The Two Hatreds

In the aftermath of the suicide bombing in Eilat, the kumbayista community (not to mention the Israel-haters) have spared no effort to say how “there is hatred on both sides”, hatred that needs to stop if there is to be any chance of peace. Presumably, drumming and chants and other tried-and-true tactics of the 1960's can “heal the rift between the Israelis and the Palestinians” and make the conflict history. But enough of ranting about the hopelessly naïve, and on to refuting their main thesis.

First off, it’s actually true there is hatred on both sides; but—and that’s the crucial, oft-overlooked point—it’s not the same kind of hatred. I hate the Muslims (not “Palestinians”) for what they perpetrate against us, and the latest event only fuels my hatred, but it must not be overlooked that if the hostilities against us were to cease, I would cease hating them. That’s a very important difference between Israeli Jews’ hatred toward their enemies and the converse.

Case in point: Anwar Sadat. The late president of Egypt had, on October 1973, inflicted an initial military blow to Israel the likes of which his predecessor, Nasser, could only have dreamed of. In the aftermath of that war, Sadat was hated, reviled and burned in effigy by the masses of Israeli Jews. He then came and signed the peace treaty with Israel, complete with a speech in the Knesset. Right after that, the raging hatred against him died out. Of course the families of those killed in the Yom Kippur war could not forget, and their grief could not be assuaged by the peace treaty, but the masses of Israeli Jews stopped their hatefest around Sadat. All because of the peace treaty.

We Jews do not turn the other cheek; we are commanded to hate our enemies. But we are to cease hating them once they have repented, and we are not to hate sons for the deeds of their fathers. In this area, the rule for G-d is certainly different than the rule for humans: He keeps hatred and wreaks revenge, whereas we are not allowed to do so. That is because He is always objective and righteous, while we are bound to fall into errors of judgment.

Thus, we cease hating Sadat once he has signed a peace treaty with us; and had Arafat not opted to continue hostilities toward us after the Oslo Accords of 1993, we would have ceased hating him as well. On my travels in Germany, I do not burn in hatred at the sight of every German, for, even if his grandfather was an SS man, he himself is not so. Jewish hatred, then, is cause-based.

As for the other side’s hatred—what is there to say? I would think it sufficient to bring a small example from the last Hajj (from the thread Hatred in a Holy City on LGF):

“The prayers of all Muslims when they cast their stones at the devil must be directed at (U.S. President George) Bush and his devilish allies in America and the Arab world.”

Ahmed al-Dosary from Kuwait agreed. “I prayed for myself, my family and for the end of the main evil, the United States.” (Emphasis mine. —ZY)

“From Kuwait”. Kuwait, the same country that the first George Bush liberated from Saddam’s occupation at their request. A hatred that continues to burn even after a good deed has been done to them.

The Muslims of the West (Europe and Israel, for example) have standards of living there that their brethren in the Middle East hell-holes can only dream of. Do they, then, live normally? (I’m not talking about showing gratitude—that’s really too much to expect.) Not a chance. Not in Britain, not in Australia, not anywhere. Wherever they live, far from integrating to their host society, they do everything to lower it to their 7th-century level. And they hate, hate, hate their non-Muslim hosts, not because of any “legitimate grievance”, but because they believe they are to dominate and not to be dominated. Their religion commands them to harbor and show everlasting hatred toward the other, no matter the circumstances. Greater a contrast between two types of hatred there could not be.

With this truth in mind, I can now review the latest moral-equivalence-fest on Daily Kos. A left-leaning Jew, once again, sees how his beloved platformed has turned into a place where “the wish for the end of the Jewish State is a laudable goal” (to quote D. Honig’s cry of distress on the “The End of Zionism?” diary I mentioned two posts ago). Eyal Rosenberg ponders the raw Jew-hatred on which “Palestinian” children are raised, and even though he posts a disclaimer saying he believes the “occupation” must end, this is a sober moment in which realizes that “no withdrawal will suffice, as the goal is All Of Palestine”. (The link is from the original quote. —ZY)

The reactions from some of the commenters? “Israel started it all”. And moral equivalence aplenty. Commenter “weasel” says:

Additionally, I must ask the eternal question of the I-P debate. If it is hate's triumph when Palestinians kill Israeli civilians, what is it when Israelis kill Palestinian civilians? Was that hatred not worthy of a denunciation as well?

Eyal Rosenberg answered the way I would:

Palestinians carry out large number of acts out of hate. From the heart. Wrathful, active against civilians and soldiers. "Collateral damage" intentional.

Israelis carry out very large number of acts out of calculation. From the head. Mechanic, reactive against perceived enemies. "Collateral Damage" unintentional.

Both cause death, but are carried out with different intent. Which is worse? Judge for yourself.

“Weasel” has no problem brushing it all off:

This is pure projection, and it makes you one more defender of the occupation you claim to oppose.

Wow. Manichean dualism from a guy who would lambaste President Bush for his post-9/11 “either with us or against us” comment. Continues:

The fact is you know nothing about what was in that young man's heart. You know nothing about what was in his head. You know nothing about what was in his history or education.

He knows nothing… yet you do know it was caused by “the occupation”. And, of course, there is nothing, simply nothing that could give us a clue as to the education given to “Palestinian” children. Continues:

The "hate and only hate" motif is simply a way of ignoring the realities of Palestine under Occupation. What drove this man? Hate is possible. At least as likely is rage at the suffering of friends and family. Perhaps a relative was one of the countless civilians murdered by Israeli "Defense" Forces. Perhaps what was driving him was hopelessness.

I’ve had a relative killed by “Palestinians”. Why don’t I feel like going into the middle of one of their towns and killing randomly there? As Eyal Rosenberg replies:

The fact is that:

1. I have lost a classmate, three friends and a family member and still do not want to blow myself up in Ramallah.
2. My Grandparent's families were exterminated in the Holocaust, and I still do not want to blow myself up in Berlin. (Nor has any other Jew for that matter).

The reply from “weasel”? Can you say, “deaf ears”? I knew you could:

Or maybe you are not faced with your country being occupied for 40 years in the past and an unknown length into the future. Maybe, those in Ramallah have not strangled your country, preventing you from having any job, or often food, health care, transportation, or decent housing. Maybe those in Ramallah have never denied you a simple passport or citizenship in any country on earth. Maybe, and I'm just speculating here, the Palestinian Occupation of Israel has been somewhat less overwhelming than the Israeli Occupation of Palestine.

And, of course, maybe this young man would have preferred to kill Israelis in the proper and civilized manner, with an Apache attack helicopter. Maybe he simply could not get his hands on one, and so resorted to his hateful means.

There’s a lot more I could bring here, but the post is getting long enough as it is, so I’ll wrap this up with a comment from “dmsarad”. Commenter “dmsarad” is among those who I have seen showing distress at the direction of Daily Kos ever since the last Lebanon War, and has a few diaries trying to remedy it (listed on his user page, if you’re interested). But in this case he makes an absolutely kumbayistic comment, titled, “1 thing you forgot”:

Abject poverty. Give a guy a job, 3 meals a day, and a solid middle class existence and he is far more unlikely to blow himself up.

This, after counter-terrorism experts have reached the conclusion that poverty is not the usual drive for terrorists. This, after 9/11, whose 19 perpetrators were all wealthy Saudi citizens.

Poverty, the “occupation” and all that. Yes, it is everyone’s right to raise hypotheses, but then it is their duty to provide falsifiers for them. Poverty and occupation (a real one, suffered by a real people!) is what the people of Tibet have been going through for decades, courtesy of a truly oppressive regime that, unlike Israel, doesn’t give a fig for the niceties of international law and human rights (but does, however, capitulate to the Muslims). So where, where, just where are the Tibetan suicide bombers blowing themselves up in the malls, markets and bakeries of Shanghai?! Does any kumbayista have an answer for that?

And where do we find suicide terrorism, apart from Israel? There was 9/11 in America and 7/7 in Britain as one-time events. There are, as day-to-day events, suicide bombings in Kashmir (Indian territory) and in the south of Thailand. Those things are, upon investigation, found wherever there is a sizable Muslim population—and nowhere else. No other people, no matter how long their list of grievances toward an oppressor is, engage in suicide terrorism. It’s a Muslim-only thing. Only Jews keep the Sabbath, only Christians believe Jesus atoned for mankind’s sins, and only Muslims kill themselves together with their enemies for divine reward.

They hate us for what we are, not for what we do. They are commanded to hate us. We are commanded to hate them to the extent of our self-defense, and no more. If they repent, we are to cease hating them; if they do not, it is up to us to defend ourselves, and it is up to HaShem alone to close the account. There is simply no equivalence between the two hatreds.