The Silence of the Activists

By Noah Rothman

Tuesday, April 15, 2025

 

Maybe it wasn’t the most earth-shattering development when Hamas rejected the latest ceasefire proposal, which would have secured a six-week armistice in exchange for the release of only half the living October 7 hostages in the terrorist group’s control. The outfit has established a record of rejecting similar ceasefire proposals — that is, when it’s not violating the terms of the agreements to which it reluctantly consents.

As a result of Hamas’s recalcitrance, the war it inaugurated in 2023 — a war that resumed in March after Israel accused the group of preparing new cross-border attacks – will continue.

 

This development will come as shocking news to those in the West who insist that they and they alone display the kind of concern for the preservation of innocent Palestinian lives we should expect from any civilized society. You’ll read nothing about the latest developments on the feeds populated by Students for Justice in Palestine. The Intercept’s most recent coverage of Gaza is limited to a story published Friday that describes the horrors that followed the collapse of the last ceasefire agreement. To the extent that the far-left agitators with Justice Democrats have focused on the conflict today, it was to rail against the moral hazards associated with America’s support for the Israeli government.

 

Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) seems more focused on events at Columbia University that are only tangentially related to events in the Middle East. Indeed, on days like this one, the imponderable goings on that consume American campus life seem wholly divorced from the conflict that is supposedly motivating students to make spectacles of themselves in the name of peace. Her like-minded colleague, Ilhan Omar, has observed a similarly conspicuous commitment to direct her attention elsewhere.

 

Surely, some enterprising activist will figure out how to blame the ongoing conflict on Israel. Until then, the Americans who turn to these figures for the latest news on the conflict will remain underserved. That is a strange posture from those who present themselves as peace advocates. It’s almost as though peace isn’t the goal.