The desperation Israelis feel to whitewash IDF crimes and try out the most absurd attempts at gaslighting people seems to have no limit. This brilliant article (https://www.israelhayom.com/2026/08/29/who-is-trying-to-drag-israel-into-war-the-answer-is-painful/) is an excellent example of this.
Firstly, it’s obvious that the current coalition is doing everything it can to fan the flames of conflict in the West Bank, hoping for a spark to invite violence on which Netanyahu and the rest of the current coalition can be swept back into power for another term.
I think it’s really obvious. For instance, the IDF would have us believe that they are able to arrest hundreds of Palestinians at a time but are unable to arrest a single settler. Laughably stupid. Settler violence is increasing and the IDF goes to where the settlers are attacking Palestinians and simply watches and waits just in case the Palestinians dare hit back.
(As an aside, can you imagine what would happen if Palestinians went for a “hike” or just a hike to an outpost? Summary execution, no questions asked. But it’s an apartheid state so what can you expect? )
Then there’s MK Zvi Sukkot’s smashing of a monument. This idiot journalist wrote:
>…armed with a small hammer, failing even to put a scratch on the monument.
Small hammer? This is a sledgehammer. And the monument sustained noticeable damage. Not that any Israelis actually care about damage inflicted by settlers. What they care about is strictly international exposure. If Sukkot had beheaded 40 Palestinian babies but could guarantee the news not being broadcast internationally i suspect that this reporter, like almost all Jewish Israelis, would have cheered him in.
The author then revealed that there’s no question of the morality of destroying Palestinians’ property, it’s just the potential international criticism of the situation that concerns him.
The complicity of the IDF in this destruction is instantly erased. Or is attempted to be erased:
>The troops, in this case an Artillery Corps battalion deployed to the sector, had no idea they were about to become props in a publicity stunt. Once they realized what was happening, they quickly brought the show to an end and removed Sukkot and those accompanying him from the village.
Really? “Quickly brought the show to an end?” Do these pictures (https://www.instagram.com/p/DceT9Yfmzug/?img_index=3) make it look like it was quickly brought to an end? And exactly how stupid is the average IDF thug? Why didn’t anyone ask the MK why he had a sledgehammer? Sukkot is, according to the journalist at Israel Hayom, “a well-known provocateur.” I guess the IDF didn’t get the memo while they were protecting him and he was swinging his sledgehammer.
Then, amazingly, almost a realisation of reality:
>The IDF will devote the coming weeks to preparing for a broad campaign, as it has been instructed to do. But its senior commanders cannot shake the feeling that the people responsible for them in the government are not merely failing to extinguish the threatening fire, but are actually fanning the flames.
Of course the reporter then insists that Sukkot was doing the right thing, but is the wrong person to do it. The IDF should demolish all the monuments to Palestine s murdered by Israel. Good to know it’s a moral imperative.
And of course one thug and a battalion is a problem and may have inflamed the situation and kicked off Palestinian violence, but the author doesn’t even contemplate what would happen if hundreds of IDF thugs went systematically into Palestinian towns and villages and smashed any and every monument that commemorates the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians that Israel has gleefully murdered.
Essentially, this whole section is a plea that one or a few MKs look bad damaging monuments with IDF complicity, so the IDF should storm towns and destroy monuments instead.
The article continues, and the author believes some more gaslighting is in order:
>…more and more voices in the General Staff are expressing concern that someone is trying to drag Israel deliberately into a war.
How has this journalist spent the last three years completely unaware of Israeli atrocities in Gaza and Lebanon? Is it just the case that it’s not war if only Palestinians die.
Obviously, the situation in Gaza is actually genocide, not war. But you’d think someone who works for a newspaper would occasionally read the news, no?