The New York Times does an unprecedented thing for a paper that has long supported Israel: puts the faces of dozens of Palestinian children slaughtered by Israel in Gaza on its front page. “Never thought I’d see the day when Palestinian victims were pictured, named, & their stories told,” says James Zogby.
An outpouring of support in India for Israel’s war on “terrorists” can be explained by: India’s rightward drift under Modi, underpinned by hatred for Muslims, and a sense of identity between Zionism and Hindutva, the political philosophy of the ruling party in India. The close ties are also strategic, relating to India’s tensions with Muslim-majority Pakistan.
We can expect an unprecedented surge of COVID-19 in Gaza in the coming weeks and a severely damaged health care system and exhausted health care workers unable to cope adequately. Prior to the bombing, 99% of the COVID-19 virus circulating in Palestine was from the highly contagious British Variant B.1.1.7. An estimated 5% of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza had been vaccinated and mask use during Ramadan was lax. The positivity rate for coronavirus in Gaza was around 30% three weeks ago.
Israel suffered a P.R. disaster in the last Gaza attack: western media for once openly questioned the reasoning and morality behind yet another murderous onslaught on an imprisoned population, the fifth in the last 12 years. Even the NYT runs an op-ed saying that “legitimate resistance” to violence is a Palestinian right. Pro-Israel voices in the media are pushing back by saying sharp criticism of Israel is antisemitism.
At the very moment that the UK government has announced plans to ban boycotts, divestment and sanctions by public funded bodies, the very reasons for supporting non-violent strategies to achieve equality for the Palestinian people look more urgent and compelling than ever. BDS is about fairness, equality and justice, ideas that have been at the heart of Jewish ethics for thousands of years
Park Avenue Synagogue’s Rabbi Neil Zuckerman expressed worshipful feelings about his Israeli soldier son’s M16 because it represents the “miracle” of Jewish power.
Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s courageous encounter with President Biden on a tarmac in Detroit yesterday, demanding action against Israeli war crimes, is already having an effect. Biden, who is on the defensive from the progressive wing of his party, told Netanyahu today that he “expects ‘a significant de-escalation today on the path to a ceasefire,” NBC reports.
Don’t look now, but mainstream Democrats are defying Israel over the Gaza attack. Chuck Schumer calls for a cease fire, joining 30 other Senators, and Gregory Meeks, chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, called for a hold on a $735 million sale of missiles and bombs to Israel that the White House approved May 5 — till he backed down today. But liberal Zionist J Street group is for all military aid continuing to flow to Israel.
We are mentors for the We Are Not Numbers youth storytelling project. We work with Palestinian writers 18 to 30 years of age whose stories have been rendered largely invisible by the world. And we support the general strike by Palestinians on May 18.
Mohammed Moussa survived the Israeli attack on Gaza in 2014, but now he is watching from afar. “I feel broken while I watch my memories burn along with the soul of Gaza,” Moussa writes. “They kill us twice, inside Gaza, and they kill us outside Gaza – when we die worrying about our families there.”