Ron Paul Refuses To Condemn Hamas

Foreign policy is one of the areas where Ron Paul and I part company, and this is an example of why:

The U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a resolution strongly defending how Israel has repelled rocket attacks.

The non-binding resolution, passed 404-1 on Wednesday, was substantially rewritten since its introduction in January to include a strident defense of recent Israeli tactics in the Gaza Strip.

New passages include one saying that “those responsible for launching rocket attacks against Israel routinely embed their production facilities and launch sites amongst the Palestinian civilian population, utilizing them as human shields” and “the inadvertent inflicting of civilian casualties as a result of defensive military operations aimed at military targets, while deeply regrettable, is not at all morally equivalent to the deliberate targeting of civilian populations as practiced by Hamas and other Gaza-based terrorist groups.”

More than 100 Palestinians and three Israelis have been killed since last Wednesday, when Hamas and its allies intensified rocket attacks on Israel’s south and Israel retaliated. Palestinians say most of their casualties are civilians, while Israelis say most of them are combatants.

(…)

The sole vote against was U.S. Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) who preaches the reduction of U.S. involvement in overseas conflicts.

Which would make sense if we were talking about sending troops to Israel. But we’re not, we’re talking about condemning the actions of a terrorist organization.

One who is responsible for actions like this:

JERUSALEM (CNN) — A gunman opened fire on people inside a Jewish seminary in Jerusalem on Thursday, killing at least eight, police and rescue officials said.

Video from the scene showed a frantic crowd of rescue workers carrying bloodied victims into ambulances. Dozens of police officers were scouring the campus and surrounding streets.

Police spokesman Mickey Rosenfeld said the attacker “opened fire on innocent youngsters studying. A number of students have been killed.”

Israeli police and ambulance officials said eight people were killed by the attacker, who was shot dead. Eight people were injured, five of them seriously, according to police.

(…)

CNN’s Ben Wedeman in Gaza reported celebratory shooting shortly after the attack.

Refusing to condemn a terrorist organization is, in my mind at least, tantamount to condoning it’s actions.