Israel's options, all of them bad
Israel is damned if it invades Gaza, and maybe even *more* damned if it doesn't.
First of all, I’ve made this helpful Venn Diagram, based on years of reading about politics and society on the internet, in order to determine once and for all who qualifies as a literal Nazi:
Yes, that’s happening (in Sydney, Australia, not Sydney, Nova Scotia, for now at least). Funny way of saying “we want to express our disappointment toward the Netanyahu government’s abandonment of a viable two-state solution,” but who am I to judge?
As Israel adds a fourth digit to its death count, the Netanyahu government has confirmed plans to invade and blockade Gaza in response.
Whether or not you think it’s justified, I think you have to agree this is a very bad thing. Many Palestinian civilians - unlike what some dedicated human rights activists say about Israelis, I believe that Palestinians can be innocent civilians - will die. Many more will be displaced and injured. In a ground invasion, the Israeli death toll may increase dramatically, among IDF combatants and Israeli civilians who may face reprisal attacks. International sympathy for Israel, much of it from left-leaning observers (as opposed to extreme-left wingnut groups like the Democratic Socialists of America and Harvard University) sympathetic to the Palestinian cause but appalled by the Hamas-led pogrom, will dissipate and we’ll be back to the status quo of Israel as oppressor and Palestinians as victims.
Many Hamas fighters will die, but that’s a silver lining to a very dark cloud.
The next few weeks will be very bad, with much more destruction, a backlash against Israel (and Jews in general - though, to be honest, antisemitic hate-crime enthusiasts don’t need an excuse) which can and probably will turn very ugly, and Hamas’ military capacity badly weakened but its support among Palestinians even stronger.
So, the solution is obvious: Israel shouldn’t invade Gaza, right?
Yeah, about that…
First of all, Netanyahu’s government not responding with force would be political suicide in Israel. Israelis will disagree about tactics and how far they should go, but considering how being peace activists and conscientious objectors didn’t save Israelis caught up in Hamas’ net, the appetite for doing nothing is likely pretty weak even among those who despise Netanyahu and blame him - not without reason - for the country being caught napping.
But that’s just in the short term. What happens in an alternate timeline where Israel responds to this horrific assault - a literal pogrom the likes of which haven’t been seen since Jews were expelled en masse from the Arab world following Israel’s founding - by retreating to a strictly defensive posture?
Whatever dovish Earth-2 Israel gets, it sure as hell won’t be peace.
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