The Other "Genocide" in Israel

They're just not human.

There are too many things going on in Israel right now that are so upsetting and infuriating for me that I can’t even bear to write about them. So I’m going to write instead about something that a lot of other people in Israel are extremely upset and angry about, some even calling it a “genocide,” but about which I don’t think they should be as upset as they are, and I also think they are blaming the wrong people. I’m referring to how COGAT, the government body that administers civilian affairs in Judea and Samaria, this week arranged for 262 deaths.

But not of people. It was the shooting to death of 262 crocodiles. Yes, you read that correctly.

The 262 crocodiles were housed at a farm in Petzael. Several such crocodile farms have been created in Israel, some as tourist attractions, and others for leather production. (Many years ago I was filmed for an Animal Planet TV special about Biblical animals at a crocodile farm in the Negev, which I just discovered has been made freely available for viewing here. In the picture below, I am behind the scenes at a US zoo, feeding an alligator.) A certain temporary Israel law allowed for the farming of wild animals, which was utilized for both crocodiles and ostriches. However, when this law expired, animal rights groups successfully pressured the government not to renew it.

There have been many clashes, both in Israel and other countries, between animal rights activists and wildlife conservation authorities. For example, animal rights activists will oppose the culling of feral cats and dogs, while conservation authorities are more concerned about the devastating effects that these have on wildlife.

The dispute over farming wild animals is another such instance. There is nothing more cruel about farming crocodiles and ostriches than farming cows and chickens (in fact, the latter is generally considerably more cruel). In the US today, alligators and other wild animals such as deer are farmed for meat. But people’s emotions get more stirred up about animals that are considered beautiful (as we discovered when we served peacock at one our Exotic Feasts) or that are wild. And thus the animal rights groups successfully fought for the farming of these animals to become illegal.

It’s all very well to rule it illegal to kill and sell a crocodile, but then what do you do with 262 of them? Dr. Simon Nemtzov, our Chief Scientific Advisor at the Biblical Museum of Natural History, was formerly Head of International Relations and Wildlife Ecologist at the Israel Nature & Parks Authority. Back in 2012, when the crocodile farm at Pitzael was declared illegal, COGAT tasked him with finding a solution for the crocodiles, and allocated millions of shekels for the job.

This was an immense challenge. Crocodiles are not endangered in the wild, and these crocodiles could not be placed there. They breed in captivity very easily, and no zoo wanted to buy them. Initiatives were explored to rehouse them in Cyprus and in South Africa, but these countries eventually pulled out. It was impossible to find a solution.

Meanwhile, the crocodiles were being housed in a farm that the owner no longer cared to maintain and was growing increasingly dilapidated. COGAT paid for fence repairs, but there were still serious problems. The crocodiles started eating each other. Recently some youths broke in for some “fun” with the crocodiles (see pictures below). Fortunately nothing happened in that incident, but the entire farm was an accident waiting to happen (note that crocodiles are far more dangerous than alligators). Crocodiles did live wild in the Land of Israel not too long ago, as I discuss in my new book The Lions Of Zion. But they were hunted to extinction by the Gawarna tribe for understandable reasons - as they were a threat to human life. Imagine if dozens of crocodiles escaped to the Kinneret!

And so, regrettably, the only solution left was to humanely euthanize them all. This led to some people getting very upset, but there was simply no better alternative. It was the right thing to do.

Still, the entire situation was very unfortunate. I don’t know if the animal rights activists consider the result of their efforts - the euthanasia of hundreds of crocodiles after several years of poor living conditions - to be a victory, but I certainly don’t.