An Israeli woman kidnapped by Hamas militants on October 7 and held hostage for 245 days before being rescued lashed out on Friday at Israeli media outlets that twisted her words to make it seem as if she was wounded by her captors when in reality she was injured in an attack by the military in which she once served.
Responding to reports in outlets including The Jerusalem Post—which on Thursday ran the headline “Hamas Beat Me All Over”—Noa Argamani said on Instagram that “I can’t ignore what happened in the media in the last 24 hours.”
“Things were taken out of context,” the 26-year-old navy veteran from Be’er Sheva said of her earlier comments to Group of Seven diplomats in Tokyo. “I was not beaten… I was in a building that was bombed by the Air Force.”
“I emphasize that I was not beaten, but injured all over my body by the collapse of a building on me,” Argamani added. “As a victim of October 7, I refuse to be victimized once again by the media.”
Good for her speaking out. The Israeli government propaganda against Palestinians is unconscionable and unforgivable.
I’d be careful with “unforgivable”. That’s the exact shit that fuels the cycle of violence in the first place.
No, an individual entity’s actions certainly can be unforgivable. Genocide being a big one that qualifies. Please note that I didn’t say “Jewish people” or “Israeli people” or any other collective group that people are potential unwitting/ intrinsic members of. I said “Israeli government”.
The Israeli government is a purely political entity, a social construct that can be changed or replaced and has no inherent right to exist (unlike persons). Everyone in Israel could collectively decide right now to strip it of power and replace it with something new. I don’t blame them for not doing that (because that’s obviously largely infeasible), I’m simply pointing out that the government as an entity itself is not something that has any right or necessity to exist, and is apart and separate from “Israelis” as a group.
“Israeli government” != “Israelis”
There are also individual Israelis who have committed unforgivable actions. But that is unrelated to their identity as Israelis, and due to their choices as individuals.