[…] The only word to describe what Hamas did in Sderot is “atrocity”. In all, Hamas deliberately killed at least 900 Israelis, mainly civilians, that day in various parts of their country.
The Israeli government, completely blindsided, reacted ferociously. Warplanes targeted the Gaza Strip, a conurbation of 2.1 million people encompassing 365 sq kms – an area only about a third larger than Edinburgh but with four times its population. […]
Their lives would soon become even more precarious. Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant announced “a complete siege” of the Gaza Strip that would sever electricity, gas, and even food and water supplies – to an already hardscrabble place. The Strip’s per capita income is $5,600, 47% of the population lack jobs, and 81% live in poverty. The minister’s justification? “We are fighting animals and are acting accordingly.”
Yet despite the horrors the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam visited on Israeli civilians, Gazans are not animals, any more than are their counterparts in Israel. Nor can they control what Hamas does. As Freedom House notes: “No open elections for any office have been held in Gaza since 2006,” the year Hamas won the Palestinian parliamentary elections. Hamas may act in the name of Gazans, but the connection between its deeds and their preferences are murky at best, not self-evident. Läs artikel