Jonathan Tobin: Anti-Israel virtue-signaling on Gaza is immoral
As has been the case for decades, those who criticize or condemn Israel act as if the Palestinians have no moral agency for their conduct or fate.Kurt Schlichter: Reject the Moral Blackmail of the Marxist/Jihadi Axis
Instead, Israel-bashers and the “more in sorrow than anger” critics who lament its alleged betrayal of Jewish traditions seem to think that the Palestinians have no responsibility for what has happened and must be saved from the consequences of their actions, no matter how often they reject peace or even just a cessation of hostilities. They don’t care that Israel has fought this war with greater morality and concern for the safety of civilians than in any prior instance of urban combat. Instead, they demand something unique in history: that an aggrieved combatant in a war forced upon them assume complete responsibility for the enemy population even before their opponents surrender.
Israel has gone a long way toward doing just that by allowing aid into Gaza throughout the current conflict. Even that unprecedented gesture has not been enough to silence critics.
Israel isn’t perfect, and neither is Netanyahu. But the prime minister’s resolve in pursuing his country’s war goals in the face of overwhelming American pressure prior to Trump returning to office in January and the drumbeat of unfair international opprobrium since Oct. 8 has enhanced his country’s security immeasurably. Treating the continuation of the war until victory as merely a cynical political ploy on his part or a hateful desire for revenge on the Palestinians is unfair. It also does real damage to Israel’s ability to defend itself against enemies that are still seeking to shed Jewish blood.
That’s why it’s vital to understand that the Jewish virtue-signaling about Gaza is more than just misguided moral posturing.
By taking sides against Israel and joining the chorus of those who seek to delegitimize its self-defense and force an end to the war in a way that clearly grants a triumph to Hamas, these “as a Jew” critics, like Stewart or Patinkin, are giving aid and comfort to genocidal Islamists that is as real as the suffering of the Palestinians. The same is true of many in the Reform movement who have allowed their progressive politics to get in the way of the religious denomination’s moral compass.
It’s also important to point out that those who make these criticisms have no answers as to how Israel can defend itself in a way that will not harm Palestinian civilians, while at the same time, Hamas is determined to maximize their suffering. Anguish about the situation of the Palestinians won’t make things better for them. On the contrary, by lending their voices to the information war against Israel, they ensure that they remain under the thumb of Hamas and others who are similarly committed to the destruction of the Jewish state.
Joining the mob
Though those who speak for Israel and the IDF can always do better, the information war against Israel that is being conducted in bad faith won’t be won by better communication strategies. The only way through is for Jerusalem to stick to its justified demands for an end to Hamas rule in Gaza and for those who care about the Jewish state to give it their backing, despite the temptation to join the mobs smearing it.
Virtue-signaling about Gaza starvation isn’t a reflection of Jewish values. It is a gift to the enemies of the Jewish people, whose goal is the shedding of more Jewish blood.
War remains, as it has always been: sheer hell. The only moral way to end this one is with Hamas’s surrender of control of every inch of Gaza and freedom for all of the hostages. Those who deviate from those demands are doing great harm to both sides in this war to feel good about themselves and to stay in sync with liberal political fashion. And that’s not merely wrong, but deeply, deeply immoral.
Our enemies have no moral standing. Everything they say is a lie. We cannot let them morally browbeat us into choosing suicide. The ugly truth is that Jews can’t die in enough numbers for their enemies to stop hating them. But that also applies to those of us who are not Jewish. Our Marxist/jihadi enemies would not break stride if they made their Holocaust II fantasy come true (their perverse fantasy of “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” means free of breathing Jews) and would immediately get onto killing the rest of us. That’s why I’m going to side with civilization and continue to advocate for the total destruction of the Marxist/jihadist enemy.Seth Mandel: Democrats, anti-Zionism, and the Worst Interview of All Time
The Gazans are enduring hardships, but this is not a bug. It is a feature. Bad things should happen to people who start wars, particularly with grotesque rape and murder sprees. This tends to discourage future wars, but understand that the Marxist/jihadi doesn’t want to discourage future wars. The Marxist/jihadi wants to win future wars and intends to do so by morally hamstringing those fighting against it.
Israel should have cut off all food, water, and power to Gaza on October 7. That’s how sieges work. It should have attacked with unrestrained fury until the enemy was completely annihilated. That’s how wars are fought, with the objective being victory. It’s how they’ve always been fought throughout history. When did it suddenly become the duty of the side winning a war to start taking care of the enemy’s logistical needs during the war? I find it bizarre that not only would some people expect the forces of civilization to fight in a manner unknown to human beings before last week – somehow the righteous besieger is now responsible for the logistic support of those resisting the siege – but that people within the scope of civilization would accept this concept.
We are under no moral obligation to allow the enemies of civilization to survive. That means finish Hamas. If their families suffer as a result of their conduct, they are free to relieve that suffering by total and unconditional surrender. Enemies of humanity must be defeated. Anybody who is a friend of the swamp of human waste known as Hamas is an enemy of humanity.
The only way we can lose the war against the semi-human savages of Marxist/jihadi barbarism is to choose to be defeated. That choice manifests as refusing to win the war in the way that human beings have won wars for 5,000 years. The choice to embrace brand-new rules and norms that have never existed within the history of conflict, which somehow shield the aggressor from righteous retribution, is a suicidal one, and we must have no part of it.
Remember, the Marxist/jihadi axis and their pathetic, morally illiterate American and other Western allies would gleefully cheer as you are actively exterminated. If we submit to their moral blackmail, they will have the chance to exterminate you actively, and they will do it. The only way they can defeat you is if you are both weak and stupid enough to submit. Reject the aptly named David French and his fellow submissives.
The answer to the Gaza problem is to annihilate Hamas and anybody helping it. It is to inflict righteous retribution such that no one dares start another war. This is what history teaches. This is the way.
The truly soul-crushing part of Sen. Elissa Slotkin’s interview on Breaking Points yesterday comes when she tells the progressive host about running in an election while the Israel-Gaza conflict was raging:
“There was no issue that was more difficult for me in this last, I would say six years but certainly in this last election, other than this issue, because it’s personal.”
Slotkin is Jewish. She came to office, first as a member of the House, as a moderate Democrat with a background in national security. But in office, she has steadily become a vocal critic of Israel and gone noticeably quiet on the issue of anti-Semitism. The worse the domestic situation for Jews became, the greater her indifference to it seemed to be.
So when she went on a show known for its anti-Zionist conspiracy theories (the first question to Slotkin yesterday was about whether Jeffrey Epstein was an intelligence asset, perhaps run by Israel) and its overt reliance on Hamas propaganda for its broadcasts, it could have been a “Sister Souljah moment” for Slotkin, an opportunity to push back on the hate.
Then she said “it’s personal,” and I thought we’d get a statement of pride in her Jewish faith. Instead, Slotkin said this:
“There was no issue that was more difficult for me in this last, I would say six years but certainly in this last election, other than this issue, because it’s personal: I’m a Middle East analyst by training.”
The genocidal war against the Jews and the explosion of anti-Semitism in her state and beyond is personal to this Jewish senator, because she’s… a Middle East analyst by training.
I’ve rewatched the clip several times, each time hoping I was hallucinating. But, like the old joke about the guy who watches reruns of the evening news, it always ended the same way.
The interview itself is not an especially easy watch. It’s as if the Hindenburg and Chernobyl had coincided. At one point hostess Krystal Ball asked Slotkin why she even agreed to appear on their show. It was the only good question she or her cohost asked Slotkin.
