The Taliban was in control of Afghanistan. They gave Al-Qaeda, the international terrorist organization, a safe base of operations. That was where the plans for the attack on September 11, 2001 were formulated.

President Bush’s reaction to 9/11 was swift and furious. The invasion phase of the Afghanistan war was engineered by General Tommy Franks–one of the great military tacticians of our time. With all of their might, after years of struggle, the British couldn’t conquer Afghanistan, the Soviet Union couldn’t conquer Afghanistan. In two weeks of ground combat with a proxy army, the United States toppled the ruling faction. We freed the people of Afghanistan from the clutches of the Taliban. (We ended up giving it all back in 2021.) Al-Qaeda moved into the shadows.

Being a brilliant strategist was intertwined with overseeing a massacre on the ground. In the first phase of the Afghanistan invasion, we bombed the Taliban’s military infrastructure. There was scant regard for innocent life. An estimate of more than 2,000 Afghanistan civilians were killed in that operation. The Arab news station, Al-Jazzera, covered the devastation in detail. American news outlets hardly mentioned the carnage–that would have been “unpatriotic.”

With a population of 2.1 million and only 141 square miles, the Gaza Strip is one of the most densely populated regions of the world. The coastline is just 25 miles long. In the surrounding State of Isreal, there are 9.8 million residents.

The bombardment and ground assault on the dreary day of October 7, 2023 took 1,200 innocent Israeli lives. An estimated 50,000 Palestinians have been killed since then. Getting drafted into an enemy army is a crime punishable by death. President Bush and Prime Minister Netanyahu have blood on their hands.

The people at the top of the Israel Defense Forces and the Hamas military are war criminals. To use humans as shields in hospitals is a war crime. Bombing hospitals is a war crime. Netanyahu won’t let food and medicine get to the sick and starving people of Gaza. If Hamas are the good guys, why are they still holding the hostages?

Is it really anti-Semitic to dislike the Netanyahu regime? The people of Israel have protested the choices that their government has made. The Palestinian people have held anti-Hamas rallies–most have been met with violence.

Although there are dozens of victims of any bombing raid in any nation, the pain of losing a loved one is as devastating as the death of anyone, anywhere, in any family.