Yesterday, in a daring raid, Israel found and rescued four hostages that hamas had held for 8 months – four of the 250 or so hamas captured last October 7, when they massacred 1,200 – 1,400 Israelis, thus causing Israel to declare war the next day.
In the course of rescuing these hostages, a number of Gazan civilians were killed.
Currently, hamas claims over 200 were killed, many of them women and children. It does not mention how many hamas “soldiers” were among them.
The world, of course, has come down on Israel. Not hamas, but Israel.
The UN and other world bodies have quickly asserted that Israel is in the wrong for rescuing its citizens from the hamas hostage-takers. That it should not have done so.
I have a few questions for the righteous folks attacking Israel for its raid-and-rescue operation:
-The four hostages were being held by a terrorist organization committed in writing to Israel’s destruction and the death of all Jews – not just in Israel, but everywhere else as well. Israel acquired intelligence regarding where they were and could get to them. If you had that intelligence, what would you have done? Left them there to the tender mercies of people committed to killing them?
-Why would you believe any of the casualty “information” hamas has issued, since hamas has been shown to regularly lie about casualties throughout the 8 months since its October 7, 2023 attack?
-If women and children were killed during the rescue operation, who put the hostages where, in order for a rescue to take place, civilian casualties would occur? Does it not stand to reason that – as usual – hamas used their own Gazan civilians as human shields?
– And if hamas used their own Gazan civilians as human shields, who do you blame for the casualties incurred when Israel rescued its citizens?
I would like to think that, even as the world condemns Israel for its successful rescue operation, there are people – maybe a great many of them – who realize where blame for the civilian casualties actually resides. People who don’t reflexively blame Israel for the situation they were presented with. People who put the blame where it should be; on hamas and its apologists.
I hope so.
