Over the past few days, I have noticed a disturbing trend playing out as the war is broadcast over social media.
“Do you believe in slaughtering babies?” someone will ask someone—anyone—who dares to post anything related to Palestinians, whether it is supporting Gazans living under siege, or drawing attention to the context—the seventy-five year occupation of Palestine—that provoked the war.
Meanwhile, anyone who posts about the numerous Israeli casualties—the hostages who have been taken, the people beaten, raped and killed—are met with something along the lines of: “But this is what the resistance looks like.”
For me, it raises so many questions—particularly, how we, particularly those of us far away from where any carnage is taking place, engage in this debate. We have the privilege of connecting with each other, of even learning from “the other side” without fearing violence—and yet, so many of us choose not to, or worse, refrain from taking a stand that might display any nuance out of fear of being “cancelled” or alienated from our communities.
I wrestle with it myself—on the one hand, throughout my entire journalistic career and even before that, I have always been a staunch advocate for Palestine, and the Palestinian right to self determination. But do innocent people deserve to die? On the one hand, the answer is obvious—no, no one does. No one attending a music festival deserves to be kidnapped and killed. No one deserves to experience this for a loved one—and historically, it only breeds more desire for revenge.
Are Israelis—more specifically, are all Israelis to blame—for what is happening right now? Israel’s draft is mandatory, which means that any citizen who serves—which is the vast majority, unless they were able to be exempt or a conscientious objector—is, in some way, at least implicitly involved in enforcing the occupation. But also, Israel’s draft is mandatory. Anyone who does not participate faces not only a prison sentence, but a lack of job prospects in the future and the possibility of being ostracized by their community. It would be one thing to expect an educated adult to make the choice to be a conscientious objector—but most Israelis are drafted into the military at the age of seventeen. Would you have taken that strong of a stance at seventeen?
Of course, this point—as compelling as it may be—does not change the reality for Palestinians. Palestinians living in the West Bank are still humiliated by the seventeen year old Israeli soldiers checking their travel permits every time they want to travel to Jerusalem, still teargassed and shot at any time they try to resist settlers encroaching on their land. If anyone deserves the right to see this issue without nuance, it is Palestinians, Palestinians living in Gaza in an open air prison, Palestinians living in the West Bank under occupation, throughout Israel with a different set of rights to their Jewish Israeli counterparts. Palestinian refugees who are displaced across the Middle East in countries like Lebanon and Syria, unable to go home, even though it is just across the border. Palestinians in the diaspora who might have better passports, but have been forced to deal with dehumanizing, pro-Israel media narratives their entire lives, nevertheless.
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