Thank You, Protesters

 Thank you to the folks who are protesting the U.S./ Israel's war on Palestine. The news tells me this is a war against the government of Hamas, but it sure as Hell looks like a lot of Palestinians are being tortured and murdered to me. I don't think the Israeli government and its supporters are discriminating in regards to who is a threat and who is not a threat.  

When I say "protest," I include the people who talk about the war with their friends, co-workers, acquaintances, etc. in a time when lobbyists are pushing for laws that equate the act of speaking out against the actions of the Israeli government with an act of anti-semitism. Am I to believe that being anti-genocide is being anti-semetic? Thank you to the letter-writers, bloggers, artists, and bakers who use their talents to express their dismay at mass murder. You may not be getting hit in the head by a cop's baton, but your energy is being directed toward a hard-won goal. Perhaps protest can take the form of your organizing a book swap among pals with the goal of educating yourselves rather than blindly accepting what television and radio media tells us.

An Old Woman's Education

 When I heard 1,500 Israelis met their makers in a fiery blast, I thought what could compel a group to launch such a  strike? I decided to read about the history of the relationship between Israel and the Palestine. I learned how the Palestinians had been forced off their land by the British and the Israelis. Think about that, people. Your family -- your ancestors, grandparents, children -- has been living in this home built on memories for generations, and suddenly you  receive government paperwork that tells you "Hat up, and get thine ass out, so that an Israeli can live here." If you're familiar with the United States' history, then you have an idea what goes with this storyline. But back to my re-education.

Anytime you kick someone off his land (backed by bloody weapons and strategies that you'll figure out how to market to other colonists), you create policies and operating procedures that convince the former landowners that they are not welcome to return home; in fact, you come up with ways to subject former landowners to the "less than equal" category. Enter apartheid. If you do not know what apartheid is, then I encourage you to read books written by Jewish authors who describe life under the the National Socialist German Worker's Party. 

Once I became aware of what Palestinians endured under Jewish control, I became aware of the following: (a) if you are beneficiaries of apartheid and its offspring known as genocide, you have to convince people that your truth is the most important truth even if that truth is a brass ass monkey lie. In this case, 1,500 Jews didn't die in a fiery blast. You'll note in successive weeks during news broadcasts, the number for the body count dropped. It seemed others besides Jews died in that fiery blast, but hey, if you craft the storyline that the media doesn't challenge, then you decide whose pov is newsworthy. (b) You have to make genocide profitable. If your allies aren't receiving an incentive to support you in your organized, homicidal frenzy, then your allies might not fall in line and perpetuate the narrative. (c) You have to come up with a way to convince people it is within their interest to keep their mouths shut if they disagree with you. Perhaps it's through a loss of employment or maybe it's through bodily harm by the police. 

What am I learning from these weeks? I learned that people don't forget history. People learn from history. They learn the ways of their oppressors, and use those methods against other people. In other words, genocide is bad until you figure out a way to make it work for you.  

Book That Made Me Say "Wow.": The Palestine Laboratory by Anthony Lowenstein