100 Days of War

Aperture Priorities Contact Sheet #8

Auschwitz in a time of Gaza. Nizza Millefonti, Torino.

By Joel Schalit

Blame it on the Six-Day War.

No conflict has ever done as good a job at creating expectations wars should be short as the 1967 war.

Within six days, Israel had defeated four Arab armies and seized Syria’s Golan Heights, Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, and the West Bank from Jordan.

The speed with which Israel won was so great it made the Nazi Blitzkrieg (Lightning War) look slow.

The 1967 war so impressed the press that every time new Arab-Israeli conflicts take place, it’s common to encounter assumptions they’ll end quickly.

Sometimes, it's because of the assumed superiority of Israeli forces. 

Sometimes, it’s because of the impatience of superpowers, who get portrayed as anxious referees with stopwatches.

The problem is these wars never end as quickly.

The aptly titled War of Attrition, for example, which immediately followed the Six-Day War, lasted for three years, from July 1967 to August 1970. 

The first Lebanon War, which began in June 1982, lasted until May 2000, when Israel withdrew from the country.

Yet, if you paid attention to the headlines on 7 January, one news organisation after another marked the 100 date as though it were a milestone.

The Sukkot War, which began on 7 October, had lasted 100 days.

For the better news organisations in the mix, the measurement was simply a sign of shock.

A savage war that has so far cost nearly 26,000 lives had lasted far too long, and this was how they expressed it.

The problem is that 100 days means the Sukkot conflict could last much longer.

Based on last week’s fighting in Lebanon and Yemen, everything indicates the Gaza war is expanding, not winding down. 

That’s why we've returned to the crisis for this edition of Aperture Priorities. 

Being in Europe, we begin with an image about Holocaust Memorial Day.

No single event is as responsible for the last seventy-six years of conflict between Israelis and Palestinians as the Nazi genocide.

Starting in 1941, it sets an entirely different timeline than six days to win.

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Bringing home the produce, Porta Palazzo.

Equally hated in Israel, Mercato Centrale.

Real and imaginary Africans, Balon.

Arab and antiwar graffiti, Corso Giulio Cesare.

Refugee solidarity rubber stamp, Corso Cesare.

Haunted by Palestine. Centro Storico, Savona.

The happy diaspora. Via Po, Torino.

The Kurdish ideal, Via Milano.

Photographs courtesy of Joel Schalit. All rights reserved.