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Home » On Israel’s choices

On Israel’s choices

The New Neo Posted on by

Here’s a tweet I saw that refers to the Arab Bedouin Israeli hostage who was held by Hamas and recently rescued by the IDF:

I wonder if the Jew-haters will pause for a moment to realize the effort Israel put into liberating a single Arab Muslim.

It’s rhetorical, because the person writing that clearly doesn’t wonder at all. The answer is clear: if Jew-haters/Israel-haters do realize the magnitude of that effort, their goal will be to ignore, deny, bury, minimize, and/or lie about the news. Because Israel is an “apartheid” state, don’t you know? And they also will continue to ignore the fact that on October 7 Hamas killed Israeli Arabs and also took Israeli Arabs hostage, as well as the same for citizens from other countries who happened to be working in Israel at the time.

Hamas does not care in the least about these things, nor do its legions of supporters. And of course, Hamas cares just as little about its own citizens, except as pawns to be deliberately put in harm’s way and die when Israel tries to defend itself or fight Hamas. To Hamas, Palestinian deaths at Israel’s hands – or deaths that can be falsely portrayed as being at Israel’s hands, as happens time and again – are a big bonus.

I’ve already discussed that phenomenon time and again, as regular readers here are well aware. And I’m just one small voice among so many who have been saying it over and over for years. But the lies of the left seem louder, even in the face of incidents like this hostage rescue which dramatically point out the difference, which is that Hamas values death and Israel values life – even the lives of Arabs. That was pointed out so long ago that it was Israeli Prime Minster Golda Meir who said: “We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children. We cannot forgive them for forcing us to kill their children. We will only have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us.”

Meir was Israel’s prime minister from 1969 to 1974. That’s fifty years ago. And she was Israel’s foreign minister from 1956 to 1966. As best I can determine, she started saying something to that effect in the 1950s and said it several times after. It’s still true of the majority of the people who call themselves Palestinians.

Meir said something else I noticed on that page of quotes, a 1973 statement of hers I’d never seen before but which remains very true today (not of Egypt and some of the Gulf states, or of Jordan, but of many of the rest including non-Arab Iran, and of enormous numbers of supporters in Western countries). Here it is:

I guess we have no choice. Either we do everything that is possible, and may seem to others as impossible, and just give up. Or we do everything that is really impossible and we remain alive. There’s one more basic thing that I think that people outside of Israel must realize, and if they understand and accept that, maybe other things will fall into place.

For instance, we’re not the only people in the world who’ve had difficulties with neighbors; that has happened to many. We are the only country in the world whose neighbors do not say, “We are going to war because we want a certain piece of land from Israel,” or waterways or anything of that kind. We’re the only people in the world where our neighbors openly announce they just won’t have us here. And they will not give up fighting and they will not give up war as long as we remain alive. Here.

So this is the crux of the problem: it isn’t anything concrete that they want from us. That’s why it doesn’t make sense when people say, “Give up this and give up the other place. Give up the Golan Heights,” for instance. What happened when we were not on the Golan Heights? We were not on the Golan Heights before ’67, and for 19 years, Syria had guns up there and shot at our agricultural settlements below. We were not on the Golan Heights! So what, if we give up the Golan Heights, they will stop shooting? We were not in the Suez Canal when the war started.

It’s because Egypt and Syria and the other Arab countries refuse to acquiesce to our existence. Therefore there can be no compromise. They say we must be dead. And we say we want to be alive. Between life and death, I don’t know of a compromise. And that’s why we have no choice.

Comments

On Israel’s choices — 18 Comments

  1. There are Arab Jews, and Arab Christians, it only seems that the Islamic Arabs that are filled with an all consuming hate. Make of that what you will.

  3. Unfortunately, events in the US make it clear that the elimination of Jews in general is the goal of the Islamists, not just those in Israel, which is their immediate goal. Nor should Christians think they are exempt from the hatred.

  4. Instead of saying “and that’s why we have no choice,” she should have said “and that’s why we choose not to compromise.”

    She did have a choice. But one of the choices was intolerable and unacceptable.

    Still is.

  5. SCOTT the BADGER:

    I don’t doubt that, on the whole, Arab Christians of Palestinian descent who live in this country are more Israel-friendly than Arab Muslims of Palestinian descent who live in this country. But Arab Christians who still live in Gaza and the West Bank – at least the vocal ones I’ve seen being interviewed – appear just as full of hatred as Muslim Palestinians, unfortunately. They may just be paying lip service to Hamas, etc., because of where they live, and not really feel it in their hearts. But I have no way to determine that.

    Also, Sirhan Sirhan was from a Christian Palestinian background.

    Some history:

    Palestinian Christians have played a role in the anti-Zionist movement and related political violence, both before and after the establishment of Israel in 1948.

    During the 1936-1939 revolt in British Palestine, the Palestinian Arab rebels bore flags with a cross and crescent, symbolizing Christianity and Islam, respectively. At least 282 rebel leaders participated in the revolt, four of which were Christians.

    The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) was founded in 1967 by George Habash, a Christian.[64][65][66] Habash once stated that he believed there was perfect harmony between his Christian religion, his Arab nationalism, his Islamic culture, and his Marxist politics. Wadie Haddad, the leader of the military wing of the PFLP, was also Christian. Reportedly, Eastern Orthodox priests would bless PFLP hijacking teams before they set out on attacks.

    Sirhan Sirhan, who assassinated Robert F. Kennedy in 1968, came from a Christian family and later changed church denominations several times, joining Baptist and Seventh-day Adventist churches. However, in 1966, he joined the esoteric organization Ancient Mystical Order of the Rose Cross, one of the Rosicrucian Orders.

    A Jordanian Christian, Nayef Hawatmeh, leads a Palestinian organization, the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), which broke off from the PFLP in 1969.

    The 1972 Munich massacre was perpetrated by the Black September Organization, which called its operation “Iqrit and Biram”, after two Christian villages whose inhabitants were expelled by the IDF during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. Luttif Afif, the commander of the unit that carried out the massacre, was reported to have a Christian father and used the alias “Jesus”.

    The Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades has had a Christian presence as well. Two of their militants, Chris Bandak and Daniel Abu Hamama, both Christians from Bethlehem, participated in anti-Zionist violence. Bandak was imprisoned by Israel for shooting at Israeli motorists during the Second Intifada, and was later released in 2011 as part of an exchange for the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit. Daniel Abu Hamama, who was also a senior Tanzim operative, was killed by Israel in 2006. An image was later taken of Hamama’s Christian funeral in Bethlehem.

  7. There is a certain cohort of American Christians who aren’t so generous toward Jews, Israeli or not.

  8. Richard Aubrey:

    American Christians are generally Israel’s best friends and defenders. But go back in time to the early part of the 20th century and before, and the picture is different. And you are correct that there’s a small subgroup of Christians who are still anti-Israel and anti-Jewish. One vocal example would be Candace Owens.

  9. I regret to say that I met some Arabic-speaking Christians who were reflexively anti-semitic. It seems to come from the culture and the language.

  10. We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children. We cannot forgive them for forcing us to kill their children. We will only have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us.

    Heavy…

  12. Neo to Richard. Exactly. This is my understanding, too.

    Karmi. Quoting a classic very Gandhi-esque line by Golda Meir, has anyone else seen “Golda”? The biopic out just over a year ago?

    Compellingly played by Helen Mirren, “the film depicts the actions of Golda Meir, the 4th Prime Minister of Israel, during the Yom Kippur War, writes Wiki.

    In a positive review, Matt Goldberg describes the film as “an acknowledgment of sacrifice” and “cold pragmatism leading to the warmth of peace.” [-Times of Israel] In a negative review, the film was described as “typical Israeli propaganda,” by Ramzy Baroud, published in Arab News and Middle East Monitor.

    Critics were, Wiki reports, evenly divided. But at IMDB, the vox popoli vote it virtually a 6 out of 10. I think it’s better than that.

    I’ve only seen half of it on cable TV, the last half. I found it riveting. All the more so because it’s so effective on a small budget. A drama of that historic point and place in time, and the toughest decision-making. And PM Golda, becoming a legend.

    Trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HZLQhuEI-o

  14. neo
    That’s some Christians. Not wanting to name denominations, but I’ve been in discussion groups among various churches in town. One, sometimes described as Presbyterians who can afford shoes. No, it’s Presbyterians who can live on their means. Anyway…..if I wore a tee shirt which said, “I STAND WITH ISRAEL” to that church, the prosecutor would probably say I was looking for a fight.

    Nope. The Presbyterians are warning against Christian Zionism and pretty much take Palestinian “news” as, you should excuse the term, gospel.

    The Jews’ safe spaces will be, as I’ve said before, NASCAR events and Baptist churches.

  15. Related?
    Via Bari Weiss:
    “A Palestinian Dissident’s Remarkable Story”—
    https://mosaicmagazine.com/picks/israel-zionism/2024/08/a-palestinian-dissidents-remarkable-story/
    https://www.thefp.com/p/the-price-of-speaking-out-a-palestinian-72c

    Immediately after learning of the October 7 attacks, a young Palestinian living in the West Bank took to social media to convey his horror at what had occurred. He now fears for his life and rarely leaves his family home….

    – – – – – – – – – – – – –
    Other recent links from Mosaic, which is a remarkable “clearing house” on a wide range of topics focusing on Jews, Judaism and Israel:
    https://mosaicmagazine.com/about-us/
    https://mosaicmagazine.com/observation/politics-current-affairs/2024/08/podcast-adam-kirsch-on-settler-colonialism/
    https://mosaicmagazine.com/essay/israel-zionism/2023/09/the-perennial-power-of-the-nakba/

  18. Douglas Murray, Brit writer and journalist, has a lot on youtube. Worth watching for his take on Islam and Europe, so forth.
    WRT the current war and Oct 7, he refers to “Me Too” and “Believe All Women”, except, apparently, if they’re Jews.

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