The world sympathized with Israel for the rockets they endured in their backyards, but when they get on the revenge bandwagon and indiscriminately kill, they lose sympathy. The oppressed ones all around the world including the majority of Israelis and Jews feel the pain of this violence, it flies in the face of our continued efforts to stop massacres, it is time for all of us to speak up. This is not the act of peace making; this is the act of destroying a people.

Edmund Burke had said something to this effect, “Evil flourishes not because of evil men, but because good men do nothing about it “. Indeed, lack of condemnations or protests encourages the evil to flourish. The least we can do is to speak up and show that the world stands against this attitude..

The poor reasoning the Israeli admin is propagating is that they were tired of the rockets. The causes that led to this situation is the blockade of Gaza; where a parent watching her son die for lack of medicine was ignored, it was brutal and inhuman, the world stood by and particularly our Admin sank low on human rights. They were even blocked from seeking Medicine. Prior to that our admin refused to acknowledge an elected Government in Gaza, causing Israel and Hamas to dig in their heels, so much for our Bush freedom hypocrisy. Mother Teresa had said " if you want to make peace, you talk with your enemies and not your friends". The Neocons have duped the Israeli and American Administrations not to talk with Hamas. Who will we make peace with then? I hope the new President will change that equation for the good of the Israeli and Palestinian people and keep the greedy men, lobbyists and the Neocons out of reach.

This bombarding is not good for Israel’s psyche and it is not good for us to watch and do nothing about it. We the Americans are consistently duped by the media, we are conditioned not even to ask the other point of view and are made to become judgmental beings. We need to know the truth, so we can live with morality.

Peace begins when we recognize our own faults, it takes guts and vision, and when we get it, it would be a solid step towards peace making. Thank God, there are many Organizations including several Jewish organizations who are working for peace, we all need to lend them our support.

On Monday or some time next week, the world will witness the stupidity of our administration. The US Ambassador to the UN will say a soft word of condemnation, then Ms. Rice or Bush, will make a statement to the Israeli PM, that our friendship with Israel is solid and that they can ignore the remarks of that Ambassador. Meaning? ‘Keep doing it’, we just have to do the verbal diarrhea to appease the world. This is a guaranteed response from our shameful history. The world will laugh at us again.

Sixty years have gone by; a few good men have made remarkable efforts and brought some stability, but in the last decade neither the Israeli nor the Palestinian leadership has produced notable peace for the people, instead they have ruined the work of Begin, Sadat, Rabin, Peres and Arafat. Both sides have a few evil destructive men at the helm. Our Middle East policies are dictated by the Neocons and this will do more harm to Israel than Good. The Israelis and the Palestinians need to wake up and rid of all those who are war mongers and destructive, we did it in America.

The revenge mind set is not good to either Israelis or the Palestinians; it deteriorates any possibility of peace. The public needs to elect the people whose focus is peace - and each leader must be asked to look in to the eyes of the children, both Israeli and Palestinian and asked them to spend a week with babies, toddlers and teens, and then make public pronouncements that he or she will work on giving hope and security to both children. Most Israelis and Palestinians will support that; hitherto they were not given that opportunity by the villains of humanity. It is time to stoke the moderates in Israel and Palestine, who probably make up more than 95% of the population.

Let’s hope the Israelis and Palestinians will dump their Bushes and elect some one who can at least promise peace and not destruction.YOUR COMMENTS PLEASE NOTE: I am committed to peace and my words and my actions are expressed to mitigate conflicts and nurture goodwill. This is one of the most painful events this month and I have done my best to focus on solutions though not fully satisfied with it. I particularly invite my Palestinian and Israeli friends to add another perspective with the intention of finding solutions. No solution will be fully acceptable to any one, but we have to take the steps to break the cycle of revenge - all of us owe the hope and security to those little Children in Palestine and Israel, we cannot live in peace unless we think and act peace and it begins with each one of us. Furthermore, neither Israelis nor Palestinians can have advantages at the cost of the other, such benefits are temporary and deleterious to lasting peace. We believe what is good for one has got to be good for the other and vice versa, to sustain it. It is in their interest to ensure Justness. Please share your comments below.Mike Ghouse is a Speaker, Thinker and a Writer on Pluralism, interfaith, terrorism, peace, interfaith, Islam, Multiculturism and India. He is a frequent guest on talk radio and local television network discussing interfaith, political and civic issues. His comments, news analysis and columns can be found on the Websites and Blogs listed at his personal website www.MikeGhouse.net. Mike is a Dallasite for nearly three decades and Carrollton is his home town. He can be reached at MikeGhouse@gmail.com
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