October 7, 2023 is a date that will live in infamy for Israel, as well as the Jewish people. Last Saturday was not only the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War of 1973. It was also Shabbat (the Jewish Sabbath) and the Jewish holiday of Shemini Artzeret. This holy time on the Jewish calendar was when militants from the terrorist organization Hamas crossed into Israel, took hostages, and slaughtered Israeli civilians. As I am writing this piece, Israeli death toll is at 1,200 people, almost exclusively civilians. This included the murder over 200 young civilians who were simply enjoying a music concert. Not since the Holocaust had this many Jews been murdered in a single day. In response, Israel's security cabinet voted to go to war for the first time since 1973.
What appalled me was the reaction by the pro-Palestinian side. There was no condemnation of these heinous acts. Protestors in Sydney, Australia were chanting "Gas the Jews" and "Fuck the Jews." Student organizations at elite U.S. universities blamed Israel for the civilians' deaths. The Black Lives Matters Grassroots said, "When a people have been subject to decades of apartheid and unimaginable violence, their resistance much not be condemned, but understood as a desperate act of self-defense." Such hateful, anti-Semitic protests were taking place all over the developed world. First, I want to concisely address the major pro-Palestinian accusations before delving into the issue with providing such support since, as we shall see shortly, it has bearing on what Hamas truly is.
Israel's presence is not occupation. Under international law, Gaza and the West Bank are disputed territories, not occupied territories. It is a designation given to multiple entities, including West Sahara and Kashmir. This is a concept I have explained in 2017, in 2015, and in 2011. The legal status has not changed since then because it is still in dispute. I would also point out that Israel removed troops and 8,000 Israeli settlers from Gaza in 2005. Until recently, the Israeli military had no reason to enter Gaza. Let's also remember that Jordan had illegally occupied the West Bank from 1948 to 1967, which was condemned by most of the international community. Jordan's illegal occupation brings up another inconvenient point: there was no Palestine prior to 1967. The United Nations proposed a Palestinian state in 1947 (UN Resolution 194), but refused. Why? Because part of that proposal was allowing a Jewish state alongside, which was unpalatable and remains unpalatable to the Arab world up to this day.
Israel is not a colonizer. After all of these years, Israel is roughly 8,469 square miles. To put this into context, that is about the size of New Jersey. Let's ignore Gaza and West Bank for a moment since they are disputed territories. Some other points on the topic:
- What other countries has Israel conquered? Israel has not conquered sovereign nations since it became a state in 1948. Israel annexed the Golan Heights, Sinai Peninsula, and all of Jerusalem in the Six-Day War of 1967 fighting a legitimate war of self-defense. I remember writing a paper on that topic in college...good times!
- Israel gave the largest parcel of land (the Sinai Peninsula) back to Egypt vis-à-vis a peace treaty in 1979 in exchange for a cold peace, as well as leaving Gaza in 2005. Giving up land for peace is not the behavior of a ruthless colonizer.
- Compare that to Spain conquering most of Latin America, the 57 countries and territories the British colonized, or the vast territories of the French empire. Even the Portuguese and Dutch acquired more land than Israel did.
- Let's not forget that the Jewish people have a 3,000-year-plus-old presence in and connection to the land. Furthermore, many Jews in the 1940s were fleeing their nations that were looking to expel them, which is also not behavior of colonizers. If anything, Israel is an example of what decolonization looks like.
Israel is not committing genocide against the Palestinian people. Genocide is the deliberate killing of a large group of people with the aim of destroying the people. The Global Firepower Index ranks Israel in the Top 20 for having the most firepower. If Israel wanted to, it would have wiped out Gaza already.
- Instead, Israel has used the tactic to warn Palestinian civilians before they strike. No other country on the planet uses that tactic because it loses the element of surprise. That is how painstaking it is: because Israel would rather avoid civilian bloodshed.
- There has been considerable population growth in West Bank and Gaza. According to World Bank data, the population of West Bank and Gaza increased from 1.97 million in 1990 to 5.04 million in 2022. That is an increase of about 156 percent! Even the United Nations show that the Palestinian population was slightly below 1 million in 1950. The numbers do not support that genocide of the Palestinians is the intent or the result of Israel's foreign policy.
- This charge from the pro-Palestinian side is rich with irony give that, as we will see shortly, Hamas has openly expressed genocidal intent when it comes to exterminating Israel.
Israel is not an apartheid state. This accusation affects the Israeli Arabs more than it would the citizens of Gaza. This is an argument I refuted in 2016 and in 2012. Israeli Arabs can vote in elections, sit in Israeli Parliament or the Israeli Supreme Court, or become doctors, none of which could be done in a genuine apartheid state. As I pointed out in 2021, all Western nations have had issues with how they treat minorities, including the United States, France, Sweden, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Canada, you get the idea. Israel is a younger nation, which means that it has growing pains. It is not to excuse the marginalization of people, but rather that it does not amount to being an apartheid state. If we were to follow that logic, virtually every developed nation would be apartheid states.
As I have clearly illustrated, Israel withstands scrutiny from these fallacious allegations. These charges even more problematic given who Hamas is. Israel is the only democratic state in the Middle East surrounded by hotbeds of authoritarianism. Hamas is an anti-Western, anti-Semitic, anti-gay military group that has been declared a terrorist organization by the United States (and reaffirmed in President Biden's remarks on Hamas earlier this week), Australia, the United Kingdom, and Japan.
Hamas does a fine job of restricting the political and civil rights of its people (Freedom House), not to mention that it uses its own citizens as human shields whenever it is fighting with Israel. As for how it treats its Israeli neighbor, Hamas has openly declared its hatred for Jews. In its original charter, it explicitly called for the extermination of the Jewish state. In its revised 2017 version, Hamas does not recognize the state of Israel and views Israel as "racist, aggressive, colonial, and expansionist." How are you supposed to negotiate peace with a side who will only be satisfied if you are wiped off the planet?
It is not simply some minority faction of government that has held an authoritarian grip on power in Gaza. According to the latest survey data from the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PCPSR), only 28 percent of Palestinians support a two-state solution (PCPSR, p. 9). Even more disturbing are the survey questions about how Gazans would vote if there were elections held soon. If Abbas ran, 65 percent of Gazans would vote for the Hamas incumbent: Ismail Haniyyah (PCPSR, p. 14). If it were between Haniyyah and the popular Marwan Barghouti (the guy responsible for the Second Intifada and is sitting in Israeli jail), 49 percent would vote for Haniyyah and 49 percent for Barghouti (ibid.). The majority of Gazans support leadership that would do away with Israel if they could. This all implies that neither Hamas nor a majority of Gazans want a two-state solution.
I already pointed out how Israel is not a colonizer, an occupier, an apartheid state, or committing genocide. Strictly for argument's sake, let us assume that Israel was some or all of those things. It does not matter. Rape is not resistance. Taking hostages, including a Holocaust survivor, is not social justice. Shooting children or parading unconscious women around like trophies does not make you righteous. No amount of "the situation in Middle East is complex" makes it acceptable to decapitate babies. It makes you the bad guys. Hamas did not hide its perversion this past weekend; it bragged about it and posted its heinous acts on social media. In case it was not clear beforehand, Hamas' hatred of the Jewish people outweighs the love of the Palestinians.
Such reprehensible behavior is not simply defined as war crimes as laid out in the Geneva Convention (Section II). It goes well beyond "two wrongs do not make a right." Anyone who resorts to or supports such tactics are not noble. If your politics are so dogmatic that you support the depravity that Hamas committed, it does not make you a hero. It leaves you susceptible to condone blatant human rights violations, including the butchering of Jewish citizens. There is no moral equivalence argument or "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter." There is no instance of "some very fine people on both sides." There is no "on the other hand."
Hamas represents some of the most depraved aspects of humanity. What Hamas did was revolting, plain and simple. This is about human decency, an element that Hamas clearly lacks. Those who protest in favor of Hamas are saying that it is acceptable to slaughter innocent civilians, to shoot children in front of their parents, to massacre the elderly, and parade around naked, unconscious women.
These pro-Palestinian protests sadly remind me that their support for Hamas is not in opposition of Israeli foreign policy or a certain prime minister by the name of Bibi. Chanting genocidal slogans against Jews (instead of just against Israelis, not that either is acceptable) and openly celebrating a terrorist organization shows that its animus is not about Israel, but another manifestation of Jew-hatred (If you have doubts about the difference between merely criticizing Israel and downright anti-Semitism, you can read my 2016 analysis here). We must oppose anti-Semitism much like we must oppose other forms of bigotry. If this hatred is not confronted, the Western world will lose its ability to earnestly call itself civilized.
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