On the Killing of Children
I am old enough to vividly remember the footage of Muhammad al-Durrah, screaming in terror, as his father desperately tried to shield him from Israeli gunfire in Gaza. Almost twenty-three years ago to this day, I had just turned twenty and was getting into human rights and social justice activism while an undergraduate student. His death helped spark the second intifada, or uprising, against the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. It also solidified my belief that the only way to peace was justice. This meant clearly and end to the immeasurable suffering under occupation and apartheid. Anything absent that, meaning more settlements, occupations, thefts of land, water, and humiliation and torture in daily life, would just beget more violence and suffering.
Just seconds after the above still frame, he and his father were hit with a barrage of gunfire from an Israeli military post killing him. His father, gravely injured, survived. Nothing I have seen over the past twenty-three years, including working to end the occupation non-violently in Palestine itself, has even remotely made me question my position on ending the violence. Yesterday, Muhammad's father, still in Gaza, lost two other sons to Israel’s bombs.
Earlier this month, as we all know, the Hamas led attack against Israel killed primarily civilians, including dozens of children. Many of these children were murdered directly by Hamas members including being burned alive in fires that they set. US President Joe Biden chimed in on the matter, claiming to have directly seen photographic evidence of “of terrorists beheading children”. Of course Biden had to walk back those comments as as no such evidence exists. His lie originated from a remark made by an advisor to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The question must be asked, why lie about this “ISIS style attack”? Were not the massacres already enough? No. Why not? Because it turns out that the Israeli state was about to kill a lot more Palestinian children, and killing children requires some serious dehumanization.
As of today, the Israeli military has killed more Palestinian children (over 700 of them and climbing rapidly) in one week than the state of Russia, not known for being shy for its attacks on civilians, has killed during their entire war and partial occupation of Ukraine launched a year and half ago.
The image of the hooded ISIS member cutting off people’s heads is one easily surfaced in the American psyche, and I am sure the lie was chosen for that reason. This, followed by the usual fascist propaganda, simply can be taken as foreshadows that their perpetrators are about to engage in an exercise in the worst kinds of things imaginable. In a way, it’s a good sign that the Israeli propaganda machine is so deeply ingrained within our own media and political structure. The fact that consent has to be manufactured in order for the atrocities to happen also means that they can be stopped.
Gaza is 50% children. They are not members of Hamas, they did not vote for Hamas. The genocidal Israeli policy of isolating Gaza in conjunction with a prolonged resource siege (blocking food, fuel, and water) plus constant terror bombing day and night, is directly targeting children. They will pay the heaviest price. If not murdered, their bodies pay the heaviest price from lack of food and water. They will pay the heaviest price when the coming unsanitary conditions lead to outbreaks of preventable disease. They will pay the heaviest price when their parents and care givers are killed and they are left alone in trauma. There is no “defense” here, there is not even a “war”. There is just a pivot from one massacre to another, much larger, massacre.
Frankly, Netanyahu propped up Hamas more than the children of Gaza. Even prior, the Israeli state favorably viewed and even supported Hamas as a counterbalance to the more secular PLO. Quite simply, the likes of Netanyahu are openly willing to sacrifice the safety of Israelis to further their apartheid and occupation. Peace, in exchange for ending apartheid and occupation, is the real threat to the current Israeli state.
There is, however, some hope. Instead of unifying behind Netanyahu, the majority of the Israeli public now wants him out of power. This is a much different reaction than how Americans viewed George Bush after the attacks on 9/11. Many, rightfully so, are blaming his security failures. Playing offense in support or settler violence in the West Bank instead of defense outside of Gaza, clearly had some cost, not only to the dead children in the West Bank, but also to the now dead in Southern Israel as well.
Further, the political currents in the US, not an insignificant player in propping up Israeli apartheid and occupation, are shifting towards peace. Twenty three years ago, it would be unheard of to have a dozen members of congress back peace. More and more, public opinion, including with American Jews, is shifting against apartheid and occupation and more towards peace.
However, even once we begin driving in the right direction, there remains a long and difficult road ahead. The media and the governments of both states have done serious damage to our societies. Last Saturday, an seventy one year old anti Palestinian landlord stabbed a six year old Palestinian child twenty six times, killing him, in a vicious hate crime. Israeli settler Amiram Ben-Uliel, who burned to death an 18 month old Palestinian child, has become a bit of a morbid cause for the Israeli right, with many calling for his release from prison and several members of Netanuahu’s own party calling for his prison conditions to be eased.
The hate fuel that drives the above crimes can be stopped. There is no reason to support Israeli settlers, not politically, economically, or militarily. Once that tap is closed, the hate there will begin to recede.
On the other end, once the apartheid and occupation ends, a certain dignity will be regained and the hate will also lessen in the hearts and minds of Palestinians who, unlike the settlers, have been oppressed for generations. Luckily, both of these things are connected. You can not have one without the other. There is a reason why Palestinian citizen of Israel, not under apartheid (although facing their own discriminatory problems), are not committing acts of violence against Israeli civilians anywhere near the level to those who are suffering severe oppression under apartheid and occupation. Some are even working together to stop acts of violence.
After young Muhammad was killed, the Israeli state lied about relentlessly. First, it was claimed that his killing was staged, that it was all fake, then the story shifted to “Palestinians killed him to create a martyr.” One of the prime pushers of this lie, even back then, was none other than Benjamin Netanyahu.
Once the deep obfuscation around the killing of children begins to abate, the likes of Netanuahyu and the other leaders of the Israeli occupation and settlement project will fall. The cracks are already forming. In the US, criticism of the Israeli state is much louder than it was twenty three years ago and it is finally beginning to break into the government, albeit slowly. Unfortunately, even under the best case scenario, many more children will be killed. They will fall victims to settlers, suicide bombers, and fascists of all stripes, to heavily armed soldiers who will shoot them without hesitation or consequence, and to cowards who reign down expensive precision bombs from the comfort of a jet cockpit, flying above a territory with no air force or air defense of any kind. May their young and brief memories guide us away from the dark path of further suffering, occupation, and violence.
