I will say first that I cast my vote as NO...God is not cruel. There was a previous poster who said it well, 'God is not cruel, our idea of God is cruel.' We as free thinking people often do a great disservice to God with our fantastical expectations and fantasy world we live in and our powerful innate need to place blame.
I look it at it this way. I am a parent. Many of you are parents. And any of us who are reading this thread right now had parents. Right? Right? Gosh, I hope that is right.
Let's say I have ten children (I don't quite have ten children). Well they certainly are NOT a SIMS game to me. My children are the most important people in my life and I love them dearly. Same for you folks, right? I want my children to go out into the world and experience and accomplish anything they desire...if they want to be successful at something or get married and have kids, whatever it may be.
Now let's say something bad happens to one of those kids. Does that make me a bad parent? Does it make me bad that I couldn't stop it or that maybe I did have the power to stop it but for some reason missed my chance to stop the bad thing? I am their parent and as close to that God figure as can be on earth, the protector and provider and guidance through life, and also the creator that loves his creation. Does it make me a bad parent for even having the kids knowing they will probably suffer at some time in their life? Most of us will say no. Most of us will say that we're all good parents trying our best and we sacrifice so much of ourselves to protect our kids that when bad things do happen we can accept it as part of living in this reality. (Unless of course it is a clear case of blatant neglect or negligence or abuse). <--then we can point at those people and say they are bad parents...
The point I'm getting at is why don't we apply this for God? I believe God is a good parent and creator and wants the best for us. But I also believe he put us in this reality knowing that we must suffer the bad experiences at the same time that we enjoy the good experiences. There is no part of the bible that I can find where God says 'I am all powerful. I can do anything so don't worry I will always protect you from harm.' In fact, all I see in the bible, starting from Genesis, is that God says you will work hard to exist and live on this world and the earth will work against you and make it even harder, and then one day you will die. I always thought the bible painted a clear picture of the reality we live in....it is a hard one, a dog eat dog world, that you must be strong to thrive in, but no matter how strong you are or how hard you work you are going to be hurt and killed one day by someone or something. But what is the easiest thing to do....blame God, or rather blame our 'idea' of God and use our 'idea of evil' and 'idea of good' against Him. When we were never at any point taught that God would take care of all of our earthly worries and problems and threats and fears.
In this world evil things happen every day. Some are evil because we have a broad concept that we created as to what is evil. Some things are evil because it is clear to see they are evil. Either way, blame God, right? But also in this world wonderful things happen every day. Every single day someone is helping someone else. Every single day people are loving and laughing and having fun and supporting each other as friends and family and community. Every day miracles are happening. So why do we blame God for all the 'evil' and not praise him for all the good? Or rather why do some of us focus on the evil and not focus on the good that happens?
I believe a lot of us are simply out of touch with our spirituality and therefore hateful toward....well hateful toward most things in the whole world, not just hateful toward God. And therefore blame everything around them, including and especially God. And some of us are mentally ill, suffering with constant depression and illness so the entire world looks bleak, especially God because he is easiest to blame.
We talk about starving children and criminals and all these evil things happening everywhere. I did not save a starving kid today. Did you? Does that make me evil? There are people being raped and killed every single day. I did not stop any of it. Did you???? Does that make you evil? We have the power to make changes in our world, but most of us don't....we just blame God.
We all need to work on our own personal relationship with God. We can pour over the contradictions in the bible, the evils that happen in the world, the meaning of life and why must we suffer and die and everything in between. But we must have a direct and personal relationship with God. When you hold on to that....you may find your own way to breach the incredibly flawed view that we have created that exists between God and our 'idea' of God.
I believe in God. I believe in the power of prayer. I believe in being good to those around me and not blaming anyone or anything for my hardships because I know I am a human being that was put here to live and experience life(the real life that exists in this reality, not some fantasy where God is supposed to protect me from everything). And that means I will suffer pain and eventually death....but while I am alive I will experience all the good things, too, and have a glorious opportunity to connect with my higher power and have the most important, fulfilling, life affirming relationship of my existence for it.