Reply #26: well, considering Gaza is very small

[THUNDER HANDS]

like, 1/4 the size of Long Island, I'd imagine that there's not a lot of room for Hamas to put it's facilities that aren't near a hospital or a school or something. Plus its dense population makes it doubly likely that civilians would be injured or killed in an ariel raid.

Which, IMO, means that Israel obviously has tough choices when dealing with them. My problem with this is that they did it in the last few days of the Bush administration, who they knew was just going to sit back and take a hands-off approach to peace talks, unlike the Clinton administration, who basically worked until the last moments to try to hammer out a deal.

Israel *could* have waited until Obama and his team took office to let them weigh in on any plans. IMO, that would have been the responsible thing to do. Since Hamas' rocket attacks were more of a nuissance than an actual threat, I don't see any reason they couldn't have done this.

I'm sure Obama doesn't appreciate Israel doing this three weeks before he's sworn in. Or maybe they were just making sure his hands were tied before he took office, limiting his options with how to deal with any peace proposal he may have had.