On this day, six months ago, Hamas barbarically attacked Israel. Of the roughly 250 people taken as hostages on 7 October, 34 are known to be dead, and 130 remain in captivity.
Anthony Blinken has his share of worries. Evidently, not so much about the remaining hostages. One concern of President Joe Biden’s secretary of state is that Israel will become like Hamas.
“Democracies place the highest value on human life, every human life. As it has been said, whoever saves a life, saves the entire world,” he pronounced during a press conference in Brussels late last week. “That’s our strength. It’s what distinguishes us from terrorists like Hamas. If we lose that reverence for human life, we risk becoming indistinguishable from those we confront.”
A Moral Observation Charade
On a general rule, it’s true, maintains Rich Lowry in NRO.
… if Israel began sending fighters into Gaza villages to kill, rape, and kidnap civilians, it would be a terror group just like Hamas.
Since Israel isn’t doing this, nor will it ever, the Blinken statement represents a shameful smear masquerading as an unassailable moral observation.
- Israel is a Democratic state, which abides by Western norms, including honoring the laws of war. It is trying to maneuver through the extreme difficulties of combating a terrorist group that secrets itself among the civilian population.
- Hamas is a terrorist group that evicted its political rival from the territory by force. Hamas flagrantly and unapologetically violates the rules of war and is trying to do everything to maximize civilian casualties for propaganda purposes.
Who Started the War
Israel did not start the war; Hamas did, notes Mr. Lowry. This was not by accident in a hair-trigger situation. Rather, malice was its intent.
Israel seeks to discriminate between enemy fighters and civilians; Hamas deliberately targets innocents. Israel apologizes for its mistakes and attempts to rectify them; Hamas makes no mistakes — not that it will acknowledge, at least.
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… even if you oppose Israel’s war or how it’s prosecuting it, and even if you despise Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — any hint that the two sides could be comparable is deluded or cynical, the product of an ideologically driven inability to make basic distinctions or of a desire to pander to anti-Israel animus. It represents a return of the worst sort of moral equivalence that characterized much of the Left’s thinking during the Cold War.
