This seems to be following the BBC's highly slanted lead. Since when has Gaza had an army, navy and air force? They are all civilians.

The problem (or one of them) is that according to well-established research, about 10 per cent of them are dedicated Hamas fighters. That may be a minority but this minority rules Gaza with a rod of iron. And Hamas is a UN-designated terrorist organisation.

That puts it alongside the Provisional IRA, Al Qaeda, AQAP, AQIM, Taliban, Isis, Al Nusrah and Nigeria's Boko Haram. In other words, all terrorists are civilians. They have enlisted in no known armed forces, wear no uniforms and carry no badges of rank. They are deliberately indistinguishable from the 90 per cent who just want to get on with peaceful lives, and among whom they mix.

But it is Hamas which has launched 1,400 rockets at Israel over the past few months, storing them in a vast labyrinth of tunnels that run the length and breadth of Gaza.

It is to get at these rocket arsenals and tunnels, and destroy them for years to come, that Israel launched its retaliation. And yes, their methodology seems to be remarkably clumsy and they are losing the public relations war by a thousand miles.

But the only alternative would be to try to clear Gaza of Hamas street by street, house by house, gutter by gutter, alley by alley, booby-trap by booby-trap. That would cost Israel thousands of lives. Ask any soldier - street-fighting is the bloodiest kind there is.

And there is the psychodifference. To the Israelis every single soldier's life is immeasurably precious; to Hamas the Gazans' lives are completely irrelevant. They are winning the propaganda war and that for them is victory.

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World Cup is the key to punishing Vladimir Putin

THERE are two pretty important questions about the Ukraine which I have not seen asked, let alone answered.

How many of the country's 27 regions or provinces (26 actually,since the Crimea is now Russian), want to secede and become either independent or accede to Russia? And are the secessionists, brutish thugs whom we see strutting about in Russian-donated uniforms and toting Russian weapons, a majority even in East Ukraine?

Or are they like the Provisional IRA a minority within a minority, prepared to kill for their dream but unwilling to be counted? Only a referendum in each secession-leaning province could tell us and a fat chance we have of that.

But this is perfectly clear. Without Russian funding, training, equipping and arming they would have been swept back into oblivion by now. So the key is Russia and the Russian key is Putin. The collective West is trying to persuade him to bring his protégés to the conference table or even one day to the voting booth. And we are failing. There is a clear reason. Our ambassador in Washington may have called him a thug and a liar but to a huge majority of Russians he is a hero.

The reason? He controls the media and is portrayed as standing up to Russia's enemies who are as ever the rest of the world. I've said before, the only people Putin fears are his own. Discredit him in their eyes and he will feel his throne tremble.

SCHOLARS have long debated: is there such a thing as a national character? I believe that in certain circumstances there can be. If it can be shown that the great majority of a nation shares the same characteristic then that becomes the national character and those not sharing it are a minority.

In the case of the Russians it is paranoia. I'll bet that about 80 per cent of Russians are quite convinced their country is surrounded by enemies, always has been and always will be and that they have no choice but to defend themselves.

Historically it is the reverse. From the small enclave round Moscow 500 years ago, the Rus nation, it is they who have invaded, conquered and expanded until Russia today is the biggest country on earth. Only Hitler's invasion of 1941 almost reversed that. (Napoleon and the Kaiser were short-term attacks, repulsed within a year.)

But the Russians won't have it that way and for them Putin is the defender against enemies. It would take an awesome shock to discredit him. Freezing the assets of a few of his mega-rich cronies, of whom the Russian people have never heard, will not do that.

Punishing his banks with measures the Russian people cannot understand will not do it either. (It would only diminish the City of London which is a German/ EU goal anyway.) But there is one thing that might. If the entire West told Fifa that if the 2018 World Cup is held in Russia we won't be there, the world footballing body would have to reconsider and award the World Cup quickly to the runner-up bidder.

That is something every single footie-mad Russian would totally understand. And if they were told (we still have the BBC World Service and the internet) that it was Vladimir Putin who had brought this disaster upon them the Kremlin would veer towards panic.

He would have to think: it's losing most of the Russian people or giving up on a bunch of brutish airliner killers in East Ukraine. An asset would suddenly become a lethal liability. I don't think it would ever come to removing the World Cup. Just proving to him that we really might and really could do that would be enough. He's a practical man after all - when it comes to personal survival most bullies are.

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Edie Campbell at Goodwood's Ladies' Day

AS ONE with zero empathy with horses (actually it's mutual) I have to take my hat off to a pretty young lady who can ride them at break-neck speed. Like model Edie Campbell who last week romped home on Ladies' Day at Goodwood to win the Magnolia Cup.

She then received her trophy from Tom Cruise, which frightened her more than risking every bone in her body on a thundering half-ton of equine meat. Well, it takes all sorts.

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Rubbish way to deal with the rubbish

THE CO is very eco-conscious and forever on at me for putting the wrong trash in the wrong bin.

It seems we now have about six categories and rising. Yet the other day I saw a garbage truck on the streets as one bin after another, all colours, was hoisted on the cradle, upended and tipped into the same compactor.

Luckily we have a waste disposal in the sink, three Jack Russells (meaty waste) 10 ducks (veg waste) and a burning pit.

It means I can keep visits to the council tip down to three categories: bottles, metal/china and old papers. Still, it's getting complicated. And all since Brussels stopped landfill after gravel extraction. You'd think good government would make life simpler. Just the reverse.

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The joys of toddlers

I HAVE spent the week hosting a visit by my elder son, his fiancée and my first grandson. It has been 35 years since my boys were that age and I had forgotten the joy of watching a 16-month-old toddler running across a sunlit lawn, trying to catch a duck, pursued by scampering little dogs.

Everything is to be touched, tasted, explored to the accompaniment of gurgles of pleasure and surprise. Only the occasional tympanum-piercing screech sends the CO under the nearest pillow. And how come the parents of babies, especially in aeroplanes, are always immune to it?

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Up to three words could drive me nuts

THERE are three words, constantly used in adverts and promotions, that I am becoming very tired of. One is "could" as in: "Running a marathon a day could add years to your life." Yes, and it could give you a cardiac arrest. (Always attributed to some incredibly obscure academic in Milwaukee looking for a bung.) Then there is "up to".

Thus: "Up to three million Slovenians could (again) be heading for our shores." This is Nigel F on the fifth pint. It's unlikely because there are only two million of them. But the cop out is "up to". The real figure is probably eight.

And there is "from" when referring to bargains. As in: "Hotel Magnifico is quite superb by its dreamy lagoon with rooms from £56 per night." Should you go there the only space at £56 per night is the broom cupboard, which is not available because it is occupied by four very jealous brooms.

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Beware of the heatwave

LAST week I praised the heatwave. This week it nearly burned my house down. On my desk there is an old tea mug with a forest of pens, letter openers. And one magnifying glass. I went to the kitchen for a cup of tea. When I got back a letter on the desk was smouldering away.

The sun had come out, shone through the window, been concentrated into a narrow beam by the magnifier and set the paper ablaze. Had I gone for lunch at the Jolly Cricketers I could have come back to find a pile of ashes where Chez Fred used to be. The glass is now safely in a drawer.