It wasn't by chance that last night's gathering of the Left against Operation Protective Edge turned into a protest so insignificant it verged on embarrassing. Meretz Chairwoman Zehava Gal-On attached herself to Hadash Chairman MK Mohammad Barakeh, and the two joined writer David Grossman and a few others in the square to give speeches to a couple thousand Israelis who went to the effort to honor them at their lowest point. Not because the Left is incapable of bringing in good, large numbers, but because most of its supporters felt there was no reason to show up. If they did anything at all, they should have played PA President Mahmoud Abbas' speech in which he condemned Hamas and announced there would be no deal other than the Egyptian initiative, and added that he had proposed a cease-fire when there were still only 70 Palestinian casualties but Khaled Mashaal had refused. Just as last night, ahead of renewed talks this morning in Cairo, the man from Qatar went all in and refused shelter to 200,000 Gazans. Actually, plenty of Israelis who want to renew talks with the Palestinian Authority and are telling Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to temporarily stop construction outside the settlement blocs in Judea and Samaria, and approve of the Egyptian proposal to deploy Abbas' people at the Rafah and Kerem Shalom crossings, cannot understand what happened to the credibility of left-wing politics. MK Isaac Herzog (Labor) says in an interview to Yedioth Ahronoth that Netanyahu is strengthening Hamas? Fine. Gal-On wants to recognize the Palestinian unity government with Hamas that Abbas himself curses? Fine. But just as the Cairo talks are due to restart, when Hamas is stubbornly rejecting the Egyptian proposal, the impassioned speeches should have been aimed at Qatar -- which is like Sodom and Gomorrah -- and not at the government in Jerusalem. Criticism will come. It has to. But now? Over what -- that Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon are refusing the demands of right-wingers in the cabinet to expand the operation in the Gaza Strip? Zionists on the Left -- maybe more so than Economy Minister Naftali Bennett, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, and the rest of the right-wing Likud ministers -- know that the IDF struck a critical blow to Hamas. Why are they helping diminish the victory as if they were members of the extreme Right? Tarnishing a clear military achievement? Fairness demands that we open our eyes to reality. Accusations over the lack of a deal with the Palestinians should be directed at Mashaal in Qatar, and arguments that Protective Edge failed not only hurt the IDF, they also impugn the truth. This is problematic. The Israeli human rights group B'Tselem refuses to see Hamas as a terrorist organization, so why should we complain about self-declared haters of Zion like UNRWA? It's obvious that it will be necessary to clarify whether the fighting crossed the boundaries of the acceptable in a few places, as well as analyze the damage caused to Israel's relations with the American administration, in which only one relationship between senior officials remains intact: between Ya'alon and his U.S. counterpart Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. That's a lot, but it's not enough. This is the background to the renewed negotiations in Cairo Sunday morning. If Hamas is not interested in the Egyptian proposal, the talks will revert to square one: quiet will be met with quiet. But if Palestinian shooting resumes, it will meet the same response as violations of the cease-fire met in this last go-around. Heavy fire in response to a couple of rockets. That's how it is in war.
