[Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette] Mark Lavie - Look at your ceiling now. Can it stop a rocket? That's what Israelis are asking. It puzzles Israelis when the world comes down on them hard for what they see as pure self-defense. But it does come down on them, every time. The mitigating factor this time is that most of the world despises Hamas even more than it holds Israel to impossible standards. Tens of thousands of civilians have been killed in operations by U.S. forces and their allies in Iraq. Thousands of civilians have died in Afghanistan in coalition air raids aimed at Taliban and al-Qaeda. No one cheers when it happens, but civilian casualties are not the focus of criticism of those wars. Unless the overall equation is changed, unless something is done to make Gaza livable and not a crucible of extremism, this is just going to happen again. The writer is an Associated Press correspondent who has covered the Mideast since 1972.
2009-01-02 06:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive