A play by a single character: John Kirby. Centered on the stage is a monitor, with running footage of scenes from Gaza. A podium to the left of the monitor facing the audience. The screen and the podium under two independent spotlights. John Kirby walks all the way till he reaches the podium, 90 seconds after the footage on the monitor started playing. Now he is facing the audience. From behind the curtain a voice emerges: three, two, one. Kirby gives the following monologue consisting of 5 statements only:

• The state of Israel has the right to defend itself.
• No indication of Israel committing genocide.
• Hamas is an ideology, and you cannot destroy an ideology.
• Hamas is an organized entity, like an army.
• The day after.

End of the play.

The “state” of Israel has the right to defend itself. And despite tens of thousands in casualties, millions in forced displacement, and mass destruction, ‘no indication of genocide.’ Questioning what Kirby can or cannot say, and what he can, cannot, or refuses to see, will only lead to a speculative chain of thought. The only thing certain here are the words that came out of his mouth, on which I, just like anyone else, can only give my opinion, and comment. 

First of all, I agree with Kirby here: Israel is a state defending itself. And clearly, the word ‘genocide’ is more abstract than one may think, at least from Kirby’s point of view. So let us not call it a genocide and simply call it for what it is: tens of thousands in casualties, millions in forced displacement, and mass destruction. But for it to happen, it needs to first be possible. ‘Tens of thousands in casualties, millions in forced displacement, and mass destruction’ is possible when a state (let alone an occupying one) is defending itself. 

• Israel is a state defending itself. 
• ‘Tens of thousands in casualties, millions in forced displacement, and mass destruction’ is possible when a state is defending itself.

Notably, to think that ‘tens of thousands in casualties, millions in forced displacement, and mass destruction’ is a bad thing is to either question the state of concern in this context, or question the notion of the state from the speaker’s point of view, Mr. Kirby. 

He goes on to demonize Hamas. While the direction he chose is not original or authentic in any way, he did go the extra mile with it. He says, ‘Hamas is an ideology, and you cannot destroy an ideology.’ But ideologies can be destroyed, at least in my opinion. An ideology is a formal definition of an idea, a reduction of an idea to the finite, with a form, shape, and boundary. But who cares about my opinion. Kirby’s own school supposedly ‘sacrificed’ to ‘destroy’ an ideology less than a hundred years ago: Nazism. 

It is not ‘contradiction’ that makes Kirby call Hamas a non-perishable ideology, contrary to the case with Nazi ideology. Actually, if Mr. Kirby is anything, he is ‘consistency.’ In Kirby’s (western) rhetoric on both Hamas, and the Nazis, the word ‘ideology’ would serve the same purpose: hiding an idea and its origin. 

But Kirby’s extra mile is not covered yet. He continues demonizing Hamas by saying Hamas is ‘an organized entity, like an army.’ So if Hamas is an ideology, a formalized idea, an institutionalized idea, a doctrine, as per his claim, and has an organized army, then Mr. Kirby could have demonized Hamas by saying: Hamas is a state. Great! Mr. Kirby is now giving everyone a lecture on the ‘state,’ not as we know it but as a notion: it is as abstract as you want it to be. 

So let us otherwise imagine a play where Kirby decides to change his monologue thus far (the first four statements) to say:

• ‘Tens of thousands in casualties, millions in forced displacement, and mass destruction’ happens when a state is defending itself.
• ‘State’ is a notion that can be exploited as a means of demonization.

Where would he converge or arrive? In my opinion, in the same place he did anyway: the day after. As long as the ‘Palestinians’ are fighting for a state and demonized for that action, and Israel, being a state, can do anything possible, thinkable, to defend itself, ‘the day after’ will remain a Palestinian question. Until the question withers away with its subject.