The fallacy of moral equivalence

| Op-Ed Submission

There is tragedy in Gaza, as Monday’s Op-Ed “Tragedy in Gaza, on both sides” (Student Life, Feb. 9) would have you believe. However, since Israel uprooted settlers and withdrew its armed forces, the tragedy is wholly one-sided. At first, I was dismayed by the author’s choice of words. But as I reminded myself of tragedy’s etymology, I let out a brief chuckle. The word originates from the Greek “tragoidia,” meaning “goat-song,” dating back to a time when a chorus would sing before the ritual sacrifice of a goat. The parallel is striking. Hamas is singing louder and louder. And the Palestinians pay a higher toll each and every time.

Wash. U. Amnesty International would have you believe that there is tragedy on both sides. Yet pictures of destruction in Israel and interviews with distraught current and former residents of Sderot are not flooding your screens. Wash. U. Amnesty International would have you believe that there is a moral equivalence argument to be made. Yet nowhere in the article do they inform you that Hamas, the democratically-elected government of Gaza, stole U.N. aid last week, forcing the United Nations to stop supplying residents of Gaza, who rely almost wholly on the world’s generosity.

So I ask, which side is denying civilians their basic human rights, the side that specifically targets civilians or the side that risked the lives of its soldiers in a dangerous ground offensive? Which side is denying civilians their basic human rights, the side that teaches its children that Jews and Christians are “pigs and apes” and that the greatest honor is to die in the act of killing others, or the side that has painfully tried to integrate a minority that sides with its enemies?

Also, if you ever want to pretend to have any objectivity, try not to write such morally ambiguous sentences in your articles as: “Amnesty does not support the targeting of civilians by either side. However, Israel’s 18-month blockade on Gaza left Palestinians with limited resources and medical supplies and increased poverty in the area.” Are you trying to hint that the targeting of innocent Israeli civilians is justified by a decrease in the quality of life in Gaza, or did I misunderstand the “however”?

Within that quote, the author further neglects the $650 million underground economy of weapons and explosives or Hamas’ seizure of nearly half the diesel fuel supplies and its attacks on the border crossings through which those supplies are received. The author simply blames the poverty of Palestinians on Israel. Furthermore, in an article that claims there are multiple sides to the story, the omission of Gaza’s other neighbor, Egypt, who instated a brutal blockade more than a year ago and ordered its soldiers to shoot or break the legs of border-hoppers, is quite telling.

My favorite part of this entire situation is that last week, I asked the Wash. U. community to commit to a real dialogue about the conflict. This Saturday, the co-president of Amnesty International on campus accused me of having an agenda and attacked the organization I work for. Then on Monday, she published the aforementioned reason for this response. Since the times have not changed, I will end as I did before: “There is no real dialogue about these issues on campus. There are only ideologues on both sides, pitching their ‘solutions’ to the wrong conflict. Until people make a real effort to educate themselves about the real conflict, I’ll go back to sitting on my couch wishing I had something substantive to do.”

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