#I AM REFERRING TO THE COLONIAL STATE OF ISRAEL WHICH IS CURRENTLY OCCUPYING PALESTINE AND ENACTING GENOCIDE ON THEM

[sugarcoatednightshade]

Israels actions against Palestine make me sick to my stomach. Every time I look at the news I see some new horror they are committing, and see how they are justifying the inexcusable, I feel sick to my stomach with rage. But now, in the heart of Ramadan, the word angry feels too small for the fire I feel in my chest.

Palestine will not be able to properly celebrate Ramadan this year. Trying to explain the situation to people who have never interacted with the community is difficult. Even when thinking to myself, I have the urge to compare it to what I know. "Imagine if there was no Christmas." "Imagine if someone took away Easter." "Imagine there was no food on Thanksgiving."

But Ramadan is not any of those things. The fact that there is no Ramadan in Palestine should be enough to make you angry.

I've been living in a muslim country for six months now. Ramadan is not nearly as festive as Eid was, but its presence is unmistakable. You can taste the joy in the air. Children here get out of school early this month. There is a school across from my home; I hear their laughter every day. String lights hang from the balconies of my neighbors, wrap around palm trees, dangle from streetlights. In the news I read that the Sheik has pardoned hundreds of prisoners, paying off their fines himself in the spirit of charity. Shops here are decorated to match, with cut out stars and crescent moons and streamers. Many shops offer discounts. "70% off home delivery."

There are festivals in the streets and lectures in the colleges.

It is wonderful. And the people of Palestine do not have this. Their fasting is forced, their children out of school by force, their houses lit by firebombs and not crescent moon LEDs, homes that smell of gunsmoke instead of oud.

I hate Israel. It feels childish to admit this. It feels like a shortcoming; hate is what causes this crisis, I should be able to focus on loving Palestine instead of adding more hate to the world. But it is a word I can't help but feel when I think about what Isreal has done, is doing, will do to the people of Palestine. What injustices they will force upon them next. Hate. It's not something I say lightly, but it is something I feel I must say.

I am not disappointed in Israel. I am not sympathetic to their 'cause.' I will not censor myself to sound more moderate, to convince the undecided. I hate Israel. I hate Israel. I hate Israel.

[intersectionalpraxis]

so, genuine question, i'm also pro-Palestine just to be clear: what do you know abt Hamas? i've seen you adamently speak up for palestinians repeatedly but ive never seen you really speak abt hamas specifically. is that because you just don't know much abt them or what?

I'm not sure what you're referring to specifically? I have my own posts (and re-blogs) that address Hamas directly (both historically and to their current context), and they are available on my page (so if you'd like to scroll, you're more than welcome to -but it will be a lot since I have been talking about this for weeks now). I know how they were founded, how they got into 'power,' and who joins them (usually the most vulnerable in Gaza city). I would also like to state here, clearly, as I have in many of the posts I did (some of which I have replied to anons and posted them), that I am tired of Zionists throwing the word 'terrorist,' around when, they themselves, are terrorizing and ethnically cleansing Palestinian people with weapons of mass destruction (and being backed by a world military power, being a 4th 'best,' themselves).

Nelson Mandela was also considered a terrorist by the US government and was on the FBI watch list until 2008. The Black Panthers were considered terrorists, as well. There are plenty of double standards that the US/western imperialist powers hold because they have (and still have) considered any form of resistance to colonial-settler/white supremacist violence to be a threat.

When Palestinians resist, they're called terrorists, but when the IOF does it they're just a 'democratic country defending themselves," despite UN resolutions stating that ANY occupied territory has a right to defend themselves against a violent occupied force.

Nobody is saying ANY civilian loss of life is acceptable anywhere in the world; most of us are calling out the 'loss of life arguments,' a lot of pro-Israel people argue, while completely denying 1) Palestinians the right to defend themselves and resist this ongoing violent occupation and 2) Saying that somehow Israeli civilians deserve more pity -and that is often based on the very fact pro-Zionist Israeli Jewish people grow up learning how to dehumanize Palestinian people.

So if you want me to link more articles about Hamas in one big post, I can make a post for folks who are interested in knowing more about them. That could take some time, in-between my updates here, and also some personal things I have going on, but if you would like this, you can clarify in another anon.

[snowscreekstories]

Week 6

1. Excerpted quote:

“The testimonies explored here track a settler-colonial narrative of evicted natives and usurped lands that centers the inscription of suffering and psychosocial maiming as a political strategy in Israel’s regime of control. These Palestinian women evince a reversal of the claim that they “infiltrated” Israeli land. Instead, it is revealed that Israel infiltrated the deepest, most intimate interiors of Palestinian life, inscribing their power on the bodies, breast milk, and blood of Palestine. Marking bodies and lives as unwanted waste advances the violent and racist terror inherent to colonial regulations, laws, and hidden machineries of oppressions.“ (191)

~Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian (2016) Everyday Militarism

2. An addition to the glossary of haunting:

B

Barren

Everything about me is barren. For the land I occupied was barren once I left. For the place I was dumped in wasn’t mine to grow in. For the children I had either died or were left behind. For my family was ripped apart and now I have nothing to hold on to. I could not keep my family together. I cannot hold onto what little family I have left. I am unable to get back. I am unable to grow anything. No. It’s not me. They took it. They took my womb. Where I grew. I am stunted. But I will never stop growing for I made no such promise.

3. Answers to this weeks questions:

This week’s topics were interesting and frankly, eyeopening. There was not much I could add to the discussion for I don’t know much about U.S. or international relations. But I was helped by some recurring themes we had touched on previous weeks. In the reading, Munira relates how she and her family felt like they were being haunted and terrorized by the Jewish-Israeli soldiers for being Palestinians (182). Though it seemed more for me like they were hunted for sport, ready to call them infiltrators, sort of like when Mexican, central and south Americans cross the border without papers or who overstay their visas are sometimes referred to as “illegals”, yet, this was their land, and in this case, they don’t wish to be granted refugee status, but to return to their homeland.

In this article by Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, Palestinians seem to be haunted by the possibility of death. For the women, the haunting seems to creep into their bodily fluids, by affecting how they bled: “if we can’t bleed while going back home, when can we bleed?” (166), or breastfed: “They asked me to breast feed the baby, because they believed that my milk put babies to sleep.“ (176). In the case of Palestinians, settler colonial rule manifested itself through the dynamics of gender and ethnicity, which tried to control the lives of many displaced families. That’s to say, those that survived from gunshot fires by the Jewish-Israeli soldiers. None, either the living or dead, seemed very lucky.

Palestinians were stripped from their homes, but also from their families. It was as if their whole lives had been erased: their house and parents. Palestinians were now just a bunch of orphans from the war. But, from those orphaned beginnings there can also be the possibility of a just and free tomorrow. For Ismat, she committed perjury as an example of resistance towards Jewish- Israeli soldiers, as to say “I am not leaving cause this is my home“, and the acts of many returning to Palestine as “infiltrators“, construct a type of just and free picture. As of now, I don’t know how much will change of Palestine and the “infiltrators’“ current situation, yet, documenting the history, such as the website that we discussed in class does, and the podcast, where they would create a free, and just future to be able to act innocent and happy,. In the podcast, it seemed that being content was an act of defiance in itself.

Relating this week’s readings with last week’s readings on the war on terror, we see how settler colonial regimes try tho control the narratives through policies and history buffs. The narrative had been constructed in order to justify the means of the state/nation. It fed into the idea of what was a Muslim/Arab and their differences with other groups when it came to faith. That conflict between them was expected, for they belonged to the “Muslim/Arab world“. Yet, the conflicts seemed to have been fueled by nations such as France, England and the United States. Nations like these seem to reek havoc in order to gain control of land, such as the Jewish-Israeli government learned to do and to follow by example.

These conflicts seem so far away, yet similar dynamics have happened in the past and continue to this day in our own backyard. The displacement of Native Americans, for one. The criminalization of indigenous and other Latin Americans who cross the border is also another way in which the narrative has shifted from earlier accounts of the USA inquiring about cheap labor in Mexico, receiving them with open arm for many many years. The trade deals within the United States and the Middle East, in which the United States backs out of life threatening conflicts when millions, even billions of dollars are at stake. It is something much more common to us, yet powerful, if we just cared to listen.

[rabbiandrewrosenblatt]

From Debate to Dialogue

In 1992 I took Modern British Literature 3269 at Columbia University, taught by the celebrated professor, Palestinian nationalist, and author Edward Said. He used literary theory and criticism to argue that European colonialism was a system in which the indigenous people in colonized lands were portrayed in art, politics, and everyday discourse as racially inferior to the white Europeans who colonized them. A central thesis of this intellectual project was Orientalism (also the title of his book that popularized the notion) – which is the point that language has the power to normalize the racial distinctions and hierarchies that enabled European empires to colonize, oppress, and enslave the non-white inhabitants of the so-called Orient. A corollary to this was the claim that Zionism was an extension of European colonialism. He argued that the founders of the Zionist movement were white Europeans who followed the same strategy to displace Arabs that European colonizers had used to conquer and enslave non-white Indians, Asians, and Africans. 

By the time I was in Prof. Said’s class, his reputation was well established. He had become an influential person in politics, advocating for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He had been an independent member of the Palestinian National Council. He had once acted on behalf of the US government to convey a peace plan to Yasir Arafat. Many of the Jewish students in my class naturally anticipated that there would be some discussion of politics. There was none. 

However, according to my fellow students there was one episode of politics. It happened in a lecture that coincided with Yom Kippur, when none of the Jewish students were in attendance. The novel covered in that session was Youth by Joseph Conrad. Conrad’s work had been a central case study of Said’s doctoral thesis. Many of Conrad's works feature ships. In Youth, the ship is the Judea. However, in that particular class, Said referred to the ship as the Palestine. My classmates were confused; they would have had less context to question the nuance of this substitution than the Jewish students who observed Yom Kippur. The next class, we all anticipated further discussion about the novel, and his changing the name of the ship. 

There was none. 

If we apply Said’s method of critical analysis to the ‘text’ of his lecturing, then he was taking advantage of an opportunity to frame or re-frame the narrative of the defining conflict of his life – i.e., the birth of Israel at the expense of the birth of a Palestinian state. The classroom is often seen as a place where knowledge, truth, and history are defined for tomorrow’s leaders. If Said saw the birth of Israel as a racist, colonialist displacement of Arab Palestine, then re-naming Judea – the ancient designation for the Jewish state – would be a step toward reversing Orientalism. 

Three weeks ago, I wrote a Friday message that commented on a podcast featuring Seth Rogen. That week’s writing got more responses than any other Friday message. Some were supportive and some critical. Last week my letter included an apology to Mr. Rogen and his family for the personal tone of my criticism of the podcast. I said the following:

In a message two weeks ago, I aggressively argued against Seth Rogen’s remarks regarding the founding of the State of Israel. The wording of the message implied a judgment of how our community and his family educated him. That was wrong, and my words should never have even suggested that. I apologize for expressing my arguments in terms that impugned the Rogen family. I, too, have to learn from my mistakes and errors 

This week, I got a phone call from Mr. Rogen. I want to share what I learned from him and what I believe we agreed we learned from the reactions to the podcast.  

The first and most important lesson is that we can all be guilty of oversimplifying each other’s positions or oversimplifying the nature of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Mr. Rogen told me that he felt that his comments had been taken out of context. I had focused on a sound bite that was intended for a podcast on comedy. To clarify his position on Israel he linked me to a long-format podcast with the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. In this interview he said he realized, on reflection with his wife, “when having a conversation about something so sensitive...it is what we said and it is also what we did not say. When you're having even a humorous conversation about something so nuanced, leaving things out or omitting things can become just as bad as the things you do say.”  

I now see that I had responded to an oversimplification at the same level, with platitudes. After speaking with Mr. Rogen and learning more about his personal values, I think that his position on Israel reflects a certain ideal, not entirely different from the philosophy of the Kibbutz movement – in which his parents met – that sought to bring a strong sense of justice and equality to the world. The humanitarian ethos of Zionism is very different from Prof. Said’s view of Zionism as an inherently racist enterprise. 

From the Kibbutz movement’s perspective, the values of liberal democracy and fairness should be applied to the present situation. Israel’s treatment of Palestine and of Palestinians should reflect the humanitarian ideals that were at the core of the humanist labour movement. The argument Mr. Rogen advances sees the current policies and negotiation strategies as a betrayal of the founding principles of Israel. Many Israelis agree. I think there is much to value in such a perspective; dismissing the merits and values of such a perspective is not true to my own thinking, nor is it an effective way to get others to understand my opinion. 

There is irony in the fact that this all began with a comedy podcast and a simple line about how Mr. Rogen’s Israel education was too narrow, and then was carried on by responses, including my own, that were similarly narrow. I don’t think it is a stretch to say that organized Jewish communities present a curriculum designed exclusively to build Jewish identity and love of Israel. It speaks to the nervousness of the diaspora about the disaffection and disappearance of Jews. It speaks to the reality that there are so many narrowly-defined anti-Israel counter-narratives out there – like Prof. Said’s linguistic turn on Youth – that it is only natural to advance a counter-counter-narrative. It speaks to the very real security concerns that Jews have had in Israel from 1920 to the present. However, narrowly focusing on any single factor leaves little room, if any, for a more fulsome presentation of the Palestinian condition portrayed in the media, in the arts, and in the classroom. Too often, it leaves out a balanced view of how dehumanizing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can be to ordinary people on both sides – especially to Palestinians. 

Mr. Rogen and I are probably more in agreement than he might think. In the weekly letter of 8 December 2017, I applied this principle [with Terry Neiman] to the Israel-Palestine situation as follows.

It is hard to imagine listening to a narrative from enemies who lie and mislabel us as an occupier, a Nazi, and a war criminal. It is hard to listen to people who cannot utter the word Israel without the modifier of Apartheid… However, in our experience, problems do not get solved without genuine appreciation of the story of the other side. Those who choose to remain callous to the opposite story in a conflict are doomed to a status quo of conflict. 

Palestinians call their story the Nakba - the Catastrophe. 

The Torah, at its core, values investigation that is broadly fact gathering to present the whole picture of any situation. The laws that emerge from this week’s Torah reading [Parshat Shoftim] concerning the procedures of the court reflect the need for both fact-finding and empathy. A panel of judges must include experts in the fields of practical knowledge. The law cannot exist outside of the factual knowledge of a conflict. Interestingly, the members of the court cannot be “exceedingly old.” Rashi understands this to mean that they must not be so detached from having raised their own children that they have ceased to have the patience and mercy that it takes to tolerate the indiscretions of youth. 

There is a law in the Code of Torah Courts that if a court gives a unanimous verdict of guilty, then they must declare the accused exempt from punishment. One interpretation, a close reading of Maimonides in Sanhedrin 9:1, is that if everyone is of one mind to convict, then it may be that the court was biased or predisposed to find guilt and therefore was guilty of either prejudice, group-think, or both. As such, even those who are the most loyal defenders of Israel should be open to widening their lens. 

I am ever mindful that my readers – many of whom I know personally – have a range of views and political leanings. My pulpit gives me the privilege to share my narrative with many, and affords me the advantage of controlling my email distribution list. In contrast to this, Edward Said had a captive, non-Jewish audience that lacked context for his interpretations, and lacked the power to challenge his academic pulpit. He was using his privilege to re-write someone else's narrative. Mr. Rogen and I, with very different audiences, share the quality of getting more diverse, unfiltered feedback than Said got in the classroom. This experience taught me that my words carried beyond my intended readership, and that those readers were sent emotionally and intellectually in a direction opposite to what I intended.

I believe that one’s ability to engage in meaningful reflections on Israel and its policy decisions and its treatment of the Palestinians suffers from being far from the realities on both sides of the conflict. We speak about Israel from the comfort and shelter of being an ocean and a continent away, and fail to appreciate what a luxury it is to opine on Israeli and Palestinian actions when we are not part of the facts on the ground.

On reflection, I see more clearly now how my conversations with political or intellectual critics and adversaries is different from my discussions with my co-author and contributing editor Terry Neiman. Over the years, Dr. Neiman and I have developed a process of  dialogue. We agree, disagree, re-construct, re-approach, and incorporate each other’s perspectives. In contrast to that, the adversarial debates I have with others are more like competitive wrestling matches in which one person will be pinned or submit. To the extent that all our debates seek to open the perspectives of all, it is a good thing. To the extent that they intend to suppress voices and perspectives, it is a very bad thing.   

I appreciate that Seth Rogen took the time to call me to sort this out. I don’t know if his conversations with me or with Haaretz changed his opinion or gave him opportunity to see things differently. I can say for myself it was an inspiration to read further, explore more, and to be disciplined enough not to fall further into the trap of electronically-mediated debate – the so-called echo chamber effect. The chiddush – the novel approach – here is that we stopped lobbing shots at each other in the media and started a dialogue. I look forward to less oversimplification, less winner-take-all debate, less competition for control of the narratives, and more dialogue.