This will be a bit different from my usual posts. It’s late and I don’t really know what to say. It will be glaring that this is stream of consciousness, but it seems more glaring not to say anything. So some random thoughts and feelings and fears from inside that I invite (and need) others to add to.
Gaza is in freefall, is burning. Parts of the West Bank may soon follow, indeed have already started. (Jerusalem is still quiet and detached, as far as I can tell). And with all of it, I think we’d have to say, any last shreds of what torn and tattered and tortured hopes of peace that still may have existed here, at least in people’s hearts. What can we say? What can we do?
I have been thinking about this for days. In some way, it’s been clear for years, and most certainly since the Hamas victory last year, that we were headed here. Well, that we were headed here if…
If…Palestinians could not bring their leadership together and create a governing body that could, well, govern in something even bordering on functionality, notwithstanding the obstacles.
If…Israel was able to continue to strangle Gaza and its people, even while “disengaged,” and occupy the rest of the Palestinians through an ever-tightening noose and expanding system of control.
If…the US did not put aside short-sightedness and instead decide to become finally the honest broker it needs to be, if it did not remove narrow and ideological obstacles to the diplomatic efforts so badly needed.
If…the Arab world did not finally make the decisions and sacrifices necessary to really support Palestinians, with more than just rhetoric and symbolic gestures.
If…
If…
If…
If…people like me were not ultimately able to bring about real change in the decision-making of their governments and their communities.
Sadly, all of the “ifs” came true. None of the good things happened, at least not fully, and there are probably more negative “ifs” than any one server could support on an internet site.
So now it feels like it’s too late to ask “what do we do now?” or “whose fault is it?” As I watched al-Jazeera (English version) today, I was fascinated to see that, at least in the snippet I saw in the afternoon, of about 15 interviewees in the West Bank, in Gaza, and around the region, not one mentioned Israel or the U.S. as deserving of blame for the current crisis.
But really those questions of blame and next steps were better suited for 2, 7, 10, 40 years ago. Decades of failure cannot be undone or forgotten so easily, no matter whose failures they are.
Perhaps what we can do then, as people, as human beings, is simply reach out. That, too, has not been happening enough in recent years. There may be a few people in Gaza or the West Bank who can connect to the Internet wirelessly. If nothing else, they need to know that at least a few people in the American and Jewish (not sure I can be bold enough to put myself in the Israeli world) worlds care a bit more and a bit longer than what they see on a news story. That their lives mean more to us than a shrug of the shoulders and “gee, isn’t that sad?” followed by a click.
Last year, shortly after the outset of the Lebanon War, I wrote this:
Perhaps it is the height of selfishness to look at myself at moments like this. No time for that, I should say. But in these circumstances, individual acts feel foreign, feel useless. Perhaps that is why I am no leader.
So still I ask, could I have done more? Could we all have done more? So few people even know there is such a movement of American Jews who disagree with these Israeli policies — and do so on the basis of their belief in and love for the idea of Israel — in the United States , and even fewer hear our voice. What more can I do, can we do, because no matter some of our successes and goals met, we must see that we still have so, so far to go?
And our failure to reach our goal means that the tragedy in Israel, Lebanon, and Palestine goes nearly unchallenged. It means that no one in Lebanon or Palestine knows there are some from within the other side who are trying to help.
So here we are again. Another moment when these failures, these missed opportunities seem so acute. When violence and chaos are replacing order and hope. When the leaders we have to look to are Hanniyeh, Meshal, Abbas, Olmert, Barak (I can’t even bear to write about his “victory”), Netanyahu, Bush, Rice, nearly all of the US Congress, et al, it’s hard to look outside and expect much, so it seems natural to look inside, to look to other individuals. Still the height of selfishness, I guess, but I’m not sure what selflessness can look like in this case. Again, the reason I am no leader.
Yes, we need to write and call our representatives to appeal to them to do something. We need to support the few NGOs and agencies left that are supporting the people. We need to keep working for an end to the Occupation, regardless of what the other side may look like.
But all I can do right now, right here, is express this feeling, this gut-wrenching emptiness and helplessness and sadness and shamefulness. We have all, an entire world, failed this situation, failed the people here. Let us never forget that. Let us redouble ourselves, then, to work, once the opportunity re-emerges, to undo those failures, however long it takes.
In the meantime, let us reach out our hearts and our hands. Let us pray that this gloomy feeling is misplaced, that hope and peace and respect can somehow be stronger than misery and pain and pessimism and opportunism. That the gleam in the eyes of the Palestinian and Israeli children I see at my son’s school each morning will light the way of the future, rather than the reflection from tracers or night vision goggles.
On Friday, my son is going with those children on a class field-trip to a place called “Beit Holomot.” The House of Dreams. I pray, perhaps more than anything else, that he and his friends find real dreams there. Never have we needed them to start finding and building their dreams so quickly.
Brad: I logged on to semitism.net because, like you, I felt the need to say something and thought I might post my ramblings. I am so gratified to see that you’ve already expressed so much of what I was — am — feeling. I’ll just add a few things:
When the Combatants for Peace were in our area, (as I wrote in a previous post here) the Palestinian speaker, Souliman Al-Hamri, talked about the ways in which the deeply embedded Palestinian social structure of families and clans led to the emergence of the various political factions loosely organized under the umbrellas of both Hamas and Fatah. Over time, Souliman said, these semi-autonomous groups have become more factionalized, often more extremist, and certainly more powerful because as the checkpoints, barriers, Separation Wall etc. made communication between the towns and villages increasingly difficult, the inhabitants of these communities were forced to became more reliant on these local factions to provide any governance that was needed. Souliman noted that the first Intifada was very disciplined, with communication throughout the Palestinian communities that enabled the people to organize large-scale economic strikes, wide-spread boycotts, and other kinds of non-violent political action under a unified leadership. The second Intifada, Souliman said, has been chaotic, subject to local “gang” control, and because of that it has been much more violent.
Souliman, when asked — as he invariably was — whether his work with the Comabatants put him in danger of being accused as an “Israeli collaborator,” just laughed and said he had a big family and was “Fatah,” the implication being that the combination of his family connections and his membership in Fatah served to protect him. (His family, by the way, consisted of something like 360 relatives. I asked him if he knew all their names, and he said, with a grin, “Most of them!”) So he himself, while his own politics were more universalist and democratically-oriented, was nonetheless an example of how things “work” on the street in Palestinian society.
I mention all this because to me, it highlights the grave misfortune of a sociocultural structure which has considerable value in many circumstances but has not served the Palestinians well in either building the infrastructure for a future state or in remaining unified (against many obstacles, to be sure) to confront an occupying power.
But more than that, I have found myself thinking about Souliman all day. What is happening in Gaza has apparently spread to Nablus, and is likely to spread further throughout the West Bank. I find myself wondering if he will stay safe; if his family and his Fatah membership will be able to protect him now. I wonder, too, about the gracious and courageous Palestinian doctors, social workers and other health care professional from the Palestinian Medical Relief Society whom I met in 2005 when I went to the West Bank with the Jewish-American Medical Project (now known as JVP Health and Human Rights Project.) Just as I worry about my relatives in Israel when I hear about suicide bombings, now when I hear that Gaza is burning and there is gunfire in Nablus, I think of real people, people whom I’ve met and liked and respected, people who have entertained me in their homes, answered my many questions about their lives under the Occupation, who put a human face on the Occupation, who talked about their dreams for a democratic Palestine.
Gaza is burning and the West Bank may be next, and I’m sure that many pundits on the left and right, in Israel and in the US, will find ways of analyzing these events and casting blame, pointing a finger somewhere. But right now, I can only think about the real faces, the real people whose lives are in danger, whose political dreams are shattered. They are people who deserved better.
If we hold those faces in our hearts, that is our motivation to go forward. If not in this generation, then perhaps the next or the one after that. Think instead of Einstein’s parallel universe and imagine that peace has happened. Cry for as long as you need to and keep going as well. I will hold you in my heart.
Dear Stefi:
Thanks for your good and sensible remarks.
Do not give up hope. When my son was about 10, he and his best friend had finger puppets. One was named Zbigniew and the other was named Brzninski. These children were wise beyond their years. They would discuss and solve the problems of the world. Both of these boys went on to become cancer patients and survivors. They each looked death in the face and we all had hope. I think they were given special gifts to survive against the odds. They are the next generation,each being 34 years old.
Tonight, Charlie Rose had as his guests, Zbigniew Brzninski, Brent Scowfield, and Henry Kissinger. When the dialogue turned to the Middle East and the role the US needs to play, I again had hope. If only people would listen to their wisdom, the world would be a better place and we could move on to solve other problems such as world hunger, AIDS, etc. Sometimes I wonder if we create and don’t solve problems that are solvable as a way of not having to deal with issues that, perhaps, we cannot solve.
on palestine “creating a governing body that could, well, govern on something even resembling functionality, notwithstanding the obstacles” who in israel is helping to find the governing body?