"Public relations entrapment" is the phrase Mahmoud Abbas used to defend the Palestinians' torching of the synagogues left behind after the Israeli pullout from Gaza.
Do you see the beauty of it? The Israelis evacuated Gaza but left the synagogues standing, because they knew the Palestinians would burn them down and would look bad as a result. The Palestinians were entrapped into bad public relations.
It's even better than the rhetoric hawked on the front page of the New York Times this morning about Hurricane Katrina:
With a crowbar and a flat-bottom boat, the two have been helping people break into their own homes and steal back from the city's most audacious looters - the falling water and rising mold - some reminders of what was: an inherited painting, a homemade quilt, a colorful print made by a child's hand that has since grown much bigger.We learn from this that people who looted in New Orleans -- and I'm talking about people who stole liquor or high-end electronics, not those who took water and necessities -- are no more morally culpable than water and mold, which have no volition and no ability to determine right from wrong.
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