Of Course it’s Israel’s Fault

Of course it was Israel’s fault. It was always Israel’s fault. Imagine if Hamas lobs a rocket into Israel, hits a school, kills five. The international community’s reaction? Nil, probably; call us when it’s fifty. So let’s say it’s fifty. The UN might meet, if they didn’t have the afternoon blocked out to pass a resolution to declare July “International Guava Month,” and they would pass a Strongly Worded Statement that condemned the violence on all sides, urged restraint, called for a resumption of the peace process, and recommended the burgundy with the stroganoff, providing it’s the ’75 burgundy. Man, that was a year for French reds, wasn’t it? What were we discussing? Right: something something regret, strongest possible concern. How many kids? Pity, that. Well, send out the resolution on the extra-thick paper. The good kind. Not the time to stint.

Ah, but what of Gaza’s humanitarian crisis? Well, it’s Israel’s fault there are “refugee” camps in Gaza in the first place. It was Israel’s fault when it occupied Gaza after the Department of Stealthy Jews silently overran Gaza positions while Egyptian generals were sitting down for weekly Yiddish classes, learning to say “shalom” as part of the Arab world’s unceasing effort to coexist with its thorny neighbor. Israel used its secret Squallor Ray to turn Gaza – the Monaco of the Levant while it was under Egyptian control – into a hellhole. So that explains the rockets.

Sure, they left, but it was still Israel’s fault; because they didn’t give them the secret formula for raising golden geese and turning the eggs into technology patents. It was Israel’s fault when the Gazans elected Hamas to run the joint, because Israel had radicalized everyone by not leaving earlier. If they’d left during the height of Intifada 2, then their opponents would have realized “hey, violence works. Well, let’s never do that again.” It was Israel’s fault when it began the blockade to keep more arms from pouring into Gaza, because this crippled the local economy, which consists of hiring people to fire rockets that cripple Jews. It wasn’t Egypt’s fault; the blockade on the Egyptian side is just one of those inexplicable things that no one quite remembers or understands, but well, they probably have their reasons. The Middle East! It’s like that! But not impossible to understand: shrug your shoulders with world-weary exaggeration, and speak knowingly of “The Street,” and you too could have a column in a major newspaper.

It was certainly Israel’s fault for stopping a flotilla aimed at busting the blockade, because A) the ships were full of peace activists who had pots of honey and Thomas Kinkade pictures of sunsets and kittens and also drugs and milk and DVDs of “Lost” – okay, they’re bootlegs, but people in Gaza don’t have enough broadband to get it on Hulu, and don’t think the UN isn’t looking into that, and B) if the ships had gotten through, they would have changed their minds about the conflict, held a press conference, praised Israeli constraint, and demanded some sort of symbolic concession from Hamas. They wouldn’t have asked Hamas to strike the “kill the Jews” rhetoric from their charter, though – heck, that’s just there for the base, you know, red meat, like an abortion plank in a Republican platform. No, something like a promise not to aim missiles at schools. Little things first.

If one looks at the video of the activists chanting kill-the-Jew slogans before they set sail on their noble cruise, one might think they were motivated by anti-Jewish sentiment, but you have to realize these things are metaphors. When they refer to an event in the Koran that involved wholesale Jew-killing, it’s a ritualistic means of expressing the desire for personal struggle. (Against Jews.) When the ship is stopped, and the commandos beaten, it’s a regrettable sign of Israel’s inexplicable desire to deny wheelchairs and shelf-stable pudding containers to Gazans. When a ship gets through with rocket parts, and one of those rockets hits a school, it’s still Israel’s fault, for all the reasons cited above.

So if you want to be taken seriously in the proper circles, always leap to the conclusion that it’s Israel’s fault. You will be praised for your nuance, your ability to understand complexity, and your willingness to see all sides. You might even win a date with Helen Thomas.