Make Me A Massacre!

It looks like Richard Landes of Augean Stables called it on December 31:

Whether by Israeli accident or Hamas engineering, expect a spectacular civilian massacre in the coming days, followed by an orgy of Pallywood photography, amplified by a compliant Western media, and even greater fury in the streets of the Muslim and Western world. It’s in the Hamas playbook… and will be until the media gets sober.

Enter Tuesday's Headline: Gaza truce proposed after Israeli shell kills 30

France and Egypt announced an initiative to stop the fighting in Gaza late Tuesday, hours after Israeli mortar shells exploded near a U.N. school sheltering hundreds of people displaced by the onslaught on Hamas militants. At least 30 Palestinians died, staining streets with blood.

But if you read further, you find the following a few paragraphs later.

Israel's military said its shelling at the school — the deadliest single episode since Israeli ground forces invaded Gaza on Saturday after a week of air bombardment — was a response to mortar fire from within the school and said Hamas militants were using civilians as cover.

Two residents of the area who spoke with The Associated Press by telephone said they saw a small group of militants firing mortar rounds from a street near the school, where 350 people had gathered to get away from the shelling. They spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.

Keep in mind that Hamas are Hizbollah wannabees, so  since comparisons between Operation Cast Lead and Israel's 2006 war with Hizbollah are obvious, it is worth pointing out how Hizbollah wrote the book on using large numbers of children as human shields--or their dead bodies as propaganda. Clinton W. Taylor wrote in the American Spectator back in May 2005:

I hope you are somewhat familiar with Ralph Kinney Bennett, who writes for TCSDaily? Yes? Well, Bennett wrote a great longish piece on the decline of the United Nations that you might have missed. He recounts a story I hadn't heard of: the discovery in Lebanon of a terrorist-training complex run out of a U.N. backed school near Sidon that was

stocked with assault rifles, bazookas, crates of grenade launchers, machine guns, explosives, and assorted other weapons. U.N. officials admitted the school had been "misused," but did not explain how terrorist training had gone on for years while escaping their notice.

The piece goes on to describe at great length espionage, anti-Semitism, and incompetence running rampant at U.N.H.Q.

Also, let's not forget that Hamas has done this thing before, for example on October 2007 from a UN (naturally) school in Gaza [hat tip: HonestReporting]:

With all the talk that in current operation in Gaza Israel has finally figured out how to do PR properly, all of that is trumped by Hamas's willingness, if not eagerness, to put children in harm's way and reap the rewards of worldwide condemnation.

Whatever Hamas's shortcomings in comparison with Hizbollah, Hamas as shown itself as capable of getting Gazans killed as Hizbollah succeeded in bringing death and destruction to Lebanon.

For more in-depth information and background on this and the other kinds of ploys Hamas uses, check out this HonestReporting communique.

Technorati Tag: Israel and Gaza and Hamas and Operation Cast Lead.