David Stairs.
I don’t know how else to put this: It seems that the people of Israel learned nothing from the Holocaust.
The current Israeli government, led by corruption riddled war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu, is dead set upon extending what the Palestinians call “al Nakba,” the 1948 catastrophe that displaced many of them, until none are left.
The wholesale destruction of 80% of the structures in Gaza, intended to make the strip unlivable, continues even under the auspices of a pretended cease fire. And incursions of vigilante Zionist Israeli settlers into villages of the West Bank are reported at an accelerating rate.
Israel’s hypocritical conduct in opening the Rafa crossing into Egypt but allowing only a trickle of highly vetted invalids to leave Gaza, while denying entry of desperately needed medicine and foodstuffs is a continuation of its genocidal conduct over the last two years.
A moving first-hand account by young Palestinian journalist Plestia Alaqad, The Eyes of Gaza, is a searing indictment of the Israeli Occupation Force’s crimes against humanity, including the targeting of Palestinian journalists. Western journalists, prevented from on-scene reporting by Israel, have been satisfied to continually refer to Hamas as terrorists while giving a pass to Israeli snipers and air strikes on schools and hospitals. The real reasons for the October 7th attacks, continued Israeli violence and repression, are seldom discussed.
Since 2023, the United Nations has annually commemorated the Nakba and Palestinian “right to return” and/or compensation for what was lost. This is only a continuation of what it has called for ever since 1948. Israel’s criminal response has been to provoke its far right Zionists to ever more horrific acts of violence. While Israel and its sympathizers are fond of invoking the Palestinian “from the river to the sea” quotation, it is actually a Jewish rallying cry, carried out every day by the crazed minions of the Zionist state.
In a world where the Jews are constantly reminding us of how much they suffered in the 20th century, it’s strange to see how blind they are about the wages of the genocide they have committed. If there is still a moderating minority in Israel, I imagine they must be thinking about the eventual consequences coming home to roost. No longer can they hide behind the word terrorist when describing Palestinian motivations for violence.
David Stairs is the founding editor of the Design-Altruism-Project.
