Israel’s Pearl Harbor
The Israeli UN ambassador and his staff wearing
yellow stars to shame the world’s diplomatic com-
munity for its willingness to appease mass murderers.
For Israel, it is now quite apparent that the mass murder by Hamas of more than a thousand Israeli civilians, including women, children, and babies, was not perceived as just another terrorist attack requiring a measured and surgical response.
No, in this case the entire nation of Israel, from the secular left to religious right, has finally recognized that Hamas had long ago declared war on the Jewish people, and the massacre on October 7th was its way of underlining that state of war.
Israel is now responding in kind, just as the United States did after Pearl Harbor. After that attack on December 7, 1941, American were resolved that they were in a war of survival that could not end until the Axis powers of Germany and Japan were utterly obliterated. There would be no ceasefire or negotiations, as had happened at the end of World War I.
For the Israelis, October 7th is their day of infamy. It is for this reason that the Israeli ambassador put on a yellow star yesterday, similar to the Star of David the Nazis forced Jews to wear, but with the words “Never Again” emblazoned thereon. He then bluntly told the appeasers at the United Nations:
Israel has made its choice. We were attacked by the Hamas Nazis. We were shown that genocide and Jew hatred did not die with Hitler. It bubbled and grew until it invaded our homeland. But the difference between 1939 and today is that today Jews have a strong state and a powerful military. We are not defenseless. We are Lions of Judah and we will defend ourselves against those that seek to annihilate us.
Israel’s defense minister underlined this point himself yesterday, “Hamas has two choices, either to die fighting the IDF, or to surrender with no terms.”
These words ring with the same moral authority of Roosevelt, Churchill, and Eisenhower at the start of World War II. The Nazis were brutal murderous savages. So is Hamas. To such people it is pointless to negotiate. They must surrender, or die.
Thus, the Israeli invasion of Gaza has now truly begun. The delay at the start was not to placate the pleas of Joe Biden and others to temper or delay it, but to prepare properly for an aggressive no-holds-barred military attack.
Israel no longer cares what the world thinks, especially if the world is willing to look the other way when mass murders take place. For decades Hamas has demanded that Israel surrender and die. It proved to the world this was its position on October 7th. Israel has decided to take Hamas at its word, and give it the same or more. It is going into Gaza, and it will do it aiming for total victory and nothing less.
The slow start was instead designed I think for tactical reasons that had both military and political components. By beginning slowly, first with only a short in-road that pulled back immediately, then to longer incursions that were permanent but only on the outskirts of Gaza, and finally to the full invasion now, Israel was making sure it was on solid military ground. Rather than rush forward and possibly leave snipers or insurgents in its rear, it has gained ground with strength and completion. Wherever it has moved it has done so with thoroughness. This careful action has also worked to minimize civilian deaths in Gaza. Note the lack of anyone but Israeli soldiers in the picture to the right, released by the Israel military. They have fled, or they are in hiding ready to surrender if surrounded.
Politically the slow roll-out of the invasion has helped muffle the guaranteed screams of outrage from Hamas’s supporters in the UN and the Democratic Party in the U.S. These backers of genocide and mass murder did not have a single sudden military action of violence to react to. Thus, they did not have the right visuals to use against Israel, and so their protests were muted.
At the very start of the American Civil War, William Tecumsah Sherman was the superintendent of the Louisiana State Military Academy where he was surrounded by hot-headed southerners calling for secession and war. His response still rings true, and is something that Hamas’s hate-filled leaders should have considered.
You people of the South don’t know what you are doing. This country will be drenched in blood, and God only knows how it will end. It is all folly, madness, a crime against civilization! You people speak so lightly of war; you don’t know what you’re talking about. War is a terrible thing.
He added, “You are rushing into war with one of the most power, ingeniously mechanical and determined people on earth — right at your doors. You are bound to fail.”
Sherman himself demonstrated that “terrible thing” to the South when he marched from Atlanta to the sea in 1864.
Israel is about to do the same to Gaza. It has no choice, because Hamas — and the people of Gaza — have left it none. And in the end, it will be Gaza, not Israel, that will suffer the most. They wanted war, and now they have it.
One last point: This invasion will not be easy, but I also suspect it will not be as hard as many have suggested. Hamas’s power is mostly that of a bully, all threats and violence against the weak and helpless, with little real military capabilities. Israel now enraged is neither weak nor helpless. It will steadily but implacably work its way through Hamas’s tunnel system, but I think it will do so within a month.
Israel will then begin the careful process of rebuilding a Gaza that is under its control. It will carefully let its residents return, bit by bit, even as it identifies and captures every person who was an active member of Hamas.
It will then try to return Gaza to the much more prosperous and peaceful place it was prior to 2006, when the Israeli’s left and Hamas took over. Before Hamas the people in Gaza routinely entered Israel to work, and had a similar standard of living as the Arabs have inside Israel, which also happens to be the highest for Arabs across the Middle East. Israel’s goal then had been to live together as neighbors. It is still its goal.
All it requires is a willingness of the Gazans to join them in achieving it.
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Gaza’s median age is 18 years. 70% are below 30 y/o. None of those voted for Hamas. But they all grew up with radical indoctrination, scarcity, Israeli security checkpoints, growing population pressure. I can’t imagine that there’s a significant number of Gazans who’d overthrow Hamas and reach out to Israel. Would the peace-loving Gazans please stand up? And if they do, they’d be sniped down by Hamas. In Gaza’s case, it’s hopeless. Perhaps Israeli intel knows better who is who, I do not.
My unhappy conclusion is that the IDF has to do what it needs to do. And ignore the UN et al.’s accusations of “collective punishment” and even “genocide.” The IDF is still remarkably cautious — since years –, if Israel actually would want to genocide the Palestinians, they’d already be toast.
I don’t like what’s happening to Gaza’s civilians and feel for their suffering and pain — between Israel’s necessity and Hamas’ abuse –, but I don’t see any alternative if Israel wants to live.
The people who are calling for a “two state solution” are either sympathizers with the Palestinians, hoping to take yet more territory from Israel, or naive fools.
Hamas’ attack on October 7th was not about land. It was about hatred, a hatred for Jews and Judaism. The Palestinians have had Gaza and the so-called “West Bank” lands for their use, but have failed to make life good for the people living on them. If they were to renounce their terrorism and truly live in peace with the Israeli’s, they would soon reap the benefits.
Instead, the Palestinians choose to continue their attacks. They are to blame for ALL the casualties on BOTH sides of this war.
“If you want blood, you got it
Blood on the streets
Blood on the rocks
Blood in the gutter
Every last drop
You want blood
You got it
Yes you have”
AC/DC 1978
I worry about the West Bank.
If there is more behind this attack on Israel than usual…I could see plainclothes assailants storming into Israel from the east.
Israel is so thin in parts that you could walk across it in a day.
The OP was an excellent article up until this point:
“Israel will then begin the careful process of rebuilding a Gaza that is under its control. It will carefully let its residents return…”
The Israeli government would be fools to let ANY Muslim live there, ever again. Better by far to bulldoze the entire Gaza Strip into the Mediterranean, with only a few roads used by the IDF crossing it. “Never Again” has to be understood to include “Gaza delenda est”, or it is a hollow lie.
Sherman, an atheist, killed 15,000 Americans by starvation in the March to the Sea. Not really a good example. Then he burned a major American city, Atlanta.
FDR probably knew Pearl Harbor was coming, but let it happen anyway because he wanted war against Germany, possibly to save his faltering economy. Again, a terrible example.
Time to boycott Amazon – From Newsweek
”
Amazon Selling ‘From the River To The Sea’ Pro-Palestinian Merchandise
“A number of online sellers on Amazon are offering garments bearing the controversial phrase “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” which several Jewish groups see as an antisemitic chant. Newsweek has found at least four instances of T-shirts bearing the slogan available in the U.S. and five such listings in the U.K., as well as a hoodie version sold by the same store offering three of the T-shirts. Most of the items became available for sale between May 2021 and August this year. However, one was listed on October 8, the day after Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants launched a surprise attack on Israel, killing an estimated 1,400 people including civilians, according to the Associated Press. ”
For the first timer in my life I am ashamed of my fellow Americans
When the Roman empire had subdued a rebel province they would usually remove the entire population, then relocate thousands of loyal folks to then live there permanently. They didn‘t fool around in those days. I‘ve always thought that Israel should make her border with Egypt a straight line.
Many say that FDR knew of the Pearl Harbor attack in advance but let it happen to justify US entry into WWII. Some say October 7 plans were similarly known and allowed to happen. The blame always belongs to the aggressor. But is the world being thrust into WWIII without knowing who or what is driving the decision?
A sober-minded friend asks, “what about the innocent victims who inhabit Gaza?”
An equally sober-mind responds, “Sadly, the same thing that happened to untold numbers of “innocent” Germans and Japanese after their cites had been burned/bombed to rubble, and the calls for their unconditional surrender were not met!
Had the A-bombs not been available and used, the carnage in Japan would have been almost unimaginable, as the American soldiers eliminated whatever might have remained of the mentalities that decided to attack almost the entire Pacific “theater!”
As for Germany, virtually ALL its major cites/industrial capacity were turned to rubble, while the allies killed untold numbers of “innocent” Germans as they rid Germany of whatever vestiges of NAZI support remained.
The key for both Germany and Japan to subsequently become what they have, is the total elimination of the ideas that gave rise to their prior political manifestations. Israel should call for Hamas’s unconditional surrender, and then proceed with whatever is necessary to obtain it. Do so as reality has reminded them they should have understood years ago. Anything less just puts off the inevitable.
Alas, the brutal imminence of the inevitable now inescapably stares cruelly at all……….
We hear “from the river to the sea” so much, and have heard it for so long, that we become numb to it. It’s good to remember that “from the river to the sea” includes the entire nation of Israel.
The Hamas charter calls for the destruction of Israel. They will not be happy with less. (The probably would not be happy if they succeeded, either, but that should never be put to the test.)
A suggested counter chant…
From the River to the Sea,
Pal-e-CRIME Will NEVER BE!
In these comments I can learn more about the aggressive and overbearing nature of the US empire and its superhuman inhabitants than about the nature of the conflict in the Middle East, in which the aggressor is actually Israel, which is occupying foreign land and displacing people. This must be said even as I condemn Hamas’ initial attack.
But now the fact has arisen that Israel has damaged itself through the excessively massive backlash. The US empire is also being damaged by its behavior, losing two of its most important allies (Turkey and Saudi Arabia) in this part of the world. This is a major blow to America’s quest for world domination.
“The United States is a war junkie. The country has existed for 240 years, and only 16 of them have not been at war. They have built 800 military bases around the world. Wherever the American military goes, people suffer everywhere,” –
Speaker of the Chinese Ministry of Defense
Col Beausabre,
You wrote: “For the first timer in my life I am ashamed of my fellow Americans”
Keep in mind that those are Democrats:
https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/essays-and-commentaries/dont-forget-the-protesters-supporting-the-hamas-mass-murderers-are-all-democrats/
Democrats have always been shameful, all the way back to the founding of their political party. They hate America:
https://www.amazon.com/Democrat-Party-Hates-America/dp/150118315X
Oh, wait. Amazon is largely owned by a Democrat.
That hatred is why Obama bragged that he would fundamentally transform America and why Democrats voted for him anyway.
________________
Dave Walden,
You wrote: “The key for both Germany and Japan to subsequently become what they have, is the total elimination of the ideas that gave rise to their prior political manifestations. Israel should call for Hamas’s unconditional surrender, and then proceed with whatever is necessary to obtain it. Do so as reality has reminded them they should have understood years ago.”
The reality may be a bit different than you are imagining.
My brother made a few trips to Israel for business and came back with interesting reports. When he was with Jewish chaperones, everything was fairly nice and pleasant. A nice country to visit with interesting ancient sites and artifacts. His last (or latest) trip was with a very different chaperone, one from a very different outlook on the country, and this Arab chaperone picked arguments with local Jews on several occasions. It was not a pleasant experience.
It seems that part of the Israeli population does not get along with people as well as the others. I’m not sure that this can change as easily as with Germans or Japanese, who only needed to be shown some compassion and to learn a little less xenophobia.
There are people in this world who are very carefully taught by their religion to be intolerant of others. If they cannot be converted, then they are to be enslaved (if only to pay a tribute) or destroyed. Others are only to be destroyed. You cannot negotiate with those people, and you may not be able to convince them to change their ways.
When it is baked by religion, it is pretty hard to unbake.
The muslims and western idiots really are trying to finish what the Nazis started. Israel is the aggressor just for existing – let’s not forget that there were three wars that decided current boundaries, and many rejections of compromises from the muslim world starting in 1948. Only the river to sea war will change things, and if you can’t fight the military you just go in and massacre civilians. Just fire unguided rockets at civilian centers, that’s only bad if one misfires and hits your own hospital parking lot. Jew hospitals are fair game.
Do you really think Israel is going to decide to stop existing? Do you really think hamas will let them exist? Hint- the answer is in hamas’ charter. Palestinians exist to suffer and die, the muslim death cults will not let them resettle. The precious blood of the civilian martyrs will destroy all who oppose islam, god is great.
There is no way for there to be peace with the likes of islamist savages like hamas in positions of power. Unfortunately there is no way to get rid of them any more than you can get rid of cockroaches and rats in a ghetto slum. Every bomb breeds more of them – and that’s what they want.
“Geopolitics and Antisemitism – Chinese Student Arrested in New York for Vile Death Threats Against Jewish Students”
November 1, 2023 | Sundance
“There are a myriad of geopolitical interests exploiting the Israeli war against Hamas terrorists. The intelligence operation we noted in Dagestan, Russia, was one small element of a larger dynamic. Here we dig into the geopolitical exploits of China and other interests.”
“Yesterday, a Chinese student at Cornell University in New York was arrested for posting vile death threats against Jewish students.”
“Instead of condemning antisemitism, the Chinese government, through the state media, has only exploited the conflict to play up antisemitic tropes and spread disinformation.”
“The Biden term presents a one-time disposable opportunity for the anti-Israel ideologues to advance rapidly. We can be relatively certain that as Hamas looks out into the larger global world, they are very happy to see Russia, China, the United States, and other EU political leadership in alignment with their desire to eliminate the independent Jewish state.”
“Benjamin Netanyahu is in a very tenuous place.”
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/blog/2023/11/01/geopolitics-and-antisemitism-chinese-student-arrested-in-new-york-for-vile-death-threats-against-jewish-students/
James Street:
I bring here another excerpt from the article you linked that describes the failure of Biden’s regime and Trumps’s success:
“Within this dynamic and directly as a result of implemented US policies, Israel has become increasingly isolated. The only thing that changed this dynamic was the election of Donald Trump and a new “peace view” that began to bring all Arab nations together over the Abraham Accords.
President Trump made great strides in resolving the chaos with a balanced approach that targeted “extremism” as a common enemy. The Trump doctrine was pragmatic, targeting only extremists and those causing chaos. ISIS and other radical elements were fought or eliminated, but good relations developed among sensible minds.
With President Donald Trump’s policies supporting the lack of unrest, things calmed down and violent extremism stopped. Within this dynamic, Israel was safer; The lack of violence created a blanket of stability. However, the team behind Joe Biden, essentially the same team behind Obama, quickly returned to the previous policy of “chaos as a tool of influence.” Now we see the consequences.
China and most Arab nations support a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Obama/Biden also support the two-state solution, and all Biden policies expressed and hidden are aimed at pushing Israel into a corner where the two-state option is their only option. The result is once again Israel’s increasing isolation, and this reality is fueling global anti-Semitism.”