The Obama Administration Holds Israel to Stricter Standards than It Holds the U.S
July 23, 2014
Lets juxtapose two stories. First, after declaring that Israels attacks in Gaza were a hell of a pinpoint operation, Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in the Middle East to press for an immediate cease-fire , a cease-fire that would leave much of Hamass military infrastructure intact and hand Hamas a victory after the FAA and others shut down flights to Tel Aviv.
Second, on Saturday the day before Kerry attacked Israels military tactics a U.S. drone strike claimed eleven lives in Pakistan. This strike followed a Wednesday attack that claimed 15 lives.
I have a few questions:
Were any phone calls made or text messages sent to warn civilians before we struck the Taliban compounds in Pakistan? Did we even drop leaflets?
Were those Taliban engaged in direct and immediate hostilities against U.S. forces?
Did the Taliban possess any weapons that were capable of directly and immediately harming Americans on American soil?
Is the United States of the mindset that an immediate ceasefire against al Qaeda is in our national interest so long as it retains the capacity and intent to strike the U.S.?
The answer to each of those questions is almost certainly no. Even more, American drone operators have a reputation (I dont know if its deserved) for so-called double-tap strikes that can also kill Taliban fighters who rush to render aid to casualties from the initial strike.
Moving beyond our drone strikes, our own urban combat operations have exacted a far higher toll in lives and property. Not only were cities devastated, but the casualty toll in Fallujah, for example, was far higher than the Israelis have inflicted.Peruse the archives of left-wing blogs, and youll find image after image of urban devastation from our fights inFallujahand elsewhere. The picture below is typical.
Let me be crystal clear: I agree with our tactics in Fallujah and elsewhere, I support our drone campaign against al-Qaeda and its allies (including even the alleged double taps), and I think that our rules of engagement in general should be less restrictive enabling even greater use of American firepower. During my own time in Iraq, our troopers once engaged in a 36-hour firefight in a village that left much of a localtown devastated and culminated in an Abrams tank driving over buildings to literally crush the terrorist occupants inside. These things happen in war, and unless you want to empower the terrorist enemy by refusing to attack him while he attacks you, these things must happen.
Sowhy is the Obama administration holding the Israel to a higher standard than it holds American forces? Why does it continue to do so in the face of continued, direct attacks on Israeli soil? By doing so, it does nothing but empowerHamas and weakenIsrael. Europes long history of vicious anti-Semitism (combined with and compounded by its growinganti-Semitic Muslim population) is a motivating factor for Europes constant and reprehensibleattacks on Israel and support for its terrorist enemies. What is the Obama administrations motivation for its own indefensible double standards? Appeasement? Something worse?
Not only does Israel have a right of self-defense (which the Obama administration does at least acknowledge), it has a right of self-defense that is co-equal to Americas, with a freedom of action that is co-equal to Americas. Anything less is asking for a terrorist victory.
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Talk's cheap.
The admin. has no trouble saying that Israel has a right to self- defense-- but when Israel actually does it, then they get angry.
The article has many valid points.
One thing that always struck me is all the attention being paid to children who are getting killed. yes-- its a terrible thing. But I wonder about the people who make that accusation vs. israel-- do they really think that in other wars no kids are ever killed?
That there's no "collateral damage" in war-- except when Israel wages?
I think most people (but not necessarily all) people on NT would agree that in WWII the allies were "the good guys" and the Nazis were "the bad guys". But here's one of the things the Aliies did:
The Fire-bombing of Dresden
On the evening of February 13, 1945, an orgy of genocide and barbarism began against a defenseless German city, one of the great cultural centers of northern Europe. Within less than 14 hours, not only was it reduced to flaming ruins, but an estimated one third of its inhabitants, possibly as many as half a million, had perished in what was the worst single event massacre of all time. (The WWII Dresden Holocaust). Dresden had no military installations, no aircraft to defend it, no munitions factories, only factories that produced cigarettes and china, and a hospitalfilled to overflowing.
700,000 phosphorus bombs dropped on 1.2 million people, 1 for every 2 people, where the heat reached 1600 degrees centigrade, in a bombing raid that lasted over 14 hours. Those who lived through this Hell on earth had to pile the bodies on huge pyres for cremation, 260,000 bodies counted; the remaining dead, indistinguishable, melted into the cement or charred beyond recognition. In just over an hour, four square miles of the cityequivalent to all of lower Manhattan from Madison Square Garden to Battery Parkwas a roaring inferno.
Thank you for your very thought provoking comment and all of this information. I'm just a little tired of the hypocrisy.
There's definitely a double standard at play here.
If Israel wanted to, they could kill everyone tonight. They have a lot more patience than I'm afraid the people in this country would have when rockets are falling around them day after day, never knowing when the next one will come and will the miss it and will it be successful. Unfortunately the children are being killed, but Hamas is using the children as shields and they are the attackers.
Amen.
In all fairness , the entire world holds Israel to a stricter standard . Apparently they think Jews should be more godlike :
The Gaza strip is not home to terrorists . Keep saying that over & over again till you believe it :
This is the internet . You can say anything you want . Just don't expect you have proven it by making a pronouncement and using the word bullshit . The word loses its power after the 5th time you use it ...
BTW no one said people were using "their own children" for shields . But it is not hard to find video evidence of such shield events ...
I expect you have mentally exaggerated what he said . There is little doubt that Hamas does place its civilian population at risk by launching rockets from near schools , mosques & even hospitals ...
And here is a comment from an extreme dumbass who can't figure out that there is anything wrong with terrorist attacks as long as only a few are killed :
If you didn't have the words lie and bullshit to fling around you wouldn't have much to say ... Why is that ?
What do you know about truth ? You don't even know how to recognize a fanatic religious organization when you see one . You have said many times in the past that you are opposed to such groups . But when it comes to Hamas suddenly your eyesight fails you . Getting you to admit they are : 1] fanatical 2] religious extremists seems to be impossible . That is a lie of omission ... or maybe just hypocrisy . Or maybe even both !
That's just stupid . You really are a hypocrite . You keep saying you are opposed to fanatic religious extremists but when exposed to actual misdeeds done by a clear cut example [Hamas] you pretend what they do is identical to acts of self defense by Israel . Apparently concepts well recognized in western law such as self defense don't exist just so you can be PC . What a sick joke . The effects of your actions are an acceptance of fanatical religious attacks on a western style democracy . If missiles were launched at Palm Springs Calif it would be OK if it was done by Hamas because YOU MUST BE PC merely because it is Moslems doing the attack . Keep bending over backwards and submitting to religious fanaticism you hypocrite ...
If you are going to go there, what of the nightly Luftwaffe bombings of London? What of the Genocide of Russians on the eastern front?
War sucks. It's ugly. It's not for the faint of heart. I, as several others here do, believe in Disproportionate Response. Attack us and we will fight you until you are dead along with anyone that was helping you in any way shape or form or until you surrender, unconditionally. The aggressor needs to be convinced it is not in their best interest to proceed. In the case of the current ME crisis? The Hamas Animals are the aggressors.
(CNN) -- Tuesday's discovery of rockets hidden in a vacant U.N. facility is the sort of evidence that Israel cites when it accuses Hamas of using civilians and their institutions as shields in the ongoing Gaza conflict.
The rockets were found in a vacant school between two other U.N. schools being used as shelters for 3,000 displaced Palestinians, the United Nations said. It was the second such discovery at a vacant U.N. school in Gaza in a week.
As suggestive as those discoveries are, Israel's claims that Hamas uses civilians as human shields are difficult to prove in an active ground conflict, experts say.
...
Why would Hamas be storing rockets in schools? That is using children as shields, plain and simple.
Anti-Israel posters (most are not pro-Palestinian, but pose at being so) constantly throw about the overblown term of disproportionate use of forcewhen describing the Israeli operation of self-defense.
Let's take a look at another recent operation in comparison. The air force of an entity which was in no way being attacked carried out bombing runs which killed at least 2,000 with at least 1,500 of that number being civilians. The recipients of this action claimed the death toll to be more than 5,000. The casualties for the attacking force: 0. Was this action carried out by evil dictators like Saddam Hussein or Hafez/Bashir Assad? No, the bombings described above were carried out by NATO forces against Serbia in 1999. Here is the explanation given at the time by the NATO spokesman:
"There is always a cost to defeat an evil. It never comes free, unfortunately. But the cost of failure to defeat a great evil is far higher," said Nato spokesman Jamie Shea.
He insisted Nato planes had bombed only "legitimate designated military targets" and if more civilians had died it was because Nato had been forced into military action.
I think the key words here are....
Exactly!
Totally agree.
An excellent question. I've wondered the same thing myself.
Good video Perrie . Everyone should watch it . One quote from it : "If the use of human shields proves to be an effective strategy it will be used again and again ... If it is not effective it will be used less and less ."
True.
What are you basing that on?
The fact is, Hamas' primary goal is to deliberately get their people killed for good photo ops-- extra points for Palestinian babies!
Their leaders even admit it:
The fact is, Hamas' primary goal is to deliberately get their people killed for good photo ops-- extra points for Palestinian babies!
Their leaders even admit it:
Nothing being said by anyone on this site in defense of Israel is going to make a dent in the attitudes of those who are "appalled" by Israel's defense of herself and her citizens.
The minute you mention she is defending, they will twist and turn the discussion to "occupied territories" and whether or not Israel has the right to be there, and there you are, on the merry-go-round again.
You can talk about the three murdered boys, and they don't care. You can talk about the unending fall of rockets from Gaza, and they don't care. You can talk about the snipers shooting at families driving innocently down the road, and they don't care. You can talk about the web of sophisticated tunnels, that surprised even the IDF commanders who expected to find them, and that would have meant eventual death to Israeli civilians had they not been destroyed, and they don't care.
They have a tunnel vision of anti-Israel discourse they insist on dumping and nothing will stop them, no counter discussion will sway them. Their asinine solution to end the war is that Israel must surrender/stop and allow Hamas to shell them because Hamas rockets rarely land on target; Israel must give back land taken in the previous war Hamas started; Israel must give up Jerusalem; Israel must give Palestinians the right of return. It's all or part of each of the things I have listed, and Israel will do none of them.
It's useless to make any further comments on this subject.
Not surprising when you consider the racist bigotry of Israel's detractors.
They even admit it!
Welcome to the NT world of "Useful Idiots".
This comment is posted on Saturday February 10th 2024 at about 7 a.m. New York City time.
About 4 hours ago a Pakistani spammer posted a comment on this 10-year-old article that brought it back to the Front (Home) Page. I deleted the spam comment, (and the spammer) which is my job on NT, but I took note of this article and the comments posted by members, some of whom have been inactive for many years and a couple who are still active today. What struck me is that unbelievably the article is as relevant to what has been happening these days to what was transpiring a decade or more ago. IMO what is said in this article justifies the naming as hypocrites those who call for Israel to "cease fire" or "ease up" with remarks like "over the top" and "causing a humanitarian crisis" when in fact it was not Israel but in fact a calculated, planned and purposely provoked result actually caused by a declared terrorist organization, supported by the United Nations through UNRWA. Many of the situations and facts referred to are the same as what has been happening now. Read what has been said above, the article and the comments, and you will see how much what is happening now is, as Yogi Berra famously said, "It's just deja vu all over again."
IMO the existence of this article provides proof as to why it is necessary for Israel to totally eradicate Hamas, to NOT stop the war because if it doesn't, then down the road there is going to be another Oct 7 and then another Oct 7 and then......So there is only one common sense solution to stop the bloodshed and release what's left of the hostages...HAMAS MUST SURRENDER. Why doesn't the UN demand it? Why? Because the UN with its UNRWA agency is COMPLICIT in this war. Again I will repeat that my wish is that the NYC UN building be bulldozed into the East River. America, so against terrorist organizations, happens to be the host of and provides a home for a terrorist organization in that building.