A cut an paste from the column: | the loss of civilian lives in Gaza and in Israel a "source of deep concern for me." | See, "in Gaza and in Israel". Obama is concerned about civilians, names both parties but from that clear expression two leaps are made?

From that, the conclusion is he'll oppose "any harming of Palestinian civilians" and further,  "This means Israel will find it difficult to close the crossings...".

No wonder Obama has kept his distance when a clear and precise concern is distorted ("mostly speculation"?) but also good enough to be a "credible analysis".

Sounds fair to  me.  I wonder if Obama is trying to change the rusted out verbal kabuki dance between the two of us.  I'm all for respecting protocol, common language is a must.  But I wonder if "deep concern" will take on different meanings in his administration.  Has January ever gone so slow?

Well, I hope so. Escalating to a ground invasion was a bad decision by Israel, and I would hope Obama would have pushed them not to do it. The initial round of air strikes caused few civilian casualties for the number of military targets they hit. Of course the fighters are going to burrow themselves deeper into the civilian population as the bombing goes on, so Israel can only cause more and more civilian casualties as this goes on. It should have stopped before this point, claimed that it achieved its goals, and waited for Hamas to put its head back up again before any more strikes.

Does this mean Obama will be more "sensitive" to Israeli civilian casualties as well? I'd like to see if he's more willing to put pressure on Hamas to stop the daily rocket attacks on Sderot and Ashkelon.

ssolomon,

Obama has already condemned, specifically, Hamas's rockets.

It's nice to see that someone cares about the Palestinians. Hamas sure doesn't, and Israel doesn't.

Good thing US aid to Israel is only 1.5% GDP. It looks like the only path to security for Israel is a dirty war, and their going to have to do it with or without international aid. As for the United Nations, when has it ever stopped anyone from doing anything?

Given that the same senior Ha'aretz writer is pushing a rather defeatist agenda in his recent article "the point of euphoria"-- dwelling on the casualties at the UNRWA school while completely glossing over the human cost of Bush I's Desert Storm (remember those 100,000+ dead in the failed Shiite uprising?)-- isn't it possibly that he's interpreting this a little too much?

Given bi-partisan support for Israel, I for one expect continuity, more or less.  Could be wrong though.

Clearly Obama has expressed condemnation for rocket attacks against Israel and he has also expressed sympathy for the plight of the Palestinians on many occasions. None of this is new. The question is what steps Obama will take to apply direct pressure on either parties to cease and desist and how "fair and balanced" his response will be.

It was like clockwork this morning when all of the Israeli doves came out condemning the ground attacks after supporting the air assault on Gaza. It didn't take long for claims of "disproportionate force" were being thrown about. The Israeli left recognizes the need for forceful action - just not too forceful.

My question is whether or not Obama will fall into that predictable pattern of supporting military action until the tide of public opinion turns against  Israel, as it has done both in the Israeli peace camp and in Europe (no surprise there, either), or if he'll have the fortitude to stand by the IDF's actions, despite climbing casualties.

I don't know what he'll do. He has been very good about laying responsibility for Palestinian strife squarely at the feet of Palestinian leadership. but Israel doesn't seem to be in the mood to back down this time around. Will Obama be able to withstand the pressure to stop voicing his support of Israel's actions?

This is his first big test, and all of the supporters of Israel who ignored the panicked warnings from the hawkish wing of the Jewish communities are all holding their breath right now to see if he passes and  proves them right.

Meanwhile the hawks are waiting for their first opportunity to say "I told you so - he's another Jimmy Carter."

Solomon,

A leader is not, by default, fortuitous by merely standing by the IDF's actions, especially "despite climbing casualties."  Israel has a moral obligation to minimize, to the greatest extent possible, civilian casualties while protecting their own people.  Any military action in which such civilian casualties occur at a rate inconsistent with this idea is something which must not be tolerated.

This is NOT Obama's big test -- whether he will stand by the IDF despite the public response.  Suggesting so, in my opinion, hints at a severely cynical view of the public, the likes of which are primarily relegated to the current US administration.

Not that public opinion should be the sole rationale for Obama's (post-inaugural) position.  But Obama's true test is whether he will equate one Palistinian life with one Israeli life, and then support the most effective IDF policies and decry those that are less than the best.  Hamas is basically a lost cause, but civilians are civilians, and we have to rely on Israel to not only show a higher regard for life than that of Hamas, but the very highest regard for life on both sides.

For my part, I'm just glad that this shows that Rahm Emanuel will not be the driving force in US foreign policy.

One style of mediation is to accept the reasonable positions of both sides and work within that framework in cobbling a resolution.  For example, a goal of avoiding civilian casualties is consistent with that, while a goal of destroying Israel is not.   If the political objective is to punish the wrongdoer by identifying which party is wrong, that won't solve antyhing.  I see a statement decrying civilian casualties in the former context.

In De Palma's "Untouchables," the beat cop instructs the young Eliot Ness: "He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send two of his -- to the morgue. That's the Chicago way."

The Chicago way was learned from the Middle Eastern way.

Obama, as a Chicago politician, should have no problem understanding the Gaza situation.

I find that strike of that UN school troubling and I can see why Obama would be concerned. Isarel claimed that Hamas was using it as a place to store weapons and I thought to myself in the words of Cheney So? How is that justification for firing on that school after you have been given the GPS location. You basically targeted Civilians there is no justification for that. I was on Isarel's side but that after that attack they are losing me. They were given that exact location knew they were civilians and children seeking shelter there and they BOMBED it. Thats SICK.

Carol

To harriscr13:  No, that's not sick.  If indeed the school was being used for military purposes, the presence of the civilians doesn't immunize the warriors -- the presence of the warriors makes the location a fair target notwithstanding the presence of civilians.  That's not targeting civilians; it's targeting fighters, even while recognizing that the civilians may be harmed collaterally.  

tarfon - there is not one reason that someone could not have called that school first.  I know of organizations that would have coordinated with the Israel military, no questions asked and could have done it easily and with great accountability. Strategically, that target had little meaning the way it was handled.  Nothing but nihilism.

It was sick, and Israel has lost me (a fierce advocate) too.  

The UN vehicle debaucle too makes them look either careless or mindless.  

This also does nothing to intimidate Iran.

I know this is an impossible situation, and I admire Israel for standing up for itself,  but I've been watching live shots of dead children from that region for my entire 44 years now and I am done.  

It all just starts to look like childish, entitled old men with their pride and fantaticism bumping chests with the outcome being dead children.

Its fucking hopeless and I'm sick to death of it.

These YouTube videos speak for themselves:

The Beauty Of Hamas And The Ugliness Of Israel, Part 1

www.youtube.com/watch

The Beauty Of Hamas And The Ugliness Of Israel, Part 2

www.youtube.com/watch

Hadn't heard that the school was said to be a weapon store. I'd heard that there were Hamas gunmen actually firing mortars from the midst of the civilians there. In that case, there's not much opportunity to phone the school and urge them to evacuate the civilians.

The UNRWA man on the spot denies there were militants actually in the school, but hints that they were adjacent. Counter-battery fire isn't like a laser beam, and explosions do damage widely.

In any case, many Gazans have kvetched that the well-known IDF phone calls and leaflets don't do them any good.

Here's an interesting link

www.nytimes.com/.../09fighter.html

One thing to remember is that IDF soldiers generally have consciences. Most are reservists. Most would be concerned about whether a strike is militarily justified, and about the "collateral damage,"  that well-known phrase. Of course I'm not talking about Dan Halutz.

Part of the reason so many of the controversial incidents, like British journalists taking risks and getting shot, have involved Israeli Arab soldiers.

Here's an article saying that the IDF was responding to mortar fire from within the school.

www.haaretz.com/.../1053418.html

Where does the story that it was a weapons store come from?

Firing mortars? I don't want IDF members killed, but mortar fire doesn't strike me as a huge menace they cannot deal with in other ways, I'm sorry.  I don't think they do either.  This is one of the most sophisticated armies on earth.

They bombed the whole building, knowing there were small children by the dozens inside. Someone had a frigging cell phone in the building, it was a UN school.  They could have called them last week.  Told them to cancel school until further notice.  Frankly, this is not nuclear physics and the IDF is too effing smart for me to belive they couldn't have avoided this.

There is no justification.  I know the IDF soldiers have consciences, but someone in that command structure does not.  We knew a long time ago Hamas does not and I'm certainly not in the business of defending those indefensible people.  

I have a hard time envisioning the IDF not knowing every target by heart, every person going in and out, every nook and cranny of the damn place. They are renown for their military intelligence.  I simply do not believe it was unavoidable.  The UN truck too, its just too much.  

Aluf Benn in Haaretz: "[the Obama administration] will support Israel, but will oppose any harming of Palestinian civilians. This means that Israel will find it difficult to close the crossings into the Gaza Strip at will."

I just don't understand how one gets from the statement of the first sentence to the conclusion of the second sentence. So what if official Washington is less rhetorically supportive of any given Israeli policy? Will President Obama's mild disapproval cause the gates at Raffah to rust in the "open" position? No. I know life feels better on days when you know your friends like you than on days when you suspect that your friends disapprove of something you're doing. But very little that a President Obama could conceivably do would actually make it more or less "difficult" for the government of Israel to do or not do anything it damn well pleases.

I sometimes wonder if we need to remind people on both sides of the Atlantic that Israel is not, in fact, one of the several United States of America. Israel is its own country, with its own interests, and its own government perfectly capable of looking after those interests.

(And really, an Israeli government that continues to enable settlement growth in the West Bank is going to find it "more difficult" to close Gaza border crossings against suicide bombers due to the American president using slightly different adjectives when he expresses his support for Israeli security? Puh-lease.)

harriscrl13: If Israel were to follow the strategy you propose, they would be rendered defenseless.

Finally, the issue isn't that Hamas terrorists ONLY fired a mortar at the Israeli troops, and therefore, they should ignore the danger...it's a fucking war. The goal is to eliminate the enemy who wants to destroy you. Sadly, the enemy doesn't give a damn about civilian casualties. There is NO MORAL AMBIGUITY HERE FOLKS. What prevents people from seeing this? Read Ephraim Karsh's article on JCPA.org.

"There is NO MORAL AMBIGUITY HERE FOLKS."

The fact that there is ambiguity moral and/or otherwise.

I'm continually asked how I would be if rockets were coming in my neighborhood and I imagine the answer is freaked out.

On the other hand, when I think of what I would be like had I grown up in the Gaza strip in those deplorable conditions watching Jewiish is settlements continually expand as well as the arrogance of the settlers and hamfisted military action I know that I would be very angry and desperate feeling. I think I'd probably want to kill and drive what I perceived to be the oppressor away.

Now I suppose if you made up your mind in the first place that one side's cause is just and the others is not then none of those things matter. But I don't think that either sides cause is particularly just.

So I see ambiguity galore.  

To Ah Yup: You are missing the point of this current war. It is not a war for territory; there is no territorial dispute here, after all,  Israel did what no other country--including Egypt which controlled Gaza from 1948-1967-- has ever done before: it returned the Gaza Strip to Palestinians with the hope that they would begin to build a state that would live in peace. Sadly, they turned their energies toward war. Do you have the gall to dispute this fact? Do you have the gall to dispute that Hamas has fired more than 6,000 missiles at innocent civilians during the past 3 years? Do you have the gall to dispute that Israel restrain itself in the face of such unprovoked aggression? Do you have the gall to claim that Israel's right of retorsion -- closing it's border to an enemy -- is illegal and not warranted?

This war is being waged by religious fanatics who are intent on destroying not only Israel, but other moderate Arab countries--and America also. They don't give a damn about Palestine or Palestinians, so get off your leftist high horse. See comments Muhammad 'Ali Ibrahim, editor of the Egyptian government daily Al-Gumhouriyya and an Egyptian MP: "Hamas's [statements] and actions are [characteristics of a group that is] trying to bring destruction upon its people… Egypt is concerned about the Palestinians, while Hamas is not - not one bit. Hamas is holding the entire Palestinian people hostage, saying: 'We will live together, or die together.' Hamas is imposing suicide [ideology] on the Palestinians, because it sees itself as their legitimate ruler." (Read the entire transcript at www.memri.org

Finally,  Hamas proudly tells the world what their goals are: www.memritv.org/video.html

If you still feel that there is moral ambiguity here, then perhaps you can't tell the difference between right and wrong.

rebml is right.  What worries me is that the Democratic Party base, which is for the most part anti-American, anti-Israeli, and anti-Western, will exercise an inordinate influence on the Obama administration.  The amazing and terrifying fact is that American left has made common cause with Islamo-fascism.

The question is why.  Why do "liberals” side with a political movement that is every bit as vicious as were Communism and Nazism?  For that matter why did so many liberals (kinda sorta) side with Communism?

Bulbman,

The election is over.  This sort of rhetorical tripe (" the American left has made common cause with Islamo-fascism') doesn't work.  Or do you actually believe it?

It's simple enough to see how this sort of self-delusion occurs.  Here's how it works:

1)  Regard any expression of empathy for Palestinian suffering as a statement of support for terrorism and for Islamist goals.

2) Regard any anti-American or anti-Israel statement (whether appearing in academia, the blogosphere or from within tin-foil hate circles)  as being representative of something called "The Democratic Party Base."

And with that simple formula, Republicans have the makings of another loser campaign strategy for the next election.  

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