I will concede this up front: it has been wildly irresponsible of Hamas to fire rockets, or allow them to be fired. To some extent they have brought this calamity upon the people of Gaza, and I hope (but do not expect) that Gazans will understand this. The natural psychological response, of course, will be to rally behind the besieged government. Already there are reports that the remnants of Fatah military elements in Gaza have linked up with Hamas forces to confront the Israeli ground invasion. Anyone who has seen 'War of the Worlds' or 'Independence Day' or any alien film could have predicted that much.
I don't have time to do this in depth right now, but I will throw my weight behind roachboy - in his assessment of how we got here, his insistence that people acknowledge what conditions in gaza actually look like, and his belief that this operation is futile, and will do no good to anyone - except in terms of the Israeli electoral calculus.
One thing I feel compelled to respond to: the idea that Gaza was 'freed' in 2005. No. The settlements were evacuated - and I maintain that this was a good step. But Israel still maintained control of entry and exit into the strip, and especially since the election of Hamas, has used that power to systematically deprive Gazans of basic necessities - including, at times, power, water, technology, and medical supplies. You don't have to go to oppositional sources for this. Official, stated Israeli policy with the Hamas government has been to turn the population against Hamas through slow deprivation, without provoking a 'humanitarian crisis'. In practice this has meant sealing Gaza as tightly as possible without actually causing, say, mass starvation.
Remember that we are talking about a tiny, tiny region - the Gaza strip is less than 8 miles across
at its widest point, with a total area of less than 140 square miles. Combine that with an absolutely devastated economy and infrastructure and one of the highest population densities on earth, and it becomes clearer why gazans are so dependent on neighboring areas for very basic things - food production, and medical care, for example. This is why the siege, as roachboy rightly calls it, is such a Big Deal.
To get a better idea of what life is really like for these people (and if you care), check out the link below from a Gaza blogger. His experiences, and worse, aren't outliers - these are routine in the Palestinian experience. These are the practical, mundane ways in which the complex system of closures, embargoes, harassment, and occupational bureaucracy destroy the lives and livelihoods of Palestinians in the territories, even without taking into account the effects of these occasionally devastating Israeli incursions.
From Gaza, with Love: The siege -closure- and my personal story