Opinions #44/23

President Biden says he doesn’t trust the numbers provided by the Palestinians. Gaza health officials estimate the number of casualties from the Israeli counteroffensive to be in the thousands, but he is not convinced. He believes that this could be propaganda. But the carpet bombing and the plight of two million civilians deliberately deprived of food, water, medicine, and electricity anger students, teachers, and government officials in the president’s Democratic Party.

Ten days before the Hamas attack, on September 26, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that the Middle East today is “quieter than it has been in twenty years.” Over the past twenty years, Israeli settlers have occupied large portions of the territory, making the creation of a true Palestinian state impossible. For Sullivan, current violence by Israeli settlers is unacceptable, and the responsibility to curb it lies with Prime Minister Netanyahu. Netanyahu has ruled the country for sixteen of the last twenty-five years.

Thomas Friedman, one of America’s finest commentators, wrote last week about the enemies Israel faces. There are many more of them than the three he faced and defeated during the first Arab-Israeli War in 1948. Those were nations. Today, there are intangible enemies, Friedman explains in his excellent New York Times article. Intangible, like “narrative”: a more elegant and modern term than reality manipulation.

By the way, Friedman includes in this category the story of the missile that killed hundreds at the Al-Ahli hospital in the Gaza Strip. Palestinian guilt is taken for granted. The Palestinians themselves initially blamed the Israeli army for the massacre.

Two days before this article was published, an investigation by his own newspaper, based on a comparative analysis of all reconstructions, built upon available videos, came to the opposite conclusion.

It is necessary to question the reasons for the growing disconnect between public opinion and politics and its ramifications in the media. This would also allow us to find answers for ourselves. It’s not difficult, it’s just inconvenient.