> ## Content Index
> Fetch the complete content index at: https://otherwise.ghost.io/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further.

# When the wretched of Gaza returned
- URL: https://otherwise.ghost.io/when-the-wretched-of-gaza-returned/
- Published: 2025-07-14T12:54:06.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-17T13:44:04.000Z
- Description: Death’s dream kingdom for six hours and one minute
- Author: Khaled Salih
- Tags: Newsletter, #Migrated-1792244264359, #Import 2026-10-17 14:38

By Khaled Salih

[Subscribe](#/portal/signup)

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d6/2c/d62cdd13-a476-41c5-8f2c-29270c99d95d/content/images/2026/10/1132c5db-d308-4fb6-a326-90672f1fbf4d_586x830-jpeg.jpg)

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedIn death’s dream kingdomText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedLet me also wearText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedSuch deliberate disguisesText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedRat’s coat, crowskin, crossed stavesText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedIn a fieldText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedBehaving as the wind behavesText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedNo nearer—Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published— [T. S. Eliot](https://poets.org/poem/hollow-men?ref=otherwise.ghost.io)

The title of this article and choice of the poem by T. S. Eliot is inspired by and by [Benjamin Kerstien](https://benjaminkerstein.substack.com/p/the-monster-of-post-colonialism?r=15k8og&utm%5Fmedium=ios&triedRedirect=true) and an interview with [Amit Segal](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I%5Fmo4Q2OimI&t=540s&ref=otherwise.ghost.io).

Apologies for failing to write a shorter version. Once you get through it, I imagine you might pardon me.

One of the most horrifying stories I heard about the Islamic State atrocities in the summer of 2014 was a particular disturbing detail: When Islamic State terrorists stormed the Kurdish Yezidi homes in Sinjar and many other other places they had a list of every household with details of family members, females, and under-aged girls. How did they get such details? It turned out that the Arab Muslim neighbours had provided the Islamic State operatives with every detail possible. Of particular interest for the ISIS top terrorists was the number and identity of their favourite preys: girls with blue eyes, blond hair and light skin. Howard Bloom summarised powerfully the horrors the Yezidi girls and women were subjected to based on interviews with surviving victims. This description has stayed with me since I read it years ago.

> “N THE FALL OF 2014, a Saudi fighter for the Islamic State, ISIS, in Al-Shaddadi, Syria, bought a female slave in the market, a 34-year-old Yazidi captive. He raped her over and over again. Why else do you buy a female slave? Then he purchased a second sex slave. This one was a 12-year-old girl. And suddenly the handcuffs of the Saudi fighter’s lust came off. Said the 34-year-old sex slave after she escaped, the ISIS fighter raped the 12-year-old youngster “for days on end despite heavy bleeding.”10 The 34-year-old escapee says with a mixture of despair and disgust, “He destroyed her body. She was badly infected. The fighter kept coming and asking me, ‘Why does she smell so bad?’ And I said, she has an infection on the inside, you need to take care of her.”  
>  
> “‘She’s just a little girl,’ pleaded the 34-year-old. But the ISIS fighter answered: ‘No. She’s not a little girl. She’s a slave. And she knows exactly how to have sex.’’’ Then he added something vital: “And having sex with her pleases God \[Allah\].” So the fighter never provided medical care. Instead, he prostrated himself on the floor next to the adolescent girl’s bed, prayed to Allah, then mounted the child over and over again. Each time when he was finished, he laid himself out on the floor again and prayed. We do not know the end of the story. We do not know if Allah the merciful, Allah the compassionate ever answered the prayers with healing. And, frankly, we do not know if the fighter even bothered to pray for such a thing.” \[3\]\[3 Howard Bloom, 2016, *The Muhammad Code: How a Desert Prophet Gave You ISIS, al Qaeda, and Boko Haram—or How Muhammad Invented Jihad*. Port Townsend, WA: Feral House\].

Like most students of Middle Eastern politics and society, I was horrified to follow the news of the invasion and pogrom on 7th October 2023, and following weeks and months. While researching for an article about the first few days of the brutal attacks, I came across a hand-written message from one of the terrorists.

Reading that short massage took me back to the immense suffering of the Kurds during Saddam Hussein’s military campaign called *Anfal* (the Spoils of War) in 1988, leading to massive casualties and destruction among Iraq’s Kurdish population (almost 182,000 perished; 4,000 to 4,500 villages were razed to the ground; 30 towns destroyed and depopulated; hundreds of schools, mosques, hospitals, farms, and wells were also destroyed or poisoned—part of Saddam Hussein’s strategy to eliminate not just *Pêshmerga*, but Kurdish livelihood and presence).

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d6/2c/d62cdd13-a476-41c5-8f2c-29270c99d95d/content/images/2026/10/8bbf12bd-11ed-4bf4-b723-a26da3dd2d37_605x280-heic.jpg)

Saddam Hussein’s regime was based on the ideology of Arab National Socialism known as the Ba‘th (Arab Socialist Ba‘th Party), but when he decide to embark on his genocidal attack agains the Kurds, he was convinced by one of his generals to call it Anfal (title of a Quran Surah). The general, strong supporter of the Ikhwan (The Muslim Brothers) reportedly told Saddam Husseisn that using *Anfal* would grant him religious legitimacy and potential silence from the Muslim-Arab world. I And so it it became, as in Muslim imagine and rhetoric, the Kurds are stigmatised as the second Israel in the heart of the Muslim word. Their long-term survival was secured only a US-led coalition that later removed Saddam Hussein from power.

The handwritten found by the IDF is a ritualistic and a religious battle cray before entering a battle.The first three words, “Allah has purchased,” refer to Quran 9:111, where Allah barters with the believers’ lives and property in exchange for paradise. “They fight for Allah’s cause, so they kill and are killed.” In the era of suicide attacks, this verse serves as the terrorist’s *modus operandi*.

In the second paragraph, the attacker is urged to “present” themselves well, sharpen their “knives,” and be “sincere” in their intentions toward Allah, for the Prophet “sought to invade and be killed.” This is a direct reference to a hadith¹¹ titled “The Virtue of Jihad and Going Out (to Fight) for Allah’s Cause.”¹²

The text then mentions several Muslim warriors who contributed to Islam’s spread through conquests. It concludes with two charged terms: *Khaybar* and *Dhu al-Fiqar*. To this day, *Khaybar* is associated with the Quranic chapter *Anfal*/Spoils of War and, according to Muslim narrative tradition, refers to the Muhammad’s massacre of Jews he had previously expelled. *Dhu al-Fiqar* refers to the Shiite leader Imam Ali’s sword with a bifurcated tip. There is no finer sword than Ali’s, and no greater hero than he.

In searching for answers about Saddam Hussein’s choice of the term *Anfal*, I came also across an instructional letter from the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. On October 18, 2023, the Ministry of Awqaf and Religious Affairs sent a directive to Palestinian mosques with guidance on sermon content for Friday prayers.

The third point on the list of ten sharia-based justifications was verse 60 from the *Anfal* surah, beginning with the words “Prepare yourselves.” The sixth point is a favorite *hadith* among Muslim preachers: “The Hour will not come until the Muslims fight the Jews, until the Jew hides behind stones and trees, and the stones and trees say: O Muslim, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him, except for the *gharqad*, for it is one of the Jews’ trees.”

If the intention is to kill every Jew, using religious indoctrination and justifications, what happens if they get a chance to realise the dream? If the people of Gaza, militants, non-militants, educated, non-educated, trained and prepare for the mission, and the ones who just managed to cross the border to Israel, what will they do? How will they behave?

In a stark contrast to the Nazis and Saddam Hussein, both Islamic State and Hamas terrorists gleefully shared their atrocities with the world. Tragically, and despite publicly available evidence, coordinated campaigns did, and still do, everything they can to cast doubt on the most horrifying element of the attacks on October 7th, particularly rape as weapon of war and its systematic nature. Adding to the suffering the surviving victims, their loved ones, relatives and friends was a combination of rejection, denial and outright accusations about validity of the undeniable evidences in the public sphere. With a report by the [Dinah Project](https://thedinahproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/The-Dinah-Project-full-report-A4-pages%5Fweb-1.pdf?ref=otherwise.ghost.io), titled *A Quest for Justice October 7 and Beyond*, this narrative must change, actions must be taken, ideologies must be questioned, individuals and organisations must be held accountable.

The Dina Project report offers a harrowing and meticulously documented account of **conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV)** during the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, and subsequent captivity. Recognising that CRSV is not merely a side effect of war but an **intentional, strategic weapon** deliberately used to dehumanise and spread terror, the report introduces a **groundbreaking dual approach** featuring innovative legal and evidentiary frameworks. By moving beyond traditional proof and accepting a broader range of evidence—from survivor and eyewitness accounts to first responder testimonies, second responder corroborations, and visual materials—the report powerfully concludes that the sexual violence on October 7th was **widespread, systematic, and tactically employed as a weapon of war, ultimately part of a genocidal scheme**. This pioneering work, which also attributes broader responsibility through adapted legal principles like joint criminal enterprise, not only seeks justice for the victims of these horrific attacks but also aims to establish vital precedents for global accountability, working to prevent impunity for CRSV in conflicts worldwide.

As [Dr. Einat Wilf](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agyUjoOrrzc&t=15s&ref=otherwise.ghost.io) has consistently argued October 7, 2023, was the direct realisation of a long-standing Palestinian vision of “return,” an ideology she terms “Palestinianism.” This “return” is not an innocent idea but “a violent invasion and triumph” synonymous with the destruction of the Jewish state. The Dinah Project report, in its meticulous documentation provides concrete, evidence-based support for Wilf's assertion that October 7th was a deliberately planned, ideologically driven attack aimed at the dehumanisation and destruction of Israeli society.

Wilf asserts that the events of October 7th were [“what the Palestinians wanted all along,”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lsY7v36ZKo&ref=otherwise.ghost.io) a [“working plan”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPZEbY4ovlY&ref=otherwise.ghost.io) rooted in their ideology. The Dinah Report’s core premise directly corroborates this, stating that CRSV on October 7th was “an intentional, strategic tool employed to dehumanize its direct victims and thus spread fear and degrade the group, collective, or nation.” \[p. 12\] The report concludes that Hamas “used sexual violence as a tactical weapon of war.” \[p. 14\] This is further reinforced by official UN reports cited by Dinah, which found "reasonable grounds to believe that conflict-related sexual violence occurred" and that the “complexity and modus operandi of the attacks... appear to demonstrate a significant level of planning, coordination and detailed prior knowledge of the targets selected.” \[p. 27\]

Wilf has described October 7th as a [“brutal invasion and undoing of the Jewish state,”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agyUjoOrrzc&t=15s&ref=otherwise.ghost.io) a [“calculated attack.”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixWWb7zrdAM&ref=otherwise.ghost.io) The Dinah Project's extensive research confirms that the sexual violence was “widespread and systematic,” \[p. 14\] occurring across at least six different locations, including the Nova music festival and several kibbutzim. The report details “clear patterns” \[p. 15\] in how CRSV was perpetrated, such as victims found naked or partially naked with hands tied, evidence of gang rapes followed by execution, genital mutilation, and public humiliation. This systematic nature aligns with Wilf's depiction of a coordinated, ideologically motivated assault rather than isolated acts of brutality.

Wilf explicitly links Palestinianism to a genocidal ideology, aiming for the [“destruction of the Jewish state.”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agyUjoOrrzc&t=15s&ref=otherwise.ghost.io) The Dinah Report powerfully concludes that the sexual violence was ultimately part of a genocidal scheme. It notes that CRSV aims at the “total dehumanization of Israelis and Israeli society,” \[p. 12\] and by “attacking sexuality, one of the primary sources of life and a symbol of humanity’s existential continuity, CRSV sends a message of death and destruction to all.” \[p. 12\] This deliberate attack on the communal autonomy reinforces the genocidal dimension that Wilf emphasises.

Dr [Wilf](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lsY7v36ZKo&ref=otherwise.ghost.io) attributes the perpetuation of Palestinianism to decades of grooming and indoctrination in UNRWA schools. The Dinah report’s legal framework for **Joint Responsibility in Mass Attacks with Genocidal Intent** directly addresses this, stating that “analysis of the ideology that motivated Hamas operatives carries clear legal significance.” \[p. 44\] It highlights that documents recovered from Hamas operatives reveal "explicit intent to commit genocide while categorically negating the humanity of Israeli civilians", \[p. 45\] and that religious rulings permitted attacking “everyone—including children, women and the elderly.” \[p. 45\] The report argues that individuals who join such an ideologically driven “violent horde that lacks any moral restraint” \[p. 48\] bear responsibility for all crimes committed.

Dr. Einat Wilf stresses that October 7th was not an isolated act of terror but a fulfilment of a century-long vision. The Dinah report similarly asserts that the sexual violence “cannot be regarded as isolated or treated like everyday sexual offenses.” \[p. 56\] It argues that viewing CRSV through the lens of “regular” sexual offenses “fails to consider both the unique structural and contextual dimensions of these crimes.” This shared emphasis on the extraordinary, ideologically driven nature of the attack distinguishes both analyses from those that might dismiss the atrocities as mere criminality.

In essence, while Dr. Einat Wilf provides the overarching ideological and historical context for October 7th as the “War of Return,” the Dinah report provides the forensic and legal validation, detailing how this ideology manifested in the widespread, systematic, and tactically employed sexual violence, ultimately proving its genocidal intent. The report’s proposed legal and evidentiary frameworks are a direct response to the complexity and severity of crimes committed within such a deeply ingrained ideological conflict, aiming to ensure accountability for what both Wilf and the report contend was a deliberate act of annihilation. Imagine if the wretched of Gaza had as long time as the Islamic State to more cities and communities deep inside Israel, or as Saddam Hussein with no one military power stopping his genocidal mission. Like the Islamic State terrorists, an overwhelming majority of of the October 7th attackers had detailed information about the households, the communities and the individuals torture, raped and killed. Like Saddam Hussein’s mass killers they used religious symbols, texts and justifications to behave in most inhuman way possible.

The Dinah Project is doing what Raphael Lemkin did after the Holocaust. A Polish Jew, Lemkin defined *genocide* while the Dinah Project introduces a framework for Conflict-Related Sexual Violence (CRSV). Lemkin addressed the absence of a legal term for the mass extermination of groups, successfully advocating for the United Nations Genocide Convention to establish this crime in international law. In contrast, the Dinah Project, spurred by the October 7, 2023, attacks, focuses on the challenge of proving and prosecuting CRSV when direct victim testimony is often unavailable. Its innovation lies in adapting existing legal doctrines to create an innovative legal and evidentiary framework that considers circumstantial evidence and joint criminal responsibility to ensure accountability for these “crimes without accountability.” While Lemkin gave a name to what he called “a crime without a name,” may the Dinah report bring the perpetrators of the October 7th justice and may the October 7th pogrom be last one the Jews face.

Where Lemkin created a name for “a crime without a name,” the Dinah Project is crafting a legal framework for what have too often been “crimes without accountability.” By creatively applying existing legal doctrines — including circumstantial evidence and joint criminal enterprise — the Project offers a path to justice even when victims cannot speak.

This isn’t just legal theory. It’s an urgent response to the brutal reality of systematic sexual violence deployed as a weapon of war. The Dinah Project’s report does more than document atrocities — it redefines how the law can function in the aftermath of silence, trauma, and mass violation.

May this framework bring the perpetrators of the October 7th atrocities to justice. And may the October 7th pogrom be the last the Jewish people ever endure.

[Subscribe](#/portal/signup)