The Blogs: Changing Peace? - How about the Rights of Israel? | Hiroko Kasai

I’ve tried to refrain from writing this kind of article, but I believe I have to. I’d like to refrain from commenting on the domestic policies/politics of Israel.

As people know from my profile, I’m a podcaster and an author as HannahKlein. As I’ve said on my podcast from the very first part, I clearly said I’m Japanese. I have legal rights to sign this petition as I’m Japanese, and I also have the right to vote. It’s not just the right to vote. When October 7th happened, I made a clear decision to decide who I call “friends.” The United States is a part of my identity. At the same time, Israel is an undeniable “friend.”

When October 7th happened, the reaction of the news media was … unbelievable to me. Israel and Hamas are some kind of same entity? “Zionist entity?” by these Japanese news media outlets? I was even frustrated by the action of Kishida administration. I wanted to believe that the nation was going toward the right decision, but Japan had been making the wrong decision. I hope, I pray from my heart, that this time Japan will change.

This issue of Article 9 in the Constitution has always been an issue in my life. Not just for the last 10 years the age of social media, but since my childhood. No one gave me easy choices or easy answers. So, what is actually Article 9 in the Constitution of Japan?

All the thoughts over the Constitution were before the start of the Internet era. In the 1990s, and after Google became the major search engine in the 2000s, I wasn’t very interested in the internet. I used email from the early 1990s, but it was about once a week that I checked.

Now is the internet era. Everyone has much more access to gain various information through various media, and social media is now included. By the way, I watch the textbooks of today and wonder, “Why are children given such easy answers? Is answering ‘Japan became a peaceful nation by eternally renouncing war?'” I listen to many analysts all the time. I rarely listen to YouTube in Japanese. However, there are some people who tell interesting opinions. I’m not stealing their thoughts and not referring to their names.

Many entities, meaning nations, especially China and North Korea, will abuse and fabricate historical facts and claim that arming Japan is revitalizing “Imperial Japan.”

The problem?

Part of the clear issues is that the so-called proof presented to Japan may have been true, while some of it was totally fabricated. I won’t go into diplomacy here and China. This isn’t very difficult to assume in diplomacy to be honest. What kind of answers does the other party have? Also, “the Imperial” Russia will “condemn” Japan’s past history of aggression. They actually did after 2022.

I’m not afraid of those words of condemnation even by the individuals. I factually have been verbally assaulted in a foreign language ### even in the U.S.

What do you see and expect the future leader of Japan to be after we witnessed the barbaric acts of Hamas on October 7th and Russian aggression in Ukraine in 2022 to now? What can be defined as the targeting of civilian infrastructure in Ukraine? I’m sorry, but those who call out “balanced diplomacy” are not welcome in Japanese politics for Japan.

I know when the word “mutual” was popular academically. It was actually in early 2000s. “The mutual benefit in the region.” “The mutual understandings between the corporations.” I have a lot to say on “mutual” for many reasons, and I came across the condemnation of the abusive usage of the term, “mutual” by Ambassador Yamagami SHINGO’s books about diplomacy. It wasn’t surprising to me; it was what happened and what was promoted. Reading often clears my mind and gives me other thoughts. What he mentioned about “mutual” made all sense. Please note that I’m not saying I know every step of diplomacy here.

Many Japanese, the so-called “peace lovers,” are blindly educated and reminded that “arming Japan is weaponizing ourselves.” Peace is defined by not owning arms? “We have learned that arming a nation is repeating history?” Well, that’s what China is saying.

Arming Japan is about securing the sovereign state. So Israel is a sovereign state. It’s high time Japan clearly chose who to have mutual understanding with. Who is the most important “friend” to Japan? Before Japan takes the wrong turn, I’d really like to comment here, but the United States must never be excluded in any aspect. Also, when we think of Arming Japan, who comes to mind?

The late Prime Minister Shinzo ABE.

Arming Japan is not illegal, even by this frail and “semi-illegitimate” organization called the United Nations. Why is Qatar, which is hosting Hamas, reelected to the Human Rights Council (UNHRC) by the General Assembly on October 9, 2025? Who is going to protect Japan, by the way? Who invaded barbarically on October 7th? It wasn’t Israel, but it was Hamas.

Arming Japan is actually enforcing the U.S. – Japan Alliance realistically and Japan appears as the real secure holder of the region for the Open-Indo Pacific, as Prime Minister Abe stated.

For many reasons, this will become the so-called “mutual” benefit to both nations. Arming Japan secures the nation. Not many people knew about the so-called “pressure,” referring from the media and not my wording, this has been the problem since the 1950s during the Korean War. At the time when the news media read or heard about the secret diplomatic phone record by the U.S. to the Ambassadors of Japan during the war-time in America. I won’t refer to how I obtained some information, but these non-existent phone records actually existed.

After October 7th, of course, it was one of the most barbaric terrorist attacks in history, in a secure Israel. Also, I was expecting what the protestors would, of course, claim. “Rights to exercise free speech.” I was reminded about the political science framework the other day, but it’s actually true. How far is the media’s language usage of “supporting Hamas as resistance” or reads out as the Qatari media, “Al Jazeera” free speech? I was reading out some comments of the academics, and I even received a list of academics who have been Antisemitic.

Japan is an island nation. It’s hard to expect an event like October 7th, where the border is directly breached by the enemy entities and the civilians those who participated in the terrorist attack on October 7th. The media journalists really read out what is happening in Gaza, or what was happening on September 11th, 2001? There are many ways to hold terrorist attacks, and we have legal entities in the United Nations Security Council members that call out Japan as “It was China before, and Japan is actually China.”

There are media personalities and academics who are against the Amendment of Article 9 in the Constitution of Japan. Nicely put, they’re different people with different values. That is partly true, as long as there are no cases like the violent protests in the 50s.

Do people know that it’s a legal obligation to defend a nation by itself in an event like October 7th? It was essential to eliminate all terrorists from inside the nation called Israel. Israel had a direct threat from the Islamic Republic of Iran. So, Japan is going to decide what to do in the event of ballistic missile attacks like you saw from Iran? I was exchanging some words with people daily.

Do people know what is happening around the border of the territorial sea areas in Japan? Is it like … if we sit, bow down to China or North Korea, they’ll go back? I think people need to know how much the fishermen have caused millions of dollars of damage to both nations. People don’t seem to understand why the Coast Guards have to now use English to fight against the illegal Chinese ships every day that violate the territories. Every single day.

Actually, Israel is facing a direct threat. The enemies don’t have to use fighter jets. They can just cross the border. Even the ICC court, in my view, weaponized its legal authorities and played politics, while there is a very basic rule: the separation of powers.

It’s the very time that the Japanese must be reminded of who supported modern Japan when Japan ran out of financing to continue the Russo-Japanese War. I think we have to remember who has been “our” friends. The United States isn’t a militaristic nation. The United States has always been a democracy.

October 7th isn’t as simple as the Japanese media claims. “The apartheid nation.” This October 7th is the result of the military “invasion” by Israel. “Settlers.” The Khamenei “media,” the social media account run as Khamenei’s official site, clearly wrote about “Zionist entity.” It’s called Israel.

There are a lot of alarms to remind the Japanese, I believe. When I listen to Israeli or Jewish people’s family history when they tell me on my podcast, it reminds me so much, and I started tracing the timeline of the footsteps of the Jewish people. Can we forget the past history of what happened during the Holocaust as “the past?”

The young Japanese need to learn about the Jewish people, in the first place, as there are many young children who don’t even know about “the Holocaust” or “Anne Frank” nowadays in Japan.