The Holy Land?

by W.D. Ehrhart

Just over a year ago, Hamas launched a surprise attack on Israel that killed about 1,200 people, two-thirds of whom were civilians. At the same time, Hamas took about 250 people hostage. It was a bad day to say the least, and there seems to be no end in sight.

Over the course of this past year, over 42,000 people have died in Gaza at the hands of Israeli Defense Forces or from disease, exposure, and starvation. Another 97,000 have been injured. On the West Bank, over 700 Palestinians have died with more than 5,700 injured. Eleven hundred Israelis have died, and 8,700 have been injured. Over a hundred hostages remain in the hands of Hamas.

According to the United Nations and the World Health Organization, more than half of all homes in Gaza have been destroyed or damaged, along with 80 percent of commercial buildings, 85 percent of schools, 65 percent of road networks, and 65 percent of croplands. Only 17 of 36 hospitals are even partially functional.

Meanwhile, according to the Council on Foreign Relations, the U.S. has provided Israel with $12,500,000,000 in military aid since last October 7th, including tank and artillery ammunition, bombs, rockets, and small arms.

But that’s not the half of the story. Supposedly in support and defense of Palestinians, Houthi rebels in Yemen have attacked at least 80 merchant ships in the Red Sea with missiles and drones, sinking two, and seizing one.

And in the north of Israel, operating out of Lebanon, Hezbollah—ya gotta love that name: “the Party of God”; but I digress—Hezbollah regularly fires rockets at Israeli targets, forcing 96,000 Israeli civilians to leave their homes. Israeli retaliation has resulted in the displacement of 1,200,000 Lebanese. Israel has now invaded Lebanon. Again. But Hezbollah says it will continue its attacks until the IDF ends the fighting against Hamas.

And then there’s the Islamic Republic of Iran, which attacked Israel with ballistic missiles back in April in support of Hamas, and just a few days ago fired another 180 ballistic missiles at Israel in support of Hezbollah. The Israeli government says that Iran will regret its attacks, and the U.S. government has expressed its support for Israeli retaliation.

None of this is new or news, however. It’s been going on for a long time. Anybody remember the First Intifada? How about Yaser Arafat and the Palestine Liberation Organization? The 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon? Sabra and Shatila? Black September in Jordan? Henry the K’s Shuttle Diplomacy and the Middle East Peace Process(ed Cheese)?

Don’t forget the Yom Kippur War (I was working on an oil tanker then in the Pacific Ocean, and that one was over before I knew it had started). And the Six Day War (I was a young Marine in Vietnam then, running around in the rice fields getting nowhere, and envious of the Israelis’ quick and easy victory).

One might also ponder the 1948 war in which Transjordan, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Egypt all attacked the newly created nation of Israel, a war that in fact really began long before 1948; a war that the Palestinians call the “Nakba” or “Catastrophe.” You want to talk about terrorists? How about the Irgun and the Stern Gang? Look up Deir Yassin. Look up the King David Hotel.

Then there’s the carving up of the old Ottoman Empire at the end of the Great War (which really wasn’t all that great, if you ask me) by the British and the French, neither of whom had an actual right to any of it. And the Balfour Declaration, as perfect an example of diplomatic doublespeak as you are ever likely to find.

And though we have to go back a way—this is, after all, an ancient land—let’s not forget about the Crusades, all eight of them, beginning in 1096, in which Christians invaded the Middle East to rescue Jerusalem from the Muslims. The Christians actually succeeded in creating a Kingdom of Jerusalem that lasted for nearly a hundred years before Saladin ended it, whereupon the Christians created a Kingdom of Acre that lasted another century before the Muslims finally kicked the Christians out.

And if we really want to get historical, we ought to consider Masada and the Roman destruction of the Second Temple. Or the destruction of the First Temple and the Babylonian Captivity. Or the enslavement of the Israelites by the Egyptians.

So what I’d like to know is why anybody calls it the Holy Land. Nobody ever behaves very holily there. Indeed, they all seem to spend their time killing each other in the name of God. That small corner of the world strikes me as the most God-forsaken chunk of real estate on the planet.

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W. D. Ehrhart is a retired Master Teacher of History & English, and author of a Vietnam War memoir trilogy published by McFarland.