Response to Written Inquiry on Language Used by Haaretz Poll

To: ABC

From: Ahmad Ibsais

Date: November 13^th, 2025

Re: Response to Inquiry

Hello X,

After I received your email, I wanted to provide some research, quotes, and context behind my use of the phrase “chosen people” (quoting a poll from the Israeli publication Haaretz).

My reason for talking about “chosen people” stems not from “anti-semitism” but from a simple fact: I am Palestinian. My family lives inside Occupied Palestine, I was born in Occupied Palestine, and are consistently subjected to the Apartheid regime. Palestinians are not treated equally, and face calls for their dispossession and expulsion every day. And this, and only this, is what I am concerned with.

Israeli politics and attitudes of Israeli civilians affect the lives of my people. They are not hobby obsessions. Within Israel, a state considered a Jewish “promised land” for “a chosen people”, Biblical language and notions affect my life and the lives of the Palestinians. They are directly invoked to justify the extermination of my people in Gaza. The only reason I have to invoke these ideas is because they form the basis of the Jewish ethno-state which is currently occupying the West Bank and which is currently committing a genocide in Gaza.

I. Scope of my reference

For your convenience, I am attaching the full paragraph in which the phrase appears, here: “But how can we even speak of “peace” when we carry Gaza in our bones? Peace cannot exist for any Palestinian, or anyone with eyes still capable of witnessing, who has seen Israel’s depravity. I still hear the Palestinian child wiping his mother’s blood from the floor; I hear the father’s wail as he placed the pieces of his child into a plastic bag; I feel the ways Palestine has been carved, dehumanized, and brutalized to carry out an extermination campaign by those who call themselves “chosen”.”

It is clear that I am describing individuals who actively perpetrated or supported a genocide, a claim asserted by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, an independent United Nations Inquiry, Medicines Sans Frontier (Doctors without Borders), and several countries at the International Court of Justice (ICJ). I, in no way, used “chosen” to imply that Jewish people view themselves as “racially superior”.

I linked to the Haaretz opinion poll to demonstrate that large numbers of the Israeli public, who are obliged to serve in the IDF and participate in military action against Palestinians, believe they are a “chosen people”. It is also the case that polling reveals that this same public overwhelmingly supports the exterminationist policies against Palestinians.

The 2025 Haaretz article, titled “Yes to Transfer: 82% of Jewish Israelis Back Expelling Gazans” reports on polling conducted by the Pennsylvania State University and conducted by Tamir Sorek for the Israeli polling firm Geocartography Knowledge Group. As Haaretz reports, the poll “posed a series of “impolite” questions – topics typically avoided in mainstream Israeli polling – about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” The poll found that “82% of respondents supported the expulsion of Gaza’s residents, while 56% favored expelling Palestinian citizens of Israel.”

The poll goes on to say: “Religious interpretations play a key role in shaping these views. Nearly half (47%) of respondents agreed that “when conquering an enemy city, the Israel Defense Forces should act as the Israelites did in Jericho under Joshua’s command – killing all its inhabitants.” And 65% percent said they believed in the existence of a modern-day incarnation of Amalek, the Israelite biblical enemy whom God commanded to wipe out in Deuteronomy 25:19. Among those believers, 93% said the commandment to erase Amalek’s memory remains relevant today.”

I am not maliciously deploying a European antisemitic trope when I report on the fact that Jewish Israelis hold these views. I am not deploying a European antisemitic trope to report on the fact that Biblical theology is used to justify extermination and expulsion of Palestinians. I am not European. I am Palestinian. And my exclusive interest is the Israeli state. And, if the Israeli public has widespread exterminationist views, then I am not the one who should be apologizing for this fact. I should be apologized to, if anything.

II. The Distinction and Relevant Facts and Quotations

The distinction of genocide is important as it is considered the ‘crime of crimes’ and necessitates a special intent. Prosecutor v. Bagilishema, Case No. ICTR-95-1A-T, Judgement (Int’l Crim. Trib. For Rwanda), 2001. See also, Prosectuor v. Akayesu, Case No. ICTR-96-4-T (genocide “embodies a special intent… which demands that the perpetrator clearly seeks to product the act as charged.” Intent can be inferred by patterns of violence and explicit statements. Id.

In the case of Gaza, public statements from senior Israeli officials, reflect a rhetorical framework that dehumanizes Palestinians and normalizes large-scale violence. Israeli President Isaac Herzog: “It’s an entire nation out there that is responsible . . . This rhetoric about civilians not being aware, not involved, it’s absolutely not true”.

Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu suggesting nuclear weapons could be “one of the possibilities” for Gaza”; Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter: “We are now rolling out the Gaza Nakba”; National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir stated that “my right for life comes before their right to movement,” “their” being Palestinians in Gaza; and IDF spokesperson Daniel Hagari: “The emphasis is on damage and not on accuracy”.^[1]

Another frequently cited example is Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s invocation of “Amalek” in late 2023, a biblical reference historically associated with the total destruction of an enemy population. This statement, among others, has been interpreted by some legal scholars and international observers as evidence of genocidal rhetoric, potentially indicative of intent under Article II of the Genocide Convention.^[2] Benjamin Netanyahu on October 10, 2023 stated that “We (Israelis) are the people of light, they (Palestinians) are the people of darkness.”^[3]

A non-comprehensive list of over 500 hundred statements by tens of Israel’s highest ranking politicians is provided in Footnote (FN) 4.^[4] The Guardian itself published a quotation describing similar rhetoric in November of 2023, the headline reading “’These are biblical lands promised to us’”, the article going on to say that “For many settlers, this delimitation is aberrant. They refer to the West Bank as Judea and Samaria, two ancient Israelite kingdoms. These terms are also used administratively by the Israeli government.”^[5]

Gideon Levy, an Israeli journalist for Haaretz, speaking at the Israel-American lobby, stated that “Three principles that enable us Israelis to live so easily with this brutal reality.) Most of the Israelis, if not all of them, deeply believe that we are the chosen people. And if we are the chosen people, we have the right to do whatever we want.”^[6] Levy is no junior, rogue journalist. He is Haaretz’ deputy editor. Levy has covered the Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza over the last 25 years, and is a writer of political editorials for the newspaper. In other words, he is an authority on the matter. And Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s Finance Minister and leader of the Religious Zionism party, has asserted that the West Bank is part of Israel by “Divine Promise”.^[7]

III. Logical Conclusion of Ideology from Genocide

The convergence of evidence permits only one reasonable conclusion: the Israeli government operates from a belief that its right to the land and life is more important than Palestinian rights and Palestinian lives. This is not speculation but the necessary inference from established facts: (1) The International Court of Justice found in its 2004 Advisory Opinion that Israel’s construction of the Wall constitutes a breach of international law, violating Palestinians’ right to self-determination and other fundamental rights under the Geneva Conventions; (2) Decades of military occupation and apartheid, as characterized by the Geneva Conventions and subsequent UN Resolutions, demonstrate systematic subordination of Palestinian rights; (3) The genocide itself resulting in the destruction of over 90% of all infrastructure in Gaza and murdering at least 66,000 Palestinians; and (4) Repeated invocations by Israeli officials of language positioning Palestinians as existential enemies deserving total elimination. Taken together, when a state persistently violates international law for decades, systematically denies another people’s rights repeatedly affirmed by the international community, invokes language of divine mandate and chosenness, and pursues policies that international legal bodies characterize as genocide, the only logical inference is that this Israeli state believes itself to possess a status that supersedes the fundamental rights of the subordinated population.

What I am concerned about is the brutal mistreatment and killing of Palestinians in Israel and the Occupied Territories. It is simply a reality that, within those territories, “chosenness” – along with the related concept of a “promised land” – is directly invoked to justify horrific acts being committed every day to Palestinians.

IV. CAMERA is Conflating the Israeli Government with Judaism Itself

CAMERA UK’s complaint operates on a false premise: that criticism of Israeli government officials perpetrating mass atrocities is equivalent to bigotry against Jewish people as a whole.

As philosopher Judith Butler has written, “Jews who are critical of Israel think perhaps they cannot be Jewish anymore of Israel represents Jewishness; and on the other hand, those who seek to vanquish anyone who criticizes Israel equate Jewishness with Israel as well, leading to the conclusion that the critic must be anti-Semitic or, if Jewish, self-hating.”^[8]

The conflation is harmful in multiple ways. What CAMERA has done is assume all Jewish people support or identify with Israeli government officials and CAMERA is holding all Jewish people collectively responsible for actions of the Israeli government. Whereas I have specifically challenged those who are committing a genocide, and those within Israel (not Jews globally – again, I am only concerned with Israel), who hold beliefs such as “chosenness” and a “promised land” that are time and time again invoked to justify the dispossession and erasure of my people.

CAMERA is taking an approach similar to the IHRA definition of antisemitism and its weaponization. In 2024, 1,200 Jewish academics signed an open letter opposing this weaponization and codification into U.S. law.^[9]

V. Conclusion

CAMERA UK is trying to warp my criticism of the Israeli government. Their complaint rests on the premise that such criticism constitutes hatred of Jewish people generally. It does not. As evidenced above, “chosen” in the context used is a reference to the Israeli state and politicians who have committed genocide, as well as large sections of the Israeli public, which holds exterminationist views that are often informed and justified by the language of “chosenness”.

I refuse to participate in the dangerous conflation. The Israeli government’s actions do not represent all Jewish people, and to claim otherwise is to traffic in the same essentialist thinking that underlies antisemitism itself.

^[1] Sprinter Observer (@SprinterObserve), X (Oct. 14, 2023), https://x.com/SprinterObserve/status/1713064886027063584 (quoting Isaac Herzog, President of Israel); Chantal Da Silva, Gaza, Nakba and Israel’s Far Right: Why Palestinians Fear History Is Repeating, NBC news (Nov. 13, 2023), https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/gaza-nakba-israels-far-right-palestinian-fears-hamas-war-rcna123909; Tom Bateman, US Condemns Israeli Minister Ben Gvir’s ‘Inflammatory’ Palestinian Comments, BBC news (Aug. 25, 2023), https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-66614459; Israeli Army: ‘Emphasis Is on Damage and Not on Accuracy’, Middle East Eye (Oct. 10, 2023), https://www.middleeasteye.net/live-update/israeli-army-emphasis-damage-and-not-accuracy

^[2] https://www.gov.il/en/pages/statement-by-pm-netanyahu-28-oct-2023

^[3]

https://twitter.com/disclosetv/status/1717232829766009086?s=20

^[4] Law for Palestine, Database of Israeli Incitement to Genocide: Decision Makers (15 Jan. 2024), available at https://law4palestine.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Database-of-Israeli-Incitement-to-Genocide-including-after-ICJ-order-27th-February-2024-.pdf

^[5] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/18/these-are-biblical-lands-promised-to-us-jewish-settlers-in-west-bank-hope-gaza-conflict-will-help-their-cause

^[6]

^[7]

; https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20250815-smotrich-declares-west-bank-as-part-of-israel-by-divine-promise/

^[8] https://cupblog.org/2012/08/29/judith-butler-on-being-jewish-and-criticizing-israel/

^[9] https://religionnews.com/2024/05/14/1200-jewish-professors-call-on-senate-to-reject-controversial-antisemitism-definition/