While Bashar al-Assad’s brutal conduct of his war to regain control of Syria has turned much of Arab public opinion against him, many devotees of the Palestinian cause have either ignored his behavior or rushed to his defense. The resulting schism came to a head when Ali Abunimah, co-founder of the venomous anti-Israel website Electronic Intifada, reacted with scornful indifference to a picture of a wounded Syrian child. Jamie Palmer writes:

Given the reckless cynicism with which Electronic Intifada has used images of dead children [for political purposes, Abunimah’s] hypocrisy was resonant. Beneath his irritation and indignation, there seemed to lurk a certain resentment that Syrians were usurping the Palestinians’ rightful claim to be the world’s most pressing human-rights emergency.

As the row escalated, the left-wing blogosphere divided. Other writers at Electronic Intifada, Salon, and [the hard-left website] AlterNet who chimed in to support Abunimah’s opposition to a U.S.-enforced no-fly zone in Syria suddenly found their mailboxes and Twitter accounts filling up with furious accusations of treachery. . . . Then [the notorious anti-Semite] Max Blumenthal inflamed the row still further with an endlessly long two-part “exposé” of the Syrian opposition.

In part one, Blumenthal described a network of sinister groups, anonymous donors, wealthy exiles, government agencies, media dupes, and other interested parties conspiring to manipulate Western public opinion. . . . It was the usual boilerplate conspiracy theory, purporting to reveal that things are not as they appear, heavy on insinuation and ominous atmospherics, light on rigor and substance, and all informed by a generally adolescent misanthropy.

But in part two, Blumenthal sought to discredit the [Syrian] White Helmets, a volunteer group of citizen first-responders who risk death to rescue survivors of aerial bombardment. . . .

[It’s worth pointing out that] the anti-imperialist left’s position on Syria has been perfectly consistent with its previous history. During the cold war, the New Left considered capitalist democracy nothing more than a new kind of fascism disguised as freedom, while Zionism—in keeping with the Soviet anti-imperialist line—was a Western colonialist plot. Any regime, no matter how backward or barbaric, which opposed this twin threat was rewarded with reflexive sympathy, especially (but not exclusively) if that regime happened to be left-wing.

For some time, opponents of U.S support for Israel have been urging the White House to end the war in Gaza, or simply calling for a ceasefire. Douglas Feith and Lewis Libby consider what such a result would actually entail:

Ending the war immediately would allow Hamas to survive and retain military and governing power. Leaving it in the area containing the Sinai-Gaza smuggling routes would ensure that Hamas can rearm. This is why Hamas leaders now plead for a ceasefire. A ceasefire will provide some relief for Gazans today, but a prolonged ceasefire will preserve Hamas’s bloody oppression of Gaza and make future wars with Israel inevitable.

For most Gazans, even when there is no hot war, Hamas’s dictatorship is a nightmarish tyranny. Hamas rule features the torture and murder of regime opponents, official corruption, extremist indoctrination of children, and misery for the population in general. Hamas diverts foreign aid and other resources from proper uses; instead of improving life for the mass of the people, it uses the funds to fight against Palestinians and Israelis.

Moreover, a Hamas-affiliated website warned Gazans last month against cooperating with Israel in securing and delivering the truckloads of aid flowing into the Strip. It promised to deal with those who do with “an iron fist.” In other words, if Hamas remains in power, it will begin torturing, imprisoning, or murdering those it deems collaborators the moment the war ends. Thereafter, Hamas will begin planning its next attack on Israel:

Hamas’s goals are to overshadow the Palestinian Authority, win control of the West Bank, and establish Hamas leadership over the Palestinian revolution. Hamas’s ultimate aim is to spark a regional war to obliterate Israel and, as Hamas leaders steadfastly maintain, fulfill a Quranic vision of killing all Jews.

Hamas planned for corpses of Palestinian babies and mothers to serve as the mainspring of its October 7 war plan. Hamas calculated it could survive a war against a superior Israeli force and energize enemies of Israel around the world. The key to both aims was arranging for grievous Palestinian civilian losses. . . . That element of Hamas’s war plan is working impressively.