Comments on: “We’re at War! Are You Doing All You Can?”

By: Andrew Schamess

Andrew Schamess — Wed, 23 May 2007 18:21:09 +0000

This is disengagement, right? There was a time in Israel when Jews and Arabs were much more interpenetrated- they were, in some sense, part of the same community, even if it was a community in conflict.

Israel has succeeded in pushing more and more Arabs outside its (temporary) borders. It has imposed more obstacles for those from the West Bank to access institutions in Jerusalem. Palestinian labor has been replaced to a large extent by migrants from low-income European, African and Asian countries. It is, literally, building a giant wall to keep the Arabs out.

At the same time, Israel has become more prosperous and more European in look and feel.

All of this makes the Palestinians nearly invisible to Israelis in their daily lives - unless, of course, one blows up a bus or a disco.

By the way, here is one of the many small ironies that stand next to the obvious large one.

Many Jews come to Israel to re-connect with their tradition, to see the Land of the Torah. But life in the small Arab towns on the West Bank is much closer to the way our ancestors lived in Biblical times, than anything a visitor will see in modern Israel.

This is just one of the things we have lost by separating ourselves, in the interest of security and of maintaining a Jewish majority, from the land and the people amidst which Israel is situated.

By: FurGaia

FurGaia — Thu, 24 May 2007 00:44:09 +0000

“Now, seems we do all we can to forget. “

I feel a bit of an intruder commenting on this blog as I am not Jewish. But still … those are questions that affect us all, I’m sure.

A while back I came upon the very interesting article by Yagil Levy, Materialist Militarism. It clearly shows the power that the military-industrial complex has over all of our lives. Thus, reading your post, it seems to me that, whether in Israel or in the Western countries engaged in the “war-on-terror”, it may not be that “we do all we can to forget”, but more likely that we are NOT encouraged to think about and to mull over the war(s). Perhaps there will come a time when the military-industrial complex will need more engagement on the part of the public (say, when a draft becomes absolutely necessary in the US), then I suspect that the images and the discourse will change in a way that will make it impossible for us to “forget”.

By: Steffi

Steffi — Fri, 25 May 2007 00:56:25 +0000

I know this will sound more controversial than I want it to, but years ago, I heard a presentation of a Master’s thesis by a social work student who had interviewed Germans who had grown up in Germany during World War II. Jews have decried the “good German” who was aware of Nazi atrocities and did nothing. But this student presented some very moving interviews, including one with a mother who lived on a farm near one of the concentration camps and saw from a distance the trains come in and unload their emaciated, barely-alive passengers. She talked about how helpless and frightened she was, and how her concerns were twofold: to protect her young son from these awful sights, and perhaps more crucial, to manage to survive by keeping the farm going to produce at least enough food for her family. Some other interviews had a similar tone: an emphasis on the need to function and survive, a feeling that if one knew too much, or spoke about what one knew, it would be terribly dangerous and/or painful.
Now none of this applies to the situation of the Israelis vis-a-vis the Palestinians. But it does speak to the ways in which human beings have to — or at least tend to — exercise massive denial regarding events or situations which are simply too overwhelming and threatening, emotionally, politically or otherwise, and over which they feel they have little control.
The separation wall works both ways: most Israelis are insulated from what life is like in the West Bank on a daily basis, and certainly have little or no direct knowledge of everyday life in Gaza. The exception to this is the soldiers who serve in the territories, and it appears that for at least some of them, their experiences as occupiers do lead them to become refuseniks or to work in some way or another for peace. It is also interesting to note that according to various sources, many young people (I’ve heard that the numbers are as high as 40%)are either avoiding army service by claiming physical, mental or some other problem such as drug use, or they are making sure they get into some elite unit that will do high level computer or similar “desk” work to avoid being sent to the occupied territories. It would be nice if all those young men and women refused to serve on moral grounds, but the point is, they’re finding some way to avoid confronting the human consequences of their government’s policy. I guess we are all “good Germans” at times.

By: Next Generation

Next Generation — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 06:44:42 +0000

Perhaps I am a bit unique in this denial business. I live 9/11 everyday as well as the Gulf War. I was there for 9/11. I saw friends gone or so damaged that they will never be the same. I worked in the rescue tents and listened to the emergency workers cry and sigh. I listened to my son and daughter-in-law who are both teachers in schools where many parents were lost. They were called to work in the middle of the night to learn how to talk to the children when school resumed. They were barely children themselves. My son-in-law will never be the same after his trips with the Air Force to who knows where. They call it PTSD and he gets a small disability pension each month. Even with that he will finish his 20 years in the military to get a pension to help his family. I do not know how he goes back one weekend a month and 2 months in the summer.
Perhaps our world leaders should wear a Tibetan Prayer Bell for one day. Each time the bell rings,they should think about what it is like to be living in Israel or Iraq today. It takes just a moment. Perhaps if we all did that, things might, and I say might, change.

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Susann

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