Sure there are isolated pockets of regret and remorse, but the opinions of those who command and control the gunships and tanks are remarkably cold and remorseless.

Israeli newspapers were filled with a mixture of remorse and recrimination on Thursday, a day after the army shelled a town in the Gaza Strip, killing 18 civilians, [mostly] women and children.

While some commentators said the attack, which Palestinians have termed a massacre, called for national soul-searching, others said it was just the "price tag" Palestinians should pay for having launched attacks on Israel.

"Anyone who couldn't sleep yesterday because they were worried about the damage to the state of Israel's good reputation can stop worrying," wrote Alex Fishman in Yedioth Ahronoth, Israel's most widely read newspaper.

Typical israeli narcissism - it's not the victims of the massacre that has them worried, but the damage it will do to their image.

"It has been a long time since we had such a reputation. Israel is viewed by the world as having a light trigger finger when it comes to civilians. Whether this is true or not, this is a fact. That is our image."

Delusions, delusions.

Always wanting to believe that they're right and that everyone else in the world is misguided.

Israeli leaders have expressed regret for the killings, which military officers said were probably the result of artillery rounds accidentally overshooting their target.

Another commentator in Yedioth, Sima Kadmon, said that if the shells did indeed overshoot, it wasn't just a problem of calibration in the military, but in Israeli society itself.

"This was not a mistake. This was a disaster. It's a regrettable mistake when you step on someone's toe, not when you kill 11 members of one family."

"No excuses can justify this atrocity," Ha'aretz newspaper said.

"None of Israel's responses to this catastrophe ... can paper over its sole responsibility for this fearsome and senseless killing."

Pity - that is just one isolated voice of reason.

[E]lsewhere in the Israeli press there was little regret, with diplomats, politicians and commentators quick to say that Israel had little to feel bad about.

The deputy defense minister, Ephraim Sneh, told the Jerusalem Post the "moral responsibility" for the deaths rested with Palestinian militants who were "cynically using their civilian population as a human shield for terrorist activity."

Same tired old tripe about Human Shields. We went over this already. Human shields are useless if the enemy doesn't care about civilian lives.

The Israeli ambassador to the United Nations, Dan Gillerman, said the attack hardly represented a "watershed moment," saying: "War is a dirty business and during war ugly things happen."

In the mass-circulation Ma'ariv newspaper, commentator Ben Caspit said the fact Palestinian militants had fired hundreds of homemade rockets into Israel meant a response was due.

"Such behavior carries a price tag," he wrote. "...Every other method has been tried, and failed. With scoundrels you behave like a scoundrel, and with murderous, bloodthirsty terrorism that wants to wipe you off the map, you have to respond accordingly: WIPE IT OUT."

Wow. That's pretty extreme.

He makes it sound like Palestinians are putting up a fierce and merciless fight.

Around 350 Palestinians have been killed since Israel began its Gaza offensive in June, doctors say. Palestinian rocket fire into Israel has caused panic and injuries BUT KILLED NO ONE.

Crazy israeli bastards.

Apparently, they need the Wall after all - but it ought to be padded.