The Electronic Intifada posted an article yesterday where young men and women participating in the ongoing Day of Return Marches along the Gaza Imprisonment Fence explain why they continue to face down Israeli bullets week after week.
The article is entitled, “Why We Protest.” Click on the title for the entire article or read the excerpt below:
It is always important to listen to the ways in which others explain themselves, their actions and their attitudes.
When it comes to understanding Israel and Palestine, this is especially 
important because the Western media rarely tells the entire story, substituting Israeli government talking-points for real investigation.
The worst source of information, in this regard, is Christian media. Listening to the so-called “expert analysis” provided by Christian newscasters always makes me want to scream, shout, and pull my hair out because they are no different than the mainstream when it comes to mindlessly repeating the propaganda fed to them by Israel’s government.
Here are the typical explanations for why thousands of Gazan residents gather every week, offering up their bodies for Israeli army target practice:
- The vast majority of the Gazan’s who march are Hamas terrorists seeking to destroy Israel.
- Hamas completely controls the marches, directing everyone who participates.
- Israel is only defending its southern border from a hoard of would-be, foreign invaders who want to enter the country illegally. (Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?)
- The Palestinian Authority from the West Bank is trying to take control of Gaza away from Hamas so the people are out to defend Hamas.
Yes, I have heard each of these ignorant and utterly false “explanations” expressed by some Christian “expert” providing his/her insights into the “Palestinian problem” on Christian radio.
You can also read them all in any number of Christian news magazines, both in print and online.
However, I am willing to bet my bottom dollar that not a single one of these
pontificators has every been inside of Gaza, or lived with a Gazan family, or interviewed any of the people who brave the live ammunition and tear gas shot at them by Israeli soldiers week after week.
How often do these spokespeople for Christian media let their audience hear, first hand, the words and the voices of the people who are being killed and wounded week after bloody week? Never.
Folks, this is not journalism. Nor is it Christian.
God’s people are supposed to care about Truth. If we care about the truth, then facts matter. If we want to know the facts, then we have to engage the people who are actually involved. We have to do research. We have to 
investigate. We have to listen to all sides, AND be open to hearing things we never expected. We have to be even-handed. We must be willing to change our minds. We’ve got to be willing to admit that we have been wrong, that we misunderstood. We have to stop repeating the things that others tell us to believe and learn to think for ourselves.
More than that, we must be ready to repent, to confess our past errors. We must speak Truth to Power as we Speak Up for those who suffer, who are marginalized and ignored.
We have got to call sin sin, identify evil as evil, and condemn atrocities even when committed by those we call friends.
Here are only two of the stories from this article:
“More than 200 Palestinians have been killed since the launch of the Great March of Return along Gaza’s boundary with Israel on 30 March 2018.
“Palestinians participating in the protest series are demanding their right to return to the lands on the other side of the boundary from which their families were expelled decades earlier.
“Every two in three Palestinians in Gaza is a refugee.
“Protesters are also calling for an end to Israel’s land, sea and air blockade on
Gaza, now in its 12th year, which has plunged the territory into poverty and despair.
“Mohammed Zaanoun, a member of the Activestills photo collective, has documented the Great March of Return since its beginning.
“Here protesters tell their stories and explain why they come back to the boundary week after week, despite Israel’s brutal crackdown.
Husam, 25, from Khan Younis, southern Gaza
“Last Friday, when I had the Palestinian flag painted on my face, I was hit by a gas canister directly in my back. I was badly injured and transferred to a hospital. I’m now being treated at home. I wish to recover so I can go [back to the protests] next Friday.
“Despite the killings and the injuries, I am still going. I think I will keep 
participating even if it lasts for nine years, not just nine months. One of the worst things I’ve seen was one of the Fridays during which about 60 people were killed, when they [soldiers] were killing youth randomly and shooting towards heads and legs. It was a horrific day. I felt like I was in a nightmare.
“It was so hard when I could not save one of my comrades who was bleeding on the ground after being injured by an Israeli sniper, and then he died. I can’t understand how they can kill unarmed people.
“After nine months, the world is still not doing anything. We need them to stand with us and to stop the killing of the unarmed youth by the occupying forces…
Aya, 21, from Gaza City
“I participate because it is our duty to demand our full rights, as the Palestinian people, despite the killing and the injuries. This is the march of a nation.
“I ask Avichay Adraee [the Israeli army spokesperson who advised Palestinian women on Twitter that it was best for them to stay at home] to sit next to his wife instead of spreading foolish speech. I have witnessed so many scenes of
children being killed and the targeting of women, medics and the press. My oldest sister was seriously wounded but thank God she survived and she returned to the protest again. After all that time, the Return march continues and will not stop.
“I wish that the world would stop the oppression of the occupation and the killing of innocent, unarmed people. The difficult thing in my life is that I’m looking for a future amid the darkness. I wish to live in a society like any other Arab or Western society where there are no wars or killings, only justice, equality, love and peace….”
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Naturally, many folks (including many Christians) will accuse these people of lying. They will say, in effect, that they are not worth believing…
But why? Because they are Palestinians?
Are Palestinians not capable of telling the truth? Are they not able to think for themselves, to make up their own minds?
Such popular accusations of lying or serving as useful Hamas stooges not only express the crudest form of racism, they also reveal that the one expressing such foolishness has never put his/her life on the line for a heartfelt conviction.
How many people do you know who are willing to die for something they know is a lie?
