What Would You Do if You Were an Israeli?

In general, I don't pay too much attention to issues in the Middle East. I know we squander $billions on foreign aid to prop up socialist policies in Egypt and Israel, and I obviously would like to see an end to that wasteful spending. But I've never had strong opinions on the foreign policy issues in the region that get most of the attention. That being said, I found myself somewhat sympathetic to Charles Krauthammer's column on the topic. There's no question that there is a campaign to end Israel's blockade. And there's no question that an end to the blockade will lead to shipments of weapons that would be used to attack Israel. So unless one wants Israel to be wiped out (or at least endlessly attacked), doesn't Israel have no choice but to maintain a blockade? If your answer is no, what's the alternative?

...the blockade is not just perfectly rational, it is perfectly legal. Gaza under Hamas is a self-declared enemy of Israel -- a declaration backed up by more than 4,000 rockets fired at Israeli civilian territory. Yet having pledged itself to unceasing belligerency, Hamas claims victimhood when Israel imposes a blockade to prevent Hamas from arming itself with still more rockets. In World War II, with full international legality, the United States blockaded Germany and Japan. And during the October 1962 missile crisis, we blockaded ("quarantined") Cuba. Arms-bearing Russian ships headed to Cuba turned back because the Soviets knew that the U.S. Navy would either board them or sink them. Yet Israel is accused of international criminality for doing precisely what John Kennedy did: impose a naval blockade to prevent a hostile state from acquiring lethal weaponry. Oh, but weren't the Gaza-bound ships on a mission of humanitarian relief? No. Otherwise they would have accepted Israel's offer to bring their supplies to an Israeli port, be inspected for military materiel and have the rest trucked by Israel into Gaza -- as every week 10,000 tons of food, medicine and other humanitarian supplies are sent by Israel to Gaza. Why was the offer refused? Because, as organizer Greta Berlin admitted, the flotilla was not about humanitarian relief but about breaking the blockade, i.e., ending Israel's inspection regime, which would mean unlimited shipping into Gaza and thus the unlimited arming of Hamas. ... The whole point of this relentless international campaign is to deprive Israel of any legitimate form of self-defense.