Israel’s propaganda machine has begun to work overtime to convince the world of the occupation state’s innocence in the bombing of Al-Ahli Arab Hospital on Tuesday night 17/10/203. Complicit in the destruction of Gaza Western leaders aided by the media have also started to work round the clock to dutifully parrot the lies amplifying the fog of war. US President Joe Biden who was the first Western leader to repeat the gruesome Israeli lie about 40 beheaded babies dutifully trumpeted the Israeli narrative that a misfired Hamas rocket killed 500 people.
The playbook is all too familiar. First blanket denial. Then blame militants. As the truth emerges Israelis cry &ldquomistake&rdquo &ldquojust an accident&rdquo. When that fails to quell public outrage and people demand accountability Israel shouts anti-Semitism. And when all else fails critics are denounced as Nazis and fascists in their twisted narrative. This course has been charted before. The same smokescreens used to obscure the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh are being deployed once again.
We don&rsquot require a forensic investigation &ndash though one should be carried out by an independent body &ndash to hold Israel responsible for the bombing of Al-Ahli Arab Hospital. Israel has been openly pre-justifying hospital bombing and school bombing before launching its military campaign. It’s been pre-justifying war crimes declaring with no fear of accountability that it will impose collective punishment by denying Gazans electricity water and food.
Israel’s denial is not credible because the occupation state has a long history of committing atrocities and massacres against Palestinians. For decades the brutal realities of massacres were suppressed details buried. But slowly they came to light &ndash stories of indiscriminate slaughter rape torture and exile of defenseless civilians. The brutal details of these killings have been revealed over the course of time. Fortunately in the world of social media lies and propaganda are harder to conceal. While Israel still tries desperately to control the narrative Palestinian voices now ring out louder. Their stories and images expose Israeli lies in real-time.
A cursory glance at history shows how mass killing of Palestinians was a strategy employed by Zionist military groups to ethnically cleanse Palestinians. Israel’s potential ground offensive in Gaza raises a chilling prospect &ndash mass slaughter and ethnic cleansing repeating the dark tactics of the past.
One of the earliest and most notorious was the massacre at the Palestinian village Deir Yassin in 1948. As many as 250 people including men women children and the elderly are said to have been killed. The aim of the atrocity was to sow terror and fear to force Palestinians to flee. Some 750000 Palestinian three-quarters of the population fled because of the terror campaign unleashed by the Israelis.
A month after Deir Yassin Israeli forces slaughtered up to 200 Palestinians in the coastal village of Tantura. It was part of a ruthless ethnic cleansing campaign &ndash Plan Dalet &ndash to seize territory for a future Jewish state. Tantura was one of 64 Palestinian villages lining the road between Tel Aviv and Haifa. Once thriving coastal communities all were wiped off the map &ndash except two. The inhabitants were expelled en masse joining the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians ethnically cleansed from their ancestral lands in 1948.
Israel’s seemingly never-ending drive to uproot Palestinians from their homes by force of arms and threat of imminent slaughter resulted in another massacre on 29 October 1956 in the village of Kafr Qasem on the Israeli side of the 1949 Armistice (&ldquoGreen&rdquo) Line. Soldiers went door-to-door spraying homes with gunfire. Forty-nine residents were massacred in under an hour &ndash men women children gunned down in cold blood. The violence was calculated intended to stoke terror make Palestinians flee for their lives.
According to Palestinian historians the massacre at Kafr Qasem mirrored the typical Israeli blueprint of terrorizing Palestinians into fleeing. In his book Atlas of Palestine (1917-1966) Dr Salman Abu Sitta lists at least 232 places where atrocities massacres destruction plunder and looting were carried out by the Zionists between 1947 and 1956. Almost every one of 30 military operations were accompanied by one or two massacres of civilians. There were at least 77 reported massacres half of which took place before any Arab regular soldier set foot in Palestine during the 1948 Israeli-Arab war.
Decades of Israeli occupation birthed countless atrocities against Palestinians including horrors beyond their borders. In 1982 the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Lebanon became a brutal killing field. Christian militia unleashed into the camps under Israeli protection went on a 38-hour rampage. They slaughtered over 3000 Palestinian civilians in cold blood. Rape mutilation and torture preceded endless executions. Parents saw their children die before facing the same fate.
Israel denied direct blame but its fingerprints were everywhere. They lit up the camps at night to aid the killers. They prevented desperate victims from fleeing. UN resolutions declared Israel complicit in an act of genocide. Then Defense Minister Ariel Sharon found personally responsible for enabling the bloodbath faced no real consequences. The victims saw no justice. It was one of countless episodes of Israeli leaders incubating anti-Palestinian violence with impunity.
Israel’s violence against Palestinians extends far beyond isolated massacres. Thousands have been killed over decades to maintain Israel’s illegal occupation.
Past Gaza assaults bear names now synonymous with death &ndash Operation Cast Lead in 2008-2009 left 1400 Palestinians dead. Operation Protective Edge in 2014 killed 2251 more. These attacks came on the heels of countless other operations each leaving hundreds dead and thousands more wounded.
The onslaught did not cease. During the 2019 Great March of Return Israeli snipers gunned down 267 unarmed protesters. Over 30000 more suffered critical injuries. Children and medics were not spared.
With the fog of war descending once more as Israel’s propaganda machine lurches into motion fabricating myths to shield the truth following the bombing of Al-Ahli Hospital while Western leaders and media obediently amplify Israel’s distortions muddying reality let’s not forget that Israel’s legacy of killing and massacres.
Just as in the past the truth will not be buried under this avalanche of deception. People around the world see through the web of lies and recognize the regime’s brutality laid bare. The stories of those shelled while seeking care at Al-Ahli cannot be erased.
Israel’s desperate myths may multiply but the blood-drenched reality remains. The propaganda will not whisk away the war crimes nor inoculate Israel from accountability.
– Nasim Ahmed is a political analyst. He publishes articles on a daily basis with the London-based Middle East Monitor (MEMO) focusing in particular on Israel and Palestine and the Gulf region.
