War and religious ethics

 

Religious ethics are holding back Hezbollah from paying Israel bitter Gazan wages, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, it seems religions disagree over what you can or cannot do in war. But let’s not be too hard on religions, the real blame lies with those who interpret religious texts, and the clerics who define those ethics of war if such a thing exists.

 

 

I woke up today to more of the same, televised images of torn and mangled bodies piled in bloody heaps broadcast by Al Jazeera. But this massacre was different, they were civilians preforming dawn prayers in accordance with Muslim religious rites. They didn’t see those missiles coming. When medical and civil defense teams arrived at the scene some bodies were still burning. I couldn’t think straight the whole day, I kept pacing up and down my veranda, I didn’t leave the house, I didn’t want to see anyone, I was seething inside, I wanted the resistance to hit back, to take the lives of Israeli civilians, I wanted blood, I wanted revenge.

 

Of course, the inevitable happened, I got in an argument over those very religious ethics of war with a dear friend, and long story short, I pulled away from unsocial media I didn’t want to hear or read any more. I was angry, and I still am. It’s natural to want revenge, in fact its human to have the blood lust, it’s a defining characteristic of our species. But in the modern world we have found ways to solve our problems with talk, endless talk. Until now.

 

Israel has shown the world that it does not care what anyone thinks of their genocidal killing spree in Gaza, nor what they think of their torture of Palestinian suspects, even minors, in fact Israel and Israeli soldiers revel in their blood lust, as evidenced by a soldier recently who spoke in a published video of how he saw a young 12-year-old Palestinian girl playing in Gaza so he shot her in the head. Modern day Zionism, like many far right ideologies, revels in the real or imagined glories of the distant past and wish for time to go backwards to that imagined time.

Religious text interpreted in a certain way may actually support Galant’s “human animals” comment, at least it does to his supporters and many Israelis. And since Gazans are not fully human and since they are all responsible for what happened on October 7 as the Israeli president said, then killing them should be no worse than swatting a fly.

 

This is an example of religious ideology used to justify the annihilation of an entire people, which means ethics are what you make of them. You get to move the goal posts. But Hezbollah secretary general Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah doesn’t seem to recognize this convenient little loophole that all religions have: you make it up as you go along, you get to decide what a particular religious text means, you get to decide if it is ethical or not to kill babies! This is the brutal reality of real world warfare, always has been, always will be. If you stick to your ethical guns you will lose because your enemy will take you places in this conflict you could never follow him to. He will escalate in ways you refuse to allow yourself to escalate. Therefore I’m afraid its checkmate, Israel wins another one!

 

Frankly, that’s all I wanted to say. I couldn’t care less what people think of me, I can’t stop thinking of the piles of human meat I saw this morning while trying and failing to have my breakfast. I am a normal human being who yearns for victory, that of the righteous, that of my father’s Palestinian people. But I am also human, with human feeling and I want all this to end, with victory if possible, in defeat if necessary. Why should this round be any different than all the other wars we have fought?!

 

We never go all the way, we never dared, because let’s face it, we could never imagine winning, taking occupied territory back from the enemy, and if so how could we win when defeatism lives in our hearts!

 

Good night