A Tale of Two Attacks

Heavily Armed Israeli Soldiers

On November 5, 2009 a Muslim terrorist, masquerading as a U.S. Army psychiatrist, conducted an attack on Army personnel at Fort Hood, Texas. Major Nidal Hassan, the terrorist, opened fire with a handgun on military personnel on their base and succeeded in killing 12 American soldiers and wounding 31 others.

On August 18, 2011, three Palestinian terrorists conducted an attack on a bus full of Israeli military personnel traveling from their base at Be’er Sheva to the resort city of Eilat on leave. When the three Palestinians opened fire on the bus with automatic weapons, the Israeli soldiers got off the bus and engaged the terrorists with their own automatic weapons, killing two and seriously wounding the third.

These were two separate attacks with two very different results. But how could the Fort Hood terrorist with a handgun succeed in killing 12 and wounding 31 while the three Palestinians with automatic weapons ended up the only victims of their attack? Simple, the U.S. Army (and the Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps) prohibit the possession of weapons, either military issue or private weapons, by military personnel while not directly involved in training exercises. So American soldiers are liable to be shot down as helpless victims of a deranged Muslim on their own base while Israeli soldiers, when attacked while riding on a bus through the desert, are able to dismount the bus under attack and successfully defend themselves.

But this is the United States, not the violent Middle East, where everyone needs to be armed and capable of defending themselves, right. If a Muslim terrorist can conduct an attack on a U.S. military base with enough impunity to kill 12 and wound 31 before being stopped by an armed policeman, it will not be long before such attacks are conducted in the public domain such as at malls, shopping centers, and sporting events. The attacks of September 11, 2001 are nearly a decade behind us, yet the United States still does not consider itself a nation under attack.

The critical difference is trust. The Israeli military trust their personnel to possess weapons and to use them for their intended purpose: defending themselves and the state of Israel. The Israeli military issues weapons to every soldier. Israel then trains them extensively on their use and allows the soldiers to retain possession of them at all times. The U.S. military does not trust the American servicemen to retain possession of their weapons, except when using them in training or in actual combat. That’s why Nidal Hassan knew he would be able to kill and wound many Americans before being subdued at Fort Hood.

Its time that we in the United States understand that we are at war, as the Israelis have been for years. We are all at war, and are all vulnerable to committed Muslim terrorists who want nothing so much as the sight of dead American bodies in the street.