Hamas's Dupes

[msmcghee]

Jan 21, 2008 23:11 | Updated Jan 22, 2008 12:20

Yesterday, External Relations European Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said: "I condemn the rocket fire into Israel and we fully understand Israel's need to defend its citizens." But she also accused Israel of causing "blackouts in parts of Gaza, affecting both homes and hospitals. Closing the crossings will also result in shortages of food, medical and relief items ... I am against this collective punishment of the people of Gaza."

It would be nice if the international press and the governments that blindly took their cues from it would take a moment to consider that their Pavlovian embrace of the manufactured "humanitarian crisis" in Gaza could lead, at best, to prolonging the suffering of Gazans and Israelis and, at worst, to full blown war. The reason for this is that anything that reduces the pressure on Hamas to end its unprovoked aggression against Israel will encourage that aggression, with all its associated results.

Israel obviously has no interest in causing suffering of any kind in Gaza, and every interest in encouraging Palestinian development, absent the war Hamas is waging against Israel. But Hamas is responsible for the firing of dozens - 50 in one day last week - of missiles at the citizens of Sderot. As a result, Israel has reduced fuel supplies, producing a 25 percent reduction in the electricity availability to Gazans.

As Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni explained, "We are maintaining the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip. Israel is the only place in the world that supplies electricity to terrorist organizations that launch rockets at it in return. Life for the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip is not easy because there is terrorism there… Hamas can change the lives of the people in Gaza in an instant, if it ceases terrorism. It knows that, and the Palestinian civilians must understand it as well." A Hamas official warned that the reduction in fuel shipments to Gaza's power plant would cause a health catastrophe. "We have the choice to either cut electricity on babies in the maternity ward or heart surgery patients or stop operating rooms," he said.

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