It was the summer of 2014. Hamas rockets had pounded Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. The rockets were stored in schools. They were launched from mosques and churches.
The dead included Daniel Tregerman, a 4-year-old Israeli boy killed by shrapnel. Another Hamas massacre of Jewish children was narrowly averted when a father managed to get kindergarteners inside before a rocket hit.
At the beginning of August, even the White House spokesman had called Hamas’ actions “barbaric”. Later that month, Professor Andrew Pessin, a Yale and Columbia educated teacher of religion and philosophy at Connecticut College, wrote, “One image which essentializes the current situation in Gaza might be this. You’ve got a rabid pit bull chained in a cage, regularly making mass efforts to escape.”
Pessin referenced Hamas suicide bombings in the 90s making it clear that he was talking about terrorism. As author of The God Question, he had respectfully condensed the views on religion from Christians, Jews, Atheists and Muslims, and was about as far from a bigot as any human being could get.