Scott Gurvey's Public Offerings

I could never have imagined, three years ago, as I listened to the horrific news coming out of Israel, that I would be writing a post such as this.

For the many who seem to have forgotten, On the morning of October 7, 2023, Hamas terrorists broke through the fence separating Gaza and Israel and killed roughly 1,200 people, many teenagers attending a music festival, and dragged 251 hostages back into Gaza. There they were met by cheering crowds of Gazans. It was the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust. By the next day, Israel was already being accused of “genocide” on social media and in the streets, even though Israel’s ground operation into Gaza had not yet started.

The “Gaza Genocide” is one of the biggest lies of the 21st century. It was generated and promoted by anti-Zionist and antisemitic networks following the October 7 Massacre to prevent Israel from saving its hostages, to delegitimize the Jewish state, and to fuel global antisemitism. Three years after their murderous attack, the people of Gaza claim to be the victims.

Try watching some of the footage from Hamas GoPro videos which they shared with pride, so the world would see the barbaric genocide they committed against Israelis and non-Jews in Israel. Victims don’t take hostages and start wars. Hamas did exactly that. The videos have been vetted. They are horrific. Israel is showing an extended edit of the Hamas generated videos in a documentary titled, Bearing Witness to the October 7th Massacre. Excerpts and reports from people who have viewed it are on YouTube although, as of this writing, the entire video is not.

The word “genocide” means to deliberately and systematically kill or persecute a large number of people from a particular national or ethnic group, with the aim of destroying that nation. But Gaza officials themselves report a population decline of about 10% since the start of the war in 2023, mostly through displacement. More than two million remain. That’s not a genocide.

And there are nearly two million Arab Palestinian Muslims who are Israeli citizens, descendants of those Arabs who stayed when the United Nations created the Jewish state in 1947. These citizens of Israel live, work, practice their religion, raise families, hold government positions, serve in law enforcement, serve in the military, and vote in Israel. To accuse Israel of genocide is absurd.

Has there been death and destruction in Gaza since October 7? Of course. Is that tragic? Yes. But this is as willed by Hamas, the duly elected government of Gaza. This is war. Hamas knew their slaughter of Israelis on October 7 would provoke a massive response. What, if you were running Israel, would you have done? The greatest trick Hamas pulled was to build 500 km of bomb shelters, provoke a war, refuse to let Gaza civilians take shelter, and convince the world to blame Israel for their deaths.

The Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, says, “The scale of killing in Gaza is unlike anything I’ve witnessed in my years as Secretary-General.” Really? Since he took office in 2017 120,000 have been killed in Syria, 150,000 killed in Sudan, 162,000 killed in Ethiopia, and 200,000 killed in Yemen. In Gaza, according to Hamas’s own reports, there have been about 70,000 deaths. More than half of the dead were Hamas fighters. That is what happens when you start a war. But different standards apply to Israel at the UN.

In sum, 3% of Gaza’s population, mostly male combatants, have died in a war they started. That is not genocide. 96% of Jews in Poland were murdered by the Nazis. That is a genocide.

If Israel wanted to kill every single Palestinian, it could have. It is a nuclear power. Why did it distribute polio vaccines to the children of Gaza? Why did it allow any food in at all? (The food is frequently stolen by Hamas fighters). Why does Israel continue to supply water and electric power to Gaza? Why did Israel drop leaflets in different neighborhoods, repeatedly saying please get out of this neighborhood because Hamas solders are operating there and we are going to attack?

Of course, Israel’s actions can be questioned. Israel will consider these issues itself when it votes for its legislature at the end of this month. But to call its actions in Gaza a genocide is a libel. It runs along with the claim that Israel is intentionally starving Palestinians (the famine libel, disproven by the UN’s own reports) or deliberately murdering Palestinian children (the child-killer libel, from a UN document with no evidence or source). I will not forget politicians or others in the public square who equivocate, justify, or excuse Hamas.

The genocide charge fails from its sheer implausibility, combined with the moral offense of accusing Jews of the very crime that had been inflicted upon them in the Holocaust, as well as a still-resilient Western cultural memory and a robust liberal consensus. It must not become established as fact now.

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