Hamas derives much of its popularity from it civilian infrastructure: It runs schools, orphanages, and other quasi-governmental services that aren't supplied by the Palestinian Authority. The IDF has apparently decided that the way to solve the problem of Hamas' popularity is to destroy those services:
"Last week, troops focused their efforts in Nablus, raiding the city hall and confiscating computers. They also stormed into a shopping mall and posted closure notices on the shop windows. A girls' school and a medical centre were shut down in the city, and a charitable association had its computers impounded and documents seized.Brilliant."This policy, officials say, is meant to deny the Islamic group, which is committed to Israel's destruction, the ability to use these institutions as a pipeline by which money is channelled to finance attacks on the Jewish state. But the main goal of this campaign is to stem Hamas's growing popularity in the West Bank. ...
"In recent months, the army has also closed down an orphanage, a bakery and other institutions in Hebron, which Israel believes are associated with Hamas. In Gaza, meanwhile, Israel and the Islamic group are observing a truce, but this does not pertain to the West Bank where the Israeli military operates freely."
The motivating concept behind strategic bombing in World War II was that enemy morale would be crushed by the destruction of the infrastructure of civilian life; the Japanese, it was thought, would stop supporting their government when the United States Army Air Force destroyed the ability of that government to supply civilian services. Essentially, the point is to make the people blame their own government for their hardships.
In somewhat modified form, this concept still motivates strategic bombing attacks -- blow up a bridge in Serbia, and the Serbs will stop supporting Milosevic, for example. Of course, the entire concept is built on the odd idea that people will blame their government for the absence of a bridge rather than the enemy force that blew up the bridge in the first place. As such, this kind of bombing almost invariably makes a target government <i>more</i> popular amongst its people.
The Israelis aren't actually blowing anything up, but the concept seems to be the same -- close an orphanage, and hope that the Palestinians blame Hamas instead of Israel. Good luck with that...
--Robert Farley
