Stop children, what's that sound?

It is hard not to be deeply conflicted regarding the goings on in Gaza. Hamas, which has always called for the total liberation of Palestine and the right of armed resistance, launches hundreds of missiles at Israel. Israel decides it has had enough and not only assassinates their military leadership, but also initiates strikes that kill large numbers of civilians. They threaten a ground war to finish the job.

Now Hamas is daring Israel to launch an invasion.

Both sides deserve ample blame. Hamas is behaving like a child that kills their parents and then cries about being an orphan. They want the right to resist but not to pay the eventual bill.

Israel, or at least some Israelis, have ceased to see the jailed as human beings. Like old testament warriors of yore, they want to smite the infidel. Perhaps some feel that they have a biblical mandate, I don't know, not being a particularly religious person.

Ariel Sharon's son Gilad wants to flatten Gaza.

We need to flatten entire neighborhoods in Gaza. Flatten all of Gaza. The Americans didn’t stop with Hiroshima – the Japanese weren’t surrendering fast enough, so they hit Nagasaki, too.
There should be no electricity in Gaza, no gasoline or moving vehicles, nothing. Then they’d really call for a ceasefire.
Were this to happen, the images from Gaza might be unpleasant – but victory would be swift, and the lives of our soldiers and civilians spared.
If the government isn’t prepared to go all the way on this, it will mean reoccupying the entire Gaza Strip. Not a few neighborhoods in the suburbs, as with Cast Lead, but the entire Strip, like in Defensive Shield, so that rockets can no longer be fired.
There is no middle path here – either the Gazans and their infrastructure are made to pay the price, or we reoccupy the entire Gaza Strip. Otherwise there will be no decisive victory. And we’re running out of time – we must achieve victory quickly. The Netanyahu government is on a short international leash. Soon the pressure will start – and a million civilians can’t live under fire for long. This needs to end quickly – with a bang, not a whimper.

I think that this type of thinking is very shortsighted. While the Palestinians can be rightly blamed for snatching defeat away from victory many times, the longer Likud chips away at a deserved contiguous national homeland for the Palestinians the longer both parties existence will teeter on such a precarious cliff.

The Palestinians will get nothing from provoking Israel with constant missile barrages and the Israelis are deluding themselves if they think that the status quo, jailer relationship in the occupied territories is in any way sustainable. I hope that we will see fresh thinking from both sides before the whole region turns into a denuded wasteland. Everybody will soon have the nasty weapons. Make a deal.


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Washington Post writer David Ignatius was on the radio today discussing Israel. Yesterday on Face the Nation yesterday he talked about his surmise that the Gaza incursion is a way for Israel to test the Iron Dome missile system prior to a strike on the real target, Iran. Whole thing has been well calculated in his opinion. Very interesting. Expose and pull the fangs of the snake to the south before you take on the more dangerous adder to the northeast.

*Stratfor Global Intelligence Israeli analysis.