5.11.21 — POV on the current I/P conflict. Links + sources included.
What’s happening between Israel and Palestine has been making me sick, as it has been for most. But I’m having a lot of issues with how people have been posting about what’s going on without even a basic understanding of the history between the two. People who are talking about it all as if this is new, one-sided terrorism inflicted on Palestine by Israel.
People also don’t realize that sharing misguided and piecemeal information is an open invitation to more anti-semitic rhetoric. Anti-jewish commentary has erupted over the past few weeks, even more so than it has been. From the stampede tragedy in Israel a few weeks ago, where pro-Palestine and anti-jewish people cheered that 45+ Israelis died and more than 150 were injured, to having an excuse to blame any and all Jews for the atrocious acts on Palestine this week. Calls for Jewish annihilation have returned, and the anti-Israel conversations are making it grow.
What happened yesterday was not just a deadly airstrike by Israel. Is was a series of violent events. Clashes at the Al Asqa Mosque in Jerusalem lead to rocket attacks by Hamas which Israel responded to with an airstrike. NONE of these violent acts are more valid than the other. ALL of them were made with the intent of harm or killing of the other.
“The violence on Monday began after the police entered the mosque compound around 8 a.m. and fired rubber-tipped bullets and stun grenades at stone-throwing Palestinians…Hamas had been threatening for weeks to respond with force to what it described as Israeli provocations in Jerusalem. On Monday, angered by the raid on Al Aqsa, Hamas and its allies in Gaza sought to make good on that promise. Hamas militants fired at least 150 rockets across southern and central Israel, the Israeli Army said, with at least one landing in a village in the hills west of Jerusalem, causing damage to houses but no casualties…The volley of half a dozen rockets that reached the Jerusalem area were the first to be fired toward the city since 2014, an army spokesman said. Israel returned fire with airstrikes.” (https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/10/world/middleeast/jerusalem-protests-aqsa-palestinians.html)
Both Israel and Palestine are committing terroristic acts on each other. This is part of an ongoing conflict between the two, as it has been for decades now.
Hamas is, and has always been, an anti-Israel, anti-jewish terrorist organization.
“The Hamas covenant, issued in 1988, is replete with anti-Semitism, and echoes the notorious Protocols of the Elders of Zion charging Jews with an international conspiracy to gain control of the world. In Hamas’ world-view, Islamic precepts forbid a Jewish state in the area known as Palestine, and they assert the Jewish people have no legitimate connection to the land of Israel…
Since 1994, Hamas has been the main organization perpetrating terrorist attacks in major Israeli cities with targets including shopping malls, cafes, buses and hotels. Its most deadly attacks include the March 2002 suicide bombing of the Park Hotel in Netanya, killing 30 and injuring 140 during their Passover seder; the August 2001 suicide bombing of the Sbarro pizzeria in Jerusalem killing 15 and injuring 130; and the June 2001 suicide bombing at the Dolphinarium nightclub in Tel Aviv, killing 21 and injuring 120, most of them youths. Following the Israeli disengagement from the Gaza Strip, Hamas has been behind the thousands of rocket attacks that have targeted Israel’s population centers.” (https://www.adl.org/resources/glossary-terms/hamas)
It absolutely didn’t start there. An even more, in-depth, and neutral view of the entire conflict history between the two can be found here, dating back to the early 1900s. https://pov-tc.pbs.org/pov/downloads/2001/pov-promises-timeline.pdf
In modern-day Israel and Palestine, the violence between the two only grows stronger with each new generation being brought up to hate the other based on this history. Neither side is innocent. Both sides have an enormous amount of blood on their hands. Both have been the victim. Both have been the aggressor. The violent terrorist actions of Israel are 100% Israel’s fault, and the violent terrorist actions of Hamas and Palestine are 100% Hamas and Palestine’s fault. No act of terrorism or injustice should be justified for any reason. Israeli’s deserve peace, justice, and humanity. Palestinians deserve peace, justice, and humanity.
As I have been accused of this already, I will make myself very clear. I am not in support of the Zionist movement. Zionism does not equate to Judaism.
“The Religious Zionist Party includes a new incarnation of the Kahanist movement, a Jewish extremist group outlawed as terrorists by Israel, the United States and other Western countries decades ago over its incitement to violence against Arabs.” (https://apnews.com/article/israel-elections-benjamin-netanyahu-exit-polls-6fc44df2043b04b1b823a45d6d508859)
As a Jew who is proud of her history, culture, and beliefs, I am and always will be pro-Israel. As a human being who is always overcome with empathy and sickened by continued acts of terror and injustice, I am also pro-Palestine. This may sound like an “all lives matter” kind of opinion, but it’s what I feel in my heart. I am pro-human, and anti-hate. I am pro-peace, and anti-terror.
I want to hope for resolution and compromise, but until both Israelis and Palestinians learn to overcome their learned hatred for one another, and learn to cooperate as human beings who can live together with different cultures and beliefs and accept one another, there will be no peace.
