Two veterans of the battle with the anti-Zionist media in South Africa recently attended the UN Day of Solidarity with the Palestinians in Pretoria. They have agreed to provide us with their account of the experience.
UN Day of Solidarity with the Palestinians
Gill Katz and Rolene Marks
It was a particularly hot day, but in the University of South Africa’s auditorium, the air conditioner only added to the chilly reception we felt as we slipped in – a half hour late. Five Media Team members, having somehow lost our way to the correct campus, finally arrived and not a moment too soon! Sliding down as unobtrusively as possible into my seat, I was prevented from seeing the speaker at the podium because of the dark-suited man wearing a kefiyeh and blocking my vision. Was he a government spy? He certainly appeared to be one, as he persisted in taking photographs of us five throughout the afternoon. How irritating!
We had come in midway through Palestinian Ambassador, Ali Halimeh’s message of welcome. The event was sponsored by the University of Pretoria, UN Information Centre, South African Department of Foreign Affairs and the Embassy of the State of Palestine (I know, I am confused about this as well!) and included a panel of six experts: Palestinian Ambassador to South Africa, Ali Halimeh, UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-Moon (on whose behalf a message was delivered), HE Dr Alzubeidi, Ambassador of Libya to South Africa and Dean of the Diplomatic Corps, SABC radio presenter, Xolani Gwala, Professor Steven Friedman, Ronnie Kasrils and Dr Mahmoud Abada, senior advisor, Fatah Foreign Relations.
With hindsight, I am not sure if we five were brave, stupid or just gluttons for punishment for deciding to attend this event.
We had come because as members of civil society, and as proud Zionists seeking peace which can be attained in a 2-state solution embracing Israel and Palestine, we wished to show solidarity with the Palestinians who wanted the very same things. We didn’t want to keep returning year after year to such events, because the Palestinians deserve better. They deserve a government that looks after them and schools which practise and preach peace and tolerance; they desperately need the funds stolen by their leaders for nefarious reasons - both present and past. But as the panelists rose one by one to address the audience, we became more and more saddened.
“This is not helping the Palestinians” we whispered to one another, “This is another event designed to hijack the plight of the Palestinians and use the platform to spread hatred and to poison minds with anti Israel rhetoric” I was transfixed by the sight of two Jews on the panel of Palestinian sympathizers. Unless I was mistaken, we late comers were five out of a total of 7 "tribe" members, the other two being Messrs. Friedman and Kasrils.
Kasrils – when he got up to speak, beaming and shrugging his splendid kefiyah over his shoulders like some obscene version of a tallis – was no surprise. Like the proverbial record, he went on and on, reciting his familiar mantra of hatred and antagonism towards Israel, Zioinsts and anyone foolish enough to think that Israel had the slightest modicum of ethics and integrity.
When Professor Steven Friedman got up to speak, we could taste the bitter irony. Here were 2 men – cogs in the wheel of the New South Africa – the struggle – the incredible death of apartheid and the welcome miracle of a democratic country, yet both were able to do nothing other than drown their receptive audience with vitriolic racism - the cheap double standard they both employ when engaging in racial profiling which they legitimise by their "intellect".
At the end of the speeches, members of the audience were invited to comment and question. A polite and well spoken Josh Shewitz rose to his feet and addressed Professor Steven Friedman:
‘Jews will never give up Jerusalem, just as Moslems would never think of giving up Mecca”,
To our collective disgust - but not surprise - Prof. Friedman turned on Shewitz, calling him an "evil Zionist!" We were outraged!
Was calling someone an ‘evil Zionist’ not akin to calling someone else ‘nasty Moslem’ or similar? From one of the stature of Professor Friedman this kind of bully boy behaviour would surely create dismay and disgust among others in the Auditorium. But how wrong we were!
Nobody had batted an eyelid when earlier he had opined, "Israel is an ethnically national State that creates a human rights violation with its identity." Instead, he was applauded and lauded for effectively delegitimising a state which had been created by the United Nations some 60 years earlier - as is the policy of those who cry for Israel's destruction.
For Steven Friedman, Ronnie Kasrils, members of the Media Review Network, Ambassadors of many Arab states, and sadly, many ordinary men in the street, who lack any knowledge of history, those ‘evil Zionists’ do not deserve a State of their own. Somewhere Martin Luther King is looking down with great sadness and frustration. Imagine how the mood of the room would have changed if the "Zionist entity" present would have declared Islamic republics or emirates ethnically national human rights concerns. Ah, ye olde double standard…when would we ever learn?
The traffic on our return drive to Johannesburg was bearable. We had hoped the panel would have come up with some solutions to the horrible plight that has befallen the people of Gaza. We’d hoped that we could have become partners for peace.
Are we masochists or just passionate Zionists? Definitely the latter
Interesting question I heard the other day. If the question of Palestine was an issue of borders, why are there dead Jews in Mumbai?
Perhaps Ronnie and his friends are correct; a one state solution is preferable.
A state based on national interests, places value in human life, fosters open minded education and is willing to view the outside world on equal terms. This state just like every other country in the world would decide its own ethnic identity and hold national election with free participation to all its citizens regardless of their religion, heritage or gender. All those who are unwilling to live in such country could voluntarily seek citizenship of other countries and/or leave and receive compensation.
Posted by: Shaun | December 12, 2008 at 10:01
Interesting question I heard the other day. If the question of Palestine was an issue of borders, why are there dead Jews in Mumbai?
Perhaps Ronnie and his friends are correct; a one state solution is preferable.
A state based on national interests, places value in human life, fosters open minded education and is willing to view the outside world on equal terms. This state just like every other country in the world would decide its own ethnic identity and hold national election with free participation to all its citizens regardless of their religion, heritage or gender. All those who are unwilling to live in such country could voluntarily seek citizenship of other countries and/or leave and receive compensation.
Posted by: Shaun | December 12, 2008 at 10:06
Congratulations to those who attended the event. Very brave to attend, and to challenge. I would be interested to see a transcript of Friedman's remarks.
Posted by: Joel Pollak | December 12, 2008 at 17:55
Friedman is genuiely a very strange guy. If you read what he has written in the last ten years about the SA Jewish community you can see that quite clearly cares very much about it. Sure he doesnt like the orthodoxy, but then he is reform, that shouldnt come as a surprise.
He is not like Ronno whose only happiness at being born a Jew is that he can bash those of the same ethnicity.
Yet he persists in taking a line that not only puts almost half the worlds Jews in direct danger in Israel but also actively supports groups in South Africa who support Palestinian violence. By extention he seems also to put his very own community at risk, very peculiar indeed.
Posted by: Bigben | December 14, 2008 at 00:57
You can't care about the South aFrican Jewish community and not the Israeli Jews, otherwise you are a hypocrite.
The Jews are one people.
Left wing anti-Zionist Jews claim that it is certainly not un-Jewish to
criticize the state of Israel. Oh but it is very un-Jewish and inhumane
too , for Jews in New York , Paris, Johannesburg , Toronto, Sydney or
London to show such lack of compassion for their fellow Jews in Israel,
and even hostility , cruelly supporting those who are brutally murdering
Jewish men , women and children in Israel.
What makes these leftist diaspora Jews think that their lives are so much
more important than that of Jews in Israel.
I think it is high time that we dealt with, and stopped tolerating, Jews
who turn on their own people, i.e. Left-wing anti-Zionist, anti-Israel
Jews. What these leftist anti-Zionists are practising is a form of racism
against Israeli Jews. The fact that they are born Jewish does not excuse
this violent and revolting racism.
These people cannot grasp that Israeli Jews are also entitled to human
rights.
These self-hating Jews do incalculable damage to the struggle of Israel to
survive, and they encourage Arab terror. They are completely heartless,
lacking any compassion for Jewish women and children murdered by the
Palestinian terrorists in Israel.
It is time we exposed and isolated these despicable Judenrat Kapos. They
should be completely isolated from the Jewish communities in every country
in which they are found.
How can human beings , let alone Jews, show solidarity with the
perpetrators of the murder carried out by the PLO and Hamas and their
positions?
How can they have anything positive to say of those monsters who can
calmly assemble a device designed to mutilate the bodies of children , and
destroy countless human lives?
I cannot and will not keep company with those who make common cause with
modern-day Arab Nazis who shoot a pregnant Jewish woman at point blank
range before executing her four terrified small daughters.
I shall always shun those who show any acceptance of the perpetrators of
such atrocities and will continue to condemn those whose twisted ideas
suggest any equivocation of Israel's self-defence with brutal Arab terror.
The idea that anti-Zionism does not count as anti-Semitism. needs to be
rejected with the contempt which it deserves.
Anti-Zionism is racism , as it involves hatred of an entire people i.e the
Jews of Israel. I believe anti-Zionism ,is in fact , far more contemptible
that traditional anti-Semitism.
The new anti-Semitism is cloaked in the language of political correctness
and academic language, but the end goal is the same, genocide of Jews. On
university campuses, in the media, in the halls of the United Nations, and
in Third World governments (like the government of SA) , prejudice runs
strong. The leaders of today's Nuremberg rallies are supposedly
'enlightened' and 'progressive' Left-wing academics, as Israel is
pilloried, without the slightest compassion for the men, women and
children of that tiny country. On the contrary, it is condemned by a
coterie of malignant narcissists for destruction.
Of course the Israel-haters deny hotly that they are antisemites: The
first thing students learn today in the 'humanities' departments on
university campuses across the world is that anti-Zionism and antisemitism
are different. Many Jewish ultra-Leftists lead the "burn Israel" movement.
In fact it could be argued that the new antisemitism was founded by
malignant high priest of Marxist academia Noam Chomsky, together with his
partner in hate, Arab propagandist Edward Said. Indeed, the Jewish
Israel-haters are often the most callous and vicious, hoping that
expunging five million Israeli men, women and children from the face of
the earth will make themselves more universal and progressive in the world
today. It is only the 'backward Israelis' who get in the way of the place
of Diaspora Jewish Marxists as leaders of the 'progressive vanguard' once
more. So innocents must die in the millions!
After all, is it not antisemitism to deny Jews the right to live in
Israel? Is a Jewish child in Israel, gunned down in her bed by Palestinian
goons in 2002, any different than a Jewish child in Poland, gunned down in
her bed by Nazi goons in 1942?
Martin Luther King, Jr. pointed out the truth when he said 37 years ago:
"Antisemitism, the hatred of the Jewish people, has been and remains a
blot on the soul of mankind. In this we are in full agreement. So know
also this: anti-Zionist is inherently antisemitic, and ever will be so."
There is no logic in the intensity of the hate of the new antisemites, as
Israel is condemned for every action taken to defend herself, by the same
ones who are so silent in the face of massacres of Israeli women and
children by Palestinian killers. The latter are seen as the victims and
the former as the aggressors in this macabre Orwellian theater.
Indeed, as we saw with the rise of Hitler, when the world loses its moral
compass, there is no limit to what they will stoop to, and no amount of
politically correct jargon and Marxist obfuscation can hide this from us
all.
Anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism at it's worst. Period.
To hate an entire nation, as anti-Zionists openly admits to doing here is
called RACISM! That is what it is. And to claim that your best friends are
Jewish and that they also hate Israel, or that you hate Israel and not
Jews as such does, or that even YOU yourself are Jewish but hate Israel,
not change the fact that if you hate Israel and Israelis you are a RACIST.
Anybody who is prejudiced against Israel and Israelis is as much a bigot
as someone who is prejudiced against Jews per se'. And do not say that you
hate the State of Israel and not it's people, because the state is the sum
total of it's people.
As Judea Pearl says: "As a form of racism, anti-Zionism is worse than
anti-Semitism. It targets the most vulnerable part of the Jewish people,
namely, the people of Israel, who rely on the sovereignty of their state
for physical safety, national identity and personal dignity. To put it
more bluntly, anti-Zionism condemns 5 million human beings, mostly
refugees or children of refugees, to eternal statelessness, traumatized by
historical images of persecution and genocide".
Anti-Zionists claim that they are not anti-Semites but that the only state
they want to dismember is the Jewish state. Anti-Zionists claim they are
not anti-Semites but the only people who are not entitled to human rights
are the Jews of the Levant. Anti-Zionists claim that they are not
anti-Semites but that the only children who it is justified to bomb,
shoot, murder and maim are Jewish children. So much for the 'We are
anti-Zionist but NOT anti-Semitic' crowd of hypocrites who only enjoy the
killing of 'Zionist' children. Not only do the rabid anti-Zionists who
boycott and demonize Israel display gross and racist anti-Semitism , but
they are also responsible to a large extent for terror against Israeli
women and children.
It is entirely in keeping with the character of Islamists or rabidly
leftist anti-Zionists that they should carry a rabid hatred of Israel to
the point of defending the killers of Israeli children. Author Jacques
Givet , in his remarkable book The Anti-Zionist Complex refers to the
massacres of Israeli children at Ma'alot and Kiryat Shmona in 1974 by the
Marxist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. The author points
out how prejudiced and unfair condemnation of Israel in the United Nations
has led to deeds: 'For moral denigration encourages physical elimination;
a few days after the adoption of the resolution of November 1975,
challenging the very existence of Israel, a bomb killed six young people
(all of them refugees from Arab countries) in Jerusalem. The PLO forthwith
claimed the credit for this feat, justifying it by reference to the United
Nations resolution..."
In more recent years, Irish poet Tom Paulin explicitly called for the
killing of Jewish civilians in Israel. A few days later , a five year old
Jewish girl, Danielle Shefi, was shot dead in the Jewish village of Adura,
by Arab terrorists , as she cowered under her bed. They also shot her baby
brother. Journalists on the far left website indymedia openly gloated over
and celebrated this murder. In 2002 leftist anti-Zionist journalist,
Richard Calland , wrote in South Africa's far left Mail&Guardian that he
"quietly celebrates Israeli casualties". Charlotte Kates , a law lecturer
at Rutger University in New Jersey and an 'activist' of the pro-terror
'International Solidarity Movement' has endorsed the killing of Israeli
children by Arab terrorists, calling Israeli children 'fair game'.
The same way, that the dehumanization of Jews by Hitler Goebbels and Der
Sterner laid the way for the holocaust, I believe that the purpose of
anti-Zionist propaganda is to pave the way for the genocide of Israel's
Jews. This book is racist hate speech just like Meim Kampf, Protocols of
the Elders of Zion or Birth of a Nation, and should be known for what it
is. Israelphobia is a disease of hate, of racism. as much as any other
form of prejudice and hate.
one of the most unfortunate developments in the exile was the loathsome
moser (informer), the negative counterpart of the shtadlan (intercessor)
who intercedes with the authorities who speak for the Jews to those in
power. As Ruth Wisse in her book Jews and power writes "
For every Mordecai and Ester who risked their lives to protect fellow
Jews, there were always schemers who turned betrayal to profit...The
Jewish community was always hostage to it's unhappiest members who stood
to gain by serving the powers that be." "
Posted by: Gary | December 14, 2008 at 08:04
You can't care about the South aFrican Jewish community and not the Israeli Jews, otherwise you are a hypocrite.
The Jews are one people.
Left wing anti-Zionist Jews claim that it is certainly not un-Jewish to
criticize the state of Israel. Oh but it is very un-Jewish and inhumane
too , for Jews in New York , Paris, Johannesburg , Toronto, Sydney or
London to show such lack of compassion for their fellow Jews in Israel,
and even hostility , cruelly supporting those who are brutally murdering
Jewish men , women and children in Israel.
What makes these leftist diaspora Jews think that their lives are so much
more important than that of Jews in Israel.
I think it is high time that we dealt with, and stopped tolerating, Jews
who turn on their own people, i.e. Left-wing anti-Zionist, anti-Israel
Jews. What these leftist anti-Zionists are practising is a form of racism
against Israeli Jews. The fact that they are born Jewish does not excuse
this violent and revolting racism.
These people cannot grasp that Israeli Jews are also entitled to human
rights.
These self-hating Jews do incalculable damage to the struggle of Israel to
survive, and they encourage Arab terror. They are completely heartless,
lacking any compassion for Jewish women and children murdered by the
Palestinian terrorists in Israel.
It is time we exposed and isolated these despicable Judenrat Kapos. They
should be completely isolated from the Jewish communities in every country
in which they are found.
How can human beings , let alone Jews, show solidarity with the
perpetrators of the murder carried out by the PLO and Hamas and their
positions?
How can they have anything positive to say of those monsters who can
calmly assemble a device designed to mutilate the bodies of children , and
destroy countless human lives?
I cannot and will not keep company with those who make common cause with
modern-day Arab Nazis who shoot a pregnant Jewish woman at point blank
range before executing her four terrified small daughters.
I shall always shun those who show any acceptance of the perpetrators of
such atrocities and will continue to condemn those whose twisted ideas
suggest any equivocation of Israel's self-defence with brutal Arab terror.
For every Mordecai and Ester who risked their lives to protect fellow
Jews, there were always schemers who turned betrayal to profit...The
Jewish community was always hostage to it's unhappiest members who stood
to gain by serving the powers that be." "
Posted by: Gary | December 14, 2008 at 08:10
Only Gary and Brett have been calling a spade a spade on this forum - pointing out the bloody obvious which being obvious, hardly anybody notices - anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism. It is anti-Semitism by definition.
Jews who are anti-Zionist are therefore anti-Semitic. Jews who share the same political position/stance re Israel as anti-Zionists or are sympathetic and/or justify/rationalise the political stance of self-admitted anti-Zionists re Israel, are likewise anti-Semitic.
Neo-Nazis are anti-Zionist, Hamas, Al-Quaeda, Islamic Jihad, the Iranian regime of Ahmandinjehad and all Muslim extremists around the world without exception are anti-Zionist - the implications are stunningly obvious.
"To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle." - George Orwell
Brett remarked on a thread some months ago that it was a waste of time to debate these so-called "Jews", they would just lie and keep on lying, and not let facts get in the way, and so it is..
"What can you do against the lunatic who is more intelligent than yourself, who gives your arguments a fair hearing and then simply persists in his lunacy?"
George Orwell
". . . You declare, my friend, that you do not hate the Jews, you are merely 'anti-Zionist.' And I say, let the truth ring forth from the high mountain tops, let it echo through the valleys of God's green earth: When people criticize Zionism, they mean Jews--this is God's own truth."
Martin Luther king Jr
Posted by: Lawrence | December 14, 2008 at 11:22
Lawrence, unfortunately there are ppl who while ostensibly pro-Israel, give the anti-Zionists and Israel-burners legitimacy by agreeing with them that 'Anti-zionism is not the same as anti-Semitism'.
That "there is a difference.
Maybe it is more intellectualy sophiticated to pretend there is a difference.
Until we accept the fact that ANTI-ZIONISM IS ANTI-SEMITISM
Posted by: Gary | December 14, 2008 at 13:44
Lawrence, unfortunately there are ppl who while ostensibly pro-Israel, give the anti-Zionists and Israel-burners legitimacy by agreeing with them that 'Anti-zionism is not the same as anti-Semitism'.
That "there is a difference.
Maybe it is more intellectualy sophiticated to pretend there is a difference.
Until we accept the fact that ANTI-ZIONISM IS ANTI-SEMITISM
Posted by: Gary | December 14, 2008 at 13:49
yes Gary I know.
It is important to understand the psychology of the "I am an anti-Zionist, not an anti-Semite" self-deceivers though.
I have not read Jacques Givert's 'The anti-Zionist Complex', but I assume he goes into a lot of detail on it.
I just quickly want to sum up something about the psychology here: liberals cannot admit to themselves that they are anti-Semitic, since anti-Semitism is racism - anathema to a "liberal", conjures up the Nazis who liberals pretend to be opposed to and to stand against. Non-racism is a bastion of liberalism, at least it is supposed to be; so liberals have to pretend they are non-racist, to themselves as much as others. The thing is they are anti-Semitic (for reasons I have mentioned at least three or four times on this blog and I'm not going to repeat myself in this regard), but they have to pretend they are not, to themselves as much as others, to themselves more so even. How to do this?
By hiding their anti-Semitism from themselves by employing the cover term, anti-Zionism. The thing is whenever you try hide something, you always reveal what you are trying to hide in the very act of hiding itself. This is the paradox of the mask - it reveals its nature in its very disguise - in this case the mask of anti-Zionism. After all anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism by definition, and it is an anti-Zionism they share with the Nazis and neo-Nazis for crying out loud, with Muslim fanatics. Their very mask, their disguise therefore only reveals them for who they truly are - anti-Semites. In the same act of disguise, one is exposed - it is a paradox.
The fact that it doesn't occur to many Jews that anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism reveals a failure to educate our children properly; and this is in the so-called Jewish schools as well, I don't know what they are teaching them, but nothing much that matters, certainly not critical thinking skills. Also it reveals a lack of seriousness on the part of Jewry that they are not even aware of this (anti-Zionism = anti-Semitism) to a high degree.
Posted by: Lawrence | December 15, 2008 at 09:57
yes Gary I know.
It is important to understand the psychology of the "I am an anti-Zionist, not an anti-Semite" self-deceivers though.
I have not read Jacques Givert's 'The anti-Zionist Complex', but I assume he goes into a lot of detail on it.
I just quickly want to sum up something about the psychology here: liberals cannot admit to themselves that they are anti-Semitic, since anti-Semitism is racism - anathema to a "liberal", conjures up the Nazis who liberals pretend to be opposed to and to stand against. Non-racism is a bastion of liberalism, at least it is supposed to be; so liberals have to pretend they are non-racist, to themselves as much as others. The thing is they are anti-Semitic (for reasons I have mentioned at least three or four times on this blog and I'm not going to repeat myself in this regard), but they have to pretend they are not, to themselves as much as others, to themselves more so even. How to do this?
By hiding their anti-Semitism from themselves by employing the cover term, anti-Zionism. The thing is whenever you try hide something, you always reveal what you are trying to hide in the very act of hiding itself. This is the paradox of the mask - it reveals its nature in its very disguise - in this case the mask of anti-Zionism. After all anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism by definition, and it is an anti-Zionism they share with the Nazis and neo-Nazis for crying out loud, with Muslim fanatics. Their very mask, their disguise therefore only reveals them for who they truly are - anti-Semites. In the same act of disguise, one is exposed - it is a paradox.
The fact that it doesn't occur to many Jews that anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism reveals a failure to educate our children properly; and this is in the so-called Jewish schools as well, I don't know what they are teaching them, but nothing much that matters, certainly not critical thinking skills. Also it reveals a lack of seriousness on the part of Jewry that they are not even aware of this (anti-Zionism = anti-Semitism) to a high degree.
Posted by: Lawrence | December 15, 2008 at 09:58
People just dont get it.
If hou hate the entire Jewish community of America , South Africa, Europe, Russia etc you are anti-Semite but if you hate the Jews of Israel you are 'mereley an anti-Zionist'.
When Zackie Achmat says 95% of Israelis are racists there is no reaction but if a rightwinger say in Russia said that 95% of Jews in Russia are thieves/Communists/misers, whatever there would be a massive outcry from the Jewish establishment.
Israel's detractors falsely accuse Israel of committing enormities, packed into inaccurate and emotionally-charged catch phrases like "apartheid," and "genocide," in order to:
: Incite violence against Israel.
: Justify violence against Israelis in Western eyes.
: De-legitimize Israeli self-defence.
: Pressure Israel into not defending itself.
: Justify as moral the immoral and genocidal act of obliterating Israel.
Until we start treatin ALL Islamic and leftist anti-zionists and vicious Israel-detractors including, Jewish ones, the same way as neo-Nazis wew will be guilty of the same thing.
Posted by: Gary | December 15, 2008 at 12:40
The Order to Destroy Has Been Given
'I think, this is not real. I must have walked in on a film set.' (Mats Svensson)
By Mats Svensson – Jerusalem
It is Wednesday afternoon on the 5th November. I woke up this morning and was happy. The man who repeatedly exclaimed “Change” and “Yes we can” had done the impossible, had proven that change is possible. Now seven hours have passed and I have gone to Silwan, south of Jerusalem's Old City. A house is to be demolished and the morning and the happiness feel distant, as if it had been a different time.
The questions aggregated this morning when I within myself still heard Obama's voice and simultaneously at a distance saw the violence spreading out before me.
Before I reach the house that is to be demolished, I stop for a while and look up at all the windows, at all the balconies, at all the flat roofs. People everywhere. Old, young, women, men. Everyone gazing in the same direction. I am struck by the silence. It is as if someone had said, “Silence, action.”
Many spectators but very few who are moving. Women stand in the shade, away from the sun. An old man behind the soldiers tries to shout something but his cry gets caught behind the bars of despair. I see the desperation in his eyes. I see how his back is bent. I see how the soldier, the soldier who looks like a teenager, shoves him away. He cannot get through. A young soldier carries water bottles, water for all the soldiers.
I turn to the shade and face the women. Contrary to the soldiers with green clothes and heavy weapons I see dignity, no expressions of hopelessness but not hope either. As if one right now is in an inferior position but still have not lost. As if one has lost everything but still has everything left.
I have still not reached the house but am stopped by soldiers on horsebacks. Soldiers that shout at me. I am saved by a photographer from Reuters who begins to speak with me, as if he recognized me. Together we go on, past clusters of soldiers. Past men with combat equipment, men who do not look proud, men who dodge my eyes, men who do not wish to be photographed. There are only some older military men who express a feeling of victory but without showing any joy.
When I reach the site, the film cameras have begun to register, second upon second. The stage is bathing in a clear light as the sun is setting high above us, over the rooftops. For the photographers, this is the best lighting. It is light that creates contrasts, that creates depth against the white limestone walls.
I think, this is not real. I must have walked in on a film set. As if the director had moved from Fårö to Jerusalem. As if Ingemar Bergman was adapting Selma Lagerlöf’s book Jerusalemfor the screen. In front of me I see how Sven Nykvist shapes his right hand, shapes a three-sided figure to block out the unessential, concentrates and locks the gaze while the director behind him quietly watches. How I wish that it was the case, that in front of me I was watching a performance, acting. That it would have been about a tragedy between father and son. Or that it would have been about Swedish farmers who had left Nås for the holy city. But these feelings subsist for only a short moment.
I am immediately thrown back to reality when the young soldier points with his whole hand while he raises his automatic weapon ten degrees, aiming at the man in the door who is carrying the red carpet, the one that had just covered the floor. A small table had stood on the carpet. Around the table, had been the couch, some armchairs and chairs. This is where they had celebrated Eid and friends had come to visit last Friday. Children had played on the floor and they had drunk strong Arabic coffee.
I have reached the center of the drama. Recently, this morning, I had been sitting at home with tears of joy. As if the elections in the USA were important for me, as if they touched me personally. A young man stood in front of the world and exclaimed the words, “Yes we can.” He had personified that everything is possible, Yes we can, that everything can be changed, Yes we can.
But now, a few hours later, the silence is almost palpable. The neighbor has become an enemy. Hundreds of soldiers, many of them young, a moment ago they were children, now they carry heavy weapons and combat equipment. The order to destroy has been given. The young soldiers who this morning listened to the election results now know that Yes we can, means something different to what they had thought this morning. Now it means to destroy, dominate, take over, demolish, create despair, humiliate, be in control, be in the center.
In the periphery stands a lonely American diplomat. He registers and takes notes. I am glad and impressed by his presence. When a house is demolished, he is there; when a family is thrown out on the street, he is present. And I begin to believe that something is happening. Someone far away will tonight read what has been written, pass it through the system, rework it, make lists and compilations. Destroyed house after house is put into columns, today there were four houses, so far this year there have been 86 houses destroyed. Someone is listing the number of women, the number of men, the number of children, elderly, sick, the ones who have lost, and by the end of January 2009 the compilation for 2008 will be complete.
I want to believe that this document will be there when President Bush leaves the Oval Office, when President Obama for the first time gets a moment of privacy. I want to believe that Obama has a moment of calm to read the report from East Jerusalem and that he then within himself again will think and perhaps say to himself, Yes we can, Yes we can change. Those words that have been exclaimed thousands of times and in which we all today want to believe.
Then the silence is broken. The house is emptied. Everything has been brought out and placed in a large pile. Toys, toothpaste, the sofa bed, the yellow teddy bear, plastic flowers, tables, carpets, refrigerators with photos of happy children. The men are forced away, the soldiers’ attentiveness is sharpened. Everyone’s gaze is sharpened. Everyone is looking at the yellow machine, the machine with the large axe, which reminds us of a dentist’s drill. But here there is no one drilling. Here it is not about being careful, here something is to be axed, struck, broken.
Everyone watches when the man in the machine from hell approaches the house, lifts the large thorn and begins to axe through the roof. The ground trembles. The man who earlier tried to cry raises his hands towards the soldiers who prevented him from approaching the house and then he aims his hands towards the sky, to the Almighty.
Hell is suddenly in front of me, clearly manifested. I stand beside the family that has lost everything. In front of us we see the machine that breaks into pieces, killing all hope. The young soldier who in a democratic society should protect the weak was not allowed to do so. I see spectators from near and far. Fellow beings, journalists, diplomats and activists. Children who are scared of what they see and who wonder whose house will be demolished tomorrow. I look around and see all the young, all the boys. Boys standing on the roofs, on the balconies, who stand in groups and who begin to talk, begin to point towards the house which is soon a pile of rubble and towards the soldiers. I see young boys who clench their fists in their pockets and who maybe think “Yes we can.”
The young boys stood beside me. They saw a family removing all of their belongings. They saw the family watching their house become crushed. I can guess what images they will carry within themselves for the rest of their lives.
I saw that too. Together we saw it on BBC and CNN. It is happening in the middle of Jerusalem, a few hundred meters from Via Dolorosa. In the middle of the hopelessness I begin to tell myself that this must be stopped, that together we can stop the madness. We have to stop saying that it is meaningless, stop all forms of the cynicism that has become part of reality amongst foreigners among diplomats in Jerusalem. There must at the end be some kind of damn law and order in this place.
Those of you who decide over your country’s foreign policy in relation to Palestine are really quite few. Few but powerful when you hold many thousands of families’ homes in your hands. Power must be managed well when your decisions affect the young peoples’ views on democracy and arouse and extinguish dreams.
My mobile phone vibrates. The UN through OCHA writes that three more houses are being demolished today, more persons are about to become homeless.
- Mats Svensson, a former Swedish diplomat working on the staff of SIDA, the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, is presently following the ongoing occupation of Palestine.
Posted by: Erin | December 21, 2008 at 14:09