I have written it again and again: The war in Gaza is complicated. There is no simple “right side” and “wrong side.” The war should end as soon as possible. Both sides have committed terrible atrocities and crimes against humanity. The only way out is through negotiation. All the hostages must be returned, alive and dead. The end result must include plans for a Palestinian state.
Nicholas Kristof said it best in yesterday’s New York Times:
I’ve been on a book tour for the last few weeks, speaking around the country, and one of the questions I get asked most often isn’t about my book at all but along the lines of: What should I think of the war in Gaza?
The toxic public debate is dominated by people with passionate views on both sides, but most people I meet are torn and unsure how to process the tragedy that is unfolding. That makes sense to me given how exquisitely complex real-world ethics are, as much as we may yearn for black-and-white morality tales.
With that in mind, I’d like to offer this highly personal road map for thinking about the war. Here’s a set of morally complicated, sometimes contradictory principles for a nuanced approach to sort out the issues.
1. We think of moral issues as involving conflicts between right and wrong, but this is a collision of right versus right. Israelis have built a remarkable economy and society and should have the right to raise their children without fear of terror attacks, while Palestinians should enjoy the same freedoms and be able to raise their children safely in their own state.
2. All lives have equal value, and all children must be presumed innocent. So while there is no moral equivalence between Hamas and Israel, there is a moral equivalence between Israeli civilians and Palestinian civilians. If you champion the human rights of onlyIsraelis or only Palestinians, you don’t actually care about human rights.
3. Good for President Biden for pushing a proposal on Friday for a temporary cease-fire that could lead to a permanent end to the war and a release of hostages; as he said, “It’s time for this war to end.” Let’s hope he uses his leverage to achieve that end. It’s also true that Biden’s failure to apply enough leverage over the last seven months has made the United States complicit in human rights abuses in Gaza, because it has provided weapons used in the mass killing of civilians, and because it has gone too far in protecting Israel at the United Nations.
4. We can identify as pro-Israeli or pro-Palestinian, but priority should go to being anti-massacre, anti-starvation and anti-rape.
5. Hamas is an oppressive, misogynistic and homophobic organization whose misrule has hurt Palestinians and Israelis alike. But not all Palestinians are members of Hamas, and civilians should not be subject to collective punishment. In the words of a 16-year-old Gaza girl: “It’s like we are overpaying the price for a sin we didn’t commit.”
6. There was no excuse for Hamas attacking Israel on Oct. 7 and murdering, torturing and raping Israeli civilians. And there is no excuse for Israel’s reckless use of 2,000-pound bombs and other munitions that have destroyed entire city blocks and killed vast numbers of innocent people, including more than 200 aid workers.
7. When Israel began military operations after Oct. 7, it was a just war.
8. What starts as a just war can be waged unjustly.
9. Israel was entitled to strike Gaza after the Oct. 7 attack, but not to do whatever it wanted. In particular, there should be no argument about Israel’s practice of throttling food aid. Using starvation as a weapon of waragainst civilians, as the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court alleges Israel has done, is a violation of the laws of war.
10. Each side justifies its own brutality by pointing to earlier cruelty by the other side. Israelis see Oct. 7. Palestinians see the “open-air prison” imposed on Gaza before that. This goes all the way back to the displacement of Palestinians at Israel’s founding in 1948, the 1929 massacre of Jews at Hebron, and so on. Enough obsession with the past! Let’s focus instead on saving lives in the coming months and years.
11. Hamas’s brutality toward Israeli hostages, such as credible reports of sexual assault and starvation, is unconscionable. So is Israeli brutality toward Palestinian prisoners, such as CNN accounts that some Palestinians have had limbs amputated because of constant handcuffing.
12. War nurtures dehumanization that produces more war. I’ve heard too many Palestinians dehumanize Jews and too many Jews dehumanize Palestinians. When we dehumanize others, we lose our own humanity.
13. Zionism is not a form of racism. And criticism of Israel is not antisemitism. Both sides are too quick to fire such epithets.
14. Each side sees itself as a victim, which is true — but each side is also a perpetrator.
15. “Apartheid” isn’t the right word for Israel today, where Palestinians are treated like second-class citizens but can still vote, serve in the Knesset and enjoy more political freedoms than in most of the Arab world. But “apartheid” is a rough approximation of Israeli rule in the West Bank, where Arabs have long been oppressed under a system that is separate and unequal.
16. “From the river to the sea” refers to the dream of a single state from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, encompassing what is now Israel and the Palestinian territories. The slogan as used by protesters can mean many different things, some peaceful and some the militaristic vision of the Hamas charter, while a parallel vision is in the original platform of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party. Hamas imagines a Palestinian state with no room for Israel, and Netanyahu wants perpetual Israeli sovereignty from the river to the sea to deny a place for a Palestinian state. I think that instead of either version of a one-state solution, a two-state solution is infinitely preferable.
17. Pro-Palestinian demonstrations have too often tolerated strains of antisemitism, which in recent months has shown itself to be stronger than many imagined. How can a movement that claims the moral high ground make excuses for any kind of bigotry?
18. Campus protesters would do more good raising money for suffering Gazans rather than using it to buy tents for themselves.
19. We probably know what an eventual Israeli-Palestinian peace deal would look like. The plan was outlined in the Clinton parameters of 2000 and in the Geneva Accord of 2003. The only question is how many innocent people on both sides will die before we get there.
20. To establish peace, both Israel and the Palestinian Authority will need new leaders with vision and courage. This won’t be achieved tomorrow. But there are peacemakers on each side. To understand how a path toward peace may emerge, consider the words of the Chinese writer Lu Xun more than a century ago: “Hope is like a path in the countryside. Originally, there is nothing — but as people walk this way again and again, a path appears.”
A wise Palestinian from Jenin, Mohamed Abu Jafar, whose 16-year-old brother had been shot dead by Israeli forces, told me last year: “They can’t kill us all, and we can’t kill them all.” That leaves, he said, one practical option for all of us: working for peace.
Let’s get to it.
Well said, Diane!
Freaking blin troll scammers should crawl back under the rocks they were born under.
Glad Diane deleted it so no one can make the mistake of clicking the bait link.
Whoever has posted that link about making $165 an hour is either a troll or a prostitute or both.
I’m basing this largely on vibes but support for a two state solution seems very low right now. Seems low in Gaza from what I’ve read. Seems low historicallly in Israel. Definitely seems very low among anti-Israel protesters, who seem to have a utopian vision of one state encompassing the entire region with equal rights for all.
To which anti-Israeli protestors do you refer? The students here at home?
Students here at home and students abroad in some major European cities.
I think we must keep in mind that students generally awaken to political thinking at times like these. I grew up on political discussion in a politically-oriented family, and I was still without real understanding of world events until college. Most of these kids are just awakening to the idea of being in a political world, and they awaken to find Israel denying humanitarian aid to Gaza. You and I may understand the complexities of this matter, but they see the starvation and the misery. They are right in one fundamental way: The struggle to maintain hegemony that falls upon the defenseless is not justifiable in any sense of the word justice.
As Diane has correctly pointed out, complexity is an integral part of the picture here. But I suggest that we be understanding and patient with students who recoil at man’s inhumanity.
Some anti-Israel protestors have a vision of a single state with equal rights for all, but others have a vision that Jews would be expelled from the region. All too often we hear (at least on social media) that “Jews should go back to where they came from.”
We are talking here of a very tiny minority of the nation’s college kids (and college-age kids). The Reichwing, of course, has done its typical fear-mongering and blown this up into a nationwide youth movement. It’s not, just as CRT is not being taught in our schools, Antifa has negligible membership, and the pedo pizza parlor and space lasers are delirious fantasies. The Reichwing loves to make something of nothing. These things are their version of Emmanuel Goldstein and The Brotherhood, created for their versions of the Two Minutes Hates.
In other news, a judge has ordered Bannon to report to jail.
The Republicans love the campus demonstrations!
They may lower Biden’s vote.
They divide Democrats.
Meanwhile Trump and Netanyahu are best buddies. Trump won’t set any limits on wiping out Hamas
So bizarre, huh? And yes, these demonstrations play into their hands, just as the ones in the late 1960s and early ’70s played into the hands of Richard Nixon.
Dienne’s comment was deleted. My note to her follows.
Dienne,
I won’t post any comments that use the word genocide. The discussion ends with that word. I recall that you excused the atrocities of October 7 because a) Israel deserved it; b) Israel should give up and return the land to the Palestinians; or, c) Israel never should have been created.
History is full of injustices and brutality and war.
I want the war to end now. I defend Israel’s right to exist. I support peace and two states. You don’t agree. You want Israel destroyed. You think Hamas is a just and righteous group. I believe Hamas started the war and is willing to sacrifice every last Palestinian.
Please stop writing comments expressing your hatred for Israel. I won’t post them.
Diane
I too have considered that bit of historical irony. As I said above, I think it happens when children become suddenly aware of their political world, and it conflicts with their idealized world. I recall well my own journey through that maze.
The wars in the Sudan, in Ethiopia, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DNC) are decades old with no end in sight, wars are irrational, and Kristoff is rational. The war in Gaza, as the others, will not end, for the Israeli the total elimination of Hamas is their un achievable goal and for Hamas the eradication of Israel… for whatever reason genocidal wars are increasing, not a good sign for the survival of our species.
I fear you are correct
Peter, I agree. War is irrational. The war in the Middle East has lasted for 75 years. Those who want to perpetuate it are in control in Israel and in Gaza. Wars are irrational, although it is rational to fight someone who wants to kill you.
I prefer, like Kristof, to think rationally. If Israel could get a deal that guarantees peace and security; if the Palestinians could get a deal that promises an independent state, bolstered by the rebuilding of Gaza and the promise of economic development and freedom, then a deal could be worked out.
Endless complaining about the very existence of Israel will not lead to peace. Israel is not going away.
While I appreciate many of the points raised by Kristof, to create an equivalency between Hostages, most of whom were civilians and many of whom are children, elderly, disabled, etc, and most if not all of whom have been and are suffering under much worse conditions than most Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, is horrifying to me: “Hamas’s brutality toward Israeli hostages, such as credible reports of sexual assault and starvation, is unconscionable. So is Israeli brutality toward Palestinian prisoners, such as CNN accounts that some Palestinians have had limbs amputated because of constant handcuffing.” To then say that “Kristof said it best,” confirms all his points. Additionally, and more important, Kristof neglects to mention, as most NYT journalists do, that Hamas has no intention or desire for a two state solution, and currently Palestinians, according to the polls, have no intention of abandoning Hamas. Hamas wants every Israeli and Jew dead or gone from the land, PERIOD! How can there be a two-state solution with that as the foundation of their charter.
Michelle,
I understand. As I have said many times, Hamas is a terrorist organization. Its charter, past and current, states explicitly that it wants ALL the land “from the river to the sea” to be ruled by Islamic principles. That includes what is now the state of Israel. Hamas looks on Jews as infidels, monkeys, and pigs. Israel cannot live with Hamas, which is dedicated to its destruction. No one—not even the Arab states—has suggested a Palestinian state ruled by Hamas. The goal is a state ruled by the Palestinian Authority. Hamas must be marginalized.
As the current situation stands, neither Hamas nor the Israeli government wants an end to the fighting. Hamas knows it is winning the public relations war, and it hopes Hezbollah starts a war on Israel’s northern border. Why stop now?
Netanyahu has reason to keep the war going. His rightwing allies support the war. Once the war ends, there will be an election and he is likely to lose. At that point, he faces trial for crimes he committed before October 7. He wants to keep the war going until after the American election, and he wins if Trump wins. Trump’s biggest donor is Miriam Adelson, a multibillionaire. She supports Netanyahu.
The point of the article—which I agree with—is that those who long for peace must have a strategic plan. Condemning only one of the sides is a non-starter.
I am not optimistic about the possibility of a two state solution. When powerful entities need Conflict, as Hamas and Netanyahu both seem to, conflict will win. This is, of course, to the detriment of all who want peace. I cannot conceive of peace without a two state solution.
You are right, Roy. The only way to peace is a two-state solution. Both Hamas and Netanyahu thrive on war. Kristof writes that both Israel and the Palestinians need new leadership.
Yitzhak Rabin was an Israeli military hero who served as Prime Minister for two terms. In his second term, he agreed with PLO Leader Yasser Arafat to enter into a peace process that would culminate in two states. Rabin refused to wear a bulletproof vest or any protective gear. He was assassinated by an Israeli extremist in 1995.
How well I recall the Rabin assassination.
The most (& possibly only) evenhanded assessment of Gaza/Israel I’ve seen. Thank you Diane!
In other news, two extremely substantive cases–the election interference case in Georgia and the classified documents case in Florida have been basically derailed by our Just Us system. Teflon Donnie Trump, seditionist, slithers away unscathed again, leaving a trail of slime behind him. If you and I had done these crimes, we would already be serving long prison terms.
“Equal justice under law.” What a freaking bad joke.
Trump complains that holding a trial in the last months of the campaign is “election interference” and “weaponization of the justice system.” But his essential tactic was delay, delay, delay.
He succeeded in three of the four cases.
Yes. And the ones he was successful in delaying are the ones that are truly substantive, that go to the heart of our democratic system and our national security. This is not an accident. It’s the Just Us System at work.
What a shame that Fani Willis was indiscreet. What bad judgment!
THIS MAN (I use the term loosely) TRIED TO OVERTHROW THE DULY ELECTED GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED STATES, and what we are worried about is whom Fani Willis was sleeping with? GIVE ME A FREAKING BREAK.
Priorities! A sense of the relative gravity of these matters!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
That’s not how criminal law works. You don’t get to say “the defendant (who hasn’t been convicted yet) is such a bad guy that we shouldn’t care about this disqualification motion filed by the defense.”
How it “works”
That’s rich.
Like Gotti before him, this guy has slid by for decades thanks to his army of lawyers, connections, endless appeals. All the little Bubbas and Bubbettes who heeded his seditious call to storm the Capitol and stop the count of the certified state electors’ votes have been tried and sent to prison.
But not the Teflon Don.
Our Just Us System at work.
And thanks for the instruction, oh seer of the obvious.
Geez!
Sorry. I am frustrated and angry. And sickened by the whole farce. He gets to slide. Always.
On all the important stuff.
I don’t give a flying (rhymes with truck) who he slept with or that he decided in his addled brain that his apartment was worth ten gazillion dollars. I do care that he was storing extremely sensitive information about how intelligence soruces and methods and about our defense capabilities ON THE STAGE IN HIS BALLROOM AND IN HIS FREAKING SOMETIMES SORT OF LOCKED BATHROOM. And that he ran several concurrent attempts to overthrow our duly elected government.
AND THAT HE GETS TO SLIDE ON BOTH OF THESE. If you or I did anything similar, we would be in prison lickety split.
US intelligence resources get identified AND MURDERED precisely because of the bullshit that Trump pulled. That’s why we have a freaking Espionage Act. But hey, he’s Trump. He’s rich. He’s connected. SO IT’S NO BIGGIE. Just ask Aileen. Or anyone in the Repugnican Party. Sickening.
Reminds me of the Onion headline about guns:
Nothing to be done about mass shooting gun violence says only country where such shootings are a daily occurrence.
Nothing to be done about attempting to overthrow and election (in several concurrent ways) or about major compromising of our intelligence and national security. After all, the perp has paid to have pieces of paper filed.
Bob,
I share your outrage.
I’m so sorry about that outburst, Flerp. I so appreciate your knowledge and your careful argumentation and consider you, though we have never met in person, a dear friend. So, my apologies. –Bob S.
No worries, Bob!
If Fani Willis had not been indiscreet, some other pretense would have been created.
Don’t minimize how stupid she was and how it jeopardized the case. The judge was moving that case along just fine. It would have faced other hurdles and possible appellate issues because it’s a complicated RICO case. But giving the defense a non-frivolous disqualification motion, to be decided by an appealable order, was an absolute gift.
Flerp: You are certainly correct in that the prosecutor would have been more effective squeaky clean. Still, it sticks in my throat a bit when people on one side are required to be squeaky clean. Abe Fortas was deserted by the Democrats for a 15,000 dollar thing his wife did. Clarence Thomas has full-throated support for millions he took personally, and his wife’s participation in the plot to steal the election. Dan Rather get the pink slip for sloppy reporting, but Fox News does that stuff for a living.
The absolutely idiotic Fulton County D.A. had a lot to do with the derailment of the Georgia case, though. (Contrast with the Manhattan D.A.’s office.)
Cannon in Florida is an absolute nightmare.
Cannon has managed to sit on the Florida case for over a year. If Trump wins, she gets the next SCOTUS seat.
it saddens me to read what you wrote. Both ignorant and without one iota of self awareness or any sense.
There is no moral equivalence between Israel and Hamas. You don’t understand the Middle East.
Hamas is the modern day equivalent of the Nazi Einsatzgruppen. The difference is the Germans tried to conceal their crimes. Hamas broadcast their savage actions.
I used to feel a degree of sympathy for the civilians.
the fact is that over five thousand of the civilians embarked on a frenzy not seen since ghengis khan, it’s not in question what should be done.
a biblical response as in the amalek is the only logical solution
You really feel no sympathy for kids in a school getting blown to bits?
I used to feel for them. Until I understood what they did to civilians on October 7. They are the embodiment of genocide. Their children are brainwashed . Unlike most reading this, I grew up there. I understand the region and its culture. The only way to survive is to eliminate the threat. Morality and compassion have their limits. The illusion that peace or a two state solution is possible is not rooted in reality. I see a lot of bleating about the poor Palestinians. I didn’t and don’t see much of it unless it’s after searching. Hamas has propaganda that seems to divert most of you. This is a 1400 year war. This is the thirteenth crusade. Yet none of you understand. Read their charter and look at their actions. Believe them. The west is next.
t
I’m not naive about any of this. But I can’t go to that dark of a place.
Jonathan,
I read the Hamas charters, both of them. They terrorists who want to eliminate Israel and turn all the land to Islamic rule.
But there must be a path to peace. Yitzhak Rabin saw it. It’s a tragedy that he was assassinated. Israelis should not live under the daily threat of death, suicide bombers, rockets, drones, missiles. That’s no life.
Palestinians should not live as an occupied people, under the control of the Israelis.
Rational people believe that there must be peace, there must be two states, there must be dignity and justice for all.
is everyone who commented going to send Biden a contribution? Billionaires elected Trump, we “little guys/gals can elect Biden, don’t be shy or reticent- $$ drive elections
I agree 100% with the article posted and all the comments agreeing with it. No one is going to “win” this war. Heck, when, since 1945, is the last time anyone anywhere actually won a war?
Again, slightly off topic, here is an article about the lesson plans posted by the Portland teacher’s union concerning Palestine.
“Lesson plans on the Portland teachers’ union website that drew condemnation from Jewish leaders this week — and that the union removed, reposted and then moved to a different, more discreet location online — urged public school students to pray, make posters and write letters to leaders in support of Palestinians.
The rest of the article is here: https://www.oregonlive.com/education/2024/06/portland-teachers-union-links-to-lessons-urging-students-to-pray-to-allah-write-biden-to-stop-funding-israel.html?outputType=amp
There are probably first amendment problems, but I wish the rules that bar unions and school employees from endorsing political candidates were expanded to bar them from general political advocacy. Otherwise this is what you end up with, sadly.
I’m curious. Regarding the Georgia election case, where – exactly – is the Fanni Willis “conflict” that may have impaired, impinged or otherwise impacted the rights of those accused in that case?
The Associated Press reported this:
“A Fulton County grand jury in August indicted Trump and 18 others, accusing them of participating in a sprawling scheme to illegally try to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Georgia. Four defendants have pleaded guilty after reaching deals with prosecutors, but Trump and the others have pleaded not guilty…Trump and eight other defendants had tried to get Willis and her office removed from the case, arguing that a romantic relationship she had with special prosecutor Nathan Wade created a conflict of interest. McAfee in March found that no conflict of interest existed that should force Willis off the case, but he granted a request from Trump and the other defendants to seek an appeal of his ruling from the state Court of Appeals.”
So, again, what EXACTLY is the “conflict” that infringes on the rights of the accused in the Georgia, some of whom have already – in fact pleaded guilty.
CNN reported this:
“In March, after what amounted to a mini-trial where attorneys for Trump and his co-defendants sought to prove their case against Willis and Wade, McAfee found there was not enough evidence to firmly prove Willis financially benefited from the relationship.”
So, the prosecutors were put on trial and the judge found that there wasn’t evidence to say that Willis got some kind of financial favor from Wade. But even if she HAD, where is the “conflict” that harms the right of the accused?
The Washington Post put it like this:
“McAfee ruled that Trump and the others had ‘failed to meet their burden’ of proving Willis’s romantic relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade and allegations that she was financially enriched by trips the two took together were enough of a ‘conflict of interest’ to disqualify her from the case..
To put it differently, the “conflict” in this case was that Willis and Wade slept together and sometimes took trips together– they were “bad” — and thus that should disqualify them from the case. But, What. About. The. Case? What about the facts of the case? What about the specific charges and the charges to which others have pled guilty?
Sydney Powell – yes, her – pled guilty to “conspiracy to commit intentional interference with the performance of election duties.” She also agreed to help prosecutors in other cases.
Guess who was involved in the conspiracy and the other cases?
Kenneth Chesebro, charged with seven felony counts, pled guilty to “one felony count of conspiracy to commit filing false documents. ” False documents to be used to overturn the election results. Guess on whose behalf Chesebro filed those false documents? Chesebro agreed to cooperate with prosecutors in other cases too.
Trump attorney Jenna Ellis pleased guilty in Georgia “to a charge of aiding and abetting false statements and writings, a felony. She has already written an apology letter to the citizens of Georgia, and she agreed to cooperate fully with prosecutors as the case progresses.”
So, there’s a pattern here.
But where – exactly – is the “conflict” in the other cases? The cases of the ringleader Trump, and dirty trickster Mike Roman? The cases of Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman? Of Mark Meadows and Jeffrey Clark and the rest?
Meanwhile, the findings of fact in the Colorado court decision by Sarah Wallace that declared Trump an insurrectionist, which relied heavily on the January 6 Committee Report and included testimony by officers attacked in the January 6 riot, have gone unchallenged by any credible evidence, including that put forth by Trump or his attorneys. As noted in the decision,
“while Trump spent much time contesting potential biases of the Committee members and their staff, he spent almost no time attacking the credibility of the Committee’s findings themselves. The Hearing provided Trump with an opportunity to subject these findings to the adversarial process, and he chose not to do so, despite frequent complaints that the Committee investigation was not subject to such a process. Because Trump was unable to provide the Court with any credible evidence which would discredit the factual findings of the January 6th Report, the Court has difficulty understanding the argument that it should not consider its findings which are admissible under C.R.E. 803(8).”
The Colorado Supreme Court found that because Trump was – in fact – an insurrectionist, he could not be on the Colorado ballot because the United States Constitution explicitly prohibited it under Article 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment, which states that
“No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.”
Seems pretty clear: “no person shall…hold any office, civil or military, under the Constitution who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States…to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same…”
The United States Supreme Court ignored the findings of fact in the Colorado trial court and overturned the Colorado Supreme Court decision to take Trump off the ballot. The Court said “We conclude that States may disqualify persons holding or attempting to hold state office. But States have no power under the Constitution to enforce Section 3 with respect to federal offices, especially the Presidency.”
According former federal appellate judge Michael Lutting and constitutional scholar Lawrence Tribe, this was “a grave disservice to both the Constitution and the nation…Our highest court dramatically and dangerously betrayed its obligation to enforce what once was the Constitution’s safety net for America’s democracy.”
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/03/supreme-court-trump-v-anderson-fourteenth-amendment/677755/
Three members of the Supreme Court were – in fact – appointed by a seditionist, an insurrectionist, who took lots of help from Russian intelligence agencies to win* the 2016 election, and tried to violently overturn the 2020 results. One other justice flies seditionist flags over his houses, and another has a wife who is an open seditionist.
It appears to me that the “conflicts” some people, mostly Republicans, are worried about are the absolutely entirely wrong conflicts.