Israel Under Attack

For both Israeli and Gazan civilians, the war with its loss of life and destruction was an unforeseen calamity imposed by Hamas. Only Hamas profiteered by achieving their grand goals: ““Hit Jews where it hurts” meaning flare up of global antisemitism and “Blame it on the Jews”. As was preplanned, Hamas paid for it with blood of civilian Palestinians and with turning Gaza into unlivable ruin. However, few blame Hamas. Nobody seems concerned that Hamas has been with impunity infusing Gazan generations with homophobic hatred. People blame Israel – why?

‘Racial’? This accusation is grotesquely inapplicable to Israel. Statistically, “in the Gaza Strip, around 1% of the population is estimated to be black. Most Palestinians are Levantine Arabs, who are lighter than Gulf Arabs. In Israel, about 30% of Israeli Jews are Ashkenazi who are generally fair-skinned. Sephardic Jews are generally dark-skinned and make up about 55%. And every 5th person is an Arab,” (Wikipedia). It looks then like some 75% of Israelis are ‘brown(ish)’ while most Palestinians – fair-skinned… And of course, both peoples belong to the same race. Or may it be called ‘racial’ because the brownish Israelis were victimized by fair-skinned Hamas aggressors on Oct. 7?

“…Palestine, as George Orwell pointed out in 1945, is a ‘colour issue’, and this is the way it was inevitably seen by Gandhi… and the postcolonial nations, which almost all refused to recognise the state of Israel” (Mishra, LRB, March 21, 2024). Orwell and Gandhi meant European colonizers, Britain, at the time controlling Palestine. True, Arabs and Brits belong to different races. But what on Earth does it have to do with Israel? Israel didn’t even exist in 1945. To claim that Israeli existential struggle is “a racial issue” is like to suggest that religious wars that decimated 16th-18th centuries Europe were “a racial issue”. To furtively substitute Britain for Israel in order to make Israeli-Arab conflict look racial is an example of despicable millennial Jew-scapegoating.

As to postcolonial nations, their refusal to recognise Israel, referred to by Mishra (ibid) was exactly of the same nature as were 140 resolutions against Israel that the UN General Assembly adopted since 2015 (as opposed to 68 resolutions it passed against all other countries combined, including North Korea, Iran, Afghanistan, Myanmar, Russia, etc.). This response was forever preprogrammed in the UN where 22 Arab and many more other Muslim countries always voted as a block against one Israel. The name of the game is prejudice, specifically – antisemitism.

Historical racial inequality that Mishra referred to is an abhorrent inheritance people have lived with and fought against. As is historical Jew-hatred. Both – colored people and Jews – are on the same, not opposite, side of the divide even if one calamity consumed “countless millions” (out of billions) while the other ‘only’ six (out of less-than-fifteen) millions. Why should limelight on one be at the expense of belittling the other? Brutalizing of natives in Congo and Namibia had been abysmal, this urgently needs recognition/admission, but how does it make the Holocaust less inhuman? After all, one might say, Holocaust remains unique in that neither slavery, nor bombing Nagasaki purposely aimed at total – think of it, literally to the last baby (as if they were plague-infected rats) – annihilation from Earth of certain people (as it had for Jews, also Gypsies, disabled, homosexuals). Only the Nazis made monstrous ‘final solutions’ their goal. It is arguably a yet-different degree of depravity.

Columbia Professor Joseph Massad also claims that antisemitism is being used as ‘cover’ for Israeli ‘colonialism’, that genocide is Western way and Israel is deeply aligned with these values, including ‘settler colonialism’ and ‘utter racism.’ There are far too many others ready for anti-Israel, anti-Jew propaganda under the banner of this defamatory libel. But in truth the creation and defence of Israel have never been tainted as racially nor colonially motivated – it is literally an existential struggle for survival of Jews as a people as well as (and it is not an exaggeration) – their mere physical survival. Israel has been brutalized by allied Arab countries (seven against one) since inception. Syria initiated a state of war on May 15, 1948, and never lifted it. Conversely, the settlers’ aggression, same as Palestinian car-ramming or stone-throwing, must have been more desperate snapping, overreacting, than any ‘colonial ideology’. “Israel endured over 18,300 terrorist attacks last year… [in which 134 were killed and 1277 wounded], as the Jewish state faced an onslaught of terrorism from seven fronts…” (Algemeiner, January 9, 2025).

Insinuating term “‘Settler colonial ideology’ closely resembles the antiracist ideology of Robin DiAngelo and Ibram X. Kendi … just as all white people are supposedly born with the original sin of racism, all non-indigenous people are born with the original sin of settler colonialism –- even those who have been around for generations. (This leads to the bizarre result that to some scholars, Black Americans whose forebears arrived in chains are viewed as colonizers.) …With ‘settler colonialism’, you are either indigenous and belong to the land, or you are non-indigenous and your presence is irrevocably evil. …Because all non-indigenous people bear the irrevocable stain of settler colonialism, they can be collectively punished. …[But] the original Zionists who populated the British Mandate were refugees, not colonizers. They came to escape oppression and reclaim their homeland, not to widen the boundaries of European influence. …Moreover, strikingly unlike typical colonial ventures, Israel has no mother country obligated to defend it, or to accept millions of refugees if it fails,” (Paul Schneider, Algemeiner, December 17, 2024).

Besides, “Palestinians and Jews are genetically closer to each other than to other populations… closer… than the Jews are to their host countries,” (Wikipedia). Call them white, brown or polka-dot – they are genetically a family. To announce Palestinians as ‘inferior colonized ones’ would have been for Jews like to spit against the wind… Two million Israeli Arabs experience this formal advantage of being ‘a family’: the Declaration of Independence (1948) ensured complete equality of social and political rights to all Israelis irrespective of religion, race or sex. In 1980, Israeli citizenship was granted to Palestinian Arab residents of the former mandate and their descendants who remained living in Israel. Even if the reality may not yet have fully achieved perfection – still, it is far cry from the ‘apartheid’ that Israel is blamed for. Gaza and Arab countries do not offer Jews, who might have hypothetically wanted to live there, even formal equality with Arabs – but nobody blames those countries for apartheid. Their Jewish population has been completely ethnically cleansed. Why such difference?

“Recent years have seen a surge in the number of East Jerusalemites seeking Israeli citizenship… Since 2009, there have been some 800-1,000 requests each year,” (Wikipedia). “The number of Druze who are Israeli citizens is at 20%, double the number at the beginning of the 21st century… In the past year, the number of Druzes in Israel applying for Israeli citizenship has increased to unprecedented levels,” (January 9, 2025). Note that “the past year” was 2024 – a year of the Gaza war but even this did not stop the applicants.

What is it then if not the ‘racial colonial’ conspiracy? Can Palestinians and Jews share the land and live in peace? Their mutual hostility has been fueled and financed by powerful international forces pursuing their own political gains. To have it masked they used conveniently available religious incompatibility. Unforgiving religious divisiveness and exclusiveness toward any non-coreligionist is notoriously known. Think of European religious wars or of Sunni/Shia since-inception-conflict that cost zillions of Muslim lives. This is the rupture line. To libel Jews as colonizers (hence to fuel anti-Jew hatred) is yet another attempt of habitual Jew-scapegoating: “Blame it on the Jews!”

The fact that Israel has never been a racial colonial project certainly does not absolve Jews automatically nor keep them immune to any deserved critique. Many of its accusative points are indisputably true. But the anti-Israel chorus is so overwhelming that here I’m taking liberty to just focus on mortal prejudices against Israel/Jews.

Israel is not perfect as no one is. But other countries do not suffer background hostile pre-fixation. Nor has there been a perpetual TV flood of horrifying images of dead children/fatalities from other contemporaneous wars (in which civilian casualties were mostly by orders higher than in Gaza). In Sudan, for instance, “more than 2.5 million people are estimated to have been killed or to have died of conflict-related starvation and disease (Wikipedia). Sudan’s military has used chemical weapons at least twice against the paramilitary group…”, (NYT, January 17, 2025). Imagine global howling, if it were not in Sudan but in Israel…

Since 2012, al-Assad had been fighting the Syrian opposition using Russian bombers. The UN asked not to bomb hospitals and provided their exact coordinates. But Russian and Syrian aviators used the provided coordinates to specifically target hospitals even though there were no claims that any opposition fighters were hiding there. “Over 230,000 Syrian civilians were killed [by Assad partly with sarin] …with 30,193 children and 16,451 women included in the death toll”. Not much international outcry, nor stabbing of ex-Syrians on the streets abroad, no libels… But 44,000 Gazan casualties were immediately called “GENOCIDE”. Again – why? “Blame it on the Jews!”

Only the Gaza war is under daily magnifying glass of unfriendly global media and social press, ‘excessive response’ being the mildest accusation. ‘Excessive’ in civilian casualties? Horrifyingly so, but it was because the terrorists had been hiding among civilians used as human shields, in hospitals and schools. Hamas is to be blamed for it.

The Israeli government has an obligation to guarantee safety for its population. But Hamas threatens ever-repeating attacks. “Palestinian official Ali Faisal stated that another event like October 7th is on the horizon and will continue occurring until a Palestinian victory is achieved,” (El Pais, January 2, 2025). Israel’s stated goal was to destroy Hamas because Israel had no other options. Negotiating with Hamas was as impossible as, say, with a malignant tumor. As with the tumor, if surgery is not radical, it returns to kill.

You be the judge: Ghazi Hamad publicly vowed to repeat the October 7 attacks “time and again until Israel is annihilated,” and expressed a desire to “sacrifice martyrs” referring to Gazan civilians (October 24, 2023, LBC TV, Lebanon). Peace is not an option for Hamas: “There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through Jihad,” (Hamas Charter, Article 13). And repeatedly: “We’ll do it again and again”. Even on the day of signing the ceasefire: “Senior Hamas official Khalil al-Hayya pledges to repeat the Oct. 7 massacre just hours after ceasefire agreement,” (MEMRI, January 16, 2025). “Israel is a country that has no place on our land…” (Ghazi Hamad). “Bring annihilation upon Jews,” (Hamad al-Regeb). “Kill them all without leaving a single one,” (Ahmad Bahr). In this light, does the Israeli response look ‘excessive’ – or arguably sufficient? It’s response was vital, existential (not ‘disproportionate’) because it allowed (if barely) Israel to protect its citizens. There were no other options. The Israelis stopped as soon as their citizens got protected for the time being. Israel’s legitimate views are totally ignored when its response is called ‘disproportionate’. Why such a lopsided anti-Israel attitude? Similarly, the UN lately condemned the Israeli military response to the Houthis shelling. But what remained – welcome Houthis bombs killing Israeli civilians?

As to destruction of Gaza – even if they were Israeli bombs, it was Hamas mortal provocation to be blamed for. Here is the analogous story. On September 1, 2004, in Beslan, Ossetia (Northern Caucasus) 32 Islamic terrorists occupied a school taking over 1000 hostages, teachers and children. The hostages were denied water/food; some children resorted to drinking urine. Russian Special Forces (RSF) attacked. One third (about 330 mostly children) were killed in the attack, many more wounded by Russian fire. Should we blame the RSF for this suffering/loss of life? Wouldn’t justice be done by having blamed the Islamic terrorists even if technically most hostages, yes, were killed by RSF bullets? Was the RSF response ‘excessive’ or ‘disproportionate’? Similarly, why on Earth does the social media blame Israel for ‘Palestinian genocide’ if it was orchestrated by Hamas? Even if those were Israeli bombs that killed the Gazans – just like they were the RSF bullets in Beslan?

Let alone that “The normally foreseen rate of civilian-combatant casualties in urban warfare is 9:1, whereas in Gaza, despite Hamas using civilians as human shields and killing so many civilians by misfiring rockets and for wishing to flee to safer zones, the rate is 1:1… The fact that the real casualty rate is so low compared to other similar conflicts and to the number of Hamas et Co. combatant deaths, actually puts Israel in a remarkable place of managing to avoid civilian casualties to the extent of achieving the lowest civilian-combatant casualty rate EVER. …During WW2, the Germans suffered over 2 million civilian deaths in British air raids, while the British suffered ‘only’ 70,000 civilian deaths? Are you claiming that you support Nazi Germany because of this?

…International law says that Israel is acting in accordance with the internationally accepted rules of engagement… Some of the rules governing the use of force in armed conflicts are set forth in treaties, such as the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and the Regulations annexed to the Fourth Hague Convention of 1907… The Israeli High Court has ruled that these customary international law rules bind Israel under both international law and Israeli law,” (Wikipedia).

Despite all the Arab-Jew mutual accusations of ‘ethnic cleansing’ in the Middle East, the Arab population has grown and is as widespread and dense as ever (including in Israel). However, this is not true in reverse: there are no longer any Jews in the Middle East (except in Israel). “Around 850,000 Jews were forced out… from Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia and several other Arab countries in the 20 years that followed the Arab-Israeli war of 1948. …Age-old communities, with roots dating back millennia, were gone. It was the largest exodus of non-Muslims from the middle east…” (Wikipedia). It has become a Judenrein zone, a Nazi dream come true. Tell me again, who and by whom has been ‘ethnically cleansed’ in the Middle East?

U.S. foreign aid (grand total) is as follows:

1. Ukraine $17,193,710.40
2. Israel $ 3,302,860.882
3. Jordan $ 1,686,862.605
4. Egypt $ 1,503.609.426

But once again it is only Israel that is being singled out – not for having turned malarial swamps and deserts into gardens but “…for actions inconsistent with international law.”

To dot the i’s and cross the t’s in case someone missed it: all this IS antisemitism. Beware of it: it always starts with Jews but never ends with Jews. Antisemitism is as abhorrent as slavery or Nazism. It is where Jews are defenseless and vulnerable victims with no fault of their own whatsoever. Why does it exist? Antisemitism follows religious geographic distribution and is limited to areas whose populations are Christian and Muslim. India, China and Southeast Asia are largely unaffected.

For two millennia the Church (fearing ideological competition from Judaism) and – later – fanatical Islam, had been relentlessly teaching and preaching that Jews are irredeemably-evil Jesus-killers. It has worked and in generations people got used to it as something self-evident like daylight. Negative attitudes toward Jews became a social norm, almost an instinct, even though the very idea of evil Jesus-killers had been manifestly absurd: according to the Church teachings God sacrificed His only son to redeem peoples’ sins; Jesus was a victim NOT of evil forces, but of his Father’s plan. What should it  matter then, had God chosen Romans, Jews or a gray wolf to inflict Jesus’ suffering? Any of them would have been only a tool in God’s grand plan. Who ever accused a tool used in any action?

Yet, Jews were scapegoated – for two millennia. How many other than Jews peoples experienced 150+ exiles/expulsions in their history? Countless persecutions, mass murders, forced conversions, pogroms, humiliation, endless restrictions, ‘Jewish quotas’ widespread in the 19th and 20th centuries… and never-ending scapegoating.

Previous anti-Jew riots in history must have been expressions of routine xenophobia. Xenophobia is universal in human society The list of historical ethno-religious cleansings has far over 250 items (anti-Catholic, -Shia vs. Sunni, -Hindu/Buddhist vs Muslim, anti-Albanians, -Armenians, -Bosnians, -Greeks, -Turks, -Soviet minorities [like Tatars] -non-Han Chinese, etc., etc.). “The first organized anti-Jewish uprising accompanied by looting and massacre we know of took place in Alexandria in the year 38 CE. . …Jews were accused of not honoring the Emperor,” (Wikipedia). If early anti-Jew riots attracted more attention, it is because of this perennial pariah-status of Jews as compared to all the others.

How is antisemitism expressed in practice at our time?

An example: children and elders are being globally attacked, even stabbed on the streets if recognised as Jewish. What exactly is their fault? Many people dislike Iranian ayatollahs; many despise Putin – yet their expats are not being stabbed on the streets for being ethno-religious Iranians or Russians. The very idea seems absurd. Even at the height of atrocities in Nazi Germany, nobody stabbed ex-Germans around the Globe ‘in protest’. But this natural, fair attitude seems inapplicable to Jews and only to Jews. Jews (born, living anywhere) are a ‘legitimate’ target for anti-Netanyahu enthusiasts anxious to find a scapegoat. Again – why the difference? “Blame it on the Jews!” This is antisemitism and scapegoating, homophobic, immoral and dehumanizing, yet habitual to the point of looking natural.

Allow me a metaphor. Tiny Israel among the countries is not unlike Cinderella in her step-mother’s house: the scapegoat, always at fault, no matter what. “The international Jewish conspiracy… has been described as ‘one of the most widespread and long-running conspiracy theories‘… Belief in an international Jewish conspiracy for world domination can be traced back to the thirteenth century…” (Wikipedia).

Humans are unique in their ability (critical for forming our cooperative on-demand responses/efforts that make Sapiens uniquely powerful) for story-telling and -believing. “In order to cooperate, Sapiens… just had to know the same story. And the same story can be familiar to billions of individuals. …What they have connected to has been a carefully crafted story… A ‘brand’ is a specific type of story. To brand a product means to tell a story about this product, which may have little to do with the product’s actual qualities but which consumers nevertheless learn to associate with the product [like a story about Jesus killed by Jews, SD]. …As numerous modern studies indicate, repeatedly retelling a fake memory eventually causes the person to adopt it as genuine recollection. …If people stop talking about them, they disappear,” (Y.N. Harari, Nexus, 2024).

Antisemitism is a branded Story mightily spread for two millennia by both Abrahamic religions. It has not helped that both of them are fiercely relentlessly proselytizing (which is forbidden by Judaism). The Jew-hating. denigrating quotes of Church Founding Fathers (St. Augustine, Chrysostom, Tertullian, Origen, etc) as well as the quotes from Islamic Quran have been their mortal weapons.

It took the Story and a few first centuries CE for the Church Fathers to demonize Jews into global pariahs, to make Jew-hatred legitimate. “The early Church Fathers introduced a major source of hatred into the founding of the Church… They became the foundation of a much more aggressive form of Jew-hatred that kept growing and morphing over the centuries. This hatred towards the Jewish people and Israel still persists today… Origen injected a special brand of unforgiveness that targeted Jewish people as ‘Christ-killers’, Tertullian – with his ‘Against the Jews’ and Augustine in his Sermon Against the Jews (8.11): ‘You killed Christ in your ancestors’,” (O.J. Melnick, 2021). Those texts have been the learning sources for billions of people during two millennia.

And now antisemites apply maximal efforts NOT to let people stop talking about Jews. That’s why the anti-Israel chorus is so deafening. Groups that seemed ideologically incompatible otherwise are united through antisemitism. “The surprising nature of the spread of antisemitism between the far left and Islamist groups, has been called the “Red-Green Alliance,” (I. Grand, Algemeiner, January 21, 2025).

Another example of branded story with calamitous consequences: witch hunts in Europe in 15-18th centuries. “The most influential book which promoted [witch-hunts] was the Malleus Maleficarum, published in 1487 by clergyman and German inquisitor Heinrich Kramer”, (Harari, Nexus). Printing press was conveniently just invented. Some 50,000 witches were burned alive, 80% of them – women, all accused of causing disasters and diseases.

Current conspiracy stories, proliferating in social media like bacteria, being anti-democracy, anti-Jew, anti-Muslim, anti-gay, etc, are exactly as mortal.

Israel mightily weakened Hamas, Hezbollah and through them Iran. It takes time and resources for them to recover. Israel has the same right to exist on its ancestral land as any other national state. With those wins, Israel has achieved safety for now.

Hamas designed this war as a provocateur and a puppeteer aiming at a flare up of global antisemitism. “There was a 340% increase in the total number of antisemitic incidents reported worldwide in 2024 compared to 2022, and nearly a 100% increase compared to 2023… The choice of 2022 as the methodological reference year was due to its status as a year without exceptional events affecting the level of global antisemitism, unlike 2023, which was significantly impacted by the events of October 7 and their aftermath… A massive increase in the number of antisemitic incidents across North America between 2022 and 2024, rising by 288% and peaking in April 2024. The incidents included severe acts of violence, such as murder… attacks on synagogues; and violence in educational institutions… In Canada, the situation is even more severe, with a 562% increase in antisemitic incidents, a quarter of which were violent. Significant increases in the number of reported antisemitic incidents were also found in Europe, with a 450% increase in Britain and a 350% increase in France…

Some 76 percent of people in the United States said they thought another Holocaust could happen, followed by the UK at 69%, France at 63%, Austria at 62%, Germany at 61%, Poland at 54%, and Hungary at 52%. In Romania, 44% said they thought such a scenario was possible,” (Times of Israel, January 22, 2025).

“Worldwide… 46 percent of adults backed a majority of the antisemitic tropes, representing around 2.2 billion people… Western Europe was the least antisemitic region, at 17%, followed by the Americas at 24%; Oceania, 20%; sub-Saharan Africa, 45%; Eastern Europe, 49%; Asia, 51%, and the Middle East and North Africa, 76% …[the latter figure] ascribed to Al Jazeera – a ‘nonstop fountain of antisemitism.’ Al Jazeera’s Arabic coverage differs significantly from its English-language coverage, and Iran is the only country in the region, besides Israel, that does not mainly speak Arabic… Iran was the least antisemitic of the 18 countries in the region, with 49% of respondents holding significant antisemitic views,” (ADL survey of 58,000 respondents in 103 countries; Times of Israel, January 15, 2025). What do thousands of dead Gazans matter for Hamas in the light of such success?

What is the major obstacle to peace? Hamas is hell bound on destroying Israel. The US and UN offered Hamas unlimited control over Gaza, Judea and Samaria as well as money had Hamas agreed to stop fighting – and Hamas refused. Everyone who blames Israel rather than Hamas must understand very clearly that (s)he approves of the total destruction of Israel.     It is not about Israel’s need to fix its many errors which it does have. It is an existential problem for Israel. This is not any fair struggle: Hamas used convenient two-millennia-long anti-Jew injustice created by religious fictional ‘stories’, bringing up generations of Jew-haters. Hamas wants Judenrein just like the entire Middle East has become. Will the world allow it?

Is history repeating itself? Al Jazeera has been creating another Jew-hating ‘Story’ in Islamic world – they also need an all-purpose scapegoat. Would it take another two millennia to recede the tide of hatred to liveable for Jews levels in the Muslim countries? An abysmal perspective… 

    Hamas, The Vampire, profiteered grandly from the blood of Gazan civilians, its livelihood, as it justifies Hamas’ very existence, its relevance, its financing…  Sacrificial lambs Gazans, kept in the dark, just knew not better. And the cherry on top: “Blame it on the Jews” worked for SO many once again – above all expectations! ‘The Story’ is still mortally poisonous…