Finally, sanity on "proportionality"

I've written before on the charges against Israel that its campaign against Hamas has used "disproportionate" force. These charges stem from one of two bases. First, the reflexive anti-Israel bias of some critics who simply refuse, for ideological reasons, ever to admit that Israel might be in the right, and second, from persons who simply do not understand what the principle of proportionality means in Just War theory. Read about that here and here and here.

At last, some sanity among the commentati is starting to appear. First up, the WaPo's Michael Gerson, who writes,

Israel's response has been criticized as "disproportionate," which betrays a misunderstanding of proportion's meaning. The goal of military action, when unavoidable, is not to take one life in exchange for each one unjustly taken; this is mere vengeance. The goal is to remove the conditions that lead to conflict and the taking of life. So far, Israel's actions have been proportionate to this objective. And the convoys of fuel, medical supplies and food sent by Israel into Gaza show an appropriate concern for Palestinian suffering, even during a broad assault on Hamas forces.

Next, Harvard law Professor Alan Dershowitz:

The claim that Israel has violated the principle of proportionality -- by killing more Hamas terrorists than the number of Israeli civilians killed by Hamas rockets -- is absurd. First, there is no legal equivalence between the deliberate killing of innocent civilians and the deliberate killings of Hamas combatants. Under the laws of war, any number of combatants can be killed to prevent the killing of even one innocent civilian.

Second, proportionality is not measured by the number of civilians actually killed, but rather by the risk posed. This is illustrated by what happened on Tuesday, when a Hamas rocket hit a kindergarten in Beer Sheva, though no students were there at the time. Under international law, Israel is not required to allow Hamas to play Russian roulette with its children's lives

Somewhat immodestly, I would claim that as perceptive as these two gentlemen are, my own analyses are somewhat more thorough. Then again, I'm not limited here by space as newspaper writers are.