When I woke up the other day, I found an email from an old and good friend—who may no longer be a friend, at least on her side. It was a bit of reporting from the British satirical magazine Private Eye, which does have some straight reportage, and she insisted that the magazine had “a stellar record in reporting.” Well, if it did, it doesn’t any more. The bit my friend sent me was not only strongly anti-Israel, but full of lies and unsubstantiated assertions. I’ll embed it here, and hope you can read it by clicking on the photo.
The article above has bought totally into Hamas propaganda, ranging from the ludicrous claim that there have been more than “60,000 trauma-related deaths” of Gazan civilians caused by Israel, and “an estimated 70% of the Palestinians killed are women and children, victims of widespread indiscriminate bombing.” That sentence needs some severe correction; even Hamas, I think, wouldn’t claim that 70% of the dead are women and chilren. (And don’t forget that “children” are defined as those under 18, while, as John Spencer notes below, the average age of a newly recruited Hamas terrorist is 16). This ignorant writer also claims, without evidence, that Israel is deliberately shooting Palestinian children in the head and neck or abdomen. I won’t go into that “indiscriminate bombing.”
Note that the article mentions Hamas only once—to deny that Hamas uses Gazan hospitals as command centers. But that happens to be true, and is well documented. Dr. Maynard, the author, is another example of someone who deliberately ignores facts they don’t like, and, in fact, denies them.
It’s an abysmal piece of propaganda that the writer, a surgeon in Oxford, has swallowed whole. I was deeply saddened to wake up to this in an email, especially from a friend with whom I once was very close.
I wavered about responding, but decided that I coiuldn’t let this pass, so I said a few words about the “data” given above, and then simply sent my correspondent the video below from the podcast Triggernometry.
Here, the two moderators,Konstantin Kisin and Francis Foster, interview John Spencer, “chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute, codirector of the Urban Warfare Project, and host of the Urban Warfare Project Podcast at West Point”. As an expert in urban warfare, Spencer is qualified to speak about the kind of palaver given above, though you can say he’s biased if you want (he is not Jewish). He’s emphasized since the war’s beginning the care that the IDF has taken to avoid killing civilians, and that the civilian/terrorist death ratio among Gazans is lower than any ratio in modern warfare (between 2/1 and 1.5 to 1, I think).
I won’t go on; you can listen for yourself, but of course those who are anti-Israel or anti-Zionist (which amount to the same kind of bigotry), will not listen. As for the starving children, if it were true it would be horrible, but, as you can read in this Free Press piece, nearly all the photos used to convince the world that Israel is starving children involve infants with other medical conditions that would make them malnourished. There is certainly hunger in Gaza, but widespread starvation of children, and starvation planned by Israel? I don’t buy it.
Listen for yourself: it’s an edifying hour. And remember, if you want to criticize Israel for all kinds of war crimes (I will not tolerate dumb accusations of Israeli “genocide,”), be prepared to offer a solution to the war, preferably one that leaves Israel still in existence.
I append a second Triggernometry video below, titled “Our honest opinion on Israel”. Kissen does most of the talking at the beginning, and it turns out that both he and Foster are “pro-Israel”, but only with respect to this war, not necessarily in general. Kissin avers that Israel is winning the war against Hamas and Iran, but is losing the propaganda war to Hamas, which is true.
Kissin feels, like Spencer, that many people who discuss the war are ignorant of the facts, are not rational, are governed by their emotions, and have no interest in resolving the issue. They just want to demonize Israel. He asks the question that I often do, “If you are so keen to demonize Israel’s behavior in the war, what would YOU do?”
You never get an answer that would work. Kissin mentions that he posed the same question in a Triggernometry discussion with Bassem Youssef, and got no answer from the strongly anti-Israel Youssef.
Kissin does add that Israel is committing some war crimes (he mentions the food cut-off and the West Bank situation) but says that every Western country has committed war crimes in every war it’s been in, including the U.S. in WWII and its response to 9/11.
But then the discussion turns discursive, dealing with free speech, antisocial behavior in the West, housing prices, the problems facing college-aged Westerners, and British politics. I listened dutifully to the whole video, but found most of it uninteresting.
There is more coming later, as I found a Triggernometry video of Kissin and Foster interviewing PM Benjamim Netanyahu, and I suspect they didn’t go easy on him. I haven’t watched it but will before I post it.
I’ve queued up the Netanyahu interview and will listen while at the gym.Thank you for mentioning it.
Waking up to an e-mail like that must be frustrating—and depressing if coming from a friend. It has gotten to the point that defending against the propaganda is like standing at the edge of the sea and trying to hold back the tide.
I watched the Netanyahu interview earlier this afternoon. Definitely worth a viewing.
Yep. I just finished. It’s very good. He is very well practiced. For the most part, I also think he’s right.
Hi, Jerry. James Randall Martin here. Your friend from Heidelberg HS. My email is martinjr195050@yahoo.com
My education direction took me to a Ba in Humanities and ABD Philosophy, with some MA degrees and Linguistic studies.
Blaming Israel for all the horrors of war—a war Gaza forced on Israel not only by the Oct. 7, 2023 outrage, but by rocket and missile attacks every year for decades—is by now a shibboleth of LEFTISM. Therefore,, abandoning LEFTISM as a general stance is unavoidable. Recall that rational, principled conservatives (e.g., George Will, David Frum) quickly became Never-Trumpers. I think followers of the former humane, social-democratic center-Left ought to re-position comparably as Never Lefters. Whether this stance should be called “centrist” or “independent” or Triggernometrist is not important. It does mean paying serious attention to other arguments from outside the Left
(e.g., Will, Frum) that we used to ignore.
A call for nuance is largely going to be ignored by the broadcasters and media that compete for our attention. If it bleeds it leads, if it shocks it rocks, spite is might.
The media constantly present social events as ‘wars’ or ‘battles’ or ‘shocks’ when they are mostly pundits expressing un-nuanced opinions. The pudding has been well over-egged.
If only our political leaders would ignore the headlines. Regrettably calmly occupying the centre ground generates no column inches or pixels.
I rather like Private Eye, but it definitely does NOT have “a stellar record in reporting.” I don’t think they really care if their reporting is accurate – they just like shit-stirring. It has had some good scoops over the years, but it has also published plenty of nonsense, and it’s very common to see retractions of, and apologies for, previous articles. The editor spends a great deal of time in court in libel cases. You’d be mad to believe all its reporting.
Yeah, he definitely has his biases. He is very quick and funny, though. I love him (and everyone else) on Have I Got News For You.
Private Eye has always had some blind spots. It was instrumental in supporting the disgraced medic Andrew Wakefield over his claims about autism and the MMR vaccine (it eventually came to its senses and apologised). It was notably absent from the sex /gender identity debate until the UK’s Supreme Court judgment made it safe to criticise gender identity ideology. And it is very disappointing to see its line on Israel / Gaza.
Agreed, Neil.
Spencer is top notch. Heard him first last year on Sam Harris’ show. Excellent, really bright guy.
Private Eye.. I thought they were just jokers but I don’t really know them.
Batshit Yussef is like a garbage town clown you’d see in the streets of Cairo’s slums. (There’s a chaotic dynamic in Cairo slums you don’t see anywhere else: and they have dusty, berserk clowns believe it or not). Yussef is not at all a serious person. Total hack. And a hypocrite – who came here as “oppressed” from Egypt yet simps for Egypt when it comes to beating Jews. World class scumbag.
Triggenometry had Netanyahu on the other day – worth a listen. Say what you want about him but since Oct. 7th I wouldn’t have made many different choices than those he made.
DavidAnderson_JD_NYC
@DavidandersonJd
Those who express similar opinions to the idiot UK doctor really ought to consider WHY they are so willing to believe lies like those. It is simply NOT credible to claim that one is unaware that they ARE lies. So the question to them remains; WHY do you believe the lies?
I know it’s a fool’s game. This is one of those issues, like “transwomen are women’; it isn’t possible to bring reason to bear as it isn’t about truth or facts. It’s politics, wokery, religion and old tyme antisemitism, four of the slimiest things humans are capable of. But I do wish some of these useful idiots would at least do a little self-reflection.
Actually Edward, I think it’s exactly the other way round.
Most people genuinely don’t know that these are lies, because these lies are pretty much all that is reported in the UK. Surely, people say reasonably, the BBC, ITV, the Guardian, the Times, and the governments of the UK, France, the EU, Australia and the UN can’t ALL be wrong about the Palestinians? On the other hand, surely whatever Trump says about anything probably is wrong, because, well, he’s Trump. Add to that the general idea that Netanyahu is a well-known right-wing fascist thug, and the Private Eye story sounds all too believable.
So, most people are blissfully unaware that these are lies. I have some sympathy for them. You have to try pretty hard to find the other side of the story.
I stand by what I said; it is simply NOT credible that people are unaware they are lies. In fact, I believe it is an ACTIVE ignorance, employed to protect oneself from upsetting pre-concieved notions. In the old creation/evolution debate there was something called “Morton’s Demon”, named after ex-creationist, Glenn Morton Morton said that while he was a creationist he’d hear the truth and the facts about evolution, but in an analogy to Maxwell’s demon, he had a demon which prevented the facts from even entering his mind. He was aware of the truth, at least at some level, but chose not to believe it.
I think the same dynamic is going on here; supporters of Hamas are protecting themselves from accepting that their motive for hating Israel ISN’T based on truth, instead it is something very dark indeed.
“these lies are pretty much all that is reported in the UK”
True.
Most of the mainstream media in the UK has fallen into the gutter and, sadly, many ordinary people don’t realize that they have been dragged into the gutter too.
I cancelled my TV Licence in 2014 because it was broadcasting government propaganda, and from what I’ve read, it hasn’t improved any. Nutmeg reviews the BBC on Graham Linehan’s blog and it sounds like it’s full of woke propaganda now. I read the Guardian for years, but I can’t now as it has an anti-women agenda. It’s hard to find decent journalism now.
A mild caveat there, in that the claim that the civilians to combatants casualty ratio is the /lowest/ in recent history is heavily contested and IMO doubtful. I’d refrain from making this particular claim.
It is, if nothing else, exceptionally unlikely that it’s possible to keep civilian casualties in urban ground warfare (and with non-uniformed combatants) anywhere near as low as NATO’s campaign against Serbia in 1999.
Much better to focus on the facts that 1. Hamas started the war, 2. Hamas primarily targets civilians, including the start of the war, 3. Hamas’ very founding charter demands the destruction of Israel and 4. Israel is exceptionally restrained in its response, since even wars below the level where one’s very existence is threatened have historically resulted in significantly less restrained measures (e.g. strategic bombing in WW2; starvation in WW1 & 2).
A decent point of comparison would be if Nazi Germany happened to border Israel and tried to have a go at it: How far would Israel be allowed to go?
Because Hamas’ goals with regards to Israel are functionally identical to what Nazi Germany’s goals would be.
If your opinion differs, could you please cite information about ratios that you see as more credible than what I cited?
https://www.justsecurity.org/93105/israeli-civilian-harm-mitigation-in-gaza-gold-standard-or-fools-gold/ a response to Spencer specifically, no less.
To be clear, the measures suggested to minimise civilian harm that the article suggests are likely impractical given conditions on the ground. But given the urban environment & Gaza’s total population as well as population density (which are what likely renders the suggested measures impractical), the notion that the fighting in Gaza results in a lower civilians to combatants killed ratio than Afghanistan or Serbia strains credulity past its breaking point.
I was made aware of the article through this: https://acoup.blog/2024/03/22/fireside-friday-march-22-2024/ and ideological misgivings notwithstanding, when fellow military historians consider the article credible, it’s worth considering.
You know, you COULD have looked to see if Spencer or others critiqued the Lewis article, and it is telling that you did not. Well have a look at these:
https://x.com/Aizenberg55/status/1786042063982592303
or
https://x.com/SpencerGuard/status/1786045463780610425?lang=ar-x-fm
or (from Spencer again):
https://x.com/SpencerGuard/status/1786198896793796747
and
https://x.com/SpencerGuard/status/1786205164275155214
I am amused as well that you use the Hamas figures of huge proportions of deaths being women and children, which is ridiculous.
This is the end of the back-and-forth.
I agree with Spencer that Lewis is engaging in apples-to-oranges comparisons. The US waged a war of choice in Iraq, as aggressor, among a population that was not entirely hostile. We had to find ways not to alienate that population. Similar dynamics were in play in Afghanistan where, while we had just cause to fight, we turned what should have been a months-long operation into a decades-long occupation. Israel is in a much different situation, both in terms of its enemy and the nature of their fight. Lewis largely discounts the difference between US and Israeli objectives and operations, seeing in his models a universally-applicable framework. In doing so, he also seems to have effectively lost sight of the fact that one’s chief concern in war is to win rather than to minimize damage to the enemy population.
He tells us that he is “an analyst who has helped define the field of civilian harm mitigation”, so perhaps it is understandable that he wants to design and use his widget as he chooses. He laments that “Israel has yet to demonstrate that it has embraced [his] process”, but he seems unconcerned why they might not do so, given that “Civilian harm mitigation is a relatively recent development”. He asserts that the questions of “how is the IDF doing [in mitigating civilian harm] and what can it do better?” are ones that “should be of key interest to the Israeli government itself as public support domestically and internationally wanes due to the scale of civilian harm.”
Perhaps. But this is a secondary matter, important only insofar as Israel depends on the support of others to continue operations. If they have correctly calculated that US support is firm, then they will set this issue somewhat aside. Israel’s chief concern is to determine its military objectives given its understanding of the enemy and the resultant nature of the fight. Israel, and Israel alone, is in the position to determine whether the civilian deaths on the other side are acceptable when pursuing its objectives. Perhaps Lewis might disagree with Israel’s level of tolerance. It is not his war.
Does Israel sometimes fall short of even its own goals? Of course they will. Clausewitz in “On War” correctly notes that “Everything in war is very simple, but the simplest thing is difficult. The difficulties accumulate and end by producing a kind of friction that is inconceivable unless one has experienced war. . . . Countless minor incidents—the kind you can never really foresee—combine to lower the general level of performance so that one always falls far short of the intended goal. . . . Friction is the only concept that more or less corresponds to the factors that distinguish real war from war on paper.”
So, let’s consider war as it is seldom seen on paper. Consider two stark choices: 1) you can win the war and lament for a time the unfortunate loss of lives on the other side, or 2) people can eulogize you and your former country and wax eloquent about how you cared so deeply for the lives of your enemy. The potential outcome of a war can shift rapidly and unpredictably between these two extremes. It is not easy to plan for. Aspects of military planning, particularly in logistics, can have a technocratic feel: spreadsheets, flow charts, maps, diagrams, etc. But the overall war—what to fight for and whether, when, who, and how long to fight—is not amenable to calculations by experts. Those are the difficult decisions of real war—and the answers can be provided only by those who are fighting it.
Doug, a question can be raised about this assertion:
” The US waged a war of choice in Iraq, as aggressor”. The first Gulf War ended with a ceasefire in which Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi government agreed to allow unlimited inspections by the UN Special Commission. Did not Saddam’s repeated blockage of UNSCOM investigations of various Iraqi sites abrogate the ceasefire agreement? From this view, the 2003 Iraq invasion was simply a resumption of the first Gulf War,
occasioned by Saddam’s frequent violation and evasion of the ceasefire agreement.
Private Eye magazine does have a lot of stellar reporting, but they DO sometimes get it badly wrong, as in when they backed Andrew Wakefield. Their work on Deepcut Barracks exposed army bullying which led to several cadet suicides, their work on covid PPE contracts has exposed a lot of profiteering by members of the government, and their current work on pushing for an appeal for nurse Lucy Letby, who has been falsely convicted of murdering 7 babies, is garnering a lot of expert witnesses on her side.
Having said that, the Gaza article isn’t by one of their regular staff, and doesn’t seem to quote reputable sources as their usual journalism tries to. Dr Maynard works both for the NHS and the private sector and I don’t know much about his history. I’m surprised that he didn’t back up his claims of destroyed dialysis machines etc with photographs. I’m sure he carries a decent mobile phone with him and I question why he hasn’t been using it.
I agree that the IDF is not “the most moral army”, but I don’t trust claims against them that are made without evidence. Hamas are terrorists, and I have no doubt whatsoever that they would take cover in civilian areas. I wouldn’t even be surprised if they destroyed some hospital equipment themselves so they could blame it on others.
I don’t believe that Israel is committing literal genocide, that’s a word being used for propaganda.
To answer your point about a solution, I don’t have one, but to start with I’d like to see the UN in there and monitoring the situation. Then we might find out the whole truth and that would be a good first step to finding a solution. Meanwhile peacekeepers could ringfence a hospital and we could help re-equip it as long as they could guarantee to keep Hamas away from it and Israel would agree not to attack it while the UN is there.
I am sure there will be plenty of letters criticising that article in the next issue of PE. If your friend doesn’t send you the follow-up let me know and I can scan it for you as I have a subscription.
Who’s is the most moral army, if not the IDF? Iceland’s (which has none)? Canada’s? (A small group of our soldiers — the whole unit had gone rogue, said the inquiry that followed — beat an unarmed Somali thief to death, during a peacekeeping operation no less.)
What even constitutes a “moral” army? Surely its ability to defend the people it was created to protect by smiting their enemies must count for a lot. Killing people in a losing cause, a cause you lost because you were too reluctant to kill enough people, or because you accepted too many casualties on your own side, seems perverse and anything but moral. By that standard, the IDF is indeed the most moral army because it has never let Israel lose a war and be exterminated.
Canada has much experience with UN peacekeeping. I can tell you with 100% certainty that no country will contribute forces to engage in hot combat with even one side, never mind with both sides at once, who aren’t ready for peace. The UN has no military capacity of its own. From Korea, it has requested voluntary support from member governments. Other than Korea, this has consisted entirely of observing violations of established cease-fires and peace treaties. That’s what UNIFIL is supposed to be doing. Rarely, as in Sarajevo, the Blue Berets engage in combat (shooting people and getting shot) to keep humanitarian corridors like the airport open. For your proposal to be itself moral, your own country, Joolz, would have to be willing to commit combat troops, men you might know and love personally, to enforcing the rules of war in Gaza, which is very different from peacekeeping, the only thing the UN is fit to do.
If Israel agreed not to attack a hospital “when the UN is there”, Hamas would use that opportunity to infiltrate the hospital, confident that the UN force would be unwilling to take casualties to prevent it. Knowing this, the IDF would give the UN five minutes to get its busybodies out of the way before they bombed it. The UN troops would want to be careful which way they ran, if Hamas had surrounded the hospital. There might not be any way out. Hamas would be happy to see the IDF kill them all unavoidably. So Israel would be doing those poor blokes a kindness by not letting them into Gaza in the first place.
Your estimation of the United Nations is woefully inadequate to think that the UN “needs to get into” a hot war zone to monitor what’s going on and then engage in combat with the rule breakers.
As in any war once joined, the only solution is for Israel to win. How to win is up to the Government of Israel, no one else. Whatever happens is on them.
To say that the IDF is not “the most moral army”, doesn’t mean that a ‘moral army’ exists, and it is illogical to expect there to be one. We clearly have different definitions for the word ‘moral’. To me, it’s not automatically moral to kill people just because you were born in the same country as the people you claim to be killing for.
Most wars start with immoral acts. I’m not saying wars are never necessary, but it would be a much better world if we could sort things out like grown ups and weren’t killing each other over imaginary gods.
I made no reference to ‘hot combat’ so you were arguing a point that I didn’t make. I know the UN doesn’t have a standalone army, I’m old enough to have seen it in action before, and countries CAN work together under the UN banner to do good. More countries need to stand up and be counted to show global solidarity in ending this. Until we do that I don’t see this ever ending. People are naive if they think shooting more and more people will fix this. As has been said before “How do you defeat an enemy who looks into the barrel of a gun and sees paradise?” Kill 50 Hamas terrorists and another 50 will stand up to take their place. We need a new strategy. To eradicate the reasons why Hamas even exists in the first place.
Why would I object to “men you might know and love personally” standing up to try and stop war? It could also be women I know personally.
Perhaps you missed the bit where I said that a hospital could be ring-fenced and Hamas kept out? I’m not so naive to think that Hamas would commit to staying out, but my whole point is that having the UN there would mean there would be international witnesses who could see and document exatly what is happening and get the truth out there, instead of the claims and counter claims we are getting. Dr Maynard is not a credible witness because of his history, but if people from 20 countries were there they could prove to the world whether he is a liar or a truth teller.
“The greatest victory is that which requires no battle” Sun Tzu.
I had just read a piece in the Kyiv Post that seems to take the side that Israel is responsible for Gaza famine. Ukraine is in in a hard place and when their allies like Britain and France do not denounce Hamas as they should and instead want to reward them with their own state then it’s understandable when Ukraine uses similar language. It is disappointing as Iran not only supports Hamas but sends Shahid drones for Russia to use on Ukrainians.
What should Israel do? They should destroy Hamas and de-Nazify Gaza. If that infuriates Islamofascists and their deranged leftie useful fools, so be it.
I watched the first one when you previously posted it. It was a helpful point of view.
The article in Private Eye is actually a letter from Professor Nicholas Maynard, a consultant surgeon who has been travelling to Gaza regularly for the past 15 years. Far from being a piece of propaganda that the author has swallowed whole, the letter mainly consists of reports on what he has himself seen on his most recent trip. It seems uncalled for to casually dismiss these as “lies”.
The UN uses Hamas propaganda figures, which are not credible because they are changed all the time. The only figures quoted are from Hamas, which has a history of lying.
As for women and children killed, 70% is ridiculous given that the IDF is going after terrorists, and avoiding killing women and children. The fact is that ALL of these figures ultimately come from Hamas (the Gazan Health ministry).\
Finally, there’s the claim that Hamas does not use hospitals as command centers or entries to tunnels, or builds tunnels under them. To deny that is either lying or stupidity. The presence of command center AND the sub-hospital tunnels have been documented repeatedly with video. The good doctor has been made a useful idiot simply by repeating what he hears from Hamas. (The number of dead is not known since Hamas doesn’t have a good tally and keeps changing it; moreover, they don’t separate combatants from civilians.
If you read carefully what the surgeon says, there is a mixture of what could be eye-witness accounts and what clearly couldn’t. He might have seen marauding IDF soldiers murdering healthcare workers and smashing dialysis machines, if they did, but he couldn’t have seen healthcare workers being tortured to death in Israeli prisons. Nor could he know for a fact that 60,000 mostly women and children have been killed. That’s just not something a single eye-witness can know. That many bodies lie under rubble is only speculation.
His opinion that gunshot victims have a flavour-of-the-week is also speculative and motivated. Medical observations of supposed patterns like this are highly coloured by expectation bias. First, he can’t know that they were even shot by IDF and not as punishment by Hamas pour encourager les autres. Additionally, unless they were shot at close range, which a surgeon should surely be able to tell especially with rifle bullet wounds, where exactly on the body a bullet will hit in combat is something a matter of chance. That the IDF would take the trouble to shoot people so meticulously yet non-lethally while conducting an operation stretches credulity, again especially since the surgeon sees with his own eyes only the wounds, not the shootings.
Embargo of infant formula is also hearsay on his part. Formula is a highly politicized hot potato in aid circles everywhere and it brings out the worst in people. Israel could have good population policy reasons to deny it to Gaza, as early weaning enables more pregnancies, something that seems perverse during supposed famines. I will just say that if an isolated mother is too malnourished to breast feed, it means that she or her family pissed off someone in Hamas enough that she was denied food. All those chubby people in Gaza could have shared their food with her to save her baby if they cared to.
“That many bodies lie under rubble is only speculation.”
That not many bodies lie under rubble is also only speculation.