Gaza - No Good Choices

 Israel cannot let Hamas off the hook. Hamas will not go away. 

Sarah Aziza wrote in Doomsday Diaries:

This is the heart of Israel’s problem—not one of Palestinian savagery but of Palestinian life. It is a scourge on the Zionist project, our century-long refusal to disappear. It will remain a scourge so long as the state of Israel exists as a structure predicated on our death. The moment we face now is apocalyptic, the engines of destruction roaring at our gates and in our skies. Each moment is an atrocity. Genocide has begun. But Israel is mistaken if it believes this will be the final word. Palestine will live.

I do not recall Israelis beheading babies. Life in Gaza before the bombings was miserable. Hamas is an illegal organization in Arab nations. Death and doom merge into ecstasy. Who is advocating for life?

 Ramzy Baroud writes in ‘Human Animals’: The Sordid Language behind Israel’s Genocide in Gaza:

Many seem to forget that, long before the Gaza war, on October 7, and even long before the establishment of Israel itself in 1948, the Zionist-Israeli discourse has always been that of racism, dehumanization, erasure and, at times, outright genocide.

If one is to randomly select any period of Israeli history to examine the political discourse emanating from Israeli officials, institutions and even intellectuals, one is to draw the same conclusion: Israel has always built a narrative of incitement and hatred, thus making a constant case for the genocide of Palestinians.

It is hard to buy genocide when the Palestine population booms and booms.

Vijay Prashad wrote in The Everyday Violence of Life in Occupied Palestine:

For centuries, Palestinian Christians, Muslims, and Jews lived side-by-side in the lands that would eventually be Israel and the OPT, including along the Jordan River Valley. Since the expulsion of the Palestinian Christians and Muslims and the arrival of European Jews, the legal apparatus—or the “cold violence,” as the writer Teju Cole calls it—worked alongside paramilitary and military violence against the Palestinians to create a fantasy of an ethno-nationalist state project (the Jewish State, as it was then called). The erasure of the non-Jewish Palestinians was key to this project, either by massacres (Deir Yassin in 1948) or the wholesale removal of the Palestinian population from their land (the Nakba of 1948). The massacres and the population transfers came alongside the denial of the reality of Palestine and the Palestinian people. The heir to Ze’evi, current finance minister Bezalel Smotrich said this March, “There’s no such thing as Palestinians because there’s no such thing as a Palestinian people.” This is not an opinion that can be dismissed as a far-right rant. Likud member Ofir Akunis, minister of science and technology, said three years ago, “There’s no place for any formula to establish a Palestinian state in Western Israel.” The phrase “Western Israel” is a chilling statement about the Israeli consensus on full annexation of the West Bank with disregard for international law.

Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem: There is yet time to stop the hatred 

And from Ireland, ‘Amid the death and confusion in Israel, we can take some hope from Ireland’ 

There are deep divisions within Israel about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. When I told people I was writing this article, and asked how they felt, some urged: “Don’t leave out the people of Gaza!” Others said Israel needs to get back on its feet quickly and fight Hamas more aggressively than it ever did before. The rest are deeply worried about what happens next. Will this deteriorate to a regional war?

All of this is happening while Israel is deeply divided. It is always deeply divided, but in the past ten months an overwhelming movement has protested against a judicial overhaul led by Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. The feelings, hopes and expectations for what comes next are also heavily influenced by this split.

The absurdity of war also provides unreal occurrences: a known peace activist from Kibbutz Be’eri was kidnapped by Hamas to the Gaza strip; her condition is unknown. A father demonstrating outside a government meeting in Tel-Aviv for his captive soldier daughter’s release from Hamas was physically attacked by a passerby who shouted at him: “All of you are leftists! I hope that Hamas kills your daughter. I hope they kill you all!”

***

Because of the grim reality outside, I want to end with something hopeful. One of the most popular TV series here is Derry Girls. A lot of people understand the conflict in Northern Ireland here, but some don’t at all. “They are all Christians? So why were they fighting?” As someone with academic expertise in Irish history, people ask me who’s who in the show, and what were they fighting for.

Sometimes people ask me if incidents in Derry Girls were “made up for the joke” — like British broadcasters overdubbing the voices of republican leaders — and I have to answer, no, that really did happen. The fact they can’t even imagine that how different the situation was 25 years ago gives me some hope.

(All I know about Derry Girls comes from this video.)

Airstrikes struck St Porphyrius Orthodox Church in Gaza – 18 Christians were killed (upd) 

It is noteworthy that the number of Christians in the Gaza Strip has decreased in recent years. It is estimated that there are less than a thousand left (most of whom are Orthodox), while before Hamas took power in Gaza (2007), there were more than seven thousand Christians.

From today's Washington Post, Ishaan Tharoor's The ‘impossible choices’ facing Palestinians in Gaza:

The idea of leaving Gaza entirely is all the more fraught: For different reasons, neither Israel nor Egypt is willing to accept hundreds of thousands of refugees. And Palestinians, as well as Arab governments, fear that an exodus from Gaza will mark another loss of land to the Israeli state — another “nakba,” the Arabic term often invoked to describe the “cataclysm” that represented Israel’s founding in 1948 and the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their native villages.

“An overwhelming majority of those enduring the hellish bombardment in Gaza would accept temporary refuge only if guarantees were provided for their return to their homes in Gaza after the war ends,” wrote Palestinian author and human rights activist Raja Shehadeh. “This determination of Palestinians not to allow Israel to displace them once again also acts as a restraint against a second nakba.”

U.N. officials denounced Hamas’s act of terrorism and called on the group to immediately release the many hostages it abducted and now holds in Gaza. But the atrocities carried out by Hamas do “not justify the ongoing crimes against the civilian population of Gaza, including its 1 million children,” wrote Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA chief, in a Guardian op-ed.

The only hope may be found in Patriarchate of Antioch restores communion with the Patriarchate of Jerusalem:

The Fathers of the Holy Synod of Antioch raise fervent prayers to the King of Peace and Lord of Mercies, to wipe away every tear from the eyes of the Palestinian people, and to remove all injustice, oppression, homelessness and displacement.

They call on all their children to consecrate next Sunday in all the parishes of the Antiochian See for raising prayers that God may grant justice and peace in the land of peace, and to collect aid donations to relieve this afflicted people.

Understanding that the current circumstances require intensification of prayer and cooperation, the Holy Synod decided to restore the severed ecclesiastical relations with the Patriarchate of Jerusalem.

From Israel: Israeli Poll Finds 49% Support Holding Off on Gaza Ground Offensive:

Asked if the military should immediately escalate to a large-scale ground offensive, 29 percent of Israelis agreed while 49 percent said "it would be better to wait" and 22 percent were undecided, the poll published in the Maariv newspaper said.

The daily said the results contrasted with its Oct. 19 poll that found 65 percent support for a major ground offensive.

So, maybe there is chance for a better choice. I urge people to read the comments here. Personally, I endorse Jeffrey Cohen's thoughts.

 

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