For months, many across the globe had to witness the horror of thousands of Palestinians getting killed in a relentless genocide. It didn’t stop at the violence and destruction as the inhumanity and cruelty has also reached sick proportions. In a recent video posted by Israel’s Kan News, we see a presenter, Rotem Achihun shocking the world by joking with IDF soldiers who end up showing her various tank shells. The soldiers walked around, pointing at shells and saying their prices as if they are in a garage sale. Making matters worse, it turns out that these tank shells are not your typical generic weapons as each one is marked with a message directed to its targets, the Palestinian people. Messages like “To Gaza With Love” are scribbled on tank shells whose target is the Gaza Strip.
The video doesn’t stop there as at one point we also get to see Achichun herself writing a note on a missile, one whose fate is to strike a designated area in Palestine. This is not something new as since October 7, soldiers have been firing missiles and rockets that have messages on them. Images of these missiles and rockets have been spreading all over social media.
This ongoing trend has received major backlash and criticism from social media users many of which was directed at Achichun herself. One user said, “She’s Ethiopian?? How can she support a government that sterilised Ethiopian Jewish women without their consent?” Another user likened how the IDF soldiers are treating the killing and bombing of Palestinian like a video game, “Do they really think that this is a video game or something?! I can’t believe this kind of human exists!”
The entire trend showcases how Palestinians are perceived in the eyes of Israeli soldiers as it goes beyond killings and violence towards more creative and saddening levels of inhumanity and humiliation.