More Reflections on the Gaza War Through a Glass Darkly

Is this the first war in human history—recent evidence shows that wars were also integral to prehistory—in which the measure of “justice” is how close you can conform your military operations to the civilian-free casualties inflicted by the “good guys” who play video games?

Did you know that around 20,000 French civilians were killed in the aerial bombardments and follow up ground invasion in Normandy in the Summer of 1944? Did the Nazis tell the occupied French that the Allies were cruelly killing their women and children? Yes. Did some Vichy French accept this propaganda line? Yes. Were the Allied High Command, military and political, fazed in the least by such criticism? No. That’s the difference between then and now.

Did you know that the U.S. and its Allies killed an estimated 125,000 civilians—of course the anti-American chorus falsely shouted a million—in trying to pacify Iraq?

Why does “T’ruah”—formerly Rabbis for Human Rights-North America—crusade for African asylum seekers and Bedouin as well as Palestinian rights and against human trafficking as well as “Islamophobia”—but never raises one word about the persecution of Christians (Arab and non-Arab) in the Muslim world? “T’ruah,” it is true, made a point of mourning for the three Israeli teens kidnapped and murdered. But when it comes to mourning for Israeli soldiers who fight and die so that the Jewish people should live, “T’ruah” is mostly silent.