Hamas Rampage in Gaza Remembered in Contrast to Slow-walking Genocide Down South
By Mike Odeh James
Kaduna—The world watched a nightmare unfold on October 7, 2023, as the jihadist group Hamas launched a killing spree on southern Israel. In a matter of hours, terrorist commandos breached the Gaza border and stormed towns such as Sderot, Be’eri, Kfar Aza, and Nir Oz, killing more than 1,400 civilians—men, women, and children—and abducting about 250 others into spider holes in Gaza. The world reeled at the brutality: families slaughtered in their homes, concertgoers massacred, and entire communities burned to ashes.
In retaliation, Israel launched a massive counterstrike, vowing to “wipe out Hamas from the face of the earth.” The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) targeted Hamas leadership, supply routes, and rocket arsenals, while prepping for air strikes from Hezbollah and Iran.
Nigeria’s Bloody October — A Parallel in Pain
The tragedy struck a ricochet 2300 miles away in Nigeria — a country that had endured the cruelty of jihadist insurgencies and ethnic militias shouting war cries emulating Hamas’ operational style.
But while the world mourned the victims of the Hamas assault, Nigerian Christians endured a month of bloodletting in a silo of media silence.
Conflict data compiled by the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) shows that more than 612 Nigerians were killed in terrorist and bandit attacks in October 2023 alone. Northwest and northeast regions saw most of the fatalities — with Zamfara, Kaduna, Borno, and Niger States being the worst hit.
Kaduna State’s towns in Birnin Gwari and Chikun counties, and Shiroro in Niger State, were ravaged by coordinated assaults involving mass killings, abductions, and village burnings. In one week alone, more than 80 villagers were reported slain in Kaduna’s troubled southern lands, their homes torched by heavily armed Fulani militias.
Humanitarian agencies recorded hundreds of kidnappings, chiefly of women and children, as terror groups continued to extort ransoms and impose “taxes” on rural populations.
The grim statistics, though overshadowed by global attention on Gaza, underscore a shared tragedy: mass killings of innocent civilians under the flag of religion.
Reflecting on the Gaza massacre, Rev. James Gyang Pam, Director of History at the Middle Association, told TruthNigeria that the events in Israel mirror the terror long experienced in Nigeria’s northern communities.
“Just like Hamas, these jihadist groups in Nigeria use kidnappings, killings, rape, and other acts of terror to subjugate communities,” Rev. Pam told TruthNigeria. “While Hamas seeks to wipe Jews off the face of the Middle East, jihadist groups in Nigeria — including Boko Haram, Ansaru, ISWAP, and the Fulani Ethnic Militia (FEM) — aim to wipe out Christianity and destroy the indigenous tribes of Nigeria.”
The clergyman, a former university lecturer, said both groups are fueled by an expansionist and supremacist ideology that transcends borders and national identities. “Their dream is a theocratic empire governed by extreme interpretations of Islam — whether in Gaza or in Nigeria’s hinterlands,” he said.
Pam pointed out that the world must not equate Hamas with Palestinians, nor Fulani terrorists with all Nigerian residents of the 19 northern states. Both groups exploit ethnic and religious narratives to mask deeper territorial ambitions, according to Pam.
“Those calling themselves Palestinians today are largely Arabs who settled in the area centuries after the biblical Israelites,” Pam claimed. “They want to use terrorism and global sympathy to grab land from the Jews. Similarly, the Fulani terrorists are not originally from Nigeria. Many migrated from North Africa and the Sahel, pushing southward to seize lands that belong to indigenous Nigerians.”
The pattern is clear: violence as a tool for land conquest intrinsically tied to religious domination, Pam said. “The ideology is the same — conquer, cleanse, and control,” he warned.
A striking irony is that two years later, no one doubts the sectarian motive of the Hamas massacre, whereas government-financed thought leaders such as Gimba Kakanda loudly insist that Nigeria’s killings have nothing to do with religion but everything to do with venal bandits and terrorist clashes.
Israel’s Right to Defend Itself — And Nigeria’s Faral Quietism
Israel’s military response to Hamas’s atrocities was not only justified but essential to its survival, according to Yusuf Zariyi, a Middle Belt advocate and an outspoken Christian voice.
“Any nation facing existential threat—like Israel—has every right to defend itself with full military force,” Zariyi said. “Israel is surrounded by hostile nations and terrorist groups whose sole aim is to annihilate the Jews. Self-preservation is not aggression; it’s survival.”
He told TruthNigeria that while Israel responded with strength and unity, Nigeria has shown weakness and inconsistency in dealing with its own terrorists.
“The Nigerian government has been far too lenient since 2015,” he argued. “Instead of crushing terrorists, we’ve seen policies that pardon, rehabilitate, or even compensate them. That emboldens extremists.”
Zariyi drew direct parallels between Hamas’s tactics in Gaza and those of the Fulani Islamist militias in Nigeria’s Middle Belt. “They attack Christian communities, wipe them out, then play the victim when confronted. It’s the same narrative — oppression disguised as resistance,” he said.
Amid these twin crises, Nigeria’s leaders were quick to comment on Gaza – but not their own country. On October 7, 2023, the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement calling for “de-escalation and the protection of civilians,” urging both Israel and Hamas to show restraint. President Bola Ahmed Tinubu later joined global leaders in expressing condolences to all victims and called for a ceasefire and dialogue but never mentioned the massive killings that have gone unremarked in his own backyard since 2015.
“It’s disheartening that our leaders issue statements about foreign conflicts while keeping silent about massacres in their own country,” Pam said.
For many Nigerians, the lesson is painful but clear — if Israel had ignored its enemies, it might have ceased to exist; if Nigeria continues to appease its terrorists, it may lose entire regions to anarchy.
Pam summarized it this way: “Evil thrives when good people are silent or timid. The world must stop making excuses for terror — whether in Gaza or in Kaduna.”
Mike Odeh James is a conflict reporter for TruthNigeria.
