Losing battles and gaining sympathizers

Victor Davis Hanson writes about losing battles and gaining sympathizers:

Hamas sees the death of its civilians as an advantage; Israel sees the death of its civilians as a disaster. Defensive missiles explode to save civilians in Israel; in Gaza, civilians are placed at risk of death to protect offensive missiles.

Hamas wins by losing lots of its people; Israel loses by losing a few of its own. Hamas digs tunnels in premodern fashion; Israel uses postmodern high technology to detect them. Hamas’s missiles usually prove ineffective; Israel’s bombs and missiles almost always hit their targets. Quiet Israeli officers lead from the front; loud Hamas leaders flee to the rear. Incompetency wins sympathy; expertise, disdain.

If 1,000 Arabs a week are killed by other Arabs in Syria and Iraq — whether bombed, shot, gassed, or beheaded — the Western world snoozes. If 400 Arabs are killed in a three-week war with Israel, that world suddenly awakes to damn Israelis as killers. Apparently the West, in racist fashion, assumes that killing one another is what Arabs do best. But when Israelis kill those who wish to kill them, outrage follows.

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