Means to an End

WHY DON’T PEOPLE WHO EXPRESS GRAVE CONCERN ABOUT PALESTINIAN CASUALTIES CALL ON HAMAS TO RELEASE ITS HOSTAGES AND SURRENDER?: Because they don’t really care about Palestinian well-being. The allegedly “pro-Palestine” movement’s main objective is to destroy the State of Israel, for various reasons–antisemitism, Islamism, pan-Arabism, hatred of the West. The welfare of actual Palestinians is at best a secondary concern. This, among others things, is why you see virtually no voices who claim to be concerned with Palestinian well-being calling on Hamas to surrender. Hamas’s surrender would surely be good for the Palestinians. It would end the war and its attendant destruction, and it would mean that some new group would govern Gaza, and that new government could hardly be worse than the corrupt, Islamist, war-mongering dictatorship of Hamas. But, and here’s the key, Hamas’s surrender would also benefit Israel. And the “movement” is happy to sacrifice both immediate and long-term Palestinian well-being to harm Israel. - David Bernstein