“What are we supposed to say in the face of the Gaza holocaust? What compensation will satisfy us? By Allah, we will not be satisfied even if all the Jews are killed.”
–Dr. Walid Al-Rashudi, head of the Department of Islamic Studies at Saudi Arabia’s King Saud University, on Hamas TV.
March 17, 2008 at 11:09 am
“The more Qassam fire intensifies and the rockets reach a longer range, they [the Palestinians of Gaza] will bring upon themselves a bigger shoah because we will use all our might to defend ourselves.”
Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai
“shoah” – the Hebrew word for the Holocaust
March 17, 2008 at 11:20 am
So what’s your point, John? Vilnai wasn’t using the word in the sense of the historic Holocaust–he certainly wasn’t threatening to kill every Palestinian–but al-Rashudi plainly wants Hitler’s project completed, and won’t be satisfied even with that.
Oh, but wait, they used the same word. So they must mean the same thing. That’s a rather, um, fundamentalist approach to language, isn’t it, John?
March 17, 2008 at 11:58 am
David, you give Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai too much credit.. No it wasn’t hyperbole. “Shoah” — which literally means “burnt offering” — was long ago reserved for the Holocaust, much as the Arabic word “nakba” (or “catastrophe”) is nowadays used only to refer to the Palestinians’ dispossession by Israel in 1948. The English translation of Vilnai’s “shoah” is “holocaust”. The Israeli populace knows exactly what Vilnai meant.
March 17, 2008 at 12:23 pm
“So what’s your point, John?” My point is that Matan Vilnai and Walid Al-Rashudi mean exactly what they say. We can not put one or the other on a lower moral plane. What was your point in making the Walid Al-Rashudi remark, quote of the day?
March 17, 2008 at 2:51 pm
“The Hebrew word ’shoah’ most often refers to the Holocaust but Israelis use it to describe all sorts of disasters. A spokesman for Vilnai, Eitan Ginzburg, said the deputy defense minister never intended it as a reference to the Holocaust but used the word ’shoah’ to denote a disaster.”–AP
March 17, 2008 at 2:57 pm
What was my point? That Israel is subjected to threats of genocide on a regular basis, from Hamas TV, from Palestinian Authority TV, from various Saudi outlets, from Al Jazeera, etc. This one happened to be more blunt than some, and comes from a publically sanctioned university “scholar” in what is ostensibly an ally of the United States. Beyond that, I’ve got to say that one quote from a sub-Cabinet officer, using a word understood by the Israeli public in a variety of ways, does not moral equivalence make.