Who Are Ya Gonna Believe...

...me or your lyin' eyes?

I was never exactly what you'd call a groupie of Zionism. Israel's bloodlust and ceaseless, brutal conquest of surrounding lands through acts of terrorism and fascist tactics would make an enemy of even the most mild-mannered thinking person. But when I read stories such as this, generously quoting the spokesman of Israel's Defense Ministry, Yigal Palmor (Facebook page here)... Let's just say that it's a good thing Obama got elected President instead of me because I'd be racing for that red button, demanding launch codes and getting coordinates to Tel Aviv my first minute in office.

Dr. Mads Gilbert, a Norwegian physician who has extensive experience practicing medicine in the Gaza strip with his partner Dr. Erik Fosse, told the Lancet that Gaza hospitals are overwhelmed with "nightmarish havoc." In it, they told stories in which doctors have had to perform surgery using illumination from cell phone lights.

(Note that this AP story, regardless of who's hosting it, just shows you a picture of wounded Israeli soldiers getting rushed to the hospital, not Palestinians.)

Here are some sobering figures that put the weight of validity to Dr. Gilbert's observations:

The Lancet cited the Ministry of Health in Gaza as saying that as of Monday, 292 children and 75 women had been killed in the offensive, with 1,497 children and 626 women wounded.

According to the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, the death toll is somewhat lower: As of Wednesday, it said, 225 children and 70 women had been killed. However, the ministry defines children as 18 and under, the Palestinian Center 17 and under.

Once again, that's nearly 1300 casualties involving children, 700 more involving women.

Now, this is the response from Yigal Palmor, if you can stomach reading it to the end:

"Dr. Gilbert is notorious for his radical far left opinions and his systematic demonizaton of Israel. He has already accused Israel of almost every nightmarish crime in the book only to ignore the refutation of every one of his allegations. His stories are worthy of Dante's imagination but have been proved time and again to be far removed from reality. It is a pity that serious members of the medical profession should allow themselves to be dragged into an excessive of mad Mads."

Apparently, any denunciation of Israeli terror is automatically anti-Semitic and anti-Israel, according to Palmor. For instance, this is what Palmor said Dec. 10 of Richard Falk's criticism of Israel's humanitarian shortcomings in Gaza in the days leading up to the Dec. 27 attacks:

"The credibility of this expert has suffered a major blow with this announcement, which consists more of anti-Israel propaganda than truth."

Or how about this after Cardinal Martino, the Vatican's Justice and Peace Minister, called Gaza "A big concentration camp":

"(It is) the vocabulary of Hamas propaganda, coming from a member of the College of Cardinals. Making remarks that seem to be based on Hamas propaganda while ignoring its numerous crimes ... does not bring the people closer to truth and peace."

Neither does Israel's Ted Bundy style of foreign policy. And, to be perfectly honest, I cannot remember the last time that any member of the Vatican willingly made themself a mouthpiece for "Hamas propaganda."

Not content with Palmor's neurotic invective, even the Madoff-bankrupted Simon Wiesenthal Center had to get in the act and call Martino "a Holocaust denier" on a par with Ahmadinejad, despite the fact that Martino made a blatant and unmistakable reference to the very venues of the Holocaust.

In other words, Bring up the disproportionate carnage of our actions and be branded an anti-Semite and Holocaust denier.

I don't know what's more nauseating, folks: This right wing lunatic Palmor branding as a Hamas propagandist and leftist everyone who cites facts after having worked in this war zone or the United States Senate holding a vote while our nation is falling down around our ears in order to reaffirm Israel's right to defend itself. Which is sort of like a judge reaffirming a wife batterer's right to defend himself after sending his wife to the Critical Care Unit for scratching his face.

Then again, the Democratic party has proven to be merely a more moderate wing of the Likud party, which obviously dictates our foreign policy in the Middle East considering that Ehud Olmert actually talked Bush into not allowing Condoleezza Rice to vote in the UN for a cease fire in Gaza.

Olmert got Bush off a podium in Philadelphia to order him to instruct her not to vote for a cease fire that could've helped save hundreds of lives.