Gazans, who have been subjected to decades of systemic oppression under Apartheid Israeli occupation, have been in favor of tempering positions against their occupiers while remaining defiant towards occupation and insistent on reclaiming territory from Israel, according to a Washington Institute poll and report . Here is one of the many opinions surveyed.
About half (53%) agree at least somewhat that “Hamas should stop calling for Israel’s destruction, and instead accept a permanent two-state solution based on the 1967 borders,”
This moderation comes despite expansion of illegal Israeli settlements and increasing tolls of Israel’s ongoing 56 year occupation of Palestinian territory and 16 years of blockading Gaza. At the same time, surveyed Gazans reported a desire for less corruption along with free and fair elections. They also want engagement from the West and involvement of Arab states to reach these goals and resist Israeli oppression.
Hamas used it authority over the Gaza Strip to redirect funds towards arms smuggling to launch the 50 year sequel of the Yom Kippur war with Israelis. This redirection comes on top of widely known constraining of Palestinian economic performance in reports where relations with Israel are academically written off as issues relating to movement of goods and people rather than blockades.
Just as Gazans have rights to self determination and defense, so too do Israelis. The return shelling started the same day with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu promising mighty vengeance. Hundreds are dead in the first day of this round, and Hamas has taken Israeli captives in attacks claimed to be targeted on settlers on disputed territory.
International support for Israel has been wide. President Biden stated the solid backing of the US and warned others thinking about follow up attacks. Republicans predictably blamed Biden for the attacks and assured us that only they can fix it. Israel’s occupation and blockade are overlooked by many sympathetic allies, though there will be not be lasting peace while these injustices continue. As Independent Jewish Voices of Canada has stated,
Israel needs to be held accountable for its decades of crimes against humanity, crimes that have put Palestinians in a position where violent retribution and death feels like justice.
The violent retribution doled out this weekend will not lead to more justice and equity, IMO. Meanwhile, escalating Israeli oppression and disregard from the international community leave little room for alternative paths through existing institutions. As long as we don’t listen to Gazans, they will take increasingly desperate measures to be heard.
Please continue discussing Israel, Gaza and Palestine in the comments as you wish.
Last week in a comment, I promised to cover the Rethinking Value presentation by Mariana Mazzucato in the Long Now Foundation seminar series on June 24, 2019.
In this presentation, Mazzucato calls for redirecting capitalism through revaluing of public contributions and reforming our priorities. Several topics presented in the ACM are covered, starting with the problem of financialization. Larger shares of our economy are going to financial growth at the expense of business investment. The commodity of currency has taken inordinate importance relative to producing goods and nonfinancial services. Meanwhile, government has been cast to limited roles as administrators of public goods and regulatory band aids to cover market failures.
Some history is covered, including a reference to financialization going back to 1929 with a quote from Big Bill Hayword on the alchemy of ownership by barons doing none of the requisite work. Mazzucato then spends a few minutes on considerations of value and productive sectors of the economy through the last few hundred years of Western economic theory.
This is where I want to ask my colleagues with economic experience how well this brief history of value was covered. Please let us know in the comments.
This history has led to value based on preferences. That is, value is what people pay. That leads to ridiculous situations where Goldman Sachs financiers can extol their value to the economy based on their outsized compensation in the midst of an economic crash borne of financial leveraging.
Mazzucato says that economic reports neglect the need to consistently evaluate value production from conception through consumption, and thereby fail to note where compensation mismatches contributions to value.
Value matters, she argues, because it affects so many aspects of our economy and governance. Gross domestic product is used to highlight absurdities, such as raising drug prices and polluting environments raises the GDP.
Some of our problems with outsized influence of finance arose through incorporation of financial activity into measures of GDP with inadequate consideration of consequences by the United Nations System of National Accounts. Now, interest and other nonproductive finance operations are key contributors to GDP, which inordinately gets attention as an estimate of national development and wellbeing.
The second half of the talk includes calls to rethink value relationships. Public institutions invest heavily in basic development, and, therefore add value. Examples are provided in how much the NIH invests in pharmaceutical development for little of the value added, and how digital data is privatized when we can publicly take collective ownership.
These relationships are coming to the fore with climate change, where private development is considered value added while bureaucratic guidance, government investment and public development are written off as valueless.
Before finishing, Mazzucato shares a list of how we can change these relationships. We need to rethink value as collectively produced among public and private entities. Corporate governance has to be repurposed for longer term gain. One example given was for development. Rather than consider roles for isolated sectors and technologies, we can collectively decide what are the purposes of any given development and how we want to develop for adding value now and in the future.
This is where I also am interested in feedback. What can we do about economic imbalances. I think Mazucato calls for fixing capitalism, while others might say greater valuation for public contributions will come with public ownership of collective and common aspects of our economy, such as our digital social spaces.
Please share any opinions you wish on this presentation and the included topics in the comments.
I found Mazzucato’s Long Now talk through watching videos in the youtube channel for the UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose. Some of you are more familiar with the work and people there than I am. I am not an economist and don’t know anybody at UCL, though I did write to Mazzucato’s organization there, the Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose, to prepare for this and offer my services. There has been no response in the few days since then.
Back to UCL, Here is one in their feed on digital public infrastructure for public good.
Here practical examples of national public ownership/management of digital infrastructures are presented. Private for profit entities are not necessary to add value or innovation.
My biggest concern with these examples is the lack of attention to possible abuse of personal data by governments. Public good includes justice, equity and democracy. It is not simply service to support government functions.