Many Israelis, no matter their political affiliation, are blaming Hamas for the humanitarian crises in Gaza, a report published by the New York Times on Sunday said. The war in Gaza has displaced a majority of the population, resulting in the deaths of more than 37,000 people.
But despite the suffering of those living in Gaza, many Israelis blame Hamas for October 7, when the group's gunmen stormed across the border and killed about 1,200 and took 250 or more hostage, said Israeli officials. The report claims that it was “the deadliest day for Jews since the holocaust”.
“Many Israelis — both conservative and liberal — blame Hamas for starting the war and for embedding its fighters among the Gazan population, operating, according to the military, out of schools, hospitals and mosques, and in tunnels beneath Gazans’ homes,” the report adds.
“Many also see Gaza’s civilians as complicit, at least ideologically, in the atrocities of Oct. 7, saying that they brought Hamas to power in the first place, in Palestinian elections in 2006.”
However, for years the governments led by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did their best to undermine the leadership of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, and simultaneously advance the power and control of Hamas for fear of Palestine establishing a Palestinian state, The Times of Israel reported. By propping up the “terrorist group”, Israel essentially created their own enemy responsible for the October 7 attacks.
“Most of the time, Israeli policy was to treat the Palestinian Authority as a burden and Hamas as an asset,” The Times of Israel writes.
And according to a nonpartisan research group, Arab Barometer, a 2023 survey showed that 44% of Gazans said they had “no trust at all” of Hamas authorities, while just 29% expressed either a “a great deal” or “quite a lot of trust” in their government. And 72% of respondents said they believed there was a “large or medium” amount of corruption in the government. The research for the poll, which began on September 28, 2023, ended on October 8, 2023.
Rachel Riemer, 72, who is a longtime resident of the liberal, left-leaning village Urim, said that during a previous conflict she had donated blankets for the children of Gaza. But she says this time, she can’t “pity them”.
“This time, I don’t have place in my heart to pity them,” Riemer told the newspaper. “I know there is much to pity, rationally, I understand. But emotionally I can’t.”
The indifference to the suffering of Palestinians is being seen through a lens of what occurred during the Holocaust in Europe, Avi Shilon, an Israeli historian in Tel Aviv, explained to the New York Times.
Mainstream Israeli news media does not highlight Gazan civilian death tolls or their suffering, but focuses instead on the funerals and profiles of Israeli Defense Force (IDF) soldiers who have died in the war. However, a poll from The Israel Democracy Institute found that 68% of Arab respondents and 87% of Jewish respondents reported having seen “a few or many pictures or videos of the widespread destruction in Gaza.”
A majority of Israelis have also agreed to ignore US demands on its conduct in the war, even as the US has given more aid to Israel than any other nation since World War II, a separate poll conducted by The Israel Democracy Institute found in late December. The poll found that about 21% of Arab Israelis and 75% of Jewish Israelis said they think Israel should ignore US demands to reduce heavy bombing in populous areas.
"Since October 7 of last year the death toll from Israeli aggression has grown to 37,551 and 85,911 people were injured. Over the past 24 hours the occupation forces have committed three mass killings of families in the Gaza Strip that left 101 dead and 169 injured," the Gaza Health Ministry said in a statement on Sunday.