The Witness Chronicles, April 3, 2024

Lies and death

Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

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Netanyahu is Lying and Everyone Knows It

They ‘misidentified’ the World Food Kitchen car. Right.

The aid worker’s car was covered with large logos identifying what it was, so many that pieces of the wreckage strewn about all had the logo on them in huge letters. And the World Food people had notified the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) that they would be traveling that route.

The same day witnesses claimed IDF snipers were targeting children.

Just for the record, snipers use powerful scopes that clearly show their targets. What we are seeing here is a ‘kill them all and let God sort them out’ strategy. Indiscriminate killing and a willingness to kill and starve hundreds of innocents to get a few terrorists. These are war crimes.

And the crimes are traceable directly to Bibi Netanyahu and his warmonger cabinet. It was possible after the atrocities of October Seventh to justify a harsh response. We are far past that point. Thousands of children are dead and thousands more are starving and homeless. And Bibi wants to escalate, go into Rafah, the last corner they have forced the Gazan public into and continue the slaughter.

A side story here. The US (disclosure, I am American) is planning to sell billions of dollars worth of F15 fighter jets to Israel, jets that will be used to continue the killing, if Netanyahu and his cadre of death are allowed to continue.

My anger is not targeted at Israel or the Jewish people, though many are complicit. Joining the IDF is mandatory for all Israeli youth, excepting the extreme Orthodox Jews. What this tells us is that Israel’s vaunted army is largely composed of very young soldiers thrown into a terrifying situation and told that everyone they see is Hamas or supports Hamas.

Armies are always composed of young soldiers. It’s one of the truly awful things humans do. But this level of death and destruction, now six months old, is not just kids pulling triggers on their own. It is directed by men who will never have to face that terror and who continue the slaughter to protect their personal political power.

That’s nothing new either. Politicians do it here too. We have a presidential candidate who will conspire with the enemy, lie, spread fear and bigotry, and do it all in the hope that he will be able to pardon himself. It’s despicable.

In the last six months, as a political opinion and observation writer, I have been cautious about tackling the Israel/Hamas conflict, knowing there were many factors I could not know about. But this week’s events, and the many prior to now, make it apparent that Netanyahu is out of control, a demagogue using the war to protect himself.

The Israeli people want him out. They have been in the streets by the thousands this week. Even before October 7, thousands of reserve IDF soldiers were threatening to not serve unless Netanyahu was out. His career was hanging by the thread with corruption charges about to send him to prison.

Then the world changed and he was handed a tailor made situation, a national tragedy, that ensured he would stay in power as long as the killing continued. Nations at war tend to keep their leadership during the fighting to keep it stable. Bibi knows this and has pushed it to its limits. Those limits have been reached and the world knows it.

In a supremely ironic turn of events, Netanyahu finds himself with an ally in Russia’s Putin, not because Putin cares about Israel, but because they both profit from instability and fear. Putin’s formerly Soviet Russia killed as many Jews as the Germans while under Stalin’s leadership.

Any relationship between an Israeli government and totalitarian regimes like Russia is unthinkable. But a lot of unthinkable things are on the table now in the Middle East. The constant and indiscriminate killings make that clear. So does the use of starvation as a weapon.

Here in the US, Biden must halt all aid to Israel until Netanyahu is thrown out of office by his people. It’s the only message that will get through to Netanyahu and create a path to a two state solution and Middle East peace.

Snipers targeting children. I can’t get that out of my head.

~ I write The Grasshopper, a letter for creatives, The Witness Chronicles, a place for my articles on politics and climate, and The Remarkable, a recovery letter, about my addiction and reentry experience. All are weekly and free, however this is how I live and I strongly believe all writers and creatives should get paid, if we provide value. Your upgrade to a paid subscription helps make that happen. 

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