As the death toll in the Gaza Strip rises, comments such as those uttered by Israel’s deputy defense minister, Matan Vilnai, make the blood run cold:
Israeli officials began damage limitation efforts after the country’s deputy defense minister Matan Vilnai threatened Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip with a “holocaust.”
The comments came a day after Israeli occupation forces killed 31 Palestinians, nine of them children, one a six-month-old baby, in a series of air raids across the Gaza Strip. Israel claimed that the attacks were in retaliation for a barrage of rockets fired by resistance fighters in the Gaza Strip which killed one Israeli in the town of Sderot on Wednesday, 27 February. Palestinian resistance groups, including Hamas, said the rockets were in retaliation for the extrajudicial execution of five Hamas members carried out by Israel on Wednesday morning. Israeli occupation forces have killed more than 200 Palestinians since the US-sponsored Annapolis peace summit last November. In the same period, five Israelis have been killed by Palestinians.
Speaking to Israeli army radio today, Vilnai said, “the more Qassam [rocket] fire intensifies and the rockets reach a longer range, [the Palestinians] will bring upon themselves a bigger shoah because we will use all our might to defend ourselves.”
A report on the BBC News website headlined “Israel warns of Gaza ‘holocaust’” noted that the word “holocaust” – shoah in Hebrew — is “a term rarely used in Israel outside discussions of the Nazi genocide during World War II.”
The statement is so appallingly ironic that I am deluged with thoughts from all directions.
Foremost, does the utilisation of a seemingly sacred phrase not demean the plight of their parents/grandparents generation?
Secondly, have no lessons been learned from the tragedy of the Holocaust?
As the dire actions of Israel since 1948 have raised innumerable questions as to how a populace could enact such atrocities on its fellow man, given its own history, the above statement becomes all the more utterly mind-boggling.
I could go on, but the issue is so hideous on a plethora of levels that it defies articulation.
For the full report, visit ElectronicIntifada.
I feel so helpless from here. I truly wish I could do more then I do for the plight of the Palestinians. It angers me so much to read about the countless atrocities of the Israelis.
Thank you for the link.
No problem! As long as we remember, and help others to remember, we are doing something – regardless how small.
*than (sorry, I noticed the error right now, and being the spelling freak that I am–I had to correct my comment!)
You’re right, but sometimes only petitioning, blogging, and creating awareness does not seem to cut it for me. I wish I could take an even more active part in the process, although I don’t think it is possible. I guess I’m being cynical and too self-critical, but I cannot help it when I hear about the situation in Palestine.