Cease-fire or peace? - The Jewish Standard

Israel did it. In Gaza, Israel snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Last weekend, Israel declared a unilateral cease-fire. I always thought that a cease-fire has to be bilateral. Surrender can be unilateral but not a cease-fire. The Israeli army defeated Hamas; the Israeli politicians surrendered to Hamas.

Hamas disdainfully fired a few dozen rockets into Israel and accepted the cease-fire. They gave Israel one week to leave Gaza. Later, Hamas declared a great victory and vowed to rearm. As of today, Hamas has already started to rearm and has also violated the cease-fire. Unlike Lebanon, there is not even the pretense that the UN or some other international body will monitor the cease-fire or prevent the rearming of Hamas.

In World War 2, the Allies demanded unconditional surrender. They changed the regimes of the defeated Axis powers. It worked. The defeated nations become democracies and are no longer a threat to world peace.

Peace (I prefer peace to cease-fire), stability, and security for the people of Gaza and Israel can only come with a change of the ruling party in Gaza. Hamas can not be trusted to observe a cease-fire and not to rearm. Of course, they have not even agreed to these terms. If the international community is truly interested in the welfare of the people of Gaza instead of condemning Israel, they must do the following: remove Hamas as the rulers of Gaza, place Gaza under an international trusteeship, create an effective and dedicated international police force to prevent the existence of armed terrorist forces in Gaza, end the teaching of hatred in the schools, prevent further kidnapping of Israeli soldiers and hopefully accomplish the return of Gilad Shalit, alive, sponsor humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza and create means of self sufficiency.

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