Obviously, this is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad event. Because Jews being proud of the reunification of their historic capital city is regarded as an insult to those who prefer those Jews to be dead and unable to march.
Palestinian feelings are more important than Jewish pride. That's an axiom - after all, some murder people when their feelings are hurt, so it is clearly important. In fact, Jewish pride itself insults Palestinian feelings. Jews with flags are an insult, Jews walking around their holiest spot is an insult, Jews praying at the Kotel is an insult, Jews living in Hebron is an insult, Jews breathing as free citizens is an insult. And insults are Very Bad, worse than death. Jews marching with flags is effectively genocide.
So, we have a completely artificial crisis brewing based on Palestinians not being able to tolerate Jews acting like normal people.
The question is, what will happen this Thursday?
In 2021, Hamas shot rockets towards the "third holiest city in Islam" at precisely the moment that the march was set to begin. This is considered a major victory for Gaza terrorists, who say that they linked the events in Gaza with Jerusalem. They call this the "unity of the squares," a warning that whatever Israel does in Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem will cause a reaction from Gaza.
It seems unlikely that there will be a repeat of that scenario this time, not so soon after a ceasefire.
Islamic Jihad media predicts there will be a major terror attack in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv ahead of the march.
Hamas media is trying to reproduce the hysteria that accompanied the rumors that Jews would sacrifice a lamb on the Temple Mount for Passover, saying that Temple groups requested to allow the march to enter the Temple Mount. This of course will not be allowed.
They also say that the Flag March will be confronted by Arabs with Palestinian flags at Damascus Gate trying to physically block them. In addition, Jerusalem Arabs plan their own version of the flag march on the Temple Mount, planning to stay overnight or to arrive very early as they did during Ramadan so they can block any Jews from touring on Thursday.
A Palestinian youth movement plans is announcing their own Palestinian flag day, for both Thursday and Friday, in an attempt to marginalize the flag march.
It appear that the strategy is to do everything possible to create points of friction in Jerusalem. They are hoping that the media will take video of Israeli security forces pushing Arabs with flags back, and/or video of clashes on the Temple Mount to allow Jews to visit like they do every weekday. As usual, those videos will be used to charge that Israel is violently suppressing Palestinians who are just trying to peacefully protest, with the hope that this will inspire other acts of violence.
Ultimately, as is often the case, the modern antisemites want to make it more expensive for Israel to protect its citizens' rights than to give in to Palestinian threats of violence. And any specific incident has the potential to spiral out of control - something that the Palestinians are hoping for.
And all of this is artificial. There is nothing wrong with Jews marching with flags. Yet there is an entire industry dedicated to demonizing people exercising their right to peaceful assembly. The media, sadly, buys into the narrative that Palestinian Arabs are right for wanting to quash Jewish freedoms.
In 2021, Netanyahu agreed to re-route the march around the Muslim quarter of the Old City to avoid unnecessary conflict. As usual, this was interpreted by Palestinians as weakness, not conciliatory, and Hamas attacked anyway.
Netanyahu is not making that mistake this year. The threat of violence has nothing to do with the march itself - the march is an excuse for violence, not a cause.
Normal adults do not respond to perceived insults with threats of violence. The media, and the world at large, needs to stop allowing Palestinians to act like spoiled children.
