{"id":1259736,"date":"2023-10-11T05:59:35","date_gmt":"2023-10-11T05:59:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.counterpunch.org\/?p=297843"},"modified":"2023-10-11T05:59:35","modified_gmt":"2023-10-11T05:59:35","slug":"israels-9-11-is-a-slogan-to-rationalize-open-ended-killing-of-palestinian-civilians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2023\/10\/11\/israels-9-11-is-a-slogan-to-rationalize-open-ended-killing-of-palestinian-civilians\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cIsrael\u2019s 9\/11\u201d is a Slogan to Rationalize Open-Ended Killing of Palestinian Civilians"},"content":{"rendered":"\"\"<\/a>\n
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Pro-Israeli protest in Berlin, Germany. Photograph Source: Leonhard Lenz – CC0<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n

When Israel\u2019s ambassador to the United Nations spoke outside the Security Council on Sunday, he\u00a0said<\/a>: \u201cThis is Israel\u2019s 9\/11. This is Israel\u2019s 9\/11.\u201d Meanwhile, in a PBS NewsHour\u00a0interview<\/a>, Israel\u2019s ambassador to the United States said: \u201cThis is, as someone said, our 9\/11.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the phrase might seem logical, \u201cIsrael\u2019s 9\/11\u201d is already being used as a huge propaganda weapon by Israel\u2019s government — now engaged in massive war crimes against civilians in Gaza, after mass murder of Israelis by Hamas last weekend.<\/p>\n

On the surface, an analogy between the atrocities just suffered by Israelis and what happened on Sept. 11, 2001 might seem to justify calls for unequivocal solidarity with Israel. But horrific actions are in process from an Israeli government that has long maintained a system of apartheid while crushing basic human rights of Palestinian people.<\/p>\n

What is very sinister about trumpeting \u201cIsrael\u2019s 9\/11\u201d is what happened after America\u2019s 9\/11. Wearing the shroud of victim, the United States proceeded to use the horrible tragedy suffered inside its own borders as a license to kill vast numbers of people in the name of retaliation, righteousness and, of course, the \u201cwar on terror.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a playbook that the government of Benjamin Netanyahu is currently adapting and implementing with a vengeance. Now underway, Israel\u2019s collective punishment of 2.3 million people in Gaza is an intensification of what Israel has been doing to Palestinians for decades. But Israel\u2019s extremism, more than ever touting itself as a matter of self-defense, is at new racist depths of willingness to treat human beings as suitable for extermination.<\/p>\n

On Monday, Israel\u2019s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant\u00a0described<\/a>\u00a0Palestinians as \u201cbeastly people\u201d and\u00a0said<\/a>:\u00a0\u201cWe are fighting animals and are acting accordingly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indiscriminate bombing is now happening along with a cutoff of food, water, electricity and fuel. Noting that \u201ceven before the latest restrictions, residents of Gaza already faced widespread food insecurity, restrictions on movement and water shortages,\u201d the BBC\u00a0reported<\/a>\u00a0that a UN official said people in Gaza \u201cwere \u2018terrified\u2019 by the current situation and worried for their safety — as well as that of their children and families.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is a terrible echo from the post-9\/11 approach of the U.S. government, which from the outset after Sept. 11, 2001 conferred advance absolution on itself for any and all of its future crimes against humanity.<\/p>\n

In the name of fighting terrorism, the United States inflicted collective punishment on huge numbers of people who had absolutely nothing to do with 9\/11. The Costs of War project at Brown University\u00a0calculates<\/a>\u00a0more than 400,000\u00a0direct\u00a0<\/em>civilian deaths\u00a0\u201cin the violence of the U.S. post-9\/11 wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen and elsewhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

Early in the \u201cwar on terror,\u201d Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld had fashioned a template to provide approval for virtually any killing by the U.S. military. \u201cWe did not start this war,\u201d he said at a\u00a0news briefing<\/a>\u00a0in December 2001, two months into the Afghanistan war. \u201cSo understand, responsibility for every single casualty in this war, whether they\u2019re innocent Afghans or innocent Americans, rests at the feet of the al Qaeda and the Taliban.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rumsfeld was\u00a0showered with acclaim<\/a>\u00a0from the U.S. media establishment, while he not only insisted that the U.S. government had no responsibility for the deaths caused by its armed forces; he also attested to the American military\u2019s notable decency. \u201cThe targeting capabilities, and the care that goes into targeting, to see that the precise targets are struck, and that other targets are not struck, is as impressive as anything anyone could see,\u201d Rumsfeld said. He lauded \u201cthe care that goes into it, the humanity that goes into it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even before its current high-tech attack on Gaza, Israel had amassed a long track record of killing civilians there, while denying it every step of the way. For instance, the United Nations\u00a0found<\/a>\u00a0that during Israel\u2019s 2014 \u201cOperation Protective Edge\u201d assault, 1,462 Palestinian civilians died, including 495 children.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no reason to doubt that the civilian death toll from the present Israeli military actions in Gaza will soon climb far above the number of people killed by the Hamas assault days ago. As in the aftermath of 9\/11, official claims to be only fighting terrorism will continue to serve as PR smokescreens for a government terrorizing and inflicting mass carnage on Palestinians. Deserving only unequivocal condemnation, Hamas\u2019s killing and abduction of civilians set the stage for Israel\u2019s slaughter of civilians now underway in Gaza.<\/p>\n

Absent from the New York Times home page Monday night and relegated to page 9 of the newspaper\u2019s print edition on Tuesday, a grisly\u00a0news story<\/a>\u00a0began this way: \u201cIsraeli airstrikes pounded Gaza on Monday, flattening mosques over the heads of worshipers, wiping away a busy marketplace full of shoppers and killing entire families, witnesses and authorities in Gaza said. Five Israeli airstrikes ripped through the marketplace in the Jabaliya refugee camp, reducing it to rubble and killing dozens, the authorities said. Other strikes hit four mosques in the Shati refugee camp and killed people worshiping inside, they said. Witnesses said boys had been playing soccer outside one of the mosques when it was struck.\u201d<\/p>\n

Along with releasing a\u00a0statement<\/a>\u00a0about the latest tragic turn of events, at\u00a0RootsAction.org<\/a>\u00a0we\u2019ve offered supporters of a just peace\u00a0a quick way<\/a> to email their members of Congress and President Biden. The gist of the message is that \u201cthe horrific cycle of violence in the Middle East will not end until the Israeli occupation ends — and a huge obstacle to ending the occupation has been the U.S. government.”<\/p>\n

The post \u201cIsrael\u2019s 9\/11\u201d is a Slogan to Rationalize Open-Ended Killing of Palestinian Civilians<\/a> appeared first on CounterPunch.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n

This post was originally published on CounterPunch.org<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What is very sinister about trumpeting \u201cIsrael\u2019s 9\/11\u201d is what happened after America\u2019s 9\/11. Wearing the shroud of victim, the United States proceeded to use the horrible tragedy suffered inside its own borders as a license to kill vast numbers of people in the name of retaliation, righteousness and, of course, the \u201cwar on terror.\u201d More<\/a><\/p>\n

The post \u201cIsrael\u2019s 9\/11\u201d is a Slogan to Rationalize Open-Ended Killing of Palestinian Civilians<\/a> appeared first on CounterPunch.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,266,204],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1259736"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1259736"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1259736\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1262339,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1259736\/revisions\/1262339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1259736"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1259736"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1259736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}