The New York Times prints nine letters responding to Roger Cohen’s March 9 column, in which he wrote that he had “never previously felt so shamed by Israel’s actions” as he did after the Gaza war, when Israel responded to  what he described as “sporadic Hamas rockets.” Steve Sheffey’s letter concisely makes three important points:

Perhaps Roger Cohen would not be “so shamed” by Israel’s conduct in Gaza if he considered that Israel has absorbed thousands of rocket and mortar attacks from Gaza since 2000, including more than 3,000 hits in 2008 alone — hardly “sporadic.”

The rocket fire continues, which shows that far from being disproportionate, Israel’s response was insufficient.

No military in the world, including ours, would have taken such care to avoid civilian casualties, even at the risk that its own civilians would continue to live in fear every day. I am proud of Israel’s response in Gaza.

In a BBC appearance during the war, British Army Colonel (Ret.) Richard Kemp, who commanded British troops in Afghanistan and serves as a senior military advisor to the British government, stated that “I don’t think there’s ever been a time in the history of warfare when any army has made more efforts to reduce civilian casualties and deaths of innocent people than the IDF is doing today in Gaza.”

The four-minute video of Colonel Kemp’s appearance is well worth watching, and the Israeli government post-war report on Hamas’s multiple war crimes, and exaggeration of civilian casualties and property damage, is well worth reading.  It is unlikely that Roger Cohen has seen or read either one.