Free Method and Madness: The Hidden Story of Israel's Assaults on Gaza by Norman Finkelstein

PREFACE
     
    Israel has committed three massacres in Gaza during the past five years: Operation Cast Lead (2008–9), Operation Pillar of Defense (2012), and Operation Protective Edge (2014). It also killed in 2010 nine foreign nationals aboard a humanitarian vessel (the Mavi Marmara ) en route to deliver basic goods to Gaza’s besieged population.
    This book chronicles and analyzes these various Israeli assaults. It casts doubt on the accepted interpretation of their key triggers, features, and consequences. Each chapter reproduces (with minor stylistic changes) the author’s commentary as it was composed after each successive assault. The year in each chapter heading indicates when it was written.
    A trio of themes form the connective tissue of the book’s narrative. First, Israel has repeatedly manufactured pretexts to achieve larger political objectives. Invariably, it resorted to military action against Hamas in order to provoke a violent response. Israel then exploited Hamas’s retaliation to launch a series of murderous assaults on Gaza.
    Second, Israel has time and again eluded accountability for its war crimes and crimes against humanity. Both the Goldstone Report and Turkey’s attempt to prosecute Israel after the Mavi Marmara massacre proved stillborn. An International Criminal Court indictment of Israeli leaders after Operation Protective Edge also seems unlikely.
    Third, at the end of each new round, the political balance between the antagonists did not change: each side declared victory, but neither side won. Such a stalemate has been much more tolerable for Israel than for the people of Gaza. The human and material losses suffered by Gazans have been of an incomparably greater magnitude. Moreover, Israel can live with the status quo, whereas Gaza, suffering under the double yoke of a foreign occupation and an illegal blockade, cannot. The fact that the indomitable will of the people of Gaza has repeatedly brought the Israeli killing machine to a standstill cannot but impress. However, such “negative” victories have yet to translate into a “positive” victory of a real improvement in Gaza’s daily life.
    Palestinians are under neither legal nor moral obligation to desist from using armed force against Israel. Nonetheless, it is this author’s contention that nonviolent mass resistance, both in Gaza and by its supporters abroad , still offers the best prospect for ending the illegal siege and occupation. Armed resistance has been attempted many times and, notwithstanding its heroism and nobility, has failed to budge Israel a jot. The time is ripe to attempt militant nonviolent resistance, or so it is argued in the ensuing pages.
     
    Norman G. Finkelstein
    September 2014

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
     
    I am grateful to Maren Hackmann-Mahajan and Jamie Stern-Weiner for both their editorial skills and the pleasures of collaborating with them. I am also indebted to the many individuals who forwarded me important information and read earlier drafts of this manuscript.

CHRONOLOGY
      
      
      
      
      
      
1956  
Outbreak of armed hostilities between Israel and Egypt
1967  
Outbreak of armed hostilities between Israel and neighboring Arab states; Israel occupies West Bank, Gaza Strip, Sinai, Golan Heights
1982  
Outbreak of armed hostilities between Israel and Lebanon; Israel occupies south Lebanon
1987  
Outbreak of first intifada in the occupied Palestinian territories
1993  
Israel, Palestinians sign Oslo Accord
2000  
Israeli occupation forces evicted from south Lebanon
2000  
Outbreak of second intifada in the occupied Palestinian territories
2005  
Israel withdraws troops, settlers from inside Gaza
2006  
Outbreak of armed hostilities between Israel and Lebanon
2006  
Hamas wins Palestinian elections
2007  
Hamas takes control of Gaza after preempting coup attempt
RECENT KEY EVENTS
June 2008  
Israel, Hamas agree to Egyptian-brokered cease-fire
November 2008  
Israel