If there has ever been a situation crying out for clarity, it is the ongoing “dispute” between Israel – a Western, democratic ally of the United States – and Hamas – the Iran-sponsored terrorist organization that has launched 4,000 missiles into Israel over the past few years. We are lucky – though not nearly so lucky as the Israeli people – that Israel’s government has finally had enough and has decided to remove the Hamas threat once and for all.

And yet, listening to the statesmen of the international community, one gets the impression that the whole thing is Israel’s fault. From the United Nations, the European Union, and even the United States, one hears calls for an end to the violence, as if the terrorism itself and the self-defense of the victims is morally equivalent. Meanwhile, the international media is shocked – shocked! – that Palestinian civilians have been caught in the crossfire.

Crossfire? Hamas launches its rockets, boards its terrorists, and hides its weapons along beaches, in mosques, and in cemeteries. They do this on purpose so that any retaliation by Israel can be spun to a gullible (and disturbingly anti-Israel) media as an attack against civilians. Meanwhile, reporters fail to mention that when Israeli civilians die at the hands of Hamas attacks, it’s not a regrettable consequence of war: for Hamas, killing innocent Israelis is the whole point.

The Bush Administration has been supportive of Israel for eight years, and, despite a few nods to diplomatic niceties, remains largely supportive with Secretary Rice’s call for a “ceasefire that would not allow a reestablishment of the status quo ante.” But it’s more than that. The problem isn’t just that Hamas launches rockets into Israel, but that Hamas exists for one purpose – to kill Jews and destroy Israel. The problem isn’t the conflict – it’s the terrorists.

This new war isn’t really new at all – it’s the same war of survival Israel has been fighting since its founding. It is also the same war the United States is fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq, and around the world. Islamist terror isn’t a “strategic partner” or a “global competitor” – it’s a disease, a new manifestation of the same monstrous ideas that once spawned the Gulag, Holocaust, and Killing Fields. This ideology – Islamism, Islamic Fascism, whatever you want to call it – is aggressive, totalitarian, and blood-thirsty. It won’t quit – it needs to be defeated. That’s why we fought back after 9/11, it’s why we sent the surge to Iraq, and it’s why Israel should stop being asked to negotiate with men holding hand-grenades.

We’re all for an “end of the violence.” But the violence in the Middle East will not end until the death-cult psychopaths of Hamas and Hezbollah are ended first.