Killing with Multitudinous Will—A Poet's Warning from World War II Goes Unheeded.

You would feel that after so many centuries              

God would give man to repent; yet he can kill

As Cain could, but with multitudinous will,

No farther advanced than in his ancient furies

from “The Fury of Aerial Bombardment” by Richard Eberhart, 1944.

When “peace” broke out last week in the Middle East, I avoided the temptation to be negative, to remind everyone that the Trump peace initiative was really the Biden peace initiative and that the only difference was that there wasn’t much left of Gaza to destroy, so Netanyahu decided to take a victory lap.

Now, more gunfire.

If you have seen photos or videos of Gaza in its current condition, you’ll know the exact meaning of statements from those refugees returning to their homes and saying, “There’s nothing left.”

There is, in fact, nothing left.

For historical perspective, the World War II bombing of Dresden more than 80 years ago remains one of the more controversial events in history. We can debate the specifics: some claim Germany exaggerated the death toll; others, that the Allies destroyed a city with no strategic importance. The presumed death toll in the aerial assault on Dresden is upwards of 20,000. The shocking death of so many civilians stunned the world. Maybe we’re less easily stunned these days—70,000 deaths in one day at Hiroshima with 300,000 more to follow may have numbed us forever. Nevertheless, three times as many Dresden victims, almost all of them civilian men, women, and children, died in Gaza. The war also claimed almost 2,000 Israeli victims, many of them on the day of the attack that initiated the most recent hostilities. But the photos of Dresden, as horrifying as they are, pale by comparison with the shards and dust of what once was Gaza.

And the shooting continues. And the death toll rises.

The history of Middle East peace settlements is a continuous prologue to failure, so we cannot be surprised by the recent lapse, but it appears that Trump’s “unconventional” approach to ending hostilities did, after all, produce fairly conventional results. And even if the recent hostilities are just a hiccup and peace becomes more than a wish, let’s not forget that between Trump’s ascendency to office in January and the signing last week, many thousands died while we waited for nothing more than Netanyahu’s deigning to provide his imprimatur and Trump’s craven refusal to contradict him.

Now that 200 American troops have been sent to Israel to monitor the ceasefire, our involvement there is hardly diminishing. And JD Vance’s assurance that no troops will be sent to Gaza is little more than another ploy to keep us from seeing the damage the last two years have wrought. Or maybe it’s an admission that it’s still too dangerous—and there’s nothing to save.

Dresden and Gaza—the details and causes—differ, but the pictures are horrifyingly similar. As for the poet’s observations from 81 years ago, no, man has not repented but can, indeed, kill with multitudinous will.