Excerpt:
The utter astonishment at Hamas’ brutal attack, and the refusal to understand it in the context of decades of oppression, reflect an Israeli position that genuinely wonders why the Palestinians did not cling to their status as prisoners in Gaza, say thank you for Israel’s generosity in allowing a few thousand people to work for minimal wages on the lands from which their families were expelled, and bring their occupiers flowers.
Indeed, how many Israelis care about the situation in Gaza so long as Palestinians are not firing rockets or breaching the fence to enter our communities? Who bothered to ask what “calm” looks like in the besieged enclave? As far as most Israeli Jews are concerned, the more than 2 million Palestinians in Gaza should have kept their mouths shut and embraced their starvation. But today, even this option is no longer satisfactory, leaving Israelis to rally behind a new ultimatum for Gaza: emigration or annihilation.
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Funny how giving Palestinians rights isn’t even up for discussion.
End apartheid now.
It makes sense for Israeli citizens to embrace a false dichotomy for two reasons:
- They were attacked, with primarily civilian casualties. It’s a gut reaction to an atrocious loss of human life. The US reacted similarly when the Twin Towers fell.
- Humans, and especially reactionaries, crave simple options. Good and bad. Us and them. Dangerous or safe. Assimilate or die. It’s a lot easier to avoid tigers in rustling bushes when you assume all rustling bushes have tigers.
And again, I’m not saying the citizens’ position is justified, but it is comprehendible. The citizens are still reeling from the attack, so just like GW Bush, Netanyahu is weaponizing the attack and stoking the flames of nationalism to push his xenophobic agenda.
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The oppressions of Palestinians is horrible and it is Israel’s responsibility to rectify that. However, it does not give justification for Hamas to attack civilians. Hamas must have known what would happen but they went forward with the attack anyways.
If you grew up on the other line of segregation in your country which became occupied by invaders who consider you to be subhuman, you live in poverty, your movements are restricted, and every day the worst of the occupiers force your neighbors from their homes through violence and terror, what would you personally do in such a situation? Keep in mind if you engage in peaceful protest, you will be shot at and possibly killed.
What are your options?
What would you do in such a situation
Probably not kidnap and kill civilians from the other side, and not use civilians on my own side of the line as human shields when the other side retaliates, and not murder civilians on my own side of the line to prevent them from escaping, all of which would end up making the whole situation for the people on my own side so much more miserable and violent.
The options are probably to have free and fair elections while conducting peace negotiations with the support of the international community. All of which have been thrown out of the window now in favor of another violent war that will certainly be lost.
Who is going to have free and fair elections? Last time they tried, Bibi made sure Hamas won and that was the last time there was an election in Gaza. The IDF has the West Bank under their direct control. Peace negotiations have been tried over and over for decades, and for the last decade the Likud party has rejected all attempts at peace talks as a matter of principal while systematically invading and occupying the West Bank in an illegal act of naked aggression which will continue regardless of who they elect. In Gaza until recently that wasn’t happening. Elections and peace talks are out. What are the other options?
There hasn’t been an election in Gaza since 2007, 16 years ago. Maybe they could have at least tried to have some sort of democratic process in that time? Palestine needs to appeal to the international community for support in negotiating with Israel. I agree Israel has not handled the situation humanley and has not done their best to negotiate peace either. However, Gaza is definitely not going to get anywhere under their current leadership, and this war had no chance of success for them, and their situation does not justify attacking or kidnapping civilians.
The reason Bibi installed Hamas was to to make the democratic process more difficult. I think it’s more likely that Hamas is responsible for the lack of elections than the actual democratic will of the people in Gaza. That being said, Gaza has fared better than the West Bank in terms of resisting invasion so I wouldn’t be surprised if they have support.
The international community outside the US and the UK is essentially unanimous in denouncing Israel constantly for decades for thwir imperialist project. It doesn’t mean much when the US has vero power at the UN and is itself more interested in the strategic advantage of Israel exactly as it is (although our government prefers there was less visible carnage). This has been the norm for decades, so an outside negotiation doesn’t seem like a relaible method especially since the negotiation would be taking place while ethnic cleansing is happening in the West Bank and now in Gaza.
All this isn’t to justify a thing. It’s not ok to kill inncocent people, full stop. This is to demonstrate who has the power to stop this, and the decision of Netanyahu and his Likud cronies is that having an ethnostate is the priority over having peace or allowing Palestinian nationals to have rights in their own land. Killing and eating someone is also wrong, but the Donnor party did it because they were in a desperate situation where the choice was not right or wrong but living or dying. If an outside party forced the donnor party into that circumstance and kept them there, that party is more responsible for what happened than those with no options fighting to survive.
