David May

Economic Warfare Analyst and Research Manager at @FDD, father, former @TerpsFootball kicker, vegetarian, pun enthusiast

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

At a bar this weekend, I spoke with a random person in their young 30s. She mentioned that she and her sister-in-law have political disagreements.

I asked her which subject in particular.

She said: Israel-Palestine.

So, I asked which side she stands on.

She said she was opposed to Israel genociding Palestinians.

Trying not to give away my position, I asked: What makes you say that?

She said it was Israel killing 200,000 Palestinian children.

I told her that was interesting because Hamas's death toll, which includes fighters, sits at around 70,000. At that point, she made it clear that she wasn't interested in changing her opinion.

We have a propaganda and misinformation problem. It seems that many people have developed strong opinions based on lies. But perhaps correct information could help dispel the lies. Though, I suspect the truth doesn't matter as much as the narrative.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

Some Jews are complaining about being Tokea-nized

[Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani @NYCMayor]

T’ruah means a shout, a battle cry for justice, a joyful noise that calls us toward collective liberation.

I was honored to celebrate the work of Rabbi Jill Jacobs and @truahrabbis at their gala. This year’s honorees, including New York’s own Gili Getz, remind us that solidarity is a practice.

As Tehillim teaches: “Fortunate are the ones who know this joyful shout.”

Grateful to be in this struggle for justice alongside you.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

@bethanyshondark @realrabbilinda @karol Did she get their hopes up about free samples?

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

@bethanyshondark Maybe she was just having a tough time ... finding a parking spot in that lot.

[Caolan @CaolanReports]

For weeks, Irish politicians have dodged questions about the refinery in Ireland supplying Russia’s war machine.

So I tracked down government minister Niall Collins at a farming show.

He refuses to back sanctions & his stance was worse than I expected.

Avoidance.

[Mark Goldfeder @MarkGoldfeder]

The thing about real genocides is that they are not hard to prove.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

Sure, there’s a lot of snark here.

But the underlying point is the double standard that Israel faces. When agitators are unruly and act out, police forces respond with force. But if Israel does it, decontextualized clips cause international furor.

[Sharren Haskel השכל שרן @SharrenHaskel]

Violent bullying against flotilla anarchists at the airport in Spain cannot go unanswered. The Spanish Ambassador must be summoned to explain these hostile actions. We need accountability now.

[Michael Starr @StarrJpost]

Two men were indicted for planning to assassinate German Jewish leaders for Iran, German prosecutors said.

Ali S. and Tawab M, allegedly plotted to assassinate Central Council of Jews in Germany president Dr. Josef Schuster and German-Israeli Society chairman Volker Beck.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

Of all the unforced PR disasters that Israel has had, this might be the most unforced.

[איתמר בן גביר @itamarbengvir]

ככה אנחנו מקבלים את תומכי הטרור

Welcome to Israel 🇮🇱

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

I think the IDF dangerously miscalculated humanitarian aid needs into Gaza and the extent to which Hamas was able to capture the aid and deprive the population of food, thereby contributing to hunger in Gaza. There are many instances of troops being too twitchy or trigger happy. That is very different than the malice being attributed to the IDF.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

Comments like this prove my point. The narrative is distorted from reality to cast Israel as a cosmic evil. Wars are violent, and that is why we should avoid them whenever possible. And there is plenty of room to criticize how Israel prosecuted the war against Hamas.

But there is a vast difference between Israel killing civilians in a campaign to defeat a genocidal enemy and the accusation that Israel is massacring civilians in a genocide. For many, however, Israel's guilt is a foregone conclusion, and anyone pushing back is a genocide denier.

I'll repeat: Hamas's figure of around 70k Gaza deaths INCLUDES Hamas fighters. We don't have exact numbers of killed fighters, but they are in the tens of thousands. So, in dense urban fighting, Israel achieved a remarkably low civilian-to-combatant casualty rate. Israel achieved this through advance warning, calling off strikes, and facilitating the entry of humanitarian aid even when Hamas stole it, and despite the many measures Hamas took to increase civilian casualties (building tunnels underneath civilian areas, using civilian areas as command centers, not allowing civilians to flee combat zones, etc.).

But many will skip past 10/7, the brutal fighting, and the human shields and claim that based on the death and destruction, the Gaza war was a genocide.

There are two general camps of people who make this claim.

1. The people who actively support the resistance and see the value in advancing the claim that Israel is committing genocide.
2. The well-intentioned people who are duped by the pictures and the sad stories.

The first group is beyond reach, but the second group should be reachable. Anyone given a cartoonish story of good and evil would support the side presented as innocent victims.

But this camp should understand that their well-intentioned support for a people that is suffering tremendously (the Palestinians) is energizing antisemitism. Jews are being scapegoated as genocide supporters, thereby justifying attacks on them even though Israel is fighting a war against genocidal enemies.

There are real consequences for the false genocide claim, but I doubt the well-intentioned people claiming that Gaza is a genocide will have the introspection to realize the damage they are causing.

[Leonidas29 @CheriC69965]

@DavidSamuelMay 70 thousand civilians, including children, which i believe is over 20 thousand. Its still a genocide and we dont like it.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

Since this has gotten so much attention, if you are able, please pray for a speedy recovery for Masha bat Chaya Ita.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

At a bar this weekend, I spoke with a random person in their young 30s. She mentioned that she and her sister-in-law have political disagreements.

I asked her which subject in particular.

She said: Israel-Palestine.

So, I asked which side she stands on.

She said she was opposed to Israel genociding Palestinians.

Trying not to give away my position, I asked: What makes you say that?

She said it was Israel killing 200,000 Palestinian children.

I told her that was interesting because Hamas's death toll, which includes fighters, sits at around 70,000. At that point, she made it clear that she wasn't interested in changing her opinion.

We have a propaganda and misinformation problem. It seems that many people have developed strong opinions based on lies. But perhaps correct information could help dispel the lies. Though, I suspect the truth doesn't matter as much as the narrative.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

Sore Ansch-loser

[Acyn @Acyn]

Massie: I would have come out sooner but I had to call my opponent to concede and it took a while to find him in Tel Aviv

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

Not what we had in mind when we called for more Zionist camps.

[Michael Karlis @MichaelKarlis]

TX-35 Democratic candidate Maureen Galindo says she will convert ICE detention center in Karnes County into an internment camp for "American Zionists."

"It will also be a castration processing center for pedophiles, which will probably be most of the Zionists," she added.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

*TERP

[andy peacock @AndyPeacock999]

Who's this twerp?

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

Perhaps you missed the details. 70k is Hamas's estimate of total Palestinian deaths in Gaza, including fighters, not the number of children deaths. 70k (or 200k) dead kids is a very different scenario from an urban war in which Israel killed tens of thousands of Hamas fighters despite them hiding among civilians. Meanwhile, Israel went to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties, though one can disagree with their civilian-to-combatant casualty threshold for authorizing strikes on militants or other decisions Israel made.

But painting brutal war thrust upon Israel as an Israeli attempt at genocide is simply wrong.

[Princy Mthombeni @Princymthombeni]

The same government that took Israel to the ICJ is now saying it cannot stop coal exports because of WTO rules. So which is it? Bold enough to make global headlines, but too powerless to act economically?

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

Some thoughts based on the replies.

1. Not sure why people are confidently denying an event that happened to me this weekend, but yes, this was a real conversation.

2. There is a huge difference between "Israel killed 200,000 children" and "The estimate given by Hamas is around 70,000, which includes tens of thousands of Hamas fighters that Hamas doesn't separate out, and it was in tense urban fighting in which Hamas fighters dressed as, mingled with, and hid behind civilians." Any civilian death is terrible, but people die in war. In fact, most people who die in war are civilians. Opposing death is the only moral position. Making up statistics to justify a claim of genocide, thereby energizing antisemitic attacks, is wrong and dangerous.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

@davidgross_man @kampeas Agreed. But you can make the same point without retweeting a hate site.

[David May @DavidSamuelMay]

@EliLebowicz Some useful כלים שונים?

[Menachem Wecker @mwecker]

JNS, a wire service with 100-plus subscribing news publications, was told there was no room for it to cover this event.