Religion, Nationalism, and Terror

Benziman, One, two, three, testing - Haaretz, October 28, 2007

Experience teaches that subjecting the Palestinians to collective punishment - roadblocks, curfews or economic pressure - has not brought the desired result. Just the opposite: it increases the terror organizations’ motivation to strike at Israel, and increases the number of potential suicide bombers. In addition, the use of collective punishment damages Israel’s image and efforts to gain international understanding for its position in the conflict with the Palestinians. Common sense would thus suggest avoiding this method. To put it simply, in terms of costs versus benefits - the idea of harassing Gazans to the point of depriving them of fuel and electricity deserves to be shelved in light of the price Israel will have to pay for implementing this plan. It can be inferred based on what Olmert told Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on Friday that he understands this: A statement released after the two leaders met in Jerusalem said the prime minister promised his guest that Israel would not cause a humanitarian crisis in Gaza. If that is the case, then what is the point of publicizing Israel’s plans to impose wide-ranging sanctions on Gaza’s population? Either the intention is to harass them mercilessly, in which case one may question the value of the prime minister’s promise to the PA leader; or to harass them only to a “tolerable” degree - in which case, what’s the point in harassing them?

There is a moral message to the decision, too: When Israel assassinates terrorists and injures innocent bystanders, it claims in its defense that that was not its intention, and that the terror organizations’ operational methods force it to act as it does. It is doubtful that this argument passes the test of morality, since some might argue that if Israel knows from the start that its actions will harm innocent victims, then it should avoid such actions. How much more so when the state walks, eyes wide open, into a moral and legal trap, in preparing to knowingly impose a collective punishment whose purpose is to harm tens of thousands of completely innocent people. So what should be done to combat the Qassams? Instead of trying economic siege and power outages and limited raids and ground campaigns and targeted assassinations - how about trying to reach a comprehensive settlement with the Palestinians founded on a genuine Israeli willingness to give up the territories?