SHOOTING JEWS DEAD ON DC STREETS

THIS IS WHAT “GLOBALIZE THE INTIFADA” MEANS.

Sarah Lynn Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky, z’l

Yesterday, I wrote that the language of the Palestinian movement is dangerously incendiary.

Last night, two Jews were shot at point blank range outside a Jewish museum in Washington, DC, by a gunman shouting “Free Palestine.”

According to the CBC, “Two Israeli embassy staffers, a young couple about to be engaged, were killed by a lone gunman as they left an event at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday night, and a suspect is in custody, officials said.

“The Israeli foreign ministry named the victims as Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim.”

When activists march down the streets of Vancouver or your town shrieking “Globalize the intifada,” this is what it means. Jews shot dead in the streets.

This morning, one of Canada’s most prominent Jewish academic critics of Israel was among probably tens of thousands who responded on social media. I won’t bother naming her since my point is not to doxx her or set the hounds baying, but merely to illustrate a chasm in the dialogue. (Also note: I call her a “critic of Israel,” which may be an incomplete descriptor. She is a smart person with nuanced, sometimes confounding ideas and I do not generally refer to people who do not support the right of Israel to exist as “critics of Israel.” They are anti-Zionists. But I have not read everything she has written, though I’ve read a lot, but I give her the benefit of doubt here.)

Anyway, she wrote:

“Woke up to the terrible news out of DC where a shooter approached an event outside of the Jewish Museum and murdered two people, who turned out to be staffers from the Israeli embassy. That it was an attack outside a Jewish museum suggests to me an antisemitic hate crime (some will say that because the victims were staffers at an embassy that it’s an anti-Israel not an antisemitic act; but I think that is a mistaken analysis). That the shooter yelled “Free Palestine” is a terrible use of a phrase that should — and usually does — imply a call for freedom, not for hate, bigotry and murder.”

Kudos to her for not succumbing to the despicable idea that, because the murderer conveniently, if probably randomly, shot two embassy staffers, rather than, say, a Jewish teacher and a Jewish baker, this is “anti-Zionism,” not antisemitism. Anyone who makes the case that this was an act of “anti-Zionism,” not antisemitism, is a charlatan. I shouldn’t need to explain this.

And, as I’ve said before, does the fact that the perpetrator screamed “Free Palestine” make an ounce of difference to the people bleeding out on the street?

But here is where the commentator (and, again, I use her as an example, not as a scapegoat) gets it wrong:

“That the shooter yelled ‘Free Palestine’ is a terrible use of a phrase that should — and usually does — imply a call for freedom, not for hate, bigotry and murder.”

Does it though?

I think we have come up against a clear fracture in the discourse.

I wrote a while back about how I cringed when I first heard the phrase “’Free Palestine means ‘Kill the Jews.’” But, as time has progressed, I have concluded that, quite often, that’s exactly what it means.

Does it always mean that? Of course not. Does it mean that half the time? One time in 20? It doesn’t really matter. (Well, it does matter, actually. But I’ll leave that aside for the larger point right now.) The writer’s assertion that “Free Palestine” “should — and usually does — imply a call for freedom” is pretty much wrong.

The Palestinian movement does not have so much as a whiff of genuine human rights commitment in its DNA. A “free Palestine” would be one of the least free places on earth. It would be a human rights hellhole for women, LGBTQ+ people, minorities (such as any still exist in one of the world’s most homogeneous, xenophobic societies) or anyone else.

Further, her assertion that “Free Palestine” does not represent support for “hate, bigotry and murder” is also problematic. She says it “should.” Fair enough. But she also says it “usually does” and I just can’t swallow that.

Do I have statistics to prove that “free Palestine” means support for “hate, bigotry and murder”? No. But I have stood on the sidelines of enough anti-Israel / “pro-Palestinian” rallies to know that this is a movement fueled significantly, if not primarily, by hatred and bigotry.

But murder? Well, yes. Absolutely. The “Free Palestine” movement is energized by that too. On October 8, 2023, I stood in a silent vigil of Jews holding candles of remembrance for the dead in Israel while triumphant goons a few metres away celebrated mass murder, taunting the mourning Jews among whom I was standing.

Did these represent a majority of the “pro-Palestinian” movement? Perhaps not. But you know who absolutely represents a majority of the “pro-Palestinian” movement? The people who have remained silent in the face of this and a million other examples of people celebrating the atrocities of October 7. That is not only a majority of so-called “pro-Palestinian” activists worldwide. It is almost 100% of them.

So the assertion that the Palestinian movement does not represent hate, bigotry and murder just doesn’t track with my experience.

It is a movement with hatred, bigotry and murder at its absolute core. These horrific characteristics are not bugs of the “pro-Palestinian” movement, but features.

We hear dehumanizing language against Israelis and Jews every single day from these activists, as well as outright calls for violence (“Globalize the intifada,”) and ethnic cleansing (“From the river to the sea”) and too many other examples to list.

They play with fire.

And people get murdered.