Tag: Gaza

Gideon Levy of HAARETZ continues to speak as the prophetic conscience for an inhumane, Zionist Israel.  Today, one day after the Gaza Land Day protests, he writes a lament, a funeral dirge, for the final burial of his nation’s conscience.

I have excerpted his Opinion piece below, but please be sure to read the whole thing.  It merits pondering and prayers for our humanity.

He predicts, correctly I believe, only dark days ahead, unfolding predictably from the dark decades past.

The verdict of “heartless persecutor, shameless executioner,” has been passed on the American establishment as well as Israel.  America funds Israel’s military, provides their weaponry and then bites its tongue whenever Israel goes on another blood-curdling rampage, leaving shredded, dismembered Palestinian bodies in its wake.

None of us should have any time to waste on the self-righteous debates about “even-handedness,” on the importance of seeing both sides of this “complicated story.”  It is meaningless platitude advanced by shallow thinkers that only obscures the truth of history.

I have no more time for David Gregory’s condescending smirks on CNN as he so graciously allows Diana Buttu a few moments (though he can’t stop from interrupting) to “share her perspective” on the Gazan slaughter.

Thank you CNN. A statement of facts is only a “perspective.”

I have no more time for the arrogance of Thomas Friedman and his ilk (in the White House and beyond) who continue to blame the victims as if they were mindless robots programmed by Hamas master-minds, with no personal agency and too  bloody impatient to wait for the Utopia that could be Gaza if only the people would stop shitting in their own nest. (Has Friedman never cracked open a book not written by a propagandist for political Zionism?)

The moral insouciance of these self-important talking heads is infuriating.

Remember when Friedman urged the Palestinians to mimic Gandhi and adopt his methods of non-violence? (If you don’t remember, I have written about Friedman’s piece with links to his article here.)  From his over-stuffed office chair, Friedman urged Palestinians, young and old, to sacrifice their lives for freedom, promising a compassionate Israeli response.

We have all now seen how Israeli compassion deals with massive non-violent marches.

But even worse is the evangelical/fundamentalist obsession with an embassy in Jerusalem while, on the very same day, more than 60 unarmed people are assassinated, and thousands more maimed for life, by the most immoral army in the world.

The silence of American evangelicalism screams an eternal accusation, “Here we are, a godless people; bloated by comfort; hardened by selfishness; ignorant by choice; disinterested by design…and guilty as hell.”

“When will the moment come in which the mass killing of Palestinians matters anything to the right? When will the moment come in which the massacre of civilians shocks at least the left-center? If 60 people slain don’t do it, perhaps 600? Will 6,000 jolt them?

“When will the moment come in which a pinch of human feeling arises, if only for a moment, toward the Palestinians? Sympathy? At what moment will someone call a halt, and suggest compassion, without being branded an eccentric or an Israel hater?

“When will there be a moment in which someone admits that the slaughterer has, after all, some responsibility for the slaughter, not only the slaughtered, who are of course responsible for their own slaughter?

“Sixty people killed didn’t matter to anyone – perhaps 600 would? How about 6,000? Will Israel find all the excuses and justifications then also? Will the blame be laid on the slain people and their “dispatchers” even then, and not a word of criticism, mea culpa, sorrow, pity or guilt will be heard?…

There appear to be no limits to either Israel’s lust for Palestinian blood or American indifference to an ally’s crimes against humanity.

Of course, the ongoing crime scene is Gaza.

Today alone, Israeli soldiers have killed 58 people, bringing the total death toll thus far to 107.  2,700 people, men, women and children, were seriously wounded today, bringing the total number of crippled and maimed to 12,000.

Not one single Israeli soldier has been injured or killed by these unarmed protesters.  In fact, so sleight is the “threat” that for some Israeli civilians, watching Palestinians get shot inside the Gaza fence has become a leisure time activity.  Pack up a picnic box and relax for a few hours while cheering for the bravery of “the world’s most moral army.”

Please, let those figures sink in.

107 people dead. 2,700 additional human beings wounded.  Why?

Because they want to be treated like human beings.  They want freedom of movement; to decide for themselves where they will live; to gain an education and seek employment as they please; to carry themselves with dignity without the constant fear of being shot by an irritated Israeli sniper.

Tomorrow the massacre may become even worse.  Tuesday is Nakba Remembrance Day. May 15, 2018 will mark the 70th anniversary of the mass expulsion of Palestinians from their homes by Israeli military forces in 1948.

I have heard that there may be a plan for the protesters to throw themselves en masse against the prison fence confining them to Gaza.

I have no idea if this is true.  Norman Finkelstein reported that he was told by leaders in Gaza that it may be a possibility.

Please pray that this will not happen. Pray that the leaders of these protests will decide against that action, if they haven’t already (if it was ever a real possibility). — (And NO, the Gaza marches have NOT been organized by Hamas, nor is Hamas using them for “terrorism.” This is pure propaganda. The council of organizers for these marches has one Hamas representative, where he is outnumbered by numerous other community representatives.)

Remember that this famous fence that Israel guards so fervently is not a border crossing. It is not an internationally recognized territorial, state or national boundary.  It is a prison fence.

The people of Gaza are not a population of illegal aliens hoping to immigrate into Israel.  They are 1.8 million prisoners, confined against their will to 141 square miles of territory.  Barred from a place they once called home.

Gaza is one of the most densely populated pieces of real estate on the planet.  Israel makes life insufferable there.

Gaza is a prison.  Israel is the jailer.  The precious “fence” keeps Gazans in a cage like animals.  Who wouldn’t want out?

If you have absolutely no control over your manner of living, and you have no hope of planning for a better future because everything about your world is controlled by the indiscriminate violence of a heartless occupying power, then maybe dying as a martyr in the cause of winning freedom for the next generation is the best way, the only way, to give your life meaning.

I can understand that.

I bet you could too if you found yourself imprisoned in a place like Gaza.

Remember this when you next hear Israeli and American propagandists demonize the people of Gaza for their “failure to value life.”

The killing of unarmed Palestinians in Gaza continues unabated.

As of today, the death toll has risen to 31, including at least 1 journalist wearing a vest emblazoned with the word “PRESS.”  6 journalists in all have been shot. The numbers of people wounded by live ammunition is now in the thousands.

Children are counted among the dead.

Reporting on the journalist’s death, today’s AP says:

 “Witnesses said Murtaja was over 100 meters (yards) from the border, wearing a flak jacket marked “press” and holding his camera when he was shot in an exposed area just below the armpit.

 “The Israeli military has said it fired only at ‘instigators’ involved in attacks on soldiers and was investigating Murtaja’s death amid a very hectic environment.”

A reporter armed only with a video camera “instigating attacks” on soldiers safely sequestered behind barriers and a fence 100 yards away?

The journalist Glenn Greenwald puts it best (watch the interview here):

“I think it’s just time to acknowledge and accept the reality of what Israel is…And even people who once believed that [Israel was a democracy] are now starting to come and see that Israel is an apartheid, rogue, terrorist state.”

Israel long ago slipped down the rabbit hole with Alice and the Mad Hatter.  Now Israel wants the rest of the watching world to follow suit.  Eat Israel’s magic mushroom, listen only to the official press releases and repeat Israeli propaganda.

All Palestinians are, by definition, terrorists.  As Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman said:

“There are no innocent people in the Gaza strip.”

“From the standpoint of the Israeli soldiers, they did what had to be done. I think that all of our troops deserve a commendation…”

American politicians and the mainstream media all remain silent, or nonchalantly mimic Israeli press releases.  Bernie Sanders is still the only member of Congress to speak out and condemn the mass slaughter now occurring (here, here and elsewhere).

US news outlets are obsessed with Stormy Daniels but have nothing to say about Gaza.

Our government has expelled 60+ Russian diplomats, on the flimsiest of evidence, but refuses to criticize Israel’s crimes against humanity in Gaza.

And where is the Christian church in this mix?  Where is the so-called pro-life movement?  Where is the voice of Christian conscience?

The church is nowhere to be found.  We have eaten too many of Israel’s magic mushrooms.

Evangelicalism remains silent, too busy groveling at the feet of its Republican idols to look up and notice the criminality of America’s tacit complicity in Israel’s crimes.

But the most powerful force behind this evangelical silence is not politics, not even politics veiled beneath religious conviction.  No.  The grotesque force holding its hand over the mouth of most evangelicals is the depraved theology of Christian Zionism.

A theology of Israeli privilege that overshadows and negates all competing ethical concerns.  A theology that baptizes genocide as the approved work of God.  A theology – that is really an IDEOLOGY – as effectively racist towards Palestinians as the political Zionism animating the monstrously perverse Middle Eastern beast once known as Israel.

American evangelicalism will one day be held to account.

Just as the largest part of the American church will be held to account for approving slavery, the slaughter of Native Americans, Jim Crow and its indifference to the poor, so too will our Eternal Judge ask us all, “Why did you not lament, and work to change, the fate of your Palestinian brothers and sisters?”

I encourage everyone to call one of Bernie Sanders’ office numbers.  Thank him for protesting the killings in Gaza.  Ask him to remain vigilant, not to give up, to enlist others to his cause, and to continue to speak up for Palestinian lives.