Responses to an Atrocity

Preamble – Sucks To Be Jew – Jan 2024

Sometimes we don’t need to take a position. We can let our understanding hit the limits on the ceiling and then crash through to an open endless sky with questions, clouds and clarity. We can take ‘on the other hand’ and follow with ‘however’. To do this though, we need to reflect not reflex; we need to examine our prejudices and conditioning with honesty, volition, time, and courage . 

About a month ago I finished writing ‘Responses to an Atrocity – A Letter to friends’, published the work on this blog page, and sent the link to a few friends. This piece was a culmination of a few weeks of writing that began as mind splatter, and then formed into the piece of writing below. The process was useful for me as one way to process thoughts and intense emotions, but the motivating force is the desire to do something in the war of ideas to help the case for Israel, even amidst this war that the country has been drawn into, for in all its atrocity, it is necessary. 

What could I possibly do to help in this helpless situation? Probably nothing. But if there is anything at all, it is to share my Jewish/Australian/Israeli perspective on the situation, in the hope that this will inform where understanding is lacking, or disrupt where positions are fixed.

Being so far away from the war, these days, I am not nearly as preoccupied as I was, however, the difference that I feel between myself and my social community, that I describe below, has not diminished. And I know, by talking to my family in Israel, and consuming Israeli media, that for Israelis, the atrocities of Oct 7 is an ongoing lived reality, experience daily, as the horror of the pogrom, the war, the hostages, and of the victims from both sides, continue to unfold in devastatingly brutal ways.

At this stage, I could turn away from the horrors and face the sunny, anodyne ways of our lives, free from war and terror … but … I can not.

These are stressful times for Israelis, and for all Jews who want Israel to be a safe place. Here’s a dot point list of the problems that I’m preoccupied with:

  • The worst, most fucked up leadership gripping Israeli politics and society, responsible for the security breach of Oct 7, and blustering Israel into an asymmetrical war that is a trap in which they must act to defend the country and reclaim their borders.
  • The horrors of Oct 7
  • The kidnapped
  • An evil enemy that holds no sanctity for life, but invites death as a religious ideology
  • Jew hatred from expanding and intentioned Arab Islamic population
  • Jew hatred from the Right, who see Jews as non western, semitic etc
  • Jew hatred from the Left, who see Jews as white privileged colonisers etc
  • Israel, already a tiny country surrounded by enemies, borders diminished by attacks from Hamas in the south and Hezbollah in the north, causing over 150 thousand displaced Israelis, including my family

And now I have a voice in my head that I am projecting onto you, my friends and associates: ‘What about a homeland for Palestinians?’. Yes. They too need a safe and prosperous homeland – a homeland where borders are accepted and leaders and citizens do not continue the hope of ‘from the river to the sea’, or the right of return, which are synonymous with the end of Jews in Israel. A homeland that posits themselves as whole, not in relation to a negated and despised other.

‘What about the death and suffering of Palestinians?’ Yes, it is abhorrent. I’m not denying it or turning away from it. It doesn’t make my dot points. Why? I’m not sure. Because we are tribal? Probably. I know that in Israel right now the mainstream media and population are turning away from the suffering of Palestinians. Of course they are! This is not because Israel is colonial, apartheid or genocidal; it is a war. Imagine something like Oct 7 happening to you, your family, your community, your country. How might you then feel about the culture that did this to you? And yet, Israel, as well as dropping bombs in an attempt to disarm Hamas, are also working towards wellbeing and safety of Gazans. This is well documented if you care to look. And many Israelis are asking, why should we put efforts into this when Hamas holds 150 hostages and continues to bomb us?

But whether one turns away from death and suffering, or faces it, the responsibility falls to Hamas. If this is hard to understand, I get it. It’s quite an abnormal situation, even for an asymmetrical war – normally the losing side will surrender once it realises the impending loss. In the case of Hamas, not only do they have no care for the loss, they invite it. All the ‘free Palestine’ calling genocide and cease fire, remember – if Hamas release the hostages and surrender, the war would be over immediately. It is so very twisted. And these days, the UN and the media, intentionally or otherwise, are doing the twisting, unbelievably, on behalf of Hamas. 

A gross example: many people think that the bombing of Gaza is indiscriminate, retaliatory if not revengeful. But each of these bombs has a valid target, and the best available intelligence is used to establish these targets. The news images show the rubble and victims, but they do not show what was underneath: a launch site and/or weapons storage. The media do not show Hamas fighters disguised as civilians, fighting from homes or entering safe zones to fire rockets into Israel. But if you’re casting judgement on Israel and the Jews then you might see the video of Gazan men stripped to their underwear under guard of IDF soldiers. Or you might read about the IDF bombing the safe zone.

The mainstream media does not show the central evil around which all this horror unfolds: Hamas’s complete and utter disavowal of human sanctity, providing no protection or support for their own kind, but rather, using the death and suffering of Palestinians for political gain within a perverse phantasmagorical religious ideology. (How do you show that evil anyway? Do images of the hostages show it? Only Hamas can control those images now! Is that why posters of the hostages get ripped down from public spaces from Brussels to Bega? A mate and I put such posters on lamp posts in Bega recently; they didn’t last a week. What motivates a person in Bega to tear down Israeli hostage posters? I call it Jew hatred; others call it anti-semitism.)

How do I know this? Because I pay attention to select information coming from Israel; from the media and people I know who live there, and from journalists, experts and analysts who have experience and knowledge. 

‘Ah, but this is Israeli war machine propaganda’ I hear the projected voice say.

It’s not. The information I absorb articulates and analyses a broad and diverse range of views and opinions; it is based in experience, knowledge and fact, but is not unified and singular; it holds up a transparent critique of Israel, the government, the divisive and damaging voices within Israel, and is realistic about the existential threats facing Israel.

On the other hand, the information I see coming against Israel and pro Palestine seems to have an agenda that ultimately sees the end of Israel calling for ‘from the river to the sea’ and the ‘right of return’. It may be largely fed by the fantasy of Islamic Jihad.

I also consider the mass of Arabic language information, which of course I have no access to. I wonder whether there is any equivalence in analysis and scholarship that we witness from Jewish and Western cultures.

The projected voice in my head in this war of ideas worries about the masses of youth and socially left, absorbing bad information, and I am hoping and looking for a pathway to show the errors in understanding, and the dangerous situation we have slid into.

Sometimes we don’t need to take a position. However, on the other hand, sometimes we need to.

A letter to friends – December 2023

Two months now and everyday I am sickened by the killing, the barbarism, the raping and torture, the kidnapped. The horrors of October 7, the hostages and the war unfold daily, and they will for some time to come. More than any other event in my life, this one has come with the sense that everything has changed.

One of the attributes of this sense of change is that I feel so very different from my friends, colleagues and associates. I get it. For you, this terror attack and now the war is something happening on the other side of the world to other people. For me it is very close. It hasn’t forced itself through my door, but into my mind and heart daily, hourly, always. 

Public perception/opinion of the Israel/Palestine conflict is more divided than ever – dangerously so. I’m aware of the ideological echo chamber. We use it ourselves. To help process and understand we read, listen and watch content that support our view and our love for Israel. Sometimes it fortifies; sometimes not.

My intention and hope, is that this writing breaks out of this echo chamber. That is why I am writing to you, to my friends and associates, to my community who have no emotional connection to Israel and limited understanding of the conflict.

Perhaps this story will help you to understand our pain.

It is the story of an imagined community that is closer to home.

So you have the Darwinaelis, that’s us. We are a tribe that gained brief autonomy and sovereignty over this land 3000 years ago, and were then conquered by numerous other tribes who are now long gone. During the reign of one of these tribes, many of us were expelled from Darwin, and some of us stayed, or moved close by. The brief period of sovereignty however gave us a connection to the land through a story that helps sustain our identity and cohesion across our long diaspora, in which a minority continued to live in Darwin and most were dispersed across all the lands and seas in the four directions. Across millennia we adapted to the diverse lands, histories and cultures that we made home. We were often scapegoated, persecuted, victims of murderous and barbaric violence, pogroms and genocide. Somehow we survived. Throughout our history, when we were all religious and practiced prayer (for most of us are no longer so), we always turned towards Darwin to say our prayers, as a gesture of longing and hope for better times to come. 

Better times did come … but it hasn’t been easy.

Jumping ahead 3000 years. We are back in Darwin. It has been a time of great disruption in the world; many people have been displaced by wars. Somehow, and some would say miraculously, we have a country, autonomy, sovereignty and … a longing for security; we have a mortal enemy at our doorstep. The Palmerstinians. We had to battle with them to win the right to live here. Many were displaced by the war. They live in Palmerston to the south and there is also a mob in Mandora, the Mandans.

Then, in 1967 we were attacked by the Palmerstinians and Mandans. We defeated them and took control of their lands, Palmerston and Mandora.

There were other wars too. We maintained our right to live here, but always huge loss of lives, injury and trauma to both sides.

Palmerstinians use suicide bomber terror tactics to try and achieve their political gaols and aspirations, which is to be rid of us and have Darwin to themselves.

These are some of the places that have been attacked by suicide bombers:

  • Throb nightclub
  • Casuarina Square
  • Lucky Bat Cafe
  • Several bus routes on multiple occasions.

Hundreds of Darwinaelis have been killed in hundreds of these attacks and thousands more wounded. Each attack brought retaliation from us, with huge loss of life and incarceration of Palmerstinians. We built a wall between Darwin and Palmerston; this helped our security.

Despite this, the majority of Darwinaelians wanted peace and our leaders continued to attempt this negotiation, hoping that the Palmerstinian leadership would see that we are here to stay, and would accept a two state solution and build a country for themselves in Palmerston and Mandora, without trying to destroy us.

In 2005, as a political experiment, with aspirations for peace, we returned Mandora to the Mandans.

This experiment didn’t go well. In the first and only democratic election the Mandans voted in a terrorist group whose sole aim was not to develop Mandora and work for the benefit of Mandans, but to destroy us. Within a few years they began firing rockets into Darwin, and each time we retaliated, again causing loss of Mandan lives.

Then, in 2009 a divisive leader came to power in Darwin. He was a narcissist criminal with dictatorial tendencies. Over the years his cynical political manoeuvres kept him in power and eroded Darwinaeli civil institutes and society, including our all important security.

And then, on Oct 7 at terrible thing happened; more terrible than you and I have witnessed in our life time. The Mandans conducted a surprise attack and infiltrated our defences. For several hours they raped, tortured, murdered and then kidnapped Darwinaelis living in Nightcliff and Rapid Creek.

We lost many amongst our friendship group. Scores of children, women, men, elderly were brutally murdered in unimaginable ways, including rape, mutilation, torture, beheading, burning. Hundreds survived with injuries. Several Darwinaelis have been taken hostage, including children, women and elderly. The attackers took videos of some of this and posted and shared this footage. 

On the same day the Mandans began firing hundred of missiles into Darwin.

What should we do?

In the aftermath of the terror attack and now the ongoing war, I admit, I have little empathy for the Palestinians. I do have the ability to conceptualise what it is like for the other and I am aware of the intense suffering and huge loss of lives in Gaza. I think it is a terrible tragedy. But my mind is too full of fear and loathing – reading, listening, talking and thinking about what happened on Oct 7 and the 250 kidnapped, taken hostage, being abused, tortured, raped. Thinking about the living nightmare for them and their families, and the fact that most of them will probably die, and that this will be a final relief for them, but not their families. I wake up around 3am with these thoughts.

I dread the moment of the day when I look to my screen and scroll the headlines of devastation and despair. I dread it, but am compelled. I am shocked at the twisted logic of this war where, from afar, I can accept killing and suffering, as violence is perpetrated by one, at the responsibility of the other. It’s like accepting the unacceptable, the cycle of violence and trauma, and the trauma of producing violence, seemingly endless.

My thoughts circle around other potential outcomes. What would happen if Israel did not counter attack? Could Israel disarm Hamas without so much death? However much I wish it were so, I keep coming back to this god forsaken place where there seems no choice but war. 

Hamas invited this misery upon the people of Gaza. They knew their attack and kidnapping would provoke this war, they wanted it. They invested and prepared for it, using international funding to indoctrinate a hate filled ideology, to produce war by terror, and, by using the suffering of their own, to manipulate global media and public perception. They intentionally provoked the most powerful army in the Middle East with full knowledge of the predictable consequences: death, injury, displacement and suffering of thousands of their enemy and untold thousands of their own people. This seems to be a kind of definition or embodiment of evil.

Like a suicide mission en mass, Hamas have succeeded to get what they want. But at what expense? They want the death of Israel, yet however much is deposited into the banks of trauma, for now, Israel will survive. They will not.

For the bigger future, who knows. I can not imagine or accept a world without Israel. 

Can you?

Please take some time to consider the following dot points. These are historical facts. Of course they are not all the facts. But they are important facts that are usually omitted from accounts that wish to portray Israel as an aggressive oppressor (such as the history of the conflict published by Al Jazeera News).

To begin, consider the population differential between Jews and Arabic Islam:

  • Population of the Arab world (Islamic countries of the Middle East region that surround Israel) – 475 million
  • Population of Jews – 15.2 million – 6.8 million in Israel (Do you see how tiny we are?)

Now some important points along the timeline of the Israel Arab conflict:

  • 1947 – United Nations partition plan for Palestine proposes a two state solution. Jews accept, Arabs reject.
  • 1948 – War, Jews win, declare Israel a state and develop their country within the borders of the UN partition plan. 700,000 Palestinians migrate, flee, or are expelled. Palestinians who go to the surrounding Arab countries become refugees. These countries do not, and have never accepted them as citizens (see more below). About 150,000 stay and become Israeli citizens. 
  • 1948 – 1970’s – 900, 000 Jews migrate, flee, or are expelled from their homelands in surrounding Arab countries. Most migrate to Israel.
  • 1967 – Amid ongoing hostilities from surrounding Arab nations Israel launches pre-emptive strike. Israel defeats enemy and takes control of lands designated to Palestinians, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
  • 1967 – present – Israel builds Jewish settlements inside West band and Gaza, taking Palestinian farm lands and restricting movement. Most settlements are developed close to the Israeli borders designated by the UN.
  • 1973 – Syria and Egypt launch a surprise attack. Israel defeats the enemy taking control of Syrian land to the north and Egyptian land to the south.
  • 1979 – Israel negotiates peace with Egypt in return of land.
  • 1993 – Palestinian leadership recognises Israel’s right to exist for the first time.
  • 1999 – 2009 – Several attempts at negotiating peace in return for land and a two state solution. All fail. All lead to suicide bombing terror attacks inside Israel. Thousand of Israeli’s and others die and injured.
  • 2005 – Israel gives control of Gaza to Palestinians, removing Israel settlers inside Gaza and relocating them to Israel. GAZA IS NO LONGER OCCUPIED BY ISRAEL. Gazans are free to make something with their autonomy.
  • 2007 – Gazans vote in Hamas. Hamas rule Gaza by Islamic Jihad, dictatorship and terror.
  • 2007 – present – Hamas lunch thousands of missiles and hundreds of suicide terror attacks into Israel. Israel retaliates each time. Israel creates ‘Iron Dome’ defence system to protect civilians. Israel maintains a blockade and border control of Gaza. Egypt also maintains control of their border with Gaza forbidding Gazans entry into Egypt.

Important things to know about Palestinians and all the Arab nations that surround Israel and UNRWA (UN Relief & Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees):

  • Palestinian refugees in Arab countries (about 5 million) are the only refugees in modern times whose host country does not naturalise (give citizenship) to the children born in their country. UNRWA also perpetuates this problem by having a unique definition for Palestinian ‘refugees’. In other words, the United Nations and Arab countries perpetuate Palestinians as refugees for generations.

On the days following the attack, in shock, I was on the phone a lot with family in Sydney and Israel. Then I called up Jewish people in my life (there’s a handful), check how they were coping. Crying a lot.

One theme that comes up consistently in these conversations is angry blame at the failure of the Israeli leadership. At the worst moment of our history in generations Israel is being led by a corrupt band of thieves and racists and extremists. We wish that Netanyahu could be swapped for all the hostages.

But some of these conversations alerted me to the fact that not everyone was going to stand with Israel, to see their urgent need to defend themselves and to disarm Hamas. In the immediate media coverage of Gaza being bombed and the focus on loss of civilian lives, I realised that many people were not even aware that Hamas was continuing to fire scores of rockets into Israeli populations daily. 

Then something ugly unravels – the “Free Palestine”, the demonstrations (even before Israel dropped its first bomb!), the mass of Arabs in Western countries, the ideologically ‘woke’ left aligning with “free Palestine”, more and bigger demonstrations, demonstrations in CDU, people I know and our politicians going to these demonstrations, school strikes for Palestine, active expression of Jew hatred (in our schools and public spaces, I have first hand accounts), sharp increase in violence to Jews across the western world, including Australia, but worse elsewhere. The growing numbers of people attending these rallies, the volume, the aggression, the media attention, the twisting of blame. The media believing and publicising Hamas lies, playing to their strategy, as much of Arab Islam strategically and successfully stoke the fires of public perception and Jew hatred.

And then these fruitless discursive arguments about Hamas, not representing Palestinians, the Gazans being innocent victims. Of course this is relevant. Yes, there are many thousands of innocent victims. But we can never know who and how many. 

There are some things we do know however. We know that on Oct 7 plenty of non combatant Gazan men came through the border and participated in the atrocities. We know that plenty of Gazans, Palestinians and Arabs, across the world, celebrated the attack. We know that there is no voice coming from Gaza blaming and condemning Hamas and calling for the release of hostages. We know that within the Palestinian population there are dozens of factional Jihadist groups, all of whose reason for being is to destroy Israel. We know that there is no voice within these ‘Free Palestine’ demonstrations that is condemning Hamas and bringing attention to the hostages. 

[There are however some Arab voices that are speaking out against Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and defending Israel’s right and need to defend itself. I will provide links to these voices at the end with the hope that you will be receptive to these.]

The shame of the ‘cease-fire’ message when it directs all the blame and responsibility to Israel, and none to Palestinians. There was a cease-fire in place, which Hamas broke on Oct 7. The whole world could demand that Hamas release all hostages and surrender. That is the way to ceasefire.

Fuck!!

As well as dealing with shock and grief and continuously unfolding horror of the atrocities, hostages, and war, a dangerous and corrupt Israeli leadership, we also have to deal with global moral disorder and chaos.

But there is something else I’m dealing with in my personal life – the fact that my friendship group is overwhelmingly left oriented, green supporters.

So instinctively, intuitively, I just go about my business and go home. I don’t want to make assumptions, it’s just too raw right now. I keep my head down.

But inevitably the head rears its ugly self. Things are said to me that confirm my intuition by revealing the perception and belief of some in my left leaning social circles. Hearing these things has been a knife in my heart and thorn in my side.

Being a progressive left green supporter, (or maybe, like me, sometimes being one, or having been one), chances are that, like the political Green party, you may be in the business of projecting a moral judgement on Israel, of seeing Israel as a ‘colonial’ or ‘apartheid’  state, of expecting Israel to ‘turn the other cheek’, of taking a position on something you know little about, of absorbing bad information, or omitting good information. Of having no skin in the game. Much is being written, and youtubed etc about this issue of how the progressive left have captured a zeitgeist that twists the truth, aligns with Islamic Jihad, and turns public sentiment against the Jews. I’ll say no more. 

If you are reading this, I’m not making assumptions about you. If we haven’t talked to each other then I don’t know what you think. If you find a place to stand with Israel then I desperately would like to hear your voice. But if any of this does have a relevance to you, I beg of you – please become better informed and be aware of echo chambers into which dangerous ideologies can be poured. 

And right now we – all of us in the free, democratic, liberal West – are being threatened by a dangerous ideology. The ideology of Islamic Jihad. No, not all Muslims are Islamic Jihadists. But there are enough of them, they are growing, they are living amongst us, and they have intention. Look at what is happening in many western European countries; expanding demographics of Muslim majority populations who reject liberal values and live by their own violent, oppressive, sexist values. Yes, secular, liberal, western, democratic values are far from perfect, and yes, Israel is so far from perfect, but the alternative right now is not only chaos, but an end to the freedoms we take for granted. If we from the political and social left and centre can’t see the need to fight this, then inevitably the far right will take control.

It is not a matter of taking sides, but a matter of identification. With whom do you identify? The ones investing public taxes to create an iron dome system to protect its citizens and property from bomb attacks (remember, Gaza was not occupied or under seige when they began to attack Israel). Or the ones who take global aid money and instead of using it to invest in its people, build tunnels of terror; who break a cease fire, conduct a surprise attack, rape, molest, torture, burn and kidnap, and fight from within homes, public and civil spaces. Otherwise put, we are like you; we respect and value creation, production and life. Our enemies are not like us; they do not respect these attributes. Like a devolution, Hamas have forced back human consciousness to the language of intolerance, hatred and violence.

I believe there is so much more to this conflict that we secular liberals can fathom. A religious dimension that we are outside of, and being sucked into. Or perhaps, more relevant yet, a religious dimension that we think we are outside of but, only reacting to, have never escaped. Those who read the religious texts, not with ideology but with scholarship, can expand our understanding. In that dimension we do encounter battles between good and evil. When the spectre of Jew hatred marches over the horizon we have gone beyond into madness and chaos. These are terms and ideas hard to accept for a generation of us secular humanists who have not lived through war. 

Welcome.

I was born Jewish.

My mother is Israeli and I have close family and in-laws in Israel.

My Father is nearing 90. He began his life in hiding from the Nazi’s, and survived. He didn’t think he would see anti-semitism like this again, or that nerves run so raw within a generation.

As a resource I am providing a list of links to voices who support Israel. My intention is to not to share an echo chamber but to counter the amorphous mass of anti-Zionist, Islamic and left wing ideology that is out there.

To begin, here are four Arab voices:

If you’re only going to watch one video, watch this one. Dr Ahmed bears witness to crimes against humanity. If you can’t stomach her descriptions then jump to 30 minutes in, where she talks about the barbarism of denial by academics and the ‘woke’ left.

Mossab Hussien Yousef is the son of a Hamas founding father, conditioned and indoctrinated in Islamic Jihad. While spending time in an Israeli prison he learned to read English and broke through this conditioning. He knows the story inside-out and is an impassioned speaker against Hamas. This is a speech from a few years ago, and since Oct 7 his is a lone Palestinian voice in defence of Israel.

Jousef Haddad is an Arab Israeli speaking about partnership, history and terrorism. As he points out, you really need to visit Israel before making any judgements about it. (Of course, I am not denying that there are not many (probably most) Arab Israelis who identify as Palestinians and the ‘river to the sea’ hope. If you want to listen to these voices, knock yourself out.)

The reason I’ve focused on Arab voices, is that I have noticed a tendency amongst left leaning people to mistrust information voiced by Israeli and Jews. While it’s good to be generally mistrustful of information on the internet, it boggles the mind that educated, western, liberal humanists will lend an ear to propaganda coming from Hamas, or other nefarious forces, and dismiss information coming from a transparent liberal democratic and largely progressive country. What’s that about?

Of course, one can easily find Jewish and Israeli voices speaking out against Israel. In our post truth world, it is true to say that one can always find voices on the internet that support ones view, values, beliefs, etc. So if you’re looking for anti-zionist voices, again, nock yourself out.

This brief interview with Sam Harris puts the immorality of Islamic Jihad into sharp focus, discusses religious extremism on Jewish and Muslim sides in the perspective of orders of magnitude, and talks to the public perception and criticism of casualties produced by Israel in this war.

Sam Harris speaks about the dangers of Islamic Jihad with great clarity on his podcast channel. 5 Myths about Israel and the War in Gaza explains it well.

This podcast will help you understand the concept ‘right of return’ and the intractably poor policy of perpetuating the Palestinian refugee status for generations.

In this video Einat speaks to a reality that is hard to swallow but has been long presented to us by Palestinians themselves; they don’t accept the Jewish state of Israel. Einat also explains how Russia is complicit and antagonistic. A fascinating 30 minute speech. The second part is Q&A.

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