Just like the good old days, Israel once again worships its army. The raid that released Louis Norberto Har and Fernando Marman sparked a crescendo of joy coupled with a resurgence of national pride. The video clips "permitted for publication," took us back to the time when the army was like a Hollywood production, and everyone competed to see who could heap the most praise on the Yaman counter terror unit and on the Shin Bet security service. It was a perfect operation, said all the intelligence experts – with zero casualties.
It was indeed an impressive operation and cause for joy, but it wasn't perfect and it certainly wasn't "zero casualties." The fact that at least 74 Palestinians, including women and children, were killed during the operation was hardly mentioned in Israel. Perhaps those deaths were inevitable. Perhaps even if the number of Palestinian deaths was seven times greater it wouldn't have dampened the celebration. Two very sympathetic Israeli-Argentinians were released and all the rest doesn't matter.
The images I saw from the hospitals in Rafah on the day of the rescue were among the most horrific I have seen in this war. Children ripped to shreds, convulsing, looking helplessly upon their deaths. The horror. There is no need to go into the moral dilemma of whether the release of two hostages justifies the deaths of 74 people – that question is superfluous in such a cruel war – in order to point to Israel's complete disregard for collateral deaths. On the day of the operation, Israel killed 133 people across Gaza, most of them, as is the norm in this war, innocent civilians, among them many children.
We were all happy that they were freed, and the operation in itself was moral and fully justified. But the disregard for the deaths of dozens of people as if they were not human is an outrage. Release more and more hostages, as many as possible. Marvel, rejoice and be proud – but at least mention the terrible price paid by Gazans for this just operation. The children ripped to shreds played no part in seizing the hostages. They have been destined to pay the cruel price for what Hamas did. Alongside our joy, one cannot help but think of them and their fate. An operation cannot be perfect if that is its price.
The disregard for 74 people killed in a just and righteous operation should surprise no one. The dehumanization of Gazans in this war has sunk to a level we have not known before – even after decades of dehumanizing Palestinians under occupation.
The disgraceful lack of coverage of Gaza's suffering by most of the Israeli media will be eternally remembered in disgrace, at least I hope so. As a result, Palestinians are seen by most Israelis as non-human and even non-animal. In Israel, the more than 28,000 Gazan fatalities are considered a mere number, nothing more. The uprooting and displacement of millions of people moved from place to place as if they were a flock of sheep and the unbelievable, brazen portrayal of this as a "humanitarian measure" has dehumanized Gazans even further. If one believes them to be human beings, then surely people cannot be treated like this. You can't abuse people for so long if you believe they are human.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is not the most tempestuous politician in his government – even the International Court of Justice in The Hague failed to come up with a single genocidal statement by him (unlike the case with President Herzog). However, he expressed this dehumanization in a particularly picturesque way when he compared Israel's war against Hamas to a glass cup that we had already broken; now, he said, the fragments remain and we are treading on them until nothing remains.
Netanyahu was speaking about Hamas, but after all, everyone knows that Gaza is Hamas. We broke Gaza's glass, now we tread on its fragments until they turn into grains of sand, air, nothing – human dust, sub-human dust.