Well in a legal sense, Israel is not a member of the International Criminal Court or even the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (which is extraordinary), so any legal punishment will have to come from Israeli citizens themselves (which, thank goodness, there are many brave individuals who are prepared to fight their own government in its own courts).
In a military sense, the current government is playing a very, very dangerous game. This action has caused a great deal of anger in the neighbouring Arab states. It is quite plausible that it could lead to a larger zone of conflict which Israel would find very difficult to win. The northern border is, of course, very jittery at the moment, but militarily a more frightening prospect would be an intervention by Egypt; fortunately for Israel, the Egyptian leadership is pretty pathetic.
The "We are only defending ourselves" is getting REALLY thin and threadbare.
Even to the extent that Israel is protecting itself, it hasn't been particularly convincing that this is the right strategy. Heck, you just don't shell a school full of kids because there might be a couple of militia hiding in there. You don't launch a massive invasion threatening the lives of more than a million civilians because there's a handful of casulties from Qassam rockets.
An armed force of UN peacekeepers (unlike the unarmed UN observers in southern Lebanon) on both sides of the borders of Gaza and the West Bank would be one solution, for example.
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Date: 2009-01-08 05:34 am (UTC)In a military sense, the current government is playing a very, very dangerous game. This action has caused a great deal of anger in the neighbouring Arab states. It is quite plausible that it could lead to a larger zone of conflict which Israel would find very difficult to win. The northern border is, of course, very jittery at the moment, but militarily a more frightening prospect would be an intervention by Egypt; fortunately for Israel, the Egyptian leadership is pretty pathetic.
The "We are only defending ourselves" is getting REALLY thin and threadbare.
Even to the extent that Israel is protecting itself, it hasn't been particularly convincing that this is the right strategy. Heck, you just don't shell a school full of kids because there might be a couple of militia hiding in there. You don't launch a massive invasion threatening the lives of more than a million civilians because there's a handful of casulties from Qassam rockets.
An armed force of UN peacekeepers (unlike the unarmed UN observers in southern Lebanon) on both sides of the borders of Gaza and the West Bank would be one solution, for example.