US Critics of Israel’s War Are Being Slandered for Making the Same Criticisms as Israelis
A variety of prominent Israeli voices, including its paper of record, have denounced the war on Gaza and pointed to anti-Palestinian repression as the root cause of Hamas's violence. But those in the US saying the same have been met with slander and censure.
A smoke plume erupting during Israeli bombardment on the Palestine. (Fadel Seena / AFP via Getty Images)
The past month has seen a wave of condemnation, threats, and repression aimed at pro-Palestinian voices across the Western world. Critics of Israel’s occupation and unrelenting assault on Gaza have been painted as whitewashing or even supporting Hamas, while calls for justice for Palestinians have been condemned as beyond the pale or even an incitement to violence.
What well-meaning observers in the United States might not realize is that some of the most prominent figures who have made these kinds of criticisms, often in terms far more vociferous than US critics, are Israelis themselves.
Establishment Rebellion
On the morning of October 8 — one day after Hamas’s massacre — the Israeli paper of record Haaretz published a blistering lead editorial charging that the attack was “the clear responsibility of one person: Benjamin Netanyahu,” the country’s prime minister. As the “ultimate arbiter of Israeli foreign and security affairs,” the paper stated, Netanyahu had “completely failed to identify the dangers he was consciously leading Israel into when establishing a government of annexation and dispossession, when appointing Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir to key positions, while embracing a foreign policy that openly ignored the existence and rights of Palestinians.”
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