Ha’aretz’s Amira Hass Attempts to Justify Her Obsessive Focus
Anyone familiar with Ha’aretz columnist Amira Hass knows that she is obsessive in her hostility toward and vilification of Israel. Her journalistic career focuses entirely on presenting the Jewish state in the worst possible light — as one that continuously harms and plots against Palestinians. And she let no facts get in the way of her mission.
A recent column by Hass about a Palestinian widow who was supposed to be deported from eastern Jerusalem (but wasn’t) because her temporary residency permit had expired prompted a reader to comment that Hass spends “too much time on trifles.” Given the cruelty with which Arab residents are treated in neighboring countries by their own leaders, the story of an illegal resident who faced deportation but was ultimately not deported does appear to be absurdly trifling. But Hass uses the criticism of her column as yet another opportunity to repeat her condemnation of Israeli authorities for even considering deportation. In a burst of self-righteous fury, Hass justifies her obsession and attacks her critics:
There are those who say Rajbi’s fear of being deported from her home in the Old City of Jerusalem is dwarfed by the suffering of the million Syrian children who have become refugees. Some would even go so far as to say that the history of Israeli domination over the Palestinians is dwarfed by the incomprehensible slaughter taking place in the region. According to that logic, men can tell the women in Israel and Italy not to complain about gender discrimination because their sisters in Africa still suffer the practice of female genital mutilation, while in India, the selective abortion of female fetuses is still widespread. Westernized Jews can tell Arab-Jews and Sephardi Jews that they should stop complaining because they’re doing far better than residents of favelas in Brazil.
Ranking injustices, atrocities and discrimination on a scale of horrors is just one more technique employed by those in power to retain their power, to justify their excessive privileges and to belittle any public or civil struggle for equality.
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