Moral Questions in War

Michael Walzer’s "On Proportionality" in The New Republic has a surprising discussion of the question of “how much is too much in war?”

 

Before the six months of cease-fire (when the fire never ceased), Hamas had only primitive and home-made rockets that could hit nearby small towns in Israel.  By the end of the six months, they had far more advanced rockets, no longer home-made, that can hit cities 30 or 40 kilometers away.  Another six months of the same kind of cease-fire, which is what many nations at the UN demanded, and Hamas would have rockets capable of hitting Tel Aviv.  And this is an organization explicitly committed to the destruction of Israel.  How many civilian casualties are "not disproportionate to" the value of avoiding the rocketing of Tel Aviv?  How many civilian casualties would America's leaders think were "not disproportionate to" the value of avoiding the rocketing of New York?

 

His answer seems to be that the expected responses in the above situations would not be "disproportionate" but that the “proportionality” standard actually results in “too many” civilian deaths.  He thinks a proportionality standard usually justifies excessive violence rather than restrains it. 

 

Back in the real world, this morning’s IDF “Summary of Overnight Events” circulated by the Israeli Foreign Ministry reports that one of the sites used to launch rockets that was attacked last night by IAF aircraft was “adjacent to a mosque,” and further that:

 

During yesterday's three hour pause, meant for creating a humanitarian aid corridor for the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, four Grad rockets and two Qassam rockets were launched, in addition to the fourteen other rockets and mortars launched throughout the day.

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