According to Reuters, Israel has decided that a 48 hour suspension of their military campaign against the government of the Palestinians is not in its best interest at this time.
Foreign powers have increased pressure on both sides to halt hostilities, but public anger in Israel over the widening of the rocket attacks to include Beersheba, 40 km (24 miles) from the Gaza Strip, could move the government to hit Hamas even harder.
This is a very sad situation for the civilians on both sides of this conflict. It appears that some international pressure is being placed on Israel to halt it’s attacks. But is asking a country not to defend itself against a barrage of rocket attacks unrealistic? What would the United States do if a group was shooting missles and hitting our cities from somewhere inside Canada? I realize that this situation is not the same, but it makes you think.
Can Israel be expected to negotiate with a group that does not recognize Israel’s right to exist? According to the San Francisco Chronicle the charter of Hamas states that
“Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it.”
This is a group whose leaders deny the holocaust and continually uses unconscionable rhetoric when it speaks of Israel.
It is true that the humanitarian conditions for the Palestinian people have been abhorrent, but these same people elected Hamas, a group that was deemed a terrorist organization, to power. Hamas is funded by Iran, another country whose leaders would like to obliterate Israel.
Israel has every right to exist and is in a tough neighborhood. I don’t believe that the Israelis have done everything that they can to negotiate in good faith with the Palestinians, but I also believe that Israel has every right to defend and protect herself from the rocket attacks of Hamas and its supporters.
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