The Dark Secrets of Rafah

When Israel recently invaded Rafah, it gave fresh opportunity for criticism against Israel as they continued their mission of dismantling Hamas. In an extremely unfortunate turn of events, an airstrike, which took out two Hamas leaders, also cost the lives of dozens of Gaza citizens when a fire broke out at a nearby refugee camp. This event is currently being investigated by the IDF and it is very likely that a building near where Israel took out the two Hamas officials was home to a Hamas arsenal of explosives. This arsenal is most likely what spread and set the refugee camp ablaze. According to IDF Spokesman Daniel Hagari, the munition used in the Israeli strike was the smallest their jets are capable of using and noted that their “ammunition alone could not have ignited a fire of this size.” Israel confesses that this was, as Prime Minister Netanyahu said, a “tragic mistake”. Loss of life is always considered horrific, but based on these early indicators, Hamas was, and is, entirely to blame. What does this tragedy and the response to it tell us about the war and its repercussions?

Analyzing the world’s response to this particular incident

As with any war, civilian casualties are, unfortunately, destined to happen, but in the eyes of the world, the only acceptable casualties are Jews. When a thousand plus Jewish lives were lost following the October 7th attack, the world’s outcry was short lived. When Israeli citizens were killed and are being killed on Israel’s northern border in attacks from Hezbollah in Lebanon, the world’s outcry is entirely unheard. On the contrary, when citizens in Gaza are killed (many of which directly participated in or support the October 7th atrocities), the world’s condemnation is heard loud and clear. 

This recent tragic mistake only cements the beliefs of the naive followers of the world’s propaganda and provides a small stone on which to validate their skewed and antisemitic views. As shown through the new leverage being used to castigate Israel, the world is taking advantage of the deaths of these Gaza civilians in order to falsely justify the world’s hatred for Jews. This method to criminalize the Jewish people was also shown when the Gaza Health Ministry halved the numbers of the death toll and the world simply chose to ignore that revelation entirely in order to better ostracize Israel. This deep-rooted antisemitism has spiraled to such a degree that the deaths of Gazans has become a means to further criticize and demean the Jewish nation.

This dehumanization of the Gaza people in order to advance the agenda of world powers is also shown by this: the war in Gaza and Israel is not the only war claiming the lives of civilians.

There are other, far worse atrocities happening around the world

Since the start of the 2020s, war has been happening across the globe. Wars initiated by Azerbaijan that left hundreds dead before entirely taking control of the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave, resulting in concerns of an “ethnic cleansing” of the Armenian people. In Yemen, millions of civilians have been killed, tortured, starved, maimed, and abused. Children are forced to be soldiers, women are not allowed to leave their homes without a male accompanying them, and citizens who violate a law have the potential to be subject to lashings and stonings. The war between Russia and Ukraine continues to rage and China has threatened to reclaim Taiwan as their own. Clashes between Sudan’s military and the RSF continue to claim the lives of humanitarian workers and innocent civilians. 

As there are countless other conflicts around the world, most people will have only heard small snippets of stories about the Russia-Ukraine war and whispers of China’s new plans. What the vast majority of people will have heard, however, is an overwhelming amount of (largely false) information regarding the conflict between Israel and Hamas.

I suggest that large portions of the world have become clay in the hands of these hostile terrorists. As Member of Knesset Ohad Tal said during our recent Israel Summit:

 “They [Hamas] hate us [the Jewish people] more than they love their children.” 

Hamas is well aware that the more civilian casualties reported, the higher amount of support for their cause. Hamas has, and continues, to sacrifice their civilians for the cause of destroying the Jewish people and as they continue to place the weak and needy in areas to shield their terrorist operations, they continue to gain the support of the world.

Why is it so controversial for Israel to invade Rafah? What are they hiding?

Rafah has been a controversial location for months, even before the IDF’s entrance. At one point, Rafah was deemed a “red line” that shouldn’t be crossed by President Joe Biden and countless other officials across the world have marked Rafah to be a terrorist stronghold that Israel is forbidden to enter. This recent tragedy has intensified the thundering demands that Israel stop their invasion into Rafah, but why is Rafah so much more controversial than Khan Younis, Gaza City, or other terrorist hotspots? 

Rafah is the location of heightened controversy because if the reality of what has been happening between Rafah and Egypt comes to light, the thin illusion of peace in the Middle East will unravel. The shadowed politics that have riddled the Middle East will suddenly be brought into focus in the light of day and those involved will no longer be able to claim plausible deniability to the revelations that are unearthed. The reason Rafah is so much more controversial than Khan Younis is because in Rafah, terror tunnels link the Gaza Strip directly to Egypt, thus breaking the 1979 peace treaty between Egypt and Israel and disrupting the current “peace in the Middle East”. This breach is shown in Article III 2 of said peace treaty:

“Each Party undertakes to ensure that acts or threats of belligerency, hostility, or violence do not originate from and are not committed from within its territory, or by any forces subject to its control or by any other forces stationed on its territory, against the population, citizens or property of the other Party. Each Party also undertakes to refrain from organizing, instigating, inciting, assisting or participating in acts or threats of belligerency, hostility, subversion or violence against the other Party, anywhere, and undertakes to ensure that perpetrators of such acts are brought to justice.”

This means that by allowing operational Hamas terror tunnels between Gaza and Egypt, Egypt has intentionally broken the peace treaty with Israel by assisting Hamas in Gaza. This calls into question what else may have been broken from the peace treaty. Not only could it destroy the public facade of peace between Israel and Egypt, but one of the main stipulations of the peace treaty was that Israel would hand over the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt in exchange for complete security in the region. If the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel becomes publicly broken, the implications could be world changing. 

Why Every Gaza Death is Used to Deter Israel from Continuing Operations in Rafah

Throughout the war, the deaths of Gazans have been used as a means to keep Israel from operating in Rafah. Under further evaluation, it’s easy to see that the reason the focus is solely on this single city and war instead of the countless other wars, conflicts, and casualties at hand, can only be because the wool is being uncovered and the blatant breaking of peace treaties is in the process of being undeniable. As the peace between the Middle Eastern countries continues to dissolve, nations such as the United States have begun desperately gripping at threads to try to maintain the slightest hold on the region in an attempt to keep tensions from progressing and heightening.