Midnight Morbidity

A harsh history lesson from the Ha’aretz op-ed page:

The only way to deal with this false mantra about Israeli occupation being the reason they’re killing us is to look back at history. It’s worth reminding people, for instance, that this “occupation” is only 35 years old, whereas the Arabs, before they ever knew they were Palestinians, killed Jews from the moment they set foot on these shores in the 19th century.

Only old-timers will remember with horror the bloodcurdling cry “Itbakh al-yahud” (“Slaughter the Jews”). The terminology may have changed, but the meaning hasn’t. The riots of 1921, 1929, 1936 and 1947, and the attacks of the fedayeen in the 1950s, were not because of the “horrors of occupation” but because they didn’t want Jews here.

The 1929 riots began with the massacre of 20 children and old people in Safed. The 1936 riots left 133 Jews dead and 399 injured. In the first ten days after the United Nations vote in favor of partition, 79 Jews were killed. And don’t forget May 15, 1948, when the Arab armies invaded Israel the moment it was established.

Arabs kill Jews. They always have. And why not? It’s an age-old pastime with no downside. Which means the murder is going to continue until the Arabs are shown there is a downside, and one so bloody that even the blood-soaked culture of the Arabs will finally say, “Enough!”

We won’t want to watch, but we’ll have to.