Western moral cowardice during a genocide

Published in full by The Herald on April 6th.

Otto Inglis in the April 5th edition of The Herald says we must continue to support Israel. He apparently believes the lies Israel spouts to justify the genocide it’s committing against the Palestinian people. He shares the outrage of western governments’ at the IDF’s murder of 7 white western aid workers as well as their acceptance and defence of Israel’s murder of over 33k brown Palestinians, 70% of whom are women and children. A double standard?

Israeli lies, lapped up by the western mainstream media, that Hamas raped and murdered Israeli women on October 7^th have been debunked as war propaganda. Israel never presented any credible evidence, witnesses or victims to support these allegations. The police collected no forensic evidence nor produced any victims or eyewitnesses which is strange if Israel wanted to prove these assaults happened. The sister of an alleged rape victim denied her sister was raped and complained her family was manipulated by the New York Times. The stories of 40 beheaded babies were outright lies.  

Even if these allegations were proven true, it doesn’t justify Israel wiping out an entire people. Throughout Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine, Israeli occupation forces have committed systematic sexual assault and violence against Palestinian men, women and children and the world turns away.

Before October 7, Israel would periodically go into Gaza to ‘mow the lawn,’ killing thousands and bombing everything in sight, ironically ensuring that the lawn grows back even thicker.  

And after October 7^th, Amnesty International documented ‘horrifying cases of torture and degrading treatment’ of Palestinians, thousands of whom were arbitrarily arrested. Amnesty’s regional director said, “Administrative detention is one of the key tools through which Israel has enforced its system of apartheid against Palestinians.”

Israel routinely breaks international law because it knows it will be unconditionally backed by the US, UK and EU. I would hope that like South Africa, an independent Scotland would have the moral courage to condemn Israel and its enablers.