The unintended consequences of anger
I read today about Israel’s ground incursion into the Gaza Strip. Now remember that the total land area of Gaza, as well as the size of the population, are about the same as the area and population of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Will the Israel ground forces be able, as the air forces were not, to stop the rockets still being fired into Israel? Concluding from our own unsatisfactory, if not failed experiences fighting well-hidden insurgent forces in Mogadishu, as well as in Iraq and Afghanistan, probably not.
No caves or mountain terrain in Gaza but there are, at least, several hundred thousand cement block structures, mostly places people call home, behind and within everyone of which there may be men and women, children too, with Kalishnikovs, and/or ready to blow themselves up in their enemy’s face.
The causes of Israel’s anger are evident. Editorialists in the developed world have not ceased to point them out. Plenty of reason for both air and ground wars now taking place.
Yet, we remain troubled. For, as we have learned again and again, in the words of Marcus Aurelius: “How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.”
Jack Guez/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
