When it Comes to Israel, Numbers Don't Lie - Except When Hamas Does; And Narratives Matter - Always
April 24, 2024 - Issue #49
This essay is about numbers and narratives. But first, some foreground.
Soon the IDF will enter Rafah to put an end to the first phase of fighting in Gaza. Hamas will then no longer dominate Gazans and the door for humanitarian aid and rebuilding efforts will swing wide open. Will Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Jordan, and others support those efforts? That remains to be seen. But their willingness to help Israel fend off Iran’s attack on April 14 is a promising sign. Perhaps the Arab leaders of those countries know something that protestors and antisemites at NYU, Columbia, and other college campuses don’t know—that it is Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, Jihadism, and Palestinian refusal to say yes to peace that is the problem—not Israel.
Which leads me to Hezbollah.
As readers of this newsletter know, I believe it will not be long before Israel will find itself in a much hotter war with Hezbollah—most likely after the IDF rips Hamas from Rafah. Then, Hezbollah will have to choose—continue firing missiles and UAVs at Israeli civilians and homes (a war crime the international community ignores) and at military targets or stand down. If Hezbollah continues to fire, Israel will have no choice but to end by military means Hezbollah’s ability to do so. On the other hand, if Hezbollah stands down what difference will it make? Will that alone convince evacuated Israelis that it is safe to return? Will businesses reopen and new businesses start up in the north? Will the government invest into the infrastructure of a region that can be emptied by Hezbollah at any time? Will tourists return?
If there is one lesson learned from October 7, it is that Israel will never again allow terrorists to congregate near Israel’s borders. Nor will citizens willingly return to face another October 7. Therefore, if Hezbollah does not retreat voluntarily, I suspect one way or another the IDF will force it to.
And then, of course, there is Iran. Sooner or later, and maybe now, Iran will reach the breakout stage for arming itself with nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them. Something that the United States has promised would not happen but will do little about. At that point, Israel will face a choice—accept the unacceptable—or act alone.
None of these three problems—Hamas, Hezbollah, or Iran—can be resolved by negotiation. Not because Israel would refuse to negotiate (except for Hamas only about return of hostages), but because the other side has no interest in negotiations that do not put them in a better place to achieve their goal of destroying Israel. But will the international community, and most particularly the United States, give Israel the leeway it needs to win the wars it must fight against these three main enemies? That concern is why the comment of Scott Galloway, the well-respected Professor of marketing at NYU, resonated with me—that “Jews [are] allowed to fight back for a truce but not to win a war.”
That is where we come to the issue of narrative. Because it is the narrative in place that might most impact Israel’s ability to defend itself. It is narrative that creates the perception as to who is the good guy and who is that bad one.
Since 1967, Israel has been losing the Information War. Not just because of antisemitism. Not just because of events out of its control and not just because of Israel’s real or perceived errors of judgement. Nor just because of a combination of all the above. Simply put, Israel is falling farther behind in the Information war because it has lost the narrative. Now, it is branded by many a colonial power leaving many to prioritize so-called Palestinian rights. And now, for some in the Western world and for many in the Muslim world, it is about Jihadism. It is through those narratives that many view what happens now. It is those narratives that create the straw through which each individual event is viewed and that simultaneously blocks out context and reason. It is those narratives that are buttressed by terms such as the “right to return” which is no more than a request and a code for the destruction of Israel or “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” which for many is a call for replacing Israel with a Palestinian state.
And so, it is time that Israel, and we, must fight for our narrative, which is about Israel’s rights. Israelis have a right to their sovereign nation of Israel, the historical homeland of the Jews through which Jews have remained connected since ancient times by culture, religion, and presence. A right that the United Nations confirmed in 1947. And, as part of their right to their sovereign nation, Israelis have a right to live in Israel securely and with safety, free of terrorism and attack from those who would take the land from them and kill them. Having these rights, Israelis have the right to defend themselves from Palestinians who have tried to take away Israelis’ rights through unrelenting war and terror for the last seventy-five years.
And so, it was Israelis’ rights that Hamas violated on October 7. It did so to initiate a process that would take for itself Israel from Israelis. Hezbollah hopes to do the same. And it is Iran, a thousand miles away, that wants to establish Shiite supremacy in the Muslim world and sees destroying Israel as a vital step in that direction. Understanding their nefarious goals and recognizing Israel’s rights is the necessary first to step before reaching an opinion about ongoing events. When accusations are made against Israel, one must analyze motives as well as methods. What benefits Israel’s goal of protecting its peoples’ rights vs what benefits Hamas’s goal of destroying Israel. Same with Hezbollah, and Iran. Within that context, Israel can and will make mistakes and errors of judgement. That is the nature of war. It is the inevitable byproduct of war—a war caused by a clash of Israel’s right to survive in safety and security versus its enemies’ desire to destroy it. But those mistakes, awful as some are, do not negate Israel’s rights to defend itself from those who would destroy it.
Which brings me to numbers. Numbers that are believed by many because they fit neatly within the false narrative that Israel’s detractors have skillfully weaved.
So much of the dispute regarding Gaza these days is over the tragedy being experienced by Gazans. Non-combatants are dying. Non-combatants are living in squalid conditions, and some are food deprived due to a variety of reasons. But the simple truth is that it is the fault of Iran and Hamas—entities that continue to vocally and publicly deny Israelis have a right to survive in their own sovereign nation. But a death is a death. Hamas knows this. That is why the Hamas controlled Gaza Health Ministry publishes its propaganda about the number of deaths and then keeps repeating it. But repetition is not truth. Especially when it is not verified. Especially when to further their cause the disseminators of the death toll hide behind civilians to maximize the number that do die and would be benefitted by claiming more have died than really have. Even so, in part because of the false narrative about Israel that has been weaved, far too many accept the Hamas controlled Gaza Health Ministry (HGHM) numbers.
But now, there is new information that taints the HGHM’s reporting with a stink. Let’s dig in.
HGHM wrote in its most recent report that about 33,000 Gazans have died since the war broke out. It does not distinguish between Hamas terrorists and civilians. Israel believes it has killed at least 13,000 terrorists, reducing the count of civilian casualties to 20,000. But even that is a number not to be believed because HGHM admitted that 45.9% of those it counts as dead came from media notifications. That’s 15,000 of the 33,000 claimed to have died! And, according to an analysis I reviewed, a trend that worsened from January 1 to March 31, when 77.7% of the claimed deaths came from media sources. What media is HGHM talking about? HGHM does not say. Gaza has no media independent of Hamas. Is it Al Jazeera, the Qatari network that has minimized the atrocities of October 7 and clearly is biased? Were bodies counted? What methodology did the so-called media use? Or is it just made up?
Nor do we know how many of the claimed deaths were caused by Hamas and Islamic Jihad rockets falling short into civilian populated areas in Gaza—by now more than 1,000 rockets. That is about as indiscriminate a bombing as it gets. Something tells me that thousands have died due to that.
And it gets worse, HGHM admitted that it had incomplete data for 1/3 of the deaths it reported (things like date of death, names, etc.). Perhaps understandable in a war zone, but when in conjunction with the fact that:
for the last three months most of the dead bodies have not been counted by the agency,
that no distinction is made between civilians and non-civilians,
there is no breakdown for those killed by short-falling missiles,
and no accounting is made for Hamas friendly or not so friendly fire against its own people
something indeed smells. Especially attempts to suggest Israel is at fault. But yet, Israel is vilified. Unfairly so, I think.
But there is more.
Abraham Wyner, a Professor of Statistics and Data Science at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, studied the numbers of deaths put out by the HGHM between October 26 to November 10, 2023, when HGHM was reporting daily, something it subsequently discontinued. Wyner found several anomalies that led him to conclude that the death numbers were faked, more likely ordered up by Hamas and then reported by HGHM. Although tempted, I won’t bore you with the details other than to give you these vignettes—HGHM reports that women and children comprise 70% of the deaths and that the vast majority of that 70% are children. Wyner says that is impossible given the number of combatant casualties and the number of adult males and adult females in Gaza. Also, the steady daily increase of casualties reported caught Wyner’s eye. The straight line arching upward was too smooth, lacking any deviation, which made it statistically, extremely suspect. More smacking of fraud than truth.
These death count numbers matter because they have greatly impacted public opinion that has been willing to uncritically accept as fact numbers disseminated by an agency with clear motivation to lie. Especially so, because as I have explained in my previous newsletters, never before has any nation so humanely conducted such a difficult urban war that Israel is fighting in Gaza. Attesting to that are the ratios between dead combatants and civilians, that even if HGHM’s numbers are true, prove Israel’s care for civilian lives not Israel’s depravity.
I could go further, but instead I’ll leave you to check out Wyner’s analysis out for yourself either at this link with his Tablet article or this one where Wyner appeared on Dan Senor’s podcast.
What especially interests me, however, is not just the fraud perpetrated by Hamas and its supporters, but why so many people have been taken in by it. I think the issue of narrative plays an important role—that Israel is the bad guy not the victim. It is how strongly one narrative prevails over the other that will become important in the future—when Israel moves into Rafah, when Israel deals with Hezbollah, and when Israel deals with the scourge that is behind so much of the evil it, and the world, faces—Iran.
Therefore, we have a job to do. It is Israel’s rights that we must vocally defend lest our silence undercut them.
The Northern Arena and the Shiite Axis – Weekly Review of Events and Key Data (April 15 to April 21, 2024)—Written by the Alma Research and Education Center Staff—April 21, 2024
Six Months Into The War in The Northern Arena – A Summary of Key Insights and Trends—Written by Dana Polak Kanarik & Tal Beeri for the Alma Research and Education Center—April 7, 2024
Preventive War: Its Disappearance from Israel’s Security Toolbox and the Need for Its Return—Written by Brigadier General (res.) Dr. Meir Finkel for the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies—April 21, 2024
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6e1b06b5-1563-43bb-90a1-dab647ac362a_995x655.png)
Matti Friedman: Why I Got a Gun—Written by Matti Friedman for the Freed Press—April 19, 2024—An interesting discussion of the present situation in Israel.
Israeli Weapons Damaged Iranian Air Defenses Without Detection—Written by Yonah Jeremey Bob for the Jerusalem Post—April 21, 2024
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F5b81a4e4-281f-472c-bb10-bf5c651731b9_1225x783.png)
Drone Strike at Isfahan Has Worked Before, Was it the Right Move Now? - Analysis—Written by Yonah Jeremey Bob for the Jerusalem Post—April 2o, 2024
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1e7cbada-8987-4943-9e67-6b461e9f6459_1200x798.jpeg)
Anti-Defamation League Report Card Grades 85 Universities’ Records on Antisemitism—Written by Antonette Bowman for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies—April 16, 2024 AND SEE THIS LINK TO THE ADL REPORT
and for this:
Click on the link below for the video which you simply must watch. It is contained in an article in the Jerusalem Post titled - 'F***ing murderous k*ke': Pro-Palestinian protestors harass Jewish woman in NYC
![An Iranian military truck carries parts of an S-300 air defence missile system during a military parade as part of a ceremony marking the country's annual army day, in Tehran on April 17, 2024. (ATTA KENARE / AFP) An Iranian military truck carries parts of an S-300 air defence missile system during a military parade as part of a ceremony marking the country's annual army day, in Tehran on April 17, 2024. (ATTA KENARE / AFP)](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F00837d58-ccf8-4c05-a394-a3d1d50c54ed_640x400.jpeg)
Israel Used Radar-Evading Missile to Hit S-300 Defenses Near Natanz Nuke Site – Report—Written by times of Israel Staff—April 20, 2024
Intel Report: Qatar’s Funding, Policies Led Directly to Oct. 7; it Shouldn’t be Key Mediator—Written by David Horovitz for Times of Israel—April 8, 2024
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc18877ab-4710-4904-a7a4-4a535c6d40e4_1219x641.png)
Hamas Kills Aid Workers to Manufacture Gaza Food Crisis, Fatah Charges—Written by Jerusalem Post Staff—April 23, 2024
Hezbollah Claims to Target IDF Base with Burkan Missile—Written by Seth J. Frantzman for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies—April 17, 2024
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F876c991d-a565-4879-b886-6261f6c44702_1500x812.jpeg)
Israel’s Next Steps: Build on Victory—Written by James Jeffrey for the Jerusalem Strategic Tribune—April 2024
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff2381a2b-5970-4d14-bc76-d0df31b423bd_1224x797.png)
Israel: UNRWA Review Group Org Has Anti-Israel Bias - Exclusive—Written by Michael Starr for the Jerusalem Post—April 17, 2024
Israel’s Struggle with Hezbollah—A War Without End is now available in eBook and hardback format on Amazon and IngramSpark. This compelling narrative explores Hezbollah’s origins and cancerous growth, traces Israel’s response, and reveals Israel’s present readiness to meet Hezbollah’s challenge.
Cliff Sobin
Important Link—Alma Research and Education Center: Understanding the Security Challenges on Israel’s Northern Border
In 1947, the U.N. did not confirm Israel’s right to be sovereign in a part of the historical homeland of the Jewish people. It was suggesting that the Jews engage in a “land for peace” deal with the Arabs of Palestine. The compromise over Jewish lands failed then and has failed ever since.
It bears repetition the chronology:
1. The Ottoman Empire lost WWI, as a consequence it lost all its imperial holdings in the Middle East, a loss later confirmed by treaty - so part of international law.
2. About 1% of that lost territory was repurposed to establish a sovereign state for the Jewish people. The League of Nations created a system of Mandates to fulfill this vision as well as returning the other 99% to the rule of the prior imperial ruler, the Arabs. These Mandates all created applicable international law.
3. The Mandate for Palestine was supported by additional treaties, confirming its status in international law.
4. Upon the League’s demise and the creation of the U.N., the rights afforded the Jewish people under the Mandate were recognized in Article 80 of the U.N. Charter as not subject to change or diminishment.
5. When the Arabs rejected the 1947 compromise, the entirety of the Mandate lands legally became sovereign Israeli land upon the Mandate’s termination and Israel’s declaration of independence (something the Arabs of Palestine never declared for themselves).
6. The illegal Arab seizure and 19 year belligerent occupation of parts of the former Mandate lands did not alter international law’s application.
7. In a continuing search for a political settlement, Israel has formally annexed only “East” Jerusalem to reunite its capital city.
The lesson to be taken is that Israel’s creation was fully consistent with the applicable international law of the time. You lost a war, you lost land that the victors could dispose of as they saw fit.
Perhaps the only thing that was unusual in this particular territorial dispensation is that, for once, the Jews received some measure of justice, however belated. Maybe that’s what rankles so many today.
Given the “genocide” and starvation that have been going on for 7 months+, there must be only 40-50 Palestinians still alive right?