A recent letter (“Israel makes problem worse,” Our Readers’ Views, Nov. 9) stated that Israel’s efforts to eliminate Hamas terrorists on its border has resulted in the killing of “over 49,000” Palestinian civilians. I’m surprised the letter writer did not claim they were all women and children. The basic facts are that at least 18,000 Palestinian fighters, probably more, have been killed by the Israel army — and even Hamas propaganda only claims 42,000 (not 49,000) dead.
Sad as the civilian deaths are, it is Hamas, fighting behind Gaza civilians in their homes, their schools, their hospitals and their mosques, who is to blame. The letter writer worries that the high death toll from Israeli efforts to defend itself from another pogrom (which would have been much worse had the terrorists succeeded in their full plan) will cause generations of Palestinians to seek revenge. I worry that the attacks on Israeli civilians — deliberate, not collateral — which have been ongoing since 1948 and before will cause generations of Israelis to completely give up on the possibility of a two-state solution.
