Israel and the Nearly Impossible Dirty Work
Israel and the Nearly Impossible Dirty Work
Even though it will probably come at the most extraordinarily painful price in Israel's illustrious history.
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I’m deeply concerned about the mainstream media coverage and pervasive social media banter across the world, which are seemingly trying to create a Jewish versus Palestinian narrative. In reality, this is Israel versus Hamas and other Palestinian terrorists, whom some are claiming are worse than ISIS.
It’s painstakingly obvious that Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist organizations do not represent the Palestinians and their ambitions for freedom, justice, and peace.
If your argument is, “The Palestinians should decide who represents them.” — then you should know that the Palestinians supposedly elected Hamas “democratically” in 2007. So, if the majority of the Gaza Strip Palestinians should decide who represents them, and they allegedly chose Hamas, then you’ve essentially just called the majority of Gaza Strip Palestinians murderers, rapists, baby-beheaders, and Holocaust survivor kidnappers (or enablers of these utterly disgusting behaviors).
The sober reality is that Hamas and other Palestinian terrorists have never served the Palestinians basic and other important needs in Gaza, and they likely never will. Hamas and other Palestinian terrorists must be completely eradicated, for the long-term and formidable benefit of both the Palestinian and Jewish people.
The Palestinians, including the Palestinian Authority which governs parts of Judea and Samaria (also known as the West Bank), have either refused or been unable to eradicate Palestinian terrorists, so now, Israel is the only one who is willing and hopefully able to do this nearly impossible dirty work (with what seems as incredible support from the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, and other countries).
Us Israelis will lose way too many soldiers and civilians in this process, Israeli society and our economy which feeds 9 million people will take a major hit, hundreds of thousands of Israelis (including kids) will live with the traumas and post-traumas of this war for years.
But it seems the vast majority of Israelis (myself included) are willing to pay these massive prices to do this nearly impossible dirty work — perhaps the most extraordinarily painful price in Israel’s illustrious history — again, for the long-term and formidable benefit of both the Palestinian and Jewish people.
Many Palestinians and their ardent fans want you to think that you can’t be both pro-Palestinian and pro-Jewish, because many of them have for decades refused to accept a Jewish homeland in our ancestral homeland to exist. Many of these people hide behind the pro-Palestine banner because it’s more socially acceptable than openly stating their actually just antisemites, Jew haters.
I am both pro-Palestinian and pro-Jewish, as are all of my family and friends in Israel. Most people don’t realize just how many Israelis are both pro-Palestinian and pro-Jewish, and we don’t put people in position to be one or the other.
We support a two-state solution and probably always will (unless Palestinians continue to massacre us, behead our babies, take Holocaust survivors hostage, and commit other acts of terrorism against us, the civilians).
If you think it’s okay for Palestinian terrorists to do what they did on October 7th, because of the past Israeli-Palestinian saga, then I see you — you are pro-Palestinian and pro-rape, pro-massacres, pro-kidnapping, pro-beheading of babies.
If you’ve called for a ceasefire, or if you don’t condone the war but haven’t stood loud and clear for the release of all the hostages before anything else happens, then I see you — you think us Israelis should allow ourselves to be massacred, burned to death, beheaded, and kidnapped — and then patiently wait for the return of the hostages without doing anything else, just going about our day-to-day life. Business as usual. As if nothing happened.
If you think this situation is too complicated to understand, and therefore you don’t want to say anything one way or another, then I see you — you somehow found a way to understand the Black Lives Matter movement, the people of Ukraine and the history of Ukraine-Russia, the women of Iran … but the Jews just aren’t worth enough of your time and attention to understand. I’m Jewish and I see you so damn clear.
If you think Israel should negotiate with Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups, but you never claimed that other terrorists in Europe should be negotiated with, or that terrorist groups who executed 9/11 should be negotiated with, or the terrorists who carried out the Musha Church massacre should be negotiated with — then I see you and your pure hypocrisy.
If you’re standing up for the Palestinians because you’re a “humanitarian” and subscribe to “shared humanity” and “all humans are equal” — but you aren’t and haven’t been standing up for every other group of humans in the world that is presently facing harsh conditions — then I see you, you’re picky and choosy with your humanitarianism and shared humanity.
Please, tell us what makes the Palestinians better or more deserving than every other group of humans in the world that is facing harsh conditions right now?
If you think Israel is engaging in genocide, ethnic cleansing, or collective punishment, — then I see you. You either have no idea what these terms actually mean, or you’ve been brainwashed by dangerous propaganda, and haven’t done your own homework to decipher propaganda from truth, reality, context and nuance. The Internet is widely available to everyone. Doing your own homework has never been easier.
If you think the current Israeli government — or, specifically, Benjamin Netanyahu — is to blame for the Palestinians’ current situation, then I see you — you’re disregarding history, which at best makes you look awkward and at worst blatantly ignorant. The Jewish-Palestinian saga goes back to the 1800s. Both groups have wronged and been wronged since then.
If you think Israel should be levying a “proportional” response to Hamas’ grotesque massacre of Jews, Arabs, and foreign nationals on October 7th, then I see you. Us Israelis considered a proportional response, but none of our soldiers want to go into Gaza and rape women, kidnap the elderly, and murder babies and children.
Lastly, if you haven’t publicly shared your support for the Jewish people (not “both sides” or “all parties” or “everyone involved”) in addition to your support for the Palestinians (which I’ve done many times during this war), then I see you — it’s more convenient for you to keep quiet like many Germans did in Nazi Germany. We know how that ended for us Jews, and when we say never again, be damn sure we mean it.
If you think I’m angry — guess what, you’re right! I’m angry that Israel is one of the only countries on earth that has to defend itself for defending itself.
I’m angry that truth and facts are so important to virtually every other topic — except for when we talk about the Jews! There are terms for this: antisemitism, Jew hatred.
I’m angry because, two days ago, an Islamic Jihad missile killed many Palestinians at a Gazan hospital — a place where lives should be in the safest of hands. Yet the media and so many others swallowed the lies of Hamas and Islamic Jihad — broadcasting a 21st-century blood libel around the globe.
I’m angry because so many people think “the Israeli settlements” are a defining issue in the saga that is the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. Israel dismantled all the settlements in the Gaza Strip and North Samaria in 2005. And in 2000, Israel was ready to dismantle other settlements and withdraw from territory in a deal brokered by then-U.S. President Bill Clinton.
Do you know how that deal ended? The Palestinians backed out of it and instead chose to inflict the Second Intifada, killing more than 1,000 Israeli civilians, including women and kids.
I’m angry because these so-called “progressives” and “liberals” claim to be so enlightened and open-minded. Yet when you aim to have an enlightened and open-minded conversation with them about the incredibly intricate topics of Israel, Zionism, Palestinian history, and Jews, they reflexively become some of the most close-minded, ignorant, and uneducated people on the planet.
I’m angry that so many people seem to know what Israel shouldn’t do, but when you ask them what Israel should do, they have no fucking clue.
I’m angry that the poor (literally and figuratively) Palestinians have been used as a pawn by other Arab states — they’re so-called “Arab brothers and sisters” — to advance these other states’ geopolitical agendas. In the past, it was countries like Egypt, Lebanon, and Iraq — and more recently it’s been Iran.
And I’m angry that so many people have no idea (and refuse to educate themselves) about the harsh geopolitical realities across the Middle East and its Arab inhabitants, so they conveniently use the Jews and the Jewish state as a scapegoat for all of the Palestinians’ plight.
I’m angry that so many people who “don’t condone” this Israel-Hamas war, or who are calling for an “immediate ceasefire” or “humanitarian pause,” haven’t spent the same amount of time and energy advocating for the immediate and unconditional release of the 200-plus hostages taken by Hamas and other Palestinian terrorists — including kids, women, and the elderly.
I’m angry that “pro-Palestinian” demonstrations around the world were calling for violent Palestinian uprisings and the gassing of Jews, which began after Hamas’ massacre of Jews on October 7th, and before Israel’s response in Gaza. I’m angry because they were not simply displaying solidarity with Palestinians; they were celebrating dead Jews.
I’m angry that so many people believe an absolute myth that the State of Israel was created simply because of the Holocaust (1939-1945), ignoring a period between 1850 and 1930 that was instrumental in the State’s founding in 1948.
And, lastly, I’m angry because, as former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir used to say, “If the Arabs put down their guns, there would be no more fighting. If the Israelis put down theirs, there would be no more Israel.”