It should be noted that despite his go-to stance on everything Israel, Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt), unlike so many on the extreme left, is still cognizant of who the real culprit is in the Gaza war. On Sunday, when CBS’ Face the Nation host Margaret Brennan asked: “Progressives like Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, have been clear in calling for a ceasefire. You’ve taken some flack because you have not. The United States government is opposing a ceasefire as well, and they’re isolated at the UN on that point. Why is it you oppose a ceasefire?” Sanders responded in an unexpectedly lucid manner:
“I don’t know how you could have a permanent ceasefire with Hamas who has said before October 7, and after October 7, that they want to destroy Israel. They want a permanent war. I don’t know how you have a permanent ceasefire with an attitude like that.”
Yes, Hamas has a bad attitude, even worse than Israel, according to Sen. Sanders, which makes it even harder to understand whatever else he has to say on the matter. When asked by the host, Brennan, “Okay, so the war you’re saying against Hamas is justified in that way?” Sanders offered this jewel of realistic thinking: “I think Israel has the right to defend itself and go after Hamas. Not the Palestinian people.”
Sanders then shifts the blame elegantly, with the dexterity of a closeup magician: “It may be that they’re responding in rage against the horrific and terrible Hamas attacks that killed 1,200 Innocent Israelis. Maybe in some of the right-wing extremists’ minds, there is the goal to drive the Palestinian people off of Gaza completely. But they have now destroyed about half of the housing units in Gaza. So, it’s hard to predict. But I think when General Austin said you can win the battle but lose the war, Israel is losing the war in terms of how the world is looking at this situation. And I think that it would be irresponsible for the United States to give Netanyahu another $10 billion to continue to wage this awful war.”
It isn’t at all clear why the Senator puts a higher value on retaining the world’s empathy following the mini-holocaust of October 7 than he does on the very survival of the Jewish State. As he himself put it right at the opening, that much-used line about “Israel’s right to defend itself” takes on an ominous meaning when Israel is being attacked by an irrational, fundamentalist terror group that would rather die and drive its civilians into the pit of Hell than give up the dream of killing all the Jews.
Like everyone on the extreme left, including even in Israel, there’s this imaginary place where nice, hard-working, and peace-loving “Palestinians” are being governed by evil, war-mongering people called “Hamas.” It’s acceptable for Israel to do war with the evil Hamas, but it must be done without harming the nice, uninvolved folks.
Never mind that these nice folks voted Hamas in by a landslide and collaborated eagerly, en masse, over 15 years, with every raging hostility Hamas launched against innocent Israeli civilians. Why even the most recent massacre of defenseless Israelis on October 7 was followed by thousands of Gazans who followed the terrorists into the Gaza envelope towns and kibbutzim to rape, murder, and steal. And when defenseless Israeli women were paraded on the streets of Gaza City, those nice “Palestinians” celebrated with sweet cakes as they pushed and humiliated those defenseless Jewish women, many of whom were raped and mutilated later.
“The American people were outraged by Hamas attacks against Israel, rightfully so. What they are equally outraged now by what Israel is doing,” Sanders said. “So, you’re seeing all over this country people saying why are we giving money to an Israeli government that is doing such awful things? Will it hurt politically? It might. At the end of the day, I think, you know, Biden’s gonna win this election. But what’s going on now is not helpful.”
Sanders noted that “there have been 16,000 people killed so far. Palestinians, two-thirds of whom are women and children. You’re talking about 1.9 million people displaced, going around without any water, or food. Without any medical supplies. It is a humanitarian disaster.”
Alas, in the magical world where Sanders and the rest of the extreme left dwell, no one would suggest that the best way to alleviate the suffering of those displaced people would be to support Israel’s indefatigable hammering of the Hamas monsters that threaten the lives of Jews and Arabs alike.
It’s letting the monsters live another day that would generate humanitarian catastrophes on both sides of the border. And if executing monsters would cost Israel some popularity points, even in Washington, DC, it’s a worthwhile expense.
