Thomas Wictor

I began studying the Israeli Defense Forces when I was about nine. I couldn’t explain why. Part of the reason was that the Israelis used World War II equipment, which had interested me since I was five. I’ve always hated war, but I’ve always studied it. People often enter the psychiatric field to find out what’s wrong with themselves. I may have studied war in an unconscious attempt to stop it. Today the truly amazing irony of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict was forcefully driven home. I’m now prepared to add another axiom to my analysis of this war without end.

The only people who care about the Palestinians are the Israelis.

There’s no doubt in my mind. The United Nations works with terrorist groups and lets them stockpile weapons in schools. “Human rights” organizations support the deification of “martyrs,” the younger the better. Arab nations host terrorist leaders and fund the armed groups that cheerfully commit unspeakable atrocities against Palestinians.

What do the Israelis do?

Well, this.

When the IDF decided it had to destroy the Hamas and Islamic Jihad “center of gravity” in Shijaiyah, the Israelis took virtually no steps to protect themselves. Shijaiyah was like Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima, except with 100,000 human shields.

Bunkers, combat posts, tunnels, and strong points. The Israelis gave the residents four days’ notice to evacuate.

These four days allowed Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad to lay one of the largest ambushes in the history of urban combat. Prior to the war, the terrorists had built massive improvised explosive devices (IEDs) into buildings, lampposts, and streets. The Israelis entered Shijaiyah a little after midnight on July 20, 2014. At 1:00 a.m., the terrorists opened fire on the Israeli troops with heavy machine guns, mortars, rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), recoilless rifles, IEDs, and antitank guided missiles.

To give you an idea of what it was like, play these two videos at the same time. First start this one and let it play to 0:12.

Now start this one.

The Israelis endured two hours of that, and then they climbed into their Namer armored personnel carriers (APCs).

Six hundred 155mm high-explosive artillery shells were fired onto the position, some deliberately hitting the Namers, which are built to withstand such fire. In addition, 100 2000-lb (907 kg) bombs were dropped. At the end of the seven-hour battle, the terrorist center of gravity looked like his.

The British can grimly bleat all they want; I’ve got eyes in my head. The destruction is about two city blocks. I counted no more than ten craters from explosive GBU-31 bombs. That means that most of the 100 aerial munitions dropped were inert BDU-56 cement bombs.

About seventy Palestinians were reported killed and 300 wounded. After the war, Palestinians revealed who actually killed the residents of Shijaiyah.

Before the battle, the Israelis didn’t use artillery preparation, meaning they didn’t destroy any of the bunkers or combat posts. The reason the IDF decided to forgo artillery preparation was to spare civilian lives, since terrorists had prevented residents from leaving. The initial invasion force didn’t even include tanks. It was only after the infantrymen of the Golani Brigade were overwhelmed by the ferocity of the terrorist ambush that the 188th Armored Brigade was sent to Shijaiyah.

Israeli soldiers and police regularly save Palestinians.

It doesn’t make the news because it doesn’t comport with the narrative.

Not even “pro-Palestinian” social media weirdos care about the people they claim to support. They gleefully post photos of dead, mutilated children, using them as props in the never-ending war against Jews. Each of those children was a living human being, but “pro-Palestinians” are indifferent to desecration. All that matters is inflicting harm on Jews.

There’s a particularly virulent “pro-Palestinian” on Twitter who speaks entirely in boilerplate Jew-hate. Everything he says has been said a billion times by a billion others. He claims to be outraged by the deaths of the four boys on the beach, calling it murder.

“Why did two ambulances park on the corner and wait almost an hour before picking up the boys?” I asked him.

Here’s his response.

Nyuk-nyuk-nyuk-nyuk.

I’ve said that Palestinian culture is depraved, and I stand by that statement. But a culture isn’t a person. I don’t want all Palestinians to die; I don’t even want them to suffer. What I want for them is to get their act together.

I personally know Israelis who’ve put their lives in the hands of Palestinians, and the Palestinians have come through out of humanity and a sense of personal honor.

This guy. I don’t want him to have a bad life.

He’s sincerely trying to diffuse a volatile situation, and he seems like a nice man.

Or this kid.

He’s laughing at the obese, putty colored baby-making machines who refuse to accept responsibility for their own actions. That kid is a sport of nature. Despite the odds, he finds humor in absurd, depressing situations.

Recently an Irish militaria-dork said this to me.

Racism is an affliction of the stupid. Hating skin color is like hating elbows or chins. And neither Palestinians nor the Irish are races. I did hate the Irish for about twenty years after the brave “lads” of the Irish Republican Army nearly blew me up in Regent’s Park on July 20, 1982. Courageous soldiers of Eire, using nail bombs on military bandsmen and civilians. The British Special Air Service cleaned their clocks, because like all terrorists, the IRA were good only at killing the defenseless.

Tell you what: I’ll listen to those of you who’ve survived a terrorist attack. The rest of you can cram it. Until you’ve experienced what I have, you have no bloody clue what you’re talking about, so your opinion is entirely without value.

But I’ve never hated the Palestinians. I don’t want anything bad to happen to these guys.

Or this woman.

Or these children.

I want them all to live long, happy lives, and I’m sure that virtually every Israeli and Jew feels the same way.

Supporting wars doesn’t mean you’re happy about it. All it means is that you recognize the need to take up arms in the fight against evil. The pacifist Alvin C. York initially tried to avoid military service in World War I because of his religious opposition to war. After being drafted and becoming paralyzed with guilt, he was given a ten-day pass to think it over. For two days he wandered the mountains of Tennessee, asking for guidance. Eventually he had an epiphany based on Matthew 5:9.

Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.

York took this to mean “Make peace effectively, using means that will stop the enemy.” In other words, war.

On October 8, 1918, Corporal Alvin C. York single handedly killed twenty-eight Germans and captured 132. An experienced hunter, York flanked the enemy and picked off soldiers one by one until the entire German company—armed with thirty-two machine guns—surrendered to him. During the battle, York repeatedly demanded that the Germans give up, but it took twenty-eight deaths before they’d had enough.

York never felt guilty about the men he killed, because doing so saved hundreds of Americans and Germans. The enemy who refused to stop taking lives was defeated by a reluctant adversary who was far superior in the art of war. When the enemy stopped taking lives, Alvin C. York did too.

I’ll never feel guilty about my support for Israel. In the end, the only ones who really care about the Palestinians are the Israelis. Like Alvin C. York, Israelis are peacemakers. They don’t blather on social media; they risk their lives for their people and for those who oppose them.

Alvin C. York would know exactly what it’s like to be an Israeli.