What is the Proportionate Response?

Nearly every guest in Piers Morgan’s interview has to face two questions on the Israel-Palestine issue. The first is, “Do you condemn Hamas?”, and the second is, “What is the proportionate response?"

Nearly every guest in Piers Morgan’s interview has to face two questions on the Israel-Palestine issue. The first is, “Do you condemn Hamas?”, and the second is, “What is the proportionate response?”. Baseem Youssef answered the first question cleverly. He stated that, in the West Bank, where there is no Hamas, Palestinians are still being persecuted by the Israeli military. That means the main problem here is not the October 7 attack; rather, Israel’s age-long occupation is the root cause of the problem. The role of the October 7 attack here is that it escalated the ongoing problem. That answer is pretty convincing.
But everyone becomes mazed when he asks the tricky question, “What is the proportionate response?”.
It is tricky because when Mr. Piers asks the question or when someone agrees to answer the question, both agree on the premise of the question that a proportionate response is the only possible way to react for Israel, and now the problem is to measure the extent of the proportionate response. But this premise is wrong and heinous. The moment we agree that a proportionate response is the only possible way, we agree on killing civilians, we agree on Israel’s aggression; we now just need to find the numbers that are appropriate for Israel to kill and the extent of aggression that is allowed for Israel to cause.  
We need to deny the premise of the question. I believe a proportionate response is not the only way. Israel could have sat to negotiate with Hamas to release the captives, Israel could have stopped the occupation, Israel could have signed a peace treaty with Hamas. There were other alternatives for Israel except this mass killing. If these alternatives sound ridiculous, impossible, or ‘unjust’, if the only possible response is a counter-aggression on Gaza, then Hamas's aggression, killing, and keeping hostages during the October 7 attack is also justified. Because for 75 years Israel has been murdering Palestinian citizens, children, women, journalists and taking prisoners without trial, and now Hamas just tried to give a ‘proportionate response’ for those. Is this acceptable?
If it is not, then the proportionate response of Israel is also not acceptable. 

Secondly, we need to ask Mr. Piers: proportionate response to whom? To civilians? Or to Hamas?
Clearly, Israel is giving proportionate response to civilians, not to Hamas. Why will civilians suffer for Hamas’s actions? Is it just?
If the answer is- Hamas is hiding inside the population; so, in order to obliterate Hamas, Israel needs to bomb civilian infrastructure, and as a result, civilians will die inevitably.
If this is the argument, then Hamas’s attack on the civilians of Israel is also just. Because IDF members are from civilians, majority of the civilians are given military training, and their reserve soldiers are also among the civilians. So, to fight against the occupation and killings of Israel, Hamas can also attack on civilians because potential threats for Gaza are hiding inside Israeli citizens. 

So, if we keep thinking about the proportionate response, there is no end and no solution. This is a war. And in this war, both sides are committing crimes. If we want to take a side, we have to take side based on the intention of the belligerents, not based on the means they use during war. Hamas intends to fight the occupation and injustice of Israel over Palestinians, and Israel’s intention is to occupy more. We have to determine who is committing greater evil.