Protective Edge was justified, and was conducted with professionalism

Objections: 1) Justifications In this objection, I shall show that the opposition’s “justification” of the attacks upon the Palestinian people are unjustified, as the opposition’s points justify Israel’s attacks on Hamas. a) Safety The nature of justifications must assume two things: that since the input was positive and just, and then the output must be positive and just. The opposition’s justifications could be summarized into two categories: (1) economics, and (2) safety. Both are justifications to attack Hamas and not the Palestinian state itself. Let us analyze the opposition’s justification of OPE for a second here. The opposition affirms that since Hamas has been launching rocket attacks on Israel, then Israel has every right to launch F-16 attacks on Palestinian civilians. However, conceive two arguments for a second; (1) Hamas’s attacks on Israel are highly ineffectual, and (2) two wrongs do not make a right. Israel has since 2012 deployed many Iron Dome missile defense systems. The Iron Dome system has been effective. Out of the 2,000 rockets Hamas launched, only 70 of them failed to be intercepted by the Iron Dome system. Via nature of this, Israel’s carpet-bombing of Gaza literally has no justification. Moreover, two wrongs don’t make a right; if a man rapes a women, and then the women kills his brother, then clearly both the man and the women are at fault here. If Israel retaliates on Palestine for the actions of Hamas, then conceive for a second here; if this were just, then the whole Palestinian population must have killed an Israeli directly. b) Economics The opposition affirms that since Hamas could easily attack airports and other areas of economic importance, Palestine must be reduced to shreds. Does the opposition here indicate that the Israeli state values money more than society? Again, with the Iron Dome in place, the Israelis can relax. However, if the opposition claims that Israel attacks Palestine for the sake of destroying Hamas, and not the Palestinian people, then why shell, bomb and destroy houses of innocent civilians? Israel’s definitions of terrorist in Occupied Territories are literally “anyone who supports Hamas”. This is deplorable to a high extent, for that is wholly inclusive of the majority of the Palestinian populace. 2) Professionalism This objection shall be short; analytically, conducted with professionalism means abiding the conducts of the Geneva Convention and the basic premises of the UDHR (and other Human Rights conventions). Henceforth, this is inclusive of all actions and not just some. The opposition claims to have never seen an army been so humane in it's intentions before. This is a huge lie; Israel has been shelling areas that it has declared safe. An example of this is al-Rimal, an area that Israel has declared safe. In the airstrikes in al-Rimal, 5 Palestinians (including a 5 years-old child) was killed. This is highly disgusting, and if professionalism is a scorched-earth virtue, then perhaps Israel has been acting with professionalism for this whole time. Apart from this, the invalidity of the 81% statistics could be expressed like this; the whites are more likely Nazis, henceforth we should kill as many whites as we could. This is faulty generalization and is an exemplification of victim blaming.3) International Relationsa) UN Sec. Council. Reso. 242Firstly, the opposition claims that Palestine has refused to acknowledge Israel's right to existence. Hamas alone does not believe that Israel has the rights to existence. The Palestinian Liberation Organization has stated it's intent in recognizing Israel's right to exist. This was in accordance with UN Sec. Council Resolution 242; this recognition of right however, requires a notion of "tooth-for-tooth" to be considered an exemplification of justice. Via Reso. 242, Israel must also return to the pre-1967 borders. Henceforth, we now revolve around the virtue of justice; if justice is 'to give everything one's due" then it is analytically mutually beneficial. The PLO's recognition of Israel is overtly polite, and since the status quo ante of 1967 has not been restored, it is highly unjust to the Palestinian people for the PLO to continue recognizing the state of Israel. The opposition affirms that since the state of Palestine does not recognize Israel, they should in turn be attacked and destroyed. Israel is recognized by the PLO, the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people. b) Oslo AccordsFirstly, the opposition confuses Hamas and Palestine; Hamas is an organization. Palestine is an autonomous state. Palestine is not responsible for the tunnels. Palestine is not responsible for the rocket attacks. Hamas is. Hamas is no longer the ruling party in Palestine; the PLO is. The PLO is not responsible for any attacks since the Second Intifida, and has in turn become more of a civilized party participating in clean and fair political elections. Again, all the conditions were fulfilled by the Palestinian Authority and PLO; they have renounced terrorism, they have abstained from incitement and hostile propaganda (to a point), they have accepted Israel's right to existence. The last condition however, is not in order. There are no article that demands the demilitarization of the armed forces of the PLO and Palestine. The opposition once again provides justification for attacking Hamas, but not Palestine as a whole. c) International RecognitionLet us look at the baseless claims of the opposition; the opposition claims that the PLO is eliminated. This is wholly false; the current president of the PNA is from the Fatah, part of the PLO. The opposition claims here that analytically a war consists of sending armies into one another's territory. However, Palestine's National Guards have never launched an attack on Israel. Accordingly to the opposition, the PLO is the main representative of the Palestinian territories. With this said, it cannot be said that there was legitimate reason to attack the Palestinian Authority. For legitimacy in aggression includes the official representation of the state, not an organization, to attack the "aggressed" country. Israel is henceforth the aggressor, for Israel has attacked a de facto state with weak justifications.2) ConductThe opposition here affirms the following things; that one cannot say who is right or wrong by the numbers of death. There is, however, a huge difference between whatever is "just" and whatever is "right/wrong". For a man could justifiably like fascism, whilst we all know that fascism is wrong. Justified is defined as an exemplification of justice. Henceforth, we could dismiss the ignoratio elenchi and moving-the-goalposts of the opposition. Another point must be given here; OPE was an all out assault on the Palestinian National Authority and Gaza, not an all-out assault on Hamas. This can be exemplified by the mere fact that around 10% of the people killed were "militants" in the conventional definition. a) Hospital AttacksThe opposition here commits the fallacy of presumption and of subjectivity; it would be nice for men to objectively accept the fact that killing wounded people is considered unjust. However, it is a mere fact that an Israeli tank shelled al-Aqsa hospital. It is also a fact that Israel has attacked 7 UNRWA schools operating in Gaza during OPE. Nevertheless, all the opposition has done is affirm that the al-Aqsa hospital has been used by Hamas to shelter militants. Let us use this anecdote first; al-Aqsa hospital is a state run government, not run by Hamas. Hamas has not been in usage of the hospital, and there is no evidence to suggest otherwise. The shelling of al-Aqsa killed 5 people, and wounded another 50. This goes against the Geneva Convention.b) Disporportionate Use of ForceThe opposition has also done nothing here but say that the Geneva Convention applies to terrorism, and has justified an airstrike on a neighbourhood of innocent civilians. This is simply disgusting. The Geneva Convention here states that citizens must be given a reasonable amount of time to leave indicated areas of impeding violence; how is it possible that one minute would have been enough for the people of such areas to leave? In one minute, it would be impossible for me to gather my important belongings and run as far as I could from the indicated areas of attack. This is why Israel has failed at preventing civilian casaulities.c) Israel HR Violations and IntentionsIsrael is targetting Palestine as a whole; if Israel were only targetting Hamas, then why does Israel not launch attacks on Hamas rocket positions? Why depend on high and heavy air support; why the dependence on the F-16 airstrikes when CAS and a coordinated ground operation would have done much better to stop Hamas? Again, another issue that I highlighted was Israel's hatred of democratic institutions of Hamas. Israel defines "affiliation" with whoever votes for Hamas. Israel defines "military targets" as inclusive of the homes of Hamas members. This, as proven by the Geneva Convention, is prohibited. Israel has justifications to wipe Palestine off the map, when the aim of all warfare is to neutralize the enemy. Conclusions:The opposition's main justification justifies actions against Hamas, but not agains the Palestinian people. Israel's definition of a terrorist is anyone who supports Hamas, and this applies for many people in Palestine. This deplorable fact is further supported by the mere nature of Israel's random attacks; shelling hospitals and UNRWA schools are unjustifiable. The opposition's main premise is based upon retaliation against Hamas. However, Hamas is no longer in power. Professionalism here was also defined as accordance to all the basic premises of the UDHR and Geneva Convention. Any violation of these would automatically make a miitary campaign unjust and unprofessional. Whatever is right, is not whatever is just. Resolution remains negated. Sources in Comments