It's a crazed day for me. Running. Chomsky, Bayoumi and Blumenthal are speaking in the city tonight, and last night I went to an event for our Goldstone Report book at Alwan for the Arts and didn't get home till 1.
I need to register two moving statements from the panel last night that resonate this morning. First, Rebecca Vilkomerson of Jewish Voice for Peace talked about being in Israel during the Gaza onslaught, and how lonely it felt to be against the horrors taking place just 40 miles away.
"It was the worst month of my life.... Sitting in Israel and not being able to do anything about it.... and a lot of activists felt the same way."
During the Lebanon war of 2006, Israelis had been afraid, tense, Vilkomerson said. The entire country was caught up in the war, worried for their soldiers, and Israel evacuated the north. But there was none of that fear this time, complete indifference to what was going on. "The cafes were full, life went on entirely the same."
Vilkomerson was shocked. She knew the West Bank, she went there to demonstrations all the time; but the level of the ferocity of the war was at a new level that she had not seen before, and that was evident from Day 1. They knew that 200 were dead at the end of Day 1, but Israel was unified.
The best example of the people's indifference was that she would go to get her children from school and-- "It was just like any other day. Hey, how are you doing, what's up?" a friend would say. "I'd say, 'I'm not good.' 'Oh why, what's wrong?' And when I told them, if they were on the liberal side, they would rearrange their features to look concerned." And if they were on the right, they'd look at her like, what a stupid American.
She knew some Israeli activists who were so disturbed by the national mood that they did not leave their homes except to go to demonstrations. And they would go in groups to these demonstrations so as to be safe. And at these demonstrations, police barriers were set up from which war supporters threw rotten eggs at the demonstrators, and she would see people in business clothing, respectable people, literally trying to hurl themselves over the barrier to get at her to kill her.
"There was a sense of nationalism, we're doing the right thing, how dare you criticize us."
But she had to go to the demonstrations, she said, because she would have gone crazy sitting in her place, thinking she was the only person who was appalled. And let me remind you, our valiant president-elect, who only got by Hillary Clinton by opposing the Iraq war disaster, said not one word about the slaughter in Gaza.
Now here is the good news. Gaza catalyzed the people who were alone and enraged, it ruptured a significant part of the American Jewish community that had supported Israel without question. Rupture was her word. "Irreparable rupture in some portion of the Jewish community." Yes.
And Jewish Voice for Peace was empowered. And the civil society coalition of Palestinians and Jews; and the demonstrations in the West Bank were enlarged. And Boycott From Within grew as a movement inside Israel.
What an amazing testimony.
The second statement I need to document for history was Felice Gelman's very important comment from her visit to Egypt. By the way, we had a panel of four women and one man. Pretty good on gender diversity (and I speak as a reformed sexist pig).
Gelman was in Cairo for the worst days, the violence, and she said that when the Obama administration didn't come out strongly in favor of the protesters, and when they were being attacked on that Wednesday of camels and horses, there was a feeling among the protesters, "they had to win their own revolution."
The Egyptian government thugs were using everything that the Israelis use against demonstrations on the West Bank. Teargas, rubber bullets, batons. And what did the demonstrators do: They threw stones. And they covered their heads in blankets-- as helmets. My god, what bravery. But: they threw stones, and the world honored them for doing so.
"The Egyptian revolution has legitimized the right of nonviolent protesters to defend themselves," Gelman said. "Which I believe the Israelis have taken away from us."
She explained that in South Africa, there was some violence on the part of the anti-apartheid demonstrators, in India too. As historically there has always been, by resisters who are being crushed.
"The Israeli suppression of the intifadah [second] took away the right of nonviolent protesters to defend themselves. The Egyptian revolution has restored that right, in my mind. Palestinian deserve equal treatment to other protesters seeking exactly the same rights."
Wow. I think of how brainwashed I have been by the debates over the nonviolent protests. By the insistence on the part of our media/officials that people on a boat attacked by commandos from helicopters in the middle of the night in international waters shouldn't lift a stick to defend themselves as nine are mowed down dead. Now I am nonviolent (and afraid, not willing to die for please fill in the blank); but Gelman and Egypt have swept my thinking. And I urge the mainstream media to reflect this wisdom when they begin their wall-to-wall coverage of the surging West Bank protests.
There were other great statements last night, by Alia Malek on how wonderful it is to have good news at last; by Jamil Dakwar on how many reporters got into Cairo, but "Not a single reporter, not even Anderson Cooper, was able to get into the Gaza Strip, and that was not seen as a big deal"-- that sweeps my thinking, too; and by my co-editor Lizzy Ratner on Desmond Tutu warning her not to be jaded about the importance of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, it is vital to hundreds of millions of people around the world as an aspirational document.
And which, as Malek told us last night, 7-year-old Palestinian children can recite to you from memory. Yes: why?
(Goldstone book link at right; please buy it; I sold 9 copies at the table at the back of Alwan last night; then please write scathing/gossamer reviews of the book at Am*z*n or another vendor.)
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
I am struck that children can recite this.
MRW, when i was in gaza we visited a multitude of schools and classrooms. yes they knew we were coming and yes they could have decorated accordingly but none the less there were lessons on human rights in both arabic and english on the blackboards and on posters around the rooms. of course these are UN schools but we visited schools that weren’t.
the kids know about the world and they know their situation is unique. they also know they are worthy of rights just like everyone else. it’s also rather amazing how many kids speak at least some english. i met 8 years old kids who were almost fluent and many 16-18 completely fluent.
education is highly valued in palestinian society. this kid is 17 years old, secondary school student in Gaza. they’re f’ing smart.
check out the rest of the series. mostly English Lit students @ gaza university. but human rights is something they start learning about in early elementary education. kinda makes sense considering their predicament, for their own self worth.
How can one hear testimonies like Vilkomerson’s and then accuse anti-war activists of being anti-Israel?
In rebelling against European anti-Semitism, Zionists have run headlong back into the ghetto. But, this time, there is no accusing the Gentiles for their condition. How sad, that the cure for 2,000 years of Galut (Diaspora exile) ‘sickness’ is more toxic than the disease.
What we want desperately is to lift Israel out of its isolation. It’s a national psychological state. The more isolated they are, the more Jewish they feel.
American Jews have created an unprecedented successful blend of the tribal and universal.
When will the Israelis come on board?
Thanks, Elliot. (I encourage Mondoweiss visitors to click on Elliot’s name above and have a look at his own, excellent, blog.)
thanks for the suggestion, excellent blog.
In rebelling against European anti-Semitism, Zionists have run headlong back into the ghetto. But, this time, there is no accusing the Gentiles for their condition.
Never thought of it that way, Elliot. Israel as a ghetto. You’re absolutely dead right. Complete with all the seen-as-necessary reenactments of fears, reactions, and desire for revenge.
Israel is like Meryl Streep’s head in Death Becomes Her: turned backwards and talking about immortality.
Go on over to Washington Note and see the announcement about what Feingold is up to.
Americans & others are marching to this tiny piece of post-Mubarak land between Egypt & Gaza on Feb 26th next; what will our MSM and Obama’s regime say to Dr Ayman Nur, of the Tomorrow Party, preparing to enter a new Egyptian regime?
link to israelnationalnews.com
this is really important. it is also why i support the second amendment. people have a right to defend themselves and their people. people have a right to resist vulgar violent abuse and occupation/ethnic cleansing.
this is common sense. when i was in gaza at a gathering of women from hamas who spoke with our delegation i asked several women why they supported hamas over fatah. all of them said because they have a right to protect themselves.
those second amendment rights don’t really get honored in too many places, annie.
probably not in Israel or Gaza.
Thanks for making the book available through Amazon.uk for us Europeans!
Rachel Maddow gave a speech about non-violence on her show a couple of weeks ago. About how it was the only thing that worked. She cited Gandhi. And Mandela.
Both Gandhi and Mandela were prepared to use violence to protect themselves. They said so. But they said it was the threat that they could and would use violence that made their non-violence powerful. Gandhi and Mandela understood Sun Tzu.
What Maddow was seal-clapping about was adopting an emasculating position going in.
Thanks James, Annie and MRW for your kind words and encouragement.
I don’t agree with everything in the post, Philip, but the cost of the Israeli invasion of Gaza really was a big piece of Israel’s soul.
They couldn’t really afford it.
[Israel loses its "no" vote on who gets to use the Suez Canal]
Suez Canal Dispute: Iran Warships To Sail Through Suez, Israel Warns
JERUSALEM, Feb 16 (Reuters) – Two Iranian warships planned to sail through the Suez canal en route to Syria on Wednesday, Israel’s foreign minister said, calling the move the latest “provocation” by Tehran and hinting at an Israeli response.
Israel sees a major threat in Iran’s nuclear programme and calls for its elimination, but the countries’ geographical distance has kept them from open confrontation. Syria is one of Israel’s neighbouring foes and an ally of Tehran.
“Tonight, two Iranian warships are meant to pass through the Suez Canal to the Mediterranean Sea and reach Syria, something that has not happened in many years,” Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said in a Jerusalem speech distributed by his office.
“To my regret, the international community is not showing readiness to deal with the recurring Iranian provocations. The international community must understand that Israel cannot forever ignore these provocations.” (Writing by Dan Williams; editing by Philippa Fletcher)
Copyright 2010 Thomson Reuters.
link to huffingtonpost.com