I am retired military and was shocked at this. Hamas is despicable. Their punishment should be death. All of them. As soon as possible. They are a cancer to this earth. Kill them all, let God sort them out. Hamas leaders will likely sit on the right hand of Satan. Those that support Hamas, no matter where in this world, have tarnished souls and they will face judgement in the hereafter. Nothing can justify this attack. It's pure evil.
Thank you, Bari, for your presentation 'The Silence of the Feminists'. I share your indignation, but not your surprise. You strike me as a woman of conscience, who knows that we all answer to a 'Moral Voice' that is much much bigger than ourselves, immovable, and exists apart from us, to whom we are (and forever will be) answerable. So many people now deny that 'Voice' even exists, that ethics is always a moveable target, that moral indignation is simply a cudgel to be employed as necessary to achieve some goal somewhere.
I am drawn back to that fateful moment, when in reply to a simple question, Bill Clinton responded 'That depends upon what your definition of 'is' is.' When we all (or most of us, at least) shrugged the moment off -- 'That's just Bill' -- instead of speaking out against it, I think we turned some sort of ethical corner, in which it was decided that immutable truth simply does not exist.
And here we are--shrugging ever more horrific moments off.
Thank you, Bari Weiss, for standing up, for not backing down.
Well thanks a lot Bari. I have just finished watching your Honesty video twice now and I still have a knot of undigestible anger in my stomach. I also have trouble typing due to that moist stuff filling my eyes that has not gone away since viewing the pictures of the girls you showed. I have daughters and grand daughters and that knot grows unbearably each time they flash across my now somewhat numb mind. Even with the length of time of this war increasing daily their ordeal should not be softened or blurred with time but I fear it is disgustingly becoming second page news. I find myself a bit stunned at the instant level of anger that rages out of me when I think of the statements and actions of our media and so called elite intellectual leadership including but humorously also includes politicians. "Can't We All Just Get along" seems a bit naive, distant and unattainable now doesn't it??
Free Press should get back to the challenges of Islam and continue to explore problems of cultural assimilation and furthermore explore why protests in SF tried to shut down this event from a few yrs ago. New challenges across the country in medical profession w Muslim doctors and nurses posting threats to Jews. Could portend total breakdown of medicine as practiced for centuries in the US. Incredibly challenging to discuss
Old antisemitic blood libels about Jews stealing organs are resurfacing. Numerous medical professionals are now promoting this horrifying accusation.
The latest? Dr. Sarah Najamuddin Syed, a mental health provider in Glen Ellyn, Illinois. On her public Facebook page, she accuses Israel of stealing the organs of Palestinians.
Her source - Gaza media - aka Hamas.
Syed also engages in Holocaust distortion, falsely claiming there is a "concentration camp in Gaza".
Compassion is a virtue, but it is not the only virtue. And in many situation it cannot be the deciding virtue if a person or a people is to survive. Quick analogy. Two families in close proximity. One husband draws a gun takes aim. and shoots one of the children of the other family. The other husband has a gun as well may be a bigger gun. Seeing that his child is injured and that the other man has no intention of stopping and fully intend to kill every member of family if he can and even worse that the man who shot first is hiding behind one of his own children, what should the man with the injured daughter do?
Very well said. The only thing I would add is to remind everyone how long this process (Islamic jihad) has been going on; it's been 1300+- years and counting with no end in sight.
Bari, the question to Andrew Sullivan, should be. What interest Israel could possibly have in killing children or create an humanitarian crisis? Who spent billion building tunnels under hospitals, mosques, schools with money donated ?
Why news given from Hamas is accepted as true? Not so sure about his fair mind.
I survive this maddening world by reading Bari Weiss's columns and her insight to find a path through the minefields of hypocrisy. However, the inclusion of Andrew Sullivan's article "How Many Children is Israel Willing To Kill" is not just challenging but highly provocative and, yes, even insensitive.
Every child killed is a stain on the fabric of the civilized word. Period. Despite the "innocence" inherent in newborns, maybe that innocence is depleted in short order. Nature vs. Nurture!!! The Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gazan Palestinians, and indeed in much of the Muslim world, have TV cartoons, children's books, school texts, summer camps, etc. that malign the Jews in general and the Israelis in particular. In fact, it would be unusual to find Israel on any of their maps and similarly even reference to the word Israeli would be unlikely. Zionist entity and occupier is what you will find. In the West Bank and Gaza, non-functioning explosive vests can be found in most clothing stores, including clothing stores just for kids. YOU WILL NOT FIND THAT IN THE ISRAELI SCHOOL SYSTEM, clothing stores, etc. Palestinian/Gazan children are indoctrinated and brainwashed with Hamas ideology very early in life; they lose their developmental years of childhood very early. On that basis alone, the Gazan children who are being dying are just chronological children; they are adolescent and young adults in the Hamas culture. If they were considered children by Hamas, missile tunnels and explosive supplies would not be found inside schools, among other so-called civilian sites. If they were children or just kids, mothers would weep and mourn their deaths rather than thank God for their martyrdom as Shaheeds. (By the way, Mr. Sullivan, using the words "willing to kill" means intent, and you should know better than that!!!)
So Israel is not willing to kill children, despite children dying, and just the title is highly prejudicial and inflammatory. Israeli children in the most part have bomb shelters to go to, both in schools and homes. Gazan children do not have bomb shelters because their parents did not demand bomb shelters while Hamas was boring tunnel systems to protect themselves and wage war. Gazan parents are sacrificing their children for the ideology of Hamas, which cares not one wit for anything but the slaughter of Jews.
So is Israel bound to spare Gazan children who have been abandoned by their parents and their own society? They do try but fighting in the dense neighborhoods of Gaza against Hamas terrorists without artillery and air force bombing of potential munition sites and Hamas bases that are located within civilian buildings, including schools and hospitals, would require a much different kind of warfare, and Andrew Sullivan should know what that entails.
I suppose Sullivan believes that because Hamas lives in crowded areas (all of Gaza), Israel’s response to avoid casualties among civilians could only be no bombing and just sending foot soldiers…. to be slaughtered by Hamas popping out of tunnels?
Indeed, how do you identify civilians? The children are no longer children (the babies still ARE!!) and the adult Hamas soldiers can remove their bandanas and become civilians; in fact, many have done so. Furthermore, if you view the videos of 10/7, taken by the Gazans themselves, you notice many Gazans crossing the border without being in uniform...the so-called civilians....who plundered, raped, slaughtered, beheaded and desecrated bodies and burned babies in ovens. So, a further question for Mr. Sullivan (and for the ICJ) is how do you differentiate bad civilians from good civilians?
The war WAS conducted with the utmost goal to prevent a civilian death toll by dropping leaflets, making phone calls to Gazans and warning them, and making it known beforehand where the Israel military was going. That made the Israeli army death toll higher and gave enough time for Hamas and its leaders to hide and empty supplies from the store rooms of Shifra Hospital.
Shame on Mr. Sullivan for his article which was nothing more than the age old trope of Jews killing gentile babies to use their blood to bake matzah; now in our modern age the trope is elevated to killing gentiles to harvest their organs.
Also I am shocked at Bari for including this article at this time. Her referral to Sullivan, and providing a link to his screed, at a 100-day “yahrzeit,” is for me similar to inviting Nick Fuentes and Kanye West to speak at Yad Vashem on Holocaust Memorial Day.
Lots of good reading here, thank you. Many viewpoints covered. I was most struck by Sullivan’s piece, which lays out many facts surrounding Israel’s reaction to Oct. 7, but no proposal(s) on what they should do or have done differently other than “stop and take a breath.” I’d have liked to see specifics. Israel was faced with an impossible situation and it was up to them to decide how to respond and protect themselves, not some writer sitting in an office or on a couch.
Mr. Sullivan asks the wrong question in his essay. The appropriate question is this: how many children is Hamas willing to kill? If the focus is Palestinian children, the self evident answer is "as many as it takes to achieve our aims". If the focus is Jewish children, their declared answer is "all of them". That is the simple truth behind Hamas' barbarism, and the difference between Israel and Hamas. To hold Israel responsible for the deaths of Palestinian children in Gaza is moral relativism at its worst. Those children have been condemned to death by Hamas, who use them as shields. Their unparalleled brutality against innocent Israelis was a choice. Israel now has no choice but to defend itself. It is doing so after countless warnings to the civilian population that the bombs are coming, a concession that Hamas would never consider. Israel is trying to kill as few Palestinian children as possible. For clear thinking people, there is no question who the barbarians are.
Andrew Sullivan’s piece was powerful when it first came out, and still powerful on re-reading. Israel has the moral authority (still) but lives in a world where PR and optics do count to some degree. And Sullivan imo is as good of a flag bearer for the classic liberal centrist as there is among the public intelligentsia (in the west). The woke lefty morons can and should be ignored as a matter of routine . But when Sullivan starts to have some reservations, I think that has a certain heft as an indicator of public opinion among the “silent majority”.
I also harken back to the Sam Harris position on Islam. As one of the writers noted, average Palestinians in gaza are victims here…but they are also complicit to some extent (complicated though that is, to be sure, in the face of a murderous Hamas regime). But if Islam is ultimately the root of the problem, then that is far more vexing than even ridding Hamas from Gaza will be.
"since October 7, anti-wokeness has become less appealing to me. If anti-wokeness results in an inability to acknowledge profound power imbalances and the suffering of the truly marginalized, then I’m not sure it’s a movement that makes sense"
In short, Shadi Hamid's verbal contortions show he cannot bring himself to condemn Hamas as a barbaric sect responsible for the worse act of savagery against a Jewish community since 1945. Even the Arab pogroms in Aleppo, Baghdad and Aden in the 1940s and 1950s did not come close to the brutality displayed by the Palestinians on October 7.
By all of he Palestinians as repeated surveys in the West Bank and Southern Gaza show 75+% support for the October 7 atrocities.
I do agree with Shadi Hamid though that the Oct 7 atrocities cannot compare with the violations Palestinians encounter daily in their 40 minute delays at Israeli checkpoints.
Second, you note at the end that perhaps the listener has problems with Israel, with its treatment of Palestinians, with Netanyahu, with settlements... I don't remember exactly what you listed, but those are generally part of the indictment. It's worth mentioning, given the outrageous misrepresentation of things that you highlight in this podcast, that people should question those other issues with Israel that they think they know of.
Why are so many Americans naive? The IDF takes a school yard- just a normal day in Isarel these days.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-w2cJSYbqI
I am retired military and was shocked at this. Hamas is despicable. Their punishment should be death. All of them. As soon as possible. They are a cancer to this earth. Kill them all, let God sort them out. Hamas leaders will likely sit on the right hand of Satan. Those that support Hamas, no matter where in this world, have tarnished souls and they will face judgement in the hereafter. Nothing can justify this attack. It's pure evil.
Thank you, Bari, for your presentation 'The Silence of the Feminists'. I share your indignation, but not your surprise. You strike me as a woman of conscience, who knows that we all answer to a 'Moral Voice' that is much much bigger than ourselves, immovable, and exists apart from us, to whom we are (and forever will be) answerable. So many people now deny that 'Voice' even exists, that ethics is always a moveable target, that moral indignation is simply a cudgel to be employed as necessary to achieve some goal somewhere.
I am drawn back to that fateful moment, when in reply to a simple question, Bill Clinton responded 'That depends upon what your definition of 'is' is.' When we all (or most of us, at least) shrugged the moment off -- 'That's just Bill' -- instead of speaking out against it, I think we turned some sort of ethical corner, in which it was decided that immutable truth simply does not exist.
And here we are--shrugging ever more horrific moments off.
Thank you, Bari Weiss, for standing up, for not backing down.
Well thanks a lot Bari. I have just finished watching your Honesty video twice now and I still have a knot of undigestible anger in my stomach. I also have trouble typing due to that moist stuff filling my eyes that has not gone away since viewing the pictures of the girls you showed. I have daughters and grand daughters and that knot grows unbearably each time they flash across my now somewhat numb mind. Even with the length of time of this war increasing daily their ordeal should not be softened or blurred with time but I fear it is disgustingly becoming second page news. I find myself a bit stunned at the instant level of anger that rages out of me when I think of the statements and actions of our media and so called elite intellectual leadership including but humorously also includes politicians. "Can't We All Just Get along" seems a bit naive, distant and unattainable now doesn't it??
Free Press should get back to the challenges of Islam and continue to explore problems of cultural assimilation and furthermore explore why protests in SF tried to shut down this event from a few yrs ago. New challenges across the country in medical profession w Muslim doctors and nurses posting threats to Jews. Could portend total breakdown of medicine as practiced for centuries in the US. Incredibly challenging to discuss
Old antisemitic blood libels about Jews stealing organs are resurfacing. Numerous medical professionals are now promoting this horrifying accusation.
The latest? Dr. Sarah Najamuddin Syed, a mental health provider in Glen Ellyn, Illinois. On her public Facebook page, she accuses Israel of stealing the organs of Palestinians.
Her source - Gaza media - aka Hamas.
Syed also engages in Holocaust distortion, falsely claiming there is a "concentration camp in Gaza".
Ayaan hirsi Ali. bari Weiss. SF - G
https://www.google.com/search?q=Ayaan+hirsi+Ali.+bari+Weiss.+SF&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-us&client=safari#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:ec890bd0,vid:y9sn7jFTxBU,st:0
file:///var/mobile/Library/SMS/Attachments/47/07/D06EE502-664C-4275-A1B3-66681748C3B2/IMG_4926.jpeg
Compassion is a virtue, but it is not the only virtue. And in many situation it cannot be the deciding virtue if a person or a people is to survive. Quick analogy. Two families in close proximity. One husband draws a gun takes aim. and shoots one of the children of the other family. The other husband has a gun as well may be a bigger gun. Seeing that his child is injured and that the other man has no intention of stopping and fully intend to kill every member of family if he can and even worse that the man who shot first is hiding behind one of his own children, what should the man with the injured daughter do?
Very well said. The only thing I would add is to remind everyone how long this process (Islamic jihad) has been going on; it's been 1300+- years and counting with no end in sight.
Bari, the question to Andrew Sullivan, should be. What interest Israel could possibly have in killing children or create an humanitarian crisis? Who spent billion building tunnels under hospitals, mosques, schools with money donated ?
Why news given from Hamas is accepted as true? Not so sure about his fair mind.
I survive this maddening world by reading Bari Weiss's columns and her insight to find a path through the minefields of hypocrisy. However, the inclusion of Andrew Sullivan's article "How Many Children is Israel Willing To Kill" is not just challenging but highly provocative and, yes, even insensitive.
Every child killed is a stain on the fabric of the civilized word. Period. Despite the "innocence" inherent in newborns, maybe that innocence is depleted in short order. Nature vs. Nurture!!! The Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gazan Palestinians, and indeed in much of the Muslim world, have TV cartoons, children's books, school texts, summer camps, etc. that malign the Jews in general and the Israelis in particular. In fact, it would be unusual to find Israel on any of their maps and similarly even reference to the word Israeli would be unlikely. Zionist entity and occupier is what you will find. In the West Bank and Gaza, non-functioning explosive vests can be found in most clothing stores, including clothing stores just for kids. YOU WILL NOT FIND THAT IN THE ISRAELI SCHOOL SYSTEM, clothing stores, etc. Palestinian/Gazan children are indoctrinated and brainwashed with Hamas ideology very early in life; they lose their developmental years of childhood very early. On that basis alone, the Gazan children who are being dying are just chronological children; they are adolescent and young adults in the Hamas culture. If they were considered children by Hamas, missile tunnels and explosive supplies would not be found inside schools, among other so-called civilian sites. If they were children or just kids, mothers would weep and mourn their deaths rather than thank God for their martyrdom as Shaheeds. (By the way, Mr. Sullivan, using the words "willing to kill" means intent, and you should know better than that!!!)
So Israel is not willing to kill children, despite children dying, and just the title is highly prejudicial and inflammatory. Israeli children in the most part have bomb shelters to go to, both in schools and homes. Gazan children do not have bomb shelters because their parents did not demand bomb shelters while Hamas was boring tunnel systems to protect themselves and wage war. Gazan parents are sacrificing their children for the ideology of Hamas, which cares not one wit for anything but the slaughter of Jews.
So is Israel bound to spare Gazan children who have been abandoned by their parents and their own society? They do try but fighting in the dense neighborhoods of Gaza against Hamas terrorists without artillery and air force bombing of potential munition sites and Hamas bases that are located within civilian buildings, including schools and hospitals, would require a much different kind of warfare, and Andrew Sullivan should know what that entails.
I suppose Sullivan believes that because Hamas lives in crowded areas (all of Gaza), Israel’s response to avoid casualties among civilians could only be no bombing and just sending foot soldiers…. to be slaughtered by Hamas popping out of tunnels?
Indeed, how do you identify civilians? The children are no longer children (the babies still ARE!!) and the adult Hamas soldiers can remove their bandanas and become civilians; in fact, many have done so. Furthermore, if you view the videos of 10/7, taken by the Gazans themselves, you notice many Gazans crossing the border without being in uniform...the so-called civilians....who plundered, raped, slaughtered, beheaded and desecrated bodies and burned babies in ovens. So, a further question for Mr. Sullivan (and for the ICJ) is how do you differentiate bad civilians from good civilians?
The war WAS conducted with the utmost goal to prevent a civilian death toll by dropping leaflets, making phone calls to Gazans and warning them, and making it known beforehand where the Israel military was going. That made the Israeli army death toll higher and gave enough time for Hamas and its leaders to hide and empty supplies from the store rooms of Shifra Hospital.
Shame on Mr. Sullivan for his article which was nothing more than the age old trope of Jews killing gentile babies to use their blood to bake matzah; now in our modern age the trope is elevated to killing gentiles to harvest their organs.
Also I am shocked at Bari for including this article at this time. Her referral to Sullivan, and providing a link to his screed, at a 100-day “yahrzeit,” is for me similar to inviting Nick Fuentes and Kanye West to speak at Yad Vashem on Holocaust Memorial Day.
Lots of good reading here, thank you. Many viewpoints covered. I was most struck by Sullivan’s piece, which lays out many facts surrounding Israel’s reaction to Oct. 7, but no proposal(s) on what they should do or have done differently other than “stop and take a breath.” I’d have liked to see specifics. Israel was faced with an impossible situation and it was up to them to decide how to respond and protect themselves, not some writer sitting in an office or on a couch.
Mr. Sullivan asks the wrong question in his essay. The appropriate question is this: how many children is Hamas willing to kill? If the focus is Palestinian children, the self evident answer is "as many as it takes to achieve our aims". If the focus is Jewish children, their declared answer is "all of them". That is the simple truth behind Hamas' barbarism, and the difference between Israel and Hamas. To hold Israel responsible for the deaths of Palestinian children in Gaza is moral relativism at its worst. Those children have been condemned to death by Hamas, who use them as shields. Their unparalleled brutality against innocent Israelis was a choice. Israel now has no choice but to defend itself. It is doing so after countless warnings to the civilian population that the bombs are coming, a concession that Hamas would never consider. Israel is trying to kill as few Palestinian children as possible. For clear thinking people, there is no question who the barbarians are.
Andrew Sullivan’s piece was powerful when it first came out, and still powerful on re-reading. Israel has the moral authority (still) but lives in a world where PR and optics do count to some degree. And Sullivan imo is as good of a flag bearer for the classic liberal centrist as there is among the public intelligentsia (in the west). The woke lefty morons can and should be ignored as a matter of routine . But when Sullivan starts to have some reservations, I think that has a certain heft as an indicator of public opinion among the “silent majority”.
I also harken back to the Sam Harris position on Islam. As one of the writers noted, average Palestinians in gaza are victims here…but they are also complicit to some extent (complicated though that is, to be sure, in the face of a murderous Hamas regime). But if Islam is ultimately the root of the problem, then that is far more vexing than even ridding Hamas from Gaza will be.
Andrew Sullivan is an asshole.
I guess I'm a 100% "them vs. us," and as such, I did not appreciate the opinions that favor "them." (To clarify, my "us" is Israel, unconditionally).
"since October 7, anti-wokeness has become less appealing to me. If anti-wokeness results in an inability to acknowledge profound power imbalances and the suffering of the truly marginalized, then I’m not sure it’s a movement that makes sense"
In short, Shadi Hamid's verbal contortions show he cannot bring himself to condemn Hamas as a barbaric sect responsible for the worse act of savagery against a Jewish community since 1945. Even the Arab pogroms in Aleppo, Baghdad and Aden in the 1940s and 1950s did not come close to the brutality displayed by the Palestinians on October 7.
By all of he Palestinians as repeated surveys in the West Bank and Southern Gaza show 75+% support for the October 7 atrocities.
I do agree with Shadi Hamid though that the Oct 7 atrocities cannot compare with the violations Palestinians encounter daily in their 40 minute delays at Israeli checkpoints.
Partners for Peace? Are you kidding?
Regarding "The Silence of the Feminists":
First, thanks.
Second, you note at the end that perhaps the listener has problems with Israel, with its treatment of Palestinians, with Netanyahu, with settlements... I don't remember exactly what you listed, but those are generally part of the indictment. It's worth mentioning, given the outrageous misrepresentation of things that you highlight in this podcast, that people should question those other issues with Israel that they think they know of.