To the editor, 

I write in response to what is, as of now, the only mention in The Clarion of Hamas’s attack on Israelis and Israel’s subsequent response. The author has previously, and rightly, critiqued the right-wing government of Benjamin Netanyahu. But their post on the terror of October 7th is flawed in dangerous ways. The first is a matter of scope. The DU Clarion acknowledges that Hamas “indiscriminately kill[ed] hundreds of Israeli civilians, settlers, and soldiers in settlements, outposts, and at a music festival.” How can The Clarion publish such an anodyne account of Hamas’s horrors? Yes, they killed. They also raped women before killing them. They slit the throats of infants in front of their parents. They shot parents in front of their children. They desecrated human remains. They kidnapped children and the elderly. It will be months before a full account of Hamas’s heinous crimes emerges. The way the Clarion chooses to sanitize Hamas’s murderous terror casts doubt on whether the writer values the lives of those lost in those crimes.

The second issue is a more abstract question of language. The author repeatedly calls the civilians murdered by Hamas “settlers” living in “settlements.” That term is appropriate to Israelis living in recent construction, in areas that, I hope, are part of a future Palestinian state. Many Israelis living in the West Bank are “settlers.” Those evicted from the four settlements dismantled in Gaza in 2005 were “settlers.” Those murdered on Oct. 7th by Hamas were not “settlers.” They were Israelis living in Israel. The author’s choice to call them settlers suggests the author believes that no Israeli citizen has a legitimate claim to the land of their birth.

Oct. 7th was the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust. Jews across campus, of all ages, denominations, and political affiliations, are reeling from the growing awareness of what happened. We are also watching the statements from the University and the coverage in The Clarion to tell us how safe we are living as our true selves at DU. The University has been the site of anti-Semitic harassment in recent years, mirroring trends across the nation. Editorial decisions made in these weeks will impact the mindset of Jews at DU long after those making the decisions have graduated and moved on. Please be more careful.

Mitchell Ohriner

Associate Professor of Music Theory

Lamont School of Music