Will there be light after two years in Hamas’ tunnels?

As we approach the second anniversary of the worst attack against Jews since the end of World War II, we experienced a deep significant Yom Kippur.

An attack in Manchester against a synagogue where British Jewish citizens were praying on the holiest day in the Hebrew calendar, was followed by a pro-Palestinian demonstration claiming responsibility for the attack.

On October 7, 2023, Hamas invaded sovereign Israeli territory. Under a rain of rockets that forced civilians into shelter, thousands of fighters on the ground, in the air with hang gliders and paragliders and by sea in a variety of boats, unleashed their inhumanity wherever they passed by.

More than 1,200 dead, countless wounded, rapes, fires with people inside homes or burned vehicles, the desecration of corpses and the kidnapping of more than 250 people, while they filmed and broadcasted to the world that their true intention was to annihilate the Jewish State and leave not a single Jew alive anywhere.

In these two years, which seem like a 100, we have experienced different stages in this war that opened up several fronts. The identification of bodies and the grasping the magnitude of the attack; bias in the international press; attacks from southern Lebanon to northern Israel by Hezbollah that forced thousands of citizens to flee their homes; direct confrontations between Iran and Israel twice; militias from Iraq and Syria (before Bashar al-Assad's fall); and continued attacks by the Houthis from Yemen. 

In the West, the battle was more complex. Elite universities that claimed to uphold the banner of human rights have attacked, harassed and expelled Jewish students and faculty in the name of a modern form of anti-Semitism called anti-Zionism. Their leaders downplayed hatred because they said it "depends on the context," as if there were a context that ever justified it.

A biased press that takes information provided by Hamas as true; politicians vacuous of local content who find in the "Free Palestine" claim a new slogan in the name of a genocide that doesn't exist. In this regard, it should be clarified that this consortium – which unites under the Palestinian flag, like once under the Che Guevara T-shirt – brings together people of goodwill who seek self-determination for a people, which could eventually generate our empathy; to those who demand a true genocide of the 10 million people living in the State of Israel to replace them with a possible Palestinian state.

Add to this the bias, silence and complicity of international organizations. The United Nations, in which we place our hope for democratic behaviour, is made up of more countries that reject democracy than those that defend it. And these democratic nations, in the name of tolerance, are allowing the intolerant to undermine their systems from within. Karl Popper points his index at us, telling us he warned us.

Feminist movements that believe all their sisters. except the Jewish ones, took more than three months to denounce that Hamas uses women's bodies as a battlefield.

UNICEF did not speak out for the Bibas children.

The International Red Cross never intervened on behalf of the kidnapped, except to act as an Uber when, after humiliating ceremonies, they were exchanged for criminals sentenced in Israeli prisons after having been tried and sentenced for serious crimes in a fair trial.

UNRWA, the United Nations agency that was in charge of education, healthcare and food in Gaza, is part of the problem, rather than the solution. This was evident when kindergartens, buildings that were supposedly schools, or health centres were used to fire rockets or serve as bases for Hamas fighters. And if that weren't enough, some UNRWA staff were involved in military operations or served as guarded prisons for the abductees. Or journalists who are correspondents and praise terrorism by accompanying the attacks they themselves filmed and documented.

The great South Korean philosopher Byung-Chul Han talks about the tsunami of information that sweeps the world daily and how it can dizzy, misinform and disorient, rather than setting a direction, a goal. The lies and propaganda constructed to justify terror are part of the strategy to sustain a regime that would otherwise be unjustifiable under any Western human rights standards.

But all is not lost. It is in the name of that same father of all nations, the same one who fought to restore a little hope to Sodom and Gomorrah, that there is still a way. That path is that of the Abraham Accords.

The issue of famine has been discussed to the point of exhaustion. Both the United Nations and Israel delivered more than was needed to feed Gaza, but Hamas prevented its distribution in order to maintain its hold on power. In addition to imposing their policies, they also impose the feeding (or lack thereof) of their own population.

This has enabled national leaders to bring their anti-Israelism into national politics, affecting the local Jewish communities they are essentially supposed to protect.

In Latin America alone, we have seen vandalism of cemeteries, graffiti at synagogues and community centres, hostile pro-Palestinian marches outside primary schools and kindergartens, and a reluctance to uphold policies against anti-Semitism or Holocaust remembrance. Gradually, Jewish citizens are being asked not to express their Jewishness,so as not to upset those who hate them publicly and are being prevented from attending institutions, hotels, and vacation spots. Physical attacks are becoming increasingly visible and unpunished and security forces are reaching situations where Jews should not be protected but should be made invisible, if possible, to cease to exist.

To accept this indecent proposal is to acknowledge that Hamas has won. That terrorism has won. Along these lines of thinking are those who seek to appease terror without confronting it, and who refuse to support the only one who must resist it: the State of Israel, which is fighting for its survival and to prevent the spread of this form of imposition.

We begin this article by saying that we are experiencing a different Yom Kippur. And during it, we search for something in the sacred texts that might explain how such evil is possible.

We only find one clear reference. Sodom and Gomorrah, those two cities identified with sin, were much worse than that. According to the explanation the Prophet Ezekiel gives us, the despicable thing about these cities was that food was plentiful, but the rulers starved the population. The foreigner was mistreated; that is, anyone who was different was not only rejected but dehumanised.

One of the greatest transgressions of those rulers was their desire to adapt reality to their evil. They would take the foreigner and place him in a bed. If the bed was longer than the person, they would stretch his limbs. But if the person was taller than the bed, they would cut off those limbs.

Likewise, the desire to reshape historical reality, to manipulate statistics, to fabricate false propaganda and to disregard objective history for destructive narratives is part of the Sodom and Gomorrah that is manifested today in the leadership of Gaza.

In other words, the cult of death was opposed to the intrinsic value of life. And for that reason Abraham is told that both cities will be destroyed.

However, dear friends, even though the Gaza governed by Hamas that we see reflected in the description of Sodom and Gomorrah has generated a movement in the West in its favour, almost anticipating its self-destruction, the Arab countries as a whole see something else. They understand that this model is unviable.

The figure of Abraham as the father of all these peoples, calls us to see each other as brothers who were once enemies but came from the same origin.

The 77 years of enmity and the denial of recognition of our neighbors, seeking their destruction, only brought misfortune to these peoples.

Understanding that both people are here and will not leave, that it is better to live together as neighbours and take advantage of what the other has to offer is more beneficial than what we have experienced until now, is the way forward.

It is then time to look back at history and accept Abraham's legacy, which began with Egypt and Jordan and continued with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan. Pakistan is in favour. Indonesia, the country with the largest number of Muslims in the world, understands that this is inevitable. Preventing a possible normalisation with Saudi Arabia was one of the triggers for Hamas' attack two years ago. And Qatar will have to review its sponsorship. It may gain more in another way.

Even Russia supports this plan which, with all its imperfections, allows us to dream of avoiding further destruction and thinking of a new horizon.

Abraham believed in people and argued to prevent Sodom and Gomorrah from being destroyed, searching for even a single person with values ​​who didn't deserve destruction.

We must choose to be Abraham and hope, as there were righteous among the nations during the Holocaust, that we will find people in Gaza who are in favour of life and coexistence and who until now have been unable to express themselves. May they not pay for those who impose the cult of death on them and may they accept living in peace with their neighbours, because they are there and will remain there.

Two years after the beginning, the return of the hostages is a priority. The imposition of coexistence is a priority and together we say "enough” to terror is a priority. And ensuring that no-one should be attacked for who they are is also a priority.