Rabeh Morrar:
Thank you for your profoundly moving comments!
Avram Finkelstein
On Sun, Aug 3, 2025 at 10:38 PM rabeh morrar
wrote:
> Hello,
> I am writing these lines and feeling unsafe about my life as I live in the
> West Bank in Palestine.
> I wonder about the amount of inhumanity and ignoring the suffering of 5
> million people in Gaza and the West Bank.
>
> What I find most painful is the widespread denial—or dismissal—of
> Palestinian humanity. Framing this situation solely as a war on “Islamist
> extremism” erases the millions of ordinary people who have nothing to do
> with Hamas or any militant group—people like my family, my students, and my
> neighbors—who are trying to survive in unlivable conditions. We are not
> extremists. We are not “human shields.” We are teachers, doctors, parents,
> and children.
> Israel’s sustained military assault plunged the 2.3 million Palestinians
> in Gaza into a humanitarian catastrophe of historic magnitude, with the
> United Nations now confirming that the worst-case scenario of famine is
> unfolding . According to UN-backed food security experts, two out of three
> famine thresholds have already been breached, and there is mounting
> evidence of widespread starvation, acute malnutrition, and hunger-related
> deaths. With over 60,000 people killed (more than 60% of them are
> children and women), 90% of the population displaced, and essential
> services on the verge of total collapse, what is unfolding in Gaza is not
> merely a crisis — it is, in the words of the UN World Food Programme,
> unlike anything we have seen in this century.
> In addition to the mass killing of civilians, now recognized by leading
> Israeli human rights organizations such as B’Tselem and Physicians for
> Human Rights Israel as constituting genocide, Gaza has also witnessed a
> deliberate and systematic cultural genocide aimed at erasing its ancient
> identity and collective memory .
> Where I live in the West Bank, our lives have become hell because of the
> daily attacks of Settlers and more than 1000 checkpoints.
>
> Peace cannot come through domination. Peace cannot come while entire
> populations are dehumanized or forced to choose between submission and
> annihilation. Lasting peace requires mutual recognition of suffering,
> justice, and dignity for all.
>
> I do not expect we will agree on all matters. But I hope we can hold space
> for complexity, for empathy, and for the idea that protecting one people’s
> safety should never require another’s devastation.
>
>
> On Mon, Aug 4, 2025 at 3:44 AM Rebecca Eisenberg <
> rebecca@rebecca4water.com> wrote:
>
>> That is correct.
>>
>> There is no Peace as long as there is fear. Continuing to enable
>> Islamist (which is different from Muslim) extremists is enabling fear.
>> Under Islamist law, all women are slaves. All LGBTQia2S+ are murdered. All
>> nonconformists are tortured and killed.
>>
>> None of you would survive under Islamist law. Islamist law -
>> particularly Sharia law, which is what Hamas, Hezbollah, Houthis, the
>> Taliban and the other terrorists groups linked to the Islamist Republic of
>> Iran (which is the terrorist group that currently holds Persians captive in
>> their own country) -- deprives women, LGBTQia2S+ people, and all
>> non-Islamist Muslims of all fundamental human rights. Islamist terrorists
>> have killed millions and millions of Muslims throughout MENA in literally
>> every single company they invaded and conquered by force, which is every
>> country they rule or attempt to rule. Look at a map and you will see how
>> many: dozens.
>>
>> Israel is the only country in the entire North Africa and Middle East
>> region where Jews are allowed to LIVE. Let me repeat that: Every single
>> Arab country in NAME has ethnically cleansed Jews. Although a huge number
>> of Jews had been living in the 22 countries that surround Israel when the *UN
>> created Israel in 1948, * there are virtually zero Jews living in any of
>> those countries now. They were expelled from the countries.
>>
>> No one ever offered Jews a right of return to Iran, Iraq, Morocco (where
>> dozens in my family lived before being ethnically cleansed, whereupon they
>> settled in Chile), Yemen, Lebanon (which used to be, and can again, be a
>> diverse and advanced nation, if they can get rid of Hezbollah), Jordan,
>> Egypt, and every other Arab country that surrounds Israel. All of those
>> Jews were forcibly removed. None of those Jews have any right of return.
>> It is only Israel where Jews are allowed to live.
>>
>> Meanwhile, Israel offers equal rights to all people regardless of race
>> and religion. Anyone would know that by visiting Israel. If you have not
>> been to Tel Aviv in the past 10 years, you have no standing whatsoever to
>> comment about it. Here are some fast facts:
>>
>> 1. Unlike the US and most other countries, Israel has TWO official
>> languages: Hebrew and Arabic.
>> 2. The signs in every city are in at least two languages: Hebrew and
>> Arabic. In many cities, including Israels largest city Tel Aviv, signs
>> are in three languages: Arabic, Hebrew, and English. Go find that anywhere
>> in the US.
>> 3. Israel has some of the highest quality health care programs in the
>> world, and this universal healthcare program is provided to every single
>> resident regardless of religion, meaning that millions of recipients of
>> Israeli top healthcare are Muslim, Christian, Hindu or other religions.
>> 4. Israel completely pulled out of Gaza in 2007. At that time it
>> forcibly removed all Jews from Gaza -- there has been no right of return
>> for the Jews that were ethnically cleansed out of Gaza. Gaza does not
>> allow Jews to live there. Neither does the West Bank. I do not support the
>> Jewish settlements in the West Bank, but I point out that in any other
>> context, people of other religions are called immigrants and not
>> colonists.
>> 5. Jews and Israel have NEVER conquered any country. They have one tiny
>> country: Israel.
>> 6. Islamists have invaded DOZENS of countries, conquering almost all of
>> them -- and those they have not conquered are still wrought in civil war.
>> Islamists have been the most violent and invasive conquering force on earth
>> in the last century. They have taken over dozens of countries, and when
>> they do, they ethnically purge people of all other religions or practices.
>> 7. The vast majority of people who have been invaded, massacred,
>> murdered, and forced out of their own countries by Islamists are MUSLIMS.
>> Islamists have, and continue to kill, millions of non-Islamist Muslims in
>> all of war-torn MENA, including Yemen, Syria, Jordan, Iran, Iraq,
>> Afghanistan, and every other country they currently are in. These civil
>> wars are not between Jews and Muslims. They are waged by Islamic Muslims
>> against other Muslims.
>> 8. It is not racist to criticize Islamist regimes. Islamists represent a
>> minority of Muslims. The most amount of criticism -- even though they are
>> murdered for speaking out -- comes from other Muslims subject to Islamist
>> terror in Iran, Jordan, Afghanistan, Yemen, and everywhere else that is
>> still fighting not to be taken over by Islamist extremists.
>> 9. There is such a thing as anti-Muslim racism. But again, as a reminder,
>> the majority of people speaking out against Islamism are Muslim.
>> 10. The vast majority of black people in Israel and Palestine are
>> Jewish. Black people have equal rights in Israel. The word for black in
>> Arabic means "slave." In Israel, it is the color black.
>> 11. There is racism in Israel like there is racism in the US, Europe, and
>> everywhere else. Racism is ubiquitous.
>> 12. Several hundred thousand Ethiopian - and black -- Jews live in
>> Israel. Israel helped them escape from Ethiopia, where they were being
>> ethnically cleansed by the Islamist extremists. In Israel, they are alive
>> and full citizens. In Ethiopia, they were illegal and killed.
>> 13. Ethiopian Jews escaped terror in their homeland to settle in Israel.
>> They are amongst the most patriotic Israelis. They serve in leadership
>> positions in the IDF and in every other aspect of Israeli life. In fact,
>> they likely have more representation in Israel than black Americans have
>> achieved in 400 years in the area now known as the US.
>> 14. The IDF is made up of 18 and 19 year old young men AND women who are
>> required to serve prior to receiving their (highly subsidized if not
>> entirely subsidized) college education. 18 and 19 year olds are what Hamas
>> calls "children."
>> 15. Even though only Jews are forced to serve in the IDF, the majority
>> of non-Jewish 18 and 19 year olds of all other religions in Israel,
>> including Muslims, Christians, Hindus and otherwise, volunteer to serve.
>> This is how and why the IDF is both young (children in Hamas language) and
>> diverse in every way: gender, sex, religion, race, ethnicity, language, and
>> otherwise.
>> 16. The IDF has special units for autistic people. In Palestine and other
>> Islamist-run nations, it is a criminal offense to be autistic and most are
>> killed. My daughter would be killed not only because she is Jewish, but
>> also because she is autistic and queer. I
>> 17. Israel is the only safe place for queer, neurologically diverse, and
>> female (including trans) people to live in the entire area. Everywhere
>> else they are enslaved or murdered.
>> 17. Jews are indigenous to Judea, which is the area that includes not
>> just Israel, but also Jordan, the West Bank, Gaza, the Sinai Peninsula,
>> Lebanon, Syria, and other nations that surround Israel. The only country in
>> their entire indigenous religion where Jews are allowed to live is Israel.
>> There is nowhere else for Jews to go if Israel is destroyed.
>> 18. Half of all Jews in the world live in Israel. If Israel is destroyed,
>> so will be the Jewish religion and culture -- one of the most ancient
>> religions and cultures in the world.
>> 19. Without Israel, Jews will become like all the indigenous peoples in
>> the Americas. This is why the American Indigenous communities
>> overwhelmingly support Israel. They have lived the genocide that Jews face.
>> 20. There are Israeli hostages who have been held in the least humane and
>> most terrorizing circumstances for almost 2 years. None of these hostages
>> were ever accused of any crimes. They were pulled from their cribs, their
>> beds, their bomb shelters, walking down the street, or at a teenage dance
>> rave. To the extent they are considered military, almost none were actually
>> on duty, and those who were on duty were in positions of merely
>> watching. Almost all of the Israeli military captured and raped and
>> dismembered, tortured and murdered were 18 or 19 years old -- children.
>> 20. Size wise, Israel is the size of a postage stamp on a football field
>> of Arab nations. Jews are not allowed to live anywhere else on that
>> football field other than in the postage stamp called Israel.
>> 21. More than half of all Israeli Jews are Arab. Most of them were
>> ethnically cleansed from the nearby countries. There is ZERO ethnic or
>> racial difference between Arab Jews and Arab Muslims. You would not be
>> able to tell one from the other if not for the religious clothing and
>> hairstyles. Take those off and there is no ethnic difference. This is not
>> a racial war.
>> 23. 13 members of the Israel Knesset are Muslim.
>> 24. Muslims are represented in all levels of leadership in Israel:
>> government, business, academia, medicine, nonprofit,and everything else.
>> Muslims enjoy abundant lives and many are very wealthy.
>> 25. Approximately 25-40% (depending on whom you ask) of Israelis are not
>> Jewish. In other words, Israel is a little more than half Jewish.
>> 26. Israel recognizes same sex marriages. Every Arab country that
>> surrounds Israel considers being LGBTQia2S+ a capital crime, and non cis,
>> hetero folks are murdered by the rulers.
>> 27. The Israeli army, known as the IDF, is comprised of a similarly
>> reflective variety of races, ethnicities, and religions. When you call the
>> IDF terrorists and murderers and genocidalists, you are accusing a huge
>> amount of Muslims, Christians, and Hindus of participating in genocide.
>> 28. Israel provides more equal rights to women than almost all countries
>> in the entire world. Abortion always has been a funded part of healthcare.
>> Israel had a female prime minister 70 years ago -- something that the US
>> still has not achieved. Before Netanyahu arrived and fired almost all the
>> women in highest ranks of govt, women were fully represented in all
>> leadership positions.
>> 29. Israel is a democracy -- in fact, right now more of a democracy than
>> the US (despite its fascist prime minister).
>> 30. 90% of all Israelis - and the vast majority of Jews worldwide -
>> oppose the leadership of Netanyahu. The largest and strongest opposition
>> to Netanyahu comes from Jews in Israel. They know how to oppose a fascist
>> leader (like Trump) without arguing that the country should be destroyed.
>> (Few argue that the US should be destroyed because Trump is a fascist).
>> 31. Judaism is a religion based on ethics, where Jews are commanded to
>> disagree with each other in order to find the most righteous response,
>> words and actions. Jews are expected to disagree with each other,
>> including politically.
>> 32. Islam is a religion based on complete submission to an ideology from
>> a third party (male) prophet. Disagreement is met with punishment
>> including, most of the time, death. There is no freedom of thought in an
>> Islamist society.
>> 33. The vast majority of Jews oppose the war.
>> 34. It is possible to oppose the war without calling it a genocide. It
>> is not a genocide. Genocides cannot be ended with returns of hostages and
>> surrender. The majority of Israelis do not want to annex Gaza. They want
>> an end to the bombing of them and the invasion of them.
>> 35. Hamas is the source interfering with the distribution of aid.
>> Israel has provided more aid to the country that invaded it than any
>> country in a similar situation has in recorded human history. As a
>> reminder, Hamas - which represents a much larger presence than Israel -
>> invaded Israel and murdered, raped, mutilated, and kidnapped thousands of
>> Israelis. Israel is Ukraine. Hamas is Russia. Would Ukraine be expected to
>> feed Russia? Regardless, Israel is doing it anyway in order to have peace.
>> 36. Most Jews and Israelis favor a two-state solution if the Palestinian
>> state would not continue to bomb and invade Israel. That is literally all
>> it would take. But every govt that has taken hold in Palestine has
>> included as its most important goal to destroy Israel. Is it too much to
>> ask that your next door neighbor be refrained from trying to destroy you?
>> 37. The Palestinians, formerly known as the Arabs, have been offered a
>> separate state dozens of times dating back to before the creation of
>> Israel. They never accepted the offer for a separate state. They always
>> insisted on the destruction of Israel.
>> 38. There are 2.1 BILLION Muslims in the world. There are 14 million
>> Jews. There were 24 million Jews before the Holocaust, and now there are
>> 14. That is what a genocide looks like. There are twice as many
>> Palestinians now as there were 10 years ago. That is growth, not
>> genocide. (Although I still oppose the war.) For each Jew there are 800
>> Muslims. In Israel, the knowledge that for each of them, there are
>> hundreds of people who want to kill them is a part of everyday life.
>> 39. The vast majority of protesters against Israel are white. A large
>> part, if not most, of the black community supports Israel. The history of
>> black and Jewish communities working together in the US is more than
>> a century old. Jews founded the ACLU and co-founded the NAACP. This
>> history informs those who remember it.
>> 40. The only group who voted more strongly for Kamala Harris than Black
>> women in the last election is Jewish women. Jewish women voted for Kamala
>> Harris more strongly than Black men.
>>
>> The preceding facts are facts. They are not propaganda. They can be
>> confirmed by numerous external sources. They were true before October 7 and
>> are true now. They are not taught in schools because - go figure - Jews do
>> not control education. They are not covered in the news because - go
>> figure - Jews do not control the media. The truth and history of Jews and
>> Israel has been erased. This is called ethnic nullification, and is what
>> has happened to Jews.
>>
>> I think it is possible to have these conversations without resorting to
>> name-calling and ethnic slurs. (Islamist is not an ethnic slur. It is
>> using the word they chose for themselves.) Instead of calling it a
>> genocide, because it is terrible but not a genocide, call it a war. It is
>> a war. Recognize the hostages. Try to embrace the fundamental point that
>> those who care about human rights care both about Palestinians and about
>> Israelis. Consider that Islamists do not hide that their goal is to destroy
>> Israel. Recognize that if Israel is destroyed, 7 million Jews would be
>> exterminated (worse than the Holocaust) -- as these Jews have nowhere else
>> to live -- and consider that the destruction of Israel will, infact, render
>> Judaism extinct.
>>
>> Try to recognize that the IDF is made up primarily of teenagers, and that
>> those teenagers are both male and female, and are the most religiously
>> diverse military force in the world. In the IDF are a large number of
>> Muslims, Christians, and Hindus -- especially Muslims. They are fighting
>> with Jews to preserve the only Jewish country on earth, because they too
>> recognize (especially the Muslims, and all of the women) that Israel is the
>> only country in the entire global region where they can enjoy freedom of
>> religion, thought, press, and sexuality, and in the case of all of the
>> women, all of the Jews, and most of the Muslims, is the only country in the
>> entire region where they can live with civil rights.
>>
>> Recent studies by a large number of Jewish and non-Jewish organizations
>> have shown that most people alive today do not understand or recognize what
>> happened in the Holocaust. That may be true for many on this list. Anyone
>> truly informed about the Holocaust would not toss around the triggering
>> words used so blithely by so many white people, in order to defend the most
>> misogynist, terrorist, murderous, colonist, and violent force in world
>> history. They would not defend the violent regimes that enslave all women.
>> They would not defend the ethnic cleansers who consider being gay, or for a
>> woman, speaking in public, a crime worthy of death. They would not support
>> a regime led by a handful of white men who have been stealing from their
>> own people for decades, and who speak on behalf of their holy profit from
>> their skyrises in Quatar, worth a combined 30 billion dollars. They would
>> look at the situation closely and examine all evidence.
>>
>> They would recognize that there is no peace with fear. There is no peace
>> with the enslavement of women and the murder of gays. There is no peace if
>> those who criticize the government are shot to death in public. There is no
>> peace when the forces in charge steal your food, and use the money raised
>> on your behalf to buy more weapons. There is no peace when the people in
>> charge use you as human shields. There is no peace when 60 living or dead
>> innocent people are being held hostage and not returned.
>>
>> There is no peace as long as there is fear. And if you ask me, there is
>> no peace as long as there is god. Israel would survive without god. A
>> large number of Jews are technically atheists which -- guess what? -- is
>> ALLOWED in the Jewish religion. But without god, Islamists would have no
>> way to control the people.
>>
>> Lets get rid of god.
>>
>> Best,
>> Rebecca
>>
>> On Sun, Aug 3, 2025 at 3:43 PM Martin Wasserman
>> wrote:
>>
>>> The way to end the suffering in Gaza is for Israel to defeat Hamas as
>>> quickly as possible. The humanitarian needs of the Gazans can be addressed
>>> after the war is over, but trying to address them while fighting is still
>>> ongoing merely provides oxygen to Hamas and makes the conflict last longer.
>>>
>>>
>>> But I think whats really prolonging the war is Israels single-minded
>>> focus on the hostages. The lives of the hostages are very important, but so
>>> are the lives of Israeli soldiers. So far, the number of soldiers killed in
>>> the war, about 900, far exceeds the number of hostages initially abducted,
>>> about 250. Throughout the war, Israel has held its fire in places where it
>>> thought such fire might endanger the hostages, thereby costing more
>>> soldiers lives, and giving Hamas terrorists more opportunities to escape.
>>>
>>>
>>> If Israel had gone all out against Hamas right from the beginning with
>>> victory as the singular goal, the war would probably be over by now with
>>> much less loss of life on both sides, and global anti-Israel sentiment,
>>> which seems to increase each day the war goes on, would have abated.
>>>
>>>
>>> Also, if Hamas saw that Israel was not willing to pay a high price to
>>> get hostages released, they would have less incentive to take future
>>> hostages. In my view, the way to get the hostages back is not to pay Hamas
>>> an exorbitant price for releasing them, but to make Hamas pay an exorbitant
>>> price for keeping them.
>>>
>>>
>>> Martin Wasserman
>>>
>>>
>>> On Aug 3, 2025, at 9:59 AM, Guilherme Ary Plonski
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Dear Henry,
>>> I read your heartbreaking message with the same attention and affection
>>> with which I read your precious texts on STIS.
>>> Like you, all good people must be shocked by the pogrom of October 7,
>>> 2023, and its consequences. This includes, of course, the tragedy affecting
>>> good people in Gaza, regardless of who is responsible.
>>> However, this does not make me agree with your analysis. We can include
>>> this topic in our regular conversations, if you wish.
>>> Right now, the most important thing is to seek to end the suffering of
>>> everyone—Gaza residents, Israeli abductees, and those from other countries
>>> equally held hostage by the terrorists. We can all help.
>>> Personally, on average every four days or nights, Ive been forced to
>>> flee to a public underground shelter due to ballistic missiles fired from
>>> Yemen. Id also like to be able to sleep in peace.
>>> Shalom from Jerusalem.
>>>
>>> Em qui., 31 de jul. de 2025 às 17:26, Henry Etzkowitz
>>> escreveu:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> >
>>>> > Somewhere in Israel’s Governmental bureaucracy under an innocuous
>>>> title, a “collective Eichmann” is at work meticulously designing the “crime
>>>> of the new century”systematic destruction of the civil institutional
>>>> environment of universities, businesses, and housing, with the intent and
>>>> objective of atomizing the citizens of GAZA Palestine into a controllable
>>>> mass.
>>>>
>>>> > Attendant nutrition deprivation is an overlay on institutional and
>>>> organizational deprivation, conducted in Mediterranean sunlight and
>>>> international, if not Israeli, full media gaze. Rather than the inside
>>>> pages of theNew York Times where Germany’s 20th century holocaust was
>>>> relegated, this rolling, escalating genocide is on the front pages of the
>>>> newspaper of record where all news that fits is published, sometimes
>>>> ironically overshadowed by food recipes in the Internet Edition.
>>>>
>>>> > The international community, led by Europe where the Holocaust was
>>>> originated, collaborated, condoned and only sometimes resisted in the last
>>>> century, must mitigate its indelible moral stain by heading off the
>>>> Netenyahu regime’s scheme. Only a Jewish state founded on the ashes of the
>>>> holocaust could have been given such leeway, not to forget Pol Pot’s
>>>> Cambodia. Who will be the future Hannah Arendt to chronicle the ubiquity
>>>> of evil?
>>>> >
>>>> > Sincerely
>>>> > Henry Etzkowitz
>>>> > Distinguished Fellow
>>>> > University of London, Birkbeck College, Centre for Innovation
>>>> Management Research
>>>> > Co-founder, Neighbors for Environmental and Social Justice, 644
>>>> Menlo Avenue, Menlo Park CA 94025
>>>>
>>>> > RE Henry Etzkowitz et al vs Elon Musk et al Case number 24CV450485
>>>> Superior Court of California County of California, Downtown Courthouse 191
>>>> Notth First Street, San Jose CA 95113 civil division
>>>> > Sent from my iPhone
>>>>
>>>
>>>