Something that I think is grim is that a Jewish friend with family in Israel told me that they strongly suspect that the percentage of Jewish Israelis okay with ethnic cleansing is a fair chunk lower than 82%, but that because the media landscape in Israel is so homogeneous, and there’s a lot of social stigma around being anti-genocide, that there are almost certainly people who don’t agree with the ethnic cleansing, but say they do due to the pressure of social shaming.

She went on to say that of course, the people who disagree inwardly but loudly agree outwardly are functionally the same as people who wholeheartedly agree with ethnic cleansing. However, this highlights how fucking tragic the state of Israel is even for Jewish Israelis; stuff like this is why she considers Israel to be an insult to Judaism. She has a small amount of sympathy for Zionism in theory, in that she understands why so many people felt like they would only be safe if there was a Jewish state. However, modern Zionism has taken an ideology that she already disagreed with, and turned it malignant — “and now we have a state that is in opposition to Judaism, through its endorsement of disgusting attitudes and actions in its Jewish citizens”.

I hadn’t considered it that way before, and it made me feel sad to reflect on figures like 82%. I don’t know what would be more tragic: if only 40% of people were actually pro-genocide, with the other 42% of people not being pro-genocide, but succumbing to social pressure and acting like they are; or if only 10% of people weren’t pro-genocide but too scared to speak out. Both of those options are depressing, but in different ways