What did Hamas think was going to happen?

Much misfortune the woebegone couldn’t have seen coming: a raging fire in the house next door that spreads to yours. The invention of some kooky technology called ‘the internet’ that puts your travel agency out of business. Yet other calamities are foreseeable. If you suddenly stop filing tax returns without a good excuse – like, dying – it’s a virtual certainty that the all-seeing computer will come after you. So when compounding fees and interest leave you skint, our sympathies are apt to be scant. What did you think was going to happen? Or to up the moral ante: if you slaughter 18 innocents in a frenzy for no apparent reason, you have to expect that your own life will soon be effectively over, too – which is why last week’s shooter in Maine, despite Robert Card’s mental disarray, was still sane enough to eliminate himself voluntarily. What did he think was going to happen?

Cause and effect being alive and well, then, when Hamas decided to pour into Israel and murder, rape, mutilate and kidnap every Jew they could get their hands on, what did they think was going to happen? Perhaps a cowed, contrite appearance by the country’s Prime Minister on national television.