The foreign TV networks and social media universe have been jammed with talk of “slaughter” and “genocide” taking place in our little corner of the world. There’s even mention of indiscriminate fire, coming from some very influential folks. The images are gruesome and the desperate appeals to do something about it are impassioned.
However, in Israel, we’re a little confused about where the passion is directed. When we talk about slaughter or genocide, it’s in reference to that black Sabbath, October 7, that day of infamy in which Hamas laid bare its intentions for the future of the region by massacring 1,200 Israelis and visitors in the South, and taking more than 200 of them back to Gaza as hostages, where more than half of them are still being held under primitive and cruel conditions. There’s the slaughter.
Thousands of rockets have been launched toward Israel’s cities, by Hamas in the South and by Hezbollah in the North, with the aim of killing as many non-combatants as possible and ultimately wiping out the Israelis from Israel. There’s the genocide and the indiscriminate firing.
Yet, ironically, that’s not what the chatterers and talking heads are getting all worked up about. For a growing segment of the world, the genocide and slaughter that’s being condemned on the streets of London and New York, and across X and Instagram is being perpetrated by Israel against the Palestinian people of Gaza.
The Israel which warned, begged, and notified Gazans to leave their homes in northern Gaza... the same Israel which did the same with Palestinians in the southern Gaza, dropping leaflets, opening corridors of safe passage. And the Israel, whose army that my son, your cousin, our friends serve in. We’re committing genocide against the Palestinian people, slaughtering them indiscriminately.
As preposterous as that sounds for those of us knowing the reality of the situation and the people involved, there are facts on the ground. Reports from The Jerusalem Post’s Yonah Jeremy Bob, who entered Gaza, confirm that there’s nearly no building in the North that hasn’t been damaged by the IDF offensive.
Even discounting the grossly inaccurate death toll being bandied about by the Hamas-run Health Authority in Gaza, there have undoubtedly been thousands of civilians killed in the fighting since October 7. This is a huge tragedy and cause for grief and mourning. But it’s not genocide, and it’s not indiscriminate slaughter.
The Israeli media tends to ignore or downplay the scope of the suffering in Gaza because we’re also suffering, with every day the hostages remain in Gaza and with every day of the announcement of more names, photos, and stories of beautiful, young Israeli soldiers who have fallen in the line of duty.
One people in mourning does not negate another people in mourning. But it’s worth looking at the cause of all of this sorrow and anguish. Because Hamas could end it all in a matter of hours.
Wouldn’t the humanist thing to do be for all of those protesters around the world calling for an immediate ceasefire to instead demand an immediate release of the hostages from the clutches of Hamas – those elderly men and women, the remaining children, and every soul stuck in a lightless tunnel or darkened room, barely surviving and constantly under physical and psychological threat?
Wouldn’t it be the right thing to do to call on Hamas to surrender and accept the punishment for their heinous crimes against Israel? Maybe, but that’s not going to happen, and the only side to pressure, from the US to the pope to the UN and the Red Cross, is Israel.
Nobody put this illogical conundrum in which Israel finds itself in more eloquently than Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) chief Ronen Bar, in a letter written to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres whose contents came to light this week.
“We are determined to complete our mission in Gaza. All those who aspire to see a safer world should refrain from interfering or stopping us,” wrote Bar in a statement that, in a world where 1+1=2, would be obvious.
However, that logic is too complicated for people like Gutteres, when Israel is part of the equation. He’s been one of the blindest to the clear good and evil sides of this battle for the soul of humanity taking place on the scorched Gaza land.
Bar went on to write: “The UN Charter states that the goal of the organization is to ‘renew belief in the most basic human rights, in human dignity and the importance of human life, and the equality of rights between men and women.’ During the activities of Hamas on October 7, there was no respect or rights whatsoever. The UN was founded to ensure that ‘never again,’ anywhere in the world. But on the day of the massacre in October, it returned in full force. Jews were brutally murdered, just for being Jews. The IDF is an army that operates in accordance with the highest moral principles. We do not act deliberately against civilians.”
“Reality forces us to act in a civilian environment. We are forced to do this by a terrorist organization that acts as a sovereign on the ground and has killed civilians, Israelis, and Gazans alike, from the first day it was founded… Gaza should be freed from Hamas, not from Israel. Hamas is ISIS.”
There is huge consensus behind the current approach
THOSE NAIVELY calling for a ceasefire may think they’re taking the humanist approach, but it’s clear to all who lived through October 7 that Bar is correct and that Hamas must be weakened to the point where it can no longer pose a threat to Israel or to the rest of the world.
And surprisingly or not, there’s a huge consensus within the country for that approach. That must blow the mind of the pundits who use the ‘Bibi on one side and Hamas on the other’ comparisons of two outliers, who believe that if only they weren’t around, we’d solve all the problems between Israel and the Palestinians.
In today’s Israeli reality, it’s unlikely that any prime minister or any war cabinet not including Netanyahu would be directing the country at war any differently. Netanyahu’s day of reckoning for his role in enabling October 7 will arrive sooner or later. But for now, those who are trying to pin the war on him don’t understand the unity in Israel for the war effort, despite the prime minister.
The biggest dilemma facing the country now is the priority – decimate Hamas or get the hostages home. Our military leaders have repeatedly said that the immense pressure placed on Hamas during the first month of the war led to the temporary pause that saw nearly 120 hostages freed.
Presumably, that is the strategy at play now, as well, in the IDF’s onslaught of southern Gaza. However, Channel 13 reported Wednesday that a planned visit by Mossad Director David Barnea to Doha for talks on renewing a ceasefire and hostage releases was canceled.
Some of the families of the hostages angrily released a statement saying that they were “shocked” and “fed up with the indifference and deadlock.”
They’re obviously in pain, as each day their loved ones remain in captivity endangers their lives. But is the culprit here the government, or Hamas, which broke the previous truce and is cynically using emotional terrorism in an attempt to create divisions in the country?
As much as it’s natural to blame the government for not acquiescing to any and all Hamas demands in order to free their loved ones, there needs to be clarity that the only address that can enable their return is Hamas. When they are weakened enough, they’ll beg to return to negotiations for a ceasefire and freedom for more hostages.
Even though we may not have admitted it to ourselves, many of us were hoping for some kind of Hanukkah miracle to occur this past week. If only we could have witnessed those remaining hostages walk across the border and embrace their families, what a holiday celebration that would have been. Instead, the war continues, the death toll of soldiers continues to rise, and the hostages remain in their Gaza hell hole.
ON MY BIRTHDAY this week, I went to pay a shiva call to the parents of Sgt.-Maj. (res.) Ari Zenilman, 32, who was killed in battle on Sunday. The father of three, Ari made aliyah as a teenager from Minnesota in 2005 with his parents, Rob and Lisa, and his three younger siblings to Ma’aleh Adumim.
They’re an exemplary Zionist Israeli family, raised on Jewish values and contributing greatly to their community and to the country. At the shiva, Rob and Lisa spoke with admiration for the army, for their city’s local government, and for local businesses, all of which stepped up and provided for them through their harrowing ordeal.
Maybe that’s the Hanukkah miracle – that despite the hardships and the agony that Israelis have endured since October 7, our humanity and our ability for compassion is intact. Realizing that was a birthday present I’ll always remember.
In this dark age, there don’t seem to be any more absolute truths. Everyone chooses the reality and set of “facts” that suit them.
Israel didn’t choose its current reality, however. It was thrust upon it in the October 7 bloodbath.
But everyone who lives here, and everyone around the world who identifies with the plight and aspiration of the Jewish people and its sole country, realize that there’s only one way to deal with this reality we find ourselves in... believing that 1+1=2.