Interesting

Been finding a few interesting statistic based studies coming out over the last few days. This one, from the International Policy Institute for Counter Terrorism casts statistical doubt on the idea that the Israelis are "massacring" the Palestinians. In fact, it shows quite the opposite.

If the Israelis were engaging in a full scale assault on the Palestinian people, as has been alleged, we would expect to see some similarity between the numbers of men and women who are killed or a relatively even age distribution. If you were invading cities and indiscriminately killing anyone that is what you would expect to see in the death distribution graphs.

But instead we see that nearly half of the Palestinians killed have been verified full combatants and that less than 1 in 5 killed has been a verified non-combatant. Plus there isn't a random distribution in the sex of the Palestinian dead, even ignoring the combatants on the Palestinian side, 92% of the Palestinians killed were male. And age-wise, most of Palestinian fatalities overall were between the ages of 15 and 29.

So the statistics are clearly showing that the Israelis are not indiscriminately killing. The percentage of women and children just isn't high enough to substantiate the claim.

But what do we learn from the age distribution graph? The greatest proportion of the Palestinian dead come from the generation what would have been educated in the aftermath of the 1968 war. This is first generation to be completely indoctrinated from day one with absolute hatred for Israel and the humiliations of the Palestinian people. They came of age during the hijackings and bombings of the 1980s. They are coming into their own as a rage filled militaristic population now.

It is the Arab emphasis on male machismo and the fruition of nearly 30 years of hate indoctrination that is coming together in the orgy of violence that we have seen in the Al-Asqa uprising. It also explains the fatality distributions that the statistics are clearly pointing out.

So Israel is in a true war, not just militarily, but philosophically as well. But contrary to the claims of massacre, the statistics show that Israel is fighting a war against the combatants, not against the Palestinian population as a whole.

So how does that stack up against the Palestinian claim that it is fighting a war against the Israeli war machine? They claim not to target civilians intentionally, but instead the attempt to target the settlers and the IDF (never mind that they classify every Israeli Jew as a settler, it helps with the fiction that they don't target civilians).

But when we go back to the statistics, we find a different story. Over two thirds of all Israelis killed in the uprising have been non-combatants. And of those, nearly 40% were women.

In addition, the age distribution of the Israel's non-combatant deaths is more randomly distributed. I don't think that the distribution is completely random, but that the relatively high numbers of deaths among the younger age groups is due to the Palestinian habit of bombing nightclubs and discos, which are more likely to be frequented by those younger age people.

What the statistics for the Israeli deaths are showing is that there is support for the claim that the Palestinians are, in fact, targeting the civilian population of Israel.

Most people in the West are not going to strongly dispute the claim that the Palestinians are targeting civilians. When the bombs go off in bars, discos, shopping malls, busses and outdoor markets, it's hard for even the most diehard fanatic to argue too much.

But the claim that Israel is out to massacre the Palestinian people is one that has much more traction, especially among the anti-Israel contingent in the US. I realize that no amount of fact or research will ever sway them from their blinkered belief that Israel is committing evil atrocities on a Hitleresque scale.

Statistics and studies like these can help to sway the reasonable, yet uninformed decision making majority in this country. The friends of Israel must be ready with fact and reason to counter the wild and unfounded rhetorical claims of the anti-Israeli crowd.

Israel is not perfect and not without its faults. But they have been a damn good friend to the US, and a damn good friend of freedom in the Middle East. Twice, in Gulf Wars I & II, they have sat still and let their nation's security be risked to further the common good of the world. Most nations wouldn't be willing to even consider, much less take, that step. Israel shines as a beacon of common sense and selflessness in a sea of the darkness of indoctrination and selfish greed.

The anti-Israeli crowd must not be allowed to win the public relations war in America. The US population must continue to stand by Israel. This study and its results are but one weapon in the fight for our friend.