Attacking Hamas – though it won’t break Hamas – can help to give temporary alleviation from the rocket attacks. Unfortunately, the pragmatic way to win the war is to take as many lives as possible and/or to take away the enemy’s will to fight. Though this always works pragmatically, there are major ethical problems with it.

Likewise, Israel can set up a government in Gaza (their own) and not worry about giving any concessions to the Palestinian people if they so choose. This can solve a problem, but again, it raises ethical problems as well.

In Afghanistan, by contrast, the US had both a military strategy and a political one, the latter involving installing Kharzai. In Israel, you’ve got a prime minister who hasn’t identified his war aims or outlined a post-Hamas landscape– if such a thing is even contemplated in Israel at the moment.

Israel can and should defend itself vigorously, but this crisis merely underlines the profound nature of its strategic dilemma. Does anyone think that 300 deaths, or 30,000, will end terrorism or make Hamas and its supporters finally cry uncle?

The international community hates terrorists, but they hate Jews more.

And of course, Hamas have no interest in “trying something else” (e.g. recognizing Israel) but they understand that it’s in their strategic interest for other nations, especially European nations, to perceive those options as being on the table because it might lead to their de facto recognition at some point down the road. Eventually, if Europe wants to continue having a say in what Israel does or doesn’t do vis a vis Hamas, then it’ll either have to drop their boycott of Hamas and engage it diplomatically, or get involved militarily (peacekeeping troops, direct support for Israel …). And when push comes to shove, it’s pretty obvious which side of the fence they’ll fall on, and Hamas knows this, which is why they’ve been content to play a waiting game for the past two years.

Once that happens, Israel will have plenty more options for dealing with Hamas instead of just two, and military action against it will become less and less reasonable. So whatever Israel’s full plans are for Cast Lead, it had better see them through to completion right now because they probably won’t have another chance (see: Second Lebanon War).

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That’s why ineffectual performances like that in Lebanon really hurt Israel and its international standing. Even the lefty media will accord an atavistic respect to power, if it’s effectively exercised. That’s why criticism of the US is muted if civilians are killed in Iraq, for example, and why the press is prepared to blame last summer’s Caucasus conflict on Georgian provocation. Respect will be earned if Hamas is decisively defeated. If it isn’t, someone will try to get Barack indicted for war crimes at the Hague. And the bad press will continue unabated.