Moral equivalence?

Rick Bayan is the owner of a blog called "The New Moderate," with which I often agree and, even when I disagree with him, which I appreciate for his attempts to find a “moderate” position. Today he put out a post entitled “Itching for Another World War” which discusses a number of things, but a large piece of it discusses the fighting now going on between Israel and Hamas. And unbelievably, his conclusion is rather hard to take:

For now, let’s focus on Israel and its implacable adversaries. Both sides have been going at it with alarming gusto, and of course both sides claim to be victims. Hamas militants have been firing away at Israel mindlessly and persistently, like mosquitoes tormenting a sweaty horse, giving Israel a perfect excuse to fire back. Israel, no longer the plucky underdog of its early decades, has been spilling mostly-innocent Arab blood in the Gaza Strip, an Arab-occupied, Hamas-dominated patch of real estate the size of Philadelphia.

So who’s to blame? The obvious answer, at least from The New Moderate’s perspective, is both sides.

He correctly identifies the problem, I think, when he writes:

Hamas, like all Islamic terror groups, is guilty of refusing to accept the validity of Israeli statehood. What will it take for these Muslim militants to stop begrudging the Jewish people, dispersed and oppressed for nearly two thousand years, a New Jersey-sized slice of turf occupying roughly half their ancestral homeland, with a little extra desert thrown in for good measure? Where were the Jewish survivors of Nazi depredations supposed to establish a modern state for their people – Antarctica? The Jews earned their right to Israel through a combination of land purchases, grit and perseverance, and they’ve successfully defended it three times against staggering odds. The people we call Palestinians are simply Arabs who lived in an artificial state created from the ruins of the Ottoman Empire. After the establishment of Israel in 1948, they were free to stay put or find a new home within a vast Arab dominion that stretches from Morocco to the Iranian border. Israelis have only Israel. This much is certain: if terror groups like Hamas stopped putting Israel in their crosshairs, the bloodshed in the so-called Holy Land would stop tomorrow.

He even recognizes the artificiality of the “Palestinian nationality.” But yet, he proceeds to write:

And what about Israel, now widely vilified (especially on the multiculti left) as a world-class imperialist oppressor of indigenous peoples? First of all, Israel must plead guilty to creating a caste system that relegated its resident Arabs to second-class status. Yes, Israel was founded as a Jewish state, and you can’t blame Israel’s Jews for wanting to keep it that way. But Israel can be shockingly, almost gleefully ruthless in lashing back at its enemies; that ruthlessness has been amply displayed during the ongoing blockade and siege of Gaza. You’d think a civilized people who endured centuries of persecution at the hands of ethnic majorities would show a little more sensitivity toward the minorities in their midst – at least toward the civilians who suffer most from Israeli overkill. I’ll never forget the chilling words of an extremist rabbi who declared that “a million Arabs aren’t worth one Jewish fingernail.”

Now first of all, he refers to “a caste system that relegated its resident Arabs to second-class status.” I really wonder what he means there. There are Arabs in the Israeli Knesset (Parliament), and Arabs in the highest court of the land. By what measure are they “second-class”? On all matters where religion matters, the Jews run their own affairs, and Christians and Muslims run theirs. It's not like Saudi Arabia, where public celebration of Christmas can get you in trouble with the law. As for that rabbi who said “a million Arabs aren’t worth one Jewish fingernail,” this was one extremist — it hardly represents the views of the Israeli government.

So how can Rick Bayan say there is guilt on both sides? Hamas is killing innocent civilians, deliberately. Israel is firing back at the enemy, and, yes, killing innocent civilians, but warnings have been given in advance so they could have left, and they didn't. This is hardly a case of equally sharing the blame. I see not a single thing that Israel is doing in this war that they aren't forced to do, and that any other country would do in a similar situation.

How can a “moderate” criticize Israel in this battle?