From the WSJ -
Amazing.
Den

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OPINION
The Moral Chasm Between Israel and Hamas
The 3-mile-long tunnel from Gaza was designed for launching murder and kidnapping raids.
By JAMES T. CONWAY
July 24, 2014 7:05 p.m. ET

Americans are understandably concerned when they hear that the majority of Palestinian casualties in the fighting between Israel and Hamas have been civilians and when they see images of houses in Gaza reduced to rubble and women wailing. Given the lack of corresponding Israeli civilian casualties to date, this creates the impression of an unequal—and hence immoral—fight between Israel and Hamas.

Although American empathy for noncombatants is a critical component of who we are as a people, it should not blind us to reality: Israel's military exists to protect its civilian population and seeks to avoid harming noncombatants, while its adversary cynically uses Palestinian civilians as human shields while deliberately targeting Israeli civilians.

I recently had the opportunity to see for myself the moral chasm between how the Israeli Defense Forces and Hamas treat civilians during military operations. In May I joined a dozen other retired U.S. generals and admirals on a trip to Israel with the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs.

Just outside Hamas-ruled Gaza, we toured a tunnel discovered less than one kilometer from an Israeli kindergarten. Unlike tunnels that I had seen during the Iraq war that were designed for smuggling, this Hamas tunnel was designed for launching murder and kidnapping raids. The 3-mile-long tunnel was reinforced with concrete, lined with telephone wires, and included cabins unnecessary for infiltration operations but useful for holding hostages.

Israel, fearing just such tunnel-building, has long tried to limit imports of concrete to Gaza for anything but humanitarian projects, yet somehow thousands of tons of the material have been diverted for terror use rather than building hospitals or housing for Palestinians. Since the beginning of ground operations into Gaza, the IDF has uncovered approximately 30 similar tunnels leading into Israel, in addition to the more than two dozen discovered prior to Operation Protective Edge. Hamas operatives have been intercepted emerging from such tunnels in Israel carrying tranquilizers and handcuffs, apparently hoping to replicate the successful 2006 kidnapping of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, for whom Israel exchanged 1,000 Palestinian prisoners in 2011.

Beyond targeting Israeli civilians with kidnappings and with the indiscriminate firing of rockets, Hamas shows a callous disregard for the lives of the Palestinians it ostensibly represents. Earlier this month Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri appeared on Al-Aqsa TV and encouraged Gaza residents to act as human shields. They appear to have heeded the call: Israeli Defense Forces combat video has shown Palestinians rushing to rooftops after receiving warnings from Israel—via phone calls, text messages, and unarmed "knock-knock" small projectiles striking a targeted building—that a missile attack is imminent.

Nor is Hamas the only potential adversary of Israel that believes its civilians' propaganda value is worth more than their lives. From an IDF outpost overlooking the border, I saw housing tracts in Lebanon built with Iranian money after Israel's 2006 war with Hezbollah. The IDF has determined that the housing masks the launch sites for some of the more than 100,000 rockets that Hezbollah holds in reserve for attacking Israel and its citizens. As we have seen in images from Gaza, the occupants of these dwellings either will serve as human shields to deter Israeli pre-emptive strikes, or in the event of another war they will be valuable "collateral damage"—dying in the service of Hezbollah's propaganda mill.

This cynical inducement of civilian suffering for propaganda is in marked contrast to the IDF's treatment of noncombatants. While Hamas is encouraging the sacrifice of its civilian population—and its cowardly leadership is ensconced in underground bomb shelters—the IDF reports that in the conflict's first week it provided more than 4,400 tons of food to Palestinians in Gaza, about 900 tons of natural gas and about 3.2 million liters of diesel fuel. All this despite 1,700 Hamas rockets fired at Israel.

Meanwhile, the Rutenberg power plant outside Ashdod in Israel supplies Gaza with electricity, though the Palestinian Authority's payments are badly in arrears. This supply only stopped when a Hamas rocket destroyed the power lines to Gaza on July 13, plunging 70,000 Palestinian households into darkness. Despite the rocket fire, Israel repaired the transmission lines, restoring electricity to Gaza.

I do not relate these experiences to argue for an Israeli moral perfection that does not exist, or to suggest that the IDF should be immune from criticism even if it commits genuine abuses. The tragic reality is that no matter how much the IDF tries to avoid collateral damage, its operations will kill some number of civilians. That won't be close to the carnage of noncombatants in the Syrian civil war, but it won't matter. As one Israeli commander told me, "The world judges Israel differently," regardless of its efforts to minimize civilian casualties.

I suspect that he may be right. If so, it is essential for the IDF to be as vigilant in shaping the information environment as it is in intercepting rockets from Gaza.

Gen. Conway, who retired in 2010, was the 34th commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps

The summer's been a bummer for Blogging - for me.

I suppose my travel, our vacation, my writing another book and my leadership on a political race or two have combined to draw down the reservoir of cogent, fully-clever, semi-befuddling, blogosphere content. Ah, but the well's not empty...

I'll be back shortly and jump into my Blogging. I arrive in Idaho later tonight to reconnect with clients, politicos and friends. Blogging is all a part of that.

Been thinking about a new look to the Blog - after 10 years or so, it may just need it.

Meanwhile, here's a new-look pic of my grandson and me from this summer.

New things are on the way.
Den

As authors who believe in the mission of the United States, Ryan Pacheco and I have agreed that from July 2nd to July 4th we'll be offering E-copies of BENGHAZI AND BEYOND for free. Happy Independence Day!

Why July 2nd? 

Look what John Adams wrote to his wife about this date: 

"The Second Day of July 1776 will be the most memorable Epocha, in the History of America. . . . It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires, and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more."
--John Adams to Abigail Adams, July 3, 1776

Why free? To see how you like it so you can tell others about it. (I'd love you to leave a review of the book on Amazon.com and let folks know!)

Order here: http://www.amazon.com/Benghazi-Beyond-Dennis-Mansfield/dp/0996014608

Americans don't often discuss the issue of class systems, let alone embrace the concept as some type of truth.

We want to believe that class distinctions, cultural derivatives, group dynamics and individual accomplishments negate even the possibility of "class" levels in the US.

That is, we like to theoretically believe it. In practice, we live out such distinctions every day.

Think I'm in error?

Think again.

Ask yourself when the last time was that you embraced, as a very close friend, someone deeply below your educational level. Ask yourself when the event took place when you immersed your life into the lives of ex-inmates or addicts, recovering or not. Has it ever been the case that you chose to live in an area of intense poverty simply to assist others, "less fortunate" than yourself?

If we're honest with ourselves, most of us have never and will never find ourselves - by our own volition - hugging the shoulder  of a broken, filthy person.

And in a particularly twisted way, you're glad about it, aren't you?

It's all just so dusty and dirty, isn't it?

That is, until the filth is from you.

Dylan put it this way:

You used to be so amused
At Napoleon in rags and the language that he used
Go to him now, he calls you, you can’t refuse
When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose
You’re invisible now, you got no secrets to conceal

How does it feel
How does it feel
To be on your own
With no direction home
Like a complete unknown
Like a rolling stone?

However...

What if right along with our own prejudices against these "icky" people, there was a bit of an ironic fact to the contributing behavior patterns that create an "underclass" in western countries?

What if, along with our own detached cringing, there were actually reasons why many of those within that class remain in that class?

We may want them to leave their way of life - yet what if their very language of life assists them in their remaining in the underclass?

Hmm.

Underscoring the American perspective on not fully embracing the class concept, let's allow one who has floated across the pond to poke the stick into that cultural beehive.

Anthony Daniels recently addressed Hillsdale College's National Leadership Seminar.

Here's what he had to say:

It was in the prison that I first realized I should listen carefully, not only to what people said, but to the way that they said it. I noticed, for example, that murderers who had stabbed someone always said of the fatal moment that “the knife went in.” This was an interesting locution, because it implied that it was the knife that guided the hand rather than the hand that guided the knife. It is clear that this locution serves to absolve the culprit, at least in his own mind, from his responsibility for his act. It also seeks to persuade the listener that the culprit is not really guilty, that something other than his decisions led to the death of the victim. This was so even if the victim was a man against whom the perpetrator was known to have a serious grudge, and whom he sought out at the other side of the city having carried a knife with him. 

The human mind is a subtle instrument, and something more than straightforward lying was going on here. The culprit both believed what he was saying and knew perfectly well at the same time that it was nonsense. No doubt this kind of bad faith is not unique to the type of people I encountered in the hospital and the prison.

More here.

Den

Date night last night took us to Clint Eastwood's Jersey Boys.

It is a GREAT flick - a nostalgic piece, even for people who never lived back then!

Although Frankie Valli's rise to fame was meteoric, his ability to stay in the celestial sky and shine like the sun remains to today.

What a well written screenplay from the stage musical!

Go see it, and sing, sing, sing.

You'll laugh about Joe Pesci and roar at the end of the film - it's like watching the credits of a Bollywood film.

Go see it, Capeesh?

In particular, I enjoyed the one and only Four Seasons' piece December '63 (Oh, What a Night) that actually was part of my high school years.

Den