On the rare occasion that I seek the advice of a medical professional, I’m careful not to offend the good doctor by asking if his adherence to the ethical standards of his profession remains, after all these years, unwavering. That supposedly “sacred” Hippocratic oath to which he pledged himself way back in med school–does he still feel bound to its tenets?
Seated in the waiting room, I can’t but quietly wonder if there’s an expiration date on ethics. Is it something for which, every now and again, a public renewal is needed? Or, once avowed, is a commitment like that enduring?
When, at last, my name is called and I take my seat atop a cushionless blue plinth (over which the departing nurse has just unraveled a crunchy sheet of “hygienic” paper; is it no longer appropriate, at thirty-one years of age, to remove a pen from my pocket and begin doodling on the paper?) I wouldn’t dare risk hurting the incoming doctor’s feelings by asking if he really intends to do me “no harm”.
That would be insulting, and I’d rather perish right there on the squishy, pen-stained mat than offend a man for whom I had respect.
I would, rather, think much more highly of the man who’d proven himself deserving of high-thinking.
Now, dear reader, I want you to substitute the state of Israel for the good doctor. (I pray the analogy isn’t too strained; if it is, you’ll doubtless do me the service of informing me in the comments section below).
Through many years of conflict, Israel has conducted itself with a scrupulosity unpracticed by its Arab neighbors. It has, undeviatingly, and often at immense cost to itself, adhered strictly to the “rules of war”. It’s an oath that Israel stands by.
It has, at no small expense to its citizens, channeled vast resources toward the development and use of the “Iron Dome” system, a purely defensive mechanism by which airborne missiles can be intercepted and neutralized. It has, when launching salvos of its own, attempted only to hit enemies and to spare innocent life. Before attacking a building in which civilians are thought, and terrorists are positively known to reside, Israeli forces will first strike it with a non-lethal “knock bomb”. After feeling the tremors issued by the harmless ordinance, civilians have the opportunity to exit the building and find shelter. Ceding the vital element of surprise, the Israelis will disseminate leaflets and text messages that tell civilians where they should go (and, more importantly, the places from which they should keep their distance).
For the Israelis, collateral damage is incidental, not purposeful.
Civilian casualties are lamented, not celebrated.
Ethics are, without exception, upheld.
The abduction of innocents and the taking of hostages–these aren’t acts in which the Israelis giddily engage. Nor is sodomizing young women and defiling the corpses of the elderly. They’re not known to “dirty” (read, brutally and repeatedly rape) young girls before executing them in front of their horror-stricken parents. They’re not in the habit of disemboweling people and shoving infants in broiling ovens. They haven’t the reputation of decapitating writhing bodies with old, rusty farm tools, and tossing hand grenades into jam-packed basements.
The Israelis, you see, faithfully adhere to certain ethical standards–conventional ‘rules of war’, you might say–of which their Gazan neighbors fall unabashedly short.
And yet, despite a long history of unwavering adherence to these ethics, the world, once again, enjoins Israel to “fight fair” (in truth, it would prefer Israel not to fight at all, and, maybe, not even to exist). It must renew its avowal not to misstep, lest the opprobrium of the entire world fall upon it. It must assure us all that it’s well-behaved and even better-intentioned. We demand that Israel’s adherence to the ethical standards of war remains steadfast and we’re impatient to hear its public commitment to that end.
For his part, President Biden said, “It is really important that Israel, with all the anger, and frustration, and just, I don’t know how to explain it, that exists, (sic) is that they operate by the rules of war, the rules of war, and there are rules of war”.
Indeed, there are “rules of war”, but only one side is concerned about them.
A few days later, Biden said that “Hamas is hiding behind Palestinian civilians, and is despicable and, not surprisingly, cowardly as well. That does not lessen the need for Israel to operate and align with the laws of war…Israel has to do everything in its power, as difficult as it is, to protect innocent civilians”.
For what it’s worth, it is not, nor has it ever been in the long course of human history, the responsibility of an attacked nation to protect the civilians of the state by which it was attacked. That’s ludicrous. It is, rather, incumbent upon each state, respectively, to ensure the welfare of its own people. That, I think, is the most basic service that a state can, and, frankly, must provide. Is that not the very reason we all agree to exit the state of nature, sacrifice a bit of our liberty, and enter into the social contract?
And yet, Israel still makes every effort to spare the lives of Palestine’s noncombatants.
Israel is, in my opinion, the good doctor. An enlightened, religious, Western state, it treats seriously the “oath” that it has undertaken. Since its inception, Israel has adhered closely to an ethical code toward which all its neighbors have turned a blind eye. During conflicts, it acts in accordance with the laws of war, even when their opponents do not. Its commitment to these laws is, by all evidence, enduring. For Israel, as for the good doctor, there is no expiration date on ethics. They are everlasting. They are non-negotiable.
And thus, we needn’t breathlessly hound Israel to “operate by the rules of war”.
It already does.
Given that fact, we might all begin to think more highly of a state that’s proven itself worthy of high-thinking.