John Oliver: ‘The immense suffering in Israel and Gaza has been sickening to watch’
In an unusual move, John Oliver addressed his audience before the intro for Last Week Tonight, acknowledging the violence in Israel and Gaza. “Without all the music and the lights and – at least theoretically – the laughter, I wanted to briefly talk to you about what has clearly been a terrible week,” he said. “The immense suffering in Israel and Gaza has been sickening to watch, and we’re not gonna be covering it in the main body of our show tonight for a couple of reasons.
“First, it’s horrific. I don’t really want to tell jokes about carnage right now, and I’m pretty sure that you don’t want to hear them,” he continued. And second, there was a delay between the Saturday taping of the show and its Sunday airtime.
“A lot could change” in the few days, “but I do have a few broad thoughts that I think will still apply, and they have to do with sorrow, fear and anger,” he said. “Now, sorrow is the first and most overwhelming feeling, the images that we’ve seen this week from last Saturday onward have been totally heartbreaking – thousands now dead in Israel and Gaza. It would be devastating, not just to those in the region, but to diaspora communities across the world.”
Regardless of one’s thoughts on the history of the region, “it should be impossible to see grieving families and not be moved,” he added. “So there’s been sorrow this week, a lot of it, and also fear – understandable fear of further attacks in Israel and for those taken hostage and fear of what is to come in Gaza, as Israel’s leaders seem intent on embarking on a relentless bombing campaign, mass displacement and a potential ground invasion.”
All signs “seem to be pointed toward a humanitarian catastrophe”, he continued, as Israeli officials announced plans to cut off food, water, fuel and power. “This has all the appearances of collective punishment, which is a war crime. And I think many Israelis and Palestinians are feeling justifiable anger right now, not just at Hamas, whose utterly heinous terrorist acts set this week’s events in motion, but also at the zealots and extremists across the board who consistently thwarted attempts at peace over the years.”
Both Israelis and Palestinians “have been let down by their leadership time and time again”, said Oliver. “And I don’t have a great deal of faith in the leaders currently in charge to steer us toward peace.
“I’m not going to tell either side how to get it – certainly not in this [British] accent, which has frankly done enough damage in that particular region to last a fucking lifetime,” he concluded. “But just know in the long term, all the people who want to live in that region are going to keep living there. So peace is not optional and will require some tough decisions. And I can’t say where a peace process ends, but it just has to start with that kind of ability to recognize our common humanity.”
In his main segment, Oliver pivoted