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“Israel bombarded Gaza with air strikes and Palestinian militants kept up cross-border rocket fire, with no firm sign on Wednesday of any imminent ceasefire… Gaza medical officials say 217 Palestinians have been killed, including 63 children, and more than 1,400 wounded since the fighting began on May 10. Israeli authorities say 12 people have been killed in Israel, including two children.” Reuters
On Monday, President Joe Biden spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “The President reiterated his firm support for Israel’s right to defend itself against indiscriminate rocket attacks… The President expressed his support for a ceasefire and discussed U.S. engagement with Egypt and other partners towards that end.” White House
Here’s our recent coverage of the situation. The Flip Side
The right supports Israel and cautions that a premature ceasefire would be a victory for Hamas.
“Hamas paints a target on its own civilians by hiding explosives in residential neighborhoods and putting rocket launchers near schools. If it spent half as much on schools, medicine and civilian infrastructure as it spends trying to kill Jews, Gaza would be far better off. The vast tunnel system Hamas built under Gaza City is a glaring example of how it diverts millions of dollars and construction material to war while using ordinary Palestinians as shields. Israel goes the extra mile by often warning Arab civilians by telephone to evacuate buildings it is targeting, showing more concern for them than Hamas does…
“[Hamas has fired] more than 2,000 rockets and mortars… While the explosives are unguided and many are destroyed by Iron Dome batteries, the sheer number has at times overwhelmed the defense system, making all of Israel more vulnerable… The rockets are smuggled from Iran or built in Gaza using Iranian supplies, making the weapons a proxy for Iran’s malign reach…
“The Iranian connection and the willingness of Hamas to fire indiscriminately on civilian areas, including Tel Aviv and Jerusalem… justifies Israel’s ferocious response and its effort to wipe out the terrorist group’s leadership.”
Michael Goodwin, Fox News
“Calls for a cease-fire for cease-fire’s sake ignore the drivers of the conflict. Hamas has won a political victory within Palestinian politics with its show of force. Its leaders were open to a temporary cease-fire after their attacks last week. They want to pocket a political win, walk away with their military capabilities intact, and regroup. If Israel lets that happen, the next Gaza war will take even more lives. Hezbollah, the more proficient missile-armed Islamists on Israel’s northern border, would be emboldened…
“One irony is that the calls for the U.S. to dictate terms to Israel come primarily from Democrats who want less U.S. involvement in Middle East security. Washington’s demands that Israel make politically impossible concessions could reduce U.S. influence and inflame the region further. The better approach is to mediate the conflict but recognize that Israel is the best judge of its own security. The U.S. can also try to capitalize on the Abraham Accords to include nations like the United Arab Emirates in any cease-fire settlement.”
Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal
“New realities are reshaping the dynamics of the conflict… Iran and Turkey have replaced the Arab world as the most important allies of the Palestinian resistance movement. The current Gaza war is, among other things, a proxy war between Israel and Iran. Hamas’s rocket barrage attempted to test the Iron Dome, helping Iran figure out whether Hezbollah’s 100,000-plus missile arsenal can overpower Israeli missile defenses…
“Meanwhile, Washington has less leverage than ever. Everyone in the region knows that since the 2012 Benghazi debacle, the chief goal of U.S. policy has been to reduce America’s Middle East footprint—a goal that has so far spanned three presidencies. Concerns about the declining value of their American alliance—rather than enthusiasm for the statesmanship of Jared Kushner —drove Arab and Israeli support for the Abraham Accords…
“Even fewer Palestinians believe that the U.S. can or will force Israel to make the concessions on Jerusalem and settlements they demand. So don’t expect words from Washington to stay their missiles. The Hundred Years’ War between Israelis and Palestinians, alas, isn’t close to an end.”
Walter Russell Mead, Wall Street Journal
“Polls show Democrats no longer uniformly view Israel as the good guys in the struggle with the Palestinians. A 2019 Pew poll found that 35 percent of Democrats viewed Israelis unfavorably, compared to 18 percent of Republicans… A majority of Democrats now say they think the United States should put more pressure on Israel to make compromises with the Palestinians to bring peace, up from a mere 33 percent in 2008…
“Biden cannot ignore this split as he navigates the conflict — or broader Middle East issues. Presidents have greater leeway on foreign policy than they do on domestic policy, but it’s unwise for a president to take positions on high-profile issues at odds with so many of his party’s voters. Biden has a long history of taking positions that unite the normally fractious Democratic coalition. With regard to Israel, that means taking a middle course: trying to find a way to nudge Israel into positions that accord with Democratic preferences (pro-Iran nuclear deal and supportive of an independent Palestinian state) without openly breaking with them.”
Henry Olsen, Washington Post
The left calls for a ceasefire and urges Biden to push back against Israel.
The left calls for a ceasefire and urges Biden to push back against Israel.
“Israel did not start the war that now rages between it and Hamas. The Islamist movement began launching missiles indiscriminately at Israeli cities a week ago, using as a pretext several days of unrest in Jerusalem. Israel’s subsequent bombing of targets in the Gaza Strip, which has been aimed at killing commanders of Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, eliminating rocket launchers and destroying the tunnel network used by the militant groups, is not morally or legally comparable to the rocket launches, which are war crimes. As the campaign continues, however, Israel is pushing the boundaries of legitimate military targeting…
“More bombing will inflict only incremental damage on Hamas, which cannot be destroyed by military means. But it could cause harm to Israel’s relations with the United States, and it could tear at the social fabric of the country. Since the fighting began, the worst riots in 20 years have broken out in several Israeli towns, fueled by Jewish as well as Arab mobs. In a week the Israeli military has inflicted, by its account, extensive losses on Hamas, including the killing of numerous leaders and the destruction of miles of tunnels. It’s time to call a halt.”
Editorial Board, Washington Post
“It’s hard to see how [Biden] could have given Netanyahu more cover. He has not criticized Israel over clashes between its police and Palestinians inside the compound of the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem or over possible evictions of Palestinians in a neighborhood of East Jerusalem, the part of the city they see as the future capital of their prospective state… In an earlier sign of Biden's shielding of Netanyahu, two diplomats told CNN that the US blocked public statements from the United Nations Security Council on the conflict.”
Stephen Collinson, CNN
“When reporters asked him on Thursday if the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, was doing enough ‘to stop this violence there from escalating’. Biden answered that ‘thus far there has not been a significant overreaction’ from the Israelis. Considering the massive asymmetry of death and destruction, one can only wonder, in absolute horror, what our president would consider ‘a significant overreaction’…
“[The Biden administration] was alone in opposing the UN security council from holding an open meeting on the issue on Friday… A US envoy also didn’t arrive in the region until Saturday, and the Biden administration hasn’t even named a nominee for US ambassador to Israel…
“So while the administration claims to be working ‘behind the scenes’ to solve this latest crisis, that argument is looking more and more like an alibi for being both unprepared for the tough demands of foreign policy while simultaneously adopting a nihilistic business-as-usual approach to cover for Israel’s aggressive policies.”
Moustafa Bayoumi, The Guardian
Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) writes, “‘Israel has the right to defend itself.’ These are the words we hear from both Democratic and Republican administrations whenever the government of Israel, with its enormous military power, responds to rocket attacks from Gaza. Let’s be clear. No one is arguing that Israel, or any government, does not have the right to self-defense or to protect its people. So why are these words repeated year after year, war after war? And why is the question almost never asked: ‘What are the rights of the Palestinian people?’…
“While Hamas firing rockets into Israeli communities is absolutely unacceptable, today’s conflict did not begin with those rockets… Over more than a decade of his right-wing rule in Israel, Mr. Netanyahu has cultivated an increasingly intolerant and authoritarian type of racist nationalism…
“It is shocking and saddening that racist mobs that attack Palestinians on the streets of Jerusalem now have representation in its Knesset… If the United States is going to be a credible voice on human rights on the global stage, we must uphold international standards of human rights consistently, even when it’s politically difficult.”
Bernie Sanders, New York Times
“The Trump administration deserves credit for encouraging Arab normalization but blame for leaving the Palestinians out of the mix. This month’s war reminds us that ignoring Palestinian political demands in the hope that their aspirations for a state will eventually disappear isn’t a strategy — it’s a dangerous delusion. Beyond a negotiated, durable cease fire, the Palestinians need three pillars for stability: new political leadership, economic reconstruction and security. Putting them together will take years, but this month’s ruinous war is the right time to start.”
David Ignatius, Washington Post
