Savages, Civilization, Israel, and the West

One should resist the temptation of separating Hamas from the Palestinian people.  There is broad popular support for Hamas in Gaza; they were elected overwhelmingly in the one election held.  Palestinians embrace acts of terror by Hamas and other Muslim terrorist groups.  They celebrate them.  If Hamas had 

the wherewithal to do to all of Israel what they did in the southern part recently, there would be ecstatic merrymaking for months.

The Palestinian terrorists chose the timing of their massacre of the Jews strategically.  It was the fiftieth anniversary of the beginning of the Yom Kippur War, in 1973. It was also a Jewish holiday that comes at the end of Sukkot known as Shemini Atzeret/Simchat Torah, a celebration of the renewal of the Torah reading cycle.  They knew the Israelis would be resting or in prayer, cell phones off, and not prepared for an attack.  And so, they celebrated by slaughtering some 1400 innocent Jews, men, women, children, and babies. 

There is a sociopathology amongst Palestinians, particularly those living in Gaza, but elsewhere as well.  Embracing victimhood, they are also ready to strike out with extreme violence, as the world has seen.  They are among the most subsidized people in the world, pampered and indulged by the “international community,” receiving billions of dollars in aid every year, a form of protection money.  They are also the darlings of the media, NGOs, aid organizations, the EU, and the UN.  With all this attention and coddling for so unworthy a cause and people, their violent tendencies well known, and especially with so many other conflicted and underserved areas of the world, is there any wonder they act as they do?  They are the terrorist equivalent of spoiled children and know the world will support them, regardless of how heinous their crimes.

Israel left Gaza in 2005, thus ending the “occupation.” In 2006, Palestinians voted Hamas in over the Palestinian Authority.  In June of 2007, Hamas launched a brutal takeover of Gaza and massacred their Muslim compatriots in the Palestinian Authority by hurling them off roofs, shooting them in the head in front of loved ones, or dragging them through the streets chained to cars. They are a recognized terrorist organization that calls openly for the destruction of the state of Israel and do not recognize Israel’s right to exist. An offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, they seek not just the death of Israel but all of Christendom and the West and to create a global caliphate. 

But Hamas is merely a reflection of its people.  It is not, as it is often portrayed, of poor Palestinians dominated by the kleptocrat terrorists that form Hamas. Not at all.  The people are Hamas.  They embrace and support Hamas.  

Gaza and the Palestinians should be a wild success story.  They receive tremendous amounts of aid, are beloved by the West and the liberal establishment, and doted on by the media and the UN.  They enjoy a favorable climate, pitched on the Mediterranean Sea as they are, with gorgeous beaches and neighbors to a highly intelligent, dynamic people that can readily employ them.  They themselves are known to be an industrious, innovative people.  So, why do they not flourish? Because like Hamas, the Palestinians are obsessed with death and killing, and not building a lawful, thriving, civil society.  Combine that with equal measures of self-pity and hatred, and you wind up not with Miami on the Mediterranean, but Mogadishu.  

It is also odd, that Israel is portrayed in the media as a villainous oppressor over the pathetic, helpless, long-suffering, poor Palestinians.  One would think that the Jewish people have some claim to victimhood, not that they want or need it.  But isn’t it the case that the Jews are the most victimized people on earth and through history?  And not the poor Palestinians?  For the last 2000 years, since the calamitous Roman war of annihilation against the Jews and the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD, Jews have largely been a stateless, ghettoized people subject to the will and whim of the surrounding Christian or Muslim majority.  They have endured expulsions, pogroms, massacres, ghettoes, second class status, and a minor item known as the Holocaust.  But just the raw numbers alone should suggest the absurdity of the fantasy of Jewish oppressors.  There are half a billion Arabs and nearly 2 billion Muslims.  And 16 million Jews. There are 22 Arab nations and some 50 Muslim nations.  And one Jewish state, barely a pinprick on the world map.  How could a single tiny Jewish nation, Israel, scarcely the size of the state of New Jersey, a mere 6 miles wide at its waist, in a sea of Arab and Muslim nations, dominate the Middle East – or come to abuse the Palestinians?  Well, it doesn’t.  But the world is obsessed with Israel, its every miscue and misstep, its very existence, the leftist media having long ago abandoned the one nation and people most in need of some commiseration.  Indeed, Israel is the David against the Arab/Muslim Goliath and the Palestinians are the political football used to attack it.

There are common terms adopted by the Left to condemn Israel and to define the Arab-Israeli conflict with such nomenclature as “colonialism,” “expropriation,” “apartheid,” or “occupiers,” as if the Jews had no claim to the Holy Land and did not have a presence there for nearly 4000 years.  This is the language used against our own nation and others such as Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, but particularly America, based on their European or Western or, let us say, “white” origins.  It is a farcical attempt to racialize Israel and portray it not as Jewish but white, to better align with neo-Marxist theories.  It is bogus for any number of reasons wherever deployed but in particular in regards to Israel.  Israelis may be white, although many Sephardim (“Spanish” or “Arab” Jews) are “swarthy,” and some are actually black (the “Falasha” or Ethiopian Jews).  But Israelis are first and foremost Jews and they are the indigenous people of the land.

As we observe the raucous support for Hamas occurring on our streets, college campuses, and capitols, what are we to make of our own policies, in particular our wars in the Middle East, and then immigration?  How many Gazas have we imported into our own country because of misguided policies?  How many Jihadis have we allowed into our nation, our college campuses, and into the very halls of Congress?  How many 9/11s await us, how many slaughters of the innocent will we have to mourn, here, and the West in general, before we awaken to the self-inflicted wounds we have committed?  Will we recognize the damage done, begin deportations, end student visas from various Muslim nations, and reconsider our reckless immigration policies?

There is such a thing as Just War, which includes the defense of one’s people, especially after repeated attacks.  Few question the wisdom and morality of Dresden or Hiroshima and Nagasaki despite the enormous civilian casualties.  Israel has every right to defend itself, destroy its enemies, despite significant civilian casualties.  If Hamas and the world are concerned about civilian casualties, Hamas can unconditionally surrender and leave Gaza, or otherwise accept the responsibility for the death and destruction that is coming.  Israel must abandon the absurd “Two State Solution” and “peace process,” and embrace instead a “One State Solution,” not to commit genocide as Israel’s enemies would, but to control and administer its territories.  This will include Israel proper, Gaza, and the West Bank (Judea and Samaria), allowing “Palestinians” some autonomy and self-governance but under Israeli control.  

Israel is the canary in the coal mine.  What has happened there has and will come to us again. The West, including the US and Europe, and then Israel, must awaken to the threat of Islam and take appropriate measures.  Do we have the will to live?  To do what is necessary to survive?  Or are we too decadent and corrupt?  We shall find out. Out of the ashes of Auschwitz and the Holocaust, the modern state of Israel was born.  So must it and we be reborn again.

Dr. Moss is a practicing Ear Nose and Throat Surgeon, candidate for Congress in 2016 and 2018, author, columnist, local investor, and small businessman, residing in Jasper, IN.  He has written A Surgeon’s Odyssey and Matilda’s Triumph, available on amazon.com.  Find more of his essays at richardmossmd.com. Visit Richard Moss, M.D. on Facebook, Twitter, Parler, Gettr, GAB, TruthSocial, and Instagram.