Critic’s Notebook
In fights to sway public sentiment, critics often point to costly clothes as evidence of moral corruption.
On Oct. 19, three days after Israeli soldiers killed the Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, the Israeli military released a video that was dated a year earlier, just before the attack that began the war in Gaza. It shows, among other things, Samar Muhammad Abu Zamer, whom the Israeli military says is the wife of Mr. Sinwar, moving into a tunnel carrying a black handbag.
In the blurry video the purse has a boxy shape, with top handles and some metallic hardware at top center. Avichay Adraee, the Arabic-language spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces, posted the video on X as well as a still of the handbag next to a photo of a similar-looking Hermès Birkin, along with the lines: “Did Sinwar’s wife enter the tunnel with him on October 6th, carrying a bag from the Birkin company, which has an estimated value of about $32,000? I leave you to comment.”
On cue, the comments began — and not just on Mr. Adraee’s post (though as of Wednesday, that one had over 4,000 of them).
“Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar’s wife reportedly spotted with $32,000 Birkin bag as she went into hiding,” read a headline in The New York Post. Some reports added a question mark, some did not. Some commentators disputed the handbag identification, saying it was impossible to tell if the bag was a Birkin (or even a luxury bag at all, for that matter). Hermès did not respond to questions on Tuesday about whether the bag was definitely one of its products, or definitely not.
But in a way, Birkin or not, what matters is what Mr. Adraee wanted to imply by associating the leader of Hamas, whose death in combat has cemented his heroic status in the eyes of many Palestinians, with a luxury brand. What mattered was the coded meaning of such an expensive item.
“The running theme is the exposure of hypocrisy,” said Christopher J. Berry, an emeritus professor of political theory at the University of Glasgow and the author of “The Idea of Luxury: A Conceptual and Historical Investigation.”
