As the Dead Pile Up, IDF Flies 'Pride' Flag over Gaza
Talk about fisting while the city burns, or: the weirding of the Israeli-Hamas conflict has taken a new turn
Today, I have a particular gem for you, dear readers, which, above all, drives home one particularly awesome aspect of the psy-op side of the current uptick in violence in the Middle East: why are esp. LGBTQI+/- whatever alphabet soup members—among them, of course, the ‘queer’ and ‘trans’ being ‘the vanguard’ (in the original Leninist sense of the term, on which see below)—coming out strongly in favour of ‘the Palestinians’?
I mean, they (pun intended) should probably try living a day in Gaza or any other Moslem country of their choice to figure out just how bad and stupid that combo actually is.
As an aside, albeit for a ‘fun’ read on this, see Sarah Schulman’s Israel/Palestine and the Queer International (I’m not making this up, by the way; it’s been printed by Duke UP, 2012); from the publisher’s website, with emphases added:
In this chronicle of political awakening and queer solidarity, the activist and novelist Sarah Schulman describes her dawning consciousness of the Palestinian liberation struggle. Invited to Israel to give the keynote address at an LGBT studies conference at Tel Aviv University, Schulman declines, joining other artists and academics honoring the Palestinian call for an academic and cultural boycott of Israel. Anti-occupation activists in the United States, Canada, Israel, and Palestine come together to help organize an alternative solidarity visit for the American activist. Schulman takes us to an anarchist, vegan café in Tel Aviv, where she meets anti-occupation queer Israelis, and through border checkpoints into the West Bank, where queer Palestinian activists welcome her into their spaces for conversations that will change the course of her life. She describes the dusty roads through the West Bank, where Palestinians are cut off from water and subjected to endless restrictions while Israeli settler neighborhoods have full freedoms and resources.
As Schulman learns more, she questions the contradiction between Israel's investment in presenting itself as gay friendly—financially sponsoring gay film festivals and parades—and its denial of the rights of Palestinians. At the same time, she talks with straight Palestinian activists about their position in relation to homosexuality and gay rights in Palestine and internationally. Back in the United States, Schulman draws on her extensive activist experience to organize a speaking tour for some of the Palestinian queer leaders whom she had met and trusted. Dubbed ‘Al-Tour’, it takes the activists to LGBT community centers, conferences, and universities throughout the United States. Its success solidifies her commitment to working to end Israel's occupation of Palestine, and it kindles her larger hope that a new ‘queer international’ will emerge and join other movements demanding human rights across the globe.
If this abstract hasn’t wetted your tongue for ‘more’, I don’t know what could possibly do this. Also, I’m happy to share my PDF (for educational purposes only, of course) upon request; if the book is for you, drop me a line by email.
The below is a partial translation of a piece that appeared in Aftenposten, Norway’s newspaper of record (of course owned by the Schibsted Group, which owns most legacy media in Scandinavia) that appeared on 16 Nov. 2023. Here’s the original link (paywalled), here’s a link to the content (w/o paywall); the below comes to you in my translation, with my emphases added.
With Over 4,600 Children Killed, Israel Pushes Queer Love
Opinion by Vebjørn Selbekk, Aftenposten, 16 Nov. 2023
Photos of Israeli soldiers with rainbow flags in the Gaza Strip were shared on Monday by Israel's official X/Twitter account.
The rainbow flag held by IDF soldier Yoav Atzmoni in front of bombed-out buildings reads as follows:
One image is captioned ‘the first pride flag ever raised in Gaza’.
‘In the Name of Love’
So far, more than 11,240 people have been killed in Israeli air strikes [sic; I don’t know if that tally would be higher if it included ‘other’ military operations, too, since 7 Oct. 2023] against the Gaza Strip, according to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health. The vast majority of the victims are civilians, including more than 4,600 children.
Many people on social media have reacted to the images. What did Israel really mean by the post?
Macabre ‘Pinkwashing’
The man in the photo wants to send a ‘message of hope’ to the people of Gaza ‘who live under the brutality of Hamas’, according to Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. They are the ones who control Israel’s X account.
His [Yoav Atzmoni] purpose, they [Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs] write, was to raise the first pride flag in Gaza as ‘a call for peace and freedom’.
Omar Orhan Akhtar, chairman of the organisation Queer World [orig. Skeiv verden], reacts to the use of the pride flag in Gaza:
There is something macabre about raising rainbow flags in Gaza and writing that this is about love and queer rights, while at the same time around 5,000 children have been killed by the Israeli Defence Forces.
At the same time, he believes it is important to remember that Israel has taken major legal steps when it comes to recognising queer rights:
This is of course very good. At the same time, many people with a queer background in Israel and elsewhere see this as ‘pinkwashing’ of the war.
Pinkwashing is defined as promoting gay-friendliness in an attempt to trivialise or soften aspects of an activity that are considered problematic and negative.
According to Orhan Akhtar, Israeli authorities have for decades deliberately used queer rights ‘as a kind of defence for human rights violations’. According to him, the military has also for a long time systematically used queer soldiers to spread ‘this kind of propaganda’, which he says is done to divert people from violence:
They try to appear liberal, but in practice we know that's not the case. We know that Israel will not offer Palestinian gays refugee status and that conditions for Palestinians in Israel are very poor. [this is probably the understatement of the year…/sarcasm]
Hamas are Islamists who Hate Gays
Vebjørn Selbekk, editor of the Christian conservative newspaper Dagen, believes that the images Israel has shared are ‘symbolically heavy’:
The image can be interpreted in different ways. I interpret it as solidarity with gays and a significant point. Hamas are Islamists who hate gays, and Israel is the only country in the Middle East that treats gays properly. [please don’t ask me how to ‘treat gays properly’; call me old-fashioned or reactionary, but ‘gays’ are people and, like everyone else, they have but the right to be treated equally under the law, everything else is preferential treatment and thus discriminatory]
He is not surprised that Israel is now using ‘every means at its disposal’ to emphasise that it has different values than its enemies:
There have been strong accusations about what is going on against gays in the Gaza Strip. I assume that the gay organisations are aware of the enormous atrocities committed against gays by Islamists. They hate gays as much as they hate Jews, and I think it's fine to point that out. [this is, I think, a valid point to make]
Selbekk says he also understands those who react to the word ‘love’ on the pride flag, published at the height of a devastating war that has largely affected Palestinian civilians:
What the Israeli army is doing in the Gaza Strip is not love.
Bottom Lines
Remember, the best propaganda always marries a truth, however small, to one or more lies.
Personally, I could care less beyond equal treatment under the law, and I consider the ‘pride’ issue, well, highly problematic as it is a massive agit-prop campaign designed to overwhelm and, yes, shame everyone who is not ‘affirming’ other peoples’ lifestyles.
Even in our rural small town (pop. around 1,600), the municipality, the local welding plant, and the dairy producer flew ‘pride’ flags in June; at least the school was spared this notion, although I’d add that there was so much agit-prop in local and national media throughout June that one could hardly miss out on it.
In a way, reading the above and seeing through this crude, shameless, and, frankly, disgusting kind of agit-prop makes me almost nostalgic for comments, such as ‘bombing for pride is like f***ing for virginity’.
Also, let’s not forget that the ‘pride flag’ is literally everywhere these days in official pictures. It is, in other words, the litmus test of Western imperialism in the twenty-first century.
Take, e.g., the below image of former Austro-Covidian ‘Health’ Minister and Big Pharma whore Wolfgang Mückstein (Greens):
Covidistan Annals XXVIII: Mückstein Resigned, Most Mandates are Revoked as of 5 March—but it's not yet time to celebrate
Two days ago, I notified you about the impending resignation of Covidistan’s Health Minister and wannabe medical tinpot dictator Wolfgang Mückstein. So, in today’s post, I shall try to accomplish a couple of things all at-once, for things are moving very fast these days and there’s so much other stuff to attend to as well:
Of course, it’s a picture I found in the most woke’n’leftish daily Der Standard, but these days one can hardly find pictures of politicos without the ‘pride’ flag around.
See, e.g., the Norwegian prime minister in the image accompanying this piece that appeared on 10 June 2023 with state broadcaster NRK:
Epilogue: ‘Pride’ as Ersatz Ideology
The post-Cold War West might no longer be defined by the ideological struggle vs. Soviet-style ‘Communism’, but in reality, ‘pride’ has become a kind of cheap, artificial ersatz ideology, albeit with a decidedly evil twist: since it has no textbook definition that maintains its salience for long (which is the essential feature of ‘Queer Theory’), hence it’s the perfect instrument to enforce compliance.
All ‘our’ (thought) leaders pay at least lip service to this lunacy, and the above piece by Aftenposten is a wonderful example of it. No matter how ‘bad’ members of the LGBTQI+/- alphabet soup are treated in the Islamic world, I doubt this justifies this kind of crude agit-prop.
And if you’d excuse me now, I’m going to puke.
It's genius.
Israel's leadership has realised that they are rapidly losing support in USA and Europe (and the rest of the world is perfectly indifferent) - the wave of marches, well-organised, in direct contravention of national laws on "hate-speech" without police doing anything much than arresting those who protested /against/ the "kill all the jews"-marches; the presence of palestiniansor their mouth-oieces and supporters in all communist, liberal and socialist democrat parties in the entire EU and the same in the upper echelons of the Democrat party (not to mention US academia and media) - all that must have been a real cold shower.
By flying the pedophile-flag over Gaza, using it as a symbol of them triumphing over palestinians, Hamas and islam (because that is how the palestinians and their supporters will see it), they further inflame and incense moslems of all sorts but especially arabs all over the world, most importantly the West, making the moslems show their true colours if you pardon the expression.
For Israel, it's a win/win no matter the fallout from using the pedophile-flag as a symbol of their victory.
That is so bizarre.
There cab be no mistake about it, it's designed to anger Muslims. There is no other reason for it.
Most Christians have given up on this subject.