Once and for all: Never again - opinion

In the aftermath of the October 7 attacks, it is essential to confront the realities of a conflict that continues to challenge our understanding of justice and coexistence. We could have had a different Middle East – one where Israel thrives peacefully alongside its neighbors, and the relentless conflict with the Palestinians is a distant memory.

Time and again, Israel has extended its hand, offering peace, coexistence, and a shared future. But these gestures have been met with violence, not diplomacy. For 76 years, Israel has sought to live in peace, asking only that those who bear enmity lay down their arms and release the anger they have carried for generations – anger rooted in a choice they themselves failed to make.

In 1947, the United Nations proposed a partition plan that would have established two states: one Jewish and one Arab, side by side. While Jewish leaders accepted the plan, eager to secure a homeland after millennia of persecution, the Arab world rejected it outright. Had the Palestinians accepted the 1948 partition plan, they would now be celebrating 76 years of independence, just as we do.

Instead, they remain a fractured diaspora, entrapped by jihadism, corruption, and the terror-aiding disaster that is UNRWA. Self-determination is not an entitlement handed over without sacrifice or compromise. It is time for Palestinian leadership to accept a hard truth: Israel is here to stay. Jewish autonomy will not be undone, and we will not be sacrificed on the altar of someone else’s distorted notion of historical justice. Only by yielding can they offer their citizens a sliver of peace.

Reflecting on the events of October 7, now a year behind us, I am both heartened and dismayed. Many activists like myself, who have long championed Zionism as a beacon of democracy, are finding new allies. Those who once dismissed the ideology as outdated – perhaps believing it irrelevant in a post-Holocaust world – are realizing how wrong they were. October 7 exposed the virulence of modern antisemitism. It is not a relic of history but a raging force, disguised in the language of human rights and social justice.

This war is not about revenge

One of the greatest misunderstandings in the world today is the notion that for Jews, a homeland comes at the expense of others. We do not seek absolute territorial dominance, as evidenced by the willingness to partition land at every opportunity of a two-state solution for the past seven decades. However, we demand the right to live free from terror and persecution. The world acts as though our survival threatens global peace. It doesn’t. Jewish self-determination threatens only those who wish to see us eradicated.

This war is not about revenge. Israel’s response to the atrocities of October 7, and to the hatred it has faced since before 1948, is not driven by a thirst for vengeance. It is fueled by the need to ensure such horrors never happen again.

Recently, when landing in Israel on an El Al flight, the flight attendant announced: “Welcome to Israel. We remember to pray for the safety of our brave soldiers and to bring all of our hostages home.” To me, even this simple and procedural moment captures the essence of the conflict – one side focuses on protecting its people and ensuring no more lives are lost.

In contrast, the Iranian regime and Qatar – the masterminds behind the offensive and the virulent antisemitism driving this conflict – pray not for the safety of their people but for Israel’s destruction. This is the moral divide in this war.

Elie Wiesel, in his masterpiece Night, recounts that when the Holocaust ended, he had no thoughts of revenge. Even as they were freed from the camps and survival became less of a concern, it never entered their minds. This lack of thirst for vengeance is emblematic of Israel today.

The state is not at war with Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran out of revenge for October 7. Israel is not fighting to mirror the jihadists’ cruelty. It is fighting to ensure that October 7 never happens again.

The crux of the issue

Never again – for the second time in less than a century. That is the crux of the issue.

More disappointing than the ongoing fight with jihadism, which many expected, is the unexpected sympathy or alignment from parts of the so-called intellectual Left. They are a bigger threat because they don’t openly advocate for our annihilation; instead, they cloak their hatred in the language of social justice. They pretend their fight is for human rights, but their chants for a global intifada leave no ambiguity.

Do these people even understand what they’re calling for? Do they know what it means? If their interest lay in justice, they would not call for bloodbaths that did not discriminate between Jew or Arab, soldier or civilian. They would not justify the atrocities committed a year ago.

There is no moral gray area. The line between good and evil in this conflict is clear. Yet some still try to complicate it. They claim that the Israel-Palestine issue is intricate and that the solutions are elusive and fraught with ambiguity. Perhaps, in the past, that was true.

But after October 7, the intentions of our enemies have been made abundantly clear. And not just on that dark day but in the year that has followed, as genocidal antisemitism has once again shown its face in anti-Israel protests, hand in hand with Iranian missiles.

Israel is prosecuted at the ICC for following the moral code of war, yet Hezbollah and Hamas do not fall under scrutiny. What if the situation were reversed – if Israel, too, hid weapons in synagogues and kindergartens. What if Israel used systematic sexual violence as a weapon of war in southern Lebanon? Could anyone imagine it? Of course not.

Intentions matter. The world that Israel seeks to build is one where citizens of Israel, Jews and Arabs alike, can live in peace – as is the case within its borders. If Israel had wanted to wipe out the Palestinian people, it could have done so long ago. Yet Israel is continually forced into war by those who are enthralled to genocidal fanaticism, those who will not rest until every last Jew is eradicated, or themselves are.

After 76 years of independence, we know that sovereignty is not a gift – it is a responsibility. We will never surrender our right to live freely and safely in our homeland. We did not seek this war. But we will end it. And we will end it so that, for the second time in a century, we can say, once and for all: Never again.

The writer is a lecturer for Stand With Us Brazil and the academic coordinator at Hillel Rio.