this is, in fact, this bad.
Peter Beaumont on what the latest attacks mean for the citizens of Gaza | World news | guardian.co.uk
in the end, there are mutually exclusive claims from both sides that one can latch onto in order to evade what is happening on the ground.
but the Problem is what has been happening on the ground, and even more what seems about to happen.
it seems that in order to support this action you have to substitute very general rationales and avoid looking to hard on what the siege has already meant. i posted a link to a large collection of articles above from electronic intifada which is replete with descriptions from people who are in gaza. ignore the editorials and read the descriptions if you like. call it activist if you want--i see in that evasion.
through these descriptions you get a glimpse of reality.
and that reality is not pretty.
at all.
and if the israelis launch a large-scale ground assault on gaza, there will be no rationalizing away the result will be a massacre.
it is self-evident that this will be a masscre.
the conflict is hopelessly assymetrical: a military superpower bringing its air and ground forces to bear on a densely populated civilian area the ruling party of which israel does not like, a population that has been deprived of economic wherewithal, food and medical supplies for 18 months.
i do not understand on what grounds that can be understood to be ok.
obviously, neither side is composed of angels.
but nothing, and i mean nothing, justifies 18 months of siege followed by one of a radically assymetrical military action like this.
and frankly i do not understand the desirability of this action from the israeli side either---they will not be able to control information entirely, and sooner or later the world will see fragments at least of what they will put into motion. i don't see how israel can possibly benefit from the ongoing human rights disaster accelerated into god knows what. i don't see anything good coming from this for israel, except perhaps the fake sense of security to be derived from moving against hamas. it will radicalize and add solidarity behind the types of actions that it is supposed to prevent. it will intensify the conflicts is it supposed to end. it will throw any hope of a peace process out the window. and alot of civilians will end up dead.