Justice On Offense - For A Change

   As I watch the drama of Israel's present military operations in Gaza, an aspect that almost never seems to be discussed in the Western press stands out to me.

   It has always been remarkable to me that evil relies upon goodness to be good so evil can do its work. People doing evil actually factor into their plans the unwillingness of good people to do certain things that evil people are quite willing to do.

   America has the capability to destroy utterly the civilization and population of anyone attacking us, without endangering a single American soldier's or civilian's life. How? We have the H-Bomb, the Neutron Bomb (which kills people with a radiation burst, but leaves no blast imprint, thus sparing all the enemy's goods for us), nerve agents and biological agents, and the accurate, long range missile-delivery systems to send them wherever we want without needing to put American military personnel into harm's way. If America ever actually did wage war the way those who fight us wage war (using their resources to the utmost limit of their destructive powers) - no one could survive a war with America. Every war with America would be over in a matter of hours - and the toll would be excruciating, as were Hiroshima and Nagasaki.   

   In the words of Harry S. Truman, the only American Commander-in-Chief to order the use of our full powers, "We dropped the first bomb and heard nothing. We dropped the second bomb and they capitulated." Truman had sent the Imperial Japanese Government a message saying "If you do not unconditionally surrender, we will send a rain of destruction on you from the skies that has up to now never been imagined by the human mind, and it will utterly destroy your civilization." Where was Truman's goodness? It is little known that America actually only had two working bombs, called "Fat Man" and "Little Boy." Once they were used, it would have been quite some time before any other bombs were available. However, Truman knew what the effect of the second blast would be: Japan would be convinced America could - and would - destroy every city in the Japanese empire. Surrender was the only option other than utter annihilation. Why did Truman choose to destroy two cities, causing over 200,000 casualties, mostly civilians? Hiroshima and Nagasaki were war-industry cities, and the people working in them were sources of equipment and personnel for the Japanese war machine – knowing every bit as well as the Germans working in Hitler's war industry cities, what the meaning of their work and their products were. If America had used conventional military means to attack the Japanese islands, the death toll on American soldiers was estimated to be in the hundreds of thousands, and casualties over a million. The Japanese military and the civilian reserve militia, numbering over a million combined, were prepared to make a defense of their homeland to the last man, and their initial defenses in places like Iwo Jima had been savage, and extremely costly in American lives. Truman did the math, and chose to save American lives. If memory serves, Truman said he never lost any substantial sleep over the decision; and added with the subtlest of wry grins, "I still have never heard an apology for Pearl Harbor." 

   Israel has the H-Bomb and the Neutron Bomb, as well as other horrifying military tools at its command. Israel has means at its disposal to annihilate utterly its enemies in Gaza, Damascus, Riyyad, and anywhere else. 

   Why do America and Israel not do what their enemies would unhesitatingly do?

   One of the most compelling photographs I have ever seen is from back in the 1980's, when Yasir Arafat's PLO was the prime source of terror to Israel and Jews worldwide. It is a picture taken by an Israeli sniper in Beirut, a covert operative who had Arafat in the sights of his rifle - and took the picture instead of the shot. The picture was intended to show the PLO - we always have you in our reach, and can do whatever we want to you whenever we choose. The only reason you are alive is because we allow you to live.

   Why did the Israeli not pull the trigger?

   Why does America not just "drop the bombs?"

   Why do both not simply give the order, "Take them out." to all their armed covert operatives standing within mere feet of their targets, and able to assassinate them at will?

   The definition of "good" in our ethical structure is not "anything that advances our interests." We protect our interests as we protect our citizens - but there is a limit to how far we will go when we are on either offense or defense. Where we stop is defined by something other than whether every one of our enemies has been destroyed. Some values go far deeper than utter victory.

   Machiavelli's formula, "the end justifies the means" - which basically entitles one to do any evil if one believes the evildoing will result in good" – does not work for the most part for anyone having a significant conscience operating.

   Israel now tastes the irony of America, just as since September 11, 2001, America has tasted the agony of Israel. Israel cannot do all she is able - and still, doing a restrained fraction of what she could do, incurs the world's wrath for protecting her citizens with a small sliver of her might. Israel has committed herself to do what she must, within moral bounds, in order to remove entirely the daily rain of rockets on her citizens. The Gazans who elected Hamas - a political machine maniacally bent on Israel's destruction, and motivated by an antisemitism positively pre-medieval in its content ("It is true that Allah changed Jews into pigs and apes." – Nizar Rayyan, lecturer in Islam at the University of Gaza) - are tasting now the folly of putting a Nazi-like regime into power.

   The commander of the Imperial Japanese navy in World War II, upon learning their Pearl Harbor sneak attack failed to destroy many of the US Navy's most powerful aircraft carriers and destroyers, told his staff after the attack was over, "I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant, and fill him with a terrible resolve." (Diary of Isoroku Yamamoto, per E.Williams & L. Forrester)

   To awaken a sleeping giant, and fill him with a terrible resolve.

   Let the native fear of the idea sink in.

   Hamas has awakened in Israel a giant-killer. The soul of King David sleeps within Israel, until onslaught awakens it. The warrior king's character is revealed in his Psalms. David wrote, "I pursued my enemies and did not turn back until they were entirely destroyed. I wounded them so that they could not rise again. I have crushed my enemies as fine as dust before the wind. (Ps. 18:37-42)." King David would rather have sung songs and worshipped in the temple: but when the time came for war, he was like Shakespeare's King Harry: "Such as we are, we would not seek a fight; but such as we are, we will not shun one." And when he waged war, he destroyed his enemies so they could not rise to make war again.

   What is an acceptable outcome to Cast Lead? Zero rockets launched from Gaza.

   Any conclusion other than that asks Israel again to accede to the world's demand that Jews"make peace" by accepting that more of our number will die from randomly dropping Gazan rockets.

   May peace come soon and in our days.

   And may it come without the price being acceptance of still more Jewish deaths at the hands of unreasoning hate committed to our destruction.

14 January 2009 © Rabbi Bruce L. Cohen