It appears that soon the lights will go out in Gaza.
After months of constant rocket attack, Israel has had enough. In a retaliatory step, the government last week approved a plan to cut electricity to the 1.4 million Arab residents of the Gaza Strip.
This will not be a wholesale blackout. Israel will phase in the cuts. Fifteen minutes after any rocket attack, electric power will cease, with the length of the shut-off gradually increased if attacks continue.
Predictably, worldwide reaction has been negative. Many accuse Israel of inflicting collective punishment. Others say such actions violate international law.
While fingers wagged, on Oct. 30, Gaza-based terrorists launched two Kassam rockets and five mortar rounds into southern Israel, one scoring a direct hit on a home. If that’s not indiscriminate collective terror, we don’t know what is.
It’s a common theme among Israel’s detractors that Israel derives pleasure by punishing defenseless Arabs. We know this to be utterly false. Israel does not wish to take steps like cutting the electricity.
But in the face of nonstop attacks, is Israel to do nothing to protect its citizens? Is the country not entitled, even obligated, to retaliate? Wouldn’t any other nation respond, perhaps even more harshly, if it came under similar attack?
A cutoff, while severe, will kill or maim no one. It will, however, send a strong message: Attack Israeli population centers and there will be consequences. Elect a criminal gang like Hamas as your leadership and there will be consequences.
It is easy for the rest of the world –– indeed, easy for many Jews –– to blast Israel for taking this step in Gaza. Were they to spend a week or two in Sderot, the southern Israeli city that has endured the brunt of the attacks, they might see things differently.
With peace talks in the offing, with Israel having voluntarily departed from Gaza two years ago, it is intolerable that Israel should leave these attacks unanswered.
Will cutting off the electricity stop the attacks? Probably not. Will it rally Gaza’s Palestinians around the Hamas flag? Probably so. But Israel should not have to apologize for reacting like any sovereign nation.
The struggle for peace goes on. The battle for survival goes on. Israelis will do what they must, and while we are free to criticize, we should remember: We are not the ones with the rockets falling on our heads.
CopyrightJ, the Jewish news weekly of Northern California