LewRockwell
“First of all, don’t target civilians.”
~Murray Rothbard’s first principle of just war in his essay, “Just War”
Like Hans Hoppe I have been a friend of Walter Block’s for decades. I co-authored a book and an article with him, sponsored a guest lecture by him at my university; lectured twice at his invitation at Loyola University New Orleans; wrote dozens of online articles in his defense when he was libeled by the administrators of Loyola University Maryland for giving a world-class (but non-woke) lecture on the economics of discrimination; and wrote in his defense against the New York Times smear of him.
Walter has published hundreds of articles but he is probably best known to the general public for his book, Defending the Undefendable, and many related writings and speeches. He is indeed very libertarian when it comes to such topics as the legalization of drugs and prostitution, ride sharing, privatization of government-run soccer fields and swimming pools, rent control, and myriad other mundane topics. He used to be very libertarian on the issue of war as well, emailing a number of us at the outset of the Iraq War that “this will separate the men from the boys,” with the “boys” being faux libertarians who would support the bombing, invasion, and occupation of Iraq.
But in the past eight months Walter Block has abandoned the principles of libertarianism with regard to war with his full-throated support of the war crimes committed by the Israeli government by intentionally targeting and killing tens of thousand of civilians, including women, children, and babies in Gaza. (A real American libertarian would argue that Israel’s war, and Ukraine’s war with Russia, are none of our business, period).
Walter Block is what Ryan McMaken has called a “microlibertarian.” He sounds libertarian when it comes to legalizing drugs and prostitution, but on the big, paramount issue of war he has become an outspoken advocate of war crimes committed by the Israeli government.
Walter Block has always been “pro-Israel” and no one at the Mises Institute, named after the son of a Jewish Rabbi and co-founded by Murry Rothard, a New York Jew, ever gave it a second thought. He is no longer an unpaid senior fellow at the Mises Institute not because he is “pro-Israel,” as some uninformed or dishonest commentators have asserted. It is because the Mises Institute cannot be associated with such a well-known, prolific, public advocate of the intentional targeting and killing of Palestinian women, children, and babies.
Israel has every right to defend itself against future barbaric attacks by the gang of murderous thugs known as Hamas– and anyone else — but that’s an entirely different matter than having a “right” to commence a campaign of genocide against the civilian population of Gaza, as has been occurring in recent months — accompanied by the almost apoplectically enthusiastic support of Walter Block.
Walter “justifies” the mass killing of civilians by invoking a theory of collective punishment, something that was outlawed by the Fourth Geneva Convention. Writing in the Wall Street Journal, he and a coauthor lectured us that “The West” must support “an overwhelming, unprecedented use of military force” and that “Hamas is and will be responsible for any civilian casualties.” It’s not the bombs supplied by the U.S. government to Israel and dropped on civilian-populated areas that are responsible for civilian deaths, they write, but Hamas. Israel must do “whatever it takes,” to defeat Hamas, and their subsequent writings prove beyond all doubt that that includes the war crime of targeting and killing civilians.
The West, they say, has a “moral duty” to “support Israel” in its effort to “do whatever it must to finish this war in the fastest way possible, with minimum civilian and military casualties on its side” (emphasis added). That is, minimum Israeli civilian casualties, but to hell with worrying about Palestinian civilian casualties. This is moral?
Walter has written several belligerent articles on an Israeli Web site called Israel Hayom. One is entitled “Open Letter to the “Children of Gaza” in which he conflates the Hamas murderers with ALL parents in Gaza. “Your parents,” he writes, “launched a despicable, unwarranted . . . attack on October 7” where “Many Israeli children were mangled, just as you now are; many more have been slaughtered, the fate of all too many of you Gazan children.” In saying this he sheds an ocean of crocodile tears.
Of course, it is complete nonsense and a lie to say that ALL parents in Gaza participated in the murderous attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. It is heartless and cruel and sociopathic to tell these children that it is not Israeli/American bombs that are maiming and killing them but their own parents. In a “moral, just society” writes Walter Block, our new self-appointed pope of morality and justice, “you would be taken away from your evil mothers and fathers.” Yes, and placed under the tender loving care of the IDF and the Mossad in a concentration camp built just for you…
READ FULL ARTICLE HERE…. (lewrockwell.com)
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