I WILL leave the more substantive and critical remarks regarding the Goldstone Report to more savvy political commentators. That really is not my department. I know nothing about the phosphorous component of the report which the press is humming about. Nor am I a military person, and never have served in that capacity.
What I am, though, is a human being, and what I am, though, is a Jew. And as a human being and as a Jew I have a reaction.
We have all already heard the powerful statement of Richard Kemp, former commander of British forces in Afghanistan, to the UN:
Mr. President, based on my knowledge and experience, I can say this: During Operation Cast Lead, the Israel Defense Forces did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare.
That, indeed is a resounding validation for the humanitarian approach the Israel Defense Forces invested when it finally chose to act in the self-defense of innocent citizens living under the weight of rocket fire from terrorists, day in and day out.
Did Israel make some mistakes? Im sure Israel did.
This is war, we are taking about. War. The darkest choice a human being can make.
By the way, Israel being Israel, and Israelis being Israelis the self-scrutinizing people that she is way before the Goldstone Report Israel already added the voice of self-reflection to the conversation when it produced the documentary, Waltz With Bashir.
The fact that Israelis are bothered by war to the point of reflecting upon it and being self-critical for the purpose of their own moral accounting not in reaction to the UN or other external pressures well, this is Israel. These are the Israelis out there fighting in war, this time in Gaza.
In their criticism of Israel, the world and the Goldstone Report are hard to take seriously. They paint the Israelis with the fine, micro-paintbrush of detail, while the Palestinians are painted with the broad, macro-paintbrush of very wide, amorphous strokes. The approach is so asymmetrical, to the point of absurdity.
If you want to evaluate the Goldstone Report, or any other criticism against Israel for its choice to defend its citizens last Chanukah, you need to look first at erev Chanukah.
WHERE were these microbrush strokes of scrutiny against the egregious and murderous acts of the Palestinians against innocent civilian Israelis on erev Chanukah?
You cant expect to have vague excuses for the Palestinians and a canned criticism of Israel every time, and then expect to have any credibility left even if Israel does make a mistake.
For the Israelis there seems to be a microscope, while for the Palestinians it is a macroscope.
How can one expect the Israeli or Jewish reader to take the Goldstone Report seriously in the context of reflexive criticism and condemnation of Israel?
Last Chanukah Israel had to make that worst of all choices: to defend itself at the cost of knowing this would cause the loss of life. The good guys, as well as the bad guys, would be killed. Whether the good guys were Israel Defense Forces soldiers or innocent Palestinians, this was the worst decision to have to make.
Unlike the pain of death by an act of G-d, war is the darkest choice death by the act of man.
Life is pierced with the knowledge, sadness and poignancy of the preciousness and fragility of life. War exposes this in the ugliest way.
The history of war is the history of inevitable mistakes, loss of life, the crushing of the soul. All avoidable until you can avoid it no longer. Let us remember the erev Chanukah climate in Israel, 2008:
Sderot and her surrounding towns were saturated with unnecessary pain and suffering visited upon them by Palestinians who were launching missiles from territory that Israel, unbelievably, had given them for the purpose of developing, with dignity, a Palestinian state for themselves.
Instead, this territory became a terrorist base and, as a consequence, life in that part of Israel came to a standstill. There was no life. No living. It was strangled by rocket fire and paralyzed by fear.
This was the erev Chanukah before the Operation Cast Lead of Chanukah . . .
I pray for the time when the brushstrokes of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will be the colorful and vibrant ones on the canvas of a beautiful painting.
