Israel implementing its horrendous final solution

As global scrutiny intensifies, the silence around Israel’s actions in Gaza is breaking, revealing a decades-long impunity now impossible to ignore. Lyn Bender writes.

WHEN JOURNALIST Masha Gessen declared that Israel was liquidating the Ghetto, they were denounced.

How dare they allude to the Warsaw Ghetto? Now the parallels are increasingly undeniable.

Israel has been committing war crimes for decades, but it seems that only in this extreme phase of ethnic cleansing, the world is seeming to awaken. Until now, Israel has enjoyed a weird form of impunity. Apart from citations regarding International Law, such as the Geneva Conventions and International Criminal Court (ICC) and International Court of Justice (ICJ) rulings, Israel has escaped significant consequences.

The USA has supplied massive bombs even while asking Israel not to kill civilians, despite Israel’s illegal occupation and settlement of the West Bank and its ongoing murder and assaults on the people of Gaza, Jerusalem and the West Bank. Israel has destroyed Palestinian olive groves and agriculture.

Gaza casualties expose collapse of international law

As the Palestinian death toll rises, the future of international law hangs in the balance not just for Gaza but for human rights the world over.

In opinion pieces I have written from 2014 onwards, I have felt as repetitive as the atrocities committed by Israel.

In this most recent and most brutal iteration of Zionist Israel’s assault on Gaza, it has occurred to me that Zionism acts and behaves as a cult.

There is no ultimate definition of a cult, but some cult like features of Israeli Zionism include:

rigidly and exclusively espoused irrational beliefs that exclude other world views;
exclusion, shunning and denouncing of Jews who criticise Zionism and Israel as self-hating or antisemitic Jews;
a strictly defined narrative that must not be questioned, despite its factual inaccuracy;
claim to religious entitlement as God’s chosen people;
biblical rights to the lands known historically as Palestine;
the God-granted land is holy and belongs entirely to the Zionist Jews;
killing others who are a threat to this exclusively Zionist Jewish land is acceptable;
because of the suffering of the Holocaust, Israel can do whatever it wants;
brainwashing in both the diaspora and among Israelis; and
any person, group, organisation or government that criticises Israel is called antisemitic.

Gideon Levy, journalist for Haaretz, has identified trends and espoused beliefs within Israeli society.

In summary, Levy says:

Israelis believe that they are the chosen people;
because of the Nazi Holocaust, Israelis can do whatever they want;
Israel is always the victim; and
Palestinians and Arabs are lesser beings.

Since the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023, Israel has now added a further non-negotiable all-encompassing justification to its violence in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon and Yemen, aided by the USA bombing.

Far-right Israel's fascist ties

Israel's far-right Government deepens ties with European fascists, reviving a history of troubling alliances.

Since that time, everything has been about Hamas and Israel having the right to defend themselves. But do the occupied Palestinians have a right to self-defence? Israel has declared itself the sole victim, the only mourner.

Hospitals, schools, universities, medical workers and their families are all cited as legitimate targets as an unproven connection to Hamas is declared.

Despite numerous testimonials from credible medical staff who have served in Gaza, the significance of the daily deaths of Palestinians did not seem to register in the mainstream.

Even as U.S. President Donald Trump promotes a fake genocide of White South African farmers, the G word is still cautioned against on the ABC airwaves. Hamish Macdonald, on the Global Roaming podcast, asked journalist Lindsey Hilsum to speak about the use of terms such as genocide. She states that these were expert legal terms and that a good journalist must show caution.

In the words of former Greens Leader Adam Bandt, “Google it, mate”.

There is hope that the ABC may be sliding away from its one-sided bias in favour of Israel. But it has persisted since the 7 October refrain of “Do you condemn Hamas?” Never asking, “Do you condemn Israel?”

Academic Richard Bean documents this imbalance, noting that:

‘Any guest mention of the word “genocide” resulted in an interruption from the host or an editorial note.’

I can attest to this, as it was a source of great irritation as I listened to ABC News Radio. It distracted and appeared to discredit the point that a guest sought to illustrate.

In contrast to how pro-Israeli interviewees were not fact-checked, when a Palestinian supporting guest mentioned the word “genocide” or “colonialism”, even once, the host would either immediately interrupt to state that Israel contested this, note this at the end of the interview, or an editorial note would be added to the online version of the interview (nine cases).

Israeli genocide reveals double standards of European leaders

EU leaders who acted against the Russian invasion of Ukraine have been reluctant to put pressure on Israel for its genocide against Gaza.

This again parallels the BBC approach:

“People were terrified of using the word ‘genocide’ in coverage... if an interviewee says the word ‘genocide’... the presenter will almost always panic.”

The apartheid system keeps Israelis and Palestinians separated. Walls, fences, separate roads and checkpoints keep Palestinians out of sight of the majority of Israelis.

Nathan Thrall, an American Israeli writer, illustrates this abomination in his book, A Day in the Life of Abed Salama.

Abed spends the day searching for his son, Milad, whom he fears has been injured or killed in a school bus accident. He is thwarted cruelly at every turn by the humiliating, cruel delays emanating from Israel’s apartheid system.

The story of the dream of a Jewish Land has been told prior to the Holocaust, but an added layer has been conferred by the Nazi genocide and expulsion of the European Jews.

Those firmly in the grip of the Zionist cult denigrate and attack the increasing numbers of Jewish People who protest the horrors of the Israeli Occupation as fringe or not real Jews. However, researcher Emma Thomas writes that the Zionist narrative is eroding.

Canada, Britain, Germany, France and even Australia are now declaring much more strongly that the siege against Palestinians is to be opposed, as Omar El Akkad has revealed in his splendid book, One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This.

Slowly, Israeli allies are disassociating from its crimes.

Kenneth Roth, former director of Human Rights Watch, in his book, Righting Wrongs, says different approaches work with various violators. For some, international shaming or loss of support. It can be a combination of measures: economic, political or desire for acceptance. Always remaining factual and accurate.

Protest can be an important part of this pressure.

We all have a part to play.

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has set up a charade of aid distribution. Meanwhile, denying experienced aid organisations from distributing the supplies waiting in trucks at the border.

While its U.S.-Israeli operation is proving more harmful than helpful, it shows Israel is sensitive to the criticism of its starvation of Gaza. This is hopeful.

Meanwhile, Palestinians are suffering more intensely than ever. And babies are being starved to death.

I believe that I am not alone in the opinion that the media and Australians must put more pressure on the Albanese Government to match words with action.