Suffering is inexcusable

Dear editor:

Your little editorial on Gaza retribution distorts facts. After 60 years, there will be no simple answers. But to excuse killing children at school as a "product of war Hamas brought upon itself' only worsens the situation.

If Israeli "retribution" is to kill 700 civilians in response to a dozen rocket attack casualties, this is the same sort of "retribution" the Nazis carried out in Europe.

History: 1948, refugees fled to Gaza to get out of the way of Arab armies invading Israel. After the war, Israel refused to let the refugees go home and confiscated their farms and homes.

Over the next 61 years, Israel has transformed Gaza into a concentration camp for their children and grandchildren, who live, often without electricity or running water, in inhumane squalor.

The population is greater than the State of Idaho, living in an area 5 percent that of Elmore County. The equivalent population density for us would be to have 30 million people living in Elmore County. But, Gaza is more like alkali flats. Security fences surround the area and soldiers keep machine guns pointed at them to keep them from escaping. So, when weapons from Saudi Arabia and Iran are smuggled into Gaza, there are plenty of people angry enough to use them.

Retribution? Yes. There's plenty of that on both sides. However, the responsibility to find long-term solutions falls more heavily on the powerful than on the powerless. It could not be more obvious which side has the power in Gaza. But, it's more than military power. Israel has the economic power to transform Gaza and create choices for its people, and people around the world have offered to help.

That's not simple, but it is preferable to endless warfare on a defenseless population.

Jim Breslin