Conventional wisdom seems to be that, by making incursions into Palestine, the Israelis are provoking further violence from terrorists. In other words, even if you don't play shallow games of moral equivalence (by suggesting that there's no difference between destroying terrorists and terrorism itself, for example), it should still be "obvious" that Sharon's recent Palestinian invasion will only incite further terrorism.

But as Jonathan Chait notes in The New Republic, quite correctly, there has been a very sharp reduction in terrorism against Israeli civilians in the last week. One wonders if people who throw up their hands and say all is hopeless, or who cluck their tongues at Israeli actions, are really thinking clearly about human nature and history. (I think Chait's also right about the future of female suicide bombers.)