Richard Cohen takes on the accusations that Israel's military response to Hezbollah's attacks have been "disproportionate" at RealClearPolitics:
The dire consequences of proportionality are so clear that it makes you wonder if it is a fig leaf for anti-Israel sentiment in general. Anyone who knows anything about the Middle East knows that proportionality is madness. For Israel, a small country within reach, as we are finding out, of a missile launched from any enemy's back yard, proportionality is not only inapplicable, it is suicide. The last thing it needs is a war of attrition. It is not good enough to take out this or that missile battery. It is necessary to re-establish deterrence: You slap me, I will punch out your lights.
. . . .
Hezbollah, with the aid of Iran and Syria, has shown that it is no longer necessary to send a dazed suicide bomber over the border -- all that is needed is the requisite amount of thrust and a warhead. That being the case, it's either stupid or mean for anyone to call for proportionality. The only way to ensure that babies don't die in their cribs and old people in the streets is to make the Lebanese or the Palestinians understand that if they, no matter how reluctantly, host those rockets, they will pay a very, very steep price.
Arguing that terror must be met only with a "proportionate" response is just another way of demanding that the terrorists be allowed to win.
Imagine the raucous laughter that would accompany a demand that the police department only take one officer per suspect to any hostage standoff because any additional police manpower would be "disproportionate." Please.
Comments