Naturally, the Palestinian terrorists have chosen to mark Christmas with a suicide bombing. I hardly regard this as a surprise as, given by events of recent years, human fireworks seem to be the traditional Islamic way of celebrating just about any holiday (additionally today, Pakistani President Musharraf was almost killed in another suicide bombing). I often believe that people fail to understand just how desperate the situation in Israel is this: they’re losing the war. Israel has one of the strongest militaries in the world, they have hundreds of nuclear weapons, and they have every type of military technology that you can dream of. Yet still, it finds itself faced with a bitter reality: if things continue along the present course, Israel will lose and, within a few decades, it will cease to exist.

In The Death of the West Pat Buchanan tells of a conversation that he had with President Richard Nixon about Israel. Nixon declared that, in the short term, Israel would be fine. But, in the long term, it would be endangered by the demographic facts on the ground. Asked what Israel’s long-term fate would be Nixon, in the fashion of a Roman Emperor, made a fist and slowly gave a thumbs-down.

Israel is struggling against the tyranny of fixed numbers. The Moslem population within Israel is growing much faster than the Jewish population is while, at the same time, the will of the Israeli people to struggle for a Jewish state is being worn away by a combination of economic suffering, random homicide bombings, and the weight of world disapproval.

In my mind’s eye I can see what will happen, if things are let to be. Israel will acquiesce to the creation of a Palestinian state. Soon thereafter, the Palestinian state will begin demanding new concessions from the rump Israel: new land, additional rights for Arabs remaining within Israel, and whatever else they can dream up. Arabs and Moslems within Israel will begin to agitate for union with the Palestinian state: and their voices will grow with time as they breed. Eventually their numbers will grow so large that Israel will be given the choice of either surrendering or becoming a dictatorship. Israel will hold on for a little while after that but, year by year, their resolve will fade. Finally, with the cheering of the Europeans, the United Nations, and the American left, whatever is left of Israel will agree to the creation of a ‘multiethnic state’, thereby restoring the territorial integrity of Arab Palestine. The new state will, of course, constitutionally enshrine protections for all religions- and those will last for a while. But, in the end, I foresee that the Mediterranean shore will be foaming with much blood: Jewish blood.

Some will hold that I am being excessively pessimistic, but I think that they’re fools. Anyone who looks long enough at the Middle East can see two things. First, that the Islamic cries over Israel will never be appeased until that nation has been wiped from the map and the Jews either driven out or forced into a state of Dhimmitude. Second, that as things stand today, a great number of Israeli Jews are willing to sign away their future for a little temporary security today.

I’ve had dreams about this, nightmares. I see myself in the not-to-distant future, visiting refugee camps somewhere in America, refugee camps that house the battered and sick survivors of Israel. After all: what other nation would take them in? I can see them, with the sad eyes of a race that has too many times endured the unendurable, bared the unbearable, and lived though the unliveable. ‘Never Again’ means something to me: something real.

Israel is breaking because her civilian will is evaporating faster than that of the Palestinians. Why is this? Aren’t Palestinian civilians dying as well? Yes, they are: but not in numbers anywhere near as great as Israeli civilians, and certainly not in the same fashion. Palestinian civilians die when they get caught up in the effects of legitimate military actions, not when they go to the grocery store. Moreover, unlike Israelis, the Palestinian people as a whole are well-adapted to the problems of war and deprivation. More than that: they support this war, as polls and facts shows. Palestinian mothers encourage their children to become suicide bombers and celebrate their martyrdom. Palestinian schools revel in violence and terror. It isn’t just that Yassir Arafat and Hamas are guilty: the entire Palestinian population is guilty of great crimes.

In Imperial China the families of enemies of the state were liable to be punished, “to the ninth degree.” In essence, that meant that the entire family of such a person would, where possible, be executed. In practice this meant that the government would send a group of soldiers to the hometown of the enemy, and have them kill everyone they could find. It was a cruel policy: but it was also effective. Such a policy not only deters action by an individual, it also encourages members of that individual’s family (even very distant members) to keep watch over potentially dangerous members of their family.

Now, in this day and age, the people would never approve of a policy which called for the mass execution of people simply because of their bloodlines. Nor, under the present circumstances, would such a policy be wise: it would encourage the relatives of suicide attackers to become suicide bombers themselves.

However, what I propose is this: whenever a suicide bomber is identified their family should immediately have their property confiscated, their home burned to the ground, and then be either deported far away or imprisoned. The war being waged by the Palestinians is a collective act that demands collective punishment.

Some might think that such a solution is cruel. It is. But, as William Tecumseh Sherman reminded us, war it cruelty: there’s no refining it. The more cruel it is, the sooner it will be over.