FLASH
Shkruar nga Rod Liddle
If you're already complaining that I've swallowed Hamas propaganda and that Hamas is the one stopping the aid, or that Palestinians, who are not at all hungry, are eating three full meals a day, eggs Benedict, shrimp étoufée, bananas Foster and so on, then you're suffering from an illusion.
If any other country in the Middle East had behaved as monstrously as Israel has in recent weeks, jets would be lined up on our runways, ready to do a little show-stopping bombing. Forget BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions) and diplomatic pressure. I mention this because those of us who support Israel, and have done so largely uncritically since October 7, 2023, need the scales to fall a little from our eyes, for the good of Israel, as well as for the good of those starving Palestinians.
I have been to Israel many times, as a journalist, as a vacationer, as a friend. I readily accept the argument that it is the region’s only democracy, and a liberal democracy at that, surrounded on all sides by failed authoritarian states that would like to see it wiped off the face of the earth. I also subscribe to the idea that if Palestine got what it wanted, from river to sea and all that futile rancor, then they would turn one of the most remarkable countries in the world into a variant of Somalia in about six months (if ever), regardless of how much money its naive white liberal benefactors have poured into the country. I have an absolute lack of respect for poor Arab countries that are ruled, for the most part, by bloodthirsty, intellectually challenged religious maniacs, just as I have an absolute lack of respect for rich Arab countries that were lucky enough to find an oil reservoir in their sands and have created hateful totalitarian slave states as a result.
This may be unfair, but I have the distinct feeling that Arab culture, when combined with Islam, creates a uniquely toxic mindset; a mindset fueled by absolutism, hatred, and a lack of respect for human life. I despise the savage savagery of Hamas and was fully supportive of Israel’s intervention in Gaza, even if, at the time, I thought it might be more useful to start by firing a few missiles at Tehran. Why not target the organ mill instead of its idiotic apes? Likewise, I have a strong aversion to the Keffiyeh Klan, the deluded legions of wealthy Western liberals who have enthusiastically embraced anti-Semitism and when asked to identify the sins of the world have only one answer.
In short, I am instinctively, politically, morally and pragmatically on the side of Israel. I do not want our country to recognise Palestine as a sovereign state (and Keir Starmer’s decision to do so is a stupid knee-jerk reaction to his idiot MPs. What do you know, you miserable little man?). Nor do I think, according to Starmer, that the Palestinians have “an inalienable right” to independent statehood. Just to make the point, I believe that from the Maghreb to the Levant and then east, over those vast dunes, in what used to be a much better place when it was called Persia, corrupt and vindictive regimes govern a corrupt and vindictive culture, a culture that is responsible for much of the misery in the world. Israel, then, is an oasis, so we cannot allow it to pollute its own waters. And this looks very similar to what it is doing now.
If you're already complaining that I've been buying Hamas propaganda and that Hamas is the one withholding aid, or that Palestinians, who are not hungry at all, are eating three full meals a day, eggs Benedict, shrimp étoufée, bananas Foster, and so on, then you're suffering from an illusion. If virtually every disinterested observer in the world, including the President of the United States, believes that the people of Gaza are starving and that Israel is largely responsible, then that's enough for me, honestly.
Sure, Hamas has looted aid convoys, and sure, it lies to the press, and the press is often too quick to report what it says as the truth. But that doesn’t change the fact that people, mostly innocent people, are dying, and that Israel is largely to blame. Sure, this conflict has become terribly polarized in the West, and so it’s all too easy to just keep repeating the mantra that everyone is against Israel and that you should only believe what you hear coming out of the mouths of Benjamin Netanyahu and the IDF press office. (Even then, Netanyahu admits that there are some areas where aid has not reached.) But if you accept this credo, you are morally lost. We should form opinions based on the evidence put before us, not let them be swayed by partisan loyalties, no matter how well-founded those loyalties may be.
It must be said that the United Nations must be held largely responsible for the partisan nature of the debate. Ostensibly neutral, it has vilified Israel at every turn, just as it has for the past 20 years passed resolution after resolution condemning Israel, while ignoring every other violation occurring anywhere else on Earth. It was no surprise to discover that Hamas terrorists were actively involved in UN programs. As soon as this was discovered, the terrible secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, should have resigned. In the meantime, we must move away from an organization that adheres to the patently idiotic view that the world’s ills are the result of colonialism, except when those ills are perpetrated by Israel. It is far from being a force for good. Instead, it has become a force for the propagation of post-Marxist illusions, which are patently absurd.
I don't have a solution to the crisis. Frankly, Donald Trump's idea of turning the Gaza Strip into a kind of Las Vegas, except with falafel instead of T-bone steaks, has much to commend it, but that imitation of Sodom should not be built on the bodies of dead children. We support Israel because of its erudition and strength, but above all because it has decency./ Adapted "Pamphlet" from "The Spectator".
Lini një Përgjigje