October 7 – Two Years Following a Genocide
By: Deji Yesufu
Three days ago, the United States of America, led by President Donald Trump, invited Israel and Hamas to sign a cease-fire agreement that will bring back forty-six Israeli hostages (of that number, twenty are presumed to still be alive). The agreement will enable a foreign agency to lead the government in the Gaza Strip and will aid in the reconstruction of the entire war-torn area. Trump has gotten the help of the Saudis, the Qataris, the Egyptians, and other leading Arab nations to speak with the leadership of Hamas to agree to the terms of the agreement. Israel will not be governing Gaza, and Israel will be returning hundreds of Hamas prisoners of war in the deal. Hamas has agreed to 95% of the terms of the deal. There is one little line, however, that they insist on: Hamas wants to continue to be part of the rebuilding process of Gaza. When Israel learnt, two days ago, that Hamas was still giving conditions, they moved into Gaza and began to pummel the terrorist group. Trump had to call Benjamin Netanyahu and ask him to hold fire. Hamas has only a day or two left to agree fully to the conditions of this ceasefire; if they do not, Israel will be moving into the Gaza Strip with a “final solution”. The cry of “genocide” that the world has come to characterize the activities of the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) in Gaza will not deter them. Every trace of terrorism will be rooted out of Gaza – the only problem is that the twenty or more Israeli hostages left may have to be sacrificed in the process. How did our world get to this point?
Jews and Christians have not always been good neighbors historically. Many Christians regard the Jews as the killers of Jesus, and thus must be held suspect. This is what gave rise to the word “antisemitic”, and it led to an increasing desire among European and American Jews in the 19th century to return to the holy Land and reclaim the land of their fathers. This movement was generally called Zionist, and they began to return to the Holy Land little by little. But it was a typical case of moving from frying pan to fire. What the Jews called “The Holy Land”, the European colonizers called “Palestine”. Palestine will therefore encapsulate the Holy Land, which will include Jerusalem and Nazareth, where Jesus grew up. While the Jews were exiled from the holy land, a number of Arab communities had sprung up there. It is these Arabian people who are regarded as Palestinians today.
At the turn of the 20th century, antisemitic fervor was so rife in Europe that the Jews began to move everywhere they could find safety. America shut its borders against them at some point, and so they had no choice but to head to the holy land. By the early 1940s, it was clear that there was going to be a religious clash between the Jews and their Arab neighbors in the holy land. The Second World War ended in 1945, and the United Nations was put together at about that time. The first duty of the United Nations was to settle the Jews in their homeland in a peaceful manner. In September 1947, the UN suggested a two-state solution, where the Palestinians would occupy Gaza and parts of East Jerusalem; they would also live in the West Bank, and they would also have some parts of Nazareth too. The UN divided the territory in a most even manner. The Arabs rejected this plan. Instead, in May 1948, Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon went to war with Israel, and by a stroke of what could only have been called divine intervention, Israel defeated all six nations at the same time. The aftermath of the war left Egypt in control of Gaza, while Jordan had control of the West Bank. The Palestinian communities were then moved into Gaza and the West Bank. Since that time, Israel has held control over the whole region that used to be called Palestine, and the Palestinians who live in Gaza and the West Bank have continued to constitute themselves as terrorists against the nation of Israel.
October 7th, 2023, is now regarded as the new 9/11. On September 11th, 2001, a number of men hijacked four American local airplanes. Two of them were flown into the World Trade Center in New York, killing all passengers on board and another three thousand persons on the ground. A third plane was flown into the Pentagon – America’s seat of military defense. A fourth plane was heading for the White House, but passengers on board that plane overcame the hijackers and crashed the plane in an open field, killing everyone on board. Al-Qaeda, a Middle Eastern terrorist group, claimed responsibility for the dastardly act. The head of Al-Qaeda, Osama Bin Laden, became a wanted man. He was killed by American special forces in Pakistan in 2011. 9/11 introduced the Western world to militant Islam. What very few people did not know is that militant Islam is what Israel has been battling from its inception.
When the Palestinians rejected the two-state solution that was proposed by the United Nations in 1947, they did so simply on the fact of the rabid antisemitism that the Quran teaches. Just as every action of militant Islam is founded on bigotry against every other religion besides their own. It has taken close to 1,000 years for Christians to learn tolerance – the ability to co-exist with differing religious beliefs. Many Muslims are yet to learn this. Therefore, when October 7th happened, the whole world was again awoken to the extremism of militant Islam. An extremism that many people all around the world experience on a daily basis, but may not have the media power to cover. For example, Nigeria has been under extreme militant Islamic domination since 2009. Some have suggested that both Christians and Muslims are victims of Boko Haram. This is not an entirely correct narrative. While indeed both Christians and Muslims are victims of Boko Haram, the fundamental ideals of Boko Haram are to wipe out Christianity from Nigeria and end Western civilization in the country. Christians are their primary target, while Muslims may be collateral damage.
The real battle with militant Islam is the concept of a clash of civilizations. Many extreme Muslim adherents are still living in the seventh century, where debates are ended with the use of the sword. The blessing of modern times is that there can be a proliferation of ideas, such that independent ideas can coexist for the overall betterment of society. It is true that there are many ideas today that are anti-religious. It is, however, the duty of theologians and religious people to persuade society against such ideas. Now, if society rejects theological theories for modern theories, we must have the good sense to allow people to do whatever they wish to do. Life has a way of teaching men the right path, after they may have followed some destructive paths. Governments must also endeavor to lead society in such a way that beneficial ideas can coexist. Where such ideas are inimical to society, the government can lead an effort to ban them through legislation. The real challenge with Islam is that many people who profess the religion have simply refused to grow up. While many progressive ideas are very bad, we cannot reject other beneficial ones. For example, Israel today has become the sole military might in the Middle East because it is the most progressive of all the countries there. While other countries in the Middle East were struggling to come out of their seventh-century worldview, Israel has built a military capacity that can take on the whole of the Middle East at the same time. Iran can testify to this fact.
Today, exactly two years ago, 1,200 Israeli civilians were killed on the border they share with Gaza. They were killed not because they were combatants at war; rather, they were killed solely because of their race and religion – Israelites and Judaism. That is genocide and if anyone wishes to know who committed genocide in the Middle East in recent times, it was Hamas on October 7th, 2023. What Israel is doing in Gaza is a just war that is necessary to flush out terrorist activities on its borders. It is sad that there has been a colossal loss of lives in the process. This loss was clearly envisaged by Hamas, and they were confident that Israel’s rage against the Gaza people would lead to many losses of lives and world outcry against Israel. Israel is today almost blacklisted in the comity of nations, but those who know the lessons of history know that what is happening in the Middle East is a necessary conflict of good against evil – and good is triumphing. Israel’s war against militant Islam will spill over to other countries, like Nigeria, and with time, Islam will need to outgrow its 7th-century worldview.
Deji Yesufu is the pastor of Providence Reformed Baptist Church Ibadan. He is the author of HUMANITY. He can be reached at [email protected]
Share this: