Now we hold our breath — and our noses. The killing of Sheikh Yassin has once again exposed both the terrible dilemma of Israel in attempting to defend itself against annihilatory attack, and the moral bankruptcy of the world in its response.

Israel undoubtedly wanted both to start to clear Hamas out of Gaza before it withdrew, and to show that it was not withdrawing out of weakness. Those in other countries who enjoy the luxury of not being marked down for extermination, as Israel and the Jews are marked down by Hamas, interpret this as an atavistic and destructively pointless beating of chests. In fact, it can make the difference between life and death, since any perception that Israel is weakened will lead to more murder of Jews. Does the world care about such considerations? No.

In any event, attacks upon Israel are likely to continue regardless. Israel is as ever in a cleft stick, damned if it does and damned if it doesn’t. The only question — and it is an agonising one — is whether the means it chooses to try to prevent more of its citizens from being murdered will merely increase the toll. Such is the terrible choice it faces, only to be condemned by the rest of the world for choosing not to do the decent thing and passively submit to the relentless murder of its people. Because as we all know, Jews don’t do self-defence — they only do revenge.

It is jolly decent of Xavier Solana, Kofi Annan, Joschka Fischer and Uncle Tom Appeaser and all to be so concerned about a possible escalation of violence in the region. It would have been nice had they expressed similar concern about the murder of hundreds of Israelis at the hands of Yassin and other terrorists over the years, to the extent of actually coming up with a practical means of stopping further carnage — or at the very least, ceasing to pay for it and sympathise with it, if that's not too much to ask of them. As it is, their shrill condemnation of Israel for defending itself sets up nicely their likely response when more Israelis are murdered, when they will be able once again to blame the Jews for their own destruction.

That is not to say that Ariel Sharon has made the right judgment call here. Who can see into the future, and say whether or not he has? He appears to have made a calculation: that the killing may motivate revenge attacks in the short term, but will ultimately leave a leadership vacuum in Hamas which will diminish such attacks in the long-term. Such is the kind of deadly trade-off -- and gamble -- made inevitable by the trap from which Israel cannot extricate itself, until and unless the rest of the world breaks the habit of a century's abdication of responsibility in the Middle East, and stops dancing to the terrorists' tune.

According to Ha’aretz: 'Yossi Kuperwasser, head of the Military Intelligence research department, said Monday that the absence of leadership could harm Hamas activities. He said there were no other leaders in the organization who possess Yassin's leadership qualities…In Palestinian eyes, said Kuperwasser, Israel crossed a red line with the assassination of Yassin. He said the Palestinians are now bothered by the possibility Israel might cross the line again.’

Nevertheless, the killing has provoked a rival analysis that it will not only make the violence in Israel worse but will now broaden it out to target Jews worldwide. Indeed, Hamas has already threatened America, which — of course — it claims endorsed the killing. According to Dr. Reuven Paz, Director of the Project for the Research of Islamist Movements: ‘Yassin's demise could have severe repercussions not only in Israel, but will cause reactions throughout the entire Moslem world and lead to attacks against Israelis and Jews abroad. "We are talking about Moslems in Europe and the United States who identify with the Hamas and its policies, and recruit funds on its behalf," he said. "I believe that the same Hamas supporters abroad will also begin to recruit activists to wage attacks against Israeli and Jewish targets abroad, and we could possibly see elements affiliated with Al Qaeda recruiting activists on behalf of the Hamas… "I can't see anything good coming out of it. I believe in the coming weeks, we will witness an escalation of violence, not just suicide bomb attacks, but attacks carried out by loners who aren't affiliated with any movement but seek revenge," he said. "It is also possible that Yassin's death will lead to a further strengthening of ties between the Fatah's Al Aksa Brigades, Islamic Jihad and Hamas who have launched a number of joint attacks in the past and may well decide to continue," he said.’

Ha’aretz makes a similar bleak forecast that the war against the Jews may now be spread more widely:

‘The immediate danger is that Hamas, lacking a clear cut leader, will split into factions, as happened to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt or the Jihad in Algeria, with some of the groups aligning with Al-Qaida. Such factions create their own ideologies and operations that don't necessarily take into consideration the local conditions. Palestinian groups have so far been careful to stay clear of alignment with Al-Qaida. But Abdel Aziz Rantisi yesterday announced that Hamas had opened a special account with Israel, calling the assassination of Yassin a declaration of war on Islam. That will have real significance if Hamas decides to turn its back on years of strategy and begin operations outside the country, striking at Israeli, Jewish or American targets overseas. There are many infrastructures overseas ready to cooperate with Hamas and the dilemma for the organization now is whether to become part of a global organization, which it has so far avoided. The answer apparently depends largely on their assessments on how it would affect the Palestinian cause if Palestinian terror begins operating overseas again.’

Whatever the debate over Israel’s tactics, there is no doubt that Yassin was a prime architect of a strategy of mass murder and was intent on continuing to escalate the toll of innocents. Which makes the response by Tony Blair’s spokesman remarkable for its hypocrisy: ‘We have repeatedly made clear our opposition to Israel's use of targeted killings and assassinations. We recognise Israel's right to defend itself against terrorism, but equally any steps should be within international law and should be neither disproportionate nor excessive.’ Oh really? So where exactly does this leave the current attempt by Britain and the US to hunt down and almost certainly kill Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants?

While remarks made by Foreign Secretary Jack Straw defied belief: ‘Mr Straw said that he did not believe that Israel would benefit from the killing of an old man in a wheelchair’.

‘An old man in a wheelchair’? This was in the same league as the BBC ‘obituary’ of Yassin, which under the headline: ‘Sheikh Yassin: Spiritual figurehead’ eulogised thus:

‘Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the founder and spiritual leader of Hamas, was a frail quadriplegic who could barely see. His voice was thin and quavering.’

To paint this man as a saintly, pious ‘spiritual leader’ is obscene. As the Israeli foreign ministry observed: ‘Yassin was at important link in international terror, and Hamas had connections with other terror groups around the world. Trying to characterize Yassin as a "spiritual leader" is similar to trying to characterize Osama bin Laden in the same vein. Yassin took advantage of his status as a spiritual leader to influence the carrying out of hundreds of murderous attacks, from the Dolphinarium attack in Tel Aviv in 2001 to the Passover eve attack in Netanya in 2002. He personally was responsible for the June 2002 attack on the Number 19 bus in Jerusalem at the Patt Junction, in which 19 people were murdered and 74 wounded. Yassin led for years a radical Islamic terror organization that carried out a long list of horrible attacks which killed and wounded hundreds of Israelis. Yassin was a chilling example of the cynical use of religion to send women and children to blow themselves up and kill hundreds of Israelis.’

His toll so far stands thus: ‘Over the past 3 1/2 years, the Hamas has, in 425 attacks, killed 377 Israelis and wounded 2076. Hamas perpetrated 52 suicide attacks, in which 288 people were killed and 1646 were wounded.’

Proportionate to the population, that would translate in Britain as 3,770 murdered and more than 20,000 wounded in three and a half years — with the threat of many more to follow until the British state was destroyed. Would the Prime Minister say in those circumstances that the killing of the ultimate perpetrator was ‘excessive’? Would the Foreign Secretary paint such a mortal enemy as ‘an old man in a wheelchair’? Or would they regard it as their bounden duty to safeguard the state and prevent more of their citizens from being annihilated by all possible means?

Why this double standard all the time? Why do Britain and Europe suspend normal moral responses where Israel is concerned?

For the Jews, in Israel in particular but now also in America and Britain, the immediate outlook is fearful. This demented, hate-fuelled, homicidal frenzy is now to be spread still further, with many more innocents explicitly targeted — but in the warped moral universe of those who govern the countries of Europe, it is the victims who are once more to be blamed for their own demise.

Posted by melanie at March 22, 2004