Famed Queer Theorist Judith Butler Calls October 7 Hamas Terror Attack ‘Armed Resistance’

Judith Butler (Andrew Rusk / Flickr / CC / Cropped)
Andrew Rusk / Flickr / CC / Cropped
Joel B. Pollak

Philosopher Judith Butler said Sunday that the Hamas terror attack in Israel October 7, in which 1,200 people were murdered, was “an act of armed resistance,” not a terror attack, saying it was debatable whether it was the “right thing.”

Butler was the guest speaker at Paroles d’honneur, a left-wing political debate show. She is known as one of the leading thinkers in the radical left-wing “queer theory” movement. She has publicly opposed the State of Israel for decades.

In her remarks, Bulter said that she “did not like” the October 7 attack, and said that she had “gotten in trouble” — i.e. from the left — “for saying it was, for me, anguishing.”

But she also insisted: “It is not a terrorist attack, and it is not an antisemitic attack. It was an attack against Israelis … The violence done to Palestinians has been happening for decades. This was an uprising that comes from a state of subjugation, and against a violent state apparatus, okay? Let us be clear … Let us at least call it armed resistance, and then we can have a debate about whether we think it’s right, or whether they did the right thing. … You know, it is an open debate.”

The audience applauded her remarks enthusiastically.

Butler, who identifies as Jewish, lesbian, and non-binary, was recently criticized by Jewish feminist Phyllis Chelser:

Butler appears to be either ignorant of or deliberately concealing several important facts: Israel left Gaza in 2005. Hamas—an Iranian-funded Islamist terror group—controls, indoctrinates, tortures, torments and impoverishes Gazans. Hamas has taken the lion’s share of the aid meant for Gaza civilians and diverted it into their own bank accounts abroad and into building their terror tunnels and weaponry. No Arab country has been willing to offer Gazans refuge, even temporarily. Egypt has walled off Gaza from the Sinai. Hamas has increasingly forced women to wear veils, marry into polygamous families and risk being honor-killed if they “shame” their families.

…

Do[es] this non-binary lesbian … not understand that, if they lived in Gaza, Hamas would torture and behead them—along with any other LGBT person Hamas could get its hands on?

Butler was also the chief antagonist of then-Harvard University President Lawrence Summers when he warned, twenty years ago, that anti-Israel criticism on campuses was leading to a rise in antisemitism — words that have proven true.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent book, “The Zionist Conspiracy (and how to join it),” now available on Audible. He is also the author of the e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

Photo: file

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