The Chabad House MassacreThere is very little if anything for me to add to the many words already written. But here are a few thoughts:
1. Rescuing hostages is extremely difficult. Even a well-planned and well-intentioned rescue operation would likely have resulted in failure.
That said, the raid by Indian commandos was appalling in its complete disregard for the Chabad House hostages.
The raid was in no way a rescue operation. It was first and last an operation to ensure that the terrorists be killed without any casualties among the Indian military.
The statements by ZAKA members on the scene, that Rabbi Holtzberg and possibly others were likely still alive when the raid began on Friday, are heartbreaking and infuriating, and mandate that India's apathy toward the hostages be condemned.
2. The apathy toward the hostages was consistent with the media coverage from India, particularly that of IBN, which had significantly less information about the hostage situation than anyone could pick up in five minutes on the Internet. CNN's India reporters similarly had no idea even of the basic facts.
This is not really surprising, since many more victims were located in the other locations, and India was presumably most concerned about its own citizens. The exhausted media members were similarly mainly focused on the situation at the Taj Mahal hotel.
Nevertheless, it is hard to avoid the obvious conclusion that in India, the victims in the Chabad House were at most an afterthought.
3. I've read comparisons to the massacres at Ma'alot and Munich, which are certainly apt. But for me, the enduring thought about last week is the murder of a Jewish family in their own home.
posted on 12/01/2008
