Peel the scales from your eyes in Gaza
It says something about just how alien the radical Islamist mindset is to those not directly affected by it that even after two years of war between Israel and Hamas, such people struggle to accept, perhaps even understand, the true nature of this conflict. Hamas is a radical Islamist death cult that celebrates the death of its own children and believes the murder of an infidel, especially a Jewish infidel, grants direct access to heaven.
Barney Mthombothi’s op-ed, “Gaza ‘ceasefire deal’ lays bare the breathtaking hypocrisy of Western leaders”, and an editorial, “Slim chance for lasting peace in Gaza” (both October 19), come from fundamentally compassionate places. Both acknowledge that the war began as a result of Hamas’s barbaric invasion of Israel on October 7 2023 and both draw their conclusions from widely reported facts and figures. Even with all of this, both pieces fall apart by, in effect, failing to see the forest for the trees.
Nowhere is this more blatant than in the second to last paragraph in Mthombothi’s piece: an impassioned plea for civility that in its underlying basic decency, completely misrepresents both the realities of war and the true nature of the enemy Israel has been fighting.
Mthombothi does condemn Hamas’s action on October 7 and admits that Israel had a right to fight back, but then makes the claim that only Hamas ‘should be paying for this atrocity’ and not the people of Gaza.
Mthombothi does condemn Hamas’s action on October 7 and admits that Israel had a right to fight back, but then makes the claim that only Hamas “should be paying for this atrocity” and not the people of Gaza. Noble, but the idea that only those responsible for starting a war will face the consequences is unbearably naive. It was not only Nazis who were killed by the Allies during World War 2 — they were, in fact, the vast minority.
Like the Nazis and Germany, Hamas is the political and military representative of Gaza, who, after committing an act of such vile terror that Israel would have no choice but to respond with full force, retreated into its tunnels under the enclave’s civilian infrastructure.
It is Hamas that is responsible for every tragic death that has resulted from this war. Even accepting that Israel has been far from perfect in its execution of its war, the responsibility still falls squarely on those who started the war and use their own civilians as human shields.
Mthombothi doesn’t let Hamas off the hook. He correctly asks, “Once they realised the price Palestinians were paying with their lives, why on earth did Hamas not release the hostages?” But to understand this, you need to understand radical Islam and the poisonous ideology that drives it.
Hamas didn’t not release the hostages simply because it does not care about Palestinian lives, but precisely because it wanted as many Palestinian civilians as possible to die. It is the greatest political tool at its disposal in its efforts to isolate Israel.
Hamas cares not a jot for “Palestinian liberation”, let alone Palestinian lives. This failure to see Hamas for what it is emboldens the movement and gives it cover to drag the Palestinian people ever further into a hell of their own making.
— Ilan Preskovsky, freelance journalist, film and TV critic
Violence is our basic problem
When I saw the video of the pupil being brutally assaulted by older boys at Milnerton High School, my heart broke. I wonder if South Africa is still not ready to have a candid conversation about the problem of violence without name-calling, apportioning blame, scapegoating.
When I left home in 2008, to live in an affluent suburb in a large city, this was the first time in my life to be in an environment where violence was not a day-to-day occurrence.
In primary school and high school we had fights almost every week; often there was grievous bloodily harm. Fighting was simply a matter of survival.
Many of the boys we grew up with are dead. Almost all of them died violently.
Older boys bullied us often, and yes, we also bullied younger boys. It was endemic. Most of us were both victims and perpetrators. I suspect that those boys in that video are also both perpetrators and victims. Does it absolve us or them from responsibility? No, but it helps give context for this violence.
This matter goes deeper than just demonising these boys. Should they be held accountable? Perhaps. What I ask is that we think about the environment that produces this kind of violence, and what should be done to change it.
Leaving home was one of my best moments in life because, among other things, I could leave all that violence behind me. I have not been in a fistfight since I left home (18 years ago now), and I’m happy about it. But the impact of that upbringing is still with me to this day.
— Bongivangeli Buthelezi, e-mail
Oliphant in the room
Lumka Oliphant’s saga is a case study for all government communicators. The job of a government spokesperson is to protect the image of the department and that of the ministry at all costs. It is not about how you feel as a person, it is about how the department should be viewed by the citizens. It is not about your personal ambitions, your job is to communicate positively about the work of the department.
Why does Lumka deserve to be fired? I did not know that the minister of social development does not have a matric — which, by the way, is not a requirement. Ministers serve at the behest of the president and qualifications are not a requirement.
That Lumka made public such information brought the name of the department into disrepute and publicly disrespected the minister; therefore she deserves to be fired.
The relationship between an employer and employee is based on mutual trust. When an employee is charged you must ensure both administrative and procedural fairness; the accused must clearly understand what they are being accused of, and the disciplinary procedure must be followed correctly. In this case we are told a process is under way, but the accused has already been fired. Why are you rushing to get rid of her? Allow procedure to be followed. — Kwazi Myeza, e-mail
Colombian mayhem, here we come (head)
The growing number of assassinations of political figures and whistleblowers in South Africa echoes Colombia’s darkest years — violence has become the shield of corruption. When councillors, journalists or honest officials are eliminated, it’s no longer random crime; it’s organised silence.
Colombia in the 1980s and 1990s showed what happens when fear and corruption capture the state. Violence became the language of power. South Africa is not there yet, but the symptoms are hauntingly familiar: political assassinations, intimidation, and a justice system that barely responds. Every time a whistleblower is silenced, a piece of the truth dies with them.
What makes this even worse is the quiet acceptance of it all. When the public and even the media begin to see such killings as “part of life”, corruption wins its greatest victory. No democracy can survive if truth-tellers live in fear.
South Africa’s future may depend on whether we have the courage to turn off this Colombia road. No nation can survive long when its honest citizens become the targets.
— Sarel Myburgh, Sukhotha
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