Cometh the miserable hour, Cometh The Baffler, bringing unhappiness both specific and general.
https://thebaffler.com/latest/running-amok-turfah
Specific
In a video, a soldier shares a revelation, “I’m going through these terrorists’ houses looking for guns and explosives . . . at every single house”—he can hardly contain his excitement—“inside of Gaza this is what I see. Every single—unbelievable.” He opens a dresser, narrating, “Two or three drawers stuffed with the most, ehh, exotic lingerie that you can imagine. Just piles of it. Every single house. Stuffed to the brim! Look at that!” he says, dipping in a hand, lacing his fingers through it, “Unbelieeevaboh,” his British accent thickening. He adds, following a strange grunting sound, “These naughty, naughty Gazans.” The video, shared as an Instagram story, includes a poll: the prompt is “WHAT DYA THINK,” and viewers choose from the following: (1) Kinky terrorism, (2) Wtf, (3) Halal, (4) Haram.
The soldier in question is Levi Simon and the video itself - if you chuck in some additional context and have a decidedly darker sense of humour - funny.
About a month before said video came to light, Jewish News published an article (
https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/stay-stron ... ill-be-ok/) interviewing the parents of diaspora Jews who had gone to fight with the IDF. Simon’s mother provided much stirring material about the young lad and his sense of duty to his people and to Israel, the fine qualities his service has developed in him etc. To compare this, scant weeks later, with self-posted footage of him pawing though bedroom drawers, waving around what look to me like perfectly ordinary items of women’s underwear as if they were the contents of a particularly outré bondage dungeon is quite the contrast.
General
While many viewers might find this content disturbing, they are not the target audience. In Israel, where a majority opposes a ceasefire and supports starving Gaza, this content is, on the whole, incredibly well-received. It offers the folks back home an image of fortified dominance, the illusion of control. In March 2024, the liberal Zionist daily Haaretz detailed, in a report titled, “We’re Not Only Here to Fuck Hamas,” how battlefield imagery has flooded online dating profiles in Israel. Beyond its sexual currency, this content, like the torture of Palestinians aired on mainstream Israeli television, functions as entertainment. Telegram channels sharing graphic images of dead or dying Palestinians—and foreign aid workers—have amassed hundreds of thousands of subscribers.
I was talking to an ex army - British rather than Israeli - friend of mine about this, because I’ve long suspected that if the desire was there, top brass could make it very clear to the rank and file that an
immensely dim view would be taken of putting this stuff online. It can’t do the ‘most moral army in the world’ branding much good for starters. Perhaps the above is a partial explanation of why no one much seems to care.
Brave new world though, innit? I can still remember a time when the excesses of an invading army would come to light through the intrepid work of investigative journalists, aided, perhaps, by some of those selfsame soldiers, who found themselves tormented by the things they’d witnessed and maybe participated in. Now it’s just content, cheerfully whacked up on Facebook or TikTok for all to enjoy.