Cui bono – who benefits?

Yesterday in Washington DC, a man shot dead two young Jewish people.  Israel’s embassy in the US has named the couple shot dead i as Yaron and Sarah. Levi Shemtov is a rabbi in Washington who met the couple. They were “nice people, popular” people he says, and this was “brutal news”.

ON October 7, Hamas and other Palestinian paramilitary groups invaded the fringe of Israel. A  total, 1,195 people were killed: 736 Israeli civilians (including 36 children), 79 foreign nationals, and 379 members of the security forces.

In February 2024  Donald Trump was shot in the ear at a rally by a would-be assassin.Details of the wound have never been released, but some think he was wounded by shrapnel rather than the bullet itself. Later Trump boasted “I took a bullet for America”

In all three incidents, it’ may be worth asking “Cui bone?” Who benefits?

Well, to take the assassination attempt first, Trump benefits. Yes, his ear was wounded, or there was blood or something like it dripping from his ear. He suffered, but gained enormously among his followers as he appeared bleeding and clenching his fist in the air, shouting “Fight! Fight! Fight!”

Cui bono? Trump.

On October 7 2023, Israel suffered the loss of nearly 2,000 of its people. Cui bono? Well, Hamas apparently. Israel then went on a murderous tour and has killed well over 50,000 Palestinians, many of them women and children. Cui bono? Well, Israel. Certainly not the Palestinians.

In Washington DC, two young Jewish people were killed. Cui bono? On the face of it, the man who murdered the young couple. But public sympathy is probably with the two people killed.

Events,however, sometimes have unintended consequences. Or at least unexpected.

Did Donald Trump  really get his ear nicked by an assassin’s bullet? It’s hard to say – he was out of sight for several seconds, before his resurrection with a stream of blood at his ear. He gained considerable admiration for his courageous response, so he actually was the one who benefited from the attack.

Likewise the Hamas incursion into Israel. The horror of what happened gave Israel the obvious justification for attacking Hamas and, since they were in the way, the entire Palestinian people. Who benefited? Long-term Israel – it will take years if ever to reconstruct the Gaza Strip.

As to the double killing in Washington DC, it came at a time when Israel was being deserted even by those who had been hard-core in their support for that country. The brutality of yesterday’s attack swung the needle back in Israel’s favour, if only temporarily.

What am I saying? I’m saying that maybe Israel itself facilitated the slaughter by Hamas. It certainly produced a circumstance where Israel could embark on the genocide of a people, yet get the sympathy of many countries as they did so.

I’m saying Trump could have staged a faked attack on his life,  to boost his popularity further.

And I’m saying that Israel may have been compliant in the deaths of the two young Jewish people in DC. After all, it gives support for Israel’s claim that a lot of people in the US, especially on college campuses, are violently anti-Semitic.

In short, I’m suggesting it’s possible – no more, just possible – that the apparent victims in all three cases could have benefited from the attack. The two young people killed in DC won’t come back, but it’ll give Israel an excuse to stand as the victim of anti-Semitic people.  And I’m suggesting it’s possible – no more, just possible – that Hamas were helped to enter Israel and slaughter so many. Would Netenyahu haave baulked at the death of two thousand Israelis in return for a chance to slaughter tens of thousands of Palestinians? And I’m saying it’s most definitely possible that Trump was involved in a degree of fakery in the apparent attack on his life.

Because many conspiracy theories are bonkers doesn’t mean that some aren’t true.