One day after the terror group slaughtered scores of innocent Israelis—including women and children—a Brown student group during an “emergency meeting” argued that Hamas’s attack was “justified violence” and “in fact a victory,” the Washington Free Beacon reported. Brown students have also sympathized with Hamas on Sidechat, a popular app on Brown’s campus that allows students to share anonymous thoughts with their classmates. Students have taken to the app to share comments such as “There is no such thing as an innocent Israeli.”
The Brown students who think that the atrocities committed by Hamas constituted “justified violence” and a “victory” have lost all moral sense. There is no reasoning with them. They should, however, be punished — all the way up to, and including, expulsion from the university — for defending, and even praising, what are clearly war crimes. There is, alas, no way to find the authors of the anonymous comments on Sidechat, where Brown students have been justifying the October 7 murders of civilians in such terms as “there is no such thing as an innocent Israeli.” They are, every one of them, including a three-month old, ten-month-old, two-, four-, and six-year-old children, guilty of war crimes and deserve to be punished.
Brown president Christina Paxson has also faced criticism for abandoning Jewish students—during a recent event, Paxson cut from her speech a planned remark denouncing anti-Semitism after pro-Palestinian students heckled her. A university spokesman said Paxson merely “abbreviated” her remarks in an attempt to wrap up her speech….
Profiles in Pusillanimity: President Paxson, apparently fearful of pro-Palestinian students who heckled her, succumbed to their menacing behavior, and cut from her speech a section that did nothing more than denounce antisemitism. Apparently even that proved too much for the pro-Palestinian crowd, that was unwilling to hear a word in defense of harassed Jews on campus and against antisemitism. Instead of sticking to her script, Paxson — not wanting to endure chants and catcalls — simply dropped her condemnation of antisemitism. If you were a Brown alumnus or alumna, would you want to support the university that is now being run by people unwilling to condemn antisemitism?
Bartov in his op-ed also urged Israel’s government to “define a clear political endgame that will create conditions to end this conflict.” While the Jewish state has identified that “endgame” as the destruction of Hamas, Bartov in the op-ed said the removal of “Hamas’s political and military control … may not be entirely feasible.”
The removal of Hamas as a military force looks more “feasible” every day. I was unaware that in addition to his work in “Holocaust and Genocide studies,” Omer Bartov had become a sudden expert in military strategy. I’d put my faith more in the IDF generals than in armchair warrior Bartov, as to what is or is not “feasible.” And all this talk about Israel “having to define a clear political endgame” is silly. Israel is in the middle of a most difficult war. Until that war’s goals are achieved — the destruction of Hamas as a military power and the return of all the hostages — Israel does not have time right now to come up with such a plan, which whatever it turns out to be, will depend for its adoption on the fractious Israeli electorate. Even if the current Israeli government has such a plan, it is not at all certain that it will remain in office once the war is over. And in any case, why would Israel’s government want to tip its hand in such a delicate matter? I suspect that Israel is hoping, with American help, to persuade the rich Arab oil states — chiefly Saudi Arabia and the UAE — to take control of day-to-day life in Gaza, and to contribute the tens of billions of dollars in reconstruction aid that Gaza will require. The Gazans will accept with better grace rule by other Muslim Arabs, especially if those Muslim Arabs are the very people pouring billions of dollars into the Strip. And the UAE and Saudi Arabia would have their agents right inside Gaza to make sure their aid money is not diverted or wasted. Both the UAE and Saudi Arabia hate and fear Hamas, which is part of the Muslim Brotherhood; the MB is a dangerous enemy of the Gulf monarchies. And both will be re ready to cooperate with the IDF in making sure that Hamas does not reappear in Gaza.