While the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza and the West Bank continues, Palestinians inside Israel are also facing tough times.
I want to take a moment and distance myself from the current hamas vs fatah discussion, and re-focus attention on the larger picture. In the midst of all this we forget about the very people we are struggling for- the Palestinian people. I am not surprised that land confiscations in Qalqlyia don’t make headlines anymore. Nonetheless, it is disturbing. And so are the daily UN briefings that keep telling me about the humanitarian situation in Gaza. People, Gaza’s stats have been in red zone since the day Hamas got elected and the world turned its back on the Palestinian people. Today, Gaza is even in worse shape (something I could not even consider possible nine months ago, when I wrote my term paper on the subject). A year ago people were saying that if nothing was done, the Palestinians would greatly suffer. Hell, I said that! And what happened?
The West Bank is not faring much better, either. Qalqlyia is suffering more and more everyday because of this massive wall- Billin now as well, despite a strong effort of peaceful resistance. And I am to believe that this is all about security, and that the Israeli government has "respectfully taken into consideration" the thoughts of those effected Palestinians. On the contrary, the only thing that they’ve respectfully done has been to completely ignore the ICJ’s decision- like some petty five year old with his hands clasped over his years screaming: "I don’t hear you!". In the midst of this, of course, the occupation of the west bank continues: a bullet in one boy’s head in Nablus, an "accident’ in Hebron- y’all know how it is. There’s barely any clean drinking water at this time of year, because the settlers redirect all the water for fill their swimming pools. In fact, there’s always a shortage of water year round for this exact reason- and need I mention how the Israeli government pollutes Palestinian water wells by turning them into land fills?
At this point some right wing Zionist will come up to me and say, well, its ur own damn fault. It’s your fault that you exist, because you and your people are ‘backwards’, because Palestinians are the cause of all evil and the reason why everything goes wrong in this world. So don’t waste your breath, dear Zionists; I believe I’ve stated your argument for you. Allow me now to say pre-emptive "Gee, thanks!" in hopes that one day you come back down to earth and get a little more touch with reality.
Moving on-
In addition to the Palestinians of the West Bank in Gaza, you’ve got the ones in refugee camps all around the world (Naher el Bared comes to mind, but we’ll save that discussion for later). That leaves us with the Palestinians inside Israel. For those of you who don’t know, Palestinians are treated like third class citizens in Israel- much like the way African Americans were treated prior to the civil rights movement- only worse. Don’t take my word for it- take a look at Israeli law. The spouse of a Jewish individual who does not hold Israeli citizenship can automatically apply to get one. This is not the case for Palestinians- in fact in many cases, spouses of Palestinian citizens of Israel are often forced to leave. This has happened many times in Jerusalem; if a Palestinian from Jerusalem chooses to marry a Palestinian from say, Nablus for example, there is simply no way the couple can live together in Jerusalem. Or how about the Law of "Return", which states that an Jew anywhere anytime can come to Israel and become a citizen on the spot. Palestinians, who have lived on the land for centuries, do not have this same right. Americans of Palestinian orgins have been denied entry to Israel repeatedly(for more info visit righttoenter.ps)- but An American of Jewish ancestry would never face such a problem. There are countless more examples of course.
Yet one particular example I would like to focus on has more to do with demographics. A news story broke out this past week about how Israel has finally allowed Palestinians to say the word ‘Nakba’ (i.e. the catastrophe of 1948 where over 700,000 Palestinians were forced out of their homes and many more killed) in their textbooks. Many in Israel were outraged by this- Avigdor Lieberman, who openly advocates for the forced transfer of Palestinian citizens of Israel, was particular distraught. Many Israelis think that by putting forth such initiatives they are in fact doing Palestinians a favor. But the truth is this is not a favor; nor is it a sign of pluralism or democracy (just look at Lieberman). Quite simply, Palestinians have the right to define themselves in any way they wish; to deny them such a right would be absurd. Whether Israeli society officially approves of Palestinians classifying the Nakba as a catastrophe or not is of little consequence to Palestinians and what they know to be true. In the 1920s, for example, Virginia made sure to remove all references of Native Americans from official record because it deemed them to be genetically inferior. When Virginia repealed this law, it was not doing Native Americans any favors; everyone knows that Native Americans are not genetically inferior- and Native Americans certainly knew that to be true all along. By repealing such a law, they were simply doing the bare minimum. They did not apologize for passing the law in the first place, nor did they (or the federal government) apologize for what happened to the Native Americans. Just head on down to colonial Williamsburg and see how the everyday life of the colonialist is celebrated with real live enactments.
As the ‘Nakba’ story developed, no one seemed to question in this uproar or the fact that ‘Arabs’ went to separate schools. And as we know here in the US, separate is not equal. A recent poll of Jewish Israelis showed that more than half believed it was treason for a Jewish woman to marry an Arab man; 40% said Arabs should no longer have the right to vote in parliamentary elections; and 75% opposed apartment blocks being shared by Jews and Arabs. These kind of statistics are not at all new; and there are plenty more of them. Just as health data here in the US shows that the average black male dies sooner than his white counterpart, the same holds true in Israel. It is no coincidence, ladies and gentleman. Nor is it a coincidence that the United States of America supports Israel financially and militarily. You might ask: how could the US, the land of freedom and opportunity, fund such a racist system of apartheid- where Jewish only roads and Jewish only settlements are built on stolen Palestinian land? Where Palestinians in Israel live in the poorest of neighborhoods, where districts are redlined, where Palestinians are denied the right to even build a house when their Jewish counterparts have that right and more? To these questions I reply by saying that I am not surprised. I ask: How could America wipe out an entire people and pretend everything’s ok? How could America enslave an entire people and not apologize? (A Republican politician in Virginia recently said that black people "should get over slavery". He himself is a descendant of slave owners) How could America send its own citizens to fight an unjust war?
At the end of the day, it almost makes perfect sense. America did away with its native inhabitants- and Israel continues to do the same. America was built on racism and continues to suffer from it. Israel too. And yet, both nations don’t seem the least bit worried. After all, why should they- both claimed their land was God given from the start; and the native population? What native population?