The Real Israel

Caitlin Johnstone
4 min read1 day ago

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Listen to a reading of this article (reading by Tim Foley):

One of the very few good things coming out of the relentless nightmare happening in Gaza is that at long last the western world is getting a clear look at Israel. The real Israel.

Not the Israel they teach you about in school. Not “the only democracy in the middle east,” where Jews were given safe haven after their victimization at the hands of the Nazis and managed to create a thriving society despite existing in a sea of savage enemies bent on their destruction.

Not that Israel. The real one. Arguably the most racist society on earth, whose existence has depended on nonstop violence, theft, tyranny and abuse since its very inception.

The real Israel, whose government is deliberately and methodically starving Palestinian civilians to death by the tens of thousands just for being the wrong ethnicity.

The real Israel, whose snipers routinely murders Palestinian children by shooting them in the head.

The real Israel, whose military is so sadistic that it created an AI system to specifically target suspected Hamas fighters when they are at home with their families, and called the AI “Where’s Daddy?” because it would be killing fathers when they are at home with their children.

The real Israel, whose soldiers cannot stop posting footage of themselves mockingly dressed in the undergarments of dead and displaced Palestinian women and playing with the toys of dead and displaced Palestinian children.

The real Israel, where Palestinian doctors are raped and tortured to death.

The real Israel, where the majority of men do not believe acquaintance rape or spousal rape are real crimes, and where the majority do not believe the soldiers accused of raping and torturing a Palestinian prisoner to the point of severe injury should face criminal charges.

The real Israel, who routinely bombs buildings full of civilians and then uses sniper drones to pick off the survivors, including children.

The real Israel, whose drones have been heard playing the sounds of crying babies and screaming women in order to lure out civilians so they can be killed.

The real Israel, who has damaged or destroyed 94 percent of the healthcare facilities in Gaza with hundreds of targeted attacks.

The real Israel, whose military forces target medical staff so methodically that doctors and nurses in Gaza reportedly change out of their uniforms when they leave the hospital in order to avoid assassination.

The real Israel, who hates truth so much that it has been killing historic numbers of journalists in Gaza while preventing foreign journalists from entering the enclave.

The real Israel, who has been knowingly attacking the locations of humanitarian aid workers.

The real Israel, whose citizens are so warped and twisted that they attend boat tours to cheerfully witness the devastation in the Gaza Strip.

The real Israel, whose citizens set up blockades to prevent aid trucks from getting to starving civilians in Gaza while they enjoy barbecues and set up bouncy castles and cotton candy machines for their children.

The real Israel, whose TikTok influencers started a viral trend mocking the suffering of civilians in Gaza.

The real Israel, whose citizens will travel to another country and tear down Palestinian flags and sing about how there are no children left in Gaza and then cry victim when people fight back.

This is the real Israel, in all its glory. And it is good that it is being seen.

The sooner everyone stops supporting this freakish, murderous society and begins insisting that normal human values win out over the demented forces which keep it going, the sooner there can be peace in the region. And the better off our entire species will be.

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Featured image via Wikimedia Commons/IDF.

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