Editor’s Note: Below is a short excerpt from Michelle Kamhi’s essay posted on X. The full essay delves into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, particularly the author’s response to a friend’s pro-Palestinian viewpoint. With permission, this excerpt is crossposted here, as readers of Minding the Campus may find it valuable in addressing campus anti-Semitism and pro-Palestine protests. Read the extended essay here.
Less than two months after the horrific events of October 7, 2023, one of my oldest and closest friends astonished me by adding her voice to the deafening chorus condemning Israel for its response, and pitying the innocent civilians suffering under it in Gaza. When I defended Israel, she indicated that she had many reservations about Israel vis-à-vis the Palestinians. Since I have always regarded her as reasonable and fair-minded, and I respect her intelligence, I begged her to tell me what facts had led to her view.
Her response was even more astonishing. Apart from conceding that October 7th was indeed a horrific act of terrorism by Hamas, against which Israel clearly has the right to strike back, the account she presented could have been lifted whole cloth from Al Jazeera or the Palestinian Authority. My American friend, an ostensibly “moderate” Democrat, had accepted virtually every major lie and distortion contained in the pro-Palestinian version of Israel’s history—from the claim that Israel had stolen land from Palestinian landowners to the allegation that Zionists had committed a massacre of innocent civilians in the Arab village of Deir Yassin.
What follows is my reply to her account in full. I publish it here in the hope of reaching some of the many presumably reasonable people who share her view in whole or in part, with potentially disastrous consequences not only for Israel but for the U.S. and the entire free world.
Image of Pro-Palestinian Rally, Washington, DC USA by Ted Eytan on Wikimedia Commons
