Germany has lost its collective mind
Gideon Levy in Haaretz yesterday.
Opinion |
In Israel, 20,000 Gazans Are Responsible for Their Own Deaths. Iâve Never Been So Ashamed
Dec 17, 2023 6:23 am IST
Journalist Ben Caspit epitomizes the Israeli center. He lives in Hod Hasharon and co-hosts a radio talk show with journalist Yinon Magal, who is on the extreme right. Caspit, supposedly, is not. He is a well-connected journalist, highly respected and successful.
Over the weekend, the executive director of the anti-occupation group Breaking the Silence wrote on X: âDonât look away. A CNN correspondent entered the southern Gaza Strip and opened a âwindow on the hellâ of Gaza.â
This is what Caspit, a moderate and decent person in his own eyes, had to say in response: âWhy should we look? They earned their hell honestly; I donât have an ounce of sympathy.â Caspit, as usual, is the mouthpiece of Israelâs mainstream.
Eight thousand children are to blame for their own deaths; 20,000 people are responsible for being killed; 2 million people caused their own uprooting. This is how a rich person always talks about the poor, the successful person about the less fortunate, the healthy person about the disabled, the strong about the weak, the Ashkenazi about Mizrahi Jews: They are to blame for their victimhood.
In post-October 7 Israel, one can blame 10,000 children and babies for their own deaths without Israel having even a hint of responsibility and culpability. In post-October 7 Israel, one can feel blameless only because Hamas started committing atrocities first.
A country lies in ruins and all its residents are in hell, and the generator of this hell bears no guilt, not even a tiny bit, not even together with Hamasâ guilt. The epitome of the Israeli center doesnât even have an ounce of sympathy for the amputee children shown in the courageous, horrific report of Clarissa Ward from a Rafah hospital.
Let their limbs be amputated, let the children die, let all Gazans expire, let them suffocate in hell, itâs not our business. They are responsible for their disaster, only them. Caspit is on to something here â the victim is responsible for his victimhood.
Putting aside the issue of guilt and responsibility â these are all on Hamas, not at all on Israel, whose soldiers and pilots are running wild and unbridled in Gaza â we have no hand in it, the main thing is that we feel no guilt for any of it.
Putting that aside for a moment, one needs an unbelievable degree of obtuseness, cruelty, and even barbarity to not feel at least some empathy for children dying on hospital floors, to a father crying over the body of his child, to an infant covered in the dust of his bombed house, looking in vain for someone in the world, for people living for two months in terror, in despair and with nothing left in their lives; for the hungry, the sick, the disabled and the dispossessed of the Gaza Strip.
Even empathy is prohibited in the eyes of Caspit and his ilk, lest a dangerous, forbidden thought creep in â that it is human beings who live in Gaza. This is something Israelis cannot cope with.
This is a crossing of a dangerous line which may be followed by thoughts that are alien to Israelis, regarding how far it is permissible to go for a just cause; what is permissible, and, mainly, what is prohibited under any circumstances.
There are things that are forbidden under any circumstances. The killing of 8,000 children in two months, for example. Caspit and his folks only want to cheer the heroic army without seeing its handiwork.
Humaneness is forbidden, we are Israeli. When an earthquake happens anywhere on the globe, weâll send aid and be proud of ourselves, but mass killing in Gaza is not our business. Thatâs the way Israelâs morality works. Itâs meant to allow Caspit, not just Magal, to feel good about themselves about Gaza.
At an international conference held last weekend in Istanbul, I said, among other things, that never have I been so ashamed to be Israeli as I have been in viewing pictures from Gaza. These words were posted on a popular Israeli entertainment website. Over the weekend, I received hundreds (perhaps thousands by now) of abusive calls and text messages. One can often learn about a society through its sewers. Together we will win, goes the current slogan.
However, the distance between the sewage flowing my way and the ostensibly respectable words of Caspit is smaller than one imagines. There is no difference between the hatred of Arabs and their dehumanization, as expressed in the vulgar, inarticulate language of my callers, and the well-formulated words of Caspit.
Both the lower and higher Israel have lost their human image. This is reason enough to be ashamed of being Israeli.
Theyâre a genocidal society at this stage. I said it a good while ago, I donât know how they can be walked back to anything approaching normality. Itâs worse theyâre getting, the enraged denial of any possible guilt or wrongdoing and insistence they are the only victims is driving it on further in a vicious circle.
I agree. The propaganda techniques and the self-deception techniques they employ are fascinating in the grimmest way possible. Itâs so reminiscent of Nazi propaganda.
Excellent article. Sheâs a terrific writer. There isnât much real difference between Israel and ISIS in terms of their respective hatreds for other peopleâs cultural treasures. ISIS are just more honest about it.
The IHRA definition and examples of anti-Semitism are bullshit, a political project designed to censor and silence criticism of Israel.
https://twitter.com/derJamesJackson/status/1736815095131549801
This poor girlâs story was reported on Channel 4 News tonight. Her story is over.
3 Likes
A modern day SS at play here.The irony is lost on the filth.
Human nature,eh?
1 Like
They even hate donkeys the cunts.What a horrible race of bastardâs they are.
1 Like
Indeed. Absolute cunts
2 Likes
âPrecision strikesâ
And the sickos watching on from Israel cheering.
1 Like
They picked up all those tactics from their Nazi masters
And they are pure brazen about it.They dont give a fuck what anyone thinks.
I often wondered to myself why Jews have been disliked so much down through the ages.Even old Irish had a serious issue with them.
My eyes are well and truly opened the last couple of months.
1 Like
Tbf even some Israeli ppl are totally against itâs government policy ref Palestinian 
people
But youâre right they donât give a fuck
Uncle Sam backs them no matter what they do
1 Like
I just comprehend how journalists & politicians can carry on like this in the public eye.
What is driving these people to be so openly racist & so full of hate?
I noted even on News at 1 yesterday that Dobbo was still peddling the line that 1200 Israelis were Murdered on Oct 7th when that figure is widely questioned by most media at the moment.
Just how much power do they carry that Countries are afraid to call this behaviour out?
1 Like
Hereâs another one.
https://twitter.com/_ZachFoster/status/1737596433249783815
Hereâs Rachel Maddow explaining why they do it. It works. Propaganda is like a tsunami. It consumes all before it. It whips people into the behaviour of the mob, be they online or offline. Thereâs an almost sexual energy that comes from that. Itâs a drug and like lots of drugs, is very dangerous.
1 Like