Perhaps liberals in the West who support Palestinian “right of return” (which means the end of Israel) don’t realize how heavily indoctrinated with propaganda Palestinian kids are, or the degree of hatred and anti-Semitism to which these children are exposed. There’s really no excuse for not knowing about this anti-Semitic propaganda, but of course when it comes to Palestine, many on the Left pretend that they’re simply the passive victims of Israeli aggression. Yet this propaganda, like much anti-Semitic propaganda from other Arab countries, can easily be found on the internet.
Here’s a video posted by MEMRI (Middle East Media Research Institute) showing what kind of “summer camp” some kids in Gaza enjoy (this is a chain of summer camps called “Sword of Jerusalem”. Below are the MEMRI notes, and I doubt that there are any translation errors of the video itself.
A teen camper, participating in the Islamic Jihad “Sword of Jerusalem” summer camp, said: “We did not come here to enjoy ourselves or play,” rather he said campers came to sacrifice themselves for the sake of Palestine and their people. He made these remarks in a news report about the camp that aired on Al-Quds Al-Youm TV (Islamic Jihad – Gaza) on June 29, 2021. The teen boy said that Hitler left some Jews alive to show how wicked they are. He threatened that the PIJ will tear the Jews’ bodies apart with their rockets, and said: “Scram into the shelters, you mice, you sons of Jews!”
Ahmad Al-Ra’I, spokesman for the “The Sword of Jerusalem” summer camps, said that the camps are run by trainers and commanders with the Al-Quds Brigades and that they instill military knowledge and skills in the boys, which will enable them to confront the enemy in the “next stage.” “Abu Omar,” a PIJ commander in charge of training at the “Sword of Jerusalem” summer camp said that the commanders are training the campers so they can follow in the footsteps of their fathers.
He said that the children will sacrifice their blood and their body parts on behalf of the Arab and Islamic nations, “who stay silent regarding our cause.”
Believe me, there are plenty of similar videos, many from previous sessions of the “Sword of Jerusalem” summer camps. The Left should be condemning this stuff loudly and continuously, but of course what we get is. . . crickets.
These are the people tacitly supported by Students for Justice in Palestine, by many students at American colleges, by the Congressional “Squad”, by many supporters of the BDS movement, and by all those who demonize Israel as an “apartheid state.” Or, if they say, “No, we don’t support Hamas or terrorism,” they surely don’t condemn this kind of murderous hatred.
If Israel is an apartheid state, what do you call a territory that trains its kids to hate and kill Jews? A murder state?
Some summer camp! As the South Pacific song goes, “You’ve got to be carefully taught.” Note that it’s not about Israel per se, but about the Jews.
This frustrates me almost more than the anti-Semitism. He’s basically admitting that they know they’re being callously used by other Arab nations to perpetuate the conflict, while those nations care nothing about Palestinian welfare – and he’s fine with it.
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Apart from everything else, it is severe child abuse, I’d say.
They both need to lose their religion. People killing each other over which god granted who real estate is the dumbest form of human thought.
Ah, I see that you presume total equality on both sides on the degree of hate instilled in the children on religious grounds. I’m sorry spartanatheist, but you’re wrong. Israeli media does not promote this kind of hatred and indoctrination of children because they’re Muslim. Granted, if there were no religion this wouldn’t take place, but given that it is, you can’t say that both sides are absolutely equally culpable.
I did not say anything about total equality. But you can’t deny that the Palestinians are taught the Jews are evil, and the Jews are taught that this land is theirs for the taking. If they both shed those religiously-motivated concepts, there would be a much higher chance of them getting along and acting like humans toward each other, right?
By the way, I purchased and read “Why Evolution is True” a few months back, and thanks for that book. Thorough and answers all their challenges. Nothing to do with our conversation, just wanted to thank you.
Dear Dr. Coyne, Individuals, not sides. I do not believe most Muslims in the world are anti-Semitic, nor do I believe most Jews in the world are anti-Muslim, although I do believe both “Sides” want to create that impression. I for one am not pro-Jew, nor am I pro-Muslim, I am however pro-Atheist/Secular Humanist/anti-capitalist/pro-Living Earth/pro-Compassion, Kindness, Love, and Generosity/pro-Humanity of all ethnicity, gender, and race. Also I love critters, feline, Canine, Bird Kind, Marine Kind, Rodent Kind, Etc, Etc. That said, I do love Ceiling Cat. Be Safe, Be Well, Live Long and Prosper Dr. Coyne Respectfully Damien McLeod
Born into misery and then, perpetuated misery… what’s more Hitler “lives” with these children under his shadow.
Atilla the Hun:
… the Romans paid the Huns off, which worked to keep Atilla at bay.
At least the Romans could negotiate a peace plan.
Shocking – or rather, it should be. Sadly this extremist anti-Semitism comes as no surprise to me anymore, although no thanks to the media organisations that should be making knowledge of its existence unavoidable.
There seems to be a tacit assumption made these days that if someone does has not explicitly and individually condemn something then they must be supporters of it.
It seems to me that if we were to individually condemn each and every thing that deserves to be condemned we would spend 100% of our lives condemning and doing nothing else.
Yes, Hamas are radicalising youth using vile anti-semitic hate, they have been doing it for a long time now and “the Left” have often condemned it.
In an analogous situation, I could decide that anyone who opposed marriage equality was a tacit supporter of regimes who imprison and kill gays and point out that they don’t loudly and continuously condemn these regimes.
But I use my common sense and realist that the average person who is against marriage equality would share my repulsion for those regimes.
The problem with your reasoning is that there are two sides in this conflict. If you see the number and intensity of condemnations of one side (Israel) by the Left, by the UN, by human rights organisations, by academic organisations etc. and almost no condemantion of the other side – just a few word about “condemning all violence” (and definitely no mass demonstrations, boycotts etc.) – no average person has a chance to share your repulsion for Hamas. The “average person” has no idea that Hamas is repulsive because the mainstream media do not report things like this; he/she knows that the only guilty party in this conflict is Israel.
Sorry, but I disagree. If Israel were doing what the Palestinians are doing–formenting hatred, sending kids to vile summer camps, etc., the people I named would be trumpeting that from the skies. They don’t. The ignoring of this hatred and indoctrination is hypocrisy of the Left, pure and simple.
Islamic Jihad is an extremist group, motivated by religious fundamentalism. I don’t think you can associate American supporters of Palestinian nationalism with Islamic Jihad. The question you should be asking is why this kind of extremism has spread in the Occupied Territories? The old PLO, let by Fatah, had its share of problems to be sure. But their agenda was defined by secular Arab Nationalism, not by religious extremism. I think you also need to look at the racism spread by Likud and Israeli extremist groups, along with the overt anti-Arab racism towards Palestinians by people here in the US. If you take away people’s territory, homes, etc., deprive them of a nation, continue to settle on their land, subject them to massive violations of human rights, you will get this kind of extremism. I can’t agree with either side. I don’t agree with the BDS people, but I can’t condone Israel’s policies either. The description of the Occupied Territories as apartheid is unfortunately true, and it is a betrayal of all the better ideals of the early Zionist movement. We can’t undo that last 150 years of history in the Middle East that have led to this situation. If you want to end this kind of extremism, then the only path forward is justice for the Palestinian people. We could start by recognizing that they actually exist and are human beings, and as such, should be treated in accordance with international conventions-to start with. Likud has created a situation now where the only solution going forward will be a one state solution.
It’s so easy to blame Likud for everything. There was no Likud in 1929 when the precursors of the PLO massacred Jews in Hebron, Jerusalem and other places. There was no Likud during the Arab war against Jews in Mandatory Palestine during 1930—-but there was their leader, Grand Mufti Al-Husseini, allied with Hitler, who after the war had a huge and constant influence on the Palestinian Arabs (PLO and Fatah included) and who until today is celebrated and venerated by the Palestinian Authority.
If you read what Arafat, Abbas, Jibril and all the rest have been saying in Arabic, and what they teach their children, the difference between Hamas and Islamic Jihad is not so great. The leaders of Palestinian Arabs–from Grand Mufti al-Husseini through them all until today–never accepted that Jews, these enemies of Allah, these “vilest of creatures” (that’s from Qu’ran), these dhimmis subservient to proud Arabs for 1400 years, should suddenly have their sovereign state in the holy land of “waqf”.
There is not even a slight resemblance to apartheid in either Israel or the West Bank. That word has become a smear concocted in 1960 by the KGB, who helped build Fatah and the PLO. (BTW, Fatah had a huge religious component from the beginning but they tried to hide it as deeply as they could in order to avoid annoying their atheistic masters from Soviet Union.)
Justice for Palestinian people? So all these peace proposals from Israel’s side count for nothing? Removing Israelis from Gaza in hopes of getting a start in implementing the Oslo Accords (and getting rockets instead of peace) counts for nothing? How about helping Palestinian people get justice for themselves by overthrowing their terrorist rulers in Gaza and their tyrants in the West Bank (Abbas just started the 17th year of his four-year term as president). You could also read the text of Oslo Accords to see that there is no mention of the two-state solution, as well as the last speech by Yitzhak Rabin (definitely not a Likud representative), where he presented his vision for the Palestinians living on the West Bank having autonomy but not a state. Well, 95% of Palestinian Arabs on the West Bank now have autonomy and look what they have done with it!
The spread of Islamism and return of Islam over secular nationalism all over the Arabic world has nothing at all to do with Israel, but with Gulf money and the demise of Arab socialism.
The left and the media need to finally recognize that “freedom fighters” are rarely nice people, that their cause is usually not progressive, that they actually hinder, not further the development of “their”people and that they start to be oppressors (in same sense that they earlier used the word) the moment they have their own state/come into power. Underdogs in a conflict are not per se morally better, or better from the viewpoint of progressive and liberal values than the regimes or majority groups they fight against. The left and the media never seem to learn this. The CRT dogma that the group with less power can never be racist is actually part of this whole complex.
At least, with Israel, there is no danger that the US war machine is set in motion in a humanitarian war to help the poor Palestinians. The US has again and again sided with brutal nationalist militias and mafia-type organizations in their “humanitarian” wars. The Hamas is no worse than the UCK in Kosovo (who were terrorists before the Kosovo war and started ethnic cleansing of Serbs and Roma as soon as they had NATO support), the Salafist militias in Syria, the Benghazi militias in Libya or the South Sudanese freedom fighters.