Do you think that Israel should forget that Netanyahu, who is still somehow in power even though he ignored a year's worth of intelligence warnings thar Hamas was planning this, should be absolved of h8s share of responsibility for Hamas' deeds? He had spent most of his tenure as prime minister "bolstering Hamas"- HIS words there- to sideline Fatah and prevent a two-state peace.

There can never be peace without Palestinians getting a state. There was never any possibility that sidelining Fatah was ever going to produce a new, credible, more reasonable Palestinian leadership, let alone one which could survive if it did what Netanyahu demanded and accepted never getting a Palestinian state, because no peace in a conflict like this can ever be made by humiliating the Palestinian leadership.

And whole the hostages should be released, it serves no purpose to try and make Hamas surrender, because no wars in that region ever actually end in surrender- I'm not sure any war anywhere on the planet has ended in any side surrendering since VJ Day, for the record- and all that would come of making Hamas surrender would be some new, far deadlier group emerging to avenge the humiliation.

Hamas is vile. Likud and its coalition partners are equally vile. And nothing can be solved through any further killing.