On October 7, 2022, Hamas invaded 22 points in Israel by land, sea and air, massacring innocent youngers at a music festival, burning people living in border communities alive in their homes, decapitating babies, and numerous women were raped. They were even heartless enough to break into kindergartens and to stain teddy bears with the blood of slaughtered babies. As of today, more than 1,400 Israelis have been killed, some 5,312 Israelis have been wounded, and over 210 are held hostage by Hamas in Gaza. Israeli forensic experts have already confirmed that Hamas is guilty of rape, torture and other crimes against humanity against their victims.
Simultaneously, thousands of rockets were fired into Israel from Gaza and Lebanon, thus effectively putting normal life in the Jewish state to a halt as the whole country rushed to bomb shelters. Some Israelis have been evacuated from their homes due to intensive rocket fire, an act which prompted many to crowd into hotels in Eilat and along the Dead Sea and others to leave Israel altogether. As the Jewish people faced all of these atrocities, one must ponder, how have the Armenians responded to the present war in Israel?
Israel does have one fan in the Armenian community, the actress Kim Kardashian. Immediately after the October 7 massacre, her sister posted a sympathetic message towards Israel, but then came under fire from pro-Palestinian social media users and then retracted her statement only to have Kim herself post this instead: “Brutal terrorism has taken innocent lives and now both innocent Palestinians and Israelis are suffering and paying the greatest price there is. No matters whose side you are on, our hearts should always have room for compassion towards innocent victims caught in the crosshairs of warring over power, politics, religion, race and ethnicity. I don’t know who needs to hear this but both Israelis and Palestinians deserve to live in peace and safety. Anyone trying to convince you that one must come at the expense of the other does not support human rights for all.” In the end, despite her pro-Israel sentiments, she condemned violence on all sides and did not specify the October 7 massacre directly.
Unfortunately, the Armenian government and the mainstream Armenian political organizations as well as media outlets did not show nearly as much sympathy to Israel as Kim Kardashian did. Recently, at a time when Israel is more dependent than over on oil imports from Baku as the Jewish state fights against the brutal Hamas terror organization, whose crimes on October 7 parallels the Yezidi Genocide in terms of brutality, ANCA, the main Armenian political organization in the US, published an appeal to the incoming American Ambassador to Israel to put a halt to Israeli arms sales to Baku, not caring how this could impact Baku’s oil shipments to the Jewish state at a time of war. The Armenian organization to date has remain deafly silent about the October 7 massacre, but did condemn Israel for not only sending arms to Baku but also for a series of other things as well. ANCA published this statement literally at a time when Israelis are crowded into bomb shelters. The fact that Israel experienced the worst massacre since Israel was established has not prompted them to tone down their rhetoric or be more sensitive to Israel.
On X, formerly known as Twitter, the Armenian Ministry for Foreign Affairs did state: “We are shocked by the violence between the Palestinians and Israel and targeting of the civilian population. We express condolences to the relatives of the victims and a speedy recovery to the wounded. We join international calls to stop the violence.” However, they failed to note the October 7 massacre specifically. Even worse, Armenian Radio referred to the Hamas terrorists as “militants” while the Armenian Weekly engaged in even more anti-Israel rhetoric.
According to the Armenian Weekly article titled ‘How the military escalation in Gaza could impact the South Caucuses’, “On October 7, 2023, Palestinian Islamist militant group Hamas launched operation “Al-Aqsa Flood,” aiming to destroy the Israeli army positions near Gaza and capture as many soldiers as possible, in order to exchange them with the almost 7,000 Palestinians detained in Israeli prisons. The operation created a shockwave in Israeli society, killing more than 1,000 soldiers and civilians. As a result, Israelis started indiscriminately bombing Gaza, killing civilians and threatening ethnic cleansing through a land invasion. The danger that the escalation will turn into a regional conflict involving Iran and Hezbollah is high. Such a step would surely have devastating consequences for the region and a domino effect beyond the Middle East.”
Another article in the Armenian Weekly titled ‘Why is the US government so vigilant about Israel but not Armenia’ even explains why the Armenians lack so much sympathy for the innocent victims of Southern Israel who were massacred, mutilated, raped and tortured in the cruelest and most barbaric manners possible: “Understandably, most Armenians are furious at the Israeli government for permitting its arms manufacturers to provide 60-percent of Azerbaijan’s advanced weapons, which have killed and wounded thousands of Armenian soldiers during and after the 2020 War.” However, they are not able to rise above their resentment of the Israeli government and to demonstrate sympathy for the innocent civilians of Israel, who suffered the worst massacre in their nation’s history.
In contrast, the Flame Towards in Baku have lit up in the colors of the Israeli flag, the Israeli Embassy in Baku has been flooded with flowers, candles, teddy bears and other gifts given by Azerbaijanis to the Israeli people in their hour of need, and the Working Group for Azerbaijan-Israel Interparliamentary Relations issued a statement saying: “We condemn unequivocally and in the strongest terms the wide-scale attacks against Israel from the Gaza Strip, accompanied by indiscriminate rocket strikes targeting civilian infrastructure objects, population centers, and civilians.” They added: “We stand firmly with Israel in these hard times.”
Rachel Avraham is the CEO of the Dona Gracia Center and the editor of the Economic Peace Center. She is the author of “Women and Jihad: Debating Palestinian Female Suicide Bombings in the American, Israeli and Arab Media.”
