No one can watch what I have seen and not be changed by it.
Late Thursday afternoon, I was one of about 20 journalists at a private screening of the raw footage of the 10/7 Hamas attack on Israel.
Security was tight at the Israeli Consulate in Manhattan; the unmarked building was surrounded by police. Our phones and laptops were stored in lockers. We were escorted in small groups through two locked doors to a conference room.
None of us wanted to be there. But all of us needed to be there — for this film, put together by the Israeli Army, will never be made public.
The point of these viewings, the consulate staff told us, was to make sure that 'conspiracies and distortions don't make it into mass media.'
As we know, they already have.
Is there any clearer proof than those grossly misguided and malicious 'activists' making a sport of tearing down posters of hostages held by Hamas? Of assaulting Jews on streets and college campuses?
The youngest hostage, by the way, is 10 months old.
Holocaust denial, now as before, remains very much with us. As does anti-Semitism. This footage is unassailable evidence.
Here is some of what I saw:
On the morning of October 7, Hamas terrorists break into the gated Kibbutz Be'eri in southern Israel, near the Gaza Strip. We see, from Hamas body cams and overhead kibbutz surveillance, a father gather his two young sons, clad only in underwear, and rushes them out of the house into a tiny outbuilding.
A terrorist tosses a grenade inside their hiding place. The father comes into frame and slumps to the ground, dead.
The boys are yanked into their kitchen, the floor splattered with blood. The younger sits at the small kitchen table, the older boy nearby on a sofa, crying.
'DADDY! DADDY! DADDY'S DEAD!'
One of the terrorists observes their hysteria with boredom. He opens their refrigerator, looks around, selects a bottle of water.
'Daddy's dead!' the older boy tells his brother. 'It's not really a prank!'
The younger boy has gone still, his head in his hands. 'I know,' he says. 'I saw.'
The terrorist holds up the water bottle, reconsiders, then puts it back and pulls out a near-empty two-liter plastic Coke bottle.
'I want my mom!'
The terrorist swigs the soda as he strolls out the door.
The older brother goes to the younger. He sees that one eye is bruised and bloodied.
'Can you see with this eye?
'No.'
'You're not joking?'
'No.'
There is even more blood on the floor now. A TV flickers out of frame.
The older boy collapses and begins keening.
'WHY AM I ALIVE?' he howls. 'WHY?'
He can't be more than twelve.
This film has been screened approximately 75 times, according to the Israeli Consulate.
The question now isn't who has seen this footage.
The question is: Who among the powerful and influential has not?
These horrors were committed little more than 30 days ago. Yet what we see in the media, overwhelmingly, is minimization, cowardice, and both-sides-ism.
The very same day of this screening, the Washington Post took down a political cartoon by two-time Pulitzer winner Michael Ramirez that depicted Hamas leader Ghazi Hamad with babies and children strapped to his body, a cowering woman tied to his back.
With one baby wailing, Hamad raises a finger and says, 'How dare Israel attack civilians . . .'
Naturally, the woke WaPo newsroom and social media users took offense and WaPo's op-ed editor caved.
'The reaction to the image convinced me that I had missed something profound, and divisive, and I regret that,' editor David Shipley wrote in an open email. 'Our section is aimed at finding commonalities, understanding the bonds that hold us together, even in the darkest times.'
That is literally the opposite of what an opinion page should do. It's not a kumbaya space. It's meant to provoke, be an open exchange of ideas, and yes, sometimes upset people. If WaPo staffers and editors don't get that — well, they're damningly in the wrong profession.
Has Shipley seen this footage? I would bet not.
How about Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos?
If there's one thing this film makes undeniably clear, it's that Hamas — intentionally and joyfully — targeted babies, children, women and civilians.
What is depicted here is not warfare. It is savagery, barbarism, the deification of death.
A woman attempts to hide in a kindergarten — note these targets. She is shot point-blank, her body slung over one terrorist's shoulders for further violation.
We are suddenly on an unnamed street inside Gaza. The hatchback of a dusty Toyota springs open. Inside, a young woman, her expression blank, looks straight at us. A terrorist pulls her out and turns her around. The backside of her sweatpants is soaked through with blood. She is led into the backseat as three more terrorists pile on top of her.
Audio from Hamas radio comms, intercepted by Israel.
Hamas terrorist: 'They cut off their heads with knives and shot them in the head.'
Hamas leader: 'Take photos of the heads as the guys are playing with them.'
We see a Thai man, shot to death, as terrorists take a shovel to his throat and begin to behead him, the shouts of 'Allahu Akbar' ever-present.
This footage spares us the worst, and that's saying something. We did not see the gang rapes or the beheadings of babies.
What we do see is not just a second Holocaust. Make no mistake: This was also an attack on the West. The dead child in Mickey Mouse PJs, the girl next to her Mickey Mouse blanket, the young person in a Tupac T-shirt, the young woman with ripped fishnet tights, the young man wearing a T-shirt that says Costa Rica.
Hamas left ISIS flags behind.
We see bodies burned beyond recognition, female corpses with legs splayed open, limbs missing or broken backwards. The silhouette of a once-sleeping baby, burned to death in a crib, only ashes left. The stuff of Pompeii.
The film's final act opens at the music festival. We see and hear young people wondering what those fuzzy black spots are in the sky.
Now we know. Will Alicia Keys, that great paragliding enthusiast, ever see this footage?
Strapping young men are shot and piled into trucks, thrown one on top of each other. Festival-goers flee into the desert, nowhere to hide or camouflage themselves, as Hamas terrorists shoot them in the back, then speed away with more hostages, smiling and laughing and shooting rifles in the sky, the wind in their hair. This is the greatest day of their lives.
The slaughter we bore witness to in that screening was a mere fraction of the 10/7 attacks: Less than 10 percent of the Israelis and foreign nationals beaten, raped, burned, murdered, beheaded, and crucified that day were shown.
Now more than ever, as leaked diplomatic cables reveal that America is losing allies in the Mideast over support for Israel, as French President Emmanuel Macron demands an immediate Israeli ceasefire in Gaza, our elected officials, diplomats and ambassadors not only need to see this — it's their duty to.
Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, should see it, as should every candidate for president.
Who else: Western presidents, prime ministers and parliamentarians.
Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg.
Every member of The Squad, Rashida Tlaib especially.
Former president Barack Obama, who recently said that 'neither side has clean hands' here.
Billionaires who back political candidates.
The Joe Rogans of the world.
Every talking head from Rachel Maddow to George Stephanopoulos to the ladies of 'The View'.
Perhaps above all others, President Joe Biden.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken, as Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus told me in an after-screening briefing, is the highest-level US official to have seen this film.
Does that mean the President has not?
On Friday morning, DailyMail.com asked the White House that very question.
As of this writing, we have not received a response.
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