The Hatred That Must Be Explained
Russia invaded Ukraine and has killed hundreds of thousands of people.
Russian Orthodox churches in America are not bombed in retaliation.
China runs a massive system of concentration camps for Uyghur Muslims and crushes religious freedom inside its borders.
Chinese temples abroad are not attacked.
The Islamic Regime in Iran funds militias and terrorist groups across the Middle East, from Hezbollah to the Houthis, destabilizing entire regions.
Mosques in America are not targeted because of it.
The Taliban run Afghanistan as a brutal Islamist theocracy that persecutes women, minorities, and anyone who resists their rule.
Afghan mosques abroad are not bombed.
Myanmar’s military carried out massacres against the Rohingya and forced hundreds of thousands to flee their homes.
Buddhist temples overseas are not attacked.
There are wars, atrocities, repression, and mass violence all over the world, committed by governments and movements tied to every religion and ideology imaginable. Yet out of all of them, only one country and one people provoke a reaction so obsessive that someone would decide to drive an explosives-filled truck into a synagogue full of American Jewish preschoolers.
Think about how warped that logic is.
The victims are American children in Michigan, the justification being floated is something that happened in Lebanon, and the target chosen is a synagogue pre-school.
The distance between those things should make the entire argument instantly collapse but instead, the media rushes to fill in the gap.
Within hours the attacker’s grievances appear. His anger is explained and contextualized away. Photographs of his family circulate, as if the correct response to attempted mass murder is to conduct a psychological profile of the perpetrator.
Here’s an excerpt from the Detroit Free Press article on the terrorist:
Zaidieh described Ghazali as “my rock.”
“He was the best. The best neighbor. Always quiet, a hard worker. He was always pleasant. Everybody liked him,” she said.
“I’m not going to say ‘was.’ Is.”
And he always treated her well, she said. “Always. Always. Always.”
Employees at the popular shawarma stop, Hamido, down the street told the Free Press he worked there and was “so, so nice” but wouldn’t grant an interview.
We are also told his relatives were killed in Lebanon, as though that somehow transforms attempted mass murder into a tragic emotional reaction.
Even setting aside the fact that his relatives were themselves involved with Hezbollah, the entire premise of this argument is absurd.
Family members of those murdered on October 7th didn’t hunt down random Muslims around the globe. It’s hard to even imagine such a thing.
Everywhere else we understand the obvious moral boundary. You do not take out political anger on random civilians who have nothing to do with the events you are angry about.
Except when the civilians are Jews.
Then suddenly the connection becomes acceptable. Suddenly it is implied that Jewish institutions, Jewish communities, and Jewish children are legitimate stand-ins for the State of Israel.
At the very same time we are constantly lectured that Zionism and Judaism are completely separate, that Jews everywhere should reject any connection between the two. Someone should inform the terrorists because the message clearly isn’t getting through.
You cannot spend months insisting that Israel is uniquely evil, uniquely criminal, uniquely responsible for suffering in the world, and then act shocked when someone decides that attacking Jews anywhere is morally justified.
Ideas have consequences.
If blowing up a synagogue in Michigan because of Israel sounds insane, that’s because it is. It makes exactly as much sense as shooting up a mosque in Michigan because of what Hamas, Hezbollah, or ISIS have done.
No one would tolerate that logic for a second.
Yet when the target is Jews, we are asked to listen patiently while the murderer’s grievances are explained.
Strip away the excuses and the language of “context,” and what remains is very simple.
It’s not geopolitics, or grief, or moral confusion.
It’s hatred and violence directed at Jews, dressed up in political language so that people can pretend it is something else.