So now Israel has agreed to a cease fire, of sorts and we are told that it has ‘exceeded its objectives’ in Gaza. Big deal. Over 1200 dead and many thousands injured. What for? If the Israelis think that bombs, rockets and assassinations will destroy a dream, will destroy the emotional fervour of the Palestinians (however disunited their various factions are) then they have learned nothing from their own history. Have the many and various anti-Jewish activities that have happened over the centuries ever sapped the Jewish dreams; ever broken their morale? Of course not! So what makes them think that doing what they have done, during the last 22 days of their offensive will bring ‘peace’ any closer.
The Israeli have destroyed the infrastructure of Gaza (for sure they will not pay for the repairs!); they killed, injured and maimed thousands of people after 22 days of brutal activity to arrive back at the point they started from! As I say what was all the death and destruction for?
They may kill thousands and destroy houses and buildings but they will never kill the Human Spirit. They should know that. So what makes them think that they are so special that what never had any affect on them will affect Palestinians any differently? We are all human beings on this world together. For whatever reason we are all here, now, with our differences in skin colour, beliefs and creeds, daily practises of living, our loves, our dreams, our hopes and aspirations – we are all in this together. So for one group of people (the Israelis) to try to subjugate another group (the Palestinians); to attempt to control how they should think and act towards the first (dominant? group) shows breathtaking arrogance, unbelievable hubris and staggering presumption.
The presumption is that Israel knows best. Do they? Have they addressed the root of the problem – a landless, disenfranchised population? That they are an occupying nation that was ‘given’ Palestine in 1946 because the world wanted to give the traumatised survivors of the Nazi death camps some place for them to recover and call home? What about the Palestinians? Without so much as a by your leave they were made landless and moved.
As the English poet and sermonist John Dunne wrote in the 1600s, “No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.”
The Israelis have been diminished by their actions – therefore they have lost. They may have ‘exceeded their objectives’ in Gaza but as I said, in the long run they have lost.
This is a defining moment in Israel’s short history. As a people the Jews in Israel are morally bankrupt. Their only recourse is to arms, to fight. That is not the way civilised people act. Whatever the shortcomings of Hamas and other hard line Palestinians, and there are many, by lowering themselves to ‘Hamas levels’ of activity the Israeli have diminished themselves – and they know it.
Why can’t the Israelis show moral leadership and lift the whole region to a new level of consciousness? Isn’t this what Jewishness; the Kabbalah and their spiritual practices are supposed to bring about? They should not just talk about it. They should walk the walk, not just talk the talk!!
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