The Israel-Hamas War is a Microcosm of Everything I Hate

Tribalism satisfies the most vain, banal, animalistic instinct we have—that is, the belief that we are better than someone else.

Via Getty images

by Rich Herschlag

This is not an article about which side is right in the Israel-Hamas war. Do I think the Palestinian people have legitimate gripes against the Israeli government or do I think Israel has a right to defend itself aggressively against barbarism? Yes. This is an article about how virtually everything I despise in the world is encapsulated in this conflict. This article is also a substitute for the hundreds of social media flame wars I’ve avoided over the past few weeks because as stupid as I am sometimes I am intelligent enough to realize a) I can offer no meaningful solution to this conflict that hasn’t already been tried and failed over the past two or three millennia, and b) Debating people self-confidently omniscient enough to think they have a solution will only make me feel worse.

For starters, you’ve got religion. I’m one of those folks who feels connected to a Higher Power in some strange way but doesn’t insist anyone else should and doesn’t offer unsolicited advice regarding how to achieve a quasi-theistic state of mind. Draw and quarter me, but this is one of those countless bloody conflicts on the planet driven in part not by a fundamental love of God but by the worship of a religion. Religion is not a Higher Power but rather, at least on a good day, merely a tool to experience it. Often it goes off course like a homemade Hamas rocket. Like gunpowder, lasers, semiconductors and good old fashioned fire, religion is a tool that is weaponized once anyone else stands in the way of a straightforward material objective. Which brings us to our next microcosmic poison—tribalism.

Tribalism satisfies the most vain, banal, animalistic instinct we have—that is, the belief that we are better than someone else. Of course, projecting that visceral feeling can create a great deal of social blowback if performed routinely on an individual basis. Much more convenient is the act of expressing it through an entire group or civilization and hiding behind that same group or civilization. Much more satisfying as well, because by ensconcing yourself in a tribe you can foster the illusion of self-sacrifice and benevolence. And fairly soon you’re lobbing bombs at men, women, children and household pets that aren’t from your tribe and who must somehow have deserved it for the unforgivable crime of not being you.

Which segues nicely into the next detestable microcosmic element of this war—distance. As brutal as was the old hand-to-hand combat of feudal European wars, there was no mistaking the irreversible damage you were causing by chopping off an arm or a leg because your opponent was right in front of you bleeding to death, and your carnal understanding that you could be next was nearly one hundred percent. Not that this system was any good at all and didn’t often promote further bloodlust, but at the same time it did not foster the particular brand of cowardice that has been allowed to run wild with technology. By technology I refer not simply to the notion of modern drones incinerating a tent a hundred miles away but also at least as far back as a cannonball crushing a skull 400 feet away. The unifying theme is out of sight, out of mind. Beyond blood splatter range, beyond dry cleaning bill. Long distance murder becomes physically and morally easier with each generation, and while the Israel-Hamas war has put on display a handful of throwback in-your-face features, it is still primarily a vicarious armchair massacre.

Which poses an interesting digression. While wars have always allowed a fairly high ratio between armchair quarterbacks and actual participants, our sprawling 24/7 global digital media swamp has raised that ratio to previously unimagined heights, allowing bowling league enthusiasts to check body counts on a phone between frames and post a heart emoji at the sight of a burning corpse from the opposing side. How much better and more ethical would our world be if for every hundred pointless deaths each of us had to cut off one of our own fingers with a steak knife? This is what we call having skin in the game.

Perhaps lack of general participation is related to the next microcosmic pet peeve, perhaps not. I’m talking about the endless chicken and egg cycle of violence. Without immediate, excruciating, personal physical pain, carrying a grudge for years, generations, or even eons is certainly facilitated. When the vast majority of wounds are emotional rather than physical one has more time and peace of mind to plot out the next round of pointless destruction. As punishing sons and daughters for the sins of fathers, grandfathers, and great-great-great-grandfathers goes, the Israel-Hamas War is the Olympics of cyclic vengeance. Even a cursory reading of history combined with 15 minutes of channel-surfing cable news allows one to see clearly the link between camel-killing desert conflicts of the 11^th century and the forthcoming 23^rd century galactic AI bloodbaths over the same 10,000 square kilometers. It’s the gift that keeps giving.

Perhaps one microcosmic element to this war that is not universally the case is the bad leadership on both sides. This is the part where certain readers start to throw virtual rotten tomatoes at me, but when you have bloodthirsty sadists leading on one side and an opportunistic power hungry demagogue on the other, massive loss of civilian life is almost guaranteed. The greater question is why individuals of extremely poor character tend to rise to the top. This is a softball. The instinct to protect oneself and one’s family against ambitious madmen willing to commit heinous acts drives the vast majority of decent people below the political radar, opening the door to the type of mayhem we see here. We only have to look as far as the voluntary political exit of 30 or so moderate Republican members of Congress in our own blissful nation-state soon after the election of Donald Trump to the presidency. Bye-bye. See ya. This political thing is getting nasty, unpleasant, maybe a little dangerous and, frankly, beneath me.

Ultimately, most wars are about resources—as in the notion that there aren’t enough to go around. In its own way, this microcosmic element of the Israel-Hamas War disgusts me the most. You only need to look out the window of a airplane flying over any continent you can name to see the vast, vast majority of land, sea and most significantly, potentially arable land is—even with our sometimes Malthusian proclivities toward procreation—available, virgin, untouched. Challenging though it may seem at times, there is genuinely enough for everyone on this planet if we don’t insist on a four-car garage and a wave pool. But collectively we are too myopic and greedy to see this and instead prefer to address our resource acquisitiveness with crushed limbs and vaporized flesh.

Well, this is the part where some readers who have kindly or otherwise made it this far take me to task for not having a solution. Guilty as charged. The most meaningful social statement I made in my entire life was going vegetarian in 1985. Minus a couple of cheesesteaks at a Superbowl party one year I’ve more or less kept my vow. As a very young man my views of war were pretty much the same as the views expressed herein albeit without the benefit of spell check. So I undertook a single lifelong symbolic commitment to nonviolence that for all the tofu-pups and fake chicken cutlets consumed probably has made no difference whatsoever in the ensuing nearly four decades of unceasing global carnage. Sorry. That’s all I’ve got. I’ll try to do better next life. Best of luck with the rest of this one.

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