That's how it is when you live in the warm, cozy bubble, completely disconnected from reality, in complete denial, that the Israeli media builds for us: We are always the victims and the only victims; there was a massacre only on October 7; all of Gaza is to blame; all of the Arabs are bloodthirsty; all of Europe is antisemitic. Do you have any doubt? See Kristallnacht in Amsterdam.
And now for the facts: In Amsterdam, some of the Israeli fans rampaged in the streets even before the pogrom: disgusting, shouted chants of "We'll screw the Arabs" (in Hebrew) and the removal of a Palestinian flag legitimately hanging from the balcony of a building were almost never shown in the Israeli media, which could spoil the image of antisemitism. No one asked the first question that the sight of the violence and hatred in Amsterdam should have raised: Why do they hate us so much? No, it's not because we are Jews.
Not that there isn't antisemitism: Of course there is, and it must be fought, but the attempt to pin everything on it is ridiculous and mendacious. An anti-Israeli wind blew in Amsterdam Thursday, and that's what ignited the pogrom. The North African immigrants, the Arabs and the Dutch people who rioted saw the horrors in Gaza over the past year. They are not willing to remain silent about them.
For them, the victims are their brothers and their compatriots. And who can remain indifferent when your people are slaughtered so cruelly? Every Moroccan waiter in every remote Dutch town has seen much more of Gaza than the experts on Arab affairs in Israel. No decent person could remain indifferent to the images from Gaza. The rioters in Amsterdam committed egregious violence and deserve condemnation and punishment. Nothing can justify a pogrom, neither in Amsterdam nor in Hawara.
But the Amsterdam riots also have a context, and Israel is unwilling to address it. It would rather send a bodyguard with every Israeli soccer fan who travels to Europe from now on than to ask why it is that they hate us so much and how this hatred can be quelled. After all, it did not erupt like this before the war in Gaza.
This is another cost of the war in Gaza that should have been considered: The world will hate us for it. Every Israeli abroad will be a target for hatred and violence from now on. That's what happens when you kill almost 20,000 children, carry out ethnic cleansing and destroy the Gaza Strip. It's a little quirk of the world; it doesn't like those who commit these sorts of crimes.
From Gideon Levy's Opinion piece in Haaretz, 10/10/24