How can it happen?

Whenever I was taught about the Shoah (Holocaust) at a young age, I always used to ask myself “how could this happen?”  Like so many others, I have never been able to comprehend just how a crime of this magnitude could be perpetrated.  How could an entire society allow a genocidal maniac come to power, and how could nations stand idly by while millions of Jews were gassed, cremated, shot, worked and starved to death.  Surely the concept of decency and morality within society would have found a way to stand up against the demonisation of a people.

I no longer ask myself this question.  As I see today the way that Israel is demonised in the media, and I see the way in which ignorant people simply accept the consistent portrayal of Israelis as agressors and abusors of human rights, I understand how easy it is for the Jewish people to be scapegoated and hated.  When the reality is perverted to such an extent, the Orwellian vision is no longer fictional. 

Take for example this news report, that cannot take the time to admit that in the past week Palestinians have fired 180 missiles into Israel, but editorialises that “The attacks rarely cause casualties among Israelis but often draw deadly reprisals against Gaza. “

All week the media have been publishing articles about Israel cutting off fuel supplies to Gaza.  The only problem is that it is an exercise in Palestinain propaganda.  To make matters worse, Israeli Electric Company chairman Miko Zafarti claimed on Ynet that their workers are at risk from being struck by missiles, as they continue to operate their facility to supply nearly 70% of the electricity to the Gaza strip.  All of this, while the Palestinians have shut down their own network and blame Israel for thwarting their supply.  What other nation in its right mind would supply electricity to its sworn enemies, whilst deadly missiles are fired towards the very power plant that supplies them?   This is absolute madness.  

The newspapers and the UN will have their feast, whilst Israel muddles around.  When Israel withdrew from Gaza, the agricultural and economic facilities that were supposed to build Palestinian employment were ransacked and desecrated by the Palestinians, along with Jewish Synagogues. Those areas are now terrorist training camps.  Yet Israel is still blamed, occupation is still believed to be the obstacle to peace, and billions of dollars of aid is now supplied to further the Palestinaian cause.  The leadership, both Hamas and Fatah, refuse to recognise the right for Israel to securely exist as a Jewish State, and continue to wage terror against Israeli citizens.  Any form of retalliation or response is the cause of international headlines against Israel.  

One further example that speaks volumes.  In this item by Ami Iseroff   you will read about Carlos Chavez, an innocent volunteer who was murdered in Israel.  Contrast his contribution to the region with that of Rachel Corrie.  See how the media portrayed each of them, and how morally inverted the coverage of this conflict has truely become.

I’m not sure what the answers are.  Israel needs strong leadership more than ever, and needs to assert its right to defend its citizens, their lives and their limbs.  No other country in the world would tolerate hundreds of missiles raining down on its cities, or be expected to refrain from reprisal. 

Jews are no longer lambs to the slaughter, albeit that this is the historic role that the world seems to expect of us.  We have our own nation, and the right to defend it.  Ultimately nothing is stronger than the truth, but the problem we have at the moment is that the truth is not being communicated.  

If the Government of Israel understands the meaning of the words “never again”, then it must act assertively and forcefully to defend itself.  Israel has 60 years worth of history to prove that a military response will quell a threat, and a lame toleration of terrorism will only exacerbate further conflict.

How can the Holocaust happen?  Many years of propaganda and cultural entrenchment (verbal victimisation) of Jews is required first.  That is what we are seeing today.  Seventy years ago there was no State of Israel, no Jewish homeland or refuge.  Today that is different, and as a soverign nation with the right to defend its borders, Israel is no historic abberation.

Israel can fight the physical battle on its borders.  However the battle for the minds, values, virtues, and knowledge that sits behind the current situation is being rapidly lost.  Supporters of Israel everywhere need to stand up against media bias and distortion before it is too late.