Tafsiran Bilangan 20:3: Rashi, Kli Yakar, Sforno & Or HaChaim

ולו גוענו — means, WOULD THAT WE HAD DIED.

And the people quarreled with Moses. In all the complaints, we do not find the language of quarreling except regarding water matters, twice: here and at Massah and Meribah (Exodus 17:7). This is because from water, division was created, as our Sages said (Bereishit Rabbah 4:6): “Why was ‘it was good’ not said on the second day? Because on it division was created, as it says (Genesis 1:6), And let it be a separation between waters and waters.” And it is explained in the tradition (Proverbs 17:14), The beginning of strife is like releasing water. When the waters were released and separated from each other, this was the beginning of strife and the start of all quarreling. Similarly, the quarrel of Isaac’s shepherds was about water, for all this follows naturally from the primordial waters. And they quarreled with Moses, who was drawn from the water, and whose hand ruled over the waters at the Red Sea and at the rock. [They argued,] “Why can’t he bring forth water for us from the flint rock now as well?”

וירב העם עם משה, the subject of the quarrel was why Moses had brought the people to such a desert as the one they found themselves in at the time. However, there was also a complaint against G’d Himself, as the Torah testifies in verse 13 where the Torah writes: אשר רבו בני ישראל את ה', “in that the Children of Israel quarreled with G’d.” This referred to the words (verse 5) “why did you take us out of Egypt?”

בגוע אחינו means, by the death of our brethren — i.e., by the pestilence. This tells us that death by thirst is worse than that (i.e., than death by pestilence).