Leading Israeli leftists rebuke progressives elsewhere for failing to condemn Hamas
A teddy bear and blood stains in a kibbutz attacked by Hamas; bodies of Palestinians killed in Israeli air raids on Gaza. Photo by Getty (Kibbutz: Alexi J. Rosenfeld; Gaza: Ahmad Hasaballah)
By Beth Harpaz November 6, 2023
Nearly 100 prominent Israeli leftists are rebuking their U.S. and European counterparts for criticizing Israel while failing to condemn Hamas.
“There is no contradiction between staunchly opposing the Israeli subjugation and occupation of Palestinians and unequivocally condemning brutal acts of violence against innocent civilians,” reads their statement. “In fact, every consistent leftist must hold both positions simultaneously.”
The 98 signatories include peace and human rights activists, writers, academics and politicians. Among them are Yuval Noah Harari, author of Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind; renowned Israeli novelist Etgar Keret; Taleb el-Sana, former Knesset member from the Arab Democratic Party and head of the High Committee for Arab Citizens of the Negev; Booker Prize winner David Grossman; Eva Illouz, director of the social science research institute EHESS Paris; Dov Khenin, former Knesset member from the left-wing Hadash coalition; and political scientist Dahlia Scheindlin, board member of A Land for All.
“Let us be clear: Hamas is a theocratic and repressive organization that vehemently opposes the attempt to promote peace and equality in the Middle East,” their letter stated. “There is no justification for shooting civilians in their homes; no rationalization for the murder of children in front of their parents.”
Hamas gunmen murdered 1,400 Israelis, mostly civilians, and kidnapped more than 200 in surprise attacks on Oct. 7 on kibbutzim and a music festival. Israel is now engaged in a retaliatory bombing campaign in Gaza that, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health, has killed more than 10,000 people and reduced swaths of the 25-mile-long territory to rubble.
The Israeli activist group asks their “peers on the left” to join “the struggle to break the cycle of violence and destruction,” adding: “We never imagined that individuals on the left, advocates of equality, freedom, justice, and welfare, would reveal such extreme moral insensitivity and political recklessness.”
The group noted that some “prominent voices in the Arab world” have denounced the “sadistic murder of innocent people.” At the same time, “elements within the global left, individuals who were, until now, our political partners,” have refused to condemn Hamas’ violence. Those voices claim “outsiders have no right to judge the actions of the oppressed” while rationalizing Hamas’ attacks through “historical comparisons” and “arguing that Israeli society brought this tragedy upon itself.”
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