For 7 years, the Palestinians in Gaza sent a constant battery of rockets against the Israeli civilians of Sderot and Ashkelon. The bombing had only intensified when Israel pulled out of Gaza, turning it over to the Palestinians. Finally, after 7 years and constant requests from the residents under attack, Israel attacked Hamas in Gaza.

One of the targets of air attacks was the Islamic University in Gaza, which had very close ties to Hamas. Hamas, although democratically elected in Gaza, soon consolidated power by killing or arresting members of its rival, Fatah, and thus established a totalitarian regime.

According to Israel, two laboratories in the university were targeted because they served as research and development centres for Hamas's military wing. It was stated by Israeli intelligence that the development of explosives was done under the auspices of university professors.

University buildings were also used for meetings of senior Hamas officials. Hamas is classified by most Western countries as a “Terrorist Organization”.

The Israel Defence Forces said rockets and explosives were stored in the buildings.

Israel, being a liberal democracy, has a flourishing free press, and opposition parties, (including Arab parties) and anyone from the media or the political opposition, can find it career-enhancing to find any false statements from the government. Like journalists and opposition parties here, there is plenty of fact checking for government allegations, and a journalist who proves a politician lying can find that digging up the facts for that purpose can make his or her career.

That is to say, in Israel itself, there is an inherent protection against false allegations. So, what I read in the Jerusalem Post or Ha’aretz (both online in English), I tend to believe.

Nothwithstanding the conversion of a university into a weapons laboratory to be used against Israeli civilians in Southern Israel, some Canadian university students are up in arms about the fact that Israel bombed a university.

Most provocatively, the student council at York University, Canada (the York Federation of Students) at a meeting that was supposed to deal with the almost 12 week strike at York, deferred that topic to unanimously adopt an anti-Israel set of resolutions.

One of the recitals to the resolutions stated that “on Monday December 29 an F-16 fighter plane bombed the Science Laboratory and Library of the Islamic University in Gaza, just a few hours before some of its 20,000 students were to enter the campus to conduct exams.”

One of the resolutions stated: “RESOLVED THAT the York Federation of Students show support and solidarity with the people of Gaza by calling upon the Canadian government to pressure the government of Israel to adhere to its' international legal obligations to end attacks on civilian infrastructure and to allow unimpeded access for all Palestinians to their educational institutions”.

One wonders about this kind of selective concern. Where were the York students when Israeli civilians were the target of Hamas sponsored bombing of Israeli universities, restaurants, cafes, buses and other targets where Israeli civilians gathered?

Also, don’t the York students know that the fact that Israel bombed the university lab “hours before some of its 20,000 students were to arrive”, is an essential difference between Israeli military who are commanded to take all necessary steps to minimize civilian deaths, and Hamas terrorists whose very purpose is to maximize civilian deaths?

Let us take a look at just one of the horrible incidents that took place in Israel during what became known as the “Second Intifada” in 2001 and 2002. I was in Israel during that period, writing my book, The Second Catastrophe: A Novel about a Book and its Author (Mantua Books).

On July 31, 2002, nine people - four Israelis and five foreign nationals - were killed and 85 injured, 14 of them seriously, when a bomb exploded in the crowded Frank Sinatra cafeteria on the Hebrew University Mt. Scopus campus during its lunchtime. Hamas claimed responsibility for the attack.

The bomber left the bomb in an innocent looking bag packed with shrapnel in the cafeteria. The purpose of the shrapnel was to kill or maim the maximum number of people.

Though classes were not in session, students were taking exams at the time of the blast, and the cafeteria was crowded with diners. There were also numerous students in the building registering for classes for the coming school year.

The cafeteria is also near the Rothberg International School, where about 80 pupils from the US and other Western countries had arrived to prepare for the fall semester.

Most of the injured were between the ages of 18 and 30. The explosion gutted the cafeteria. The dead and injured included Jews and Arabs, Israeli nationals and foreign students.

The Hebrew University of Jerusalem has some 23,000 student, 5000 of them being Arabs.

According to Fox News, Hamas, which carried out the largest number of Palestinian bombings during the Second Intifada, claimed responsibility for the bombing during a rally in Gaza City that drew some 10,000 supporters into the streets following evening prayers in the mosques.

"This operation today is a part of a series of operations we will launch from everywhere in Palestine," said a masked Hamas militant, dressed in a green military uniform.

At the request of the masked Hamas speaker, the entire crowd knelt to pray that future Hamas attacks "would succeed against the enemy of God."

If one checks the internet, there are photographs of wildly cheering Palestinians waiving Hamas flags and flashing victory signs, as they celebrated some kind of victory over a student cafeteria.

In addition, how many readers know that in February, 2008, a Hamas rocket (one of 40 launched that day!) landed at Sapir College in Sderot, killing 47 year old student, Roni Yihye, who was survived by four children, and injuring a pregnant Bedouin student? How many newspapers in the West even bothered to report it? Did the students at York even bother to research these facts before they make Israeli actions the single most important issue in their agenda, even more important than a resolution of the strike preventing students from attending classes?

Israeli government officials delayed a substantial military intervention in Gaza during 7 years of Hamas rockets against towns like Sderot, where studies indicate that due to the frequent rockets and sirens requiring refuge in bomb shelters, some 75% of the children are suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

But, once it finally acted, the Israeli government and its public took no joy in the Gaza operation. They only took joy when their reservist children returned from service in the War, because Israelis worship life just as surely as the residents of Gaza, with Hamas turning them into human shields or suicide bombers, worship death. It is just one of the distinctions that the student council at York University seems not to grasp.

Howard Rotberg is the author of, the novel, The Second Catastrophe, and two books of non-fiction, his most recent being Exploring Vancouverism: The Political Culture of Canada’s Lotus Land. His literary website is www.howardrotberg.ca and his blog is http://secondgenerationradical.blogmatrix.com/