If the 10 plagues and the Exodus took place now, this is how the events would be portrayed: 

The headlines in the world’s most respected news platforms are focusing attention on the terrible suffering of millions of Egyptians. From the first blow, journalists featured interviews with mothers who spoke about the devastating thirst after Moses, the leader of the Israelite rebels, turned the sacred Nile River into blood. Shortly afterwards, other victims provided moving descriptions of the traumatized families, particularly children, resulting from the frog invasion, and the succession of parasites, insects, hail, darkness and other afflictions. Officials from Pharaoh’s palace were featured on media platforms, where they denounced the entirely unjustified Israelite attacks, and rejected reports of slavery as inventions of an evil cabal. 

To give additional support, 1000 legal and human rights experts from Egypt’s top universities and NGOs signed a petition condemning Moses and Aaron as nefarious war criminals, responsible for destroying the Egyptian economy and causing millions of deaths. Doctors Without Borders produced testimonies accusing the Israelite leaders of causing horrendous pain, entirely without provocation, and joined Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch in declaring that a genocide was being committed. These accusations were parroted by UN officials, journalists, and European political leaders. Social media mega-influencers posted choreographed Tik-Tok and Instagram reels and podcasts poured scorn on the Israelites and pledged solidarity with their Egyptian victims. 

Although the Israelites are known for the hi-tech skills acquired by building giant pyramids, boycott campaigners told everyone not to use them as consultants or to purchase their products. “Boycott Israelites” events were held in major cities, and the items were theatrically removed from Cairo’s stores and shopping centers. In these performative hatefests, fringe activists organized as Israelite Voices for Peace were placed in the front of the crowd. They were the “proof” that Moses and Aaron did not speak for the majority, that the Israelites were always treated fairly and hospitably by their Egyptian neighbors, and the slavery allegations were inventions and lies.  They erased all traces of Pharaoh’s order that all Israelite boys are to drowned at birth, including Moses (whose mother saved him by sending him downriver in a small basket) 

Amidst all this, a few courageous commentators have tried to break the narrative monopoly by mentioning the 200 years of enslavement and Pharaoh’s decrees on slaying of the Israelite boys, but they were instantly condemned as apologists for war criminals and Zionists. Attempts to discuss the story of Moses’s birth and miraculous survival, after his mother was forced to send him floating down the Nile in a tiny basket were immediately denounced as Israelite propaganda and silenced.  

With the final plague – the slaying of the first-born, followed by the triumphal Israelite march out of Egypt, the house of bondage, with fists clenched in defiance and victory – the chorus of condemnations has grown much louder, The United Nations Secretary General and the Commissioner for Human Rights announced the formation of an expert commission of veteran anti-Israelite propagandists to investigate these events. European politicians, joined by Canadians and Australians, called on both sides to negotiate a settlement in the spirit of shared humanity and moral principles. But they also declared that they would honor the arrest warrants issued by corrupt judges and prosecutors of international courts, should Moses and Aaron happen to set foot in their territories enroute to the Promised Land. When Pharaoh reversed course again and sent his elite chariot forces to surround the escaped slaves at the edge of the Sea of Reeds, they pledged not to provide any weapons or food to the Israelites.

On university campuses, the network of Students for Justice for Egyptians (SJE) branches organized violent protests and built tent encampments, where they set out to harass, intimidate and attack supporters of the Israelites. Funds that pay the salaries and other costs of the SJE organizers on each campus and their allies are top secret, but are likely provided by oil-rich dictatorships with close ties to Pharaoh and his family. 

These campaigns are supported by learned academics at institutions such as Harvard’s Center for Human Rights and the University of Toronto Law Faculty. Professors publish scholarly papers denouncing the Israelite lobby and calling for retributive accountability, counter-liberation, respect for Egyptian dignity and restorative justice. They are joined by activist fellows, including one whose father had been an Israelite slave, but after bitter fights with family members, hid his identity and married into Egyptian royalty. In this pseudo-academic facade, they hold propaganda seminars platforming the NGO advocates and UN officials, such as the Special Rapporteur for the Inalienable Rights of the Egyptian People. A few faculty who did not share this hatred are too fearful to speak out. 

Postscript: Led by Moses, Aaron, and their sister Miriam as head of the Women’s Division, and aided by Divine Protection, the Israelites escaped Pharaoh’s chariots, which drowned in and  the Sea, as they began the 40 year journey back to the Land of Israel. And every year, the former slaves and their descendants (the Jewish people) stay up late eating matza and drinking wine (four cups), while reciting the story of the victory of freedom and justice over oppression and evil. 

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)