Alex, if you think Hamas has the capability to destroy Israel with untargeted rockets that are so ineffective they have killed only about 20 Israelis since the beginning of this decade, then you are the one who needs to check into an insane asylum. And no, I am not saying the killing of only 20 Israelis, or only one for that matter, by Hamas rockets, is a trivial thing. It is not. But it’s not the destruction of Israel, either. Shooting rockets at Israel is a very bad thing; it violates international law, and it’s a crime, but it’s not going to destroy Israel. These are two separate things you’re talking about.

On the other hand, Israel *does* have the capacity to destroy Gaza, and the West Bank, and everyone living in those places. I’m not saying Israel is doing that, or has the intention of doing that. But it certainly could if it wanted to. And in Gaza, right now, the Palestinian population is at very real risk of death and/or serious physical harm due to lack of food and clean water, diseases caused by poor hygienic and sanitation conditions, lack of adequate medical care, or any at all, and of course the continuing violence.

You say you don’t care about all the Palestinians who have died because “All terrorists should fucking suffer, the slower the better. And that goes for anybody that supports them.” Does that include children and their mothers? The elderly? Pregnant women? Many Palestinians as well as others in that region think that Israeli soldiers in the IDF are terrorists, and that Israeli civilians who support the IDF are just as bad. Maybe if you were seeing your neighborhood turned into rubble and your friends and family blown up in front of you, you would feel the same way, or at least understand the feeling. If you were pulling bodies of women and children out of the rubble of bombed buildings, and one of them was a seven-year-old child, and that child had been decapitated by the force of the bomb, how would you feel?

I’m not trying to suggest such horrors justify firing rockets into Israel — they don’t. I’m saying that Palestinians in Gaza are just as human as Israelis in Sderot. And I can understand why ordinary Palestinians might support Hamas fighters just as I can understand why Israelis might support what the IDF is currently doing in Gaza.

I think it’s very important that we stop dehumanizing people who are living in conditions that we cannot even imagine. That goes for both sides, regardless of what political position one takes on the substantive issues involved.

And how is that working? Is Israel secure now?

Perhaps you should do a little questioning of what you read instead of accepting it at face value. Any fool can see that sealing up Gaza so no one and nothing can get get in or out is not making Israel secure.

Alex, I’m sure all the tar one needs to build a road can fit in a rocket. Fuck you, hard.