Cruel Necessity/ Senseless Brutality

Cruel Necessity/ Senseless Brutality

 

     After the execution of Charles I in 1649, Oliver Cromwell, looking at the decapitated body shook his head and uttered under his breath “ Cruel Necessity “. The cruelty of the deed no one can question. Its necessity has been a matter of debate ever since.

     Israel invades the Gaza knowing that with its massive fire-power and due to Gaza’s dense population, that there will be many civilian casualties and says it was a “necessity, the cruelty of which escapes it and its political and military leaders. “Collateral damage,” “fifty eyes for one eye”, (more like 75 to 1…1000+ to 13(4 of whom were killed by Israeli “friendly fire”), blame Hamas, (when hospitals, schools, media centers and U.N. aid and school buildings are targeted), the propaganda machine proclaim and the impotent world “leaders” parrot and find cover for doing nothing. The ends justify the means

     After the Battle of Culloden in 1745, the Duke of Cumberland unleashed his soldiers on the Scottish population, to teach them a lesson that would send a message to others who wanted to fight for their freedoms. Carnage was perpetrated, hundreds of unarmed civilians, women and children were slaughtered…..Senseless Brutality? It was not to George II and the English Government. They saw it as a necessity. People must be taught a lesson and know their place. It made perfect sense to them and it was not brutal, just the price for law and order. The ends justify the means.

        

     On April 13, 1919, at Jallianwalla Bagh, in Amristar, Gen. Dyer ordered his troops to open fire on a crowd of 5,000 peaceful demonstrators in an enclosed garden. After 10 minutes of firing 1,650 rounds, over 1,000 men, women and children were killed and 2,000 wounded. Cruel necessity/ Senseless brutality? Overkill? Not according to the British. India the Jewel in its Crown must remain in its control, at all cost. The ends justify the means.. Gen Dyer had one regret….too many bullets wasted, because he could not use his  machine gun. This massacre marked the beginning of the end of British rule in India.

     Deir Yassin, April 9, 1948, a peaceful village, which had according to Jewish newspaper, driven out militant Arabs, and was outside the area recommended by the U.N. for the future state of Israel, but which was earmarked for an airfield, was attacked at noon by the combined forces of Irgun, led by Menachem Begin, the Stern gang and 25 Haganah commandos.. 254 villagers were systematically killed (many bodies were stuffed down the village well, after being paraded up and down the village), houses were dynamited and even the graveyard bulldozed to remove any trace of the village. It was wiped off the map..    

     Begin,(later Prime Minister of Israel), said this “ Arabs throughout the country, induced to believe wild tales of “ Irgun butchery”, were seized with limitless panic and started to flee for their lives. This mass flight soon developed into a maddened, uncontrollable stampede. The political and economic significance of this development can hardly be overestimated”. INDEED!!!!!.

     Cruel Necessity/ Senseless Brutality? Not according to Irgun, Stern,and Haganah….. . The ends justify the means.  Very efficient.

     Deir Yassin served its purpose. The brutality sent a clear message….leave or else. 750,000 fled in grief and panic. Villages and cities were depopulated and their place was taken by survivors of the Holocaust and others.

     60 years of death and destruction. The enmity runs deep. Both sides have become warped by Necessity and to them it is not Cruel or Brutal or Senseless

                               The dance of death.

 

 

 

     

          

       



 
                              

 

 

 

     

          

       

 
             

                                      The dance of death.