How a Hamas Anthem Became a Hit in Israel

Why Israeli kids are singing ‘Up, Do Terror Attacks!’

By Yoram Hazony for Tablet Magazine

A few days ago, I called a young relative who is serving in the Israeli air force and asked him: “Do you know that song—“Kum, Aseh Piguim”?

Without missing a beat, he said: “You mean that song that’s a hit all over Israel? The song that all my friends are singing all the time?”

“Yeah,” I said. “That song. I wanted to know if you can explain to me why they are singing it?”

What I actually meant to ask was: Can you please explain to me why all the young people in Israel are singing a song entitled “Up, Do Terror Attacks”—a song recorded and released by Hamas in Gaza, which repeatedly calls for killing or expelling all the Jews from Israel? But I didn’t have to say all that. He knew why I was asking.

“It’s because it makes us feel good,” he replied.

By then I wasn’t surprised. I had made several other calls, both to my own children and to other young people participating in different branches of the Israeli armed forces, and had gotten versions of this same answer from all of them: All their friends are singing it. It’s basically become the de facto anthem of the Israeli war effort. And they are singing it because it makes them feel good. The question, of course, is why Israeli soldiers, and their brothers and sisters at home, feel good to be singing a song about exterminating them and their families, along with the country they have sworn to defend.

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