Lies Spreading Like Wildfire

From Hamas apologists to the Government

As what may turn out to be the largest fire in Israel’s history still rages, there are an astonishing amount of lies, distortions and evasions being spread by people on all sides. For those interested in facts and truths, even if they are uncomfortable, rather than feel-good polemics that make your side look good, here are the corrections to the lies and distortions:

“The JNF planted forests of flammable invasive foreign species.”

This lie seems to have originated with notorious anti-Israeli Israeli historian Ilan Pappe. In fact, the trees are Aleppo pines, which are native to the land. It’s particularly ironic when this lie is spread by Palestinians like Susan Abulhawa, who claims that Palestinians have special knowledge of the natural history of the land, but doesn’t even know its native trees!

“All the JNF forests were planted to hide the crime of the Arab villages that Israel emptied out.”

Most of the forests were planted to undo the centuries of deforestation caused by the Ottomon empire and the Arab shepherds who overgrazed the land and caused erosion. Some were indeed planted to conceal Arab villages that were abandoned. But there was no crime - there is nothing innately wrong in Israel seeking to secure its demographic gains after winning a war started by the Arabs to annihilate it. See this short and excellent letter from Benny Morris on the topic.

“The fires were started by Arab arsonists.”

This is possibly the case, but there is not yet any actual evidence of this. Contrary to Bibi’s claim that 18 suspected arsonists have been arrested for starting the fire, in fact only 3 people have been arrested, and not under suspicion of causing the main fire but of smaller fires elsewhere. As in California, wildfires can start and spread rapidly under extreme weather conditions, even without arson. That is why every country has firefighting services. Unfortunately, after the devastating 2010 Carmel fire that killed 44 people, it was revealed that Israel was woefully unprepared and ill-equipped for dealing with large brushfires. There should have been a State Commission of Inquiry, but that was blocked by the prime minister at that time (who is the same prime minister that we have today). After each of the various wildfires over the years since then, experts and officials have pointed to a lack of preparedness and to warnings that went unheeded by the government.

“The fires started naturally.”

This is possibly the case, but we do not yet know. Certainly Arabs have started wildfires in the past as a form of eco-terrorism. In 1998, an ambush by JNF foresters uncovered a network from the Galilee village of Jilabun that had prepared an elaborate forest-burning battle plan. And an editorial in The Funambulist, a Western political magazine which documents anticolonial, antiracist, queer, and feminist struggles, claims that burning Israel’s forests might be a legitimate form of resistance and part of the noble goal of destroying the Zionist regime. During the current fire, there are certainly plenty of Palestinians spreading encouragement for starting fires on social media.

“The fires are the responsibility of Arab arsonists, who should get the death penalty”

This was stated by Itamar Ben Gvir. As noted above, the fires may well have been naturally started, and spread out of control due to goverments persistently ignoring warnings that Israel is woefully ill-equipped to deal with large fires. One exception was the Bennett government, which in its brief existence listened to recommendations to order fire-fighting helicopters. However, when Ben Gvir came into power, he took the helicopters for the police instead. And in March of this year, despite the fire service being badly underfunded, the government slashed a further NIS 217 million from its budget, while approving five billion shekels for “coalition funds,” of which one billion shekels went to finance charedim for avoiding the army and employment.

Perhaps instead of shouting about giving the death penalty to alleged Arab arsonists, Ben Gvir and the government should be taking responsibility. But then, this is a government which professes to never have responsibility for anything - not the fires, not Meron, not the Hamas attack. It’s always others who are to blame.