In January 1968, the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese Army launched a massive surprise attack which overwhelmed the superior American forces in Vietnam. An American counter offensive immediately pushed them out of their temporary gains and inflicted considerable harm on their forces. The Tet Offensive did not end the war and the South Vietnamese did not rise up against the Americans as hoped. Furthermore, despite the overwhelming surprise and initial success, it was not even a military victory for the American enemy.
The North Vietnamese should have been disheartened by the result; however, it was a public relations victory. The American public was shocked: the enemy was more resourceful and more capable than they had been led to believe. Public opinion, to that point supportive of the war, shifted dramatically. This was not going to be an easy war, and indeed it drug on five more years. The next few years saw the disintegration of united political support, untenable restrictions placed upon the American military, and war weariness of the American public, leading to the eventual American defeat. The defeat began with the Tet Offensive and the changing of minds–not in Vietnam, but in America.
Gaza, governed by the Hamas terrorist organization and supported by Iran, launched their own Tet Offensive last weekend.
Hamas also surprised and overwhelmed their enemy. Their invasion was also quickly pushed back across the border; the immediate threat has been put down for now. Still, Hamas was able to inflict considerable damage in a very short period, much more than many in Israel and around the world thought possible. The Israelis were unprepared for this attack and their vaunted and sophisticated defenses failed. They seem vulnerable in this moment, just as the Americans appeared in Vietnam fifty years ago.
Public Relations Game
Hamas knows they could not sustain their so-called military victory; they know retribution is coming. So, in the aftermath of their attack, they wage a public relations battle. Fifty years ago, the North Vietnamese successfully manipulated our media and hence American public opinion, effectively using American naivete to further their political goals.
It seems Americans have learned little following this humiliating defeat fifty years ago. Many today defend Hamas’s indefensible actions, some even blame the Israelis for showing too much leg and bringing this tragedy on themselves. Westerners persist in this “Why can’t we all get along attitude?” when our enemies do not want to get along at all. Young people on American campuses talk about “justice for Palestine” just as Jane Fonda and American campus youth spoke of Vietnam in the 1970s. They were (and still are today) ignorant pawns, useful idiots (as Lenin called them) in a political game. Jane Fonda, Hanoi Jane, expressed regret many years later, but far too late to matter:
The actress drew bitter criticism after being photographed atop an anti-aircraft gun during a controversial 1972 visit to North Vietnam. Meeting with TV critics Wednesday to discuss a new HBO documentary on her life, she expressed regret for that moment.
She said it was thoughtless to perch on the gun and called it “horrible” to think about the message her action sent to soldiers and their families,
Why be so skeptical you may wonder. Surely, our enemies back then and today want the same as us? Surely, we can iron this out? They just want a homeland. Just like us, they want to live in peace: raise a family, plant a vegetable garden, and live for the weekend, right?
Or perhaps not. A senior Hamas leader was interviewed on Russian TV the day after the attack and made this remarkable statement:
We Made Them Think Hamas Was Busy With Governing Gaza, And That It Wanted To Focus On The 2.5 Million Palestinians [In Gaza]… All The While, Under The Table, Hamas Was Preparing For This Big Attack
In other words, Israel was fooled into thinking Hamas cares about the Gaza people and their security. Instead, all the money and infrastructure we received the last two years was focused on preparing for war. Israel and the West were lulled into sleep while raising our families and tending our vegetable gardens.
Hamas also fears a peace accord between Israel and its Arab neighbors, especially Saudi Arabia. They do not want to be isolated from their erstwhile allies. A peace accord counters their true intentions. The Hamas leader in Gaza warned: “All the agreements of normalization that you (Arab states) signed with (Israel) will not end this conflict”. Another terrorist leader said:
“This is a message to Saudi Arabia, which is crawling towards Israel, and to the Americans who are supporting normalization and supporting Israel. There is no security in the whole region as long as Palestinians are left outside of the equation.”
They openly attempt to scuttle a peace deal, but supporters still make excuses for them.
Yes, but what about the Palestinians themselves, the people who just want to live their lives in peace?
Israel war: Hamas tells civilians to ignore Israel’s evacuation warning | Washington Examiner
Israel Defense Forces officials have issued a warning for civilians to evacuate Gaza City, but Hamas officials have urged Palestinian civilians “to ignore” the message, and officials from the United Nations foresee a humanitarian catastrophe.
Hamas openly displays their view on the meaning of life: Don’t save yourself and your children. It is better you all die and be welcomed into heaven as martyrs for the holy cause. We will name a street after you if you kill a few Jews before you die yourself.
Furthermore, this awful government is supported by a vast majority of the Gaza citizenry. But, of course, Westerners persist in believing we all want the same thing. Our world would be a far better place if the West was as committed to the cause of life as Hamas is committed to the cause of violence.
Hamas places military headquarters under mosques. They put rocket sites next to schools and hospitals. They want Israel to attack these sites, so they can blame these deaths on the enemy. These practices violate the Geneva convention; however, their supporters talk of freedom fighters not war criminals.
“I agree there are many innocent Palestinians who don’t agree with this, but if you have a missile in your g–d– kitchen and you want to shoot it at me, am I allowed to defend myself? We have to defend ourselves, we have the full right to do so.” Israeli President Isaac Herzog, October 2023
Far too many Americans had the exact same innocent thoughts about our enemy during the Vietnam war. Protestors who knew nothing about anything made a difference. Nervous politicians appeased voters and micro-managed the war from DC; after a few years, a massive bureaucracy was established in Saigon, not so focused on fighting the war, but on “winning hearts and minds”. Meanwhile, in the field of battle, the enemy fled across the border into safe havens and the American military could not pursue. American politicians burdened the military with unreasonable “rules of engagement” which hampered progress and put troops in jeopardy.
Today, instead of “rules of engagement” we hear the words “restraint” and “proportionality” as nervous politicians demand Israel temper its response. They condemn attacks on innocent Israeli citizens (as they are expected too), but then hedge by saying this battle should be viewed in the larger context. A carefully measured response led to American defeat in 1973. The exact same self-defeating response pulls American politicians in the wrong direction today. Israel should not let these nervous politicians and ignorant protestors influence their policy in the same way.
The myopic vision has only worsened during the last fifty years. Nearly ten years ago, The Atlantic wrote about this problem following an earlier Gaza war.
During the Gaza war this summer, it became clear that one of the most important aspects of the media-saturated conflict between Jews and Arabs is also the least covered: the press itself. The Western press has become less an observer of this conflict than an actor in it, a role with consequences for the millions of people trying to comprehend current events, including policymakers who depend on journalistic accounts to understand a region where they consistently seek, and fail, to productively intervene.
In other words, Americans don’t understand how the conflict is viewed by others because we are not told the truth. The media covers for evil when they want to blame someone other than the actual perpetrator. Evil is attacked only if the story aligns with their narrative. Otherwise, excuses are found. Tragically, narrative, not truth, matters the most for our media; the public is duped, and some of us have to fight to simply explain what should be obvious to all.
What is Next?
So far, history has repeated itself. However, Israel writes the next chapter. Perhaps Hamas believes they have disheartened the Israelis and the response will be thwarted. That’s doubtful. Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu said: “our enemy will pay a price the type of which it has never known.” Hamas has become an existential threat to Israel, so Israel will respond accordingly. The threat cannot be allowed to remain. There will be a severe response. Israel is not disheartened.
To this point, the Biden Administration has unequivocally backed Israel. They have warned others from entering the war against Israel. They have supported the Israeli effort militarily as well. We should hope this policy remains steadfast. However, there is reason for concern. The Israeli response will be propaganda for Hamas. Hamas has a narrative ready for the next stage. I brace for an uninformed and ignorant response from media and educational institutions. How will we view this conflict in six months after Israel responds and death tolls mount on both sides? It is crystal clear how it should be seen.
Talk of a two state solution has also arisen again, just as the terrorists hoped it would. Hamas doesn’t want two states; they also don’t want peace unless it means peace with one state only. Palestinian leaders like Yasir Arafat in the 1990s rejected peace deal after peace deal. The Palestinians want something other than co-existence, something which they cannot openly articulate but something they clearly demonstrated on October 7.
Hamas, along with Iran, Hezbollah, and other radicals, also seek support from other Muslim countries, the United Nations, and Westerners sympathetic to their cause. Jane Fonda’s spirit is alive and well; Hamas has found the support it desires. The truth will obliterate their cause, so they focus on a narrative they believe wins the day.
Evil Rises
Evil is defined as a lack of good and there is nothing good which came from the Hamas attack: not the motivation, not the execution, not the result. It was a complete lack of good and therefore wholly evil. This is the ugliest side of humanity.
Evil had its day initially, but let’s hope and pray it’s time is short.
The term Nazi connotes a true evil, but the term is thrown around far too loosely today. True evil showed up October 7: shelling apartment buildings, shooting people in their cars, dragging people through the street, targeting and attacking women and children, burning homes, kidnapping and raping women, slaughtering hundreds at a music festival, beheading children in their beds, and torturing others. It was filmed and then celebrated.
Hamas and its supporters could have characterized their action as an evil necessary to win their freedom, but they no longer bother with such pretenses; instead, they say it is justice and what the apartheid state had coming to them. Their evil intentions are readily apparent, yet, many Americans will not condemn them.
Jane Fonda is now 85 years old and nobody cares for her opinion any longer. Instead we listen to younger know-nothing celebrities like 28 year old Taylor Swift who is terrified the Violence Against Women Act will not be renewed while remaining silent regarding Hamas’s horrific evil against women and children. https://www.msn.com/en-us/music/news/the-silence-is-deafening-taylor-swift-called-out-for-promoting-eras-tour-movie-amid-israel-hamas-war/ar-AA1i9zwa. You want to combat violence, Ms. Swift? Confront it directly. Make a positive political impact for once. Wake up, please.
Israel has not indiscriminately killed children in the manner of Hamas last weekend, yet on college campuses we now hear “glory to martyrs!” and “glory to the resistance fighters!” elevating those who indiscriminately killed.
Congresswoman Ilhan Omar called for a cease-fire before any response from Israel. I am glad she was not in Congress on 9/11/2001.
Supposedly educated Americans like Harvard Palestine Solidarity group are perhaps the worst; they support this action fully.
Millions of Arabs live in Israel. No Jews live in Gaza, and hardly any in other Muslim countries (three-fourths of all Jews live in the US or Israel). The Arabs have seats in the Israeli Knesset (as such a significant minority should). The Jews, however, no longer have representation in Gaza. Gaza was a part of Israel until 2005, but Israel expelled Jews from there so a Palestinian state could be established. Hamas was elected in 2007, and is currently in the sixteenth year of its initial four-year term. Nothing to see there, though.
Israel has for years supplied water and electricity to Gaza because of the dire need. Western countries also provided water pipes to alleviate the problem, but those were used for rockets instead–because they just want to live their lives in peace and in accord with their neighbors (the morons at Harvard may deny or excuse this action, but Hamas published the video themselves: https://www.news18.com/videos/world/watch-gaza-water-pipes-turn-into-hamas-s-rockets-8618343.html)
The Al-Aqsa mosque is built on the remains of the Jewish temple of Solomon in Jerusalem. Israel not only permits the mosque to remain at this holy location within its capital, but it also prohibits Jews and Christians from praying anywhere near in a concession to Muslim worshippers. Muslims, on the other hand, are not restricted from praying anywhere in Israel.
This is how an apartheid regime treats its minorities? Morons at Harvard say so. I am so glad my children don’t go to a school like Harvard. It was once the most prestigious, but is now a garbage heap.
If only Israel had ceded more land this violence could have been avoided, they say. Do they mean land like the Gaza strip which was ceded in 2005? Israel traded land for peace, and they got less land and less peace. The two-state solution has failed.
Actions like the following should be condemned, not excused.
hamas-terrorists-beheaded-babies
Hamas terrorists massacred at least 40 babies and young children before beheading some of them and gunning down their families in a small kibbutz in Israel, horrified Israeli soldiers have claimed.
There was no battlefield where armies met. There were no military strategic targets. The goal was simply to inflict as much pain and suffering on Israeli civilians, especially women and children, in a surprise attack during Sabbath. Afterwards, these pretend warriors celebrate and give thanks to God. God is not with Hamas in their victory. This attack has nothing to do with justice, freedom, or establishing a Palestinian homeland.
This five minute video recounts the story of one woman who was eventually rescued by Israeli soldiers. She talks of the killing and horrible treatment of other women and children. ‘They shot a baby’: Hamas attack survivor recounts terror in Israel kibbutz | POLITICO – YouTube,
Another short video is from a mother of daughter likely killed at a “peace concert”. Several hundred young Israelis were shot indiscriminately by dozens of well-armed Hamas terrorists. Yes, of course, killing peace loving teenagers in Israel is the most effective way of achieving your own homeland. Irish-Israeli woman missing after attack at festival (rte.ie)
There are many more videos, many released by Hamas themselves. They are proud of their accomplishments. Supporters cheer and even deny any evil has been done.
This is the face of evil, which unfortunately is alive and well today. God destroyed Amalek and other nations before Israel became a nation because they were as evil as Hamas is today. Evil may win in the short term, but good will eventually overcome evil. What part will we play in that eventual victory?
Proudly the wicked chase down those who suffer.
Let them be caught in their own traps.
3 They brag about the things they want.
They bless the greedy but hate the Lord.
4 The wicked people are too proud.
They do not look for God;
there is no room for God in their thoughts.
5 They always succeed.
They are far from keeping your laws;
they make fun of their enemies.
6 They say to themselves, “Nothing bad will ever happen to me;
I will never be ruined.”
7 Their mouths are full of curses, lies, and threats;
they use their tongues for sin and evil.
8 They hide near the villages.
They look for innocent people to kill;
they watch in secret for the helpless.
9 They wait in hiding like a lion.
They wait to catch poor people;
they catch the poor in nets.
10 The poor are thrown down and crushed;
they are defeated because the others are stronger.
11 The wicked think, “God has forgotten us.
He doesn’t see what is happening.” Psalm 10:2-11
The American Political Problem
As much as I dislike many American politicians, nobody in American politics today has done anything so awful as Hamas. Many American politicians, media, and demonstrators support Hamas, but I will give them the benefit of the doubt: they are too stupid to realize what they are supporting.
President Biden and several other world leaders even deserve credit for support of Israel in this war:
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/joint-statement-from-quint-leaders-on-israel-9-october-2023
Today, we — President Macron of France, Chancellor Scholz of Germany, Prime Minister Meloni of Italy, Prime Minister Sunak of the United Kingdom, and President Biden of the United States — express our steadfast and united support to the State of Israel, and our unequivocal condemnation of Hamas and its appalling acts of terrorism.
The problem, however, is American actions the last few years have strengthened Israel’s enemies. Sanctions from 2018 forward had reduced oil production for Iran dramatically, but the Biden administration has reversed policy:
A dollar in the hand of Iran is often a dollar for Hamas, and increased oil production means tens of billions of dollars for Iran. Iran was also paid $6 billion for 5 American hostages earlier this year https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/biden-administration-released-billions-to-iran-weeks-before-israeli-attack/ar-AA1hSSwq.
Weapons in the hands of Hamas can also be traced back to caches abandoned in Afghanistan.
The Biden administration played this game badly. They are back on the right side now, but now we must rely on Israel to fix the mess America, in part, created.
We do not know what happens next in this war. We should all pray the war does not spread to other countries and actors.
I pray too evil is recognized and called out. This inability to recognize good from evil should scare us all. My grandfather who served during WWII was, like so many other Americans, forced to visit Nazi concentration camps. General Eisenhower wanted the troops to remember this evil and pass this memory on for generations to come. The internet allows us to see evil today more readily, yet so many are blind to it. Will we actually look at the evil of Hamas directly or we will turn away and not be bothered? How long will we remember what happened? What will we do to end this evil?
If we unite against evil, we cannot lose. If we blindly support causes which we do not truly understand and we do not recognize the evil in their actions, then God helps us all. We too will be destroyed along with the wicked if we do not wake up.
The house of the wicked will be destroyed,
But the tent of the upright will flourish. Proverbs 14:11
Dave https://seek-the-truth.com/about/
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