There were, as should surprise no one, pro-Palestinian demonstrations on the one-year anniversary of the carnage in Israel. Would you have known there had been a massacre on October 7, 2023 by wading into the protests today? You would not have. There was no acknowledgment of the loss of Israeli life that day, of the hostages taken. Instead, there was the evidently requisite girl squeezing a little rubber piggy in cops’ faces and shouting, “Kill yourself!” And pro-Palestinian protesters spitting curses at a lone man holding an Israeli flag. And, as would happen later in the day, a man wearing a shirt from the hostage center in Tel Aviv being beaten in the head and left bloody by the mob.
I was extremely disheartened by what I saw today, by the utter lack of commemoration, yes, as well as the disinterest, feigned or real, in having a conversation with people who might see things differently. As I mention in the video, maybe acknowledging the Israelis who were murdered and taken hostage is too dangerous to your argument. Better to imagine them - the toddlers, the old people, the young people dancing at a rave - cardboard villains, all of them.
Additional video, some from the scene, some of it violent, after the break.
