ON THE ONE HAND, ON THE OTHER :

Obituary: Salah Shehada : Military leader. Died in his late 40s. (New Zealand Herald, 27.07.2002)

To the Palestinians, Salah Shehada was an Islamic hero in life and a martyr in death.

To the Israelis, he was a master terrorist who sent his men to murder hundreds of Israeli civilians and soldiers over more than a decade. He topped Israel's list of most-wanted men. [...]

Shehada served as the commander of Hamas fighters in the northern Gaza Strip, but Israel also held him responsible for deadly operations within its borders and on the West Bank.

These included suicide bombings of a pizza parlour, a coffee shop and a pedestrian precinct in Jerusalem, a Tel Aviv discotheque, and the Passover-eve attack on a crowded Netanya hotel dining-room.

The Israelis say he was also behind the killing in March of five students in Gaza and of 19 passengers on a Jerusalem bus in June.

Palestinian sources confirmed the scope and lethal impact of his activities. He saw civilians as legitimate targets.

This is what conservatives mean when we complain about moral relativism. The author of this execrable obituary is apparently unable to draw any conclusion about whether the Israeli view or the Palestinian view of Shehada is correct despite his actions and his view that it's okay to kill civilians. Implicit in the author's "evenhandedness" is the notion that intentionally murdering innocents for no other reason than to spread terror could indeed be heroic. To call him a "military leader" is to do a disservice to everyone who has ever donned a uniform and fought for their country against the combatants of another country.
Posted by Orrin Judd at July 27, 2002 7:50 AM