I think a better analogy might be the Dakota War of 1862. Treatment of the Dakota during that period is perhaps the greatest stain on Lincoln's presidency. BIA agents constantly cheated the Indians out of funds & supplies they were entitled to by treaty. At a meeting between Dakota leaders & agents where the former pleaded for the sake of their starving families, one agent, Andrew Myrick reportedly said: "As far as I'm concerned they can eat grass or their own dung." Later he was found beheaded, his mouth stuffed with dry grass.
That the Dakota, under Little Crow, were forced to act there can be no doubt. Some say the touchstone was the murder of a white family by Dakota youths seeking to prove their courage. Knowing that white retaliation would be extreme, Little Crow led his band in raids on civilian & military targets, ultimately killing some 358 civilians & nearly 100 soldiers.
After the Indians' defeat at Wood Lake a kangaroo tribunal sentenced 303 to death by hanging. Lincoln personally reviewed each sentence, granting clemency to all but 39 who had been convicted of rape &/or massacres (he commuted one more after receiving a wire suggesting doubt as to the man's guilt). The 38 that were hanged constituted the largest mass execution in US history.
Will Israel be as focused in its retribution? They don't have a Lincoln, they have a Netanyahu. So, no.
To compare Hamas with the Dakota, or Nat Turner, all the same is a bit problematic because Hamas seeks more than justice, freedom or a full stomach. Hamas is steadfastly anti-Zionist. In contradiction to the AIPAC line I believe Israel has fought only one existential war, in '48. The rest were against enemies with focused goals, e.g. Egypt sought a return of the Sinai & Syria the Golan Heights in '73.
Hamas, in contrast, wants it all.
Yet after 75 years Israel isn't going anywhere. It's a nation that colonized an Arab country that colonized a Byzantine country that colonized a Jewish country that colonized a Canaanite country & ad infinitum. I'm a Zionist who recognizes this, recognizes the necessity for the Jewish people to have a homeland of their own. They might have led the Palestinian people to trade the whole of an impoverished Palestine for a richer, more secure West Bank & Gaza ... until Jewish settlements in the former & needlessly punitive policies wrt the latter wrecked any chance of that.
Hamas doesn't want what Nat Turner or Little Crow wanted. They want total destruction & now they're in the driver's seat.
