Implications of the uprising in the Palestinian ghetto

Deepak Sinha

A veteran paratrooper and consultant with the Observer Research Foundation, Deepak writes on matters of military and broader security concerns. His blog Para Phrase will seek to unravel issues in the security domain without fear or favour, mainly from a military perspective.

In historical texts the series of Anglo-French conflicts between 1337 and 1453 are commonly referred to as the “Hundred Years War”. However, in the present-day scenario, that phrase would be more relevant, and better suited, in the context of the Israel-Palestine conflict. After all, despite all historical jugglery, the roots of this conflict lie in the Balfour Declaration of 1917 and continues to this day. Obviously, only antisemitism and the urge to throw out its Jewish population could have motivated the British government to agree with Zionist aspirations and suggest that it “views with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.” 

This, despite the fact that at the time of the declaration there were only 24000 Jews out of the total population of 690,000 of Palestine. As is well-known widespread antisemitism in Europe and the United States gave rise to Zionists demanding a homeland of their own in Palestine. A demand that gained momentum after Hitler implemented his reprehensible “Final Solution”. 

Yet, intriguingly, many in the West ignore the past and continue to frame the narrative of the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict between the borders of “the dastardly Hamas pre-emptive surprise attack of 7th October, and the unprecedented humanitarian crisis due to Israel’s response”. They perceive it as the barbarity of the Hamas attack being met by an equally brutal response from Israel, the moral high ground being occupied by Israel, despite the unprecedented scale and ferocity of its response, just because Hamas started it! Though, to suggest that we can draw equivalence between the 1200 Israeli and the 21000 Palestinians killed till date, mostly innocent women and children amongst the latter, just boggles the mind. 

One cannot also ignore the fact that nearly half of the Israelis killed were soldiers and that a fairly large percentage of all Israelis, killed died at the hands of their own security forces personnel. Obviously, panic or poor training were responsible, but so probably was the likely adherence to the outlandish and bizarre Hannibal Protocol, that was supposedly discarded in 2016, which turns basic counter-terrorism theory on its head, as it requires citizens also to be targeted if taken hostage. 

Indeed, if comparisons are to be drawn, it should undoubtedly be on the many similarities between the manner in which Netanyahu and Israel have targeted Palestinians and the Nazi treatment of Polish Jews. For example, the Nazis in April 1940 hounded approximately half a million Jews out of their homes and confined them in the Ghetto. This was an area of approximately three Sq. Kms, surrounded by barbed wire and walls with all access and egress denied and total control over what rations, fuel and medicine could be accessed by the inmates. Over a lakh of its inmates died of starvation or disease. While the situation in Gaza may not have been so dire prior to the 7th October attack, it is undeniable that the Palestinians were also hounded out of their homes and confined to the Gaza and West Bank ghettos, with all access and egress being controlled by the Israelis, including over rations, fuel and medicine supplies.

Between July and September 1942, the Nazi Occupation Government deported nearly half the residents of the Ghetto to Concentration Camps, without meeting any resistance as most thought they were being moved to labour camps. However, once the true nature of the move was known, the Jewish Resistance Forces, the Jewish Combat Organization (ŻOB) and the Jewish Military Union (ŻZW), realising that extermination was inevitable, decided on armed resistance and assumed control over the Ghetto Administration. They smuggled in weapons, ammunition and explosives and constructed fighting bunkers interconnected through a maze of tunnels. In the context of the Palestinians, because they saw no viable future for themselves or their children, and despite certain defeat, they decided to confront Israel militarily and made preparations in a manner not dissimilar to that of the Ghetto Resistance fighters.

In January 1943, the Germans attempt to transport more of the residents was met with fierce resistance that led to a temporary halt in the operation. Subsequently, additional troops were moved and in April fierce bombardment of the Ghetto was undertaken that reduced it to rubble. This was followed by attacks by Nazi SS units that used flame throwers and explosives to clear bunkers and tunnels, street by street. Over 13000 of its inmates were killed, while the remaining 50,000 were captured and transported to the camps to be exterminated. By early June 1943, the Ghetto ceased to exist. 

The manner in which the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict is playing out is no different from what transpired in the Ghetto. Whether this be with regard to what Israel sees as the final solution, its overwhelming and indiscriminate use of force or the brutal and inhuman tactics adopted. Incidentally, SS-Brigadeführer Jürgen Stroop, the commander of the German Forces involved in the destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto was subsequently captured, convicted of war crimes and executed in 1952. Clearly, as then, genocide and ethnic cleansing remain crimes against humanity and its perpetrators deserve no less. 

There are many in the West who are critical of all those who suggest similarities between the two events and accuse them of extreme antisemitism. Some of them point to the fact the percentage of overall deaths amongst Palestinians is much less when compared to that of Jews. Thus, in their view, events unfurling today cannot be compared to the Holocaust or even called genocide. In this regard commentators critical of Western perceptions and policies in support of Israel suggest that it stems from deep sense of guilt at having done nothing to prevent the Holocaust. In their view the West continues to assuage its guilt by placing Israel on a pedestal and accusing all its critics as being antisemitic and unwilling to accept the existence of the state of Israel. This has, over the years, allowed Israel to literally get away with murder. American largesse and support have allowed it to practice apartheid and terrorise the Palestinians with blatant impunity, much in the manner that Nazi Germany did the Jews.  

They do have a point, but it could also be argued that Western Governments are unwilling to see relatively large number of Jews return back to Europe or America, if the Israel experiment were to fail. There is no denying the fact that there remains a very strong and widespread undercurrent of antisemitism within the West that will have political repercussions, if that were to happen. In the circumstances, Governments are therefore willing to do all that is necessary, whatever the cost to the Palestinians, to support Israel. This, despite its intransigence and unwillingness to accept a two-state solution and given its extremely forceful and over-the-top response to the Hamas attack, is dangerous as the possibility of the conflict spreading wider seems more and more likely.