The 'General of Bloodshed' in the West Bank Is Israel's Moral Face - Opinion - Haaretz.com
Oberkommandant Avi Bluth, the head of the army's Central Command, decided that he'll show them. With his military kippah worn at an angle, blood-curdling eloquence, boundless arrogance and sick double standards of morality, he ordered "redesign operations" to be implemented so that "everyone will be deterred, any village that tries to raise a hand against any of the residents."
The "residents" in question are the settlers who carry out pogroms on a daily basis. As far as Bluth is concerned, he has no obligation to defend anyone in the West Bank other than the thugs from the settlement outposts. "We know how to set up a spotlight," the major general threatened the Palestinians who are "raising their hands" as they try, with the last of their strength, to defend what remains of the land that has been stolen from them under Bluth's auspices and with his encouragement.
I don't know anything about "spotlights," but I do know something about international law. Bluth ordered his soldiers to engage in collective punishment, which is a war crime. If so, then Bluth is a war criminal who should be extradited to the International Criminal Court in the Hague. When Haaretz publisher Amos Schocken voiced this self-evident truth, social media was in an uproar. But when Bluth made his shocking statement, social media was silent.
Bluth's remarks might sound more appropriate in German – "redesign operations," "spotlight," "hunt." But they're perfectly clear in Hebrew, too. "They'll experience curfews, they'll experience encirclement and they'll experience redesign operations," he said. All because a settler was lightly wounded by gunfire while driving an ATV across stolen land.
I was in Al-Mughayyir this week and saw the result of Bluth's "redesign operation" – 3,100 trees that had been cut down, most of them olive trees, were now strewn across the ground. It's impossible to be someone who loves the land, someone who loves other people or even just a human being and not be shocked by that sight, just a few weeks before the olive harvest. It's also impossible to ignore the context that led to the attack.
Under the cover of the war in Gaza, Al-Mughayyir lost all its land – 43,000 dunams – aside from the area where the village's buildings stand. Bluth has enabled 10 wildcat outposts to be erected on every side of the village, and he has allowed violent settlers to impose a reign of terror on the residents, to the point that they are afraid to go out to work their land.
Now, he's allowing the thugs to pave illegal roads to their outposts to make it easier for them to attack the village. Under Bluth's command, two pogroms ended in Palestinians being killed by army gunfire. Nobody has stood trial for this.
Prime Minister Netanyahu's military secretary, Brig. Gen. Avi Bluth in 2016.Credit: IDF Spokespersons Unit
But Bluth won't "set up a spotlight" or conduct "redesign operations" against the people who are really "raising their hands" against others – the settlers. He and they come from the same village, have the same hair and of course wear the same rakishly angled kippahs.
When you appoint an officer like Bluth to the job of head of Central Command, you're giving the job to someone who is the settlers' aide. Granted, the settlers have intimidated all the previous heads of Central Command as well. But it's easier when the post is held by a graduate of the pre-army yeshiva in the settlement of Eli and a former resident of the settlement of Neveh Tzuf. How did Bluth not move a muscle in his face when he spoke about people "raising their hands" and about the collective punishment they deserve?
What about punishing the real criminals – the people who live in those dens of crime known as the outposts? How do you sleep at night, Bluth, with this racist morality?
But that's what Bluth learned in Eli – that Jews are the lords of the land. The settlers are allowed to burn down, destroy, uproot and murder to their heart's content. The subhuman Palestinians aren't allowed to do anything – not to leave their villages, not to work in Israel, not to harvest their olives, sometimes not even to breathe. That is Bluth's Zionism. And that's the Zionism of the army of which Bluth is the face.
Every person has a name, given to him by God. The surname Bluth means "blood" in German. This general of bloodshed has now become the face of the West Bank and the moral image of the entire country. Maybe he'll be appointed to command the next genocide, after Gaza.