Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, March 06, 2008

Fisking the "human rights" organizations' report on Gaza

Der Spiegel reports:

A report sponsored by eight British-based aid agencies and human rights groups has described the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip as the worst in 40 years.

Isn't it interesting that they mention 40 years? Either they are claiming that things were probably worse under Egyptian administration, or they are far more likely to want to blame Israel than any Arabs for the Gaza situation.

Here are some interesting parts of the report, called "The Gaza Strip: A Humanitarian Implosion" The bias against Israel is clear:

In the months prior to the tightening of the blockade around 250 trucks a day entered Gaza with supplies 2, now the Sufa crossing is only able to deal with a maximum of 45 trucks a day 3.

Did you spot the logical fallacy? Yup - there is more than one crossing into Gaza. On Tuesday, while still under rocket attack, Israel worked to send some 160 trucks of aid through three crossings, and the reasons that many supplies of aid were curtailed is because of Palestinian Arab attacks on the crossings themselves! Nowhere do these "human rights" organizations mention those facts, twisting facts to make it appear that Israel is hell-bent on refusing humanitarian aid to Gaza.

The blockade is destroying public service infrastructure in Gaza. The Israeli government prevents the repair and maintenance of the electricity and
water service infrastructure in Gaza by prohibiting the import of spare parts.

And perhaps this has to do with terrorists using water pipes to build rockets? Israel has had to find non-metal pipes to help keep Gaza's sewage infrastructure running, and Israeli workers risk their lives daily to help Gazans. Again, any facts that might balance the report are ignored.

Israel has the right and duty to defend itself against indiscriminate rocket attacks against its civilian population, but the current policy fails to provide Israel with increased security and has led to increasing polarisation. As the head of UNRWA has pointed out, ‘Hungry, unhealthy, angry communities do not make good partners for peace.’

And the reason that Gaza overwhelmingly supported Hamas and rejected peace before the Israeli sanctions was because....?

The contention by Israeli officials that Israel is no longer bound by the laws of occupation since it redeployed its forces to the perimeter of the Gaza
Strip in 2005 is a fallacy. Israel retains effective control of the Gaza Strip, by virtue of the full control it exercises over the Gaza Strip's land border, its air space and territorial waters, and the movement of people and goods. Hence, the Israeli authorities are bound by their obligations under international humanitarian and human rights law to ensure the welfare of the Palestinian population in the OPT.

Besides the fact that this legal analysis is wrong, this also contains the small lie that Israel controls the Egyptian border with Gaza. By this logic, Egypt is also an "occupier" of Gaza - yet Egypt is barely mentioned in the report.

The "human rights" organizations go into uncharted bizarre waters when they blame Israel for falling grades in UNRWA-run schools:

In September 2007, an UNRWA survey in the Gaza Strip revealed that there was a nearly 80% failure rate in schools grades four to nine, with up to 90% failure rates in Mathematics. In January 2008, UNICEF reported that schools in Gaza had been cancelling classes that were high on energy consumption, such as IT, science labs and extra curricular activities.

This appears to be the "kitchen sink" philosophy in writing reports condemning Israel.

In January 2008, the British government stated that it did not support Israel’s closure of all crossings into Gaza as it prevented the delivery of vital supplies.

Israel never closed all the crossings into Gaza. The reference given was to “Gaza: Joint FCO and DFID statement”, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 8 February 2008 - which says no such thing. (It meant to refer to this document.)

In January 2008, up to half of Gaza’s population poured across the border into Egypt in what some commentators described as a “jail break.” Driven by need and diminishing supplies, it was an expression of the desperation felt by 1.5 million Palestinians who have been effectively imprisoned in Gaza over the past eight months.

Does this mean that every nation must let anyone who desires to enter their country? Gaza does have another border with Egypt. This report admits that Israel does let most Gazans in need of medical attention to leave. Israel also allowed Gazans to leave for the Hajj, only to be rewarded with more terrorists being let back in by Egypt. All of these facts are missing as the "even-handed" human rights organizations offer no alternatives to Israel, but blame it for everything it does.

In the absence of a functioning economy in Gaza, international aid is simply a stop-gap measure. Millions of pounds of European money, including that of UK taxpayers, is being spent, not on recovery, development and peace-building initiatives but on sustaining basic survival in Gaza. Meanwhile, Israel has one of the best performing economies in the world with steady 5% growth rates per annum for the last four years.

Now, why is that last fact relevant? Is it to imply that Israel is so rich that it should be giving supplies to those who want to see it destroyed? Or is it just to make Israel - alone among any successful nations - appear to be an ungrateful neighbor of the pleasant Gazans?

The Israeli government prevents the repair and maintenance of the electricity and water service infrastructure in Gaza by prohibiting the import of spare parts.

The report conveniently doesn't mention the fact that Israel has gone out of its way to fix Gaza electricity problems, or that Israel has allowed entire generators to enter Gaza.

It also doesn't mention anything about Gaza fuel companies refusing deliveries.

The international policy of isolating Hamas has not reaped any benefits. On the contrary, it has led to increasing polarisation across the Occupied Palestinian Territories and resulted in a political stalemate with Israel....

We ask that once a representative national authority has been created that it is recognized by the UK government, the international community and the Israeli government as a legitimate party.

Forget the fact that Hamas is sworn to destroy Israel and treat them as if they are a respected nation with no repercussions for their actions. Because human rights doesn't apply to Israelis in Sderot and Ashkelon.

Islamic Jihad distributes candy

An Israeli soldier was killed this morning by an apparent IED:

An IDF soldier was killed Thursday morning and another was seriously injured as Palestinians detonated an explosive device near an IDF Sufa jeep patrolling the area near the Gaza Strip border, not far from the Kissufim crossing.

A Hamas source told Ynet that immediately after the incident, the gunmen fired at the force in a bid to disrupt the rescue efforts. They then escaped and took shelter. According to eyewitnesses, the vehicle went up in flames. Several residents gathered nearby and expressed their joy over the incident.

Palestine Today (Arabic) mentions:

Al-Quds Brigades distributed sweets in the streets of Gaza rifles process Kissufim

And the father of the infant girl who was killed in the crossfire when the IDF killed an Islamic Jihad leader - probably by Palestinian Arab fire, but being blamed on Israel - congratulated Islamic Jihad for the operation.

UPDATE: Picture of the candy here. (I'm now hesitant to post wire service photos that might not fall under "fair use.")

Qatar - a tradition of anti-semitic cartoons

It is not surprising that Qatar is bankrolling Hamas. After all, Qatar is in the forefront of Arab anti-semitism.

And no matter how much Arab countries claim that they are merely anti-Zionist, somehow classic anti-semitism manages to leak through. From Qatar's al-Watan: (h/t MEMRI blog)

Apparently, this newspaper - whose chairman is a member of the royal family and whose half-owner is Qatar's foreign minister - has a recurring "Jew" as a character in its cartoons.The ADL lists a few from 2003:

Do these hook-nosed, bearded, sidelocked, black-hatted people look Zionist to you? They are based on Nazi caricatures of Polish Jews in the 1930s:

Israel values Gaza lives more than Gazans do

As a followup to my story earlier today...

From Ha'aretz (h/t Meryl Yourish):

According to reports from Gaza, dozens of Palestinian civilians were also killed in the fighting. The army says the fighting took place in a densely populated area, and Hamas gunmen sometimes using families hiding in their homes as human shields. The army also said the rules of engagement prohibit intentional firing on civilians, however in cases where a source of fire was clearly identified as coming from a home, permission was given to open fire without determining whether civilians were also present.

The officers said some of the Palestinian civilians were hit by "heavy and inaccurate" Palestinian fire. In one case the commander of the brigade reconnaissance force saw a boy of about 10 sent to bring a weapon from a dead gunman after another gunman was killed trying to retrieve it. The commander ordered his men not to fire and the boy delivered the weapon to other armed men.

And this is from the most Arab-leaning newspaper in Israel.

Apparently, Israel cares more about Palestinian Arab civilians than PalArabs themselves do. For example, today Israeli police stopped an Ashkelon man from firing his own homemade rocket into Gaza:

Ashkelon resident Moshe Nissimpor decided that the best way to halt rocket fire from Gaza - in light of what he terms the government's failure to do so - is some vigilante justice.

Nissimpor developed a homemade 200-millimeter ballistic missile which he planned to launch from Ashkelon into the Gaza Strip.
"From this day onwards, we will push back to the stone age every place which dares shoot missiles into Israel's sovereign territory," he said Wednesday. "It is time the world understood Israelis' lives are not expendable."
"I'm afraid this is the only language the Palestinians understand, and this is the language in which we'll speak to them. I have many Gazan Palestinian friends who live as Hamas hostages. Once we bring an end to the rocket fire, Gaza's residents will also live in peace," he said.
Nissimpor arrived at the Ashkelon Municipality building with the missile painted black and lettered "to Hamas, from the residents of Ashkelon" in red, and was planning to launch it.
Ashkelon residents gathered round to cheer him on and protest the government's conduct, but at the eleventh hour, police stopped him from firing the missile and seized it.

"I wish there were more 'crazies' like me in Israel," Nissimpor said as the crowd was dispersed by the police.

Given that many Gaza rockets fall short and injure Palestinian Arabs, we see that Israel is better at protecting Gaza civilians both from rockets and from bullets than the Gazan terror groups themselves.

One more confirmed self-death

Even though my self-death count is comparatively low this year, I don't think that PalArabs have gotten more peaceful. It is just that between the news crackdown that Hamas imposed on reporters and the fact that Hamas will sometimes hide their own murders as being victims of Israel it is much harder to find out the truth.

Occasionally, a story does leak out, though. From Palpress:

Citizens and eyewitnesses of the al-Shati refugee camp west of Gaza City said that a guard of Ismail Haniya Prime Minister killed in Gaza this morning Ms. Safiya Al Mahdi and killed her in front of her house Ismail Haniya in the Beach camp.

Eyewitnesses said that "one of the guards Haniya recklessly tampering with the arms resulted in the exit bullet struck Ms. died in the killing immediately on impact."

It is interesting that out of the 28 known violent self-deaths by the PalArabs this year, fully 12 of the victims were women or children.

UPDATE: And one more:

A 30-year-old Israeli was moderately to seriously wounded and a Palestinian killed Wednesday evening in a shooting attack in the West Bank village of Idna, near Hebron.
Israel Radio reported that the Israeli was sitting in his car with Muhammad Nufal, 40, when terrorists opened fire at them from a passing car. Nufal was killed, but the Israeli, who sustained a wound to his stomach, drove himself to the nearby Tarkumiya checkpoint.
Some two hours after the incident, the Fatah-affiliated Aksa Martyrs Brigades claimed responsibility for the shooting. The Palestinian news agency Ma'an said the Aksa Brigades issued a statement in which it said that the "business deal" had been a trap. The report was unconfirmed by security officials.

29.

Qatar bankrolling Hamas is news - what about the PA?

The Washington Times reports:

Palestinian officials yesterday said Hamas is receiving millions of dollars from the Gulf state of Qatar, some of which they suspect is used to purchase weapons.
...
Palestinian Authority officials said that oil-rich Qatar has been such a staunch supporter and promoter of Hamas — both financially and politically — that it is in a unique position to influence the Hamas leadership.
"Qatar gives Hamas millions of dollars a month [on average]," a senior aide to Mr. Abbas told The Washington Times on the sidelines of the Rice-Abbas meetings in the West Bank city of Ramallah. "They say the money is for the people of Gaza, but Hamas steals it, and some of it may be used to buy weapons."

It is most interesting that the PA is accusing Qatar of sending millions to Gaza that Hamas is probably stealing.

Because the PA does exactly the same thing.

Fully 58% of the PA budget goes to Gaza, which means that hundreds of millions of Western dollars meant to prop up the PA is instead going to help Hamas, directly or indirectly. And in recent days Abbas pledged to send more money to Gaza in reaction to Israel's raids.

Exactly what accountability is here for the millions that the PA sends to Gaza every month?

For them to complain that Qatar is bankrolling Hamas is a bit rich.

Hamas broadcast calls for human shields

From the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center:

The following are examples of calls in the Palestinian media for Palestinians civilians to serve as human shields:

1) Hamas's Al-Aqsa TV and PalMedia Website called upon civilians to form a human shield at the home of Abu al-Hatal in the Sajaiya neighborhood (in Al-Sha'af according to other version) because the IDF had threatened to blow it up (March 1).

The inscription reads: “Hamas calls upon on [the Palestinian] public to come
to the house of Abu al-Hatal in al-Sha'af [neighborhood] to act
as human shields” (Al-Aqsa TV, March 1).

2) Al-Aqsa TV called upon the Palestinians in the northern Gaza Strip to go to the house of shaheed Othman al-Ruziana to protect it because the IDF was threatening to blow it up (February 29).

3) Al-Aqsa TV called upon the residents of Khan Yunis to gather at the house of Ma'amoun Abu ‘Amer because the IDF was threatening to blow it up (February 28). An hour later dozens of Palestinians from Khan Yunis were reported to have gathered on the roof of Abu ‘Amer's house to serve as human shields to prevent the house from being hit (Pal-today Website, February 28) .

4) Al-Aqsa TV called upon Palestinians in the northern Gaza Strip to go to the house of shaheed Musab al-Ja'abir to protect it because Israel was threatening to blow it up (February 29).

5) The PIJ's Radio Sawt al-Quds called upon civilian to gather around the house of Fawzi Abu al-Hamed in the Absan al-Kabira region to prevent it from being blown up by the IDF (March 1).
Hamas prime minister Ismail Haniya boasted to Al-Jazeera TV of the “firm stance” of the Palestinians. As an example he said that the “occupation” had threatened to blow up buildings but nevertheless hundreds and thousands of Palestinians had left their homes “in the middle of the night” and gone up on the roofs of the houses the Israelis had threatened to blow up (Al-Jazeera TV, February 29).

I will restate what I wrote in 2006 for a similar story:

The use of human shields is the use of Israel's morality as a weapon against Israel.

It is interesting that while the PalArabs never tire of telling the world that Israel is practicing "genocide" and "ethnic cleansing" and "daily massacres" and "indiscriminate attacks," - and now they are adding "holocaust" to that list - they know that it is all a bunch of crap. Because they know that Israel will not purposefully attack civilians.

And they know it so well, they are willing to risk their own lives, banking on the morality of this supposedly genocidal army.

If the Palestinian Jews were one-tenth as bad as the Palestinian Arabs claim they are, why would they hesitate to kill the hundreds of human shields? Hell, if Israel is interested in ethnic cleansing as we are being told daily, having this big fat target would make the job so much easier, right?

Contrast this with the PalArab philosophy, where victories are measured in the number of dead Palestinian Jewish civilians and bombing of pizza shops is a "victory." Qassams that manage to hit Jews are celebrated. Deep down, everyone on the planet knows that there is no comparison between the morality of the IDF and that of the PalArab terror groups. Everyone knows that Jewish women and children are the intended targets of suicide bombs and Qassam rockets. Everyone knows that the vast majority of Israelis grieve over the accidental deaths of Palestinian Arab civilians while the PalArabs hand out candy at the deaths of large numbers of Jews.

And the proof is easy: how effective would "human shields" be in Sderot or Ashkelon? When the intended targets are civilians, the idea of human shields is ludicrous. They only work when the opponent is moral.

But despite these blindingly obvious facts, the world is still willing to condemn Israel and give the Palestinian Arabs a free pass.

Sharia vs. the tea pot

A Malaysian woman has been jailed for two years for belonging to a cult that worships a giant tea pot.

From the Telegraph (UK):

Kamariah Ali, a 57 year old former teacher, was arrested in 2005 when the government of the Muslim majority country demolished the two storey high sacred tea pot and other infrastructure of the "heretical" Sky Kingdom cult.
For the eccentric sect, which emphasised ecumenical dialogue between religions, the tea pot symbolized the purity of water and "love pouring from heaven".
But in Malaysia, despite constitutional guarantees of freedom of worship, born Muslims such as Mrs Ali are forbidden from converting to other religions.
Passing sentence, the Sharia judge Mohammed Abdullah said: "The court is not convinced that the accused has repented and is willing to abandon any teachings contrary to Islam. I pray God will open the doors of your heart, Kamariah."
Mrs Ali has already been jailed once for apostasy, for 20 months in 1992.
"This has to stop. They can’t be sending her again and again to prison for this," her lawyer, Sa'adiah Din, told reporters.
"She informed the court that she is not a Muslim. She doesn't come under Sharia court anymore."

AsiaNews adds more details on the teapot cult:

Born in the mid ‘80’s, the community grew outside state control until 1998, when its followers set up a Disneyland style games park – with buildings in the form of umbrellas, colourful boats, Greek and roman columns – at the centre of which they placed a gigantic teapot and equally massive blue vase. By this means they began proselytising among villagers and foreigners.
In August of 2005, Islamic fundamentalists destroyed their deity and the structures where they gathered.

Can't we all discuss this civilly over a cup of...oh, sorry, didn't mean to offend.

Sorry, but the old one-week records still stand

The Arab News, in its never-ending quest to put the most falsehoods possible in their anti-Israel op-eds, added another one today:

[O]nce again Palestinian suffering and death tolls continue to break records in the territories occupied by Israel since 1967.

It appears that the Arab News is considering the roughly 110 Palestinian Arabs killed since last Wednesday to be some sort of a record of deaths in a week.

Of course, they don't want to remember that this particular record belongs to Palestinian Arabs themselves, who managed in the seven days between June 10 and June 16, 2007 to kill 148 of each other.

So if Israel's actions are a "holocaust" - which is now the word being used universally in Arabic media to describe the events of the past week - then Hamas and Fatah must really be guilty of self-genocide.

Even the Arab News knows enough to limit the idea of PalArab suffering to "in the territories" which allows them to not compare the current Israeli actions with, say, Black September, 1970 when 3400 Palestinian Arabs were killed by Jordanians in an eleven day period. Or even January 18, 1976 when Lebanese Christians killed 1000 Lebanese and Palestinian Muslims in a single day.

Is the death of some 75 terrorists and 35 civilians over seven days (my estimate based on PCHR listings of the circumstances of death) worse than the expulsion of 400,000 Palestinian Arabs from Kuwait in 1991 - also in a single week? After all, if expulsion is considered "ethnic cleansing" and tantamount to genocide - which is the Arab definition when applied to Israel - then Kuwait might win the prize.

It's so tough to compare which has been the worst week in Palestinian Arab history, but what seems clear is that however you slice it, this week doesn't come close.

Not that the Arab media would ever admit it.

Magic bullet

al-Aretz headlines:

IDF kills infant, top Islamic Jihad militant in southern Gaza

And in the details we learn:

A two-week-old Palestinian infant was killed after nightfall on Tuesday in a brief Israel Defense Forces ground operation in the southern Gaza Strip, Palestinian officials said, just a day after Israel ended a bloody offensive in northern Gaza against Palestinian rocket squads.

A senior Islamic Jihad operative, Yussuf Samiri, was also killed. Israeli defense officials said that Samiri had been the intended target of the operation.

...Witnesses said IDF tanks fired shells and fighter helicopters fired missiles. A 1-month-old baby girl, Amira Abu-Assar, was killed by a ricocheting bullet, medical officials said.

How exactly do the Palestinian Arab "medical officials" always know that Israeli bullets are the ones that invariably kill civilians whenever there is a firefight? One would expect to see some Palestinian Arab casualties from "friendly fire," but for some reason those incidents are never reported.
Palestine Today (Arabic) reports that "fighters from the Al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Jihad Movement, fought in violent armed clashes with automatic weapons and anti-tank missiles" during this battle. So clearly there were bullets flying from both sides.

Do Gaza police have forensics labs that can identify bullet fragments, perform some metallurgical and chemical tests, look at the trajectories and ricochet angles, and definitively identify their source within minutes of the fatality?

Every single incident, Israel is blamed, and so-called "news" organizations - including Israel's major pro-Arab newspaper - report the Palestinian Arab claims without skepticism or question.

Mishloach Manot for Sderot families

Purim is coming, and Sderot is the most appropriate place to send gift baskets:

This Purim, Connections Israel plans to deliver a holiday gift basket to every family in Sderot (10,000 families in total) with a letter of support from a Jewish family overseas. This project will connect families and communities in a major expression of Jewish unity.
Every Diaspora community’s name and contribution will be marked in a major exhibit that will take place in Sderot after before Purim and will show the support, care and solidarity from the Jews around the world.

Contact your community leader to promote this event.

Urge other caring families to join this project !!!

Write a warm greeting card to a family in Sderot - make it personal! add a picture and a blessing for the holiday and mail it to us.

If you like you can donate a holiday gift basket ($36) and your letter will be included.

160 trucks of aid scheduled today

From YNet:

The Kerem Shalom terminal in the southern Gaza Strip was expected to reopen Tuesday after being closed for six weeks for security reasons.

Some 20 trucks carrying humanitarian aid to the Palestinians were expected to pass through the terminal, while 60 additional trucks containing equipment and medications were to cross the border at the Suffa crossing.

The Kerem Shalom crossing was used as an alternative terminal after the Karni crossing in the northern Strip was shut down. The terminal was shut down, however, after the defense establishment received warnings on terror organization's plans to carry out attacks at the area, and after mortar shells were fired at the terminal while goods were passing through it.

On Tuesday, the IDF was instructed to reopen the crossing, allowing a limited number of trucks to enter Gaza while following the developments in the area on a daily basis.

Sixty trucks were expected to pass through the Suffa crossing with medications, as well as equipment and food from the United Nations and donations from Jordan and Turkey. In addition, 80 trucks carrying grains were to enter the Strip through the Karni crossing.

Meanwhile, three Qassams landed in Israel so far today, to correspond with the three crossings that goods will be shipped through.

Video of near-lynching in Jerusalem

Here is the Channel 10 story from yesterday of two Jerusalem municipal workers being nearly lynched by peaceful Palestinian Arab protesters using stones and metal bars.

Defending against terror impossible in international law

Human rights organizations have two main problems with Israel defending itself: the "principle of distinction" and "the principle of proportionality." These are not what the Geneva Conventions calls them but they are the shorthand for the following rules.

The principle of distinction refers to Article 48 of Protocol 1, which states:

In order to ensure respect for and protection of the civilian population and civilian objects, the Parties to the conflict shall at all times distinguish between the civilian population and combatants and between civilian objects and military objectives and accordingly shall direct their operations only against military objectives.

And the principle of proportionality comes from article 51, paragraph 5(b) (bolded):

1. The civilian population and individual civilians shall enjoy general protection against dangers arising from military operations. To give effect to this protection, the following rules, which are additional to other applicable rules of international law, shall be observed in all circumstances.
...
4. Indiscriminate attacks are prohibited. Indiscriminate attacks are: (a) those which are not directed at a specific military objective; (b) those which employ a method or means of combat which cannot be directed at a specific military objective; or (c) those which employ a method or means of combat the effects of which cannot be limited as required by this Protocol;

and consequently, in each such case, are of a nature to strike military objectives and civilians or civilian objects without distinction.

5. Among others, the following types of attacks are to be considered as indiscriminate: (a) an attack by bombardment by any methods or means which treats as a single military objective a number of clearly separated and distinct military objectives located in a city, town, village or other area containing a similar concentration of civilians or civilian objects;

and

(b) an attack which may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated.
...

7. The presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations. The Parties to the conflict shall not direct the movement of the civilian population or individual civilians in order to attempt to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield military operations.

You will notice that Hamas often violates paragraph 7 above by telling citizens to act as human shields, as they did in Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya in 2006. And, of course, Qassam and Grad rockets by their very nature violate the Geneva Conventions multiple times by targeting civilians, by not distinguishing between civilians and military targets, by punishing the civilian population for perceived crimes of the military, and many others. Beyond that, Hamas routinely violates other aspects of Geneva, such as by placing military objects in civilian areas, by taking medicines and fuel from hospitals, by placing Fatah prisoners in areas where they are in danger and many, many others.

But Hamas can do all of this with impunity, because of Paragraph 8:

8. Any violation of these prohibitions shall not release the Parties to the conflict from their legal obligations with respect to the civilian population and civilians, including the obligation to take the precautionary measures provided for in Article 57.

So no matter how much Hamas violates the Geneva Conventions, Israel must respect the laws with regard to civilian lives. Only Israel is under international pressure to adhere to Geneva; no Arab nation is similarly pressuring Hamas to follow international law.

Hamas has the means and the history of violating dozens of provisions of international humanitarian law and can do so with no fear of sanctions or serious condemnation, and not even the fear of Israel doing the same. There is no way that Israel can attack rocket launchers without some civilians being killed as long as Hamas places them in schools and sends teenage boys out to retrieve the launchers.

In recent days we have seen people representing the EU and UN and human rights organizations who say, in all seriousness, that "Israel has the right to defend itself" - but they cannot say how it is possible without violating Geneva in one way or another. This is because it isn't possible.

It is literally impossible for a nation, hamstrung by international law, to fight against a terrorist foe that flouts that same law.

The only alternatives for Israel are:

* to ignore international law and accept the consequences.

* to be a sitting duck and let Israeli citizens die

* to adhere to the law as much as possible - a slippery slope because there will inevitably be violations in defensive actions and double-standard pressure for Israel to adhere 100%.

What needs to be done is to modify Geneva's Article 51 paragraph 8 to lay the responsibility for civilian injuries and deaths squarely on the parties that ignore the law. If the world blames Hamas for not properly separating civilians from military targets, and therefore blames Hamas for any civilians killed, there would be a short-term loss of lives but over time Hamas will be forced to abandon its policy of hiding military targets in civilian areas - thus saving many, many more lives in the long run.

We need to change the calculus for the terrorists, to force them to consider the death of their own civilians as a loss rather than a positive. And the way to do that is to place the blame for their civilian deaths squarely on them. Only when they start adhering to Geneva will it make sense to expect their enemies to do the same.