Watching the videos coming out of Israel today and reading

[bigtree]

71. no one has a right to kill unarmed civilians

...and in many ways, it's that same military overreaction that's expected to come from Israel which has exacerbated the violence.

Back and forth. Violence and retaliation. The U.S. interest in this should be to urge a cessation of violence on all sides.

It's always amazing to me how much stock people put in killing civilians to achieve an end to warring.

As our own Abe Lincoln said of America's strength:

What constitutes the bulwark of our own liberty and independence? It is not our frowning battlements, our bristling sea coasts, the guns of our war steamers, or the strength of our gallant and disciplined army. These are not the reliance against the resumption of tyranny in our fair land.

All of them may be turned against our liberties, without making us stronger or weaker for the struggle. Our reliance is in the love of liberty which God has planted in our bosoms. Our defense is the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men, in all lands, everywhere.

Destroy this spirit, and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors. Familiarize yourselves with the chains of bondage, and you are preparing your own limbs to wear them.

Accustomed to trample on the rights of those around you, you have lost the genius of your own independence, and become the fit subjects of the first cunning tyrant who rises among you.