Breaking News: Netanyahu's speech to Hamas

2021 Update: see here

Breaking news: Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu just made the following speech in front of the Knesset:

To Ismail Haniya, and the leaders and operatives of Hamas:

We, the people of Israel, owe you a huge debt of gratitude.  You have succeeded where we have failed.  Because never before, in the history of the modern State of Israel, has the Jewish people been so united, like one person with one heart.  You stole three of our most precious children, and slaughtered them in cold blood.  But before we could discover the horrible truth, we had 18 days of pain and anxiety while we searched for them, during which our nation united as never before, in prayer, in hopes, in mutual support.

And now, as you continue to launch deadly missiles indiscriminately, intended to maim and murder as many civilians as possible, while you take cowardly refuge behind your own civilians - you continue to inspire us to hold strongly onto our newly discovered unity.  Whatever disputes we Jews may have with each other, we now know that we have one common goal: we will defeat you.

But we are offering you now one last chance.  Within 24 hours, all rocket fire - and I mean all rocket fire - will cease.  Completely.  Forever.

I give you formal notice that our tanks are massed at the Gaza border, with artillery and air support at the ready.  We have already dropped leaflets over the northern parts of the Gaza strip, warning civilians of our impending arrival, and that they should evacuate southward, forthwith.  If you fail to meet our ultimatum, we are coming in, and, with God's help, this time we will not leave.  Every centimeter of land that we conquer will be annexed to Israel, so that there will never be another attack launched at our civilians from there.

Even so, we will continue to keep the door open to allow you to surrender gracefully.  The moment you announce that you are laying down arms, we will halt our advance, and there we will draw our new borders.  If you continue to attack our citizens, we will continue to roll southwards, driving you out of territory that you will never again contaminate with your evil presence.

It pains me deeply that your civilians will be made homeless.  But we did not choose this war; you did.  And if our choice is between allowing our citizens to be targeted mercilessly by your genocidal savagery, versus turning your civilians into refugees, I regret that we must choose the latter.  If only you loved your people as much as you hate ours, this war would never have happened.

To the rest of the world: Israel has tired of your ceaseless chidings that we should "show restraint".  When you have your entire population under constant missile fire from an implacable enemy whose stated goal is the of murder every man, woman and child in your land, then you may come and talk to us about "restraint".  Until then, we respectfully suggest that you keep your double standards to yourselves.  This time, Hamas has gone too far, and we will do whatever we have to in order to protect our population.

Hamas, once again, I thank you for bringing our people together with such clarity of mind and unity of purpose.  The people of Israel do not fear the long road ahead.  Am Yisrael Chai.


... and then I awoke, and it was all a dream...

Refusing Orders - Left, Right & Wrong

This latest tempest in a teacup about Naftali Bennett supposedly advocating refusal of orders has been badly played by everyone, in my opinion.  Netanyahu, by pouncing on him the way he has, has given the impression that he is, indeed, planning Disengagement II - although I don't personally believe that to be true; rather I think he's just trying to win back some of the swing votes that Bayit Yehudi has been steadily pulling from Likud.  And Bennett himself, by climbing down do hurriedly, left himself looking wishy washy.

Personally I think Bennett could have made a stronger and more principled stand by clarifying a nuance that seems to have been overlooked by pretty much everyone.

There are two types of refusal of orders.  One is where you are second-guessing your superiors, because you think you know better than them.  If your commander screams, "Acharai!" - then you better darn well be there behind him, even if you think it's a foolish move.  Refusing orders under such circumstances is indeed dangerous and damaging to the entire structure of the army.

The other kind is where you are given an order that you believe is immoral.  For example, let's say a commander orders a soldier to drive his fellow soldiers to the beach for a party on Shabbat.  Under such circumstances, the soldier is obligated to say, "I'm sorry, Sir, but I take my orders from the King of Kings, and I cannot do that."  The penalty could be a court-martial, imprisonment, or any amount of money, and the soldier is obligated to refuse orders.

In practical terms, going back to 2005, if a soldier decided to refuse orders because he believed the Disengagement was a foolish mistake and tactically wrong, that it would bring rockets on the whole of Southern Israel and make Israel's geopolitical situation infinitely worse, he would have been wrong to do so.  A soldier's business is not to reason why, but to carry out his orders.

On the other hand, if a soldier saw the Disengagement as immoral and evil, because of (among other things) the injustice it was doing to the families of Gush Katif, then he would have been obligated to refuse to participate in any way, even by taking over the duties of another soldier stationed on the Lebanese border, so that that soldier could go and rip Jews from their homes (מסייע לדבר עבירה).

I believe this is the moral duty of any soldier, anywhere, to be true to his morals - and be ready to pay the price.  This is true also for a leftist who believes it is immoral to serve in Judea & Samaria.  He should refuse orders, and be prepared to be court-martialed and imprisoned for his beliefs.  And if he is not prepared to stand tall, openly refuse orders and take the punishment, that's a good sign that his refusal is not based on moral considerations.

Suppression of the soldier's individual conscience and morality is a very dangerous and evil thing to advocate.  The logical extreme of this attitude is summed up in the infamous excuse:

"Ve vos chust following orders!"