Source: Duluth News Tribune
By M. Imran Hayee on Aug 10, 2014
By withdrawing ground troops from Gaza last week, Israel showed signs of finally winding down its Operation Protective Edge, after nearly a month of pounding Gaza in an attempt to debilitate Hamas.
In reality, Israel fell for the sinister trap of Hamas — once again.
Both Israel and the United States call Hamas a terrorist organization but expect it to behave like a moral entity that shows respect for innocent civilian lives. They ignore the fact that al-Qaeda has shown no regard for innocent lives regardless of their race or religion, killing more Muslims and non-Westerners than non-
Muslims and Westerners in its terrorist attacks throughout the world.
During Operation Protective Edge, Hamas did exactly what was expected of a typical terrorist organization. The burden to equally protect Israeli and Palestinian civilians from Hamas’ terrorism is on the shoulders of Israeli Defense Forces, whom Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called a “moral army.” Sadly, Hamas tempted Israeli Defense Forces to do exactly the opposite.
So far in Operation Protective Edge, Hamas directly killed only 64 soldiers of the Israeli Defense Forces and three Israeli civilians, but it had great success in luring Israeli Defense Forces to kill more than 1,800 Palestinians, including more than 600 innocent children and women. From a terrorist organization’s point of view, Hamas has every reason to celebrate, leaving the civilized world lamenting the loss of so many innocent civilians.
While the enormous civilian death toll will remain an eyesore for Israel, it rightfully takes pride in the killing of a few hundred of Hamas’ terrorists. This may, however, prove to be a trivial loss for Hamas, especially if it succeeds in capturing even a single Israeli soldier in a future attempt. Last time, in 2006, when Hamas captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, it took five years before he was freed in exchange for more than 1,000 Hamas prisoners.
