Israel’s Right of Self-defense

Israel’s Right to Defend Itself———————————–
A commentary
By J. F. Kelly, Jr.

Here we go again; another violent episode in the continuing, never-ending conflict between the state of Israel and the Palestinians. And once again, the liberal, mainstream western media characterize the conflict as a David vs Goliath affair with Israel as the aggressor.

And right on cue, world leaders urged restraint on both sides as if each side was responsible for the daily rocket attacks on Israel that demanded a response. And once the response began, these leaders demanded that it be proportional with due regard for civilians. But what has restraint in the past achieved for the Israelis and what has it contributed to permanent peace? What constitutes a proportional response to daily rocket attacks designed to kill and terrify civilians? And how does that response avoid civilian casualties when the Hamas militants hide among them and are themselves dressed as civilians?

Media commentators report the daily casualties on each side which, of course, are lopsided, the inference being that Israel’s response in not “proportional”. The statistics are invariably accompanied by images of suffering Palestinians and funeral services where the dominant emotion seems to be rage more than grief.

The Israelis actually care about human lives. They go to great lengths to avoid harm to innocent civilians. They warn residents in advance of attacks. They attempt surgical strikes. But Hamas, the terrorist organization that rules the Gaza Strip, cares little about individual lives. They are simply martyrs to the cause. They stow their weapons and rocket launchers in or near schools and mosques. They urge the people to remain in the target areas. The resulting casualty figures help their cause by inflaming world opinion and helping to brand Israel as the aggressor. Each funeral serves to stoke anger and rage against the Jews.

Israel, a tiny country, smaller than the state of New Jersey, surrounded by hostile neighbors, many of whom refuse to accept Israel’s very right to exist, has been subjected to repeated rocket attacks for years and has twice been invaded by massed Arab armies. The rocket bombardments have been reaching further into Israel’s interior. What nation on earth would tolerate this?

If, for example, Mexico fired rockets across the border into Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California, how long do you suppose we would tolerate this before our citizens would demand a response? And how proportionate do you think it would be? Our citizens would demand action to eliminate the threat, not just reduce it. No nation can live with the threat of daily, indiscriminate rocket attacks across its borders, into its towns and cities. A government’s first priority is to defend its citizens against foreign aggressors.

So enough, then, with restraint and proportionate responses. Hamas is an existential threat to Israel and must be eliminated, not just weakened. Israel cannot live indefinitely with a terrorist-run state on its border, firing rockets at them and digging tunnels through which to attack their villages.

The time for brokering peace and forging a two-nation solution has passed. Hamas clearly does not want permanent peace and will agree to a cease fire only as a last resort to give them more time to regroup and re-arm. The so-called peace process should be recognized as the delusion it is and abandoned. There can be no permanent peace until Hamas, Hezbollah and other Arab terrorist organizations are destroyed or accept Israel’s right to exist and until Muslim children in the Middle East are no longer socialized to hate Jews.

Repeated efforts by the United States to act as a broker for peace have failed and will continue to fail until these things happen. It is well past time that we cease attempts to find any moral equivalence between the sides in this conflict and come down firmly on the side of our only real ally in this troubled and volatile region. That includes warning Arab states in the region, including Turkey and Qatar, continued funding and support to terrorist organizations like Hamas will seriously damage their relations with us.

July 20, 2014

Terrorism Is Not a Crime Wave

Terrorism Is Not a Crime Wave————————-
A commentary
By J. F. Kelly, Jr.
President Barack Obama has said that those responsible for the Benghazi attack that killed our ambassador and three other Americans will be “brought to justice”. By justice he means the same justice that American citizens and visitors to America are entitled to in our courts. But Ahmed Abu Khattala, who coordinated the attack, is neither. He is a terrorist, dedicated to the destruction of America and Americans. The attack on our embassy, moreover, was an act of war, not a criminal event.

 
Accordingly, Abu Khattala should be detained in military custody as an un-uniformed enemy combatant until the end of hostilities unless sooner tried and sentenced to death by a military tribunal.
Either we are serious about this so-called war on terrorism or we are not. If we are not, we cannot possibly win it and it will never end. If we are, we need to act like it. This includes dealing with captured terrorists, not as common criminals entitled to civilian trials, but as dangerous, unrepentant enemy combatants bent on our destruction. That’s why we have military tribunals and detention centers like Guantanamo. To provide these terrorists the benefits of the American civilian justice system where they can showcase their anti-American views and hatred for western civilization and win the admiration of fellow terrorists is to demonstrate to the world that we do not really regard the war on terrorism to be any more of a war than the war on drugs.

 
Mr. Khattala was captured during a night raid in Libya and transported to the United States aboard a U.S. Navy warship where he was questioned onboard by trained interrogators who reportedly obtained valuable information. Upon his arraignment in a federal court in Washington, he was provided with an attorney and read his Miranda rights, just like any other common crook, whereupon the flow of information ceased. Additional questioning in military custody might have yielded information that could have aided in the war on terrorism, perhaps preventing future acts of terrorism and perhaps saving lives.

 
Defenders of this policy of affording terrorists all the legal rights and protections of American citizens claim that this somehow lends us credibility and proves that we are a fair and lawful people. Our enemies, however, probably see it as a sign of weakness and an unwillingness to take this war seriously.

 
As this legal process drags on, defendants such as Abu Khattala are provided with a forum to preach hatred against the United States and the West and to promote their cause. It will be a long and costly process for the American taxpayers. In fact, the trial hasn’t yet even begun as Mr. Khattala’s taxpayer-funded defense team will likely take months to review the evidence against him. Meanwhile, Mr. Khattala, unshackled at his arraignment, entered a request for an Arabic-language Koran and a halal diet. Is this a great country, or what?

 
This is no way to fight a war, least of all win it. In a real war, the emphasis is on winning, not bringing the enemy “to justice”. A military tribunal in a military facility like Guantanamo with little or no publicity is the proper venue for dealing with the man who orchestrated the act of war at Benghazi. Even this is almost too good for terrorists who don’t observe the Geneva Convention rules.

 
The Obama Administration likes to believe that international terrorism has been largely defeated and is on the wane. Frustrated in its effort to close Guantanamo and transfer the remaining detainees to the United States, it now chooses to ignore Guantanamo and pretend that the war has been won. It hasn’t been and won’t be until we treat it as a real war and not a crime wave.

 
July 15, 2014

A Failed Presidency

A Failed Presidency——————————
A commentary
By J. F. Kelly, Jr.
“When I was a boy,” Clarence Darrow is reported to have said, “I was told that anybody could become president. I’m beginning to believe it.” The presidency of Barack Obama is making this all too clear. A background as a community organizer, law professor and a brief and unremarkable political career as a legislator did little to prepare him for the most powerful executive position on earth. He had no experience in running large organizations and that lack of experience began to manifest itself early in his first term. It is now obvious even to many of his supporters.

He was elected chief executive and commander-in-chief of the world’s largest economy and only superpower notwithstanding this lack of experience largely on the basis of charisma, speechmaking and youthful enthusiasm. Dissatisfaction with George W. Bush and the Iraq conflict plus a concern that a John McCain presidency would be more of the same sealed the deal. Mr. Obama’s message of hope and change resonated with youthful voters with little experience in how the world works, with idealists of all ages and with the increasing percentage of people receiving government welfare who wanted it to continue flowing.

In spite of a rocky first term during which he was labeled by opponents as the worst president since Jimmy Carter, he was re-elected by the same voter block. With approximately half of the voters paying no income tax and liking that just fine, it was difficult going for a candidate urging fiscal austerity, reductions in the size and scope of government and debt reduction, and particularly for the un-charismatic Mr. McCain, to defeat the free-spending, glib-talking Mr. Obama. As Oscar Ameringer said, “Politics is the gentle art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich, by promising to protect each from the other.”

The five and one-half year Obama reign has been by most measures a series of disasters that almost certainly would have combined to topple most other presidencies. Among them has been, of course, Obamacare. The president himself promised that if you liked your plan and your providers, you could keep them. He promised better coverage at less cost. These promises were not kept and the rollout was a fiasco in spite of a $634 million dollar website that mostly didn’t work. Obamacare also attempted to force people to violate religious principles by forcing businesses in some cases to providecoverage for abortions and birth control to employees.

As the Affordable Health Care Act unfolded and its serious problems started emerging—recall that Congress had to first pass the bill to understand what was in it—the president, who took an oath to uphold and execute the laws, decided to selectively delay parts that were inconvenient and to change portions without benefit of congressional action. Accusing the Congress of obstructionism, the president announced that he would use executive authority to get things done, in defiance of constitutional checks and balances limiting the power of the executive. This included making appointments when he decided that the Senate was in recess, drawing a rebuke from the Supreme Court.

There were the bank bailouts and the futile stimulus efforts. Remember “Cash for Clunkers”, taking hundreds of thousands of serviceable vehicles off the road, forcing people to buy new ones? That didn’t save Detroit so the Obama Administration bailed out General Motors. Then there was “Fast and Furious”, the Mexican gun-running sting that resulted in hordes of U.S. weapons ending up in the hands of Mexican drug gangs.

The “Arab Spring” caught the Obama Administration unprepared and uncertain whom to support. Red lines were drawn in Syria and then ignored as that nation exploded into civil war. Iran was warned of severe consequences if it failed to halt its development of a nuclear weapons capability. The severe consequences turned out to be more warnings of severe consequences. With the Middle East boiling, the administration embarked on another ill-timed attempt to re-start the so-called peace process which predictably failed. Allies continued to question American leadership and support. There was the Benghazi disaster, resulting in the murder by terrorists of an American ambassador and three other Americans, followed by a State Department cover-up and stonewalling by the administration.

While the president attempted to lead from behind he remained focused on a domestic agenda that fared no better. The IRS scandal, involving the targeting of conservative groups, provided further evidence of an administration willing to go to any length to silence opposition. Finally, the VA scandal provided yet another reason to question the competence and integrity of this administration.
Meanwhile, we are now $17 trillion in debt, our armed forces are shrinking and over-extended and our southern border is out of control with thousands of unaccompanied children streaming across. How much more of this incompetence can the nation take? Without a steady hand on the helm, the ship of state will surely founder.

July 8, 2014