Prof defends Israel attacks

A Jewish Waikato University lecturer who sheltered from Hamas rocket attacks on a recent visit to the Gaza border is defending Israel's "collective punishment" against the Palestinian population.

Israel has imposed a crippling two-year economic blockade on Gaza's 1.6 million population since they elected Hamas to power. That has trig-gered renewed home-made rocket attacks from Gaza, and Israel's subsequent military response, from which the Palestinian death toll now stands at more than 900. Meanwhile Israel says 10 of its soldiers and three civilians have been killed.

Collective punishment violates international humanitarian law, as laid down in the Fourth Geneva Convention.

But Dov Bing, a professor of political science and former president of the Waikato Jewish Foundation, defended Israel's policies and military incursion, pointing to the impact rockets have had on life in Israel.

Late last year Professor Bing visited his brother, Gershon, and his four children who live in Kibbutz Kfar Assa, 3 kilometres from Gaza. For several years they have endured Kassam rockets and Grad missiles being fired at them, and have been regularly forced to take refuge in bunkers.

"What do you do if a group of people sit on your border and say `we are going to pop off your people'?" Professor Bing said of the Hamas rocket attacks, of up to 80 a day.

"Israel is fighting for its existence, with its back to the wall.

"While I was there, there were two red alarms and we had 15 seconds to find a bunker to hide. Three times I hid in the strong room at the kibbutz."

Professor Bing rejected suggestions that Israel was "a spoiled brat" that felt it could do what it liked, and defended the Israeli assault even though it has been widely condemned internationally for being out of all proportion.

He rejected Arab views that the Israeli military were happy to tolerate civilian casualties under a "mowing the grass" doctrine, whereby collateral damage from military action usefully trimmed the ranks of Palestinian militants and stopped the population from growing. "But if buildings are occupied by Hamas operatives, you go after them. Otherwise you get killed."

But he predicted the Israeli campaign would halt within "two or three days" once a 300m strip of land near the Egyptian border had been completely bombed, Hamas infrastructure had been destroyed and an international agreement drawn up.

Professor Bing was critical of Israel's refusal to allow the media into Gaza to cover the war.

"As a result, all the news comes from Hamas," he said, in acknowledging Israel's reputation was suffering.

"You have a war fought in front of the TV, and people don't like to see women and children killed.

"Of course it is a bit more complicated than that. The casualty figures for a three-week war is actually very low. What it means is Israel is taking incredible care."

He said comparing blockaded Gaza with the Warsaw Ghetto where tens of thousands of Jews were walled in during WWII was "ridiculous".

"That is comparing Gaza with the Holocaust. The Israelis have no systematic plan to kill off Palestinians. There is a war going on, but after this has finished there will be peace and quiet. Hamas will have learned its lesson."

- © Fairfax NZ News