A letter from Israel

October 20, 2023

My dearest friends,

Another week has passed. The cruelty and magnitude of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas on October 7 are becoming more evident. The death toll continues to rise. Many of the victims have not yet been identified. The numbers of those injured don’t yet include those who will suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The events of October 7 will plague them forever.

The barbaric acts of terror as related by the survivors are so gruesome and unimaginable that they negatively impact the authenticity of the horrors.

We are on the brink of war on multiple fronts. Our citizens will be called upon to pay an even greater price to ensure our freedom. This is not a war of revenge. It’s a war to rid the world of the forces of evil who have infiltrated our society and corrupted our most basic values.

Friends, I know you all mean well. Israel is hurting. I know we have your shoulders to cry on.

But Israel doesn’t need your sympathy. What Israel needs, is your empathy. Israel needs your understanding and for you to share this with us and with the rest of the troubled world in which we live. Your support will provide us with the moral strength and the fortitude we need to make our world a better place in which to live and a much safer place for our children and grandchildren.

We are appalled by the double standards applied against Israel. Over the past 10 years, I have written countless articles protesting the smear campaigns aimed at demonizing Israel and delegitimizing her right to exist as the nation state of the Jewish people.

The aim of these campaigns, I claimed, was to create the public opinion to facilitate yet another Holocaust. Some of you may have thought I was over-reacting. Others may have even written me off as another hysterical, fear-mongering paranoid. Friends, what happened on October 7 proves I wasn’t paranoid, over-sensitive or wrong. I wasn’t even exaggerating.

What’s currently considered politically correct is far from right. It’s hypocritical to the extreme. I’m fine with holding Israel to the highest standards. But that implies holding Hamas, the Palestinians and the rest of the world to the same standards. All the military conflicts over the past 80 years have shown that none of the warring parties, with the exception of the IDF, ever bought into upholding these standards.

I’m shocked and disgusted that the international community continues to let us down in our hour of need. It’s par for the course. Twelve of the fifteen members of UN Security Council voted in favor of censuring both Israel and Hamas for the civilian casualties in Gaza. Where’s the moral equivalence between  the wanton genocide of Hamas and the urgent need to destroy the lethal military infrastructure so carefully embedded by Hamas in Gaza’s crowded civilian areas?

The United States used its veto to block the resolution. Russia and Britain abstained. The French couldn’t even manage that. Are these the forces who determine what’s right and what’s wrong? Are these the forces who determine what’s moral and what’s immoral? The United Nations and all its redundant agencies are ineffective and dysfunctional. The UN is an affront to the inhabitants of our planet regardless of their race, color, creed or sex.

I’m shocked and disgusted that the BBC has yet to determine whether the genocide perpetrated by Hamas even constitutes an act of terror. This glorified pontification is not only offensive. It’s a downright abomination. We’ve grown accustomed to the warped double standards and the biased reporting from propaganda platforms like Pravda and Al Jazeera. The basic freedoms of speech and the press are predicated on intellectual integrity. The BBC is clearly lacking in this.

I’m shocked and disgusted that the academic and student leaderships at Harvard, Columbia and NYU are blaming Israel for the war crimes committed by Hamas. Just how did they work than one out? Are such distorted lies fundamental to academic freedom? I’m glad none of my children studied at any of these brain-washing bot-like production lines.

I’m shocked and disgusted with the insensitive and ignorant remarks made by the leaders of Russia, China, Brazil, Turkey and South Africa to mention but a few.

As I said last week. We will prevail. We have no choice. We will rebuild what our animalistic neighbors destroyed. We owe it to those who were so mercilessly slaughtered in their homes. We owe it to ourselves. We only have one country. As a people, we don’t have anywhere else to go. We also have every reason to stay and continue building our national home. Israel has always been, is, and will always be, our future.

We’re in this war together.

May God protect our brave soldiers.

Wishing you all Shabbat Shalom and better times ahead.

Am Yisrael Chai.

Harris Zvi Green.