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May 13, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation

David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church

Emily Alpert: Recession dragged down birth rates for less-educated women
Morgan Housel: The deep downside of home ownership

Peter Teffer: Will Dutch police soon be stalking cybercriminals on your computer?

Heidi McIndoo, M.S., R.D.: Meatless 'meat' can have its own set of problems

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Celebrate! This must-try appetizer is delicate yet has depth of flavor: Corn-Leek Cakes with Caviar, Smoked Salmon and Creme Fraiche

May 10, 2013

Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be

Caroline B. Glick: The dirty little secret about Israel's Arabs

Mona Charen: Hawking's Moral Calculus: The man and the movement he embraces
Morgan Housel: The biggest retirement myth ever told

Sandi Doughton: Eyes may provide new insight into brain problems

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : The Great Gatsby's Jewish Ties; Jews in the "Time 100 list" List; People's Most Beautiful Women

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: A sweet-hot meal: Pear salsa spices up salmon

May 8, 2013

Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas

Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate

Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
Amanda Paulson: Study reveals sad truths about community colleges

Harvard Health Letters: Evidence weak that zinc, echinacea are beneficial

The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility

May 6, 2013

Edmund Sanders and Patrick J. McDonnell: Think Israel's objective in Syria is to weaken Assad or embolden the rebels? Think again

Brian Bennett: Israeli airstrikes may show weakness in Syrian defense

Michael Ollove: Millions of ex-felons, parolees and those on probation are about to be entitled to tax-payer paid health coverage
Karen Kaplan: Most men can skip PSA test for prostate cancer, urologists say

Kimberly Lankford: How to track down a lost life insurance policy

Dream of Mars exploration achievable, experts say

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan M. Selasky: EGGPLANT WRAPS are an easy, sumptuous and scrumptious meal

May 3, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Human Courage and the Unavoidable, Disturbing Text

Steven Emerson: Attorney General Fights CAIR in Court, Lauds it in Public

Mediterranean diet helps beat dementia: study
Harvard Health Letters: When to be screened for a hearing problem

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Iron Man's Jewish Connections; Marc Maron's New TV Show; Martin Landau Grows Up with Israel; Shalom, Allan Arbus

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: A sweet surprise for Mother's Day dessert

May 1, 2013

Jonathan Rosenblum: An Improbable Journey to Orthodoxy

Jonathan Tobin: Blame Obama, Not Israel for Syria Push

Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Halena M. Gazelka, M.D.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: What you need to know about implanted pain relief devices

Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine

Jessica Shugart: When it comes to math, MRIs may be better than IQs

The Kosher Gourmet by Mario Batali: The celebrated chef on how high-maintenance ASPARAGUS RISOTTO need not be

April 29, 2013

Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust

Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?

Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Morgan Housel: He's rich, smart and old: Listen to him

Thomas Salinas, D.D.S.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: The safety of amalgam fillings

Harvard Health Letters: Tomatoes and stroke protection

Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Swing into spring with lemon cream pie

April 26, 2013

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: The world is a mirror

Caroline B. Glick: Time to confront Obama

Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Kimberly Lankford: New strategies ease pain of paying for long-term care insurance

Howard LeWine, M.D.: Ask the Harvard Experts: Too much ibuprofen?

Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Jewish Major Leaguers, 2013; New Movies and Comedy Show; Shalom, 'Lumpy' (Leave it to Beaver)

The Kosher Gourmet by Emily Ho : A bright and cheerful salad to herald the warmer months ahead

April 24, 2013

Steven Emerson: Boston Bomber Exposes Islamist Secret

Morgan Housel Admit it: No one has any idea what's going on
Harvard Health Letters: Can you get headaches from headache medication?

Kerri-Ann Jennings, M.S., R.D.: How to easily get more Omega-3s in your diet

Melissa Healy: Pot in a pill: All the pain relief without the smoke

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan Russo: Chipotle Chili Butternut Squash Soup is bold, zesty, hot

April 22, 2013

Ken Dilanian: Counterterrorism's future is unclear

US man departing country arrested on terror charges
Barbara Williams: An unorthodox but growing treatment in a 9-year-old's battle against cancer

P.J. Skerrett, M.D.: How to recognize a good whole grain product

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Teen actor Jonah Bobo in New Flick: Hunky James Wolk on Mad Men; Erich Segal's Daughter Writes Prize-Winning Jewish Novel

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: 'Noodles,' Asian style is a carb sub, sure. But they are also amazingly delicious and colorful

April 19, 2013

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: When violence seems the only answer

Caroline B. Glick: Why Obama's visit to Israel had no impact on public opinion or government policy

Morgan Housel: Gold collapse: The start of something big?
Harvard Health Letters: Can you die of a broken heart?

Pete Spotts: Livable super-Earths? Two candidates among Kepler's latest finds

Nora Schultz: Oxytocin helps beat booze cravings

The Kosher Gourmet by Carole Kotkin: Middle Eastern cuisine meets Italian delicious with this lentil and eggplant pastitsio

April 17, 2013

Shira Rubin: Too much of a good thing? 'Palestinians' realize downside of foreign aid boom

Geoffrey Mohan: Can computers decode dreams? Researchers take a first step

Morgan Housel: BAD NEWS: EVERYONE IS RIGHT!
Brierley Wright, M.S., R.D.: 6 heart-healthy eating tips help cut saturated fat but not taste

Michael Craig Miller, M.D.: Ask the Harvard Experts: Told your child has sensory processing disorder? Seek a second opinion

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Corn and Curry Add Zing to Chilled Soup

April 15, 2013

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: The Death of Education?

Kristen Chick: Egyptian Christians respond with harsh words to attack -- rocks, Molotov cocktails, and gunfire -- against main cathedral

Marcy Darnovsky and Karuna Jaggar: High Court to decide if you should own your DNA
Howard LaFranchi: US bracing for more Russian blowback after taking action against 18 more human rights violators

Kristin Ohlson : The loneliest fight

The Kosher Gourmet by Dana Velden: A tasty, rich dish that hints at spring's arrival while still anchored in a favorite winter staple


Jewish World Review Nov. 29, 2012/ 15 Kislev, 5773

T-ball war in the Middle East

By Victor Davis Hanson



http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Classical explanations of conventional wars run something like this: An aggressor state seeks political advantage through military force. It has a hunch that the threatened target will likely either make concessions to avoid losing a war, or, if war breaks out, the resulting political gains will be worth the military costs to achieve victory.

Wars then are prevented only by a balance of power and military deterrence: aggressors have to be warned that it would be stupid to start a war they will likely lose. If there are miscalculations or if emotions run high and logic is ignored, then the resulting conflicts only end when one side loses and has no choice but to accept the imposed terms of the winner.

That being said, the modern therapeutic West has either forgotten such rules or ignored them. In today's globally televised wars, a novel doctrine of proportionality reigns. It is sort of like T-ball in which scoring and winning don't matter. Instead both the stronger and weaker sides end up the same. Little attention is paid to who started the conflict, how it was conducted or how it should be ended.

In terms of the Middle East, contemporary T-ball war works out like this: A far weaker Gaza sends a shower of missiles into Israel, hiding its launchers among civilians to ensure collateral damage and favorable propaganda during Israeli retaliation.

Israel, with its technological savvy, knocks down most of the incoming rockets, but then retaliates inordinately to the aggression by killing far more Palestinians in Gaza than it lost inside Israel. That is considered unsportsmanlike play. In a fair T-ball fight, Israel should have stopped the war when the losses were equal and not tried to run up the score when there should be no score-keeping at all.

Apparently Israel was supposed to shut down its Iron Dome anti-missile system so that the Hamas missiles could kill enough Israelis to match those killed in Gaza. Then it should have accepted a ceasefire to the no-win/no-lose game, until Hamas chose to play the next "proportional" inning of this perpetual T-ball war.

However, just as one side in T-ball can be more skilled than the other, and parents secretly keep score in supposedly scoreless games, so too do the age-old rules of war not change just because we think they must.

Hamas went to war against Israel by shooting hundreds of rockets into the Jewish state. It thought such aggression made sense. The attack was timed just after the U.S. election. Hamas guessed that the Obama administration would be largely neutral without re-election worries over pro-Israel voters in swing states.

Hamas also hoped that it would have more success against Israel than during its last war in 2008. After all, it had plenty of new, longer-range Iranian rockets that could reach most cities in Israel.

Iran also egged Hamas on. It believed that its client's rocket barrages would give Israel a very public taste of what it should expect if it ever dared to attack Iran's nuclear facilities - while Hamas's new rockets would outshine those of its rival, the Palestine Authority on the West Bank.

More importantly, Hamas figured it had two new friends nearby in Recep Erdogan's Islamist government in Turkey and the newly ascendant Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt under Mohamed Morsi.

By going to war, Hamas reminded the world that American allies like Turkey and Egypt are now firmly in the new Iranian-backed Islamist and anti-Israel orbit. Like Hamas, both regimes came to power through elections, and then almost immediately tried to silence the opposition to ensure their permanent authoritarian rule. In Morsi's case, the new Gaza war gave him cover for almost immediately trying to suspend the constitution.

In short, Hamas and its friends felt the advantages of war outweighed the risks. And even if things went badly, they counted on their patrons imposing a T-ball truce on Israel that would save Hamas from too much damage, while allowing it to brag about its supposed success, its new rockets, its new allies and its new American support.

For now, all that may have worked.

But just as the fantasies of T-ball give way when kids grow up and start keeping score in the real world of baseball, so too will the T-ball war in the Middle East come to an end. To avoid unending rocket barrages and serial on-and-off wars, Israel will have to convince Hamas and its allies that, collectively, they all have a lot to lose by starting more T-ball wars -- ones that in the future no longer will end with a no-score truce.

Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.

Victor Davis Hanson, a classicist and military historian, is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and a recipient of the 2007 National Humanities Medal. Comment by clicking here.


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