The Battle for Truth

By Ari Bussel

Photo by Kushal Das – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikipedia

A few weeks ago, I was shocked when one of the daughters of a business colleague expressed deep concern for Greta [Thunberg], whom the State of Israel had allegedly “kidnapped” from the deck of a ship trying to break the blockade on Gaza and deliver much-needed supplies to the starving population. See the power that fairy tales have over American youth from good homes. That young girl and her sister even attend a school where the majority are Jewish.

Now comes news that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is bringing social media influencers so they can speak to their followers—in their own language and age group. Since the Foreign Ministry has failed in every other conceivable way, we can only hope that this attempt won’t be as wasted as all of the ministry’s actions in this century. Will that young girl change her mind about Greta’s “kidnapping” because of these influencers’ visit to Israel? Highly unlikely. But the bureaucrats at the Foreign Ministry will be able to convince themselves that they are acting so vigorously on behalf of Israel that they deserve a salary increase to match that of Mossad agents (you couldn’t make this stuff up!).

Meanwhile, in Israel—not in the extremist fringes, but in the mainstream—editors of the “Opinion” section at Ynet saw fit to publish the musings of one Noa Maiman. I didn’t know who she was before, but I immediately recognized her kind after reading just two of her sentences: she resembles the activists from “Jewish Voice for Peace,” an anti-Israel organization that is neither Jewish nor peace-seeking (similar to another group, albeit slightly less toxic and destructive, J Street, which once claimed to be “pro-Israel, pro-peace,” though George Soros certainly didn’t fund them for that).

The leader of that organization would always begin with: “My father is Israeli, and I’m the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors” (of course, with a Jewish name—no less Jewish than Queen Esther). And from that vantage point, she would launch the most venomous and destructive attacks imaginable against Israel and Jews everywhere.

But let’s put aside my familiarity with that organization—it’s likely known to you due to its activities on American campuses over the past two years and recently featured in the news, given its growing enthusiasm and massive financial support. It has now shifted gears and aims not only to influence public opinion through the media and universities but also to run candidates for office.

Like that Esther, so too Maiman, in her words: “For me, the Holocaust has always been something that—if it did happen and took many members of my family—then at least we should learn something from that catastrophe.” Something “that if it did happen,” suggesting maybe it didn’t. “That catastrophe,” a trivial matter, that Final Solution to the Jewish Problem, a systematic genocide which, had it not been stopped by the Allies eighty years ago, would have seen the 1.5 million children and 4.5 million adults killed doubled or tripled. A negligible, marginal thing—if it even happened at all.

At the bottom of the article, we’re told that Maiman holds a master’s degree in comparative politics—conflict studies. I immediately recalled someone else who did her master’s degree at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, writing her thesis on “Why IDF soldiers don’t rape Palestinian women.” [Since we’re being compared to Nazis—after all, Nazis raped Jewish women. In fact, they had farms of Jewish women for their pleasure.] What I couldn’t understand is how university supervisors, tenured professors, and even an entire faculty allowed such a thesis to be written. Just as Ynet’s opinion editors saw nothing wrong in publishing Maiman’s article. A shred of professional dignity should have stopped it, despite the temptation of self-flagellation.

Already in the opening, Maiman reveals her ignorance—yet she parades around under the cloak of knowledge and expertise. This is how she begins: “Recently, I found myself explaining to a young American girl about the Greta Thunberg affair and her flotilla to Gaza. [Thankfully, that American girl isn’t my friend’s daughter.] When I told her that Israel imposes a blockade to pressure the civilian population [in Gaza] through starvation…” Not just lies, but real harm that Maiman causes—because the claim comes straight from “an Israeli, granddaughter of Holocaust survivors,” and so here’s the “proof” that “Israel is starving a population in a ghetto!”

Maiman probably doesn’t know—or perhaps doesn’t care (since why let facts confuse us?)—that the naval blockade on Gaza predates the war that began on October 7, 2023, which we are currently in the midst of. It was a blockade imposed by both Egypt and Israel to prevent the flow of weapons (e.g., advanced rockets) and experts (mainly from Iran) into Gaza. There was once a very famous flotilla of six ships, led by the Mavi Marmara, also attempting to “break the blockade” to deliver necessary supplies. It turned out that the “supplies” were negligible and mostly expired. Of course, these are media stunts intended to shape public opinion—not to help the people of Gaza. If the wellbeing of Gazans were truly the goal, there are ways to deliver supplies. It’s just a shame that a human being—especially an Israeli like Maiman—doesn’t prioritize the delivery of life-saving medicines and a little food to the hostages. Let’s also remember that the Red Cross doesn’t care about the hostages either, despite having hundreds of staff in Gaza. The organization doesn’t even maintain a status list—who is alive and who is not. Jewish blood is considered cheap by the world, or at least by the UN and other international bodies.

Just like then, today there are supply convoys and full warehouses—but the moment trucks enter Gaza and their loads are placed in international organizations’ warehouses, Hamas seizes everything for its own purposes. Nothing has changed. Greta’s hatred toward us is no less than that of those who were aboard the ships back then.

Maiman, Israel is not starving the Gazans. Israel doesn’t decide the contents of the aid. And the entire war could have ended at any moment had Hamas released the hostages (or returned their bodies) and laid down its arms. Making comparisons for the sake of headlines, popularity among certain crowds, or boosting one’s ego is beneath the dignity of any rational person.

But Maiman is preoccupied with comparisons, and for her, one side weighs heavier (as her words reveal). Israel—attacked, raped, dismembered, decapitated, and murdered in ways even the devil hadn’t imagined—is hard for her to look at, and we have now become the “aggressor.” New settlements, deliberate starvation, ethnic cleansing, denial of medical care—even the first concentration camp is already being built.

No wonder someone for whom “the Holocaust was always something that, if it happened… then at least we should learn something from it” would say: “The first concentration camp is already being built.”

Anyone who ever taught Maiman has failed so miserably: the first concentration camp is being built in Gaza, and I can no longer remain silent. Maiman has already compared the terrorist Gazans to our own babies—future soldiers. No wonder the Bibas babies were murdered while still in captivity. Maiman just gave that justification. Hail education!

The main thing is that Maiman once again demonstrates clear misunderstanding and ignorance. “Our actions are not accidental or unintentional. We are concentrating them [the Gazans] to take over their land and, if possible, to make them suffer enough to leave.” Yes, we’re concentrating them and building concentration camps—soon, we’ll build crematoriums and begin burning them alive, not out of hatred for the other but because we want their land! The heap of nonsense and lies knows no bounds.

I can’t blame Maiman, her readers, her former teachers, or even the Ynet editors who allow such hate-filled content to be published as opinion pieces. Not even the esteemed professors at the Hebrew University (or other Israeli universities). Not even Esther, daughter of an Israeli and granddaughter of Holocaust survivors, who works day and night to bring about our destruction. Since I’m neither a psychiatrist nor a psychologist, I cannot diagnose whether they’re sick or simply insane.

But next time any of you sit in a bomb shelter or safe room and an Iranian missile falls nearby—remember that it’s all our fault, because we starved the Gazans, built a concentration camp there, and all because we coveted a piece of land that isn’t ours, which, according to President Trump, is one of the most desirable strips in the entire Mediterranean region (just wait, Maiman will soon draw comparisons and blame him too!).

If any of you watch the horror film—that compilation of footage filmed by the Gazans themselves during their atrocities and immediately uploaded to the internet so the world would see and tremble—when you see the disemboweling of the pregnant woman (while still alive), the attempt to decapitate the man (also alive), the body of the soldier who’s still breathing but whose limbs appear severed, the carbon statue of a father hugging his son whom Gazans burned alive, their bodies fused into one, the desecrated bodies of the murdered—before and after—with severed genitals and blood everywhere—think of Maiman, her “profound” knowledge, and the explanations she gives to that American girl and to Ynet readers—why, in fact, we are at war.

Apparently, if there was such a thing as “the Holocaust,” our expert in comparisons now likens us to the Nazis and the Gazans to the Jews. Truly, an upside-down world. Something has gone terribly wrong in the mind—because there’s no other explanation. Simply none. Not even sanity.

“It is our duty to resist. Not to cooperate. Not to be silent. Not to close our eyes to the plea of those who barely have life left in them,” concludes Maiman. She is not talking about the hostages in Hamas captivity. She is railing against Israel. Indeed, she serves Hamas—and perhaps it’s time she simply moved to Gaza, where she might be recognized as the “Mother Teresa” of the Gazans. She, Greta, and the other “wonderful” characters in the arsenal of those who wish to destroy Israel.