Leaders Lie, Civilians Die, and Lessons of History are Ignored

We've got so used to the carnage of the Middle East that we don't
care any more - providing we don't offend the Israelis. It's not clear
how many of the Gaza dead are civilians, but the response of the Bush
administration, not to mention the pusillanimous reaction of Gordon
Brown, reaffirm for Arabs what they have known for decades: however
they struggle against their antagonists, the West will take Israel's
side. As usual, the bloodbath was the fault of the Arabs - who, as we
all know, only understand force.

Ever
since 1948, we've been hearing this balderdash from the Israelis - just
as Arab nationalists and then Arab Islamists have been peddling their
own lies: that the Zionist "death wagon" will be overthrown, that all
Jerusalem will be "liberated". And always Mr Bush Snr or Mr Clinton or
Mr Bush Jnr or Mr Blair or Mr Brown have called upon both sides to
exercise "restraint" - as if the Palestinians and the Israelis both
have F-18s and Merkava tanks and field artillery. Hamas's home-made
rockets have killed just 20 Israelis in eight years, but a day-long
blitz by Israeli aircraft that kills almost 300 Palestinians is just
par for the course.

The blood-splattering has its own routine.
Yes, Hamas provoked Israel's anger, just as Israel provoked Hamas's
anger, which was provoked by Israel, which was provoked by Hamas, which
... See what I mean? Hamas fires rockets at Israel, Israel bombs Hamas,
Hamas fires more rockets and Israel bombs again and ... Got it? And we
demand security for Israel - rightly - but overlook this massive and
utterly disproportionate slaughter by Israel. It was Madeleine Albright
who once said that Israel was "under siege" - as if Palestinian tanks
were in the streets of Tel Aviv.

By last night, the exchange rate
stood at 296 Palestinians dead for one dead Israeli. Back in 2006, it
was 10 Lebanese dead for one Israeli dead. This weekend was the most
inflationary exchange rate in a single day since - the 1973 Middle East
War? The 1967 Six Day War? The 1956 Suez War? The 1948
Independence/Nakba War? It's obscene, a gruesome game - which Ehud
Barak, the Israeli Defence Minister, unconsciously admitted when he
spoke this weekend to Fox TV. "Our intention is to totally change the
rules of the game," Barak said.

Exactly. Only the "rules" of the
game don't change. This is a further slippage on the Arab-Israeli
exchanges, a percentage slide more awesome than Wall Street's crashing
shares, though of not much interest in the US which - let us remember -
made the F-18s and the Hellfire missiles which the Bush administration
pleads with Israel to use sparingly.

Quite a lot of the dead this
weekend appear to have been Hamas members, but what is it supposed to
solve? Is Hamas going to say: "Wow, this blitz is awesome - we'd better
recognise the state of Israel, fall in line with the Palestinian
Authority, lay down our weapons and pray we are taken prisoner and
locked up indefinitely and support a new American 'peace process' in
the Middle East!" Is that what the Israelis and the Americans and
Gordon Brown think Hamas is going to do?

Yes, let's remember
Hamas's cynicism, the cynicism of all armed Islamist groups. Their need
for Muslim martyrs is as crucial to them as Israel's need to create
them. The lesson Israel thinks it is teaching - come to heel or we will
crush you - is not the lesson Hamas is learning. Hamas needs violence
to emphasise the oppression of the Palestinians - and relies on Israel
to provide it. A few rockets into Israel and Israel obliges.

Not
a whimper from Tony Blair, the peace envoy to the Middle East who's
never been to Gaza in his current incarnation. Not a bloody word.

We
hear the usual Israeli line. General Yaakov Amidror, the former head of
the Israeli army's "research and assessment division" announced that
"no country in the world would allow its citizens to be made the target
of rocket attacks without taking vigorous steps to defend them". Quite
so. But when the IRA were firing mortars over the border into Northern
Ireland, when their guerrillas were crossing from the Republic to
attack police stations and Protestants, did Britain unleash the RAF on
the Irish Republic? Did the RAF bomb churches and tankers and police
stations and zap 300 civilians to teach the Irish a lesson? No, it did
not. Because the world would have seen it as criminal behaviour. We
didn't want to lower ourselves to the IRA's level.

Yes, Israel
deserves security. But these bloodbaths will not bring it. Not since
1948 have air raids protected Israel. Israel has bombed Lebanon
thousands of times since 1975 and not one has eliminated "terrorism".
So what was the reaction last night? The Israelis threaten ground
attacks. Hamas waits for another battle. Our Western politicians crouch
in their funk holes. And somewhere to the east - in a cave? a basement?
on a mountainside? - a well-known man in a turban smiles.