This terrible week in this country, with settler Yishai Schlissel stabbing six people at the Jerusalem Gay Pride parade and then the sickening realization that settlers set fire to a building and then watched while they burnt a baby alive, listening to his screams and doing nothing. Instinctively puts me on the defensive. I want to say as Hillary Clinton did when a US soldier went on a rampage murdering Afghan civilians, ”this is not who we are” she said. I want to say the same but I know that I would be speaking in half truths, shying away from reality.
”Buji” Herzog, leader of the opposition told us that the Jewish terrorists would be found as if they were Palestinian terrorists is refreshing in its earnest proposal. However, it could never come to that. Just imagine masked soldiers waking settlers at gunpoint in the middle of the night, taking scores of them because they belong to the same Yeshiva as the terrorists and holding them for 60 days without telling them what they are accused of under perpetual conditions of near-torture. Imagine extra juridical assassinations and firing live ammunition at settlers who demonstrate against them. Imagine the bulldozing of the houses where the terrorists live. No. There can be no such justice with the settlers in this strange land they have created.
It was this very week that these same politicians on the right who now condemn the terrorism and offer condolences were screaming blue murder at the fact that two of the thousands of illegal structures built in the settlements would be torn down at the order of the supreme court. They were screaming that the settlers must be allowed to continue to break the law in order to perpetuate their supremacist, messianic colonies on the West Bank. Lets get this straight. Our government was by this saying that they support, by any means necessary, a system whereby a small group of people get massive funding in order for them to get nice lawns, swimming pools, state of the art security and brand new motorways that only they may use in the middle of a land where millions of other people live an existence as non-people who may not have their own country and are subject to the arbitrary laws of a foreign military. Am I missing something here? What is it about these people and their precious buildings that we need to support? For what?
When people from this movement go and murder babies from the wrong race and stab people with a different sexual orientation. Is anybody truly surprised? I doubt it. Shocked, sure. Outraged, I should hope so! Surprised, no. I hope and pray that this is not who ”we” are, but it certainly is who ”they” are, right down to the rotten core. The settlers movement is not the only source of hatred in this country, just last week I had to unfriend a person on Facebook that I thought was decent for her support for the mass murdering fascist Anders Bering Bereivik and she lives right here in Tel Aviv. It is not the fact that we have haters, every country has them, it is the fact that our government props up and supports the haters that is so distasteful. The sheer bizarreness of a situation where we have to pay taxes for all the perks and privileges to people who ”must” live in lala land ”Green Zones” surrounded by misery and poverty of the ”red zones” simply because of race is astounding. Any way you look at it any decent future for this place is devoid of the influence of this movement. It is time for all those who support them to instead start thinking like human beings. Especially the leadership of this country.
”Buji” Herzog, leader of the opposition told us that the Jewish terrorists would be found as if they were Palestinian terrorists is refreshing in its earnest proposal. However, it could never come to that. Just imagine masked soldiers waking settlers at gunpoint in the middle of the night, taking scores of them because they belong to the same Yeshiva as the terrorists and holding them for 60 days without telling them what they are accused of under perpetual conditions of near-torture. Imagine extra juridical assassinations and firing live ammunition at settlers who demonstrate against them. Imagine the bulldozing of the houses where the terrorists live. No. There can be no such justice with the settlers in this strange land they have created.
It was this very week that these same politicians on the right who now condemn the terrorism and offer condolences were screaming blue murder at the fact that two of the thousands of illegal structures built in the settlements would be torn down at the order of the supreme court. They were screaming that the settlers must be allowed to continue to break the law in order to perpetuate their supremacist, messianic colonies on the West Bank. Lets get this straight. Our government was by this saying that they support, by any means necessary, a system whereby a small group of people get massive funding in order for them to get nice lawns, swimming pools, state of the art security and brand new motorways that only they may use in the middle of a land where millions of other people live an existence as non-people who may not have their own country and are subject to the arbitrary laws of a foreign military. Am I missing something here? What is it about these people and their precious buildings that we need to support? For what?
When people from this movement go and murder babies from the wrong race and stab people with a different sexual orientation. Is anybody truly surprised? I doubt it. Shocked, sure. Outraged, I should hope so! Surprised, no. I hope and pray that this is not who ”we” are, but it certainly is who ”they” are, right down to the rotten core. The settlers movement is not the only source of hatred in this country, just last week I had to unfriend a person on Facebook that I thought was decent for her support for the mass murdering fascist Anders Bering Bereivik and she lives right here in Tel Aviv. It is not the fact that we have haters, every country has them, it is the fact that our government props up and supports the haters that is so distasteful. The sheer bizarreness of a situation where we have to pay taxes for all the perks and privileges to people who ”must” live in lala land ”Green Zones” surrounded by misery and poverty of the ”red zones” simply because of race is astounding. Any way you look at it any decent future for this place is devoid of the influence of this movement. It is time for all those who support them to instead start thinking like human beings. Especially the leadership of this country.