Recently, popular conservative Mark Levin went to X to voice his opinion on the ongoing war in Gaza. Levin’s position was rather tasteless when he claimed that there were no “innocent Palestinians.”
He linked to an article written by D.W. Wilber, whose background is in US intelligence. In the article, he claimed that “So let’s get a few things clear. First of all, there are no ‘innocent Palestinians.’”
This take is fundamentally inhumane when considering that many of whom that have lost their lives in this war have been children.
As of October 31, 133 babies under the age of 1 have been killed thanks to Israeli bombs. This represents just a portion of the 444 babies that have been killed. The report published by the Palestinian Health Ministry claimed that, “444 babies were killed, including 133 under one year old, 153 one-year-olds and 158 two-year-olds.”
On November 29, two Palestinian boys were shot and killed by Israeli forces in Jenin in the West Bank. This came after Israel raided the camp. Adam Samer al-Ghoul, 8, was shot in the head while Abu al-Wafa, 15, was shot in the chest.
While they were sleeping, a Palestinian family was hit by an Israeli bomb. When Khaled Nabhan woke up, he immediately began to call out to his children and grandchildren. His daughter’s survived, but his 3- and 5-year-old grandchildren sadly did not. They were buried under the rubble.
All in all, the number of children who have died in Gaza because of Israel’s airstrikes is damning. According to BBC, more than 7,000 children out of the 17,500 civilians have died since the outbreak of war.
As heartbreaking is this is, Levin and Wilber would argue that they were not “innocent Palestinians.” To them, they represent terrorism and are nothing more than terrorist sympathizers.
And Wilber even acknowledged the number of civilians who have died in the conflict. Sadly, he downplays this by saying the “Palestinians should have thought about that before they elected terrorists to govern them.”
Well, only about 44% of Palestinians voted for them in 2006 to govern them. As I have shared, many children have died, and they certainly did not vote for them in 2006. In fact, about a majority of those living in Palestine did not vote for Hamas in 2006.
Today, only 11% of Palestinians align themselves as Hamas supporters. The only reason they won in 2006 over Fatah was because Fatah was divided and because they had given up on a peace resolution with Israel. 70% said that they would have voted for Fatah is they believed peace would occur if whoever won the election would make peace with Israel.
Furthermore, dehumanizing them in this manner is beyond cruel. When antisemites do the same thing when they make their voices heard, they are rightfully called out for their dehumanizing of all Jews. When we look at what the Nazis said in their attempts to dehumanize Jews to justify slaughtering them in World War II, they are rightfully called out as genocidal maniacs. But why is it not wrong to dehumanize all of Palestinians because of the actions of Hamas?
Finally, this argument is the same argument Osama bin Laden used to justify killing Americans in 9/11. As Jack Hunter wrote, “This is EXACTLY part of Osama Bin Laden’s logic in carrying out 9/11. Al-Qaeda believed Americans elected their government and so anyone who perished on the day of their attacks was worse than just collateral damage – they deserved it.”
Bin Laden using this logic is evil but it is not evil for Wilber to do this according to Levin. How does this make any kind of sense?
The notion that there are no innocent Palestinians is evil and should be eroded. The arguments used by Wilber are the same that bin Laden used to justify murdering American civilians in 9/11. This is the first step to supporting a genocide and it deserves to be called out.
Trenton Hale is a young libertarian writer. He is the author of two books, The Failed Idea: Why Socialism Fails in Theory and Practice, and Freedom for All: How a Libertarian Society Would Function. He regularly posts on his substack and Instagram pages. His works have been featured in institutes such as Antiwar.com, the Mises Institute, Libertarian Institute, and Mises Magazine for the Liberty Youth Coalition.
