I asked ChatbotAI, "When did Hamas kidnap Israelis?" The bot responded, "The Palestinian militant group has been involved in several incidents of kidnapping Israelis over the years. One notable incident took place on June 25, 2006 when Hamas militants kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit near the Gaza-Israeli border." Another "notable incident" took place on October 7, when Hamas kidnapped 240 Israelis, but Chatbot failed to mention that one. This is how deep left-wing bias against Israel is embedded in the system.
Last week, that bias rose to the surface when, on Monday, the International Criminal Court (ICC) requested arrest warrants for both Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu and the three top Hamas leaders, lumping the monsters who committed atrocities against Jewish civilians in with the leader of the nation that's trying to defend itself from more such attacks. Then, on Wednesday, Ireland, Spain, and Norway "recognized" the borderless, citizen-less "state" of Palestine, which is about as real as El Dorado, despite repeated Israeli attempts over the decades to make it real. It's odd that three nations that remained neutral towards the Nazis in WW2 couldn't also remain neutral after the second worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust. Hamas was overjoyed to receive this reward just seven months after massacring 1200 Jews and committing countless heinous sex crimes witnessed by the world. Ireland, Spain, and Norway can now frame the thank you letter Hamas sent to them.
The Hague-based ICC claims to protect the world from crimes against humanity, but non-members include the US, Russia, China, and India. The court lacks the power to arrest even a pickpocket, relying instead on its signatory nations to make any arrests its "warrants," which are arrived at behind closed door trials, call for. Still, the ICC claims to have near-universal jurisdiction over the citizens of every nation in the world, a concept that ignores all conventional ideas of justice and due process.
In making his shameless announcement, Ireland's Taoiseach (prime minister), Simon Harris said, "Each of us will now undertake whatever national steps are necessary to give effect to that decision." Would that be the regular steps like sending ambassadors to the newly-recognized nation? The problem is that there's no Palestinian state to send them to. Hamas runs the show in Gaza, so maybe the first regular step would be to contact that group. Maybe they could erect the embassy right next to a hospital.
The truth is that Ireland, Norway, Spain, won't take any regular steps, because they (along with the rest of the West) don't treat Hamas as an actual government, even though it was voted into power in a free election. As a rule, governments are held responsible for the safety of their citizens, but Hamas puts its people's lives at risk. The terrorist group could end all the death and destruction in Gaza that followed its October 7 murder/kidnapping/rape spree by returning the hostages and surrendering in a war they lost long ago. But why do that when Western democracies are recognizing Palestine as a state? The more deaths there are in Gaza, the more sympathy Hamas receives.
The reason that no Palestinian state exists and the Intifada killings continue after all these decades is because: The Palestinians don't want peace. They have no interest in the "two-state solution" that Joe Biden and other Western leaders blather on about; a one-state solution is all they'll settle for. That means all the land "from the river to the sea," just as protesters on American college campuses were recently chanting. Then we'd see a real genocide.
Because there's no desire for peace, no group representing Palestine has ever accepted a partition plan that could lead to peace. Here's a timeline that lends historical perspective:
1938—Israel accepts, but Arab nations reject, the British "Peel Commission" plan, by which most of the land now constituting Israel would be made into an Arab state.
1947—The Jews accepted a British partition plan presented to the UN that would form a rump Jewish state with much less land than Israel now occupies. The Arabs rejected it, and in 1948 they launched a multi-nation attack on Israel.
1967—In response to military mobilization among its Arab neighbors, Israel launches a successful, preemptive six-day attack and assumes control over Gaza, the Sinai Peninsula, the West Bank and Jerusalem.
1973—The Arabs, led by Anwar Sadat, plan a surprise attack on Israel on the holy day of Yom Kippur. Israel ends up with slightly more territory than it had previously controlled.
1993 and 1995—Israel signs Oslo Accords I and II with the PLO, leading to a series of failed negotiations until the agreement fell apart at the Camp David Summit of 2000, at which Israeli PM Ehud Barack offered a proposal for an Arab state whose borders would be similar to those between 1948 and 1967, with the Palestine Authority controlling the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Arafat walked away from the deal, and then started the Second Intifada that killed thousands of Israelis.
2008—Israeli PM Ehud Olmert offers a plan that would’ve split Jerusalem and handed over the Gaza Strip and almost all of the West Bank. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas declined to sign the agreement without even making a counter offer.
Ireland, Spain, and Norway, from their "good intentions," have just recognized a terrorist state in which Hamas, whose overarching mission is to kill Jews, will continue with the terrorism that it depends on for its funding. On Sunday, it launched another rocket into Israel. These three nations appear to be unaware that when one state recognizes another nation, it's done with the expectation that the new nation takes on duties such as refraining from interfering in the affairs of other states, respecting human rights and fundamental freedoms, settling disputes with other states by peaceful means. Who believes that the pretend Palestinian state will take any of these duties seriously?
