Though I try to get most of my writing done at night, during the day, I’m a lawyer.
I practice both estates and trusts litigation and immigration law. Very different areas of law, but as with so much related to the practice of law, success in both hinges on determining the truth.
And how does one solicit the truth? Well, there are of course different ways.
When you are seeking to have your client express the truth, you can have them swear an affidavit, be cross-examined, or have them testify in open court. In my immigration practice, when attempting to convince an immigration officer of one’s temporary intention to visit Canada, or one’s history of persecution in a foreign country, a sworn statement attesting to that truth is always critical.
When you are seeking to extract the truth from an opposing party, you can always cross-examine them yourself, and see what sort of admissions you can get. In my estate litigation practice, it is often necessary to cross-examine an opposing party trying to put forth a suddenly-discovered-will, and ascertain how they found it, when they found it, and why the signature looks nothing like the deceased’s at all.
Getting an admission
Recently, I’ve spent some time preparing to cross-examine an individual for a litigious estate dispute. Along the margins of certain documents, or peppered through my notes, one can see in red pen, “get admission!” I’ve written this as I prepare the questions I plan to ask, and which the stenographer at the examination will write down along with, hopefully, the answer containing an admission.
Once a detail is admitted, and is on the record, it can be useful. Oftentimes, it is advantageous not only to have a document that proves that “X” happened, but it helps to have a witness admit that “X” happened, or that the document proves the same. “You would agree, that this photograph of you standing on the glass floor of the CN Tower confirms that you did, in fact, visit the CN Tower?” An admission confirms a detail. It can be used to put together a chronology of a case. To tell a story. An admission can also be used to impeach the credibility of the witness later on; to prove that they lied, or to demonstrate that they meant to mislead. It sets boundaries.
For all these reasons, the word “admit” has been on my mind in recent days. I also felt like I had seen it a bunch on social media recently, and in doing my research for this column, I now feel vindicated. There have in fact been many recent admissions when it comes to the War in Gaza.
The narrative
Interrogation of Ahmad Kahalot, Sr. Hamas member, admitting that Hamas used hospitals in Gaza as military facilities
Taken together, the admissions that I collected (produced below), have enabled me to draft this 100% true statement, for which I have chosen my words carefully:
On October 7, 2023, Israel - a land where Hamas acknowledges Jews have lived for thousands of years - was attacked by Palestinian terrorists.
In the time leading up to these attacks, Hamas purposely deceived Israel into believing that Hamas cared about supporting the well-being of the Palestinian people in Gaza, and building up the civilian infrastructure. Instead, Hamas spent that time planning acts of inhumane cruelty against Israel. They even dug-up and converted water pipes into rockets in preparation.
On October 7, Hamas terrorists kidnapped women and children with a plan to rape them. They beheaded people, killed others, injured many, and tortured Israelis. Some of the terrorists engaged in the attacks worked for the United Nations.
When the kidnapped Israelis were taken to Gaza, they were held in hospitals, including the Shifa and Nasser Hospitals. Hamas was using, and continues to use, Gaza’s hospitals as military facilities. They hid 70 hostages at Nasser Hospital at one time, using patients as human shields.
Once the War in Gaza began, Israel undertook precise military operations to target Hamas’s terror infrastructure. Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) responded, in some cases, turning their weapons on their own people. In fact, Yahya Sinwar did not care about the loss of Palestinian lives, believing that every dead Palestinian was a success in the public relations war against Israel. A PIJ rocket even hit the Al-Ahli Hospital, killing civilians. The Palestinians sought to blame Israel for that attack, for which PIJ knew they were responsible.
When Israel opened evacuation routes for Palestinian civilians, Hamas prevented them from escaping to safety, blocking the road and sending people back to active war zones.
International media began reporting on the conflict, repeating Hamas propaganda first, and fact-checking later - the BBC’s bias in their reporting on Israel even knowingly putting Britain’s Jewish community at risk. The UN issued a report about “Children and Armed Conflict,” blaming Israel for putting children in harm’s way, but omitting details about Hamas using civilians as human shields. They blamed the omission on the length of the report, noting that the requisite word count was limiting. Inflammatory stories in Al- Jazeera about the IDF raping women in Shifa Hospital were entirely fabricated, and were quietly deleted.
Hamas’s Ministry of Health inflated the numbers of casualties reported in Gaza. By April 2024, including terrorists killed, approximately 22,000 Gazans had died, instead of the allegedly 33,000. There was no record of over 10,000 alleged casualties reported.
Culturally, Israel has been targeted too, with national Eurovision juries breaking Eurovision rules, discriminating against Eden Golan - Israel’s Eurovision entry - because of their anti-Israel views. But for such discrimination, she could have won.
In the almost nine months since the war began, much humanitarian aid has made its way into Gaza. There is no famine in Gaza. Where aid has failed to reach the Palestinian people, it is not Israel’s fault - it is the fault of Hamas, who has been stealing and looting the aid entering Gaza. Palestinians are unable to leave Gaza and enter Egypt, as the Egyptians refuse to admit Palestinian civilians fleeing the war into their country.
Despite this, and in recent months, the United States, Israel’s closest ally, has cut military shipments to Israel by approximately 50%. All this while Israel is negotiating a ceasefire in good faith, even when Hamas does not know where all the remaining hostages are, or even whether they are alive.
If they could, Hamas militants would go back in time and do nothing different on 10/7, even knowing the extent of the disaster it would cause in Gaza. They want to perpetrate 10/7 over and over again, until Israel no longer exists.
The specific admissions
Wall Street Journal headline, June 10, 2024
So what admissions have I used to construct this narrative?
In chronological order, and using the most reliable sources I could find, I’ve used these:
Of course, many details of what has transpired over the last almost-nine-months are missing from the above. The proof of those events are found elsewhere, and there is ample evidence of what happened on 10/7, 10/8, 10/9 all the way up to today, 07/03. If you are following along however, understand the actors, comprehend the motivations, and can see through some significant bullshit, then you know what is happening.
The above, however, is produced in an effort to dispel some of the lies and propaganda surrounding this war.
Given the tendency of the international media to report-first-and-fact-check-second, bogus stories and biased agendas quickly find their ways to front pages or boosted tweets. Given our tendency to believe what we read first, and not thoroughly fact check the plethora headlines we read in any given day, false stories that we may be apt to believe are stuck in our brains. They are difficult to dispel, even if the next day, the story is rebutted, proven wrong, withdrawn, or deleted. Such corrections are infrequently on the front page, or highlighted.
No matter - the damage is already done.
This is a problem, and this is why the truth matters.
It matters because the above proves that Israel is not to blame when aid does not reach Palestinians, or when Palestinians are prevented from fleeing into Egypt. It proves that Hamas planned to invade Israel, intended to rape, torture, kidnap, and kill innocent Israeli men, women and children. These admissions prove that Hamas uses Gaza’s hospital infrastructure as military facilities. They prove that Hamas leadership knows Jewish history and acknowledges the Jewish connection to the Land of Israel, but manipulates it to fit their propaganda and sway useful idiots on college campuses to their side of an ahistorical argument.
It proves that Hamas prevents Palestinian civilians from evacuating active war zones, blocking Israeli-made evacuation routes. It proves that Hamas and PIJ celebrate dead Palestinians, not caring when a rocket misfires, killing a family or hitting a hospital; they see a PR victory. It proves that stories used to support bogus allegations of an Israeli genocide are fabricated. That international media knows that their coverage is prejudicial against Israel and the Jewish world, and don’t really care. That there is no famine in Gaza. That Hamas does not know where all the Israeli hostages are. That the architect of this war, Yahya Sinwar, is quite pleased with the destruction he has brought to his people.
There is a time and place for story telling. That time is not now.
Today, we need truth-telling. We can begin with our enemy’s admissions, who know well what damage they have wrought. We can expose them, repeat them, make them the starting points of our advocacy efforts, and confront the darkness of lies with the light of truth.
We all have a role to play, and it begins with educating ourselves.
Only by exposing their lies, can we hope for a swift judgment.
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This is a refreshing article. It is so important that media is held accountable for all the distorted information they spew to create a different narrative than the truth. We need to ensure that the facts are shared. This is not a war that Israel chose and Hamas and Iran are responsible for all the deaths on both sides. Israel is fighting a just war against savage terrorists who have no respect for life and seek to eliminate in the most barbaric ways, every Jew in the world. This is their doctrine, they don’t try to hide it and it is time that everyone opens their eyes to the truth. Facts matter!
This is a refreshing article. It is so important that media is held accountable for all the distorted information they spew to create a different narrative than the truth. We need to ensure that the facts are shared. This is not a war that Israel chose and Hamas and Iran are responsible for all the deaths on both sides. Israel is fighting a just war against savage terrorists who have no respect for life and seek to eliminate in the most barbaric ways, every Jew in the world. This is their doctrine, they don’t try to hide it and it is time that everyone opens their eyes to the truth. Facts matter!