Israel at War—On the Ground

As the IDF moves into Gaza in an all-out effort to annihilate the terror group Hamas, voices in the West express "concern." 

After all, the situation is "complex" say most progressives and many Democrats—implying that there is some kind of warped symmetry (equivalence) between Hamas' barbaric blood lust that resulting in the rape, murder, torture and mutilation of 1,400 Israeli men, women, and chlidren (not to mention the kidnapping of over 200 people) all the while shouting: “Allahu akbar!”) and Israel's retaliation for that barbarism. Concern morphs into full-blown anti-Israel hatred among those Islamists and their supporters on the hard-Left, who argue that any atrocities committed by Hamas are actually Israel's fault. And yeah, there's just a bit of Jew-Hatred mixed in as well.

Many on the Left and virtually everyone on the hard-Left are fantasy thinkers. They disregard hard facts, are ignorant of history, believe preposterous propaganda (if it conforms to their fantasy thinking), make claims that are not only dishonest but absurd or even insane—and gift wrap their mental excrement in virtue signalling. They are not self-aware, seem incapable of recognizing the hypocrisy they espouse in their hysterical proclamations, and are unconcerned about the viciousness of their words. Instead of shouting “Allahu akbar!” they use other pseudo-religious mantras (e.g., "colonialism") that they think give them the sheen of intellectual inquiry when in fact, it demonstrates their abject ignorance. They are very loud, often threatening, sometimes violent, and unquestionably fanatic in their beliefs—beliefs that have no basis in reality but are amplified by their brethren in the propaganda media.

Like the Islamists who demand the annihilation of Israel, there can be no accommodation for those on the hard-Left. They are garbage people.

And yet, Western leadership tries to accommodate them, arguing that Israeli retaliation will make things worse, that the palestinians will hate them even more, will become more violent, and will commit more terror and more atrocities. If only Israel made concessions (it has); if only it gave palestinians free reign over their own territory (it has), if only it offered peace deals (it has), all of this hatred and violence would go away. IT HASN'T.  Garbage thoughts from garbage people.

Victor Davis Hansen comments on all of this and asks a few questions:

In a recent Foreign Affairs essay, the authors argue that prior to the current bloodletting, Hamas was increasingly unpopular among Gazans. But, they insist, Israeli bombing and proposed ground invasion will sadly have the unintended effect of gaining lost sympathy for a once-loathed Hamas among the people of Gaza, and therefore only intensify Israel’s problems and isolation. Maybe, maybe not ...

If Hamas has grown steadily-more unpopular since its 2007 “one man, one vote, once” popular victory, then has that disenchantment and cumulative anger in any material way stopped Hamas from siphoning off hundreds of billions of dollars in Middle Eastern, U.S., UN, and EU largess —or impeded Hamas in carrying out the attack of October 7?

Did the fact that numerous civilians followed Hamas fighters into Israel to loot, rape, and kill, while others reviled any Israeli hostage or Israeli corpse they spotted on the streets of Gaza, reflect widespread Hamas support, or not?

Are the masses in the United States who cheer on Hamas’s bloodwork and call for the destruction of Israel at odds with Hamas? Are they proof of Gazans worldwide who would seek peace with Israel, if not for Hamas? Remember – they hit the street before, not after, the Israeli air response.

Or were past negative polls more likely evidence that the popular criticism of Hamas was not that they are utterly corrupt, barbaric, and premodern, but that they are all that and more and yet still-impotent in the face of Israel?

Accordingly, isn’t Hamas now recapturing its former popularity, not by ceasing its own barbarity and corruption, but by focusing its animalistic cruelty far more successfully on killing Jews? If so, the way to undermine Hamas’s popularity is not to enshrine its killing by inaction, but to destroy it utterly and definitively demonstrate that, for all its cruelty and thievery, Hamas was cowardly, weak, and thus justifiably perished ...

But what of others, who cheer Hamas from the sidelines or are its puppet masters:

The more severely Israel deals with Hamas, and the more the world sees that Hamas’s massive infusions of international aid were almost all misappropriated for tunnels and rockets—soon to be rendered into rubble—the less Hezbollah will want a similar scenario in Beirut. And, therefore, the less likely it will be to intervene.

As for Iran, if Hamas is crushed, would it wish the same fate for its greater investment in Hezbollah? Would Iran like to say to the world, “Hezbollah and Beirut are in rubble, but their rocket barrages against the Jews topped even the late, great Hamas’s body count?” Without Hezbollah and Hamas buffers, will Iran be safer, or more exposed?

As for global opinion, it is now anti-Israel as never before, as the stronger power is currently shown to be the weaker. And so the anti-Israeli world concludes that there are no great consequences to its anti-Semitism, especially if Israel takes such a savage blow and does not respond. Is that not sad proof, in an abjectly amoral world, that Israel deserved the blow? If it did not deserve the blow, why did it not respond to kill the killers?

Clarity. 

Things are NOT complex. They're really simple. 

Hamas is EVIL. [1] Those who support it are EVIL. [1] They are driven by hatred couched in the pseudo-religious fervor of radical islam (“Allahu akbar!”) or the fanaticism of the hard Left. Evil must be destroyed. 

Radical Muslims ponder the reality: If they create Hamas 2.0, as they surely will, it too will be destroyed ... because 2.0 will also be EVIL, and evil cannot be allowed to flourish.

As for the hard-Left who have taken off their masks and now share common cause with EVIL ... well that's a topic for another day.

FOOTNOTE:

[1]  For those progressives and moderate leftists who prefer nuance and "complexity" and are uncomfortable with the word "evil," take a long look at the photo below. The young woman's name is Shani Louk, a German-Israeli who was in attendance at the Music/Peace festival when Hamas EVIL entered her world.

She was captured by Hamas, gang-raped, her legs were broken. She was thrown in the back of a pickup, driven to Gaza City where cheering crowds of palestinians spit on her body while shouting “Allahu akbar!” Hamas proudly streamed these events on-line.

We're not sure when she died, but she is dead. How do we know? Because the IDF found her skull (detached from her body) in Gaza. She was likely beheaded and then dumped. Her body has not been found, but forensic DNA indicates that the skull is hers.

Is that "evil" enough for you, progressives? 

And if you try to find "equivalence" between atrocities like the one visited on Shani Louk and the Israeli retaliation to those atrocities (no matter how many palestinians who refused to evacuate are harmed), are you an indirect accomplice to evil?

I think you are.

UPDATE-1:

Ahed Tamimi is an author and "peace activist" (read her faux CV here) who has been characterized as the "palestinian Anne Frank" for her tireless efforts at achieving peace and social justice for her people.

She's one of the good guys, people who don't subscribe to Hamas' tactics and the reason that palestinians should be spared from Israel's retailiation for Hamas' atrocities.

BUT ... wait ...

Here's the real Ahed Tamimi, the mask that made her the darling of progressives now dropped:

Maybe the Shani Louk's skull (you know, the one that came from her severed head), was Ahed Tamimi's afternoon snack. She's the kind of "peace activist" that progressives lionize. 

With "peace activists" like Ahed Tamimi', there will be no peace. There should be no peace. The palestinians must be forced to find "peace" somewhere else in the 5 million square miles that make up the Arab crescent. There, and there alone, they can "drink blood and eat skulls."

UPDATE-2:

As Secretary of State Anthony Blinken testified before congress, pro-palestinian protesters   (insurrection, anyone?) wrapped themselves in the faux-morality of victimization and called him a "murderer" while demanding an immediate "cease fire."

Alan Dershowitz contends that there are no pro-palestinian protests, just pro-Hamas and pro-Anti-Semtism. I agree and given that, take a hard look at the photo below:

I'm truly humbled by the morality displayed by these despicable people. But the bloody hands are a nice touch. Does it symbolize the Hamas atrocities in general, or maybe it's Israeli infant's blood or possibly it's the blood that ran down the legs of Hamas' gang rape victims?  I guess the media will have to ask the "protestors."

The "free gaza" inscriptions are a bit redundant, though. To make things more interesting, I'm surprised that some of their inscriptions didn't read:

"Rape, then Kill, then Mutilate—the palestinian way"

or 

"Use Human Shields—Protect Hamas Lives"

or

"Behead Infants—Allahu akbar!”

Garbage people.

 

Israel at War—8,000(!!!)

There is absolutely nothing funny about the fact that a significant majority of all Palestinians are Jew-haters, nor is there anything remotely humorous about the fact that those same palestinians elected an Islamist death cult to run their government for the past 17 years. There is nothing amusing about the reality that Hamas terrorists have allowed palestinians in Gaza to live in squalor for the 17 years in which they have controlled the region. Only useful idiots on the Left would believe that Israel is "occupying Gaza." It has not.

But one thing that is grotesquely funny is the palestinians complete and utter incompetence in faking civilian deaths. Certainly, people who refused to heed Israeli warnings and evacuate Gaza City (or were blocked from doing so by Hamas) will suffer casualities and death as Hamas uses them as human shields and fodder for their propaganda. Every legitimate instance of injury and death is on Hamas, not Israel. 

Hamas propaganda is preposterous. Instances of small palestinian children, acting unconscious and made up in grayish body paint to look dead are later seen alive and well. Video of a young palestinian man in a hospital theatrically moaning as he is attached to medical equipment and tended by his "concerned" friends, who shows up in good health the next day, yelling pro-Hamas slogans. The now-infamous "Hospital Hoax" that blamed the Israelis for the bombing of a hospital with 500 (!) dead when the hospital parking lot was struck by a misfired rocket from Islamic Jihad, resulting in a few dozen dead.

So, when Rashida Tlaib (D–MI), a U.S. congresswoman for Hamas, writes a post on X that claims 8,000 palestinians—mostly women and children—are now dead due to Israeli retaliation on Gaza, it’s worth a look. Without much effort, we find that her assertion is based on an AP report (shame on AP) that attributes the 8,000 number to the (wait for it ...) Gaza Health Ministry, which is under the direct control of guess who? Hamas! That would be the same Health Ministry that perpetrated the completely discredited Gaza Hospital Hoax.

You'd think the Associated Press would view such Hamas reports with just a bit of skepticism given that the Gaza health ministry has blatantly lied about civilian casualties on a daily basis. But of course, if you’re a member of the propaganda media, you simply take Hamas' word for it. That’s what propaganda is all about.

But death-count lies are only one element of a bigger picture. As Israel's retaliation for Hamas's barbarism ramps up, Hamas and it many supporters on the Left sense that the usual "playbook" may not hold this time around. In the past, Hamas committed 'only' minor atrocities, targeted 'only' a few Israel citizens and then relied on the "international community" to express outrage when Israel responded and defended itself. After all, "poor, innocent" palestinians were being killed "indiscriminately," they wailed. So, the West leaned on Israel to back-off and made empty promises that Hamas attacks would never happen again. Israel foolishly complied, a cease-fire was instituted, and Hamas went back into the shadows. The Islamists dug more tunnels with billions in aid money that was supposed to go to the "poor, innocent" palestinians, they acquired more weapons and rockets from their terror masters in Iran, and then struck again.

But this time, it's different. The depth, depravity, and sheer barbarism of October 7th have become a tipping point. Hamas and their leftist supporters appear to be secretly worried that their playbook won't be followed, that Israel leaders will tell the international community to fuck themselves and make good on their threat to destroy Hamas—all of Hamas. And then, I hope, deal with the complete "restructuring" of Gaza.

If that's true, Hamas needs to increase pressure on the "international community" to rein-in Israel. Their strategy, is obvious:

1. Create ever-more outrageous death toll propaganda that will be pushed by their allies in the propaganda media. 
2. Use their propaganda to roil the Arab street, but more important, 
3. Use their propaganda to ignite violent leftist protests and possibly, even anti-Semitic violence in the West. [1] 
4. The elitist cowards who lead western nations can't have that (they'd be forced to take a side) and will quietly blame Israel for that dilemma. 
5. The U.N. will issue condemnations based on lies, Western leaders will quietly threaten Israeli leaders, and the playbook will be re-initiated.

But maybe, just maybe, even that strategy won't work.

Hamas and its leftist supporters are trying desperately to make the general public forget their barbarism on October 7th and instead, focus on Israel's response to that barbarism. Hamas needs to create a new "villain" and the Left is helping them find one. It will only get worse—a lot worse.

If Israel can withstand the tsunami of faux-outrage that will crash onto it in the coming weeks, if it can stay focused on its primary goal (to utterly destroy Hamas and its terrorist infrastructure), it will have achieved a true victory against Islamist evil. We'll see if that happens.

But even that victory (satisfying as it might be) would be partial. Gaza and its population cannot be allowed to remain in place. I've already suggested an outline of how I'd like to see Israel proceed (see Terms #3,4 and 5). I'll have more to say on that subject in subsequent posts.

FOOTNOTE:

[1]  The following X post presents message board entries by despicable leftist or Muslim Cornell University students who are cowards and refuse to use their names. They advocate violence against Jews. They should be doxxed and then expelled. They won't be because leftist administrators won't let that happen.

Disgusting.

Israel at War—Darker Impulses

In any number of posts over the last 3 or 4 years, I have argued that many within our culture have embraced and normalized insanity. Driven exclusively by the American Left, it began in earnest with the COVID debacle. I won't bother revisiting the authoritarian and otherwise insane policies and dictates that negatively affected the lives of children, adults and senior citizens. But that level of insanity opened the door to those on the Left who adopted another insane mantra, derived from critical race theory—systemic racism!

During the summer 0f 2020 and in the midst of pandemic insanity, a recidivist criminal and drug addict, George Floyd, was killed in an encounter with police. Unquestionably a case of police malpractice, Floyd's death was the catalyst for a series of urban riots in which arsonists burned down property in cities across the country, more than 20 people were murdered, retail establishments were looted by organized gangs of thugs, police and federal building were attacked, historic statues were toppled, and activists claimed their "rage" at Floyd's death justified all of the destruction and violence. Incredibly, the propaganda media kept telling us that the riots were "mostly peaceful." Even more incredibly, the federal public health establishment (who had banned large groups from gathering due to a pandemic) proclaimed that "racism was a public health issue" and therefore getting together to demonstrate (a.k.a., riot) was okay, but please wear a mask.

The Left's trained hamsters in the propaganda media worked hard to gaslight a concerned public, telling us that the George Floyd rioters had legitimate grievances, and their frustration under the "oppression" of "systemic racism" justified their violent and destructive acts. But many of us didn't take the bait, so a counter-story had to be created.

It isn't far-fetched to argue that the American hard-left desperately needed the J6 riot (originally called "an insurrection") to help erase the memory of the summer of leftist rage. In fact, any attempt to compare the J6 riot with the 2020 summer riots was shouted down—it was a forbidden topic. As a consequence, the memory of the summer riots faded ... but not as a lesson for the Left.

It's reasonable to contend that the communication model used for the summer riots of 2020 is analogous to the model used after the Hamas atrocities of October 7th. Even for the hard-Left, it was challenging (but in their warped worldview, not impossible) to justify the wanton slaughter of over 1200 innocent civilians or the barbarous acts that accompanied that slaughter. What were Hamas' allies on the Left to do?

The answer was to use the characterization similar to the one used to claim that the 2020 summer riots were "justified." But also to replace a set of true villains that were allies of the Left with a set of faux villains that were enemies of the Left. This was the prototype.

Fred Bauer writes:

The ugly displays of anti-Semitism that have erupted across the United States over the past month are at once the extension of the racial “reckoning” of the summer of 2020 and a profound challenge to the legitimacy of this supposed reckoning. One of the reckoning’s premises was that the urgency of injustice demanded the suspension of civic order and the norms of a liberal society. Rioters were thus permitted to torch public buildings, loot businesses, and tear down statues of “problematic” figures from the past. When the New York Times ran an op-ed by Arkansas senator Tom Cotton calling for the military to help put down violent riots, the newsroom dissolved into a struggle session that ended in the departure of multiple staffers, including editorial page editor James Bennet ...

Despite years of warnings about the importance of democratic norms and liberal democracy, the American establishment mostly blessed these efforts. Foundations poured hundreds of millions of dollars into identity-politics activist groups. Major public institutions adopted the creed of the reckoning. Even mild criticisms of ideological purges—such as the Harper’s “Letter on Justice and Open Debate”—were treated as reactionary screeds ...

Now the promissory note of the reckoning has come due. In habituating people to the idea that righteousness justifies the abrogation of individual dignity and dismissal of political pluralism, the reckoning taught lessons deeply at odds with the functioning of American democracy.

It grows ever clearer that the hunt for “microaggressions” and the impulse to expunge America’s historical figures might not be simply the products of refined sensitivity or some naive excess of care. Instead, the yearning for extraordinary measures to confront “injustice” can speak to darker impulses—to dominate, to humiliate, and to hurt.

The true cost of these tactics has become more explicit. In cities across the world, activists rip down pictures of people, including children, taken hostage by Hamas. Such actions send clear message of animosity: the sufferings of Jewish hostages should be erased. No monuments for the wrong people has become a chic sentiment in elite American spaces. Now that logic is being chillingly applied to those slain, maimed, and abducted by Hamas.

Despite draping themselves in the pseudo-moral authority that they alone associate with their warped version of "social justice," the hard-Left adopted the communication model that worked well in 2020. To counter the rather unpleasant (to them—disgusting and evil to the rest of us) reality of Hamas's atrocities, they quickly rolled out their "anti-colonialism" message, their insane contention that Israel was perpetrating a "genocide," their evil suggestion that Hamas's barbarism was somehow justified by the "oppression" that the group suffered, and that Israel, not Hamas, was to blame for the attack. All of this is insanity, but the Left's propaganda media (meaning, once again, 95% of all media) embraced it with little skepticism, and their perverted  message is delivered to the public at large.

The hard-Left are certainly the perpetrators of this filth, but they are accompanied by many more moderate leftists who remain silent, along with an even larger number of Democrats who although uncomfortable with some of the message, refuse to condemn the insanity and refute the message. 

The hard-Left, along with its silent supporters, has let their masks slip and has now publicly embraced their inherent "darker impulses"—"to dominate, to humiliate, and to hurt." They have embraced anti-Semitism as a virtue, they have aligned themselves with a murderous Islamist death cult, and they do this loudly, publicly, and proudly.

They are as despicable and they are dangerous. It's time that those who haven't been infected by their insanity say, "Enough!"

Israel at War—Cease Fire

All of my moral superiors ... you know, 

• the vast sea of progressives who tell me that the situation in Gaza is "complex," implying that there is a moral equivalence between those who commit barbarism and those who must defend against it;
  
• the propaganda media who tell me that the palestinian "suffering" is the real issue and that the poor, poor people in Gaza really really don't like Hamas ... even a little .... despite polls that show the majority supports the terrorists and an even larger majority really hates Jews;
• the Hamas apologists who tell me that it was Israel's fault that those Islamists raped women, slaughtered children, and kidnapped grandmothers;
• the pro-palestinian activists who scream that THOUSANDS (!!) of palestinian children are already dead due to unprovoked attacks by Israel (no proof there, but you have to believe all activists, particularly after how truthful they were about the infamous Gaza hospital bombing);
• the Democrats who remain silent as members of their party (think: the Marxist Squad) tell the world that Zionists are "colonialists" and the Jews "stole" palestinian land, even though the Jews are indigenous to the region and there never was a country that defined "palestinian land"
• the United Nations who demand that Israel provide food, water and electricity to the "suffering" palestinians because it's perfectly sensible to provide assistance to people who want to exterminate you.
  

And all of these morally superior people keep telling me that Israel must agree to a CEASE FIRE right now! After all, bombing buildings that house rockets targeted at Israeli cities and civilians is an abomination because ... well, just because. 

So ... all that virtue signalling, all of the faux outrage, all of the pro-Hamas histrionics have finally made an impact, we do need a CEASE FIRE and we need it RIGHT NOW. 

Of course, the terms of the cease fire are important, so here are my (and I hope, Israel's) terms—all absolutely non-negotiable.

Cease Fire Term #1:  Hamas immediately returns all hostages who are still alive and the bodies of all who have been murdered.

Cease Fire Term #2:  Hamas unconditionally surrenders. All leaders and "soldiers" then turn themselves in to the IDF. Hamas is selfless. They'll do this to protect the palestinian civilians who they care so much about, right?

Cease Fire Term #3:  The 21 Arab countries that are located in the Arab crescent (North Africa and the Middle East) agree to take in an average of just 100,000 palestinians each—to relieve their suffering, of course. That means that all 2.1 million palestinians in Gaza will move on to other Muslim countries in the region.

Addenda to Term #3:  

(a)  The United States took in 155,000 foreign nationals who entered our country illegally last month alone, so 100K legal immigrants shouldn't be a problem, since it's a one time deal. Easy-peasy.

(b)  Muslim lands (no Jews to speak of so the palestinians will be happy) occupy a land mass in North Africa and the Middle East that exceeds 5 million square miles, so there's plenty of room for the palestinians.

(c)  There are 456 million people in the 21 Arab counties who would take in the palestinians. They would represent a four 10ths of 1 percent increase in population—so small, it would be imperceptible.

Cease Fire Term #4:  As soon as all groups of 100,000 Gazans have been gently and humanely moved into one of 21 Arab countries, Israel will annex Gaza permanently. It will be demolished and rebuilt. Israeli citizens (Jews and Arabs) will be free to live there.

Cease Fire Term #5:  To help in the resettlement of all groups of 100,000 Gazans (2.1 million people in total), each person will receive a one time stipend of $27,000. The total cost of the stipend is $57 billion. 

Addendum to Term #5: 

(a)  The average yearly income of a Gazan is $9,580, so this stipend provides a 3-year 'severance package,' allowing palestinians time to acquire gainful employment. This stipend includes kids who don't work, but the palestinian families deserve this bonanza because ... suffering, so ...

(b)  I know, I know ... that total amount sounds like a lot, but every country that voted in favor of the recent pro-palestinian UN resolution a few days ago would be required to donate an amount proportional to their GDP. Since 140 countries voted pro-Hamas, the average stipend contribution would be $400 million, small change for social justice, right? Countries that abstained would be required to donate an average of $200 million.

(c) In addition, every University whose administration expressed "understanding of the plight of the palestinians") would be required to donate just 3 percent of their endowment to the stipend. Using that math, Harvard University, for example, would donate $1.5 billion because its students, faculty and administration care so much about the palestinians.

Cease Fire Term #6:  If Israel is subsequently attacked by any party on the West Bank or from any Arab country or Iranian proxy, the U.N. will recognize that this cease-fire has been violated by the Muslim world and grants Israel the right to use all necessary force and violence to respond to the attack. Five percent of the U.N. annual budget will be allocated to help Israel in the aforementioned response.

That should do it. 

I'm sure every virtue signalling progressive, every SJW who has expressed pro-palestinian/Hamas sentiment, every propaganda media source, and every academic institution will embrace these Cease Fire terms. After all, the fighting MUST stop RIGHT NOW.

UPDATE:

I suspect that many progressives will not like any of my Terms, but will REALLY not like Terms #3, #4 and #5. As they drape themselves in faux moral authority, they'll take the position noted in the tweet below:

In case you have trouble reading David Bernstein's response, this is what he wrote: "Well, we certainly don’t want “violence and extremism” to break out among Palestinians. That might lead to decades of terrorist violence, and the rejection of peace offers. Oh, wait."

Heh ... some people truly have absolutely no self-awareness and beclown themselves as they attempt to justify barbarism. Yashar Ali is one of those people.

Meanwhile, I'm sticking with ALL of my "Cease Fire" Terms.

Israel At War—'Decolonize' Academia

Americans who have not been following the rapidly growing drift of American Universities to the hard left may have been surprised to see what amounted to demonstrations that celebrated (or at least excused) the Hamas atrocities. It's interesting to note that those demonstrations began immediately after the atrocities were committed, with pre-printed pro-palestinian placards and hand-printed anti-Semitic signs. More important, they began BEFORE Israel responded in any way within Gaza—BEFORE!

This did not start three weeks ago, or 3 months ago, or 3 years ago. It has been on-going for decades, but has accelerated as our country has embraced and normalized much of the insanity espoused by the Left. Recall that it was academia that barred unvaccinated students from stepping foot on campus during COVID [1]. It was academia that invented everything from an apocalyptic version of Climate Change to Critical Race Theory to 'micro-agressions' to "words are violence". This is what young adults are now being taught on college campuses across the land.

Once insanity is introduced as a viable option, bad things begin to happen. Nellie Bowles provides a quick summary for the insanity that now makes anti-Semitism okay on college campuses:

Nearly 2,000 sociologists signed a letter that Israel was committing “genocide” and anything Hamas does is justified by the “context.” The University of California, Berkeley Ethnic Studies Faculty Council released a statement condemning anyone who describes what Hamas did as “terrorism,” which is offensive. The student leader of a Wellesley residential house wrote to the entire dorm she oversees: “We firmly believe that there should be no space, no consideration, and no support for Zionism within the Wellesley College community.” Harvard launched a task force to help ensure the pro-Hamas protesters feel safe and can get jobs while also berating any Jews they might find. At George Washington University, students projected onto the side of the school library: GLORY TO OUR MARTYRS and FREE PALESTINE FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA. At Stanford, students are asking the school to pay for round-trip tickets for Muslim students to visit home: “Full round trip covered by University upon the signing of a ceasefire for students to visit their family and friends and grieve properly.” (Okay, fine, that one’s funny; just think of the Stanford Students for Justice in Palestine president calmly trying to explain preferred pronouns to a jihadi upon arrival. On second thought: TGIF will personally sponsor any queer activist who wants to fly to Iran. Honestly, I’m curious what would happen.)

A post on X provides some background on a pro-Palestinian/Hamas demonstration at Cooper Union:

As one commenter noted (paraphrasing): "I can recall another time when Jews tried to 'hide in the attic.' I didn't work out well for them."

American Universities have spent billions hiring appropriately intersectional DEI administrators who have, ironically, worked tirelessly to: (1) reduce the diversity of faculty ideological point-of-view, favoring only those Leftists who fit the approved mold; (2) eliminate any equity with regard to student admissions or "safety," favoring approved "oppressed" groups, while turning a blind eye to others (think: Asians and Jews), and (3) fight the inclusion of views that might conflict with leftist orthodoxy (think: banning outside conservative speakers).

But it's not just DEI administrators. The thousands of hard-left professors who teach undergraduates, propagandize them with intellectually dishonest ideas like "decolonization." Worse, they reward pro-Islamist views and punish any student who dissents. When they let their masks slip and go full anti-Semitic, their true selves are exposed. As an example, here's Cornell University Professor Russell Rickford:

In his speech to the crowd on October 15, Rickford said that “Hamas has shifted the balance of power.”

Rickford added that he abhors the targeting of children and civilians, yet added “but we are able to breathe — for the first time in years.”

“It was exhilarating,” he said. “It was exhilarating, it was energizing.”

The professor’s comments were met with cheers of “Palestine will be free from the river to the sea!”

That's a anti-Semitic chant suggesting the annihilation of the Jews. When called out by the University's president and members of the Board of trustees, this smarmy anti-Semite decided he didn't meant it:

“I recognize that some of the language I used was reprehensible and did not reflect my values,” he wrote. “As I said in the speech, I abhor violence and the violent targeting of civilians.”

“I want to make it clear that I unequivocally oppose and denounce racism, anti-semitism, Islamophobia, militarism, fundamentalism and all systems that dehumanize, divide and oppress people,” he continued.

Yeah ... all in the heat of passion and all that. This miserable excuse for an academic thinker should be fired ... full stop. And let tenure, if he has it, be damned.

Given all of this, it's time for a major academic overhaul. One way is to reduce the flow of big money donations to elite schools. That's happening, but I don't think it will mean much. [2] Another approach has been suggested by Ed Morrissey. I think it might have some merit:

Rather than launch destructive campaigns that will undermine the rights of all Americans, we need to address the issue at its core. The issue isn’t the [National Students for Justice in Palestine] NSJP, or the current flock of moral idiots on American campuses at the moment. The problem is the firehose of federal tax dollars propping up the Higher Ed Industry, and the way it gets manipulated to transform education into the kind of indoctrination that produced this anti-Semitic Hitler Youth Movement.

In other words, we need to end the student loan programs. We need to end Pell grants, and every scholarship from the federal government, even the ones for left-handed Laplanders with Lyme Disease. We need to end the transmission of every federal dollar into the bloated, corrupt Academia as it exists now and has existed over the last several decades. Its main product has become a blizzard of non-performing administrators and crops of moral idiots, the latter of whom emerge with crippling lifetime debt and nihilist fantasies that many of them will never outgrow.

To put it another way that might appeal to our progressive partners: We need to Defund the Fleece.

Gosh, even Joe Biden might like this. After all, it would solve the college loan problem once and for all. 

FOOTNOTES:

[1]  Covid vaccines did not stop the spread of the virus or protect individuals from infection, but did have serious side effects (e.g., myocarditis, blood clots) for a small percentage of those between 18 and 25, you know, college age.

[2]  It may come as a surprise, but Qatar, the Arab Muslim country that is home to Hamas leadership, is a major donor to American Universities. Eli Lake reports (while the propaganda media remains silent):

The numbers are staggering. According to a 2022 study from the National Association of Scholars, Qatar today is the largest foreign donor to American universities. [emphasis mine] The study found that between 2001 and 2021, the petrostate donated a whopping $4.7 billion to U.S. colleges. The largest recipients are some of America’s most prestigious institutions of higher learning. These schools have partnered with the regime to build campuses in Doha’s “education city,” a special district of the capital that hosts satellite colleges for American universities.

Hmmm. Maybe they're the one who pre-printed pro-palestinian signs that instantly appeared at college demonstrations after the Hamas atrocities. The "anti-Semitic Hitler Youth Movement" on college campuses has donors with deeeep pockets.

UPDATE-1:

This justifiably angry comment from Jim Treacher depicts yet another college "protest." This one at George Washington University in the nation's capital:

There’s no such country as “Palestine.” There never has been, and there isn’t one now. Maybe there will be one day, once they finally achieve their dream of killing all the Jews.

Of course, this hasn’t kept “Palestinians” from insisting we all share their delusions. And in the 17 days since Hamas slaughtered 1,400+ Jews and recorded every moment of it, there has been an explosion of support for their butchery.

Look at what’s happening right now in the capital city of the United States of America:

“GLORY TO OUR MARTYRS”
“DIVESTMENT FROM ZIONIST GENOCIDE NOW”
“FREE PALESTINE FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA”

These are all just other ways of saying:

“KILL ALL THE JEWS”

That filth was projected onto the Estelle and Melvin Gelman Library at GWU. Estelle and Melvin were Jews. This is like pissing on their graves, but a lot more public.

I hope you’ll excuse my bluntness, dear reader, but that is some Nazi sh*t right there. Those fascists might as well have projected a swastika onto the wall of that library.

You can dress it up however you want, you can put on your “Palestinian” scarves and wave your fake flags, but calling for the extinction of the Jews makes you a goddamn Nazi.

I wonder if university administrators and faculty would be as sanguine, or if the media would look the other way, or if the DoJ wouldn't begin a full blown investigation of domestic funding and foreign backing, if a large demonstration of 'white supremacist' students held up signs critiquing any one of the Left's many approved oppressed groups, and those signs implied that all members of those groups be annihilated? Just sayin'.

 

UPDATE-2:

Here's the truth that our vaunted elite universities refuse to teach:

UPDATE-3:

And finally, here is a portrait of Hamas that the gentle college students who have become de facto members of the "anti-Semitic Hitler Youth Movement" have aligned themselves with. Victor Davis Hansen does his thing:

Here are three critical considerations that must be understood about the current Israel-Hamas conflict. It is a sort of half-war. It consists of a military trying to defeat an organized clique of passive-aggressive, media-obsessed tribal murderers ... 

During peace and on a holiday, they entered Israel in a long-planned [with Iran] hit operation to murder civilians and take captives, focusing specifically on butchering the most vulnerable—the elderly, women, children, and infants—and in the most grotesque fashion imaginable. 

Their desire was to be as savagely pre-civilizational as possible—the more macabre the manner of murder, the more fertile their sophistry that they were reduced to such repulsive blood lust by their worse “oppressors”. 

It would be as though gruesome Mafia hitmen had claimed they were forced to become animal-like due to even worse systemic anti-Italian bias. Even the Mexican cartels do not claim they are led to behead because of the injustice of the Mexican government. 

By preplanned design, women were raped, and children and infants were burned alive, bound and executed, and (yes) beheaded. The dead were often mutilated. Some 1,400 Israelis were butchered, the vast majority civilians. Some 3,500-4,500 were wounded. 

Hamas never planned to stage a preemptive war against the Israeli military. Its only agenda was to send killers to unprotected villages to murder the unarmed as they slept—in the manner of Nazi Einsatzgruppen and other mobile death squads on the Eastern Front. Almost immediately they counted on using hostages, human shields, and the media to avoid any accounting from the IDF.

But yeah, the "anti-Semitic Hitler Youth Movement" and their many, many adult supporters on the Left demand a "cease-fire" so that the Hamas Nazis can escape retribution, re-arm, and kill more Jews.

Israel at War—Obama Speaks

I never liked Barack Obama. As President, his policies—both domestic and international—were blunders and failures—respectively. As a man, he was too slick by half. Obama presented well—an excellent speaker who often had a smile that never seemed to reach his eyes. Following in the footsteps of many past presidents who actively tried to heal racial divisions (with some success), Obama said things and established policies that did the opposite. He hated and dissed Bibi Netanyahu, who recognized his leftist, anti-Israel bias and made a fool of him in front of the U.S. Congress. He was a narcissist (but what politician isn't) and more ominously, a silent Marxist. He also, BTW, was the guy who tried to make nicey-nice to the terror masters in Iran.

After weeks of silence, Barack Obama has spoken on the Hamas-Israel war. A fawning propaganda media treated him as if he was the Oracle of Delphi. 

After a pro-forma two paragraphs condemning the Hamas atrocities (after all, even the most ardent pro-palestinian progressives have to quickly check that box), Obama's leftist, anti-Israel self burst through. The next nine paragraphs are vintage pro-palestinian arguments with the exception that Obama graciously admitting that Israel has a right to exist and that the situation is "complex." Nice of him.

All of his warnings for restraint are directed at Israel. He fails to demand a release of the hostages. In fact, he fails to make any demands of Hamas or the palestinians at all.

Michael Goodwin comments:

With Barack Obama publicly warning Israel about the deaths of civilians in Gaza, the Biden White House leaking its doubts about Israel’s ability to carry out a ground invasion and the head of the United Nations suggesting Israel provoked the Hamas terror attack, the question arises: Whose side are they on? 

Less than three weeks after Israel suffered the deadliest day in its history, the Jewish state is being treated like the problem rather than the victim by some of its supposed friends. [Obama has demonstrated repeatedly he is no friend.]

Instead of getting support for its justified aim of eradicating Hamas, demands are mounting for Israel to temper its response lest it spark a wider war and mass casualties of Palestinian civilians. 

Those of us who have lived through other Israeli-palestinian conflicts predicted this on day 1. Nothing has changed. The pro-palestinian leftist elites, epitomized by their figurehead, the sainted Barack Obama, incorporate just enough pseudo-sympathy for Israel to avoid being accused of blatant anti-Semitism. But this time their mask has fallen, and if you parse their language, they're reveling in the "complexity" of the palestinian issue.

If you strip away their moral preening, it's not "complex," it's really pretty simple. An internationally funded hate group—the palestinians—makes claim to a land they never owned, that never existed in all of history. They rejected a U.N resolution in 1948 that granted them a state and went to war against Israel in an effort to eliminate the Jews from the region. They rejected many Israeli offers for compromise/peace and ownership of some of the land ... because ... they are Muslims who have adopted the Islamist view that all lands within the Arab Crescent should be judenrein—free of Jews. That is their stated goal. They are driven by hate of Jews, and that will not change—ever. Given that, "peace" between Israel and the palestinians of Gaza (and maybe the West Bank as well) is a chimera that only fools believe can happen. Further, the atrocities committed by Hamas, the elected representatives of the palestinians of Gaza cannot and will not be forgiven. 

So ... the palestinians who currently live in Gaza must be removed and resettled elsewhere in the Arab Crescent where they will thrive or fester. It's up to them. For those who think there's nowhere to go, here are some options (correction: palestine is NOT a country as listed in the graphic) within the Arab/Muslim crescent that do not require the crossing of oceans or have the presense of Jews:

Resettlement is hardly a unique event throughout the world—according to the UN, tens of millions have been resettled in the last decade alone. By virtue of their own hate-driven deeds, the Gazans must join that group. That, and that alone, is "complex," but it can and must be done.

UPDATE-1:

Steven Kruiser comments:

Obama took a break from vapid celebrityhood to weigh in on the crisis in the Middle East and — predictably — his hot take was unoriginal and wrong. Those are his foreign policy hallmarks, by the way.

Rick has the latest from America’s dictator-in-constitutional-exile:

Former U.S. President Obama expressed his concern that Israel’s blockade of Gaza could “harden Palestinian attitudes for generations,” weaken international support for Israel, and undermine efforts to achieve peace and stability” in the region.

In the fever dream of American progressives, the psychotic Islamic terrorists who behead, blow up, and rape people are never seen as obstacles to peace and stability. It’s the unyielding Israelis who are being beheaded, blown up, and raped who are mucking up the bliss. The insanity is rooted in the insistence that Gaza is awash in saintly “Palestinians” who are suffering from the bad PR being brought upon them by a few bad eggs who kill a whole bunch of people. Never mind the fact that these sweet people keep electing the Hamas savages to be in charge.

Indeed.

UPDATE-2:

Even though his undergraduate grades were mediocre at best, Barack Obama was admitted to and graduated from Harvard Law school.  He had the distinction of being the only editor of the Harvard Law Review who never wrote an legal article for that publication. But I digress.

Harvard has recently established a "Task Force" to assist those soon-to-be graduates who are struggling to find jobs because they signed or participated in anti-Israel, pro-Hamas demonstrations of campus. Many enthusiastically signed clearly anti-Semitic screeds. 

Possibly Obama, a celebrity Harvard graduate, could help. He could work with his many contacts in the Arab world to establish internships right in Gaza, where the poor, spurned Ivy Leaguers could fulfill their dream of stamping out Israeli "colonialism," or "occupation." They could experience first-hand how well the palestinians treat the LGBTQ+ community. How women are elevated to high positions among the Islamists who run the place. How billions in international aid go directly to help the people of Gaza and how no one in Gaza supports Hamas. They could spend time of the "Arab street" and see first-hand how palestinians might not like Israelis, but that doesn't mean they hate Jews.

Yeah ... that's a wonderful strategy for the "task force."

Israel at War—2000 Children!!

You'd think that the "hospital" blood libel—you know the one where the Hamas barbarians falsely claimed that Israel had bombed and destroyed a hospital and killed 500 (!) people, including men, women and children—would have been enough. Nope. Not a chance. Just because the "hospital" hoax was completely false—an Islamic Jihad rocket hit not the hospital but it's parking lot (the hospital still stands) and killed at most a few dozen people—you'd think that even the propaganda media would be a bit more careful. Again, nope.

The propaganda media is no longer simply biased, it has evolved into a hard-Left press secretary for Hamas and its millions of palestinian supporters (think: KJP, but much, much more competent). That means the media wants to publish complete lies and propaganda (the source be damned) so that Israel is demonized in everything it does. But even that isn't enough for the propaganda media. It knowingly and maliciously publishes Hamas lies as actual fact, fomenting anti-Semitism around the world. 

Over the past few days, any number of Democratic talking heads, along with hard-left SJWs and pro-palestinian activists have been saying that "2,000 palestinian children (!!) have been killed by the Israeli bombing of Gaza."

A few key points:

You'd think that Hamas would be showing us photos and video of hundreds of dead palestinian children. They haven't. They haven't published any names, nor have they produced any locations for the deaths along with other details. They haven't addressed these legitimate question that the propaganda media forgets to ask:

1. Why weren't these children evacuated? 
2. Did Hamas stop them and their parents from  leaving? 
3. Was there a contemporaneous Israeli air attack on their building, street, or neighborhood?
4. Why weren't these children housed in a safe location, say, one of the 300 km of tunnels that the Hamas terrorists built with aid money that was supposed to go to the children and their families?
   
5. Did any of the estimated 500-600 errant Hamas rockets (targeting Israeli children, among others) fall on the Gazan children's building, street, or neighborhood, and did those rockets kill any of the children? 

None of those questions have been answered, but the 2,000 number (!!) is reported without any skepticism. 

• And if you argue that it would be ghoulish to show dead kids (you'd be right), or provide details of their death, that's one of the many atrocities that Hamas happily committed against Jews. They should have no compunction about providing the details for their own children's deaths—except, maybe far, far fewer deaths occurred. 
• And if you then argue that every child's life matters regardless of the number, ask yourself again, why weren't these children, whose parents were given repeated warnings by the IDF that an attack was imminent, evaculated?

So ... when confronted with the fact that this is just another Hamas lie, the propaganda media, along with Left wing (including Democrat talking heads), rise up in faux-outrage and tell the world that independent NGOs like Doctors without Borders are the "source" of the "2000 children" report. 

Actually, a little investigation would discover that  Doctors without Borders and other NGOs get their info from reports by the propaganda media or from the Palestinian Health Ministry that is fully controlled by Hamas. But it gets worse. In the case of the 2000 children hoax, the media source was CNN who quoted one or more other NGOs (who in turn got the number from Hamas). Sooo ... yeah, that's called 'washing a lie' until it seems plausible (to gullible morons).

In essence, publishing anything that comes out of Gaza and has not been verifying by a truly independent source (meaning a source that is not blatantly Left or pro-Palestinian) is like publishing Bernie Madoff's investment returns as actual fact after he was indicted.

WARNING: At this point, anything that you read or see concerning Gaza coming from the likes of [1] NYT, WaPo, LAT, PBS, BBC, Reuters, AP, MSNBC, CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, and even, at times, FoxNews or WSJ) along with NGOs like SPLC, Human Right Watch, and worldwide organizations like the blatantly corrupt and biased U.N. and all of their affiliates must be considered suspect. Those media outlets and organizations are NOT simply making mistakes or being sloppy. They're maliciously trying to shape a narrative in which Hamas' Nazi-like atrocities are equivalent to Israel's response to those atrocities. 

It's not simply wrong, it's despicable. Even worse, the leftist anti-Semites within the media, NGOs and other orgs don't give a damn.

FOOTNOTE:

[1]  Every one of the media sources listed reported the hospital hoax as actual fact. A few noted that the source was Hamas, but that was buried at the end of a headline or news article. The typical headline read something like this: "Israel bombs Gaza hospital leaving 500 palestinians dead, according to Hamas." Some didn't bother with the phrase after the comma.  Note the order of the words, the comma separating the "fact" from the "source," and the lack of any qualifying adjectives of phrases like "estimated" or "unverified."

UPDATE:

Don Surber offers his take on the propaganda media:

The English-speaking press gladly accommodates Palestinian terrorism because the press now sees itself as an academic enterprise rather than a trade. Master’s degrees in journalism now dominate the hiring at newspapers. Newspapers prefer degrees from prestigious schools, which always made me smirk because if you have a degree from Harvard, why are you working for peanuts at the Charleston Gazette in West Virginia?

But that background explains why the press promotes Palestinian terrorism against Israel. American universities are citadels of anti-Semitism. Liberals have bestowed victimhood upon the terrorists. Foolishly, I believe, because they will turn on liberals before liberals have the chance to turn on them. Terrorism is by definition a cut-throat enterprise.

American journalists blissfully ignore this as they carry the water for Palestinians.

When Palestinians bombed the parking lot of Christian hospital in Gaza, every single major news outlet in America blamed Israel and said the missile destroyed a hospital.

Let me add that today's so-called "Journalists" are an embarrassment to their once respected trade. As an Obama administration advisor once said: "Journalists are inexperienced, lazy and stupid." 

Some are too inexperienced to understand that their anti-Israel tropes aren't the new, hip take, but rather, tired and redundant rhetoric that makes them look like plagiarists. They're all too lazy to ask the pro-Palestinian crowd (themselves?) probing questions about Hamas and its palestinian supporters. The all too stupid to understand the actual history of the region. 

And yeah, lots of them come from Ivy league schools, but I repeat myself. 

Israel at War—Mugged

Social justice warriors (SJWs) and the Jewish progressives who support them have long thought that their pseudo-virtue and pseudo-morality inoculates them against criticism from those who see them for what they are. At best, they are fantasy thinkers who cannot admit error when their fantasies collide with reality (BTW, reality always wins). At worst, they are authoritarians, who cannot countenance any opposition, resorting to name-calling, demonization, and cancellation that is both vicious and amoral. At at their extreme, they are rabid anti-Israel advocates that are, at their core, unapologetic anti-Semites.

As the pro-Palestinian Left and their Jewish progressive supporters try to absorb the atrocities committed by Islamists, many suffer from cognitive dissonance. After all, how can their sainted palestinian "victims" do such awful, barbaric things? Some try to reduce their cognitive dissonance by doubling down on their fantasy beliefs. They join useful idiots on college campuses and their anti-Semitic allies in anti-Israel protests, spouting abject nonsense like "genocide," "apartheid," and "colonialism," all to help justify their warped worldview and reduce the dissonance they feel.

Others, however, are Jewish liberals who have been mugged by reality. A figurative slap in the face by leftists who they once believed were their allies in social justice, provides them with needed clarity, and they have reacted accordingly. 

• They are moving away from leftist ideology because for the first time they realize it is anti-Israel to its core. 
• They are pulling their donations to alma maters whose faculty and administrators have become increasingly anti-Israel.
• Having once embraced the notion of Middle East peace at all cost, they now reject it, recognizing that you cannot make peace with people who want to exterminate you.
  
• They are appalled by the "ceasefire" advocates who are perfectly okay with Hamas going unpunished for the atrocities it gleefully committed and streamed to the rest of the world.
• They are disgusted by the entertainment industry glitterati who parrot Islamist lies and leftist anti-Israel propaganda.
• They are revolted by their favorite newspaper, The New York Times, for enthusiastically publishing Hamas propaganda (think: the "Hospital Bombing" blood libel).
• They have lost trust in biased mainstream broadcast media (e.g., CNN, MSNBC, PBS, CBS, ABC, NBC) who parrot unverified propaganda (e.g., "thousands of chiuldren have been killed by Israel attacks") as if it were true.
  
• They are arming up. Once avid anti-gun advocates, after seeing the anti-Semitic vitriol in cities across the United States, they are now buying weapons and getting training.
• They are even questioning their beloved Democratic party, asking why there has not been wholesale and very public condemnation of Hamas apologists like Rashida Tlaib or Ilhan Omar.
• They are moving away from Joe Bidem, whose press secretary, KJP, when asked about anti-Semitism evidenced in pro-Palestinian/Hamas demonstrations across the country, lectures the reporters on ... "Islamophobia."
  

They are changing—maybe too late, maybe too slowly, maybe not enough. But they are changing.

Only time will tell whether the change is fleeting or permanent. I'm hoping for the latter. 

It's okay to make mistakes, even bad ones—as long as you learn from them and change your alliances and actions accordingly. 

At least some of America's progressive Jews are learning quickly and will, I hope, make their own second chances. Never again!

UPDATE:

To its credit, the left-leaning Atlantic published a gruesome summary of the videos taken by Hamas as they slaughtered, disfigured, raped and beheaded innocent civilians during the atrocities they committed on 10/7. The presentation was given by the IDF to the international press yesterday.

Graeme Wood, the author of the piece entitled, "A Record of Pure Predatory Sadism," does not pull any punches. To his credit he does not describe Hamas, in the smarmy and despicable tradition of the NYT, using phrases like "attacked the Israeli occupiers" or "vented their anger at years of deprivation and poverty." Instead he describes what he saw on the Hamas video clips and heard on Hamas phone calls, summarizing this way:

To me the most disturbing section was not visual at all. Like the clip of the father and his boys hunted in their pajamas, it was upsetting in part because it showed a relationship between parent and child. The clip is just a phone call—placed by a terrorist to his family back in Gaza. He tells his father that he is calling from a Jewish woman’s phone. (The phone recorded the call.) He tells his father that his son is now a “hero” and that “I killed 10 Jews with my own hands.” And he tells his family, about a dozen times, that they should open up WhatsApp on his phone, because he has sent photographs to prove what he has done. “Put on Mom!” he says. “Your son is a hero!”

His parents, I noticed, are not nearly as enthusiastic as he is. I believe that the mom says “praise be to God” at one point, which could be gratitude for her son’s crimes or pure reflex, indicating her loss for words to match her son’s unspeakable acts. They do not question what their son has done; they do not scold him. They tell him to come back to Gaza. They fear for his safety. He says, amid rounds of “Allahu akbar,” that he intends “victory or martyrdom”—which the parents must understand means that he will never come home. From their muted replies I wonder whether they also understand that even if he did come home, he would do so as a disgusting and degraded creature, and that it might be better for him not to.

There will be no peace with the son and his parents. There is too much Islamist-inspired hatred coming out of Gaza and its palestinian residents. Hamas and their many supporters are truly "disgusting and degraded creature[s]." It's time for this decades-old macabre "peace process" to end. Its time for Gaza as a nest of "disgusting and degraded creature[s]" to end. To grab a quote from the Left (just this once): By any means necessary.

 

Israel at War—Questions

Pro-palestinian/Hamas activists and their leftist Social Justice Warriors are perfectly willing to lie about Israel's history, about a broken Muslim culture that has spawned Islamist evil, about the "suffering" of people in Gaza who, if their leaders were willing to abandon their hatred and their commitment to exterminate the Jews (they cannot and will not do this), could live in an economically viable and peaceful land on the Mediterranean Sea. 

The activists and the useful idiots who support love, love, love marching in the streets of major cities and 'occupying' university campuses as they spout their anti-Israel and anti-Semitic venom. What they're unwilling to do is to answer questions, about Hamas, about a palestinian state, about the way in which billions in international "humanitarian" welfare have been squandered by a corrupt and anti-Semitic palestinian leadership.

Hillel Fuld posted a few questions on X, and I'll add a bunch more.  First Hillel's:

• Who was the prime minister of the Arab Palestinian state before Israel was established in 1948?
  
• What was the national anthem? 
• Was there any Arab terror against Jews before this occupation you speak of? In fact, was there Arab terror against Jews before Israel was even established? 
• How did Israel occupy Gaza since 2005? 
• Do Jews live in Gaza or did Israel evacuate it completely [in 2007]? 
• What do you want to free Palestine from? 
• Any thoughts about Egypt or Jordan taking in Palestinians? Why not? 
• How did Hamas become the ruling government in Gaza? Who voted for them? 
• When the terrorist Yasser Arafat established the PLO, what was his declared objective? Have you read the charter? Why not?
• Do the Palestinians want a state? If so, have they had a chance to have one? How did they respond? 
• What does “From the river to the sea” mean? 

Most SJWs are so ignorant of history that they'd be unable to answer any of these questions. The Arabs simply refuse to answer because those answers don't support their lies or pseudo-history of the region.

But I have lots more questions. Let's try a few:

• Why is it that the vast majority renowned Muslim clerics and leaders in Muslim countries have NOT publicly and forcefully condemned Hamas' barbarity? Is it that they condone the rape, torture and murder of young women or the kidnapping of small children? Or is it because they agree with the barbarous acts that killed children in front of their parents, burned families alive, and committed unspeakable atrocities on dead bodies? Or maybe it's because deep down they hate Jews and follow the dictates of Muslim religious tracts that prescribe the subjugation or death of infidels? And if they don't agree with those things, I ask the first question again, why won't they publicly and forcefully condemn Hamas' barbarity?
• Where did the funding for the 300 km of tunnels under Gaza come from?
• Given that billions in international welfare have been given to Gaza since Israel left 17 years ago, why is it that Gaza cannot supply its own drinking water or generate it own electricity? Where did the billions in "humanitarian assistance" go?
• What was the population in Gaza when it was granted full control of the area in 2005? Why were the palestinians in Gaza encouraged to almost double the population over the next 18 years? Why wasn't the infrastructure expanded to keep up with Demographic demands, given that billions in Western aid were granted to Gaza? 
  
• Why does the leader of Hamas live in Qatar? If you assert that he's afraid of assassination, from whom and for what? And if you further assert that the answer to that question is Israel, why might that be?
• The late Yasser Arafat is a palestinian icon. At his death, estimates of his wealth were close to $1 billion. How did he acquire that enormous wealth?
  
• Why does the charter of Hamas clearly state that Jews should be exterminated (i.e., that the land should be Jew-free)?
• Does palestinian K-8 school curriculum include material and textbooks that would be judged as anti-Semitic by any objective observer?
  
• What is the size of tiny Israel when compared to the Arab Muslim countries of the region?
• How many Jews (as a percentage) are allowed to live in any of those Arab Muslim countries?
• Do any Jews live in Gaza? If they did, would they be safe from harm?
• Do any palestinians or Arabs from other places live in Israel? Are they murdered or harmed if they live peaceful lives?
• You claim that Israel is an "apartheid state." Please explain. Arabs serve in the parliament, are employed in the professions, and are free to live anywhere? How is that "apartheid."
• You claim that Israel has "colonized" "Palestine." Since Jews are indigenous to the region just as Native Americans are indigenous to North America, how can it be that they are "colonizers?"And if your claim is that Jews are not indigenous, are you suggesting that the entire history of the region is wrong and that ancient, carbon-dated Jewish artifacts were planted in the desert and in ancient ruins by nefarious "Zionists"?
  
• You claim that Israel wants to commit genocide. Why is it then, that they ask civilians to move out of northern Gaza, likely to become a war zone. Wouldn't a "genocide" be more effective if they told the Gazans to stay?
• Why is it that Hamas told civilians to stay in the war zone and physically blocked their exit? Wouldn't that be a genocidal act?
• What possible reason did Hamas have for kidnapping small children? Is it fair to say the children are human shields, and if not, what exactly are they using the children for?
• Why is it that Hamas places its military HQ under a mosque and stores munitions inside schools and hospitals? Don't they care about placing civilians in danger?
  
• Why did Hamas lie and tell the world that a hospital was destroyed by Israel when it was not destroyed, but its parking lot was hit by an Islamic Jihad rocket? Given that, why should anyone trust anything that Hamas reports?
• Why did Hamas lie and tell the world that 500 people died from what we now know was an Islamic Jihad rocket, when reliable estimates put the number at a few dozen? Given that, why should anyone trust anything that Hamas reports?
• To SJWs: Why do you continue to repeat these lies, knowing that they are untrue and obvious blood libels against the Jews? Are you simply too stupid to distinguish truth from fantasy? If not, are you so anti-Semitic you, like Hamas, believe that Judenrein must be achieved "by any means necessary"?
  

I could go one for an additional 50 questions, but what's the point? 

Maybe it's this—Pro-palestinian/Hamas activists and their leftist SJWs will refuse to answer these questions. That would simply ruin their perverse narrative. But the world's media, were it honest (it is not), unbiased (it is not), and professional (it is not) should ask and get answers to each and every one. They will not!

Why? Because they, like their soulmates among pro-palestinian/Hamas activists and their leftist SJWs, are virulently anti-Israel. No question about that at all.

UPDATE:

Among the many, many lies that are promulgated by Muslim apologists for Hamas and the useful idiots of the Left is: Hamas has very weak support among people in Gaza who don't approve of its actions.

That lie is used to reinforce the notion that Israel should not attack Gaza in retaliation for Hamas's atrocities because the Gazan civilians hate, hate, hate Hamas and are therefore entirely innocent.

So ... my question to activists:

• Since you claim that Hamas has "very weak support" among the residents of Gaza, why is it that al Jazeera reported that it won their 2006 election by "a huge majority"? Why is it that in 2021 apnews.com reported that 53% of Palestinians believe that Hamas is "most deserving of representing and leading the Palestinian people"? Why is it that a washingtoninstitute.org poll in 2023 found that "57% of Gazans expressed a positive opinion of Hamas"?

Israel at War—Reduction and Projection

Many social justice warriors (SJWs) on the Left have aligned themselves with the Islamist terror group, Hamas. Please spare me the argument that taking a pro-palestinian stand is somehow different than directly supporting the Islamists. A clear palestinian majority support Hamas, and an even larger majority are anti-Israel as well as anti-Semitic. Supporting the palestinians in this conflict, not to mention using eliminationist rhetoric that makes any truly moral person cringe (e.g.,"from the river to the sea"), is the equivalent of supporting Hamas.

But the real question is this. Why have SJWs who perceive themselves (incorrectly, I might add) as our moral superiors align themselves with rabid anti-Semites? 

In yesterday's post, I noted an excellent op-ed by Shany Mor who argues that cognitive dissonance reduction is the primary cause. After providing examples of this psychological phenomenon over then past 3 or 4 decades, Mor argues that when leftists are confronted with undeniable atrocities by groups they support, they suffer from cognitive dissonance. After all, they have elevated the palestinians to their most exhaulted level—oppressed and colonized victims—and as such they can do no wrong. But damn ... they raped and tortured young women, beheaded infants, and burned people alive, not to mention kidnapping two hundred civilians as human sheilds.

Sooo ... what do leftist do? As always, they retreat into fantasy, arguing that these atrocities are all Israel's fault. After all, this reduces their cognitive dissonance and allows them to continue to drape themselves in virtue signalling.

Yeah, it's disgusting, but then again, consider the people who are doing it.

But cognitive dissonance reduction is not the only reason that leftists align themselves with a murderous Nazi-like cult who want to murder all Jews. Rabid pro-palestinian activists and their Social Justice Warrior supporters on the left, also share a number of additional characteristics:

• both groups have a desire for authoritarian control of their adjacent populations, i.e., you MUST adopt our ideology or you're a figurative "apostate" that can be cancelled. Islamists take a rather extreme view of cancellation, while SJWs have until recently only tried to ruin an apostate's life and livelihood. With the advent of Hamas' atrocities, however, their only option is to demonize Jews and the tiny Jewish state in the midst of the Arab crescent, so that the atrocities committed by Hamas can be 'equivalenced.'
  
• both groups are fantasy thinkers, who discard common sense, facts on the ground, past history, societal and cultural precedent, and international norms. Instead their worldview identifies only the "oppressed" and others as "oppressors" or maybe "colonizers" and those who have been "colonized" regardless of the gross inaccuracy of those labels. Both groups agree that the oppressed or colonized have no moral responsibility to act in a civilized and peaceful manner because they are part of the "resistance" to the "oppressor."
• both are prone to psychological projection, accusing their opponents of evil deeds that more likely are being propagated by the accuser. In the case of SJWs, this occurs in many other contexts that are not nearly as serious at the Hamas atrocities, but nonetheless represent some cause célèbre for social justice.

Both groups use keywords in a pathetic attempt to try to turn their lies into truth. Abigail Schrier posts a "cheat sheet" for spotting Hamas lies. I think it's also a good guide for spotting the psychological projection that both SJWs and Hamas use to justify themselves. Schrier writes (my additional comments in italics):

• "Occupation!"  Nope. Not one IDF soldier or Jewish person was in Gaza on October 7. In fact, Israel left Gaza 17 years ago. The only occupier, if you're will to suspend disbelief and accept the canard that most palestinians do not support Hamas, is Hamas itself!
• "Settlers!"  The entire massacre occurred within internationally recognized borders of Israel. In actuality, the palestinians want to be settlers in an internationally-recognized Jewish state. Ironically, if they were peaceful, Israel would encourage their settlement, like they have accepts tens of thousands of Arab who are now Israeli citizens. But the palestinian want to eradicate Israel, so there's that.
• "Colonialism!"  Israel is the historic homeland of the Jewish people for over 3000 years, as one of history's most indisputable cultural and archaeological record proves. You aren't a colonist in your own land. But the palestinians want to colonize Israel and have grown from a relatively small population in the mid-20th century to more that two million people today. Those 2M people have been isolated and rejected by the entire Arab Muslim world who want them to colonize and destroy the Jewish state.

As Israel moves to eliminate Hamas and its barbaric, Nazi-like agenda, the lies and projections from both the palestinians and their supporters among SJWs will intensify. These will be amplified by the Western propaganda media, whose level of irresponsible "reporting" has already made them reviled by those who are able to think critically. 

As this dangerous and dishonest "reporting" continues and grows, just remember it's being brought to you by a propaganda media that sympathizes with those who embrace cognitive dissonance reduction and psychological projection, both clear signs of muddled thinking.

Israel at War—"Humanitarian Aid"

Propaganda media outlets are following the lead of leftist, pro-palestinian/Hamas social justice warriors and hyperventilating because palestinian leaders (that would be ... uhhh ... the terror group Hamas) cannot supply their own civilian population with drinking water. NBC News claims that the poor, poor palestinians (including mind you, the tens of thousand of Hamas terrorists) might have to boil their water before drinking it. Oh, the humanity!!

The NYT gets the vapors because Israel will now allow food trucks to enter Gaza—excusing the palestinian leaders (that would be ... uhhh ... the terror group Hamas) who failed to provide a store of food within Gaza to feed its civilians for a few weeks.

And of course, there are the leftist anti-Semites within the State Department who are clutching their pearls because a "humanitarian crisis" has occurred in Gaza. Oddly, they seem to have already forgotten why the crisis occurred.

And then, of course, there's the entirety of the propaganda media, leftist SJWs, and Islamic activists who now feel comfortable with their open anti-Semitism. They are joined by political garbage-people like Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar, who demand a ceasefire (a.k.a., no retribution for Hamas's atrocities).

Caroline Glick posts this on X:

It seems that the hostages have already been memory-holed by the propaganda media, except when the Hamas nazis release 1% of them. That cynical gesture is enough for the Biden administration to tell Israel to delay its ground war against Gaza—exactly what Hamas hoped when it released two American hostages.

And then, of course, we have the propaganda media reports that 3,000 or 7,000 (!) palestinian civilians are now dead in Gaza, including 500 or 1,000 (!) children. What's the source of these numbers? That would be ... Hamas—you know that same careful terrorist statisticians who stated that Israel bombed a hospital and that 500 were dead. Only problem? An Islamist missile hit the parking lot of the hospital, not the hospital itself which is still standing and very much in operation. Hamas lied. Those killed by the Islamists are estimated in the dozens, not 500. Hamas lied. So .. of course the NYT and Reuters, along the AP, the alphabet broadcast networks, and many other leftist sources have no reason not to except the Hamas statistics. Right? Incredible, but not the least bit surprising.

And finally, there's the palestinian "civilians." 

First off, recall that Hamas soldiers wear civilian clothes, so if 10 men aged between 15 and 45 are killed in a targeted airstrike against a Hamas arms cache, they are likely NOT civilians, yet anti-Israel organizations like the UN or the Red Crescent will count them as such.

Second, recall that polling indicates that over half of all Gazans (civilians included) support Hamas and a larger percentage are perfectly fine with eradicating Jews en mass. Given that nasty reality, they can legitimately be considered hostiles.

Third, Hamas worked hard to block civilians from leaving the north of Gaza after Israel told them it would be a wise thing to do. They used a combination of propaganda, threats, and physical road blocks to keep civilians in place. After all, the Hamas cowards need their civilian human shields, don't they? 

As I've mentioned in other "Israel at War" posts—every civilian death in Gaza is on Hamas. Every. Single. One.

The useful idiots on the Left, along with Islamist activists and their propaganda media, are doing what they always do. They use demonization, name-calling and fantasy beliefs to support allegations against Israel that are counter-historical, counter factual, and clearly anti-Semitic. They drape themselves in virtue signalling that is nauseating to watch. 

In the midst of this display of amoral behavior, one thing has happened—we now know what many on the Left really want and really feel. Its ugliness cannot shrouded by the palestinian flags they hold or the "from the river to the sea" placards they carry.

UPDATE:

In an excellent piece that goes to the last paragraph of today's post, Shany Mor examines the underlying psychology that explains the Left's reaction to Hamas' atrocities and Israel 's reaction to them. He writes:

In one respect, [the Left's] response is transparent projection. Hamas’s charter explicitly calls for the destruction of Jews and Israel. By kidnapping, raping and slaughtering innocent civilians, the terrorist group gives every indication that it believes what it says. Yet its sympathizers in the West aren’t merely projecting. Their behavior is an example of cognitive-dissonance reduction, the process by which people reconcile new information that contradicts their firmly held priors. The result is an ostensibly coherent system of thought.

Western activists for Palestinians are dedicated to two nearly theological precepts: that Israel is evil, and that no Palestinian action is ever connected to any Palestinian outcome. Each precept is grounded in longstanding—and borderline racist—conceptions of Jews and Arabs.

This cognitive trap expresses itself in how Israel’s opponents in the West speak about the conflict with the Palestinians. Concern that “time is running out” for reaching a two-state solution never leads to calls for the Palestinians to hurry up and accept a negotiated compromise. They ignore that the Palestinians rejected statehood and peace in 2000, 2001, 2008 and 2014. They ignore that Hamas’s belligerence is the cause of Israel’s blockade of Gaza, a defensive measure by a nation under assault.

Hamas’s gruesome attack poses a threat to this worldview, and the only way to resolve it is by heightening Israel’s imagined malevolence. The terrorist atrocities don’t trigger a recoiling from the cause in whose name they were carried out; they lead to an even greater revulsion at the victim.

This was the playbook 20 years ago when Palestinian terror groups sent young men and women to blow themselves up in Israeli buses, restaurants and cafes—immediately after they rejected offers of an independent Palestinian state, including the Gaza Strip and more than 90% of the West Bank, with East Jerusalem as its capital. The only way to make sense of the violence was to imagine an Israel even worse than what was already believed.

The Oct. 7 pogrom raised the rhetorical stakes. If the only thing that can explain a Palestinian action is Israeli evil, then Israel’s opponents have to imagine a level of Jewish evil commensurate with what Hamas did—shooting children in front of their parents, setting houses on fire with residents inside, raping women, beheading innocent people, mutilating bodies.

Everything that the palestinians' useful idiots on the Left do results in cognitive dissonance. They dishonest, their ignorance of history, and their vicious attempts are condemnation of Israel result in a level of muddled thinking (not even close to a "ostensibly coherent system of thought") that is astonishing and sad. But one thing is certain, anyone who thinks clear won't try to reduce this cognitive dissonance, they'll embrace it as a sure indication of the moral and intellectual vacuity of the Left's arguments.