Taking sides and assigning blame is an extremely facile take on this situation. I haven't seen anyone here doing that so far. If you respond in that way to the events of the last few days and ignore history, sure, you'll do the black-and-white thing and take sides and assign blame. There's far too much going on here to make that simplistic decision.

Hamas are in charge in Gaza because Netanyahu wants them in charge. There is a huge rift between Hamas and the PA, which provides a permanent divide-and-rule setup for Bibi. He blockades Gaza but not the West Bank or East Jerusalem. He knows that the PA doesn't really mind the blockade too much. These are his calculations and he's on record as having said these things.

The current blockade goes back 17 years and has resulted in the trashing of the Gaza economy. During or just before that time there have been numerous incursions into Gaza, involving the bulldozing of homes, the shelling of schools, hospitals and water infrastructure and the deaths of hundreds of civilians, including many children. White phosphorus flares have been used to illuminate civilian buildings to make the shelling easier. Children have been murdered by snipers on the border. In the West Bank, Arab communities have been persecuted and often driven out of their homes. The discrimination has involved harmless civilians being detained at checkpoints sometimes for days at a time. The best land and the best water supplies have been stolen in order to build illegal settlements for Jewish citizens only. There have been recent provocations at the Al-Aqsa mosque by Jews going in to pray, which is currently not permitted.

All this is terrible and the history is peppered with atrocities. At the same time, Hamas has fired thousands of rockets into Israel, until now a largely ineffectual response. What Hamas have just perpetrated is truly terrible and every news bulletin shows it to be worse by the hour. I can't think that any sane person, even on the Palestinian side, would justify the specific actions this week of Hamas gunmen in Israel.

The history of this conflict has always made me more sympathetic to the plight, and plight it is, of the Palestinians in Israel and Gaza. This revolting action by Hamas, were I being simplistic, might have caused that to evaporate. But here's a thought: if Hamas can be like this now, what must life have been like for the civilians of Gaza in the last 17 years? Do the people there actually support Hamas? I severely doubt it, though there are never elections to decide it. So your house, your school, your hospital and maybe even your family are destroyed, and you might be thinking, what have I ever done to deserve this? The people in southern Israel might be thinking the same thing. Well it looks certain that there's a lot more of it to come. Pity the poor civilians. I don't know who to blame and the only "side" I'm taking is the side of ordinary non-combatants caught up in all this. And even my analysis is too simplistic.