Baby Ali wasn’t alone in the fire

Ali Dawabsheh is a name that will go down in history. He is the Palestinian child who was burned to death by an extremist Israeli gang in an appalling crime committed on 31 July, 2015 in the village of Duma, located near Nablus in the West Bank.

Behind this heinous attack are Israeli gangs that target the residents of Palestinian villages under the pretexts of “paying the price” for anti-settlement action taken by the Israeli government. Over the last few years, these gangs committed dozens of sabotage attacks, arson attacks, and terrorising campaigns, in addition to desecrating mosques, churches, and graves. There is no doubt that setting fire to the home of a Palestinian family while they slept is a very dangerous development in this criminal approach; a development that cost baby Ali his life and very nearly that of his parents and older brother. This crime was committed exactly a year after the horrendous act committed against the child Mohammed Abu Khdeir, who was burned alive by an extremist Israeli gang in a forest in Jerusalem. This suggests that a new approach is now being taken by the armed Israeli settler gangs.

The international community condemned both incidents, but a new development is the fact that Benjamin Netanyahu’s government described the burning of Ali Dawabsheh as a “terrorist act”. Although this is an interesting discursive development, it raises deep questions regarding the Israeli government’s moral commitment to the safety of children and babies.

We agree with the Israeli government that burning to death a Palestinian baby (or indeed any baby) in this manner is a “terrorist act”, but we would also suggest that the same description is used to label a similar act in which dozens of babies and children were burned but that differed slightly in terms of the nature of the act and the identity of the murderers. Modern weapons and ammunition were used instead of matchsticks, and the act was committed as a mass burning in the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2014 on the orders of senior officials in the Israeli army rather than the reckless act of individual perpetrators.

Let us imagine the message that comes to mind from Israel’s scolding of those who committed this latest crime: “Do not burn babies and children; this is not your job. It is the job of our army and forces who will carry out their duty relentlessly. It is the duty of our institutions who uses tonnes of explosives rather than primitive matchsticks.”

This is almost what the official Israeli logic looks like. It is as if the problem with these reckless gangs is that they have overstepped the boundaries set for them – simply physically abusing Palestinians and cutting down their trees. What these gangs did this time was act similarly to the Israeli army when it killed Palestinian children. Perhaps they should have joined the army in order to execute the task with the required military precision under the control and instruction of senior officials.

Unlike its position after the crime in Duma, the Israeli government does not usually condemn the attacks carried out by settler groups on a daily basis in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. This is due to the fact that they are implicitly allowed to carry out “calculated” attacks on the Palestinian villages surrounding the settlements. This allows them to torture the residents of these villages in broad daylight and before the eyes of the Israeli army, including setting fire to fields and fruit trees and seizing more agricultural land in order to expand their settlements.

However, the reckless individuals in the “price tag” gangs and other similar gangs went too far in the cold-blooded murder of baby Ali. This greatly affects Israel’s image in the world, a world that cannot imagine Israel burning a child to death.

Documents have confirmed that the Israeli military attack resulted in burning a huge number of Palestinian children until their bodies were charred. There are numerous photos documenting these truly shocking cases. The difference between the two cases is that the Israeli army possesses a specialised media and public relations team that speaks to the world in nearly 28 languages and has an amazing ability to justify all of its actions. This privilege is not afforded to the “price tag” gangs who commit their crimes without caring about the world’s view of these atrocities.

Israel’s official condemnation of the murder of Ali Dawabsheh is empty and meaningless as long as the killing of other Palestinian children by the Israeli army is justified. It is an attempt to eschew responsibility and place the blame on a number of individuals rather than on the state that sets the script for such violence in the first place. This condemnation does not include the Israeli government’s support for the armed settlers and their extremist groups that move about the West Bank under the protection of the Israeli army and storm Palestinian villages, carrying out acts of intimidation and destruction before the eyes of the Israeli soldiers. This has continued even after the heinous crime against Ali was committed in Duma.

One cannot deny the facts. Such facts include that the party held responsible for these acts should be the successive Israeli governments, including its authorities, army, and intelligence services. This is due to the fact that they created the settlement situation, supported and armed the extremist settlers, and allowed them to attack Palestinian villages and homes as well as terrorise Palestinian families and children.

Can anyone believe that the Israeli institutions, army, and intelligence services are unable to prosecute those committing these attacks, which have continued to escalate over the past few years? The truth of the matter is that official Israeli restrictions and the army and intelligence persecutions are focused almost exclusively on Palestinians. Meanwhile, the Israeli institutions are preoccupied with drafting new laws that would impose harsher punishments on those throwing stones at Israeli military targets. This is one of the faces of Apartheid.

The truth behind all that is happening is that the emerging violent and extremist Israeli gangs are a natural product of the culture of occupation, racial superiority, settlement policies, and the disregard for Palestinian rights – and even the denial of the existence of the Palestinian people – that pervades in Israel. The “price tag” crimes have increased in light of the current Israeli government headed by Benjamin Netanyahu, which is a more extreme than the previous government. Some of this government’s officials have never hesitated to glorify blind violence against the Palestinians.

Those committing these crimes grew up in the settlement environment and they absorbed the ideology of racism and hatred in their schools, curriculums, and Israeli media outlets. They learned how to handle weapons and shoot people without a guilty conscience. This suggests that the Israeli authorities protect and support these gangs that continue to commit these attacks and threaten the security of Palestinian citizens in their own villages and neighbourhoods

The catastrophe of Ali’s death did not just fall from the sky unbidden. It highlighted the reality of the Israeli occupation that voices incitement and hatred against Palestinians as well as dehumanises them and promotes “death to Arabs”.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.