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There Are Other Israeli Voices [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2023-10-22  

I am a member of Brooklyn for Peace and Historians for Peace and Democracy, two groups that denounce the Hamas murder and capture of Israeli civilians as hostages but are calling for an immediate cease fire in the region and expanded discussion of Israel’s role as an occupying power.

I have seen the horrifying images and videos posted online of the massacre of over 1,400 Israelis on October 7. As a Jew who lost family during the European Holocaust, I think I can understand the desire of many Israelis for a military response. But I have also seen images and videos showing the destruction caused by the massive Israeli bombing campaign that has killed thousands of people in Gaza. I don’t have a simple alternative for an Israeli response, which is why I support a cease fire. Since 2005 there have been 16 Israeli military operations against Hamas and Gaza. None of them created safety or security for either Israelis or Palestinians. There is suspicion that successive Netanyahu led governments tolerated Hamas position in Gaza to undermine the possibility of a two-state solution with an independent Palestinian. As the world anticipates a deadly Israeli military assault on Gaza, there are other Israeli voices that need to be heard.

This is especially important in the United States because Israel relies on this country to replenish weapons. In addition, groups and individuals who are deemed inadequately repulsed by the Hamas brutality or who point to the Israeli occupation and control over Palestinian lands on the West Bank and in Gaza and resistance to a two-state solution as an underlying cause of the hostilities, are dismissed as anti-Semitic and pro-terrorist. Some opponents of an Israeli invasion of Gaza face being blacklisted by potential employers.

The voices and people presented here were reported in a New York Times article and in an interview on National Public Radio with representatives from the Israeli group Standing Together. These are voices that need to be heard.

According to the Times, “among the grieving, several Israelis have appealed for restraint as the Israeli bombardment of Gaza continues. Shai Piron, a former Israeli education minister, believes “Our government has not done enough to make peace.” Piron is an Israeli Orthodox rabbi and a religious Zionist who represents “all those who believe that killing is not the answer, and that life is more important than death.” He calls on his supporters to be “partners for peace.”

Mickey Gitzin is director of the Tel Aviv of the New Israel Fund. Following the Hamas attack, he experienced “a feeling of devastation, of being killed from within.” Gitzin feels that the propaganda in Israel “against peace activists has been horrible” and we were accused of being “traitors, the anti-Zionists, the anti-Israelis! We were supposedly the naïve ones who did not know the game. But we have been screaming that strengthening Hamas in order to weaken the Palestinian Authority was wrong.”

Vivian Silver, a 74-year old Canadian-Israeli peace activist, is one of the hostages being held by Hamas as a bargaining chip. She was a founding member of the Israeli-Palestinian Women Wage Peace movement founded in 2014. Her son, Yonatan Ziegen, opposes an invasion of Gaza and does not want to see images of more dead children, “peace is needed.”

Rula Daoud is a Palestinian Israeli director of Standing Together. She believes “My liberation as a Palestinian cannot come through the blood of Jewish babies. But I recognize that the Palestinian feeling that ‘finally somebody struck back’ is the normal reaction of a people occupied and ruled over. We need different voices.”

Awad Darawshe was a Palestinian Israeli paramedic killed by Hamas while trying to care for wounded Israelis at the Tribe of Nova peace-and-love gathering. Many of his co-workers fled during the attack, but his cousin reports that he “felt compelled to help people as one human being to another.”

Mohammad Darawshe, his cousin, is a prominent mediator between Palestinians and Jews. He considers himself a realist and believes “realistically two states are still possible. It may be nice to dream of one shared homeland, but Israelis will not give up their state. And Palestinians also need their own state, with the two strongly interconnected.” He proposes swapping land that would allow 95 percent of the Israeli settlers to remain on the West Bank, which would make “the relocation of the remaining settlers would become conceivable. But you need the will.”

NPR’s Scott Simon interviewed Israeli peace activists Sally Abed and Alon-Lee Green, leaders of the group Standing Together. They are both Israeli citizen; Abed is Palestinian and Green is an Israeli Jew.

According to its website, “Standing Together is a grassroots movement mobilizing Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel in pursuit of peace, equality, and social and climate justice. While the minority who benefit from the status quo of occupation and economic inequality seek to keep us divided, we know that we — the majority — have far more in common than that which sets us apart. When we stand together, we are strong enough to fundamentally alter the existing socio-political reality. The future that we want — peace and independence for Israelis and Palestinians, full equality for all citizens, and true social, economic, and environmental justice — is possible. Because where there is struggle, there is hope.” Standing Together has set up a Jewish-Arab Solidarity Guard with activists collecting and distributing equipment and food and attending mourning services and comforting Palestinian and Jewish families who have lost their loved ones. The organization is trying to combat racism and dehumanization, supports Arab citizens who are discriminated against, and removes racist and violent signs from public spaces.

According to Green, “we see a lot of anger and a lot of feelings of revenge. And we do understand these feelings, but we do say in the clearest way possible, more killing of innocent people, more bloodshed, more feeding of this vicious circle of death and blood will not bring back anyone to life. And more than that, it will not bring back the 200 Israelis that are held captured and that are alive. And we're saying to our government, work on the life. Talk to us about the ones that are still alive. Talk to us about us, the ones that are still living here and suffering from this in this moment. Try and not to just promise us more death and revenge and blood and destruction. But unfortunately, that's all that we hear from our government.”

For Abed, “I really hope that from this dark corner, we can have, like, this shift in the paradigm on how we actually look at these wars and how, actually, we look at the Israeli control over Gaza and over the West Bank and really have a different outlook on what our leadership actually should look like.”

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