February 12, 2024: A Black Weekend for the Hamasniks

The Rafah psyop; State Dept vet joins anti-Israel NGO; Autogynephilic Mass Shooters for Palestine

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The Big Story

This past weekend was a bad one for the Hamas public relations machine in the West. In the span of a few days, several of their cherished myths fell apart in highly public fashion. 

The first concerned UNRWA, the U.N. refugee agency for the Palestinians, which Western leftists have long defended as a neutral humanitarian institution unfairly maligned by “Zionists.” On Saturday, only a few weeks after Israel accused UNRWA employees of participating in the Oct. 7 massacre (leading the United States and several European countries to pause funding to UNRWA), the IDF revealed that it had discovered a Hamas intelligence center and server farm in a tunnel directly beneath UNRWA’s Gaza headquarters. 

UNRWA’s head, Philippe Lazzarini, denied any knowledge of the Hamas HQ, but as the evidence against the agency mounts, such denials are becoming increasingly ridiculous. Even before the discovery of the intelligence center, a Feb. 2 report in The Wall Street Journal revealed several damning examples of the agency’s complicity with the terror group. In 2015, a top UNRWA employee who oversaw the firing of Hamas-linked employees was forced to leave after receiving credible death threats, including a box with a grenade. In 2021, the agency’s Gaza chief was forced to leave for his safety after admitting on television that it was a “safe assumption” that Hamas tunnels ran under UNRWA schools. And in 2014, the parking lot at the group’s Gaza headquarters began to sink due to a Hamas tunnel below it. “No one talked about what was causing the collapse,” a former UNRWA official told the Journal, “but everyone knew.”

The second myth concerns the status of “journalists” in Gaza. We’ve covered a few of these journalists before, including the New York Times freelancer who repeatedly praised Hitler on his personal social media and the journalists who were tapped to enter into Israel with the Nukhba forces on Oct. 7. And yet the idea that the IDF is engaged in the wanton massacre of journalists has become an article of faith among Hamas’ PR flacks in the West, such as The Washington Post’s Karen Attiah:

Over the weekend, the IDF revealed that it had captured a laptop in Gaza establishing that a journalist for Al Jazeera Arabic, an on-air broadcaster named Mohamed Washash, was a “prominent commander” in Hamas’ anti-tank missile unit. Photos from the laptop showed Washash in uniform training Hamas militants in the use of rocket-propelled grenades. That might sound bad, but credit to Washash for at least putting his body on the line—his Western counterparts push the same propaganda from the safety of Park Slope. 

Finally, anyone using English-language social media on Sunday might have noticed a flood of posts announcing an ongoing “genocide” or “holocaust” in Rafah:

The Rafah operation, the world discovered a few hours later, was a successful hostage rescue mission. The allegedly genocidal Israeli airstrikes were in support of special forces troops who found themselves in a shoot-out after freeing Fernando Marman, 61, and Louis Har, 70, from a Rafah building complex where they were being held. The hostages and the soldiers returned safely to Israel with no significant injuries. 

The situation is looking bright for Israel on the diplomatic front, too. After threatening “dire consequences” for Israel if it moved forward with its Rafah offensive, including a potential suspension of its peace agreement with Israel, Egypt announced on Monday that it would sustain the Camp David Accords.

Just don’t expect any change in tune from the White House. Thursday night, U.S. Deputy National Security Advisor Jon Finer told a crowd in Dearborn, Michigan that the White House had “no confidence” in the Israeli government and expressed regret for not taking a stronger stand against Israeli officials who “compared residents of Gaza to animals”—a propagandistic misquoting of Yoav Gallant, who in the early days of the war referred to Hamas as “human animals.” In a Sunday phone call, Biden urged Netanyahu to find a way to “close the gaps with Hamas” in negotiations for a cease-fire and expressed his opposition to an Israeli operation in Rafah. To top it all off, the White House leaked to NBC News on Monday that Biden had repeatedly referred to Netanyahu as an “asshole,” identified the Israeli prime minister as the “primary obstacle” to a cease-fire, and accused Netanyahu of wanting to extend the war to remain in power. 

In other words, Israel is winning the war, and the White House is very, very upset about it.

IN THE BACK PAGES: Booker Prize winner Howard Jacobson on anti-Zionist Jews

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The Rest

→For more on the PR blitz surrounding Israel’s impending Rafah offensive, here’s our Thread of the Day, from Seth Frantzman of the Middle East Center for Reporting: 

→Josh Paul, the former U.S. State Department official who resigned in October in protest of U.S. military aid for Israel and penned a New York Times op-ed explaining his decision, has joined Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), Jewish Insider reports. As The Scroll has previously reported, DAWN, founded in 2018 by Saudi-agent-cum-Qatari-agent-cum-martyred-“journalist” Jamal Khashoggi, is run by the anti-Israel radical Sarah Leah Whitson, and it has advocated for, among other things, the repeal of the Abraham Accords, U.N. sanctions against Israel, and U.S. travel bans and International Criminal Court investigations against individual IDF officers. It has received funding from the Rockefeller Brothers Foundation, the Ford Foundation, and George Soros’ Open Society Foundation, and its three-member board is made up of Whitson, Esam Omeish—a Democratic donor who had to resign from the Virginia state immigration commission after calling on Muslims to embrace “the jihad way”—and Council on American-Islamic Relations executive director and Hamas fellow traveler Nihad Awad. 

→On Sunday, a transgender woman accompanied by a young child walked into the Houston megachurch of pastor Joel Osteen and opened fire with an AR-15 emblazoned with “Free Palestine,” critically wounding one boy before being killed by police. The shooter, Genesse Yvonne Moreno, was born Jeffrey Escalante in El Salvador, and had several previous arrests, including for assault, forgery, theft, possession of marijuana, evading arrest, and weapons charges. Despite the rather political message on her weapon, police say they have not yet established motive. As The Scroll noted on Jan. 22, there have been several high-profile shootings by trans or “non-binary” individuals over the past two years, including in Colorado Springs, Nashville, and Perry, Iowa. 

→Quote of the Day:

In recent weeks, President Biden has grumbled to aides and advisers that had Garland moved sooner in his investigation into former President Donald Trump’s election interference, a trial may already be underway or even have concluded, according to two people granted anonymity to discuss private matters.

That’s from a Saturday story in Politico on Biden’s growing frustration with Attorney General Merrick Garland, over Garland’s failure to redact the embarrassing portions of Special Counsel Robert Hur’s recent report and, apparently, to secure a conviction of Biden’s opponent before the election in November. 

→In 2017, the Denver city council passed a law prohibiting city and county employees from assisting in the enforcement of federal immigration laws, which, along with several other Trump-era ordinances, effectively turned Denver into a “sanctuary city” for illegal immigrants. Now, the city has become a magnet for migrants entering the United States, with disastrous effects on Denver’s finances. Here’s The Wall Street Journal: 

This city of 713,000 people has absorbed nearly 40,000 migrants in a little over a year, more per capita than any other U.S. city. It is second only to New York in the total number of foreigners who have arrived since 2022.

The influx is straining the city’s budget, crowding schools and hospitals and swelling the ranks of the city’s homeless population. Denver has spent more than $42 million in the past year to house and feed the new arrivals. Public schools have ballooned by more than 3,000 students, creating a budget shortfall of roughly $17.5 million. The city’s safety-net hospital has seen at least 9,000 migrant patients in the past year, costing at least $10 million in unreimbursed care.

Denver Mayor Mike Johnston has said that the city’s migrant-related costs could rise to as much as $180 million this year and that absent more federal help, “nearly every city department is likely to face a 15% budget cut.” 

→At a rally in South Carolina on Saturday, former president Donald Trump said he would “encourage” Russia to attack NATO members if they didn’t fulfill their defense-spending obligations under the treaty. Here’s the full text of what Trump said: 

The president of a big country stood up and said, “Sir, if we don’t pay, and we’re attacked by Russia, will you protect us?” 

You didn’t pay? You’re delinquent? 

He said, “Yes, let’s say that happened.” 

No, I would not protect you. In fact I would encourage them to do whatever the hell they want. You gotta pay!

→The Kansas City Chiefs defeated the San Francisco 49ers 25-22 in overtime to win their second consecutive Super Bowl. It was also their second come-from-behind win against the 49ers in the Super Bowl, having accomplished the same feat in 2020. Readers who watched the game may remember Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce exploding at coach Andy Reid on the sideline after being removed from the game on a key play in the first half, which introduces our Meme of the Day from friend of The Scroll Joe Simonson: 

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TODAY IN TABLET: 

Finding the ‘Real Africa,’ by Maggie Phillips

Ethiopian Orthodox Christians in the U.S. try to translate and preserve their religious texts for a generation growing up in the diaspora—and to reclaim their community’s history

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SCROLL TIP LINE: Have a lead on a story or something going on in your workplace, school, congregation, or social scene that  you want to tell us about? Send your tips, comments, questions, and suggestions to scroll@tabletmag.com.

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Sefton Goldberg and the New Hate Marchers

Today’s Jewish anti-Zionists seek the bliss of persecution

By Howard Jacobson

Berated by colleagues in the Polytechnic car park for parking in a space not allotted to him, Sefton Goldberg—the hero of my novel Coming From Behind—experiences a sensation he would seem to have been anticipating all his adult life. He is outnumbered, his back against his car. He is Jewish. His tormentors—a handful of disgruntled academics demanding he park somewhere else—are not. Is it here at last, he wonders, “the bliss of persecution”?

Coming From Behind was my first novel. It was a surprise to me that my hero turned out be Jewish. I just blundered in, the way you do with a first novel, marveling at where all this stuff comes from. I did not foresee "the bliss of persecution" line. There Goldberg was, outfaced by colleagues, none of whom liked him much (no surprise there: He didn’t much like himself) whereupon the joke that the pogrom he’d long been expecting was finally to come about in a car park in a West Midlands polytechnic, wrote itself.

At a bar mitzvah soon after the novel’s publication, a delegation of uncles berated me for it. How does it help the Jewish people to say they look forward to being murdered, they asked. By making them laugh, I said. Ah, so I thought the Holocaust was funny? My uncles formed a menacing circle around me. "Here it is again," I thought, "the bliss of persecution."

The best Jewish jokes spawn multiplicities of others. "I will make your jokes as numerous as the stars in the sky," God promised Sarah. She was the one with the sense of humor. Thereafter, the bliss of persecution jokes had no end.

Nonetheless, when I had time to think about my version again, I wondered where it had come from. I wasn’t born into an especially masochistic Jewish family. I didn’t look for trouble at every corner. I didn’t want to be beaten up by antisemitic thugs. And yet there was some truth in all this. Jews are forever waiting for something bad to happen.

If I felt warmly disposed to Sefton—the first apocalyptic Jew I wrote about—it was because he knew himself well enough to suspect he was preposterous; if I felt less kind to some of those later Jews I designated as ASHamed, it was because they didn’t. And yet I acknowledge a kinship.

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I haven’t been on any of the marches for Palestine that are now a regular part of a London weekend. Every Saturday in England is now Vilify Israel Shabbes. I meet the marches half-way by not calling them Hate Marches. I’d like them to meet me half-way by not calling themselves Peace Marches.

There’s an inevitable carnivalesque quality about a march. The banners, the chanting, the optimism of numbers, the holiday from care and reality. On a march, even the lowliest become kings for a day and briefly, the overturning of the entire old order seems possible.

Exhilarating, these Shabbes-busters must be, if you are a Palestinian. But what if you are a Jew? I don’t mean a Jew watching on the news, I mean a Jew marching in solidarity with people not all of whom like Jews. In these cataclysmic times, aren’t anti-Zionist Jews, too, getting a little something of what they want? The prospect of the end of Israel, say. How many Jewish anti-Zionists were among those dancing in the streets in the immediate aftermath of the Oct. 7 massacre, I can’t pretend to know, but there were certainly a number who got high on it discursively.

Is it exhilarating, if you are a Jewish anti-Zionist, to imagine that the thing you’ve been anticipating with perverse glee is getting closer every hour? "I want to devote my energies to delegitimizing the State of Israel," the Jewish Israeli historian Ilan Pappé stated in a lecture at the University of Amsterdam in 2014. In a leader of Hamas that ambition would be unexceptionable. In a Jewish-born Israeli one can only guess at the reasons for the peevishness. "Now vee may perhaps to begin," says Portnoy’s shrink in the final line of Portnoy’s Complaint. Most tergiversations go back to how loved we didn’t feel in early childhood. Could the name be a clue? Pappé. What was that something the older Ilan feels the younger Ilan didn’t get?

Whatever the answer, we must assume that, with the numbers of the gullible sharing his miserabilist fixation, he’s getting it now. As are, presumably, those other Jewish anti-Zionists who are so sedulous in making the case against Israel’s existence. I don’t know how those who march comport themselves on Vilify Israel Shabbes, whether on the streets of London or elsewhere—I would hope they do so soberly, as befits the funeral cortege they want every march to be—but on the page and in interviews they commonly rejoice at the imminence of their homeland’s demise, or at least in the conclusive arguments they believe themselves to have made toward it. Each declares an epiphanous, anti-Eureka moment when, actually or figuratively, they stand on Israeli soil and come to the conclusion that it’s stolen. Considering most of them are historians, they are cavalier about the fact that history is the movement of ideas and events through time. Yet for their criticism to be as damning as they need it to be, Zionism must appear fully formed in all its cruelty, as impervious to time as it is to the imploring of the United Nations, a dead weight born of nothing but its own ill will. Proclaims Ha’aretz journalist, Gideon Levy, "A people came to a populated land and took it over. That’s the core of everything."

The nursery language of folk tale fulfils a double purpose. It empties history of time and empties motive of complexity. Menacing in their anonymity and blind cupidity, "a people" might as well have come from an evil planet. With the simplifications of myth on his side, Gideon Levy feels empowered to speak like an apprentice prophet. "Those who wanted the Jewish state and Zionism—it’s too late, friends. If you want the Jewish state, you should have pulled out of the occupied territories a long time ago. You didn’t do it. Too bad for you."

Here they are at last, then—the last days of Zion.

And here he is, another satisfied, disaster-seeking Jew.

Amos Oz, the Israeli novelist and founding member of Peace Now, also felt his country should have pulled out of the occupied territories, though his analysis of how the occupation came about and the difficulties of extrication was more subtle than Gideon Levy’s. Until the colonialist-settler paradigm became the one and only model for reading events, leaving Israel high and dry as the last exponent of its evils and every Zionist a collaborator, Oz enjoyed great favor with the literary left. Both sides were in the right, and then both sides were in the wrong, he reasoned, which felt like an acceptance of some responsibility at least.

But, looked at a second time, it wasn’t enough. Both sides equally at fault sounded too much like tragedy, and tragedy eschews blame. And, without being able to apportion blame to one party only, anti-Zionism is toothless. No account of Israel that doesn’t concede turpitude from the moment the first of those "people" from nowhere arrived to steal and plunder will suffice. Oz’s exquisite descriptions of his family’s life in pre-War of Independence Jerusalem in A Tale of Love and Darkness are routinely dismissed as sentimental falsifications by anti-Zionists who cannot bear a story, let alone one in which the face of Zionism was once benign. Whatever moves or changes threatens the fixity of the only truth they want to hear. And whatever evokes lives lived in ambivalence denies the absolutism of discourse.

"The answer to racism is to denounce it," wrote Jacqueline Rose in The Last Resistance, "not to flee behind a defensive, self-isolating barrier of being—and being only—a Jew."

If you want to know why a novel will always surpass a treatise as a guide to living, here’s the evidence. Imagine telling the Jews of Kishinev not to flee but to stay and denounce the racism of the rioters crying "Kill the Jews!"

"Gentlemen," I hear the rabbi remonstrating with the advancing mob ... But after that I hear nothing.

Does Jacqueline Rose really consider death by lynch mob preferable to flight, or the dash for safety to be an act of narcissism? Perhaps she has an essay somewhere among her papers teaching Jews the right way of accepting martyrdom or, if they must run away, how to do so nondefensively.

So here’s a question. Does not Pappé’s ambition to "delegitimize" an entire nation of Israeli Jews, taken alongside Gideon Levy’s designation of those same Jews as a faceless, once-and-for-all predatory people and Jacqueline Rose’s unwillingness to conceive a living Jew in a situation of mortal peril, allow of a plausible presumption of genocide?

What an innocent my Sefton Goldberg appears now, thinking the threat to his existence would come from embittered gentiles. But I forgive him. This was 1983. He couldn’t have known that, only 40 years later, those hell-bent on tearing down the Temple would be Jews.