Rep. Jamaal Bowman, the far-left wing representative of lower Westchester County in New York State, has an interesting tactic of seeking reelection to serve in the United States Congress: to lambast America and its allies.
Bowman spoke in Yonkers last week alongside noted anti-Zionist Norman Finkelstein. Bowman said that Americans had been fed lies about what was going on in Israel for 75 years and Finkelstein and other Arab leaders were going to give the audience their versions of “the truth.”
Seemingly not satisfied with the applause of demonizing the Jewish State and excusing the long history of Arab rejectionism of coexistence and support of Hamas and the atrocities it committed on October 7, Bowman railed against the United States:
“We have told ourselves in this country the myth of American exceptionalism which excuses us from our moral responsibility – not just in Gaza and Palestine – but right here in the U.S. The reason why we continue to incarcerate Black and Brown people at the highest rates in the world is because of the lie of American exceptionalism, that’s rooted in racism and bigotry and discrimination. And it’s that lie, that myth that allows us to ignore and look the other way, while being complicit in the mass murder and mass starvation of the people of Gaza.”
Rep. Jamaal Bowman lambasting the United States as “rooted in racism, bigotry and discrimination” at event in Yonkers to discuss the Israel-Palestinian conflict from a Hamas point of view
Bowman echoed the narrative of his apparent mentors in the Islamic Republic of Iran. In November 2020, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said American leaders are “not committed to any principles, neither human principles, nor human rights, nor international law and regulations.”
Rouhani’s successor, President Ebrahim Raisi said much the same in October 2022 that “the remarks of the American president [Joe Biden] – who is inciting chaos, terror and the destruction of another country – serve as a reminder of the eternal words of the founder of the Islamic Republic who called America the Great Satan. The enemy’s plot must be countered.”
Bowman is a proud member of the alt-left “squad” that demonizes America and its allies, capitalism and the economy, as well as the police and courts, all in favor of a massively destructive redistribution of wealth from non-Black people to Blacks. He is anchoring his reelection campaign by bonding Hamas supporters with Hamas apologists, in a terrifying display of antisemitic socialist rage to the praise of the Iranian regime.
The disgusting defenses of Hamas and its sadistic brutality committed on October 7, 2023 come in a number of varieties. Some people openly support the killing of Jews and desire to see the destruction of the Jewish State. Others excuse Hamas’s atrocities by stating that the actions require “context,” meaning Israeli activities limiting movement and denying Palestinian Arabs a nation. This is a discussion on the second group, as the first are obviously vile and dangerous antisemites who should be driven from the public square.
Denying Versus Not Declaring A Palestinian State
Apologists for Palestinian terrorists include Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York’s 16th District, who argue that Palestinians have been denied their rights for 75 years, as Bowman recently said at a Yonkers event with notorious anti-Zionist Norman Finkelstein, who had described the October 7 massacre as “heroic resistance.” Bowman’s statement is a complete lie.
It was Palestinian and regional Arabs who rejected forming an Arab state during the November 1947 United Nations partition plan. It was Palestinian and regional Arab countries that waged a war to destroy Israel in 1948-9 and not form a State of Palestine in the aftermath. It was those same groups that again tried to destroy Israel in 1967 rather than declare a Palestinian State.
Again and again, Palestinians themselves did not declare a state as they wanted the entirety of the land “from the river to the sea” to be the State of Palestine, so focused their efforts on destroying Israel. When they made moves to accept a state on part of the land in the Oslo Accords, they once again opted for war in 2000 rather than forge a final settlement.
The Independent Gaza Strip
After Israel put down the multi-year Two-Percent Palestinian war waged from 2000 to 2004, Israeli leaders decided to give Palestinians more independence and self-determination. With assurance from President George W. Bush in an April 4, 2004 letter to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Israel disengaged from Gaza, knowing that the U.S. was committed to backing Israel on key points that deadlocked the Oslo agreements: that final borders of Israel would not be along the 1949 Armistice Lines / “1967 borders” and would prioritize Israeli security and facts on the ground; and that Palestinian “refugees” (mostly descendants of Arabs who once lived in Israel) would settle in a new Palestinian State and not have a “right of return” to towns grandparents once lived in in Israel.
Israel withdrew all civilians and military from the Gaza Strip in September 2005. Palestinians were elated. According to a poll Palestinians conducted of themselves on the eve of Israeli withdrawal, “84% see it [Gaza withdrawal] as victory for armed resistance,” meaning that they saw the terrorism waged from 2000 to 2004 as forcing Israel to leave the region unilaterally. As opposed to the Oslo Agreement in which they would have needed to recognize the Jewish State but gotten most of the West Bank too, they got independence and self-determination just in Gaza without acknowledging Jewish rights to anything.
With their newfound freedom, Palestinians went to the voting booths in January 2006 to vote in a Palestinian parliament. Hamas, with its violent and antisemitic jihadi charter which calls for killing Jews and destruction of Israel, trampled the more secular Fatah, winning 58% of the parliamentary seats. (The last time the US Congress was so dominated by a single party was 2009 when Democrats had 59%).
The sentiment and quest for Jewish blood similarly rose.
When Israel pulled out of Gaza in September 2005, 46% of Gazans said that they supported killing Jews inside of Israel. By March 2006, that percentage rose to 64% and continued to rise.
In June 2007, Hamas violently threw out the Palestinian Authority and took over full control of Gaza. At that point, 74% of Gazans supported terrorism against Jews in Israel, even before Israel imposed a blockade on the strip. During the roughly two years that Palestinian Arabs had independence and self-determination – the only time in history when they had such freedom – their thirst for violent jihad INCREASED.
Palestinians have shown repeatedly that the desire to eliminate Israel dwarves their goal of self-determination and a state. Discussions of handing Palestinians more territory to rule after their sadistic savagery is not just blind to history and Arab sentiment, but dismisses the humanity of over 7 million Jews in Israel living in their ancestral homeland.
And those who argue that Hamas’s massacre has “context” are correct but facts and history prove the exact opposite point they claim: Palestinians are determined to wage war against Jews regardless of the cost of lives and irrespective of the level of their freedom.
ACTION ITEM
Email Rep. Jamaal Bowman “Palestinians commit and support terrorism because they have prioritized the destruction of Israel over statehood. A new Palestinian state will only come with recognizing the Jewish State and accepting that there is no “right of return” of millions of Arabs into Israel.”
When the congressional hearing about antisemitism at universities asked three university presidents whether they believed that Israel has a right to exist, they all answered in the affirmative, either believing so or feeling the pressure to state that they did. In fact, these educational leaders should have known that NO country has an inherent right to exist.
Not Turkey, not Colombia, not Japan and not Israel.
Countries have rights to secure borders and other matters, however there is nothing inherent that they must exist or that such existence cannot be dissolved.
For example, did Yugoslavia have a right to exist and does Macedonia have such right now? Did South Sudan have a right to a country before its creation? Do the Kurds have a right to a new Kurdistan in eastern Turkey together with sections of Iraq and Syria? Countries may opt to break apart into more regional tribal countries as was the case of Yugoslavia, or merge for particular political, demographic or ethnic reasons like Egypt and Syria in 1958.
But there is no inalienable right for any country to exist.
PEOPLE have a right to self-determination. Every person should be allowed to have citizenship in a country, participate in elections and have freedom of speech, religion and movement within such country as basic human rights.
It was a missed opportunity for the university presidents to educate the world on some fundamental realities but their failures were so profound, that this one was minor, especially in failing to clearly denounce repulsive calls for the genocide of Jews.
A more nuanced and interesting question is whether a country SHOULD exist. Does a country have a sound moral basis, a common sense of community and purpose? Does it have a functioning judicial system and ability and desire to govern and be governed? Is it willing to live at peace with its neighbors?
Israel meets every criteria. It has built a thriving economy and a liberal democracy in the heart of the illiberal Middle East. It has worked to forge peace agreements and engage in trade with its neighbors.
And even more, Israel built a safe haven for the most persecuted people in the world in their ancestral homeland. In their holy land. In their Promised Land.
Morning over Tel Aviv and Ramat Gan (photo: First One Through)
The answer is not clearcut regarding a Palestinian state.
The most compelling argument for a State of Palestine is that the Palestinians are stateless, Stateless Arabs from Palestine (SAPs). They should have self-determination and citizenship somewhere, whether in their own country or others like Jordan and Egypt. Many of the Palestinians have lived in the area for generations and share a language and culture, and can either unify in a single entity or be part of other Muslim Arab countries nearby.
There are many arguments against Palestinians having a country. They have consistently favored killing civilians in Israel next door and celebrate their sadistic slaughter. They have spent time and resources devoted to building a terrorist infrastructure rather than an economy. They focus their education on demonizing Jews and the destruction of Israel. On a basic political front, they have been unable to reconcile between the two dominant political factions and territories.
The United Nations continues to push for a new Palestinian State, perhaps to balance supporting Israel’s creation in 1948. In the November 1974 General Assembly Resolution 3236 (XXIX), the UN claimed that Palestinians had “The right to national independence and sovereignty;” which is a bold falsehood as described above. No nation has such right and it is highly questionable as to whether Palestinians should have a country.
While no country has an inherent right to exist, the only country which SHOULD definitely exist is the Jewish State of Israel.
There is a disturbing trend to normalize the hatred of Jews and the Jewish State as well as to normalize the calls for and actual massacres of Jews among extremists.
No To Zionism AndCoexistence
The BDS Movement (Boycott, Divest, Sanction) provides a “anti-normalization guideline” outlining the philosophy for haters of Israel: “Normalization with/of Israel is, then, the idea of making occupation, apartheid, and settler colonialism seem normal and establishing normal relations with the Israeli regime instead of supporting the struggle led by the Indigenous Palestinian people to end the abnormal conditions and structures of oppression.” It adds that its mission is not targeting non-Jewish Israelis but “refers to Jewish-Israelis and Jewish-Israeli institutions.”
The anti-normalization camp has a range of views from only opposing the blockade of Gaza, to objecting to the presence of Jews in the West Bank, to rejecting the basic existence of a Jewish State and any Jews in the region.
The far-left’s Democratic Socialist of America is a growing anti-Zionist party in the United States in both numbers and influence. NYC-DSA asked candidates to pledge to never visit Israel, putting the group on the fringe of the extremists. The socialist site Jacobin applauded DSA’s stance which “offers a model for socialist and progressive politicians who want to take on the powerful pro-Israel lobby,” using antisemitic tropes of Jews as powerful puppet-masters.
The DSA’s own “Anti-Zionist Resolution” was greeted with tremendous support by radical jihadi groups like the Palestinian Youth Movement which penned a letter “Do not allow Zionism to be normalized within your organization. We urge the DSA to truly demonstrate its commitments to revolutionary internationalism by upholding anti-Zionism.”
Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), a member of the extremist “squad” believes in variants of this twisted approach. He voted against supporting the Israel Relations Normalization Act backing the Abraham Accords in which Israel established peaceful agreements with the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan. He shockingly argued that Israel’s normalizing relations with Arab countries would actually undermine peace in the region.
Activist Linda Sarsour took the normalization language a step further, and argued that people shouldn’t “humanize the oppressor,” portraying Jews as non-human.
Yes To Massacres and Intifadas
In June 2023, the DSA Tweeted that no Israeli Jews should be viewed as civilians, that all are fair game to be targeted for violence, and simultaneously granted full absolution to Palestinians violently attacking Israeli Jews.
DSA Tweet in June 2023 arguing that all Israelis are fair game to target
Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY15) immediately responded “Denying Israelis the status of civilians means declaring them fair game for violence and terror. If a naked justification of terror against Israel is not a sign of a demonic double standard against the Jewish State, I am not sure what would be.”
In the following days, the Institute for the Critical Study of Zionism wrote a letter to university presidents that it was “horrified by the ubiquity of messaging from our university administrations that has expressed empathy for Israeli life,” essentially blessing the raping and mutilation of Jewish women and burning Jewish families alive.
Mohammed El-Kurd, a Palestinian activist who speaks frequently on college campuses including Princeton, addressed a large march in London in January 2024 and declared “Zionism is apartheid. It’s genocide. It’s murder. It’s a racist ideology rooted in settler expansion and racial domination and we must root it out of the world. We must de-Zionize because Zionism is a death cult. Zionism is indefensible…. Our day will come but we must not be complacent. Our day will come but we must normalize massacres as the status quo.”
The calls for and support for violence have metastasized. Shellyne Rodriguez was fired from Hunter College after chasing a reporter with a machete. She was subsequently hired by Cooper Union which effectively normalized her threatening behavior. It was not a surprise that Jewish students at the school had to barricade themselves a library to avoid a mob after October 7.
The New York group Decolonize This Place, has actively called to “globalize the intifada.” It seeks to hunt diaspora Jews to confront them in their homes, offices and on the streets. Backers of the group like Cooper Union’s Rodriguez have advocated for stopping rent payments to Jews in a new form of BDS of Zionists.
Some people switch back-and-forth between advocating for violence and backing away from it. El-Kurd followed his fiery rhetoric calling for massacres to be normalized tweeting that he misspoke. Another extremist, Manolo De Los Santos from the People’s Forum told NPR that he wouldn’t condemn Hamas’s October 7 attack, but said at an event that he would celebrate the destruction of Israel.
X feed of Jason Curtis Anderson showing Manolo De Los Santos telling a cheering crowd that the destruction of Israel will be the beginning of the destruction of capitalism everywhere.
We are watching extremists loudly and proudly declare that their antisemitic and violent attitudes are normal, in a perverted attempt to win supporters. The radical jihadists and alt-left believe that if they can unashamedly strip Jews of their history, heritage, humanity, dignity, rights and property, the closeted antisemites will easily follow suit.
So far, it seems that they are dangerously being proved correct.
South Africa put forward the charge of ‘genocidal conduct‘ against Israel for its actions in Gaza since October 8, 2023. The reported figure of over 23,000 deaths, over one percent of the population of Gaza, is claimed to show a deliberate intent to wipe out all Arabs in the region. The use of heavy 2,000-pound bombs in civilians neighborhoods is alleged to show a complete disregard for non-combatants as well as a disproportionate and indiscriminate use of force.
Lawyers prosecuting Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) quoted members of the Israeli parliament after the October 7 attack in which they said they wanted to flatten Gaza, encourage a ‘voluntary emigration’ of Arabs from the region, and treat them like the biblical ‘Amalek’, a people for which Jews are commanded to wipe out completely. Counsel argued that comments from leaders shows the government’s official policy for the annihilation of the region’s Arabs.
The United Nations’ International Criminal Court has disallowed Israel from bringing any evidence of the Gazans’ October 7 massacre and brutalization of Israelis, mostly civilians. It contends that even if Hamas committed crimes against humanity, Israel must still adhere to basic rules of war.
The Case Against ‘Genocide’
Genocide involves the deliberate mass killing of an ethnic group or particular nation with the goal of annihilation or ethnically cleansing them.
It is bizarre to bring the charge against Israel based on the situation before even considering the prosecution of the war.
Israel’s attack on Gaza was both reactive and defensive. It had a ceasefire agreement with Hamas which rules Gaza, which Hamas broke with its invasion and sadistic slaughter.
Hamas leaders have pledged to commit the October 7 massacre “again and again.” Israel is compelled to not only bring the estimated 3,000 Gazan perpetrators of the October 7 massacre to justice, as well as the leaders who commanded and supported the operation, but to prevent the atrocities from happening again.
Hamas continues to fire at Israel. Hamas and various factions of this Gaza army continue to fire rockets and wage war against Israel. This is not a situation of a military aggressively hunting civilians but an active battlefield.
Hamas fires from civilian neighborhoods. The battlefield is the neighborhoods of Gaza from which Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other factions of the Gazan army shoot rockets and attack Israel.
Civilian infrastructure is part of the Gazan war effort. The Gazan army and infrastructure is embedded in civilian homes, hospitals, mosques and schools. Arms are stored and tunnel-openings begin in these locations, and are therefore part-and-parcel of the Gazan war effort.
The core Gazan army infrastructure is beneath civilian neighborhoods. The Gazan army runs the majority of its operations below ground, underneath civilian neighborhoods.
The Gazan army doesn’t wear uniforms. Many Palestinian fighters do not wear uniforms to clearly distinguish themselves from civilians, blurring the battlefield between military and civilians.
Israel unilaterally left Gaza completely in 2005. Israel does not covet the land and wanted the region to be a peaceful neighbor where Arabs would have complete self-determination. Instead, Gaza became a terrorist-ruled strip which has waged repeated wars against Israel targeting civilians.
Israel is attempting to save hundreds of hostages. Hamas and other Gazans took 240 hostages, mostly civilians into Gaza, many of whom are children, elderly and infirm. Saving them requires quick action.
Those are just the basic facts which set the scene for which Israel has to prosecute a difficult war. Even with such impossible backdrop, Israel has attempted to avoid the loss of civilian lives.
Millions of text messages sent to Palestinian Arab civilians to get out of harm’s way
Leaflets dropped over neighborhoods to make sure civilians got the message to leave active battlefields.
‘Safe zones’ and escape corridors created for civilians to flee hot spots.
Israel telegraphed its intentions of where it was prosecuting the battle – starting in northern Gaza – to allow civilians to leave, putting its own Israeli soldiers at risk.
The world begged Israel to not launch a ground invasion of Gaza and so relied on air power to start the retaliation against known military targets. It is those aerial assaults that the world now criticizes.
While the world may appreciate the need to dismantle Hamas and the impossible task facing Israel of fighting an enemy which is deeply embedded with civilians, it doesn’t really care. It has no proposals or gameplans to prosecute the war any better, other than demand Israel do so.
A view of the rubble of buildings hit by an Israeli airstrike, in Gaza City, October 10, 2023. (Fatima Shbair/AP)
In regard to Israeli leaders’ commentary that Gazans are like Amalek, a metaphor is not a call to action. Amalek was called out because they attacked the weakest Jews as they left Egypt, just as Hamas and its horde brutally butchered women, children and elderly in 2023. Other Israeli comments that all Gazans are culpable have been made by Palestinian advocates, such as James Zogby, head of the Arab American Institute who told the United Nations on June 27, 2023 that there is “tragic deformity in Palestinian political culture,” as the majority of the people prefer violence.
Most importantly, Israel has said it will end the campaign immediately if Hamas surrenders and returns all of the hostages.
Israel is now going house-to-house to rescue its captives and destroy Hamas’s army and infrastructure amid a population which supports Hamas and terrorism. Hamas has 58% of the seats in the Palestinian Authority parliament from democratic elections held in 2006. The majority of Gazans support killing Jewish civilians in Israel and supported the October 7 massacre. They are family and friends of Hamas fighters, their teachers and students, donors and recipients of Hamas aid. When Israelis go through the Gazan neighborhoods in this tight battlefield, the civilians which surround them are the soft layer of the Hamas military which Hamas exploits, not uninvolved spectators.
It is likely that any other army would have killed five times as many Gazans as Israel at this point of the war. It is impossible to know because this war is like no other.
As to the charge of genocide, Palestinian Arabs are not confined to Gaza. Over half the population lives in the West Bank and Israel has not launched a massive campaign there, as Hamas doesn’t have a strong presence and there are no Israeli hostages in that region. On a macro level, 23,000 Gazans out of 1.8 billion Muslims is a 0.001% figure. By way of comparison, 63% of Europe’s Jews were killed in the Holocaust, and about 39% of global Jewry, an actual premeditated deliberate genocide of unarmed civilians.
There are therefore only two considerations to possibly judge Israel: the terrible loss of children’s lives, and the massive destruction of Gazan infrastructure.
Children are innocent by definition. They have no say in the war and not responsible for the terrible actions of adults. Close to 50% of Gazans are under the age of 18, so one would imagine indiscriminate bombing would cause close to 50% of the 23,000 dead to be children, or around 11,500 people. According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, the number of children killed is about 8,000, or 30% less than expected. While a tragic figure, it defends Israel’s prosecution of the war as being targeted against military targets.
There is no question there is widespread destruction of Gazan infrastructure. Neighborhoods have been leveled all around the Strip. That is a function that those neighborhoods are, and are above, the battlefield. It is actually surprising that a relatively low number of deaths have occurred with so many bombs dropped on the small territory, suggesting a targeted military campaign.
Hamas is sworn to the destruction of Israel and has ruled Gaza unilaterally since 2007 enabling it to embed itself throughout the region. Despite the hostile neighbor next door, Israel has limited its activities against the strip to a blockade to limit the flow of weapons, and to respond when attacked. It has never targeted the region or its residents for annihilation.
It is a tragedy for Palestinian Arabs, for Israel, and the world that so many children in Gaza have died. But the fault remains with the Arab rulers who teach their children death and martyrdom, while they attack Israel from those children’s homes. Israel is trying to minimize those casualties in an impossible battle, and the figures show that it is doing so.
The smoldering rubble of the Gazan battlefield is shocking but there is no genocide of buildings. However, the overall architecture of Gaza’s war mentality and machinery has been enabled by the United Nations, the entity which now sits as judge of Israel’s actions. It is a morbid farce, and must be confronted and rooted out for there to be a prayer of coexistence.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken made the rounds around the Muslim Middle East and Israel to declare that everyone in the region wants to avoid seeing the Israel-Palestinian War from Gaza spiraling into a regional conflict.
He is completely wrong. It is very much a regional conflict with Iran, and the region wants the Iranian threat addressed.
Secretary Antony Blinken’s X post that countries want the conflict contained
Iran has been actively stoking the conflict for years. The Islamist regime has backed the Houthis in Yemen stoking a civil war there, a war against Saudi Arabia next door, and assaulting shipping in the Red Sea. Iran backs Hezbollah in Lebanon which is shelling Israel. It is also one of the main backers of Hamas in Gaza which launched the sadistic atrocities of October 7.
The United States was on the cusp of brokering a deal with Saudi Arabia before October 7, which would have included the United States bringing the oil-rich nation nuclear capabilities, as the U.S. utterly failed to contain Iran’s nuclear program. Saudi Arabia had long made clear that if Iran got nuclear weapons, it would pursue them as well. The U.S. decided to make the best of a horrific situation, and rather than watch the Saudis secure nuclear blueprints and material from North Korea, it offered to supply the Islamist kingdom with the know-how, provided that the kingdom also normalize relations with Israel.
Iran’s nuclear break-out led directly to Saudi’s launching a nuclear program with America’s assistance.
When Israel called up a fighting force of roughly 350,000 people after October 7, it sent 200,000 of them to the Lebanese border, not Gaza. Roughly 100,000 were stationed around the West Bank to contain the various Hamas-allied terrorist groups like Lion’s Den and Jenin Brigades. The smallest segment went to Gaza.
Similarly, Israel did not only evacuate Israeli civilians from the entire area near Gaza on October 8. It also pulled all civilians away from the Lebanese border.
Israel readied for war on many fronts, not just Gaza, to confront Iranian proxies on every side.
Many Israeli military leaders are pushing to launch the battle against Hezbollah in Lebanon now, while 200,000 troops are stationed at the border and the civilians in the region have been evacuated south. They argue that the Iranian proxy with 150,000 missiles pointed at Israel is a threat which must be dealt with proactively and not according to Iran’s timetable.
This war started from Gaza but the conflict centers around Iran. Blinken may believe that the conflict is local and to be contained as he broadcast, or perhaps – hopefully – he toured the region to prepare for destroying Iran’s nuclear weapons in the very near future.
On January 3, two bombs went off in Iran during ceremonies marking the death of Qassem Soleimani. Soleimani was head of Iran’s Quds Force, and assassinated by the United States four years earlier because it claimed he was “directly and indirectly responsible for the deaths of millions of people.”
Despite the backdrop of Soleimani being a murderer, the fact remained that the bombing was an act of terrorism, so the United Nations felt compelled to issue a statement, despite the victims being supporters of that mass murderer. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres official statement read “The Secretary-General strongly condemns the attack today on a memorial ceremony in Kerman city in Iran, which reportedly killed more than 100 people and injured many more. The Secretary-General calls for those responsible to be held accountable. The Secretary-General expresses his deep condolences to the bereaved families and the people and the Government of Iran. He wishes the injured a speedy recovery.”
Guterres reached out to the government of Iran despite its fomenting wars throughout the Middle East as it pursues nuclear weapons, and also demanded that the terrorists who killed 100 people celebrating a mass murderer be brought to justice. One would therefore imagine a much stronger statement from Guterres for Israel after October 7 when thousands of Palestinians killed 1,200 people and brutally raped and sadistically tortured civilians in their homes in Israel.
The October 7 statement from Guterres was appalling:
“The Secretary-General condemns in the strongest terms this morning’s attack by Hamas against Israeli towns near the Gaza Strip and central Israel, including the firing of thousands of rockets towards Israeli population centres. The attacks have so far claimed numerous Israeli civilian lives and injured many hundreds. The Secretary-General is appalled by reports that civilians have been attacked and abducted from their own homes. The Secretary-General is deeply concerned for the civilian population and urges maximum restraint. Civilians must be respected and protected in accordance with international humanitarian law at all times. The Secretary-General extends his deepest condolences to the families of the victims and calls for the immediate release of all abducted persons. The Secretary-General urges all diplomatic efforts to avoid a wider conflagration. He stresses that violence cannot provide a solution to the conflict, and that only through negotiation leading to a two-State solution can peace be achieved.”
Rather than demand that the terrorists “be held accountable,” as with Iranians, Guterres urged “maximum restraint” by Israel. Instead of offering condolences to victim families AND the state as he did for Iran, Guterres omitted any mention of feelings towards Israel.
In the aftermath of Jews suffering the worst single day killing since the Holocaust and most savage day of sexual assault ever, the head of the United Nations demanded no accountability for the terrorists and no sympathy for Israel. Guterres and the United Nations have demonstrated a failure of basic civility and humanity, and are enemies of justice, peace and the Jewish people.
Two polls about the sentiments of Palestinian Arabs from Gaza butchering of people inside of Israel showed the same curious result, that Palestinian Arabs in the West Bank were much more in favor of the massacre than those from Gaza. the Arab World For Research and Development showed support for the October 7 in the West Bank being 83% compared to 64% in Gaza. West Bank Arabs similarly had greater support for Hamas at 87.7% compared to Gazans at 59.6%. The quarterly poll by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PCPSR) of December 2023 showed much the same, where “support for Hamas has more than tripled in the West Bank compared to three months ago”, with 82% of Arabs in the West Bank and just 57% of Gazans saying that October 7 was the “correct” action.
Figure 1: Comparison of West Bank and Gaza Arabs about supporting October 7 Massacre and the Commitment to destroy Israel to gain all of historical Palestine
The question is what are the reasons for West Bank Arabs being so much more supportive of the massacre than Gazans.
Brunt of response. Many commentators have said that they believe that Gazans are facing the repercussions of the attack while West Bank Arabs have not seen their neighborhoods leveled. The poll numbers possibly support such notion with 87% of West Bank Arabs and 44% of Gazans thinking Israel will lose the war. Gazans likely feel they have already lost.
I would like to offer some other potential reasons.
Gaining self-determination. Gazans got autonomy and self-determination in 2005 when Israel left the Gaza Strip for Palestinian Arabs to rule themselves. West Bank Arabs yearn for that same self-determination that Gazans already have so are even more committed to the fight.
Killing Israeli Jews
West Bank Arabs have shown a dramatic preference for violence which began to spike after the May 2021 attacks, which gained further momentum in polls starting in December 2022.
Figure 2: Sentiment of West Bank Arabs about Israeli Jews and opposition to coexistence
Killing Jewish Civilians Inside Israel. In March 2021, 17.8% of West Bank Arabs supported “armed attacks against Israeli civilians inside Israel.” That figure jumped to 33% after the May 2021 attacks and stayed roughly at that level until September 2022. It spiked again in December 2022 to 46% and has stayed at that level, with a peak of 57% in March 2023.
Supporting “Intifada”. Along with the increased desire to kill Israeli Jewish civilians is the rising preference in the West Bank for an “Intifada”, the misnomer which means terrorism and war. In March 2021, 29% of West Bank Arabs supported an Intifada which jumped to 51% in the June 2021 poll. Support softened through September 2022 to 38%, but spiked again in December 2022 to 51%, peaking at 54% in December 2023.
Ending The Palestinian Authority
While Gazans have been ruled by Hamas, West Bank Arabs have been ruled by the Palestinian Authority. They have long felt that the PA is corrupt but that sentiment has gained momentum.
Figure 3: Sentiment of West Bank Arabs about Palestinian Authority and feeling safe
Palestinian Authority is a “Burden” and Abbas Should Resign. West Bank Arabs have long complained about their leadership. PA President Mahmoud Abbas was elected in 2005 to a four-year term and remains in power fifteen years later, refusing to hold elections.
In December 2020, 50% of West Bank Arabs thought the PA was a burden on Palestinians and 61% thought Abbas should resign. After the May 2021 Hamas-Israel fight, 55% thought the PA a burden with 70% thinking Abbas should resign. In March 2023, the numbers jumped again to 66% and 76%, respectively. Those figures continued to rise into the October 7 massacre.
Dissolve the Palestinian Authority. Not surprisingly based on the sentiments above, West Bank Arabs grew increasingly of the view that the PA should be dissolved, from 34% in March 2021 to 49% in March 2023.
West Banker Arabs Feel Less Safe. Some of this attitude can be tied to feeling safe. In March 2021, 64% of West Bank Arabs felt safe. That dropped to 46% from December 2022 to June 2023, as the Israeli Defense Forces conducted raids into West Bank towns to foil terrorist plots by several new groups such as the Lion’s Den and Jenin Brigades, terrorist groups unique to the West Bank.
West Bank War
While Hamas rules Gaza and was able to launch this war having built deep infrastructure in the land since 2006 with hundreds of miles of tunnels throughout the Strip, the war is actually ABOUT the West Bank and Israel proper.
Gazans know that Hamas isn’t great having lived under their harsh and corrupt rule since 2007 when it threw out the Palestinian Authority. West Bank Arabs only know the PA and welcome a change of regime but most importantly, a change of situation. They want the Jewish settlers gone, ideally from all of Israel, and from the West Bank at a minimum.
Hamas successfully got rid of Jews and Israel in Gaza, and West Bank Arabs want this “war of liberation” to do the same in the West Bank and Israel. Figure 2 shows that 40% of West Bank Arabs opposed a “two state solution” in December 2020 which grew to a significant majority of 71% by March 2023. Figure 1 highlights West Bank Arabs now have a 74% commitment to “retaking” all of “historical Palestine” compared to 66% of Gazans.
Hamas called this war the “al Aqsa Flood,” referencing Islam’s holy mosque in Jerusalem, far from Gaza. Palestinian Arabs believe that stopping Jews from visiting the Jewish Temple Mount is the main reason for the war – followed vey closely be retaking all of “historical Palestine.”
Figure 4: Poll of all Palestinians about the reason for October 7 massacre has majority focused on Jerusalem – stopping Jewish visitation and ending the Jewish State
The fighters from Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and others were particularly brutal in raping and mutilating women and babies, killing the elderly and burning families alive. And they recorded it, ensuring that Israel would respond to the attack with full force to bring a full war. And it’s a war which Palestinian Arabs – especially those in the West Bank – want to see to liberate themselves from Israel and the PA.
Figure 5: Poll of all Palestinians about the end goal for the war is about the destruction of Israel
The war is taking place in Gaza but it is not about Hamas or Gaza. This fight is being conducted with the support of all Palestinians by the Palestinian army to liberate Jerusalem. To some, that means the West Bank, to others it means Israel, and for yet others, it’s all of “historical Palestine” which encompasses a “Palestinian State from the River to the Sea.”
In the worthwhile debates over the Israel-Palestinian Arab conflict, there are is much inanity, ignorance and disinformation. It is good and proper to discuss the best ways of dealing with the conflict but such discussion should be based on basic truths.
As it relates to Jews, a key item to remember is that Judaism was designed – and remains – a particular local tribal religion, as opposed to Christianity and Islam.
Christianity and Islam are global universalistic religions. They spread their gospel by word and sword, converting people everywhere. Each sought to save people’s souls, so thought nothing of killing disbelievers and apostates. The world we know today is an outgrowth of Christian and Muslim crusades, invasions and colonization efforts.
Judaism has no such aims. The Jewish faith is tied to The Promised Land, the land of Israel. In the era before planes, trains and automobiles, Jews were commanded in the Bible to visit Jerusalem three times every year, requiring every Jew to live in the land (in sharp contrast to Muslims who are supposed to visit Mecca once in a lifetime because they are supposed to live everywhere).
Jews have a diaspora, which is everywhere outside of the land of Israel. Christians and Muslims have no such concept.
Jews believe that peaceful non-Jews can ascend to Heaven, and therefore do not engage in forceful conversions. It is unique in this way, not pre-judging people of other faiths about the state of their souls.
Christians burning “heretics” at the stake in the main square of Lisbon, Portugal during the Inquisition
It is a major reason that there are so few Jews in the world despite Judaism being around much longer (3,500 years) than Islam (1,400 years) or Christianity (2,000 years). The particular nature of the faith has kept the numbers small, in addition to being victims of massacres perpetrated by universalistic religions.
There are biblical commandments that can only be done in the land of Israel to this day. Jewish farming has particular laws to keep within the borders of Israel which do not apply to farming in the diaspora, such as shmita, letting the land lie fallow every seventh year.
Sign on an agricultural plot of land in central Israel where the farmers observed shmita in 2015 (photo: First One Through)
The tribal nature of Jews has made them a source of suspicion for centuries. NOT wanting to convert people was viewed as elitist (even though Judaism believes people of other faiths aren’t damned). Whether religious or secular, living in Israel or the diaspora, people saw the remnant of Jews who survived the pogroms, genocides, expulsions and crusades as a stubborn lot.
Jews don’t simply move to the land of Israel because of history and heritage; that’s why Palestinian Arabs who had grandparents who once lived in the land want to move there.
Jews are intrinsically connected to the small strip of land in a way that has no parallels in other faiths.
It has led to interesting population statistics in the land:
More Jews moved to Palestine/ land of Israel under the Ottomans between 1800 and 1914 than Muslims. And more Muslims moved to the land under the British from 1922 to 1948 than Jews.
Jews have been the largest faith group in Jerusalem since 1867
Further, Israel’s national anthem is the oldest in the Middle East, and is the only national anthem in the world focused on its capital city of Jerusalem.
The Jewish homeland is the land of Israel and its diaspora is the world outside of that land. No other faith has such concept of homeland and diaspora.
J Street, the far left-wing pro-Palestinian group which markets itself as pro-Israel pushed the Obama Administration in 2016 to label Jews living east of the Green Line (EGL) as illegal settlers at the United Nations. That action laid the foundation for a rash of anti-Israel measures around the world.
Now, after the October 7 massacre in Israel, J Street is once again pushing the United States to stop protecting Israel at the UN Security Council.
On December 21, 2023, J Street issued a press release with four goals: 1) to pause fighting to enable Hamas to rearm; 2) get the US to “stop vetoing Security Council resolutions related to the conflict“, so more global pressure can come down on Israel; 3) get “an American commitment to recognition of Palestinian statehood” since Palestinians have clearly shown they are decent and responsible actors; and 4) put in place “strict oversight and scrutiny of arms” purchased by Israel, because J Street is convinced that conditioning aid to Israel while Iran and its proxies pursue a genocide of Jews is critical right now.
J Street;s Jeremy Ben Ami
The release concluded: “We urge the Biden administration to take immediate action to ensure that the Israeli government significantly shifts course before this conflict costs more lives and wreaks more pain and devastation. The way the current campaign is being pursued only jeopardizes Israel’s efforts to defeat Hamas and secure the release of the hostages – while laying the groundwork for even deeper, long-term security challenges.”
No such calls for “immediate action” by the US and others to pressure Hamas. J Street called for only Israel to be pressured.
Students for Justice in Palestine at Tufts wrote in March 2022 “that many Jewish people begin their anti-zionist political journey through J Street U,” J Street’s university division. The anti-Israel community knows that the woke Jewish group is a tool for young and old people in America to find their anti-Israel bona fides, to change America’s pro-Israel positions.
The United States is Israel’s sole supporting voice at the United Nations and J Street is doing its utmost to weaken that voice, just as Iran and Hamas desire.
First One Through 