Sir Nicholas Winton epitomized the Power of One. As World War II loomed, he organized a rescue operation, found sponsors and foster homes, and ultimately brought 669 Jewish Czech children to Britain. The ninth train was intercepted by Nazi troops the day war broke out; only two of the 250 children onboard survived Holocaust death camps.
It’s painfully ironic that the new film One Life, retelling this uplifting saga, opened March 15, five months after Hamas’s October 7 butchery, during Israel’s 75th anniversary year and its war to end Hamas’s reign as a terrorist force, and amid the worst anti-Israel, anti-Semitic “protests” in US history.
The raging placards and chants defy belief. We are Hamas. From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free. (Or the Arabic version: From the river to the sea, Palestine will be Arab – free of Jews, Christians, Bahais and other infidels.) Globalize the Intifada (violent uprisings and terrorism).
Hamas, we love you! Resistance by any means necessary. Al-Qassam, you make us proud. Kill all Zionists! (Al-Qassam is Hamas’s October 7 terrorists. The vast majority of US Jews are Zionists: they support Israel’s right to exist and defend itself.)
This is “intersectionality” in its most disgusting and dangerous form: Marxism, Fascism, anti-Semitism, anti-Zionism and Antifa. Hatred of America, Israel, capitalism and Western civilization.
These mobs intimidate and assault Jewish students. They rabidly support Hamas terrorists, the numerous Gazan men, women and even children who joined the 10/7 slaughter, the 72 percent of Gazans who say those massacres were justified, and the 93 percent who say Hamas committed no war crimes on 10/7.
No war crimes or atrocities? Look at these photos and videos (here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here). Watch Sheryl Sandburg’s documentary (especially at 28:00, 30:45, 32:25 and 39:20).
Hamas leaders say “Israel has no place on our land.” Until Israel is eradicated, “everything we do is justified.” “Nobody should blame us for the things we do on October 7, October 10, October 1,000,000.”
“Our land” means the entire area of Israel. It reflects the Islamist belief that once an area is Muslim, it must always be Muslim (even Spain and Portugal). It refers to Koran verse 2:91. “Kill them wherever you come upon them and drive them out of the places from which they have driven you out.”
Spontaneous protests? The campus mobsters and their gear are covertly funded by billionaire foundations. Professional agitators trained the mob bosses before 10/7, so they’d be ready when opportunities arose.
The mobs are loud, shrill and often violent. But they are tiny minority; 80% of registered American voters support Israel in its war against Hamas. But college administrators still kowtow to the mobs, and President Biden needs their votes too much to condemn them, reverse his ongoing pressure against Israel or stop appeasing Iran, the ultimate sponsor of Hamas, Hezbollah and Houthi terrorism.
Israel is guilty of genocide? Hamas wants to kill or drive out every Jew in Israel. Its terrorists targeted, raped, mutilated and murdered thousands of Israeli civilians – and promise to repeat their massacres until Israel is gone. Campus mobs want to “Kill all Zionists.” That is genocide.
In sharp contrast, Israel goes out of its way to avoid civilian casualties in Gaza, where Hamas built hundreds of miles of terror tunnels under its cities. Where Hamas hides its “militants” and weapons in virtually every home, apartment, school, hospital, mosque and office.
Where it actively “persuades” civilians to remain as human shields, to ensure high casualties. Where some families refuse to leave, even when warned of impending military actions. “We want to die. We love death the way you love life,” one family patriarch said.
That has meant destructive, deadly urban warfare. And yet civilian death tolls in Gaza are one-sixth those in other recent urban warzones.
A 2022 UN report concluded that 90 percent of wartime casualties were civilians in Afghanistan, Africa, Ukraine and the Middle East. That’s nine civilians for every combatant. Gaza tolls have been 1.5 civilians per combatant. Military experts like Col. Richard Kemp (U.K., Ret.) confirm this.
Using Hamas Health Ministry claims (up to 34,000 deaths through April) – and Israel Defense Forces (IDF) claims that it has killed over 12,000 Hamas fighters – the ratio is 1.8 civilians per fighter. But Hamas doesn’t separate terrorists from civilians killed by Israel, by Hamas rockets that exploded in Gaza or even deaths by natural causes. It classifies military-age men as children.
Moreover, Hamas has now admitted that one-third of its previously published Gaza death statistics are “incomplete” and unsupported by actual records. The actual ratio could thus be 1:1 or less – still tragic, but even further below any other urban war.
However, President Biden, Secretary of State Blinken and Defense Secretary Austin say any further civilian deaths is unacceptable. They demand that Israel restrict operations in Rafah to limited “surgical” strikes, which will never eliminate the 8,000 “warriors” in Hamas’s last stronghold. The administration then blocked shipments of precision munitions needed for surgical strikes.
These actions will make it far more likely that Hamas will survive and be able to launch more terror attacks – perhaps in conjunction with Hezbollah, the Houthis and Iran. Israel would be vastly more imperiled than it is today. One begins to suspect this is what the Biden administration wants.
Team Biden's increasingly sorry record is compounded by a State Department report accusing Israel of causing a “severe humanitarian crisis” by displacing Palestinians, and of committing other human rights violations – such as subjecting Hamas prisoners to “inhumane treatment,” like forcing them to undress to their underwear to prevent suicide bombings.
On Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day, the White House trumpeted a supposed treaty between Hamas and Israel, but deliberately failed to mention that Hamas had made critical changes to an Israeli-Egyptian draft agreement. Worst was a requirement that Israel permanently end the war, withdraw from Gaza and release imprisoned terrorists before Hamas released any hostages – most of whom could be corpses.
The prevailing Biden, campus mob and global attitude seems to be: How dare Jews fight back, after 2000 years of letting enemies slaughter them, the way they did during the Crusades, pogroms and Holocaust? How dare Israel demonstrate that its promise of 'Never Again' really means Never Again!
Israelis and Jews everywhere know bowing to Hamas and Biden demands would be suicidal.
Hamas terrorists were “brave heroes” when they battled unarmed parents and butchered babies. They could still prove their true manhood – by surrendering their army, resigning as a political entity, renouncing their avowed goal of eradicating Israel, and fully accepting Israel’s right to exist.
Or they could emerge from their tunnels and ratholes – and challenge the IDF out in the open. The Hamas terrorists would be wiped out in short order. But most of them have longed to become martyrs, and their passing could usher in a new era of peace and prosperity for rebuilt Gazan cities along the beautiful Mediterranean coast.
Paul Driessen has been to Israel multiple times, most recently two months ago, and is the author of many articles on energy, environmental, human rights and Israel issues.