Gaza Would Be Better Off Under The Israelis They HateMiddle East: Out of pure self-preservation, Israel may end up taking back Gaza. Its large, almost entirely Arab population should celebrate, because life under their supposed enemies is preferable to terrorist Hamas rule.
After a torrent of rocket attacks on Israeli population centers in recent weeks, Israel responded by bombing numerous targets in northern Gaza. And now an Israeli ground invasion of the coastal Gaza Strip has begun, possibly to be followed by a long-term re-occupation.
Gaza has been ruled by Syria, by Egypt, and now, thanks to the ballot box, by the terrorist group Hamas. Not for nothing did Melville once quip that "hell is a democracy of devils."
The good old days for the almost-entirely Sunni Muslim territory were actually the years they were ruled by ... their arch foes, the Jews of Israel, following the Six-Day War in 1967.
Confirmed Euro-liberal Conor Cruise O'Brien, in his 1986 book on Zionism, "The Siege," noted that "Jewish rule brought a significant degree of economic progress, better material conditions, including a 15% annual increase in wages, and benefits in the spheres of public health and education."
According to O'Brien, "The refugees in Gaza, who had had nothing to lose in 1967, had something to lose by 1975." Yet, "The rising prosperity was accompanied by a continuing rejection of Jewish rule, with the rejection most manifest among those who might appear to have benefited the most: the educated classes."
As Middle East Forum President Daniel Pipes has written, "Palestinian Arabs, even terrorists, generally prefer life in what they call the 'Zionist entity.'"
Pipes has pointed out that even "Palestinian leaders, between their fulminations, sometimes let down their guard and acknowledge Israel's virtues."
Nearly a decade ago Pipes suggested that "This undercurrent of Palestinian love of Zion has hopeful and potentially significant implications."
But it doesn't help when, as Israel defends itself from Islamists bent on its annihilation, President Obama takes the wrong side, saying Wednesday: "We've all been heartbroken by the violence, especially the death and injury of so many innocent civilians in Gaza."
Why "especially" the victims in Gaza, who are all Arabs? Aren't Israeli Jewish victims of Hamas worthy of just as much sympathy?
Britain's Economist magazine noted that even before Israel's heavy military response, "electricity functioned for less than half the day" in Gaza. "Half of Gazans are out of work or unpaid. Some say that in 18 months Gazans will have no piped drinking water at all."
Pipes' hopefulness for Gaza's future might be fulfilled if its residents could be shown that they're better off living under the rule of their neighbor, which is committed to Western civilized values, rather than under the malignant rule of the Islamic fanatics among them who are dedicated to their neighbor's destruction.
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