 selected writing Postcards of Hangings, Thoughts on Gaza  They used to sell postcards of hangings. Now we simply pay the cable company so we can turn on our TVs and watch Gaza. Watching Gaza. Gawking. Gaping. At an unmistakeable wasteland of man-made misery. Man-made misery. Man-made. Not natural. Not a Tsunami, nor an earthquake, and certainly no accident.  What Israel is doing is wrong. All that we see happening now is just a larger version of a single event that first took place in 2002. Israel dropped a one-ton bomb on top of an apartment building in Gaza to kill one man with the predictable result that fifteen people, nine of them children, were killed and more than one hundred injured. All that we see happening now in Gaza is a larger version of that event. What Israel is doing is wrong. But it's not who the Israelis are that matters. Who are we? Who are we, in America, who watch and do nothing? It is of primary importance to remember that the Palestinian people are just people like us. I lived in Ramallah for four years. I travelled and spent time with friends and colleagues in Bethlehem, Hebron, Nablus, Jericho, Jerusalem and Gaza. And Haifa and Akka and Tel Aviv for that matter. Palestinians watch The Simpsons, the Superbowl, and in Michigan there are so many Palestinians and other Arabs--some say almost half of the 1967 population of Ramallah--that there are street signs in Arabic. When 9/11 happened, Palestinians were glued to their TVs like us looking for news of relatives who worked in New York's financial district or were traveling. Don't think Abdullah or Amira Palestinian. Try Joe or Jane Palestinian for a change. It sounds insane to have to phrase it like that to draw out the disconnect. But the simple fact is that, if we in America truly believed that Palestinians were human beings just like us, then why do we do nothing as a nation? How can we do nothing? That is the message we need to take to Washington.
The issue is not just our silent complicity with the destruction of a people, of their way of life, of their very infrastructural means of life--bridges, roads, power plants, schools... That would be bad enough. The reality of the situation is that it is our bullets, our guns, our missiles, our technology, and our political cover that makes it possible for Israel--time and time again--to unleash a massive military arsenal on the innocent. There are no excuses for using heavy weapons in densely populated cities, cities that are obviously and primarily filled with civilians. Do we do nothing because "Israel is our friend"? What worth is a friendship if to keep it you have to not only approve of the terrible things your friend does, but are required to enable them by giving them these terrible tools? When Israel rockets Gaza indiscriminately, the completely foreseeable consequences are as predictable as if a man were to drop a hand grenade into a barrel full of fish. And the rapidly rising death and injury statistics underline the obviousness of that--that which we are allowing to happen. I have been to Gaza. I have held in my hands weapons casings that say MADE IN PHILADELPHIA on them. You should be aware that after many years of this most Gazans can read at least that much English. Some weapon casings would have production dates on them that were just a week or two earlier. We were rushing our brand new death tools to Gaza.
The name on the side of one canister I remember, Federal Laboratories, today called Defense Technologies-Federal Laboratories, are the people who brought clouds of tear gas and less lethal projectile weapons to the streets of St. Paul and Minneapolis during the Republican National Convention. The Palestinians are not stupid. They understand that not all Americans voted for the really pro-Israeli guy as opposed to just the regular pro-Israeli guy--which of course is all we get to choose from. They get it. They get that you aren't taking day trips to bomb factories with your children to sign "With love from America" on the latest case of rockets heading for Gaza. They know that the Israelis can take care of that part for themselves.
Palestinians are politically aware because all of them they have been literally born into an unavoidable, lifelong historical drama starring them. But at the same time, they know that it has been far too long now for them to wait for you to change. There have been over 100 years of, first Zionist, then Israeli colonization of the land of Palestine. And their visible misery drags on and on. Many times I had the opportunity to speak with the latest wretched Palestinian family standing on the rubble of their home in Gaza. "Where is America?" they would ask me, even though I am not American. "It doesn't matter if you are American. Go tell George Bush that we want to live in peace." It's been so long. And it's been so hard. Many of the elderly in Gaza can tell you their personal stories of being displaced in 1948 from what is called Israel today, and fleeing to the West Bank. Then, in 1967, many of those people became refugees a second time, fleeing to Gaza. And during this last decade, there have been massive demolitions of entire neighborhoods, of towns like Rafah, in Gaza that have created a horrific reality. People already displaced twice in their life have been displaced again. For some, even more horrific, it has happened multiple times to them the last decade. Or rather, it has been done to them multiple times. How many times does one person have to be displaced by war in a lifetime before someone will step in and give them peace? For many in Gaza, they have literally been made refugees by Israel three, four or five times in their life, and they know that it's probably not over yet.
Israel is doing this because it does not want to grant Palestinians full rights in their own land. There is no practical way to separate Palestinians and Israelis into two states. The non-Jewish population of the entire land has been larger than the Jewish population for several years now according to the U.S. State Department. The entire land area is just 1/14th the size of Minnesota and holds over 9 million people. With that little leeway, we are left with two possible solutions, one is a political solution, the other is a military one. The name of any military solution in Palestine is one whispered by the ghosts of 6 million Jews who died at the hands of the Nazis in World War Two. We cannot allow that to happen again. We should not have let it happen then, we cannot allow it to happen in Palestine, or Darfur or anywhere. But it does, slowly and steadily. Another one of the peoples of this world, with a multi-faceted society and rich culture, and the shared oral history and wisdom of generations are being wiped out. And we are either going to let that keep happening or we are going to stop it. Whichever we choose, let us remember that we chose.
In order to stop the slaughter we need to recognize that Israel is extremely entrenched in the U.S. political system. The Israel Lobby makes or breaks politicians. Bush was terrible on Palestine but do not dare forget that Clinton was equally as bad. And Barack Obama used to attend events in his state of Chicago that promoted the Palestinian cause. Now Obama stands in front of AIPAC and sucks on the very same teat of power that is responsible for enabling the slaughter to happen, bullet by lobbied-for bullet. I'd like to hope he will spit it out, otherwise there is no point to the man. If he cannot bring either hope or change to where it is most desperately needed, a lot of people wasted a lot of their time and energy electing him. America does not need another leader devoid of both integrity and any discernible concern for human lives that are not American. The last eight years have made us look like violent, retarded apes to the rest of the world. Enough is enough.  What we do to enable Israel's slaughter in Palestine is bad. What we do not do to stop it is equally as bad. Both the active and the passive kill. In order to stop the slaughter in Gaza, we need to recognize that America is asleep on this issue. Whatever form it takes--whether rallys, marches, letter writing, boycotts, solidarity start-ups, study tours, funding for information sources, cultural exchange, sit-ins, or circuses--we must relentlessly challenge the negative and racist assumptions about Palestinians in the White House, in our media, in our neighborhoods, and in ourselves. If you want to start with your own racism, do what I did and just stop for a minute to think about what you didn't do for Palestine which you could have while their slaughter happened in front of your eyes on TV over the last few weeks.
America loves war and America loves Israel. Once you figure in veterans' benefits into the accounts, half of U.S. taxpayer dollars are currently spent on war and Israel is the largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid--which includes direct military aid, technology and intelligence-sharing, and political cover with our shameful, Palestinian holocaust-denying, Palestinian holocaust-enabling, Get Israel Out Of Jail veto in the UN. How many times has that been used to stop a resolution critical of Israel now? 20? 30? 40? 50? 100? I don't know the figure any more because it became too painful to count a long time ago. America is asleep but there is a stirring. Whatever your neighbors believe or think about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, they are currently being forced to confront some very difficult truths despite the best efforts of the media to gently flatter the naked, rampaging Israeli emperor.
This war will only be ceased when everyone shouts "Stop!" at the same time. Right now, people have questions and we have information. The truth will end this conflict. There is no need to take a tribal side. History is on the side of the Palestinians because the misused weapons are visibly in the bloodied hands of the Israelis, and it is at times of crisis like these--when the total imbalance of power between Israel and the Palestinians can be seen with the naked eye--that are the harvest times of activism. Each time we all push and pull together at the same time, the facade cracks a little more. One day it will fall completely, as it has done in many countries, at many different times in history. Apartheid seemed impenetrable. The Civil Rights struggle at times seemed impossible. But unity and persistence can overcome any obstacle, no matter how large. No decent God stands with an Israel that stands knee deep in blood. We need to start with the uncomfortable truth that we are passively standing by as a nation and watching a people die at the hands of another people, while our government actively helps the ones doing the killing. We are the gawker standing and watching the crashed car with the unconscious passengers slowly catch fire. We are also the person handing the gasoline to their enemy and tripping up the fireman who runs to help.
Over 1,000 people killed before we even begin to talk about the thousands of men, women and children, grandparents, parents, and children who are maimed and crippled.
Every hour, the visible landscape viewed daily by the eyes of the children in Gaza becomes ever bleaker, resembling Hell more and more, children who will grow up and judge us for what we have, and for what we have not, done. It is time to recognize that there is no time left. The end of the Palestinian people in Palestine may very well be past the point of no return already. So many forces of destruction and waste have been set in motion. Are we going to stay the hands of the executioner or are we just going to buy some more postcards?
Nigel Parry is an alternative media pioneer who created the Electronic Intifada, Electronic Iraq, and Electronic Lebanon websites. He has lived in the Twin Cities for a decade and coordinates the RNC '08 Report webiste, "a citizen's archive of media reports, government documents, and other resources relating to the 2008 RNC" available at http://rnc08report.org WHERE TO DONATE TO GAZA? If you want to help Palestinians in Gaza with direct aid, look no further than the website of the United Palestinian Appeal at http://helpUPA.com. Operating for over 30 years and a Charity Navigator 4-star charity, UPA is both trustworthy and effective. RELATED MATERIALS, FREE MUSIC... For more writings and more on Palestine... |
