What of the impact of the speech? An unfair question: soft power, however desirable, has its limits. Pericles’ funeral oration did not lead to the resurrection of the dead and there is still much sin in the world despite the Sermon on the Mount.

Heading north without engine power, the pilot of the Airbus A320 changed course and — in what some are describing as a heroic but calm act — glided to a watery landing in full view of buildings on the west side of Manhattan. “The pilot got on and said, ‘You guys got to brace for a hard impact,’” passenger Jeff Kolodjay told the Times. “That’s when everyone started to say their prayers. I got to give it to the pilot, he did a hell of a landing.” When the pilot, Chesley Sullenberger, emerged from the plane, he had not even donned a life vest, according to the Times of London.

When parents name a dude Chesley, they clearly don’t expect him to have balls the size of Durian fruit, but score one for rising above expectations.

While the most trusted name in news struggles to get its “whats” and “whens” straight, I suggest following CNN’s example and getting your “whys” from the internet. Here’s some reading material I found illuminating, roughly-chronologically connecting the dots from the current crisis to its roots.

1. Israel strike on Gaza: a primer and Israel’s ghosts from the Middle East Strategy at Harvard institute lay out the recent causes and events leading up to the war, as well as a plea for diplomacy.
2. An article from Ynet news about the November 5th Israeli attack on Gaza that marked the increase in rocket attacks. Many bloggers fallaciously insinuated that the tunnels were to be used for smuggling humanitarian supplies into Gaza from Egypt, but the location of Al Bureji makes this impossible.
3. Wikipedia has a detailed list of rocket and mortar attacks in Israel in 2008, including 37 rockets and mortars launched during the six-month ceasefire in 2008.
4. Amnesty International reported earlier this year on the major humanitarian crisis in Gaza as a result of the Israeli blockade from June 2007 onward, but only hinted about the strategic purpose of the blockades. The New York Times was much more explicit as early as 2006, detailing plans to destabilize a Hamas-led Palestine through economic starvation.
5. Wikipedia has a detailed article on the June 2007 Battle for Gaza, chock-full of sources, lest you believe the misconception that Hamas took power of Gaza democratically and peacefully.
6. The 1988 Hamas Covenant sheds some light on why Israel so strongly resists a Hamas-controlled Gaza.

Yes, this conflict is complicated, and my sympathies seem to sway back and forth in the above list. What isn’t complicated, because it is invariably true in situations like this, is that innocent people continue to suffer while those comfortably in power make cold decisions about their fate.

There’s huge pressure to “pick a side” in the conflict, where the valid choices consist of one army or another. But I can’t fathom how anyone who truly believes the blessed are the poor, the hungry, the mourners and the persecuted can sit on the sidelines half a world away and choose between two armies that are none of the above. They are not divided from those who are by political or geographic lines, but by on which side of the suffering they sit.