Max Boot almost staggers into some almost useful points in a WSJ op-ed:
But to say that Israel has the right, indeed the obligation, to act is not the same thing as saying that it is acting wisely.
It is too early to know whether its actions are well-advised. All will depend on how the offensive turns out. But even as Israeli troops push into Gaza following a week of air strikes, it seems highly unlikely that they will be able to decisively defeat the terrorist organization on their southern border.
Boot follows up with some thinly disguised admiration of Russian scorched earth counter-insurgency techniques, before allowing that the Gaza offensive is unlikely to actually solve any of Israel's problems. The Israelis probably won't expel the Palestinian population from Gaza, and even if they depose Hamas, it will likely be replaced eventually by an organization with similar attitudes.
Boot deserves some mild kudos for recognizing that Israel's offensive is highly unlikely to break Palestinian will, whatever that means. His trick, however, is to assume maximal Palestinian (and Arab) hostility to Israel at all times. Neocons use this tactic to wave away problems stemming from the deep unpopularity of US and Israeli actions. If the enemy already engages in maximal, unthinking hatred, then the popularity of our actions is irrelevant. The absurdity of this position in this case should be abject; while Arab (and world) bitterness about the Israeli offensive is growing, the initial attacks were met by a diversity of opinion, even in Palestinian circles. In other words, Palestinian opinion and policy reacted to Israeli behavior, suggesting that the Palestinians do understand costs, benefits, and the utility of strategic action. Boot also employs the ridiculous "but they took the settlements out of Gaza!" canard, in the apparent belief that his readers will be dumb enough to think that Palestinians in Gaza won't notice the continual expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, or the existence of Israel's own maximalist factions. In short, Boot is trying to pretend that all Palestinians (and perhaps all Arabs) are Hamas, and as such that Israel is doomed to engage in periodic, but justified, assaults upon its neighbors.
--Robert Farley
