The 'occupation of Gaza' canard

Enemies of Israel, who are seeking to justify Hamas rocket and tunnel attacks against Israeli civilians, are mendaciously claiming that Israel has continued to occupy the Gaza Strip, even after its soldiers and settlers left the Strip in 2005. They claim that because Gaza was unlawfully still occupied, despite the absence of Israeli soldiers, resistance to the occupation - including the murder of Israeli civilians - is justified as a matter of international law. This claim is wrong for several independent reasons.

First, it is never justified to target and murder enemy civilians. Even if Israel did have a military occupation, as it does on the West Bank, it would still be a double war crime to fire rockets at Israeli civilians, using Palestinian civilians as human shields. It would also be a war crime to use terrorist tunnels to murder or kidnap Israeli civilians. The only legitimate resistance to occupation is to target the soldiers who enforce the occupation.

Second, a military occupation of Gaza - as distinguished from civilian settlements - would be entirely justified, both as a matter of law and common sense, because Hamas, which controls Gaza, is at war with Israel and has repeatedly refused to make peace with the nation-state of the Jewish people. A military occupation is proper as long as a state of war exists.

Third, and even more important for any future peace, is the indisputable fact that Israel, in fact, ended its occupation of Gaza in 2005.

The years between 2005 and the present must be divided into three time periods: 2005-2007; 2007-to the beginning of July 2014; and the beginning of July 2014 to the present.

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/The-occupation-of-Gaza-canard-369370