Organized by Hamas, the Palestinian demonstration on Friday along the Israeli border was arguably not a model of peaceful protest: people threw Molotov cocktails and hurled burning tires toward the security barriers. According to one unconfirmed report, somebody fired some shots in the same general direction. Still, the casualty figures tell you something:

Palestinians killed—18

Palestinians wounded—750-1,000 (estimates vary)

Israelis killed—0

Israelis wounded—0

International law forbids the use of lethal force unless one’s own life is in danger, but don’t expect anybody in the self-proclaimed most moral army in the world to be held accountable for this massacre.   Haaretz’s Gideon Levy was overstating, of course, when he wrote that in Israel the killing of Palestinians is accepted more lightly than the killing of mosquitoes, but clearly, it is accepted without too much anguish. Anyway, “the most moral army in the world” was never anything more than a propaganda soundbite. Does anyone still take it seriously?

Bernie Sanders has distinguished himself once again in being apparently the only member of Congress to criticize the Israeli action. It would be nice to see something at least as strong from the NY Times’ editorial writers. But don’t hold your breath: our newspaper of record doesn’t really like to talk about Israeli atrocities.

PS

In fairness, I must acknowledge that the Times did come out with a decent editorial today (4/4) on this subject.  Better late than never.