No Room for Gray

There's no room for gray in our ultimate assessment of Hamas and Israel's response to it in Gaza. Hamas is a militant Islamic terrorist group that seeks nothing short of the destruction of Israel and the murder of Jews. They must be stopped and prevented from further carrying out their mission. This is sometimes difficult for liberals like us to express so clearly. We see the gray in everything including Hamas and Gaza. The deaths of innocent civilians and so many children among them revolts us, the humanitarian crisis upsets us, and the idea that Gazans have a right to choose their own leaders - even if it's Hamas - strikes a chord at least in theory. But sometimes there's no room for gray. The true nature of Hamas is evident through their own words.

Jeffrey Goldberg, a writer with the Atlantic Monthly, reports two good examples in his blog:

Nizzar Rayyan [the Hamas leader killed earlier this week], was one of the more
bellicose Hamas leaders I have known. I saw him last in Gaza two years ago, at a
mosque in the Jabalya Refugee Camp…. There was no flexibility with Rayyan. This
is what he said when I asked him if he could envision a 50-year hudna (or
cease-fire) with Israel: "The only reason to have a hudna is to prepare yourself
for the final battle. We don't need 50 years to prepare ourselves for the final
battle with Israel." There is no chance, he said, that true Islam would ever
allow a Jewish state to survive in the Muslim Middle East. "Israel is an
impossibility. It is an offense against God."What are our crimes? I asked
Rayyan. "You are murderers of the prophets and you have closed your ears to the
Messenger of Allah," he said. "Jews tried to kill the Prophet, peace be unto
him. All throughout history, you have stood in opposition to the word of God."

Goldberg also pointed out this recent pronouncement from Hamas leadership:

Mahmoud Zahar, the Hamas leader, issued a warning this week to Jewish
parents: Your children, he said, are targets: "They have legitimised the
murder of their own children by killing the children of Palestine," Mahmoud
Zahar said in a televised broadcast recorded at a secret location. "They
have legitimised the killing of their people all over the world by killing
our people."

Put aside Zahar's chutzpah -- Hamas has been happily killing Jewish children for years. What's important is that he is making an explicit plea to jihadists everywhere to take matters into their own hands and kill Jews.

None of us would deny the terrible price that Gazan civilians pay in this conflict. None of us cheer the death and destruction. But none of us should hold illusions about the nature of the conflict and the nature of the enemy. In that regard, this is black and white.