Dor Shachar is an Arab Palestinian who defected from Gaza and converted to Judaism. Shachar’s story is harrowing, and it provides another eyewitness account of the cruelty of Hamas toward its own people. Near the end of a recent interview with Marissa Streit, CEO of the Prager University Foundation (PragerU), Shachar shares a reality that is difficult for Americans to understand. For some, it may even be impossible.

Have you taken your place on the wall?

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Having lived in Gaza for many years, Shachar boldly asserts that Hamas has been conning the public to manipulate our view about Gazans — all Gazans. He charged that there are no innocent Palestinians in Gaza. Streit wondered whether that might not be too harsh an assertion. His response was to expound on Islamism’s methods of infiltration and destruction, and he stressed that every Arab child in Gaza is indoctrinated in this culture.

“Why is it so hard for you to understand? Because they raised you on love, on peace,” Shachar said. “They raised me on hatred and murder. It’s difficult for you to get a grasp on this. If they raised you on hate and murder, then you would understand me.”

Shachar’s first-hand perspective pushes against everything I was taught through mainstream culture and during seven years of public school. His is also a necessary elucidation of the difference between Western Judeo-Christian culture and Islamic culture, about which most of my peers are ignorant. My peers and I have spent the past decade and a half being raised in a culture that claims to revere love in all forms and to champion equality above all else. We’ve been taught that the West has always been evil, and that everyone else has always been an innocent, hapless victim.

Thus, every conflict is reduced to “victim versus oppressor” status — with the “patriarchal,” Judeo-Christian, wealthy, and Caucasian culture always being “the oppressor.” Promotion of values that attack Judeo-Christian culture and America’s foundations is rewarded. That’s the perfect rhetorical mode for pro-Palestinian and essentially Ottoman organizations like Hamas to exploit and capitalize on. It has been a most effective form of curricula in instructing my misguided peers to rally toward a cause history proves will ultimately demand they bow to Allah or die — despite their having enjoyed American freedoms like those they enjoyed during their pro-Palestine protest at Raphael Warnock’s Ebenezer Baptist Church.

Let’s not fail in our fervent prayers.

Our Lord, children around the world are suffering, and You have said that we should bring them to You. We therefore commit every child in Gaza and in America to You right now. Set Your gracious hand upon them all! Give them life-altering encounters with You. Save and redeem them, we pray.

This is such a critical time. Share your prayers here for the children of Gaza and our own country.

(Photo Credit: Latrach Med Jamil on Unsplash)