I write in very late December of 2023 as the Israeli slaughter in Gaza is continuing while the US stands by supplying anything needed for Israel to continue the project.
A man whose commentaries I admire, Murtaza Hussein, posted an essay in which he said he believes there is a balance between Israel and the Palestinians, that violence is not the answer and he is reluctant to take sides. I posted my disagreement which follows...
Murtaza your opening is deeply moving, but with all due respect I believe you are wrong in attempting to make equivalent the situation of Israelis and Palestinians.
I knew absolutely nothing about the situation until about 25 years ago when I took an undergraduate course in US national security and another about the history of the Ottoman Empire. I began to wonder why, time after time, Israel was able to continue to take land and the Palestinians lose it, not only violating international law but with the full protection in the UN by the United States, veto after veto being used to stop any sanction of international law, the very law that the US has always claimed should be honored and in whose design the US was a full participant after WW2.
Being proud of the US claim to stand for liberty and justice for all, I could not believe the hypocrisy of mouthing mild criticisms of Israel, calling for a two state solution but in the end always going with what Israel wanted to do. A perfect example was when Joe Biden was VP under Obama. The US had recently told Israel that it did not want to see any further expansion of settlements. Biden was on a visit to Israel when that country announced the expansion of settlements. Biden was furious. But, as always, nothing came of it and the settlements expanded.
You speak of Israelis you know and of Palestinians you know and how you cannot come down on one side or the other, yet you mention in your opening the inability of most Palestinians to visit the mosque you visited easily. That gives great power to your account of the man enraptured to be in a place so revered by him. Though the mosque has no religious significance to Jews (or Christians), Israel has total control of the site and is the party determining who will and who will not go there, in fact, who will and will not go anywhere in the West Bank and who will and will not be able to go in or out of Gaza.
You appear to believe that the mass of Israelis and Palestinians are benign and that it is only a selection of each that engages in violence. But surely you know that humiliation of Palestinians by Israelis has been a daily occurrence for decades, be it the IDF entering Palestinian homes at 3AM to take a "census" of the occupants, or settlers beating Palestinian farmers and setting fire to their olive orchards in the West Bank, or the "Independence Day" annual march by Israeli Jews through Palestinian East Jerusalem, fully accompanied by Israeli police ready to pounce on any Palestinian who might not appreciate the march.
You mention violence being ineffective, yet violence won Zionists the initial State of Israel. Violence by Israeli settlers is routine and the settlements expand. Violence won Israel the occupied territory of the West Bank and Jerusalem. Right now violence is clearing out Gaza. The Israeli human rights NGO, B'Tselem (bet-SELL-um) stopped reporting violent attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank by Israelis because the process was always the same - report submitted - an investigation opened - investigation clears perpetrators or is dropped entirely. In other words, the process was pointless.
What I am saying to you Murtaza is something I am sure you must know. Life has been hellish for Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza and filled with violence at the hands of Israelis, all of whom may carry arms (Palestinians may not) and with the only "justice" in the West Bank coming from Israeli military courts with a 98% conviction rate.
How have Israelis been living all the while? As most Americans do...decent homes, full civil rights, travel anywhere at any time in or out of the country, start up companies if they wish (it is "start-up nation") and here is the ultimate: if one is a Jew and an American, one can enjoy dual citizenship, having full rights in both the US and Israel plus, if wished, one can move to Palestinian land and make it one's own (Israel provides a financial incentive) retaining all the rights of an Israeli...of course there will be Palestinians nearby with no rights at all, but they are under tight control and the developed settlements are gated communities. Enjoy!
Not at all a balance.
Here is what convinced me that Palestinians might have a case for violence. In a poll held in Israel within the last two years, Israelis were asked about the future. What did they see as optimal? The answer was overwhelming, continue on in the same way. Why not? A lid was on the Palestinians, settlements were expanding, life was quite decent. What might a poll of Palestinians have revealed about an indefinite continuation of the status quo, particularly in the prison of Gaza?
In the 19th century in America, it was not Zionism, but Manifest Destiny that was taking the land from the natives. One of these "Indians" by the name of Red Cloud said, "They (the white man) made us many promises, more than I can remember, but they never kept but one; they promised to take our land, and they took it".
The "two state solution" was never a meaningful thing, never more than an empty phrase for politicians in DC to mouth. Netanyahu has now proudly stated that he alone has kept two states from coming to pass, but anyone who looks at a map of the West Bank can see that it is so filled with Israeli settlements, military zones, etc. that there is no contiguous Palestinian area for a state and this was in fact a goal of the settlements, to make two states impossible. Done!
Those 19th century American Indians had a choice. Remain peaceful and watch the land get taken, or turn to violence, make a stand, hopeless though it might be, but die fighting for the beloved land. Americans now look upon the Indians who fought as heroic. Sitting Bull, Geronimo, Cochise and many other turned to violence and now the very people who took their land look back in remorse at the relentless ethnic cleansing that swept a civilization away. And remember, Indian attacks on white settlers were vicious. They scalped, they burned people alive, they disemboweled and were called animals, savages, barbarians, snakes. Sound familiar? They were the HAMAS of their time.
But HAMAS is different in that the Palestinians are not a tiny group of people. Though Israel is now actively exterminating Palestinians in Gaza, this is not 1870. The Palestinians were, before Oct. 7, regularly suffering and dying and Israelis were saying, as I just noted above, no problem with that, keep it up. According to UN statistics, since the lawn mowing in Gaza began in 2008-9, the ratio of Israeli deaths to Palestinian deaths has been 1:20 and the world was ignoring it. Operation Cast Lead and Operation Protective Edge each killed Palestinians in a number similar to the Israelis who died on Oct 7. Did anyone notice? Now, after Oct. 7, that ratio of 1:20 is being approached and will likely be exceeded. At last the job of 1948 can be completed. A very recent poll of Jewish Israelis (80% of Israelis) indicates they don't think the IDF is doing enough in Gaza.
It just might have occurred to HAMAS that since death and suffering were to be the future, why not launch the Oct. 7 attack? Some Israelis would die and the resulting slaughter, a spasm of destruction, would open the eyes of the world to what Israel is about, what it has always been about from the early days of Zionism, to clear the land of the natives and take it for the exclusive use of Jews, a token 20% Arab Israeli population tolerated, but only just. For all the hell the American Indians took, what remains of that people are full American citizens. Israel wants no Palestinians as Israeli citizens and no Palestinians on the land. Everyone out.
To this extent, HAMAS has been successful. The world is appalled, the mask has been ripped from the face of Israel so that no hasbara can hope to cover the carnage. The most obtuse American is now aware of the slaughter. American Jews are rising up against Zionism in multitudes of the young who are closing highways and bridges, making a fuss that won't stop. Even mainstream media anchors cannot hold their revulsion when hearing nonsense coming from Israeli spokespeople about so much effort being made to avoid civilian casualties. Now Israel is on the spot as are US politicians who once had no firmer ground to stand on than support of Israel but are now sounding maniacal (Nikki Haley: FINISH THEM!)
I have not been reading an Israeli newspaper for decades, I have not been reading every book I can find on Israel/Palestine, I have not been attending Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) meetings for nothing.
I never thought I would be ashamed to be an American, but I am right now as my President does all he can to supply the genocide with all it needs, the zenith of the support in money, weapons and diplomatic cover the US has provided to Israel, essentially turning it into a superpower and by doing so inviting it to become the monster we now see in operation, eagerly destroying a people that it sees as less than human.
Liberty and Justice for All - NOT ethnic cleansing and apartheid. The blind are now beginning to see. The entire world is in opposition to a community of two, the US and Israel. The tail wags the dog with ease as Netanyahu is given all the time he needs to kill without limit, but it now is all in the open for all to see. No longer will Israel be able to (shamefully) use the millions who died in the holocaust as a protective shield to cover its own wholesale destruction of a people no less human than any Israeli.
Please people, Americans in particular, wake up.
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