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No one will contest that there is suffering in the world. In many cases it is acute, if we watch TV. According to religious philosophy, suffering is a consequence of undesirable behavior such as violence, anger, hatred, greed, pride, selfishness, dishonesty, excessive indulgence in pleasure, laziness etc.

Eliminating undesirable behavior from our life and replacing it with good behavior such as love, honesty, sincerity etc. is supposed to lead to a happy life eventually. The problem is that even if we succeed in making our own lives happy, we may be pained by the suffering of others around us. What must our attitude be in such a situation? Perhaps we can insulate ourselves from the suffering of others so that our own peace and effectiveness is not compromised. However, that is not the full solution. I think it is necessary to try and make a difference, even if it is a small one in alleviating the suffering of others. It can even be with respect to one person at a time. Further, although we cannot go about interfering in the lives of others we might try and uphold the virtues of love, truth and honesty whenever we get an opportunity to do so and discourage the opposite. That can be our contribution to increasing goodness and happiness in the world. Not doing so makes us accomplices to some extent.

At the present time, we can watch the suffering of Palestinian people living in Ghaza everyday on TV. On their part, the Israelis claim that it is a fitting response to the rockets that are fired at them from time to time from Ghaza. Even if we were to ignore the fact that Israelis are an occupying power and that they have a right to respond to the violence perpetuated on them, one cannot support the violence and havoc they are perpetuating on fellow humans. If they wish to respond to the rockets fired at them they could do it more easily by firing the same or even double the number of rockets back at the source. The Israeli rockets are bound to be more accurate and powerful. If such a response is continued over a period of time it will probably produce the desired result i.e. the stopping of rockets fired at them. On the other hand their present response is resulting in their losing the sympathy of most of the world. That may bring the Israelis painful consequences in future.

Firing rockets at an occupying power at least has the excuse of resulting from frustration of occupation. It can also be interpreted as a rightful attempt at attaining liberation from an occupying power. What excuse or justification is there for Israel’s extreme response when a much better one as mentioned in this article is available?

Violence in all forms needs to be banished from civilized society. It is true that one must defend oneself against violence, but defense must not be used as an excuse for perpetuating a disproportionate amount of violence. Responding with a disproportionate amount of violence is uncivilized behavior. If some of the victims are children and other innocent persons the act could not be more inhuman. There is a need to stop such violence immediately. Whatever issues each side may have need to be dealt with as civilised humans.

Dr. Ashok Malhotra has been recognised as a leading international educator. For more of his activities click on http://someitemshave.blogspot.com

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