Israel-Palestine: This is how it ends

204,062 have signed. Let's get to 500,000

As a new round of violence kicks off in Israel-Palestine and more children are killed, it's not enough just to call for another ceasefire. It’s time to take definitive non-violent action to end this decades long nightmare.

Our governments have failed -- while they have talked peace and passed UN resolutions, they and our companies have continued to aid, trade and invest in the violence. The only way to stop this hellish cycle of Israel confiscating Palestinian lands, daily collective punishment of innocent Palestinian families, Hamas firing rockets, and Israel bombing Gaza is to make the economic cost of this conflict too high to bear.

We know it works -- when EU countries issued guidelines not to fund the illegal Israeli settlements it caused an earthquake in the cabinet, and when citizens successfully persuaded a Dutch pension fund, PGGM, to withdraw, it created a political storm.

This may not feel like a direct way to stop the current killing, but history tells us that raising the financial cost of oppression can pave a path to peace. Sign the petition on the right and call on 6 key banks, pension funds and businesses to pull out -- If we all take smart action now and turn up the heat, they could withdraw, the Israeli economy will take a hit, and we can turn the calculation of the extremists politically profiting from this hell upside down.



In the last five weeks three Israeli teenagers were murdered in the West Bank, a Palestinian boy was burnt alive, an American kid was brutally beaten up by Israeli police, and now over 40 Gazan kids have died in Israeli air strikes. This is not the "Middle East conflict", it's becoming a war on children. And we are becoming numb to this global shame.

The media makes out like this is an intractable conflict between two equal warring parties, but it is not. Palestinian extremists' attacks on innocent civilians must be condemned and ended but the root of the conflict lies elsewhere -- in the dispossession of the Palestinian people. Israel currently occupies, colonises, bombs, raids, and controls the water, trade and the borders of a legally free nation that has been recognised by the United Nations. In Gaza, Israel has created the largest open-air prison in the world, and then blockaded it. Now as bombs fall, the families, literally have no way to get out.

These are war crimes and we wouldn't accept that anywhere else, why accept it in Palestine? Half a century ago Israel and its Arab neighbours went to war and Israel occupied the West Bank and Gaza. Occupying territory after war happens all the time. But no military occupation should turn into a decades long tyranny which only fuels and benefits extremists who use terror to target the innocent. And who suffers? The majority of loving families on both sides that just want freedom and peace.

To many, particularly in Europe and North America, calling for companies to withdraw investments from financing or taking part in Israel's occupation of Palestine sounds completely biased. But it’s not -- this is the most potent non-violent strategy to end the ritual violence, ensure Israelis' security and achieve Palestinian freedom. Israel’s power and wealth dwarfs Palestine, and if it refuses to end its illegal occupation, the world must act to make the cost unbearable.

Dutch pension fund, ABP, invests in Israeli banks that help fund the colonisation of Palestine. Massive banks like Barclays invest in suppliers of Israeli arms and other occupation businesses. British G4S provides extensive security equipment used by the Israeli Defence Force in the occupation. France's Veolia operates transport for Israeli settlers illegally living on Palestinian lands. Computer giant Hewlett-Packard supplies sophisticated surveillance to control the movement of Palestinians. And Caterpillar provides bulldozers that are used to demolish Palestinian homes and farms.

If we can create the biggest global call ever to get these companies to pull out, we will show clearly that the world will no longer be complicit in this bloodshed. The Palestinian people are calling on the world to support this path and progressive Israelis support it too. Let’s join them.

Our community has worked to bring peace, hope, and change to some of the world’s toughest conflicts, and often that means taking difficult positions to address the root cause. For years our community has looked for a political solution to this nightmare, but with this new round of horror unfolding in Gaza, the time has come to turn to sanctions and disinvestment to finally help end the horror for Israelis and Palestinians.

https://secure.avaaz.org/en/israel_palestine_this_is_how_it_ends_loc/?slideshow

As my sister and my mother ran from rockets to bomb shelters in Israel this past week, I was surprised that none of my friends here in the UK asked me how they were. Or how I was. Did they simply not care? My friend explained that many people just didn't understand what was going on or why, and she suggested I write a blog post to try to explain a little about the Israel-Palestine conflict. She said that people were confused, outraged and misinformed, and that as half Israeli-half British Londoner, I might have a unique perspective. And so I began.


At first I spoke of both sides' claims over the land of Palestine. Of how Palestine was actually historically a geographical area (formerly called Judea), which has never been a country with its own with a currency, language, or government. How for thousands of years Jews, Arabs and Christians have all lived (and died) here, always under the rule of other empires/peoples including the Maccabees, the Assyrians, the Byzantines, the Romans (who renamed it 'Palestine'), the Ottomans and the British.


I pointed out that three quarters of the land of Palestine was given to the Arab population and called Jordan in 1917. That the proposal for the remaining quarter to be divided into two states (one Jewish, one Arab) by the British, and then the UN was rejected time after time. I spoke of bloody wars waged, of who was to blame, which lands were won and lost, who created refugees, of who broke peace talk after peace talk.


I went on. Noting how Hamas is an internationally recognised terrorist organisation which has sent over 13,000 thousand rockets onto Israel (a far stronger military country) since 2001, with little thought of how Israel's response might damage its own people. How the Palestinian people are not Hamas, and in fact it is they who are their greatest victims. How Hamas embed their missile launchers/training grounds and weapons stores amongst the very citizens it is supposed to protect, turning them into human shields, encouraging them to stay home even in the face of Israeli warning to evacuate targeted buildings. That the only reason there aren't far more Israeli fatalities is not for lack of intent from Hamas, but for Israel's investment in defences and bomb shelters (which Hamas does not chose to provide for its own people, despite its own vast private wealth).


I posted videos of the Palestinian ambassador to the UN Human Rights Council admitting that Hamas' rockets taretting Israeli citizens were "crimes of humanity", of Palestinian president Abbas asking Hamas what they hope to gain from rocketing Israel, of Hamas stating they "love death the way Jews love life", of Israeli armies calling off strikes when civilians were spotted, of Egyptian media blasting Hamas, of UN reps stating that Israel goes to further lengths to avoid military casualties and to provide humanitarian aid to the victims then any army ever the world. I even spoke of my own cousin, who alongside many other Israelis drives daily to the border with Palestine to pick up the sick and drive them to Israeli hospitals for treatment. That talk of an Israeli "apartheid" is madness when 20% of the Israeli population is Arab.


I also talked of the Palestinian's oppression, of their poverty, the heavy sanctions Israel imposes on them, and their genuine feeling that they need a resistance, whether violent or otherwise. I spoke of their hopelessness, their feeling of being trapped, forgotten and helpless, whilst being brutalised from every direction, by their own government and by Israelis. And how Palestinians crave a lifting of the Israeli siege, but that Israelis maintain sanctions for fear of increased imports of the very weapons used in the terror attacks against them. And on... and on...


But then... I saw a message from a Gazan student named Eslam on a Facebook page I belong to called "Palestine Loves Israel". Eslam asked us why Israelis want her dead. She said she has never met an Israeli, or seen one, she had only seen photos of them pointing guns, or seen the destruction they wreak upon her life. She asked us if Israelis are even human. If they think. If they feel. It broke my heart.


For whilst we all sit here trying to justify who is right/who is wrong/who has claim to the land/who was here first/who is provoking who, innocent people are dying. For every fact I have given you above to justify Israel's actions there no doubt is a counter fact a Palestinian could give. For every video posted, a counter-video. Meanwhile homes are being destroyed. Lies are being told and spread, and lives and dreams are lost. Eslam is not Hamas. She is just a young woman, hoping to live, in peace. And with every drop of blood spilled, with every building blown to smithereens, people from both sides feel greater injustice, deeper hate from and towards each other and the chasm grows wider.


I wrote back to Eslam, so did many others. We all sent her our love, our wishes for her safety. My sister told her that in Israel people see the same images, but of Palestinian people wishing them dead, that Israelis too are afraid for their lives. That people on both sides MUST both see the truth that we are all just humans and break the cycle of hate, joining instead together in our demands with our leaders for peace. That there are good and bad people, haters and lovers on both sides.


Eslam wrote back to my sister in tears. She saw that yes, Israelis are human too! That they are shown the same images as she is. That no one hates her for simply being a Palestinian. That there are people out there who really care for her and her safety. And most of all that there is a chance for peace. She was overwhelmed by all of our love for her. And I decided that this article would instead be dedicated to her. To her strength, and that of all those on BOTH "sides of the fence" who question what they are told, acknowledge that we are all in fact the same, and reach out to each other with hope for peace for ALL.


Eslam has opened my eyes, she says we have opened her eyes too. 


Israelis and Palestinians both have the right to exist. We must all accept that. The past is gone, the people, the present is now. Israelis (especially those in the Southern communities) have the right to live without fear of constant rocket attacks. The Palestinians have the right to live in security and socio-economic prosperity in their own state without fear of Israeli strikes.


And so I've realised a few things: 


1. We MUST stop arguing the moral high ground and pointing fingers. Everyone has a claim to this land. Everyone feels attacked, and afraid. Trying to decipher who is justified/right/entitled is an impossible and fruitless task.


2. You can be Pro-Israeli, and Pro-Palestinian, but anti-Hamas. As a Israeli-Arab woman told me herself, the Palestinians suffer as much if not more under Hamas than anyone else. Hamas must be dismantled. They are a terror organisation intent on death and destruction (even in their own words) who wreak violence upon Israelis, but also invite it thousand-fold upon their own people and (by their own admission) use them as human shields, encouraging them to stay put in houses despite Israeli warnings and to face death and "matrydom" whilst they live a life of luxury and hide in their own private bomb shelters.


3. Israel are NOT the people to dismantle Hamas. Their violent attempts to do so will serve only to drive more Palestinians to support Hamas, and gain them international sympathy and finance. 


4. The only way to oust Hamas and the other violent militant factions is to win the HEARTS and MINDS of the Palestinian people, and to give them hope for a real future.


5. Israel should instead shower the Palestinian people with love and respect. Fire missiles filled with flowers and notes of Israeli's hopes for peace and love at the Palestinian people. Perhaps, after a few months of this, the Palestinian people might truly believe Israeli's are not monsters out to murder them, that Israelis WANT them to have peace and prosperity, and they will see Hamas for what they are and drive them out themselves.


6. You will think that I'm naïve, and that my last suggestion is ludicrous, but is it really any more ludicrous that the endless cycle of violence and lives lost? 


Neither Israel nor Hamas will ever get what they want long term by shooting at each other. Let's hope they both realise that before too many more people die.


In the meantime let's keep communicating. The more Palestinians and Israelis actually talk to each other (without the middle men of media or governments) the better we will understand that we are all the same. That we all want, and deserve peace. And look! The tide is indeed turning. A recent poll in Palestine showed that the majority want Hamas out, and for their moderate leader Abbas to resume control and talk peace with Israel. Let's keep working to turn each other's hearts and minds. Join up on Facebook with "Israel loves Palestine' or with "Palestine loves Israel" and speak to each other, share stories of good will of hope. Only then can the people beat the powers that be and earn themselves and each other the peace they all deserve. 


[ltr]http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/lliana-bird/why-im-proisraeli-and-pro-palestinian_b_5592220.html?utm_hp_ref=uk[/ltr]

Why don't the Arabs just force their government to pursue peace instead of certain bloodshed and war?

BigAndy9 wrote:Why don't the Arabs just force their government to pursue peace instead of certain bloodshed and war?

That's why I was so interested in having that discussion with SM, that Islam is Justice. We need to get into the thinking.

When SM said it had something to do with "justice" I saw a kernel of insight. Look, we all know that thoughts don't come is neat little packages called "words." Thoughts come in metaphors, and metaphors convey pre-set values. Metaphors come to us in memories of experience. Dewey, John, How We Think; Lakoff, George, Moral Politics. I want to get to those pre-set values.

Somewhere in there, that's the crux of the problem. We in the west don't share the same moral metaphors as the Muslims.

Original Quill wrote:

BigAndy9 wrote:Why don't the Arabs just force their government to pursue peace instead of certain bloodshed and war?

That's why I was so interested in having that discussion with SM, that Islam is Justice.  We need to get into the thinking.

When SM said it had something to do with "justice" I saw a kernel of insight.  Look, we all know that thoughts don't come is neat little packages called "words."  Thoughts come in metaphors, and metaphors convey pre-set values.  Metaphors come to us in memories of experience.  Dewey, John, How We Think; Lakoff, George, Moral Politics.  I want to get to those pre-set values.

Somewhere in there, that's the crux of the problem.  We in the west don't share the same moral metaphors as the Muslims.

Interesting how so Quill...

SEXY MAMA wrote:

204,062 have signed. Let's get to 500,000
 
As a new round of violence kicks off in Israel-Palestine and more children are killed, it's not enough just to call for another ceasefire. It’s time to take definitive non-violent action to end this decades long nightmare.

Our governments have failed -- while they have talked peace and passed UN resolutions, they and our companies have continued to aid, trade and invest in the violence. The only way to stop this hellish cycle of Israel confiscating Palestinian lands, daily collective punishment of innocent Palestinian families, Hamas firing rockets, and Israel bombing Gaza is to make the economic cost of this conflict too high to bear.

We know it works -- when EU countries issued guidelines not to fund the illegal Israeli settlements it caused an earthquake in the cabinet, and when citizens successfully persuaded a Dutch pension fund, PGGM, to withdraw, it created a political storm.

This may not feel like a direct way to stop the current killing, but history tells us that raising the financial cost of oppression can pave a path to peace. Sign the petition on the right and call on 6 key banks, pension funds and businesses to pull out -- If we all take smart action now and turn up the heat, they could withdraw, the Israeli economy will take a hit, and we can turn the calculation of the extremists politically profiting from this hell upside down.



In the last five weeks three Israeli teenagers were murdered in the West Bank, a Palestinian boy was burnt alive, an American kid was brutally beaten up by Israeli police, and now over 40 Gazan kids have died in Israeli air strikes. This is not the "Middle East conflict", it's becoming a war on children. And we are becoming numb to this global shame.

The media makes out like this is an intractable conflict between two equal warring parties, but it is not. Palestinian extremists' attacks on innocent civilians must be condemned and ended but the root of the conflict lies elsewhere -- in the dispossession of the Palestinian people. Israel currently occupies, colonises, bombs, raids, and controls the water, trade and the borders of a legally free nation that has been recognised by the United Nations. In Gaza, Israel has created the largest open-air prison in the world, and then blockaded it. Now as bombs fall, the families, literally have no way to get out.

These are war crimes and we wouldn't accept that anywhere else, why accept it in Palestine? Half a century ago Israel and its Arab neighbours went to war and Israel occupied the West Bank and Gaza. Occupying territory after war happens all the time. But no military occupation should turn into a decades long tyranny which only fuels and benefits extremists who use terror to target the innocent. And who suffers? The majority of loving families on both sides that just want freedom and peace.

To many, particularly in Europe and North America, calling for companies to withdraw investments from financing or taking part in Israel's occupation of Palestine sounds completely biased. But it’s not -- this is the most potent non-violent strategy to end the ritual violence, ensure Israelis' security and achieve Palestinian freedom. Israel’s power and wealth dwarfs Palestine, and if it refuses to end its illegal occupation, the world must act to make the cost unbearable.

Dutch pension fund, ABP, invests in Israeli banks that help fund the colonisation of Palestine. Massive banks like Barclays invest in suppliers of Israeli arms and other occupation businesses. British G4S provides extensive security equipment used by the Israeli Defence Force in the occupation. France's Veolia operates transport for Israeli settlers illegally living on Palestinian lands. Computer giant Hewlett-Packard supplies sophisticated surveillance to control the movement of Palestinians. And Caterpillar provides bulldozers that are used to demolish Palestinian homes and farms.

If we can create the biggest global call ever to get these companies to pull out, we will show clearly that the world will no longer be complicit in this bloodshed. The Palestinian people are calling on the world to support this path and progressive Israelis support it too. Let’s join them.

Our community has worked to bring peace, hope, and change to some of the world’s toughest conflicts, and often that means taking difficult positions to address the root cause. For years our community has looked for a political solution to this nightmare, but with this new round of horror unfolding in Gaza, the time has come to turn to sanctions and disinvestment to finally help end the horror for Israelis and Palestinians.

Have you got a link to the petition?

It should do in my second post Sassy

Thanks SM, missed it.

SEXY MAMA wrote:

Original Quill wrote:

That's why I was so interested in having that discussion with SM, that Islam is Justice.  We need to get into the thinking.

When SM said it had something to do with "justice" I saw a kernel of insight.  Look, we all know that thoughts don't come is neat little packages called "words."  Thoughts come in metaphors, and metaphors convey pre-set values.  Metaphors come to us in memories of experience.  Dewey, John, How We Think; Lakoff, George, Moral Politics.  I want to get to those pre-set values.

Somewhere in there, that's the crux of the problem.  We in the west don't share the same moral metaphors as the Muslims.

Interesting how so Quill...

I can't explain the entire theory here, SM.  Cognitive linguists espouse the theory, and the best for political framing is George Lakoff, Moral Politics.  His theory is that we speak in metaphors, which in turn are based upon experience.  That defines differences in cultures.  He also argues, in Moral Politics, that political parties within a single culture speak in different metaphors, and that is why they largely talk past one another.  He calls speaking with a specific metaphor system, a framing.

The Anglo/English framing generally is the economic/market system.  Thus we speak in moral/accounting terms such as, moral accounting, payback, he got his just reward, you've gotta pay your dues, borrow from what Tom says, a stingy man, you are not very generous with your praise, a thrifty wife, he's rich in generosity and so forth.  All of morality is seen in monetary/exchange terms. That leads to certain moral conclusions: everyone has to pay their debts...or you might be a bit more charitable.

When you mentioned that the theme of Islam is "Justice," I thought immediately of what Lakeoff says, and wanted to discuss it further.  With that theory as a fulcrum we could learn so much.  Experiences and emotional reactions could be explored and understood.  But we got sidetracked in another discussion, unfortunately.

Sounds intresting Quill

Yes its worth looking into and discussing it further.

Can peace and justice both be adhered to together? I think not. One has to give way to the other.

Islam stands for justice but its message is of peace.

Original Quill wrote:

BigAndy9 wrote:Why don't the Arabs just force their government to pursue peace instead of certain bloodshed and war?

That's why I was so interested in having that discussion with SM, that Islam is Justice.  We need to get into the thinking.

When SM said it had something to do with "justice" I saw a kernel of insight.  Look, we all know that thoughts don't come is neat little packages called "words."  Thoughts come in metaphors, and metaphors convey pre-set values.  Metaphors come to us in memories of experience.  Dewey, John, How We Think; Lakoff, George, Moral Politics.  I want to get to those pre-set values.

Somewhere in there, that's the crux of the problem.  We in the west don't share the same moral metaphors as the Muslims.

................Thank fuck for that.

SEXY MAMA wrote:Sounds intresting Quill

Yes its worth looking into and discussing it further.

Can peace and justice both be adhered to together? I think not. One has to give way to the other.

Islam stands for justice but its message is of peace.

I never thought about how the theory is used; only that it vindicates many conclusions about a culture.  I guess one would begin by inventorying sayings that convey morality, really.  English is so steeped in the philosophies of Adam Smith (Wealth of Nations) and John Locke (Second Treatise), that most of our images circle around money and economics.

Don't bite the hand that feeds you, would be an example of something that is non-economic; that would come from a farmer, or one who domesticates an animal.  There must be many in the bible...eye for an eye is one that comes to mind.  In the Quran, there are economic metaphors as well: The way to turn one blessing into thousands is to “lend God a goodly loan” (57:18).  Also in the Quran: Did you not see how God strikes a parable of a good word like a good tree: its foundation is firm and its branch is in the sky. It delivers its food every season with the permission of its Lord! (14:24-25).  Egyptians have a proverb that says, Do the good and throw it in the river! which roughly means reap what you sow.  GALATIANS 6: 7-9.

In seeking out Justice metaphors, we would be looking for things that replicate experiences not only in a court or tribunal, but in other arenas where the result is not only the consequence, but it is a good result. This is a moral theory, after all.  It would be a life's lesson...such is the nature of morality.  I suppose all of this is depends on the system of justice, and the metaphors would be born of that.

Of course, we must first prove the hypothesis that Islam is the system of Justice...or, more precisely, that Islam speaks the system of Justice.  That was your original point, I believe.  When we can say that Islam speaks the language of justice, we can then say Islam is the religion of Justice.  Does that make sense?

What do you say?  Can you think of any other metaphors?  It is not necessary to draw from the Quran.  Only that the metaphor draws from the idea or system of Justice.