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By Ali Aziz:
Israel’s current election, coming at a critical juncture, is arguably the most significant in Jewish history. It spans more than three years, a period fraught with greater peril than any since Israel’s founding in 1948. On October 7, Hamas, backed by Iran, launched the most brutal assault on Israeli civilians in decades. Militants opened fire indiscriminately, carrying out a massacre that claimed 1,200 lives in a matter of hours and resulted in the taking of approximately 250 hostages. Israel’s response was swift and forceful; the government issued immediate evacuation warnings to Gaza residents, signaling its intent to uproot Hamas through military action, a goal that could not be achieved without a prolonged war. Under intense pressure, driven largely by internal Israeli demands, the situation rapidly escalated into full-scale conflict. Had it not been for these domestic pressures, and had the Israeli government exercised greater patience and long-term strategic restraint, it might have focused on rallying global public opinion around the plight and victimization of the Jewish people. Instead, the current approach has inadvertently handed a gift to the Palestinians and the forces supporting them, an opportunity they are now exploiting for their own political gain.
In truth, the events of October 7 constituted a genocidal massacre of defenseless people, driven solely by the fact that they were Jews. The chilling reality of this massacre is a stark reminder that a Holocaust could, at any moment, unfold once again. What followed was that Israel, a state that considers itself liberal, began taking rapid, imprudent steps with unconsidered consequences. It transformed the image of Jews from a persecuted, targeted people into oppressors committing massacres across the Gaza Strip. This transformation, portraying the state as a savage, criminal entity, has been in the planning for many years. It is a project in which Iran, Syria (under the leadership of Bashar al-Assad), Hamas, and various Islamist movements, including certain Palestinian factions, have all played a part.
Since 2003, and even earlier, the dominant image in global media, the one that has come to shape public perception, has been defined by the mass killings and genocides perpetrated by Iran and its affiliated militias across Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen against various minorities. This narrative is reinforced by imagery associated with Islamist movements and groups, entities born from the most horrific forms of collective violence, characterized by the use of car bombs and armed terrorist activities. This trajectory spans from the events of September 11, through the rise of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda, to the appalling massacres committed by the Syrian regime against its own people since 2011, which resulted in a massive death toll, as well as the complex, often contradictory dynamics surrounding the fight against ISIS (an organization that received covert support from Iran). Ultimately, all these elements converge into a single, cohesive picture: a cycle of death, darkness, savagery, and ruin.
To change this narrative and make the world forget the deliberate destruction these regimes and groups inflict on human life and society, they strive to keep the so-called “Palestinian cause” at the forefront of the political stage, casting Israel as the villain responsible for all manner of evils against the world. Yet none of their attempts to goad Israel into committing mass atrocities succeeded until October 7th. On that day, an active militant group, operating in the same vein as the Syrian regime, Al-Qaeda, and ISIS, carried out a horrific massacre of more than a thousand civilians. They then retreated into impregnable underground fortresses, using two million Palestinians in Gaza as human shields, a move that reveals how little these forces value the very human lives they claim to be fighting for.
These regimes and groups have effectively shaped the narrative, diverting global attention from their own massacres. We have witnessed the Taliban, the Syrian regime, various militias in Iraq, and Al-Qaeda and ISIS across Syria, Iraq, and the wider region commit atrocities comparable to those in Gaza following October 7th. The mass killing of civilians, which, by any standard, constitutes a war crime, is precisely what the Iranian regime and its proxies in Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen have done. It is what the Syrian regime, under Bashar al-Assad, has done; it is what groups like the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, ISIS, and Hamas have done. Let us examine some figures from 2011 to 2023, a span of twelve years, so the true picture may be revealed. For instance, approximately 600,000 people have been killed in Syria during this period, with the Syrian regime bearing responsibility for over 91% of these deaths. ISIS is responsible for more than 50,000 deaths during a specific timeframe, while the Taliban is responsible for the deaths of over 40,000 people between 2014 and 2021. Within Iran, the regime has executed 7,000 individuals. In Iraq, between 2014 and 2017, more than 28,000 people lost their lives at the hands of militia forces loyal to Iran. Furthermore, the Iranian regime is implicated in the deaths of countless others through assassinations, torture in prisons, and liquidations in Iraq since 2003; meanwhile, in Yemen, approximately 370,000 people have died since 2011. These figures do not account for the vast numbers of displaced persons, refugees, and those who have gone missing as a result of the actions of these regimes and groups. In contrast, the number of people who have died in the context of the conflict involving Israel and Palestinian factions, from 2000 to 2023, stands at approximately 13,000.
It is striking that the victims who perished at the hands of the aforementioned regimes and groups, except in Israel, never garnered the attention of the global public, nor did mass demonstrations arise in their support. This stands in stark contrast to the situation in Gaza, where the global Left aligned with Islamist forces and large-scale protests erupted in cities across the world against Israel and in defense of Gaza. Equally striking is the case of the Kurds, who have endured persistent injustice and oppression in Iran, Turkey, Syria, and Iraq for an entire century yet have never received this kind of global support, a sudden “awakening of conscience.” This is because the forces that exploit the Palestinian cause for political ends have skillfully leveraged the media to craft a specific, desired image of Israel. Al Jazeera, in particular, serves as the spearhead of this ideological, mobilization-oriented media apparatus, designed to impose stereotypes about certain parties while obscuring the reality of others, all in service of deliberate agendas, most notably the concealment of crimes against humanity.
The current elections are unfolding against this turbulent backdrop. It is clear that Israeli society is deeply divided, now at the mercy of the nineteen parliamentary seats won by Arab Israelis, a decisive “swing vote” that could tip the balance between two competing factions: one led by Benjamin Netanyahu and the other, a coalition of Israeli forces led by Gadi Eisenkot, that seeks to rectify and reshape Israel’s distorted global image. What matters is that if Israelis wish to ensure their protection and sovereignty within their state, it depends entirely on the strength they possess and their internal unity, rather than sacrificing major, long-term objectives for the sake of immediate political concerns, such as the pursuit of Netanyahu over matters predating October 7th, or criticisms regarding his handling of the war thereafter. In truth, whatever may be said of him, Netanyahu, when viewed through the lens of his people’s and state’s interests, possesses a sharp, strategic mind; he thinks about the future while navigating the present reality of the Israeli people. It is also worth noting that the growing faction in Israel today, which seeks to rehabilitate the country’s global image and hopes to secure Palestinian recognition of Israel’s legitimate, peaceful existence, is, in reality, chasing nothing more than a mirage.
Arab forces, with few exceptions, generally attach no value to treaties or agreements; instead, they consistently rely on raw, immediate power when addressing major issues. When they possess such power, nothing deters them from committing the most heinous massacres against their adversaries, or even against one another. Conversely, when these same forces find themselves defeated and weak, their flair for portraying themselves as wretched, weeping victims surpasses the combined production capabilities of Bollywood and Hollywood. We have witnessed this, for instance, in how they have treated the Kurds in Iraq and Syria. Although Arab-affiliated forces, whether Islamist, nationalist, or otherwise, have committed the most heinous crimes against the Kurds in both states, they have not hesitated to cast themselves as victims whenever Kurdish forces held the upper hand. This is despite the fact that the Kurds, as even Arabs themselves have attested, have demonstrated mercy and humanity, even toward defeated members of a terrorist organization like ISIS. In Syria, for instance, the Kurds, who were in a position of strength, commanding over 50,000 fighters, voluntarily chose to pursue peace with the new Syrian state, without even demanding the Kurdish national rights one might have expected. Yet, as displaced Kurds attempted to return to their villages and towns, they were met by hostile Arab crowds, clans, and tribes, who vehemently rejected them, burning their homes, vehicles, and property, and opening fire on unarmed civilians without a shred of mercy or a pang of conscience. This is the same pattern that the Kurds in Iraq have endured for an entire century. It is striking that Al Jazeera, a network that goes to great lengths to cinematically highlight the plight of a Palestinian child carrying a food container to evoke a tragic scene, deliberately ignores the massacres and terrorism perpetrated by Arabs against the Kurds in Syria and Iraq. The Kurds have finally realized that, when dealing with these two states, nothing works but force and clear, demarcated boundaries. Such boundaries would prevent the kind of intermingling that often delivers harsh, shocking blows to those who chase illusions, in the form of entities like ISIS or Arab clans, which, when attacking their adversaries, slaughter children before adults and incinerate property before taking innocent lives. The Kurds in both states have gained nothing, even though the constitution of the “new” Iraq formally recognizes their rights. Since 2003, however, the Kurds in Iraq have complained that this constitution is not being implemented; for the Arabs, whether under the regime of Saddam Hussein or the current order led by those who opposed him and ultimately executed him, the document has been little more than ink on paper. They have reneged on their promises and agreements dozens of times!
It appears that the Israelis today, in a sense, are following a path similar to that of the Kurds in Iraq and Syria. While they engage in electoral contests and approach their adversaries with a Western, democratic, and liberal mindset, those very adversaries, the moment an opportunity arises, reveal their true, predatory nature, committing horrific massacres with complete disregard for global public opinion. Yet the Israelis have now placed their own fate in the hands of nineteen Arab members of parliament, individuals who hold the power to decide Israel’s destiny and existence, potentially driving it “toward the sea” (that long-standing slogan, cherished from the very depths of the hearts of Arabs and Islamists alike)!
