Our readers know how much violence is erupting in Palestine now; and they have seen the bias with which that violence is being described in the west. When Israel killed ten Palestinians in Jenin on January 26 in what is being called a “massacre,” those deaths were not a major story in the American press. But a day later, when a Palestinian gunman killed six Israeli settlers and one Ukrainian national in the illegal settlement of Neve Yaakov in occupied East Jerusalem, that was big news in the west– with outlets saying a terrorist had targeted a synagogue as if this is a religious conflict, and not militant apartheid. Liberal Zionists echoed that bias.
And no surprise, the Secretary of State, who is about to visit Israel and Palestine, expressed no sympathies about the Israeli army killings in Jenin– while grieving over the killings in occupied Jerusalem. “Our thoughts are with the Israeli people following the terrorist attack in Jerusalem.”
Notice that Antony Blinken couldn’t bring himself to say a settlement or a colony– or occupied East Jerusalem, where Palestinians were supposed to have their capital, remember that great promise? The Biden administration this week doubled down on Trump policy by refusing to describe the West Bank as occupied territories. Because Biden and the Democratic Party leadership are determined to demonstrate the “unbreakable bond” between the U.S. and Israel, regardless of how militantly racist the Israeli government is.
Once again, it is progressive activists on the web and social media, along with a few courageous congresspeople, who are pushing the issue of Palestinian human rights in the American discourse. Because we will never give up on the principle of equality. And we do not regard this conflict as a “cycle of violence.” It is the inevitable uprising of a people being ethnically cleansed before our eyes by one of the strongest armies in the world. So this week we ask:
What does the U.S. power structure expect when it signs off on the theft of more and more Palestinian land in the name of Zionism? “We’re losing our last place of sovereignty in Jerusalem,” Jalal Abu-Khater explained to Mariam Barghouti this week of the encirclement of the city.
What do liberal Zionists have to offer to the principle of Palestinian liberty besides conflict management, docility, and apartheid-with-4G?
What does the U.S. government mean when it says that both sides must “deescalate” — and yet the “status quo is unsustainable”? Does it expect yet another generation of Palestinians to sit still as their hopes for basic freedoms are strangled? They will not do so; and their spirit of sumud, or steadfastness, now has a global audience.
Maybe Mr.Blinken -and many others – understands the difference between a firefight between IDF soldiers and armed Jihad gunmen on the one hand and the murder of unarmed civilians on the other.
Why doesn’t Mondoweiss report on the massive anti-government , pro-democracy protests sweeping the country ? Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa, here in Beer Sheva and elsewhere. That was the big news here, until the attack in Neve Ya’akov. Not a peep from MW reporters and editors.
Will it really save the democratic system? We don’t know at this point. But hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens are proving that we’re not willing to go quietly into the night.
Very well said, Phil. Thank you!
“we will never give up on the principle of equality”
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How might it come about resistance with rocks and rifles could lead to equal civil or political rights? Seems either would have better odds to lead to an independent state.