I was recently accused by a friend of disappointing him with my “thinly veiled anti-Israeli views.” This got me thinking.
The trouble with finding oneself involved with any political debate or struggle, is that objectivity often seems to vanish into the ether when emotions and family histories are at stake. When it comes down to it, I have no problem with the Israeli individual. I have family living in Israel. I have friends from Israel. I met some really awesome people when I visited Israel. My problem is that the ideology that underlies the Israeli mindset is, very sadly, a racist one. Israel, as a whole, isn’t doing anything to alter that perception, or to change the reality of what this means.
The idea of Israel, in essence, is a wonderful one. For a persecuted group of people to finally have a place to call home, after thousands of years of diaspora, ghettoization and oppression is a wonderful thing. When the UN announced the partitioning of Israel, the Jews would finally have a place to call home. Although other locations had been discussed, this place would not be in Uganda, in South America, or somewhere else in the New World. It would be the Holy Land. The Jews would finally be able to go back to their ancestral home.
The only problem with this was that there were already people living there.
That this was a problem is unfortunate. That this continues to be a problem makes it even worse.
When I was about three years old, my cousin married an Israeli. We were living in South Africa at the time. I remember later on, once we had immigrated to Canada, my dad talking about Israel as somewhere just as bad as South Africa in terms of its insane political ideologies. He, as a Jew, was embarrassed by the ways the Israeli government and army were going about dealing with “the problem” of the native population, just as he, as a white man, had been embarrassed and enraged by the way that the South African government had dealt with the native people there. I had wondered why my cousins had chosen to live in SA rather than in Israel, not realising that the situations in these countries were comparable.
Now that I am older, and having spent time in Israel and in the West Bank, I find that my own emotional make-up clouds the objectivity I would like to attempt. I am someone who has lived through tragedy in my family due to violence. I know what it is like to live in fear. Most kids growing up in the Western World, or at least those in a similar socio-economic position to my family, living in Canada, America, Australia, England, have no idea what it is like to be afraid every time you leave your home. I know what it is like to make split-second judgments based on people’s appearances. And it disgusts me that this is something that I ever had to live with.
I feel saddened by the man who raped and murdered my grandmother. What makes me saddest is that the only reason one might have to rape an 83-year-old woman, is hatred. This man had obviously lived through pain and suffering unlike anything I can imagine, and as a consequence, something in him led him to rape and beat up and old white woman. I do not hate him. I believe that like a pressure cooker, there is only so much that one can take, before an explosion is imminent. Tragedy can make people snap. It can also, regrettably, reinforce people’s beliefs that the other is evil.
The situation I found in Israel and Palestine when I visited, was one of a complete lack of objectivity and understanding on each side. When you talk to Israelis, it is easy to understand how they feel about the Palestinian people. It is natural to fear and hate these Arabs who relentlessly fire rockets from Gaza, whose “terrorist” attacks can come at any time and threaten their safety. I remember when I was about thirteen, there was a bomb at the Planet Hollywood in the biggest shopping centre in Cape Town. We didn’t call it a terrorist attack, because in South Africa in the mid-nineties, the violence that was perpetrated against the white South African elite, was understood in the larger context to be a case of those who were oppressed speaking out against the inequities of their situation. I was definitely afraid of being hurt or raped, or worse, but my parents had taught me that prejudice and hatred are not a solution. The black South Africans were certainly not terrorists.
I do not condone violence. I do, however, understand why it can erupt. I don’t think that problems can or will be solved with violence, and this is another reason why I have such a hard time with Israeli policies and the actions of the IDF. I guess when it comes down to it, having spent time meeting and living with Palestinian people in the West Bank, I lost much of the sympathy I may have had for the fear that Israeli people live in. The reason we left South Africa is because of the way in which fear eats away at people, and makes them susceptible to propaganda and the support of extreme measures. Fear is a dangerous and powerful tool.
When I was in the West Bank, I saw the poverty the people are forced to live in. I saw how discriminatory policies can act to make people even more hate-filled and extreme. Water restrictions, house demolitions, illegal land confiscation and the barring of free movement will make someone feel like a caged animal…and sometimes act as such. I was absolutely disgusted by the way the 18- and 19-year old IDF soldier treated the Palestininan people like animals. This was worse than South Africa. At least there it was acknowledged that non-whites were people.
So, yes, perhaps my views seem a little clouded. I get angry when people try to excuse Israel’s actions because I would never ever excuse any of the actions of the South African government under apartheid. When there is an oppressor wielding weapons to control another group of people, resistance to this is absolutely understandable, if not necessary for change. If anything, my experience in Palestine illuminated the many ways the IDF uses violence to increase the hatred of the Palestinian people, forcing them to react, and then using this as an excuse to continue acting so abhorrently.
The only way there will ever be peace in the region is if the Israeli government is willing to grant Palestinian people equal rights, allow free movement throughout the entire country, and live in a truly democratic state. Things will get worse before they get better. South Africa is a perfect example of this. No one can ethically argue that abolishing the pass laws in SA was a bad thing, even though this led to an upsurge of violence when black people were finally allowed to freely move in the urban centres. It takes generations to work through hatred and fear. But the sooner change comes, the sooner things can have the potential to get better.
The last thing I need to address is the problem of grouping people together and labelling them. Yes, there are Arabs who hate Jews. There are certainly also Jews (and lots of other white people) who hate and fear Arabs. But the Palestinian people I encountered were, as a whole, some of the most generous and dignified people I have ever met. The fact that I told people that I was Jewish did not affect our relationship. I do not agree with extremists or fundamentalists; these are not the people I support. I support those who have no voice, those who are being ignored by their governments. I do not support Hamas. I do not think that firing rockets from Gaza is in any way helpful or effective. But just because there are extreme people making waves, doesn’t change the fact that there are thousands of people who are simply calling for equality and human dignity.
