Tuesday 30 December 2008

And so it is war...

The Israeli public has rarely been a dutiful amen chorus for its political leaders, to say the least. Israel’s hyper-active democracy involves frequent demonstrations attacking the government of the day from the left and the right. Public opinion led to commissions of inquiry into the Yom Kippur War of 1973, and more recently, the 2006 Second Lebanon War. Twenty-five years ago massive public protests against government policy during the First Lebanon War led to the removal of Defence Minister Ariel Sharon.

All of this makes the overwhelming public support for this campaign against Hamas in Gaza all the more notable. A few days before the attack began, the left-wing Meretz Party – unwaveringly committed to a negotiated two-state deal with the Palestinians – called for military action against Hamas.

Israel has had enough.

Wednesday 16 July 2008

Swapping coffins for murderers

Today was Israel’s blackest day since I arrived some seven months ago. The ‘prisoner swap’, painstakingly thrashed out between Israel and the Lebanese terrorist group Hizballah reached its macabre conclusion. The two soldiers abducted by Hizballah almost exactly two years ago were returned to Israel, and Israel returned to the Lebanese convicted murderer Samir Kuntar and four Hizballah gunmen captured during the 2006 war sparked by the abduction.

Except, of course, the two Israeli soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, returned to their homeland in coffins.

It has been quite extraordinary witnessing the debate generated by this saga. Should Israel release the murderers of its citizens in return for dead soldiers? Indeed, should Israel release murderers at all - whether the soldiers are alive or dead? Should the entire principle, which the State of Israel has adhered to throughout its 60 years of existence, of placing the return of its soldiers over almost all other moral concerns, be abandoned?