Monday is the first anniversary of the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, and the protests have already begun. Palestinians activists shut down Lake Shore Drive Saturday afternoon. More are scheduled over the next few days.
A person from Mars considering the situation afresh might be forgiven for wondering what the Palestinians are protesting — the attacks that their own elected proxy, Hamas, carried out against their neighbor Israel, killing 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping another 200 more? What exactly is their point of grievance there?
And the answer is, Oct. 7 is passed by with barely a glance. They are upset about the war sparked by the attack, and the 42,000 Palestinians killed in the war in Gaza against Hamas, which exists in an extensive network of tunnels and safe buildings in civilian areas.
And the answer is, Oct. 7 is passed by with barely a glance. They are upset about the war sparked by the attack, and the 42,000 Palestinians killed in the war in Gaza against Hamas, which exists in an extensive network of tunnels and safe buildings in civilian areas.
The attacks should never have happened, the thinking seems to be, because Israel should never have been there in the first place. The Jews who have lived there for thousands of years, well, don't count, as Jews tend not to, and should instead be thriving at that magical place where all Jews everywhere are supposed to go, far away from where they actually are.
So, in retrospect, do Palestinians think the Oct. 7 attack was a good idea? If pressed, they explain that the attacks are "resistance" against the colonial occupation of Israel in 1948, when people who never lived there somehow just showed up and took possession of the land while the original residents fled. Can you really blame someone for seizing a nation that was so easy pickings? A fruit trembling on the vine, so ready to fall that a bunch of emaciated DPs can show up from Europe, pick up a few sticks and seize the place?
That isn't true. But it's the premise used to justify the attacks. The Palestinian strategy for a long time has to be commit yet another brutal terror attack, rationalized as resistance, then point to the reaction to that attack as evidence of the depravity of the people they've just attacked, ignoring of course the provocation. The story begins Oct. 8. The story always begins the hour after the terror attack. I punch you, then fall to the floor howling when you punch me back. This approach hasn't gotten them very far, but they're all in. Mistaking attention for success, they're going to think it worked, and do it some more. Which is one reason the war continues (the other is that Benjamin Netanyahu is the worst prime minister in Israeli history).
The questions that would come to that Mars visitor — Gee, if these people are such brutal monsters, why do you keep attacking them in strategically unsound ways that always blow back on you far worse than they do on the Israelis? And the answer, again, is, because resistance. Because, from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free. They have a dream, and this is the way they are going about trying to get it. How's that workin' for ya? Because from my perspective, not all that well.
Okay, it is not working for them at all. That a certain swath of left-leaning Americans buy it is not the endorsement they think it is. Because the kids will rush over to some new cause. They already have. The war grinds on, and campuses are ... well ... pretty quiet.
So, in retrospect, do Palestinians think the Oct. 7 attack was a good idea? If pressed, they explain that the attacks are "resistance" against the colonial occupation of Israel in 1948, when people who never lived there somehow just showed up and took possession of the land while the original residents fled. Can you really blame someone for seizing a nation that was so easy pickings? A fruit trembling on the vine, so ready to fall that a bunch of emaciated DPs can show up from Europe, pick up a few sticks and seize the place?
That isn't true. But it's the premise used to justify the attacks. The Palestinian strategy for a long time has to be commit yet another brutal terror attack, rationalized as resistance, then point to the reaction to that attack as evidence of the depravity of the people they've just attacked, ignoring of course the provocation. The story begins Oct. 8. The story always begins the hour after the terror attack. I punch you, then fall to the floor howling when you punch me back. This approach hasn't gotten them very far, but they're all in. Mistaking attention for success, they're going to think it worked, and do it some more. Which is one reason the war continues (the other is that Benjamin Netanyahu is the worst prime minister in Israeli history).
The questions that would come to that Mars visitor — Gee, if these people are such brutal monsters, why do you keep attacking them in strategically unsound ways that always blow back on you far worse than they do on the Israelis? And the answer, again, is, because resistance. Because, from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free. They have a dream, and this is the way they are going about trying to get it. How's that workin' for ya? Because from my perspective, not all that well.
Okay, it is not working for them at all. That a certain swath of left-leaning Americans buy it is not the endorsement they think it is. Because the kids will rush over to some new cause. They already have. The war grinds on, and campuses are ... well ... pretty quiet.
There is no end to this conversation, so I'll just stop. Final thought: imagine this for a moment: in the year 2200, Israel is still a nation, most likely. Where will the Palestinians be? In a place they hope to find themselves? And is their current strategy bringing them closer to that place, or further away?
A very informative article.
ReplyDeleteAnd, we, the United States and the rest of the "right-thinking" world, do not bother to remind the world that the October 7, 2023 attacks and kidnappings started all this.
DeleteThe real problem is the basic Arab mentality. They have been at war with the rest of the world since that lunatic Muhammed created his insane religion! His priorities were wars to conquer all & make them believe as he did, no alcohol, subjugate the women & no fun, fun was for after you're dead & have gone to his weird version of heaven. Then several hundred years after he croaked, a caliph declared there was nothing new to be learned, so the Arabs, who really were the first great astronomers & mathematicians, just think how many stars have Arabic name & the Arabs gave us the zero, which they got from the early Hindus, which made all mathematical calculations possible, which couldn't be done with Roman numerals. So they've been frozen educationally for over 800 years.
ReplyDeleteAs Neil DeGrasse Tyson pointed out in a lecture, the Arab world, over a billion people have won exactly one Nobel Prize, in literature, while the 18 million Jews of the world have won over 25% of all the science, medical & the Nobel Memorial prizes in economics.
So they hate everyone else, because they can't invent or create anything useful for the themselves or the rest of the world.
They hate that tiny Israel has a massive technical industry, compared to its actual size.
They hate the US & the rest of the Western world, but use our weapons & cellphones & computers. Look at the rich Saudis & Gulf Arabs, they are so lazy & corrupt, they have to hire millions of others, mostly from poor Asian countries, to do the actual work to keep their societies running.
They are a failed society % know it, which is the real source of their hatreds & if it were possible to give them their own planet, we would have to give them horses & mules to pull the plows, because they would never figure out how to maintain machinery!
Clark Street. I don't know why I try to understand what it is that you're saying I guess. I hope that underneath it all there's some sense to be found.
DeleteBlaming this entire situation and the prophet Muhammad and Islam dear the Lord man, have you ever heard of the crusades?
And you realize that our country brings in millions of immigrants to keep our society running and that some of the hatred that muslims have for us is valid. Do you know the history of the shah of Iran? Do you remember the Iraq war ?completely Unjustified.
You might want to consider taking some kind of pill
And you don't realize the hatred they have for us, because we're successful! As for the shah, I'll bet that 99% of Iranian women were happier then, they didn't have to worry about getting beaten to death by the insane vice police over whether their hair is showing! The Arabs didn't care about the Iraq war, they fully supported it in Saudi Arabia & the Gulf states.
DeleteYou might look into reading actual history, instead of blaming the USA for all the world's ills!
You make some valid points, Clark St.
DeleteOf course, you are right, and it needed to be said.
ReplyDeleteThanks for explaining it so clearly. I get it.
ReplyDeleteThat’s for saying the things that many don’t understand
ReplyDeleteMr. Steinberg I agree. As I have said before, maybe even here that the Israel and the Palestinians have reached the last man standing condition. The hatred and anger have gotten so deep that many on either side just can’t conceive of any way to make peace. So this will go on and on till one person is left on one side or the other and that person will declare victory. Then be immediately replaced by immigrants who move into the open lands thus negating all the hate. I hope still I am wrong but watching most of the entire world flirting with dictators I don’t have much.
ReplyDeleteIf you want to read some. Bullshit look at the Wikipedia entry for the expulsion of the Palestinians in 1948.
ReplyDeleteWhereas all of the things I had read over the last few years demonstrated that the Palestinians fled were refused by other surrounding countries, and when the Arabs invaded the new country of Israel, the Palestinians continued to flee in the face of the Arabs attempt to chase the new Jews out
Now somebody called the new historians is hijacking that narrative and calling it ethnic cleansing
It seems that nothing that the Palestinians do or that other Arabs have perpetrated actually happened and that everything is blamed on the Jews now. Revisionist history gone wild.
Your description is spot on of how so many people want to look at the actions of the Israeli government over the last year in a vacuum as though there was no provocation whatsoever
As bad as the Israeli leadership is under netanyahu, I hope the push on the forces surrounding Israel to move back or be decimated continues and that the American government in the odd way that they support Israel continues that support.
I would like to see the Biden administration support or spearhead a strike on the Iranian nuclear facilities to set back their ability to produce a nuclear weapon by a few years. Again. Trump really made a mass of things by backing out of the deal with Iran
The Iranians thinking that they can shoot missiles at Israel without retaliation are out of their freaking minds. Hit him and hit him hard
If people want this war to end, they should demand that Hamas surrender and return the hostages that Hezbollah move back behind the river in Lebanon as they agreed 20 years ago and Yemen stop striking random shipping
All the Arab armies in 1948, told their people to flee the new Israel, so they could come in & kill all the Jews there. Except that didn't happen, the Israelis defeated them all & now the former inhabitants were refugees in Arab countries, but the Arabs really didn't want them there, so they put them in refugee camps for over 75 years. The facts are, the rest of the Arab world hates the so-called Palestinians, because they're so violent, incompetent, stupid & refuse to make a deal with Israel! Not one Arab country would resettle any of them permanently!
DeleteInteresting points, Clark St.
DeleteI gather, from the absence of the “read further” link that this entry is not going to appear in the SunTimes, which is a shame.
ReplyDeleteMay I also express some dismay about the number of comments from that prolific scribe Anonymous.
Yes, at this point, submitting this sort of thing would just be a waste of time. I wrote another piece I thought could actually get published, and was right, since it's running tomorrow. Remember the old Marshall Field's slogan? "Give the lady what she wants." That's my motto too.
Delete@Neil why not have a ONE State solution? One man and on vote, it worked in South Africa. The whites of South Africa were horrified about black majority rule and the country became a beautiful democracy.
ReplyDeleteWhich is what Israel has. One quarter of the country are Muslim Arabs. Nobody seems no notice them, because they rarely kill people. Let me ask you this: how well is the Palestinian audition to be welcomed in going? I'm not sure a scan of current events in South Africa quite justify "a beautiful democracy."
DeleteAlso, at current birth rates it would only be a few decades before the Muslim Arabs outnumbered the Jews in Israel. Not so sure that the Israelis are comfortable with that. Notion
DeleteIf Orangy and Bibi are in charge a year from now, things will be much, much worse.
ReplyDeleteCan I like this?
Delete