Back in 1957, Golda Meir said something like:
"Peace will come when Palestinian mothers learn to love their children
more than they hate the Jews."
She also said that there was no such thing as a Palestinian people. Of course, several years later she apologized, saying, “That was the silliest damn thing I ever said.” Well, I don’t know. I think accusing Palestinian mothers of not loving their children merits a gold medal for silliness.
Palestinian mothers do in fact love their children as do mothers all over the world. They also fear for their safety. They are concerned for their future in an apartheid state where their rights as human being are being ignored because the big superpower occupying them wants their land and water. Mothers in Palestine long for their children to have an opportunity to grow up with dignity, to have a safe place to sleep and go to school, all of which are systematically jeopardized by Israel’s military occupation. Far from choosing to hate their enemies more than they love their children, Palestinian mothers on numerous occasions have sacrificed their lives to cover their children with their own bodies to protect them from bombs, tanks and white phosphorus.
I think I first heard this little caricature of Palestinian mothers in 1988 during the first intifada. Kids who had never lived a day in their entire life free of the humiliation and the pain of military occupation suddenly began throwing rocks at Israeli tanks, trucks and troops. Israel responded with “An iron fist policy.” by killing, beating, and torture.
During the first year of the intifada:
Amnesty International reported 540 killed by Israeli troops including 159 children. Their average age was ten years old.
Save the Children reported 7000 hospitalized from beatings, 1/3 were ten years old, 1/5 five years old.
Dennis Madden, Roman Catholic Priest attested,
"If you take all the Palestinians who have been killed, the number is roughly around 1,000. The number who have required medical attention is roughly around 106,000. The over 50,000 who have been in prison, the houses that have been demolished, the thousands of trees that have been uprooted, the deportations. You take all of the statistics together...what it averages out to is that every Palestinian family has had at least two members that have either been killed, deported, arrested or tortured."(1)
And this was BEFORE suicide bombers.
According to Rosemary Radford Ruether:
Anyone arrested in the occupied territories can be held without trial or consultation with a lawyer for eighteen days. During this period (and also during extensions of this period) those arrested are typically subject to brutal treatment, ranging from kicking and beatings to elaborate form of torture...” (2)
Ari Shavit, a young Israeli soldier ordered to serve in Ansar II, one of Israel’s prisons for Palestinians, reported in Ha’aretz.
Perhaps the fault lies with the screams: At the end of your watch, on the way from the showers, you hear horrible screams...from over the galvanized tin fence of the interrogation section come hair-raising human screams. I mean that literally. Hair-raising. And you of course have read the B’Tselem report...And you ask yourself, what is going on here five meters away? Is it someone being tied in the “banana” position? Or is it a simple beating? You don’t know. But you do know that from this moment forth you will have no rest. Because 50 meters from the bed where you try to sleep, 80 meters from the dining hall where you try to eat, human beings are screaming. And they are screaming because other people wearing the uniform as you are doing things to them to make them scream. They are screaming because your state, your democratic state in an institutional systematic manner — and definitely legal — your state is making them scream.” (3)
To avoid the moral judgment of the world, Israel shifted the responsibility of their treatment of Palestinian youth onto the mothers whom they said, “sent their children out to commit violence.”
But, why bring this up now, twenty five years later? Because that old unfounded quip is still being passed around by intelligent people in an effort to give Israel legitimacy. Recently, I was referred to this very slogan to make the case that the Palestinians are really the cause of their own pain.
It was quoted by a friend who is quite superior to me in education and theological acumen. I was shocked, not so much by the quote, but that with all his credentials, he still thinks this is relevant to the Israel/Palestinian situation. In spite of his creditability in other areas, when it comes to applying his biblical faith to justice for the Palestinians, he just doesn’t get it.
Thomas Are
August 22, 2012
------------------------------------------
1 - Private conversation with Father Dennis Madden, Tantur Institute, Jerusalem. Summer, 1991.
2 - Rosemary Radford Ruether, Herman Ruether, The Wrath of Jonah, (Fortress Press, Minneapolis, 2002) p. 157.
3 - Marc Ellis, Beyond Innocence and Redemption, (Harper and Row Publishers, San Francisco, 1990,) p.73.
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Thursday, August 2, 2012
Romney Sells Out Justice for Votes
This week I received an email:
Yesterday in Jerusalem, Governor Mitt Romney made some statements that were not only wrong, but frankly, prejudiced and ignorant. Romney declared that “cultural differences” were the reason the Palestinian economy is not doing as well as Israel’s, without even acknowledging the Occupation.
This criticism of Romney’s mischaracterization of the Israel Palestinian conflict was published by none other than JEWISH VOICE FOR PEACE, which called upon Romney to apologize to the Palestinian people. I respect this organization, even given money to help in their call for justice. I wish everybody would support them.(1) They are people of conscience who take seriously their Jewish faith.
Is it possible that Romney has never heard of the Occupation, or the Wall constructed by Israel which stunts economic growth? Does he not see the closures and checkpoints which prevent Palestinians from getting to their jobs, fields, health care facilities and schools as a hindrance to economic success? Could he not know about the theft of Palestinian water, the restrictions on travel and shipments of goods? Is he not aware of the prohibition of imports and exports which robs Palestinians of normal business opportunities? These restrictive policies have been around a long time. Certainly long enough for him to know.
Economic oppression of Palestine has been official Israel policy from its beginning. Twenty years ago, Frank Collins, writing for The Jerusalem Journal reports:
For 24 years of their occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the Israelis have systematically done everything in their power to block the normal
development of the Palestinians’ economy. Far from allowing the growth and modernization of the economic infrastructure, the occupation authorities have gone to great lengths to thwart any progress in this direction. They have striven to make the Palestinian economy totally dependent on, and subordinated to, that of Israel… The licensing of a new Palestinian factory requires securing certification from potential Israeli competitors that they will not suffer from the new Palestinian competition. Naturally, very few licenses for new factories are granted. Water consumption by Palestinians is restricted to 1967 levels, with the results that irrigated agriculture has declined from 18 to 5 percent of the Palestinian economy.(2)
I remember visiting a mother in the West Bank village of Hisma. She lead us down a concealed path to a hidden chicken coop which provided her family with a few eggs. I asked her what would happen if the Israelis discovered her “illegal business”? She responded that she would probably be put in jail. At that time, approximately twenty years ago, I found her hard to believe. No nation could be that calculating and cruel. Today, I know better. I owe her an apology.
It is amazing that the Palestinians have managed to hold on in face of such oppression. Romney praises Israel for its business success. He then turns right around and supports the giving of billions of U.S. taxpayers’ dollars to keep Israel’s economy afloat. I wonder how long Romney would stay in business in Gaza without electricity for most of the day, the resupply of materials or trucks to make deliveries.
Rebecca Vilkomerson, Executive Director, Jewish Voice for Peace writes:
Governor Romney’s willful lack of understanding for facts on the ground and what appears to be racist assumptions about Israelis and Palestinians do not represent us… Romney stakes his value as a leader on his success in business. But any businessperson should know that blocking free trade and commerce, profiting from exploiting stolen land, and holding an entire economy hostage is not exactly fair play. (3)
Romney was in Israel attending a million dollar fundraising breakfast and sitting next to Shelton Adelson who has pledged a million dollars to defeat Barak Obama. The fact that Adelson bankrolled Newt Gingrich’s calling the Palestinians an “invented” people was not missed by Romney. He supports Netanyahu’s hard right rejection of any peace initiative that might lead to a two state, equal opportunity, solution.
It’s ironic that his breakfast was being served in the King David Hotel, the site of Israel’s pre-state terrorism which killed 91 people. But, that was then, when terrorism was on the other foot. Now, he could look out the window and see the wall and military control of Palestinian life, if he had chosen to. But, if you are humping for votes, such things as truth and justice get in the way. Nobody says that Romney isn’t smart. It’s his morals and ethics that are being called into question. Does anything matter to him as much as “business success”?
Thomas Are
August 2, 2012
1 - Open Letter to Governor Mitt Romney: Apologize to the Palestinian People. Jewish Voice for Peace. 1611 Telegraph Ave., Oakland, CA 94612;
Phone (510) 465-1777; info@jvp.org
2 - Frank Collins, “Palestinian Economy in Chaos After Gulf War.” The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, July 1991, Vol X, Number 2, p.23 . Cited in my book, Israeli Peace/Palestinian Justice. p.155.
3 - Jewish Voice for Peace, cited above.
Yesterday in Jerusalem, Governor Mitt Romney made some statements that were not only wrong, but frankly, prejudiced and ignorant. Romney declared that “cultural differences” were the reason the Palestinian economy is not doing as well as Israel’s, without even acknowledging the Occupation.
This criticism of Romney’s mischaracterization of the Israel Palestinian conflict was published by none other than JEWISH VOICE FOR PEACE, which called upon Romney to apologize to the Palestinian people. I respect this organization, even given money to help in their call for justice. I wish everybody would support them.(1) They are people of conscience who take seriously their Jewish faith.
Is it possible that Romney has never heard of the Occupation, or the Wall constructed by Israel which stunts economic growth? Does he not see the closures and checkpoints which prevent Palestinians from getting to their jobs, fields, health care facilities and schools as a hindrance to economic success? Could he not know about the theft of Palestinian water, the restrictions on travel and shipments of goods? Is he not aware of the prohibition of imports and exports which robs Palestinians of normal business opportunities? These restrictive policies have been around a long time. Certainly long enough for him to know.
Economic oppression of Palestine has been official Israel policy from its beginning. Twenty years ago, Frank Collins, writing for The Jerusalem Journal reports:
For 24 years of their occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the Israelis have systematically done everything in their power to block the normal
development of the Palestinians’ economy. Far from allowing the growth and modernization of the economic infrastructure, the occupation authorities have gone to great lengths to thwart any progress in this direction. They have striven to make the Palestinian economy totally dependent on, and subordinated to, that of Israel… The licensing of a new Palestinian factory requires securing certification from potential Israeli competitors that they will not suffer from the new Palestinian competition. Naturally, very few licenses for new factories are granted. Water consumption by Palestinians is restricted to 1967 levels, with the results that irrigated agriculture has declined from 18 to 5 percent of the Palestinian economy.(2)
I remember visiting a mother in the West Bank village of Hisma. She lead us down a concealed path to a hidden chicken coop which provided her family with a few eggs. I asked her what would happen if the Israelis discovered her “illegal business”? She responded that she would probably be put in jail. At that time, approximately twenty years ago, I found her hard to believe. No nation could be that calculating and cruel. Today, I know better. I owe her an apology.
It is amazing that the Palestinians have managed to hold on in face of such oppression. Romney praises Israel for its business success. He then turns right around and supports the giving of billions of U.S. taxpayers’ dollars to keep Israel’s economy afloat. I wonder how long Romney would stay in business in Gaza without electricity for most of the day, the resupply of materials or trucks to make deliveries.
Rebecca Vilkomerson, Executive Director, Jewish Voice for Peace writes:
Governor Romney’s willful lack of understanding for facts on the ground and what appears to be racist assumptions about Israelis and Palestinians do not represent us… Romney stakes his value as a leader on his success in business. But any businessperson should know that blocking free trade and commerce, profiting from exploiting stolen land, and holding an entire economy hostage is not exactly fair play. (3)
Romney was in Israel attending a million dollar fundraising breakfast and sitting next to Shelton Adelson who has pledged a million dollars to defeat Barak Obama. The fact that Adelson bankrolled Newt Gingrich’s calling the Palestinians an “invented” people was not missed by Romney. He supports Netanyahu’s hard right rejection of any peace initiative that might lead to a two state, equal opportunity, solution.
It’s ironic that his breakfast was being served in the King David Hotel, the site of Israel’s pre-state terrorism which killed 91 people. But, that was then, when terrorism was on the other foot. Now, he could look out the window and see the wall and military control of Palestinian life, if he had chosen to. But, if you are humping for votes, such things as truth and justice get in the way. Nobody says that Romney isn’t smart. It’s his morals and ethics that are being called into question. Does anything matter to him as much as “business success”?
Thomas Are
August 2, 2012
1 - Open Letter to Governor Mitt Romney: Apologize to the Palestinian People. Jewish Voice for Peace. 1611 Telegraph Ave., Oakland, CA 94612;
Phone (510) 465-1777; info@jvp.org
2 - Frank Collins, “Palestinian Economy in Chaos After Gulf War.” The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, July 1991, Vol X, Number 2, p.23 . Cited in my book, Israeli Peace/Palestinian Justice. p.155.
3 - Jewish Voice for Peace, cited above.
Sunday, July 1, 2012
Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment
TIAA/CREF drops Caterpillar from its investment portfolio because of the specially equipped bulldozers sold to Israel for their construction of an illegal wall, twice as high and four times longer than the Berlin wall, and specially equipped to demolish homes in the occupied territories. Alice Walker refuses to allow her award winning play The Color Purple, to be published in Israel because of apartheid policies and the persecution of the Palestinian people. Friends Fiduciary, a Quakers investment organization holding assets of more than $200 million, is divesting from Caterpillar because of profits derived from selling weaponized bulldozers to Israel.(1) On and on it goes.
The solidarity movement has scored significant success with the organization of a boycott of Israeli products, including the decision by British University and College Union to boycott Israeli academics; the amazing decision of more than 7 million people to join the BDS campaign; the decision taken by Hamshire College and some US churches to refuse to invest in the Israeli occupation; and the decision of Norway and Denmark to divest from Israeli military companies. (2)
Artists by the hundreds, from South Africa to Canada, have pledged support of BDS, especially since the massacre in Gaza in the winter of 2008-09 and the murder of nine humanitarian workers on the flotilla bringing aid to the suffering people of Gaza in 2010. In spite of peace talks, attacks on Palestinians have become even more harsh, with more home demolitions, the building of more and more settlements, an apartheid wall, road blocks, and armed response to nonviolent demonstrations. Meg Ryan and Dustin Hoffman cancelled appearances at the 2010 Film Festival. Dock workers from Sweden to California refused to unload Israeli ships right after Israel’s attack on the Mavi Marmara. Students at Berkeley have advocated BDS for more than ten years and are influencing students on other campuses to do the same.
For all these reasons, the Church of England several years ago divested from companies profiting from the occupation. Now, this week, even as I write, my church, the Presbyterians, after several years of trying to influence Caterpillar, to no avail, will have the opportunity to uphold DBS or choose the safe and popular position of looking the other way.
I quote Desmond Tutu:
Without a doubt, we South Africans who fought apartheid have been unanimous in finding Israel’s methods of repression and collective punishment far, far worse than anything we saw during our long and difficult liberation struggle. Israel’s indiscriminate, widespread bombing and shelling of populated areas with scant regard for the civilian victims, was absent in South Africa because the apartheid system relied on cheap black labor. Israel rejects outright an entire people, and seeks to eliminate the Palestinian presence entirely, whether by voluntary or enforced “transfer.” It is clearly this that accounts for Israel’s greater degree of sustained brutality in comparison to apartheid South Africa. This provides all the more reason why it is necessary for world opinion and action to assist the beleaguered Palestinian people. (3)
So, the Presbyterians will decide, do we stand up for peace and justice or do we side with the Christian Zionists who are anxious for Armageddon and with the arms industry which seeks more profits derived from conflicts. Some would say that to vote against BDS is to partner with those who promote Israel’s crimes against the men, women and children of Palestine. I would be one of them.
Thomas Are
July 1, 2012
1 - Friends of Sebeel, May 18, 2012.
2 - Mustafa Barghouthi, Freedom in Our Lifetime, Cited in The Case for Sanctions Against Israel, Edited by Audrea Lim, p. 8.
3 - Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Realizing God’s Dream for the Holy Land, Boston Globe, October 26, 2007, Cited by Ronnie Kasrils, Sour Oranges and the Sweet Taste of Freedom in The Case for Sanctions Against Israel, Edited by Audrea Lim,, p. 109.
The solidarity movement has scored significant success with the organization of a boycott of Israeli products, including the decision by British University and College Union to boycott Israeli academics; the amazing decision of more than 7 million people to join the BDS campaign; the decision taken by Hamshire College and some US churches to refuse to invest in the Israeli occupation; and the decision of Norway and Denmark to divest from Israeli military companies. (2)
Artists by the hundreds, from South Africa to Canada, have pledged support of BDS, especially since the massacre in Gaza in the winter of 2008-09 and the murder of nine humanitarian workers on the flotilla bringing aid to the suffering people of Gaza in 2010. In spite of peace talks, attacks on Palestinians have become even more harsh, with more home demolitions, the building of more and more settlements, an apartheid wall, road blocks, and armed response to nonviolent demonstrations. Meg Ryan and Dustin Hoffman cancelled appearances at the 2010 Film Festival. Dock workers from Sweden to California refused to unload Israeli ships right after Israel’s attack on the Mavi Marmara. Students at Berkeley have advocated BDS for more than ten years and are influencing students on other campuses to do the same.
For all these reasons, the Church of England several years ago divested from companies profiting from the occupation. Now, this week, even as I write, my church, the Presbyterians, after several years of trying to influence Caterpillar, to no avail, will have the opportunity to uphold DBS or choose the safe and popular position of looking the other way.
I quote Desmond Tutu:
Without a doubt, we South Africans who fought apartheid have been unanimous in finding Israel’s methods of repression and collective punishment far, far worse than anything we saw during our long and difficult liberation struggle. Israel’s indiscriminate, widespread bombing and shelling of populated areas with scant regard for the civilian victims, was absent in South Africa because the apartheid system relied on cheap black labor. Israel rejects outright an entire people, and seeks to eliminate the Palestinian presence entirely, whether by voluntary or enforced “transfer.” It is clearly this that accounts for Israel’s greater degree of sustained brutality in comparison to apartheid South Africa. This provides all the more reason why it is necessary for world opinion and action to assist the beleaguered Palestinian people. (3)
So, the Presbyterians will decide, do we stand up for peace and justice or do we side with the Christian Zionists who are anxious for Armageddon and with the arms industry which seeks more profits derived from conflicts. Some would say that to vote against BDS is to partner with those who promote Israel’s crimes against the men, women and children of Palestine. I would be one of them.
Thomas Are
July 1, 2012
1 - Friends of Sebeel, May 18, 2012.
2 - Mustafa Barghouthi, Freedom in Our Lifetime, Cited in The Case for Sanctions Against Israel, Edited by Audrea Lim, p. 8.
3 - Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Realizing God’s Dream for the Holy Land, Boston Globe, October 26, 2007, Cited by Ronnie Kasrils, Sour Oranges and the Sweet Taste of Freedom in The Case for Sanctions Against Israel, Edited by Audrea Lim,, p. 109.
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Seven Years Later - It's Even Worse
Seven years ago, in 2005, Ariel Sharon, with great media fanfare, pulled 8,000 settlers out of Gaza. Women screamed and cried as soldiers dragged them from “their” homes. Sharon took bows. What a great humanitarian act and what a generous step to give independence to the people of Gaza. Of course, he did not have to project such harsh scenes of settler pain. All he had to do was announce that the thousands of IDF troops stationed in Gaza would be pulling out. The exodus of settlers would have followed without as much as a whimper.
Also, it may not have seemed so generous had the public known that at the very same time 8,000 settlers were moving from Gaza, Israel was building 13,000 units for Jews only on Palestinian land in the West Bank, and those moving from Gaza were offered $227,000 to relocate. Palestinians driven from their homes in 1948 and 1967 were given no compensation for the lives and land taken from them by force.
Sharon’s disengagement was hardly a liberation. It’s hard to feel liberated when surrounded by a hostile army. Israel maintained control of all crossing points, sea and air space. Gaza would remain alive only as an outdoor prison. Yet, we saw on the news only how much Israel was “giving up” to offer peace and prosperity to the Palestinians.
So, let’s take a look at what is not mentioned on the evening news, or in the chambers of Congress or even from Christian pulpits in America.
According to British based Save the Children:
Gaza’s only fresh water source is now too dangerous to drink and is contaminated with fertilizer and human waste.
Miko Peled, son of IDF General Matti Peled, continuing his father’s criticism of Israel writes:
Israel is getting away with murder, and it’s making me sick to sit around here and do nothing. Innocent people are being killed, children are hungry, there is mass unemployment and poverty, and it’s happening an hour’s drive from Tel Aviv. None if this was caused by a natural disaster. It was caused because Israel deliberately caused these conditions, and no one in America says a thing. … Israel’s restrictions on travel and movement and the import and export of goods, plus the occupier’s complete control over land and sea have created a siege that is choking one and a half million people, including 800,000 children. Gaza has essentially been turned into an enormous prison camp. (1)
In 2008, Sarah Flounders, co-director of the International Action Center, an activist organization opposing war and racism, wrote:
Conditions today in Gaza are desperate; Israel severely restricts and in some cases even denies the entrance of even basic food, fuel and electricity. Water filters, water pumps and bottled water are barred. The most basic supplies, from soap to batteries for hearing aids, are prohibited. No spare parts of any kind are permitted. Even desperately needed incubators for babies or dialysis equipment cannot be repaired or replaced. In the cold and crowded wards of Gaza City’s Shifa Hospital, the dispensary is out of 85 essential medicines and is close to using up almost 150 others. (2)
And this was before Israel bombed Gaza for 22 days in 2008-2009, killing 1400, of whom 1200 were unarmed civilians, wounding 5000 and destroying no less then 22,000 buildings.
When human rights activist attempted to enter Gaza bringing humanitarian aid, at least nine of them were murdered in international waters by Israel. When Rachel Corrie tried to stop a bull dozer from destroying a Palestinian home she was crushed to death. Even now, when kids wave flags and protest Israel’s occupation, they are shot to death. And what do our political leaders, preachers and news broadcasters do? They tremble in fear that someone might say that they are less than lovers of Israel.
Pictures of the suffering in Gaza would make most of us sick. Yet, without much objection, we Americans have been aiding this crime against a defenseless people for more than sixty four years. We support it through our taxes and remain silent when our politicians look the other way. The United States actually blocks actions of others, including the United Nations, when they speak out to condemn Israel’s atrocities. How the church can continue with “business as usual” while this tragedy continues is beyond my understanding. Politicians ignore it for money and votes. I guess the church does it for the same reason.
Thomas Are
June 23, 2012
1 - Miko Peled The General's Son, (Just World Books, 2012) p. 157
2 - Cited in Joyce Chediac, Gaza, Symbol of Resistance. (World View Forum, 2011)p. 31
Also, it may not have seemed so generous had the public known that at the very same time 8,000 settlers were moving from Gaza, Israel was building 13,000 units for Jews only on Palestinian land in the West Bank, and those moving from Gaza were offered $227,000 to relocate. Palestinians driven from their homes in 1948 and 1967 were given no compensation for the lives and land taken from them by force.
Sharon’s disengagement was hardly a liberation. It’s hard to feel liberated when surrounded by a hostile army. Israel maintained control of all crossing points, sea and air space. Gaza would remain alive only as an outdoor prison. Yet, we saw on the news only how much Israel was “giving up” to offer peace and prosperity to the Palestinians.
So, let’s take a look at what is not mentioned on the evening news, or in the chambers of Congress or even from Christian pulpits in America.
According to British based Save the Children:
Gaza’s only fresh water source is now too dangerous to drink and is contaminated with fertilizer and human waste.
Miko Peled, son of IDF General Matti Peled, continuing his father’s criticism of Israel writes:
Israel is getting away with murder, and it’s making me sick to sit around here and do nothing. Innocent people are being killed, children are hungry, there is mass unemployment and poverty, and it’s happening an hour’s drive from Tel Aviv. None if this was caused by a natural disaster. It was caused because Israel deliberately caused these conditions, and no one in America says a thing. … Israel’s restrictions on travel and movement and the import and export of goods, plus the occupier’s complete control over land and sea have created a siege that is choking one and a half million people, including 800,000 children. Gaza has essentially been turned into an enormous prison camp. (1)
In 2008, Sarah Flounders, co-director of the International Action Center, an activist organization opposing war and racism, wrote:
Conditions today in Gaza are desperate; Israel severely restricts and in some cases even denies the entrance of even basic food, fuel and electricity. Water filters, water pumps and bottled water are barred. The most basic supplies, from soap to batteries for hearing aids, are prohibited. No spare parts of any kind are permitted. Even desperately needed incubators for babies or dialysis equipment cannot be repaired or replaced. In the cold and crowded wards of Gaza City’s Shifa Hospital, the dispensary is out of 85 essential medicines and is close to using up almost 150 others. (2)
And this was before Israel bombed Gaza for 22 days in 2008-2009, killing 1400, of whom 1200 were unarmed civilians, wounding 5000 and destroying no less then 22,000 buildings.
When human rights activist attempted to enter Gaza bringing humanitarian aid, at least nine of them were murdered in international waters by Israel. When Rachel Corrie tried to stop a bull dozer from destroying a Palestinian home she was crushed to death. Even now, when kids wave flags and protest Israel’s occupation, they are shot to death. And what do our political leaders, preachers and news broadcasters do? They tremble in fear that someone might say that they are less than lovers of Israel.
Pictures of the suffering in Gaza would make most of us sick. Yet, without much objection, we Americans have been aiding this crime against a defenseless people for more than sixty four years. We support it through our taxes and remain silent when our politicians look the other way. The United States actually blocks actions of others, including the United Nations, when they speak out to condemn Israel’s atrocities. How the church can continue with “business as usual” while this tragedy continues is beyond my understanding. Politicians ignore it for money and votes. I guess the church does it for the same reason.
Thomas Are
June 23, 2012
1 - Miko Peled The General's Son, (Just World Books, 2012) p. 157
2 - Cited in Joyce Chediac, Gaza, Symbol of Resistance. (World View Forum, 2011)p. 31
Monday, April 2, 2012
Israel's Ultra-Orthodox
“Pappy” loved to sing in Sunday School. One of his favorite songs ends with the refrain, “Jesus love me, Jesus loves even me." However, Pappy, week after week stood up and sang at the top of his voice, “Jesus loves me. Jesus loves ONLY me.”
When it is sung by a senile old man, it is humorous. When it is lived out by fanatical settlers, it is serious. The ultra-Orthodox settlers are convinced that they are the only ones loved by God, the only ones God wants to live on the land. No body else belongs there. They see their task of settling Jews in the occupied territories as commanded by a God who “loves only me.”
This “me only” theology creates havoc not only for the Palestinians whose land, water and crops are stolen, these ultra-Orthodox are threatening the stability of Israel itself. Ronald Krebs, professor of Political Science at the University of Minnesota, writes:
Subsidies for the ultra-Orthodox are one of the reasons that the overall tax burden on Israel’s citizens is high, helping propel a slow exodus of largely secular Jewish elites from the country. In recent years, Israel has suffered from a brain drain, in which large numbers of its most talented citizens have gone abroad to complete advanced degrees and have not returned.[1]
Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics found that between 1990 and 2009, 260,000 more Israelis left the country than returned.[2] It’s easy to see why.
Under the pressure of boycott campaigns, a stream of international investigations into Israel’s military conduct, potential lawsuits in foreign courts against Israeli soldiers and officials for alleged human rights violations, the Palestinian quest for statehood at the UN, and deteriorating relations with Egypt and Turkey, Israelis have not felt this alone and embittered for a generation.[3]
My Republican friends detest the idea that the government might subsidize welfare recipients who “work the system.” Yet, they support Israel’s hand outs to non working ultra-Orthodox families who do nothing but study Torah and justify Israel’s theft of Palestine. The burden on Israel’s economy is immense even though much of that growing welfare is passed along to the US taxpayer.
The number of ultra-Orthodox in Israel is 470,000[4] and estimated to double in the next twenty years. Stanley Fischer, governor of the Bank of Israel said, “We cannot have an ever-increasing proportion of the population continuing to not go to work. Without a change now, within ten years the situation will be a catastrophe.”[5]
But, that is not the worst of it. I wonder what the parents of our young men and women who are being prepared to go to war with Iran would think if they knew that some 50,000 military aged ultra-Orthodox men are excused from military service in Israel.
In fact, according to Gershom Gorenberg, Israel is in trouble:
By keeping the territories it occupied in the Six Day War, Israel has crippled its democracy and the rule of law. The unholy ties between state, settlements, and synagogue have promoted a new brand of extremism, transforming Judaism from a humanistic to a militant faith. And the religious right is rapidly gaining power within the Israeli army, with catastrophic consequences. In order to save itself, Israel must end the occupation, separate state from religion, and create a new civil Israeli identity that can be shared by Jews and Arabs.[6]
It will not be easy. Even if the government ordered a withdrawal from the West Bank tomorrow, the military cannot count on its officers to carry out its orders to leave.
Israel has too many ultra-Orthodox singing, Yahweh loves me. Yahweh loves ONLY me.
Thomas Are
April 2, 2012
[1] Ronald Krebs, Israel’s Bunker Mentality, Foreign Affairs, November 2011., p.17
[2] Ibid. p17.
[3] Ibid. p. 13.
[4] Gershom Gorenberg, The Unmaking of Israel, (HarperCollins, 2011). p. 177.
[5] Ronald Krebs, Israel’s Bunker Mentality, Foreign Affairs, November 2011. p. 16.
[6] Gershom Gorenberg, The Unmaking of Israel, (HarperCollins, 2011). Front jacket cover.
When it is sung by a senile old man, it is humorous. When it is lived out by fanatical settlers, it is serious. The ultra-Orthodox settlers are convinced that they are the only ones loved by God, the only ones God wants to live on the land. No body else belongs there. They see their task of settling Jews in the occupied territories as commanded by a God who “loves only me.”
This “me only” theology creates havoc not only for the Palestinians whose land, water and crops are stolen, these ultra-Orthodox are threatening the stability of Israel itself. Ronald Krebs, professor of Political Science at the University of Minnesota, writes:
Subsidies for the ultra-Orthodox are one of the reasons that the overall tax burden on Israel’s citizens is high, helping propel a slow exodus of largely secular Jewish elites from the country. In recent years, Israel has suffered from a brain drain, in which large numbers of its most talented citizens have gone abroad to complete advanced degrees and have not returned.[1]
Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics found that between 1990 and 2009, 260,000 more Israelis left the country than returned.[2] It’s easy to see why.
Under the pressure of boycott campaigns, a stream of international investigations into Israel’s military conduct, potential lawsuits in foreign courts against Israeli soldiers and officials for alleged human rights violations, the Palestinian quest for statehood at the UN, and deteriorating relations with Egypt and Turkey, Israelis have not felt this alone and embittered for a generation.[3]
My Republican friends detest the idea that the government might subsidize welfare recipients who “work the system.” Yet, they support Israel’s hand outs to non working ultra-Orthodox families who do nothing but study Torah and justify Israel’s theft of Palestine. The burden on Israel’s economy is immense even though much of that growing welfare is passed along to the US taxpayer.
The number of ultra-Orthodox in Israel is 470,000[4] and estimated to double in the next twenty years. Stanley Fischer, governor of the Bank of Israel said, “We cannot have an ever-increasing proportion of the population continuing to not go to work. Without a change now, within ten years the situation will be a catastrophe.”[5]
But, that is not the worst of it. I wonder what the parents of our young men and women who are being prepared to go to war with Iran would think if they knew that some 50,000 military aged ultra-Orthodox men are excused from military service in Israel.
In fact, according to Gershom Gorenberg, Israel is in trouble:
By keeping the territories it occupied in the Six Day War, Israel has crippled its democracy and the rule of law. The unholy ties between state, settlements, and synagogue have promoted a new brand of extremism, transforming Judaism from a humanistic to a militant faith. And the religious right is rapidly gaining power within the Israeli army, with catastrophic consequences. In order to save itself, Israel must end the occupation, separate state from religion, and create a new civil Israeli identity that can be shared by Jews and Arabs.[6]
It will not be easy. Even if the government ordered a withdrawal from the West Bank tomorrow, the military cannot count on its officers to carry out its orders to leave.
Israel has too many ultra-Orthodox singing, Yahweh loves me. Yahweh loves ONLY me.
Thomas Are
April 2, 2012
[1] Ronald Krebs, Israel’s Bunker Mentality, Foreign Affairs, November 2011., p.17
[2] Ibid. p17.
[3] Ibid. p. 13.
[4] Gershom Gorenberg, The Unmaking of Israel, (HarperCollins, 2011). p. 177.
[5] Ronald Krebs, Israel’s Bunker Mentality, Foreign Affairs, November 2011. p. 16.
[6] Gershom Gorenberg, The Unmaking of Israel, (HarperCollins, 2011). Front jacket cover.
Friday, March 23, 2012
Now It's Solar Panels
“We had no choice,” explained Sen. Robert Wexler. “We had to cut the funds from UNESCO. They accepted Palestine as a member and the U.S. has a twenty year old law that denies funding to any UN agency that recognizes Palestine.”[1] The United Nations Economic, Scientific, and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) mission statement includes the building of peace and the alleviation of poverty. But, we had no choice, Wexler said, because we are the good guys and we want what is best for Israel and Palestine. Our responsibility is to force them to meet and negotiate their differences without outside interference.
So, we cut our $60 million pledge to an organization that seeks water for 950,000 refugees, promotes education in South Sudan, provides relief to tsunami victims and is teaching 3000 Afghan soldiers to read.
Peace talks between Israel and Palestine have been going on for more than 20 years and the sides are further apart now than they have ever been. Israel brings preconditions to the table, such as; existing settlements will become permanent parts of Israel,
As the year ended, plans were going ahead for 3,690 new apartments in East Jerusalem and 1000 in nearby settlements. Peace Now reported a 20 percent increase in settlement construction in 2011, with 1,850 new units going up in settlements east of the separation wall, and 3,500 elsewhere in the West Bank. Human Rights groups noted a corresponding increase in home demolitions in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Palestinians not only have settlements on their land, they have to deal with settlers who harass, intimidate, steal and seem to have no limits to their brutally.
In late December, a coalition of human rights groups including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, reported that during 2011 settlers destroyed hundreds of homes, water wells and farm structures, as well as 10,000 olive trees.[2]
Another precondition demanded by Israel; The separation wall will become the new border, encircling West Bank’s valuable water aquifers and more than 40,000 acres of its prime agricultural land, enclosing another 10 percent of Palestine pushing the Palestinians back onto 12 percent of what used to be their home land instead of the 22 percent they are asking for. What is left is cut up by Jewish only roads.
Now the Israeli government declares war on solar panels which provide the only electricity for many Palestinian villages. Others, more fortunate, may purchase electricity, at inflated rates, from Israel.[3] It seems that Israel is saying to the Palestinians that your land is ours, your water is ours, your agriculture is ours, your homes are ours and now, even your sunshine belongs to us.
Still, our politicians declare Hamas as the enemy of peace.
Thomas Are
March 22, 2011.
[1] Interview with John Oliver, Daily Show, 3/15/12.
[2] See Rachelle Marshall, Israel’s Current Demand: Most of the West Bank., The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, March, 2012, p.8-9.
[3] Phoebe Greenwood, Palestinians Prepare to Lose the Solar Panels that Provide a Lifeline. The Guardian, Wednesday, March 14, 2012
So, we cut our $60 million pledge to an organization that seeks water for 950,000 refugees, promotes education in South Sudan, provides relief to tsunami victims and is teaching 3000 Afghan soldiers to read.
Peace talks between Israel and Palestine have been going on for more than 20 years and the sides are further apart now than they have ever been. Israel brings preconditions to the table, such as; existing settlements will become permanent parts of Israel,
As the year ended, plans were going ahead for 3,690 new apartments in East Jerusalem and 1000 in nearby settlements. Peace Now reported a 20 percent increase in settlement construction in 2011, with 1,850 new units going up in settlements east of the separation wall, and 3,500 elsewhere in the West Bank. Human Rights groups noted a corresponding increase in home demolitions in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Palestinians not only have settlements on their land, they have to deal with settlers who harass, intimidate, steal and seem to have no limits to their brutally.
In late December, a coalition of human rights groups including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, reported that during 2011 settlers destroyed hundreds of homes, water wells and farm structures, as well as 10,000 olive trees.[2]
Another precondition demanded by Israel; The separation wall will become the new border, encircling West Bank’s valuable water aquifers and more than 40,000 acres of its prime agricultural land, enclosing another 10 percent of Palestine pushing the Palestinians back onto 12 percent of what used to be their home land instead of the 22 percent they are asking for. What is left is cut up by Jewish only roads.
Now the Israeli government declares war on solar panels which provide the only electricity for many Palestinian villages. Others, more fortunate, may purchase electricity, at inflated rates, from Israel.[3] It seems that Israel is saying to the Palestinians that your land is ours, your water is ours, your agriculture is ours, your homes are ours and now, even your sunshine belongs to us.
Still, our politicians declare Hamas as the enemy of peace.
Thomas Are
March 22, 2011.
[1] Interview with John Oliver, Daily Show, 3/15/12.
[2] See Rachelle Marshall, Israel’s Current Demand: Most of the West Bank., The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, March, 2012, p.8-9.
[3] Phoebe Greenwood, Palestinians Prepare to Lose the Solar Panels that Provide a Lifeline. The Guardian, Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Friday, March 16, 2012
The Spear Head of Justice
Gilad Atzmon writes:
The lack of capacity to reflect upon oneself from the futuristic perspective, explains the Israeli collective complicity in some of their horrendous war crimes. This should be enough to explain why the Israelis sliced up the Holy Land with separation walls and barbed wires. It explains why Israelis drop White Phosphorous on their next door neighbors as they seek shelter in a UN shelter. It also explains why Israeli Navy Seal commandos ended up executing peace activist on the Mavi Marmara on the high seas. It also explains why newly-born Israel was quick to expel the vast majority of the Palestinian indigenous population just three years after the liberation of Auschwitz… People who defy history never look in the mirror.[1]
I heard Gilad Aztmon speak in Atlanta just last week. (3/10/12) He shared with us how his grandfather had been a prominent commander of the Irgun, the terrorist gang involved in the massacre of Deir Yassin. Grandfather was also, according to Gilad, “pretty cross with the Palestinians for dwelling on the land he was sure belonged to him and his people, given to them by God.” Gilad grew up believing "it was only Jews who were associated with anything good.”[2] The greatest thing that he could do with his life was to become a martyr for Israel. Then in 1982, at 18 years old, he joined the army and was sent to Lebanon where he first encountered Palestinians. His illusions crumbled, “I knew that our leaders were lying, in fact, every Israeli soldier understood that this was a war of Israeli aggression.”
Atzmon is not very different from many other Jewish celebrities, (he is a world renowned saxophonist.) but the passion with which he spoke of justice for the Palestinians amazed me. He said something like, ‘The point of the spear for international justice is focused on how Israel treats the Palestinians.’
I sat there thinking, how right he is. If we can’t see the daily injustice inflicted on the Palestinians then what chance is there for justice anywhere? We might as well give up to a dog eat dog world, every man (and nation) for himself and to hell with the needs and pains of anyone else. The injustice in Palestine is so obvious:
Palestinian children face many obstacles:
*** 10 percent of children in the West Bank and Gaza Strip suffer from chronic malnutrition.
*** 19 percent of children under 5 are anemic
*** 23 percent of Palestinian families with children are in poverty ($2 a day or less.)
*** 25 percent of Palestinian children do not attend primary school.[3]
That’s not the worst of it.
In the last two days, Israeli forces have killed at least 15 residents of the Gaza Strip and wounded over 30. Among the dead are two young boys.[4]
If Gilad Atzmon has the moral courage to speak out against his own heritage, family and nation, can we not at least learn about the issue, speak out in our churches, inform our friends and write our politicians?
Thomas Are
March 16, 2012.
[1] Gilad Atzmon, The Wandering Who, (Zero Books) p. 181-182.
[2] Ibid., p.2
[3] Sources UN, PCBS, cited in Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, March 2012. p.2
[4] Max Blumenthal, Israel’s Bogus Case for Bombing Gaza Obscures Political Motives, Mondowweiss, March 11, 2012.
The lack of capacity to reflect upon oneself from the futuristic perspective, explains the Israeli collective complicity in some of their horrendous war crimes. This should be enough to explain why the Israelis sliced up the Holy Land with separation walls and barbed wires. It explains why Israelis drop White Phosphorous on their next door neighbors as they seek shelter in a UN shelter. It also explains why Israeli Navy Seal commandos ended up executing peace activist on the Mavi Marmara on the high seas. It also explains why newly-born Israel was quick to expel the vast majority of the Palestinian indigenous population just three years after the liberation of Auschwitz… People who defy history never look in the mirror.[1]
I heard Gilad Aztmon speak in Atlanta just last week. (3/10/12) He shared with us how his grandfather had been a prominent commander of the Irgun, the terrorist gang involved in the massacre of Deir Yassin. Grandfather was also, according to Gilad, “pretty cross with the Palestinians for dwelling on the land he was sure belonged to him and his people, given to them by God.” Gilad grew up believing "it was only Jews who were associated with anything good.”[2] The greatest thing that he could do with his life was to become a martyr for Israel. Then in 1982, at 18 years old, he joined the army and was sent to Lebanon where he first encountered Palestinians. His illusions crumbled, “I knew that our leaders were lying, in fact, every Israeli soldier understood that this was a war of Israeli aggression.”
Atzmon is not very different from many other Jewish celebrities, (he is a world renowned saxophonist.) but the passion with which he spoke of justice for the Palestinians amazed me. He said something like, ‘The point of the spear for international justice is focused on how Israel treats the Palestinians.’
I sat there thinking, how right he is. If we can’t see the daily injustice inflicted on the Palestinians then what chance is there for justice anywhere? We might as well give up to a dog eat dog world, every man (and nation) for himself and to hell with the needs and pains of anyone else. The injustice in Palestine is so obvious:
Palestinian children face many obstacles:
*** 10 percent of children in the West Bank and Gaza Strip suffer from chronic malnutrition.
*** 19 percent of children under 5 are anemic
*** 23 percent of Palestinian families with children are in poverty ($2 a day or less.)
*** 25 percent of Palestinian children do not attend primary school.[3]
That’s not the worst of it.
In the last two days, Israeli forces have killed at least 15 residents of the Gaza Strip and wounded over 30. Among the dead are two young boys.[4]
If Gilad Atzmon has the moral courage to speak out against his own heritage, family and nation, can we not at least learn about the issue, speak out in our churches, inform our friends and write our politicians?
Thomas Are
March 16, 2012.
[1] Gilad Atzmon, The Wandering Who, (Zero Books) p. 181-182.
[2] Ibid., p.2
[3] Sources UN, PCBS, cited in Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, March 2012. p.2
[4] Max Blumenthal, Israel’s Bogus Case for Bombing Gaza Obscures Political Motives, Mondowweiss, March 11, 2012.
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