Collective Punishment and Collective Guilt

Hamas, Pharaoh and the Tragedy of Gaza

"All the innocents who suffer from your stubbornness and pride"
--- The Plague Song, from The Prince of Egypt

I really admire Martina Navratilova. She is a woman brave enough to stand up even against extremism on her own side of politics. But on Saturday night, she unfairly quote tweeted a disturbing out of context snippet from Israel's President Isaac Herzog, in which he is portrayed as legitimizing the targeting of civilians in Gaza. In the clip he says: “It’s an entire nation that is responsible. This rhetoric about civilians not aware, not involved, it’s absolutely not true.”

I found this quite disturbing, so did some quick research, and found that this is not a recent statement, not something he said in January in the context of the terrible death toll in Gaza. Rather it was from a press conference he gave on 12 October, when the bodies from 7 October were still being counted and Israel was in shock. In this 12 October press conference he said (italics on the clip Martina posted): “First of all, we have to understand. There’s a State. There’s a State, in a way, that has built a machine of evil right at our doorstep. It’s an entire nation that is responsible. This rhetoric about civilians not aware, not involved, it’s absolutely not true. They could have risen up. They could have fought against that evil regime that took over Gaza in a coup d'état…” He continued to speak about how Israel withdrew, wanted to make peace, that “we said to our nation, this will be Hong Kong of the Middle East. Well reality has turned into a tragedy… We are at war…. We will fight until we break their backbone.”

Harsh words even in context. Yet I found that in the same press conference, he was specifically asked to clarify these remarks “You seem to hold the people of Gaza – the civilians -- responsible for not trying to remove Hamas and therefore by implication that makes them legitimate targets.” He responds in frustration. “No I didn’t say that.” But the problem is “The missile comes from a kitchen onto my children.” The problem is that it is impossible to work out who is a civilian and who is Hamas. Israel must fight. And innocent people will die.

Aside from the unfairness of Martina’s tweet that includes only the text in italics, this discussion brings up the issues of collective punishment and collective guilt (are they the same thing?). I have indeed been very disturbed by some of the extreme posts and statements from some Israelis (including MKs), who, unlike Herzog, have indeed said things like “There are no innocent civilians in Gaza”. Who liken Gazans to Amalek. This is dangerous rhetoric, because it appears to legitimate precisely the collective punishment that the Israeli government so adamantly argues is not its policy.

But of course we do know that in times of war, people do suffer collectively. Disastrous and immoral decisions are made by a portion of a population, and many innocents die in the cross-fire as “collateral damage”. Germans suffered terribly in the fall of Nazi Germany, and this included even those who risked their lives to protect Jews. The suffering was indiscriminate. Gaza today faces similar destruction. How do we grapple with the reality of collective punishment, and how does this differ from collective guilt? Can Jewish tradition offer any guidance?

I am reminded of the passages in Exodus we have just read on Shabbat, about the Ten Plagues, of how all Egypt suffered because of the intransigence of Pharaoh, who doubled down while his entire country was devastated. As is often asked, did the Egyptians deserve to suffer like this? What kind of God inflicted such indiscriminate suffering to punish the actions of a single tyrant? Surely each person is punished only for his or her own sins?

We can find guidance in Deuteronomy (24:16)

לֹא־יוּמְתוּ אָבוֹת עַל־בָּנִים וּבָנִים לֹא־יוּמְתוּ עַל־אָבוֹת אִישׁ בְּחֶטְאוֹ יוּמָתוּ׃

Parents shall not be put to death for children, nor children be put to death for parents: they shall each be put to death only for their own crime.

The Rabbis deduce from this that a court can punish a person only for his or her own crimes. Collective punishment is forbidden.

Yet in the Decalogue in Exodus (20:5-6), we see a different message (regarding idol worship):

כִּי אָנֹכִי יְהֹוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ אֵל קַנָּא פֹּקֵד עֲוֺן אָבֹת עַל־בָּנִים עַל־שִׁלֵּשִׁים וְעַל־רִבֵּעִים לְשֹׂנְאָי׃

For I your God am an impassioned God, visiting the guilt of the parents upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generations of those who reject Me.

It would seem that human courts are not allowed to punish the sons for the sins of the fathers, but God can and He does. What does this mean?

I think that here we need to make a distinction between collective guilt and collective punishment. Of course the actions of others affect us morally and practically. Even if we are not actually guilty for the actions of those close to us, we often feel a sense of collective guilt. Thus German children today are only just beginning to shed the sense of guilt for the crimes of their Nazi great grandparents. At some point, such inherited guilt does dissipate, but serious collective sins (Nazism, slavery, …) - these do not wash away quickly.

Yet the Torah does not permit any human being to apply collective punishment for such collective guilt. Such punishment is left in the hands of God, who is the One who visits the sins of fathers on the children, not any human court.

There is an important lesson here. The Torah understands that, however unfair it may be, collective punishment is often inevitable. When a stubborn despot like Pharaoh (or by analogy Hamas) refuses to back down in the face of certain defeat, the despot’s subjects always suffer, often terribly. This is not justice, but the reality of cause and effect. The Torah interprets such suffering as an act of God, and tells human beings they are not to cause such suffering deliberately - because such decisions are in the hands of God, and we have no right to play God. In effect, God takes the blame so that we understand our own moral limits.

So coming back to the distressing humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, yes there is a certain collective guilt in Gaza. It is impossible to escape a sense of culpability when the whole society around us is organized around a death cult that worships murder and hatred. The consequence of being in such a society is that one will suffer. But such suffering must only occur as an “act of God” - unintended consequences of military action against genuine military targets. The goal of such action can never be collective punishment. Which is I believe what is actually happening in Gaza. Israel has and continues to do its best to avoid the suffering of innocents, as it should. Because it is not for us mere mortals to pretend, like Pharaoh, that we can set ourselves up like gods.

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