I really didn’t want to comment on the situation in Israel and the Palestinian Territories. I was happy to just sit back and share a few posts from people who also just want peace in the region. It feels impossible now. I see posts from people, from all walks of life, that I just can’t get over.
First, you should know, my entire political conscience came alive as a result of the Iraq War. The only political persuasion I had as a high school kid, watching people a little older than me be sent to the Middle East, was anti-war. I simply didn’t agree with motives for the war, and when those ended up being built on false pretenses, my position hardened.
Looking at the human cost of war, military intervention should always be used as the last resort. As a society, we tend to view war as a game. We choose sides, we analyze tactics, we fawn over the stories of heroism while mourning the inevitable tragedy that comes with armed conflict. We fall into the oldest trope, battles between perceived “good” and “evil.” In some cases, it can be very clear where the “good” and “evil” lie. For the most part, it is far more nuanced, and therein lies the issue. When the costs of victory and defeat are millions of lives, the lives of mostly innocents, we must not be so cavalier with how we view and treat war. Even in the most just war, when the outcome of the war is equally as just, the people who die as a result do not get to enjoy said outcome. This is the part that disturbs me the most about the societal view of warfare. The sacrifices by soldiers, and the losses incurred by the innocents, even in victory, are deeply saddening. In war, the people that lose out the most are the people with the least to gain. The “winners” of every war are, first and foremost, defense contractors, and second, the small men in positions that want to feel big by sending other people to die for one reason (natural resources) or another (nationalism).
It is crucial to remember that the position of the government, especially when it comes to military intervention, may not be the popular position of the people of the nation. There will always be the warhawks among us, but most people just want to live quiet, decent lives where they can enjoy time with their loved ones and do the things they love to do. This is true regardless of if you are an American, Russian, Palestinian, Israeli, Somali, Argentine, or Iranian. Nobody wishes to live a life where they are constantly killing their fellow man over a few acres here and there. Some will not wish to even when the war is close to home. We all yearn, and default, to non-violence. It is, normally, forces beyond our control that push us into the crossfire. The government of Israel and the militant organization Hamas, have been putting innocents into the crossfire for decades. Hamas has carried out countless acts of violence towards civilian populations, most notably of late, the massacre at a music festival during the offensive out of Gaza. Israel has routinely conducted military strikes against civilian targets like news organizations, hospitals, schools, and apartment blocks. In Gaza specifically, they have barred Palestinians from leaving the territory, which is contrary to international agreements signed by Israel. Human Rights Watch calls it, effectively, an open air prison. These are millions of people, residing in both territories, that are having their lives destroyed as a result of the refusal of their political and military leaders to pursue a more permanent, and peaceful, status quo. Unfortunately, the rhetoric is getting far worse.
The Israeli defense minister had this to say, as the country declared war:
“I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly”
It is clear things are about to get much worse in Gaza before they get better. Gaza has over 2 million people living in it. These are not 2 million members of Hamas. These are mostly regular people, just trying to have as good of a life as they can have. They want to go to school. They want to provide for their families. They want to enjoy their hobbies. They will now be brought to their knees for crimes committed by the militant few. Half of the 2 million people living in Gaza are children. This is happening with Israeli citizens as well. Not every Israeli citizen is a war hawk that wants to push Palestinians out of their homes, yet they have to suffer for the crimes of their leaders. What makes it worse, is seeing the cheering on, the bloodlust, of people watching the conflict, like me, from thousands of miles away. To be clear, Hamas should be held accountable for their many crimes against innocent Israeli citizens. Just like all militant organizations that target the innocents they should be brought to justice for their crimes. Unfortunately, that is not what is happening and, from an optical standpoint, it is not politically expedient for leaders to be nuanced in their responses. Normally, acts of violence are met with an escalation of violence.
Americans my age, and older, experienced this first hand with the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The tenor of the online posts from the pro-Israeli side are not much different than the blood thirsty rhetoric around Muslims after 9/11. After 9/11, we were(many probably still are) scared of it happening again. The fact that the perpetrators were radical, Islamic, terrorists, fed into our national desire to affix our fears and problems on a people that are “other” to us. A different language, religion, skin color was the perfect foil. Our political class, and media ecosystem fed our bloodlust with xenophobic rhetoric that gave them the excuse to destroy the lives of millions of innocent people in Afghanistan and Iraq. At home, we spent our time thinking everyone from the Middle East and Central Asia was out to get us. It led to a rise in hate crimes in America. It scratched the racist itch America loves to scratch. We are seeing this same thing again with some of the rhetoric around the Hamas attacks into Israel. It is as if we have learned nothing as a society. The calls for a continuation of violence are abhorrent. The ignorance, the reflex to demonize the “other”, so quickly, is putting us down the same path we have been down far too many times in the past century. How many more millions of innocent lives have to be sacrificed before we realize we need to take a different path, both in the geopolitical sense and in societal moral sense?
The Israel-Palestine situation is so unique compared to other regional conflicts when it comes to how it is talked about by our political leadership in America. To not unequivocally support the government of Israel, regardless of which coalition party controls it, would be politically damaging to either party. Partisans are not going to react one way or another over a congressman’s statement on the conflict currently happening in Nagorno-Karabakh, a conflict not the same as Israel-Palestine, but not entirely dissimilar either. Senator Ed Markey said all the “pro-Israel, anti-Hamas” stuff that everyone else was saying, but was then booed when he called for deescalation. It’s the one thing that cuts across the political spectrum in America. It is an indictment on our society that we cannot, universally, request an approach that won’t lead to more death and destruction of innocents. It is not anti-semitic to hope the Israeli government doesn’t kill Palestinian children by laying siege to Gaza. Many Israelis and Jewish people do not want this to happen either! Much like many Palestinians do not want Hamas killing civilians either. We must remember that not everybody shares the sentiments of the most hawkish people in their societies. America is responsible for many crimes throughout our history but that does not mean those crimes were universally accepted by masses. What we can do, something that is required by a society to progress, is to reflect on past atrocities and learn to approach conflict in a way that reduces the impact on the innocent. Inflamed rhetoric is a step in the wrong direction.
Please, for the sake of our fellow humans all around the world, reflect on how we have gotten to this moment. It is easy to call for violence when we live in a country an ocean away from everyone else, with dozens of military bases all around the world. The overwhelming majority of us are here in the United States because our ancestors were escaping situations like the one in the Palestinian territories, victims of the slave trade, or forced into reservations after settlers moved in. Indigenous Peoples Day was this Monday. It is such a great time for all of us to reflect on the human cost that imperial power requires. 90% of the indigenous populations in the Americas were wiped out in the centuries following first European contact. Those that remain, live in a world that we would describe as “post-apocalyptic” if we had to experience it. We so often look to our past for inspiration but often we fail to learn the lessons we are supposed to take from those experiences. We need not lust for the blood of the oppressed. Our comforts come at the expense of so many others. It is our duty to ensure that we do not continue this instinctive imperialism that has dominated the last two centuries of American life. We need to implore our ruling class to learn from the humanitarian failures of US support to right-wing “strongmen” in the 20th century, and adopt a new geopolitical strategy. A strategy that encourages diplomacy over militarism, and self-determination over imperialism.
As individuals, we can very easily just show empathy for our fellow man. None of us would ever want to be in-between warring factions. It is hard, for us as Americans, because we are so far removed from all this strife around the world. There are no enemies at the gates. We sit in our homes, enjoying the privileges of empire, rooting for the suffering of others, because it makes us feel “strong.” This conflict is one where you do not have to choose sides. There will be no winners, and even if there were, what is the cost? What do you have to gain from the killing of civilians halfway around the world? I promise it is a miniscule gain, compared to the losses these people will endure. Once the death and destruction of war begins, it’s hard to stop. We should pray and hope the killing of innocents stops. That is only possible through diplomacy, not further escalation. Be an advocate for peace.
She's Worth It 