington's warnings and U.S. policy towards Israel

I TAKE IT YOU DON'T SUPPORT THE GAZA OFFENSIVE?

The Israelis don't want to exterminate the Palestinians; they just want to occupy the land they stole from them, fair and square, by killing 2550 Palestinians for the 17 Israelis killed in the past eight years.

It's eye-opening to see what a Qassam Rocket really looks like. (Not that I'd want one aimed at me, but let's have some proportionality for G-d's sake.) I was imagining V-2s, not what I used to make as a kid when model rocketry was my hobby.

Joshua Snyder
The Western Confucian, 6th January 2006

Qassam Rocket

US-Made Weaponry

WHEN WILL IT END?

The Israelis in Gaza, like the American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, are foolishly breeding the next generation of militants and Islamic radicals. Jihadists, enraged by the injustices done by Israel and the United States, seek to carry out reciprocal acts of savagery, even at the cost of their own lives. The violence unleashed on Palestinian children will, one day, be the violence unleashed on Israeli children.

This is the tragedy of Gaza. This is the tragedy of Israel.

Chris Hedges
Party to Murder, 30th December 2008