One Hair on One Israeli Soldier Worth more than All of Gaza? -The iPINIONS Journal

I feel obliged to note that Israel and Gaza agreed to another truce on Tuesday – with both sides insisting that it will prove more lasting than their eight previous ceasefire agreements. Alas, this might only mean that, in about two or three years, Gaza will be rocketing Israel and Israel will be bombing Gaza … yet again.

Meanwhile, neither side has anything to celebrate. After all, despite 50 days of fighting, during which over 2000 Palestinians and 70 Israelis were killed and practically all of Gaza was destroyed, this latest chapter in their “Neverending Story” settled none of the contentious issues related to ownership and control of the Palestinian Territories.

On the other hand, the merchants of war are licking their chops. After all, arms dealers can make a killing now resupplying Hamas with rockets to launch the next chapter, and even more resupplying Israel with bombs to retaliate in kind. Not to mention the windfall for contractors who get to rebuild Gaza … yet again.

Incidentally, Israel is claiming “mission accomplished” by pointing to the 30-plus tunnels it destroyed all over Gaza, which were used for everything from smuggling contraband to launching attacks. But nothing will betray this military feat quite like Hamas leaders rebuilding them with even greater dispatch than rebuilding hospitals and schools.

All of which means that Israel boasting of victory in Gaza will prove every bit as pyrrhic and foreboding as America boasting of victory in Iraq….

That said, after Israel swapped 1000 Palestinian prisoners for 1 Israeli soldier three years ago, I took a lot of flak for commenting as follows:

Such deals reflect the value Israeli leaders place on the lives of Israelis relative to Palestinians that is simply untenable. After all, it would seem more than fair to exchange one “high-value” Palestinian prisoner for two (dead) Israelis…

Therefore, it strikes me as a perverse form of jingoism for the Israelis to agree to such a lopsided exchange. I can see how it feeds resentment among Palestinians for their soldiers to be regarded so cheaply. More to the point, I can see why Palestinians consider kidnapping such a good strategy to execute against the Israelis in their neverending war. (“To Israel, 1 Dead Israeli Is Worth 100 Living Palestinians,” The iPINIONS Journal, July 17, 2008)

This is why I am not at all surprised by reports this week that the Israelis have just struck another deal with the Palestinians which calls for Israel to release 1000 Palestinian prisoners in return for one (still living) Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit.

(“1 Israeli Worth 1000 Palestinians?!” The iPINIONS Journal, October 13, 2011)

Significantly, nobody challenged the accuracy of the facts I asserted; nor, perhaps more telling, did anyone seem to appreciate that, inherent in these facts, is the sacrificial value Palestinian leaders place on the lives of Palestinians relative to Israelis.

But it turns out I might have been too modest in my characterization of how little value Israeli leaders place on the lives of Palestinians. Because even I was shocked when, on yesterday’s edition of the BBC program HARDtalk, interviewer Stephen Sackur asked the Israeli minister of intelligence, Yuval Steinitz, to explain why a deputy speaker of the Knesset, Moshe Feiglin, would take such militant and jingoistic pride in declaring that:

One hair on the head of an Israeli soldier is more precious than the entire Gazan populace.

When Steinitz tried, unconvincingly to dismiss Feiglin as an irrelevant politician, Sacker persisted incredulously:

What’s going on in Israeli politics when a senior Israeli politician can think that that reflects the views of the Israeli people. The view the international community gets is that you no longer value Palestinian life.

Enough said?

Except I feel constrained to note that I’m on record defending Israel against international double standards, which would see it hauled before the International Criminal Court for killing hundreds of innocent civilians in Gaza, even though the United States got a pass despite killing hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I also feel constrained to stress that the right of self-defense America claimed to go after al-Qaeda terrorists in Afghanistan (who terrorized America with one spectacular attack in New York City on 9/11/2001) pales in significance when compared with the existential right Israel claimed to go after Hamas terrorists in Gaza (who have been terrorizing Israel with rocket attacks on a regular basis since 2001).

My only issue with Israel’s retaliation against Hamas, which is similar to the one I had with America’s retaliation against al-Qaeda, is that it used the proverbial hammer, when a scalpel would have been not only more effective but less destructive (in terms of life and property).

Israel’s spy agency, the Mossad, is known as much for its stealth surveillance as for its brazen assassinations. Therefore, wouldn’t it make far more sense for Israel to dispatch agents to surgically assassinate all of the men responsible for ordering these rocket launches, instead of continuing to bomb homes where so-called ‘Hamas militants’ are supposed to be hiding out?

(“Groundhog-Day Flare Up Between Israelis and Palestinians,” The iPINIONS Journal, July 15, 2014)