Mohammad writes from Vancouver:
I cried all the way in the bus to school. I cried all the way in a
lecture on Matisse by Serge Guilbaut, scholar of
modernism. I cried while I paid for my Norman Finklestein tickets (he
is coming to Vancouver for a talk next week) at the Palestinian
Solidarity table that was tucked at a cold corner outside of the
student union building at University of British Columbia. The attendants were as sad and depressed
as the people of Gaza. And I am crying now. And I'm not a sentimental
person.
I feel so sad and so lonely and so oppressed in a
university at the end of this long and painful decade. Hillel people
walk around with the Zionist flag sticking from their jeans back
pocket.
Most kids don't really care for either side, and that
itself is tragic. It is so sad to see young people go about their
everyday school life with no consciousness of what is happening. And I
feel sad for not being young and therefore valid in displaying my
passion and my humanity in the ways of the anti war movement in the
1960's used to. I wanna grab the Israeli flag from someone's back
pocket and throw it on the floor and stump on it. I wanna set it ablaze
together with the flag of USA, Canada, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan,
And the UN. But I won't.
I see these happy kids on this rare
full sunny day but how can I blame them? It's not their fault that they
have been socialized to express their humanity for the injured cats and
dogs or the chickens and the cows in the slaughterhouses and not the
civilians in Gaza.
In other words, he wants to commit an act of symbolic violence and destroy other people's property, because he cannot destroy "the Zionists" themselves in that context.
Inta irhabi, ya Mohammed.
Do you prefer the actual violence Zionists are inflicting on these people?
what Mohammed is very poetically describing is how victims turn into oppressors, as well as how he is refusing to join that cycle of violence.
Would that the Israeli oppressors could do the same. But first Zionists would have to realize that their self-definition as the "eternally persecuted" equals an identity of "eternal persecutors".
As Bill Clinton would say, I feel this kid's pain.
However, we may REALLY feel this kid's pain in the form of a terrorist attack here in The States or our friends in Canada.
This Gaza shit is going to blow-back all over us soon.
We should cut off all aid to Israel … then deport all muslim and jewish non-citizens. We must rid ourselves of this religious war that is none of our business.
Fuck 'em all, especially the Israelis.
Dear Eurosabra
Contemplating acts of "symbolic violence" is a hell of a lot better than committing acts of real violence, as for instance when you shell a UN school.
"…because he cannot destroy "the Zionists" themselves in that context."
You made this part up. (Perhaps out of a subconscious fear of gentiles?)
Dear Mohammed. I understand your pain, but can you be the first friend of Gaza, to call on the Hamas leaders to end the armed resistance, and the suicidal policies? Can we all be constructive? Rgds.
"…but how can I blame them? It's not their fault…"
This is idiotic. Shall we say the same of every insane serial killer in history, most of whom were abused as children? And why were Hitler and Stalin so nasty? Did they somehow make a conscious and fully aware choice to be what they were, or were they too in large part the result of how they were brought up?
To look at it the other way, shall we also not praise the great people of history (or the present) because their greatness is due to their wonderful parents or whatever?
You hold people responsible for what they do. Why they do it is their problem. A rabid dog might have been a wonderful pet if another rabid animal hadn't bitten it, but once it's rabid there's nothing to do but put it down with extreme prejudice.
Hamas offers 1-yr truce if Israel pulls out within week
GAZA, Jan 15 (Reuters) – Hamas told Egypt it would agree to a year-long renewable ceasefire in Gaza if Israel pulls out all its forces within 5-7 days and reopens border crossings immediately, Hamas and diplomatic sources said on Thursday.
The sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Egypt has presented Hamas's position to Israel for its consideration. Israeli leaders were expected to make decisions on Thursday on the proposal, brought back from Cairo by their envoy.
In its proposal, Hamas demanded that the opening of all of Gaza's border crossings be guaranteed by Egypt and the international community.
Hamas told Egypt it was open to the deployment of Turkish monitors but objected to a proposal that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's presidential guard be stationed at the Rafah crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt.
Hamas also wants ceasefire to include a reconstruction conference. (Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi)
Hamas offers 1-yr truce if Israel pulls out within week
Mohammed,
Do not despair. Millions around the world share in your sadness and frustration. Millions are waking up too, and beginning to understand that there is a lot that they do not understand. The first step to setting things right is knowing that they are wrong.
The killing of our people has gone on for decades now. The British killed 5,000 between 1936 and 1939 in the first uprising we staged against foreign rule in Palestine – at that time British rule. What is happening in Gaza is horrifying and brutal and there is no justification for the sacrifice of innocents at this scale. But people were dying under the siege anyway – quietly, but slowly and surely – accompanied by sproadic Israeli airstrikes which also killed over a thousand since 2005.
When the killings happen at this scale and with this intensity and arrogance in front of the world, live on TV, people suddenly wake up and start asking questions. Those questions will lead to answers Mohammed. Morality and humanity will triumph. God sees everything and hears everything. everything happens for a reason. Try not to lose hope. Keep the people of Gaza in your prayers. And never give up on the basic goodness of humanity. It's the systems that enrich a small minority at the expense of the rest of us that are to blame. Systems can be radically modified and even discarded. People should not be. The future will be different.
All around me I see, meet, adults; none of them care about the I-P situation–its seems to be the least of their daily concerns. On MSM TV news and in their local print news its certainly no banner headline–TV gives at most gives a few seconds report and then moves on–at the moment the aircraft crash in the Hudson River
takes up an hour each on CNN, MSNBC, FoX, and the other cable news channel; local TV its not mentioned at all… I saw the Pal casualty count appear once, for a second or two, quickly vanishing
–somethng is wrong when four major cable TV channels give an hour each tonight to a talking head discussion about that single
airplane crash, apparently due to birds flying into its two engines.
It's nobody's fault I guess, nobody that I can see. No flag is burning.
Not subconscious. I've been blown up, shot at, and spat on enough for infesting Jewish Jerusalem that anyone reaching for me draws back a stump, simply because I have no idea what they intend. However, I am enough of a skeptic not to carry an Israeli flag around a college campus.
If Mohammed wants to feel sad, mad, helpless and bad, he can. Of course Palestinians are innocent victims and have always only been innocent victims, and the events of 1921 and 1929 had nothing to do with the origin of the events of '36-'39.
Own your $#^! people. Where are the Palestinian demonstrations against the rockets? There are certainly some Israeli ones against the bombing.
Where are the Palestinian demonstrations against the rockets?
Good question.
And likewise, where are the Palestinian F-16s, to dump white phosphorus shells all over Tel Aviv?
That's the sure way to strengthen Israeli moderates, right Sabra?
Mo, I know how you feel. For the last two weeks I sleep like shit and think about Gaza all the time. I blew up on my parents in law and had a nervous breakdown. After more than 2 weeks of this horror the mind sort of gets used to it, you get "conditioned", but then IDF is so good at upping the ante every freaking day…
It wasn't the same for me during the Second Lebanon Fiasco – that time I was furious at Israel for the atrocious, cruel bombings, but I still cared about the Israeli side a lot. My parents were bombarded in Haifa and I also was upset about all the civilian and soldier's losses on Israeli side as well. This time I find it very hard to sympathize with Israeli side at all. Not having parents under bombardments helps, as well as the terrible asymmetry of the losses (I know, it's not rational), but the main thing is probably that I cannot forgive those 90% of Israelis who support this madness even after seeing the same thing 2.5 years ago. This time I feel that people are really after blood and it drives me mad. It is a rude awakening for a lot of us.
But I agree with Leila – some good things are bound to come out even of such terrible tragedies. I feel the Gaza is going to be the straw that breaks the back of many a camel. I mean, I follow a tennis blog and even there people are furious over what's going on in Gaza. A tennis blog!
I also feel that now there is going to be a critical mass of Jews that will be willing to disassociate themselves from the State of Israel and its policies. Things cannot stay the same.
Well said Peter D.
'Mo, I know how you feel. For the last two weeks I sleep like shit and think about Gaza all the time. I blew up on my parents in law and had a nervous breakdown.'
I have also upset a few people in my circle when they attempted to toss a few bromides they'd read in the paper at any mention of Gaza. They might not invite me round for a while, but they got the message. I'm on hols with my wife and kids and feel drained and angry when I should be refresshed.
Not much to complain about though really, under the circumstances. My kids, at least for now, are safe, but if we continue to allow Israel to behave like Nazi Germany, these days won't remain halcyon for long.