I awoke in the night, panicking about Gaza.
For me (and I suspect millions of others) that was just a nightmare.
In Gaza is it an unimaginable reality.
No one can ignore what Hamas did on 7 October. It was unambiguously wrong.
But we cannot ignore what Israel is doing either. It is not proportionate. It is way beyond self defence. It too is unambiguously wrong.
That is why calls for a ceasefire are right. These wrongs must end, now. The lives of Palestinians, Jews and others impacted all matter. Right now, nothing matters more.
It is the legal duty of all politicians in every country that has signed the Geneva Convention of 1949 to uphold it. That must mean calling for an end to this war, now.
When will the UK's political leaders call for a ceasefire? Leaving it another day will be too late.
If you disagree with this sentiment please think very hard before commenting.
My concern is for all people in this conflict. It is not partisan. If your comment has a hint of putting partisanship over concern for life it will not be posted. You may also be banned from commenting again. I will not tolerate intolerance.
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This looks like genocide. It’s ridiculous for Israel to claim it is going only after Hamas targets. A ceasefire is needed immediately.
I too woke in the early hours with imaginings of Gaza last night….you might call civilians killed in the bombing collateral damage, I don’t….but to cut off water, power, food, medicine and communication systems to a people coralled in a tiny space with no possible escape is something else. I understand that the rage of the Iraelis is raw after witnessing such horror, but rage only begets more rage. So hard to know how this can be resolved but how can it be right to watch a people punished in this way. A ceasefire now is absolutely needed and no one should be afraid to say so.
Although brought up Jewish my viewpoint is from someone who believes religion is made up hogwash. I know a few people in Israel who do not subscribe to the far right government there and wish that Israel would consider some form of unity with Palestine. I also know a number of Jewish people in the UK and they’re typically wealthy, Conservative and in line with the Israel state due to Hamas atrocities. The far right government in Israel, not unlike the US after nine eleven will not listen to reason and will continue well beyond where we are now. The only fix is trying to get Netanyahu out of politics permanently for the umpteenth time and getting a more moderate government in, nothing else will work.
While I agree that Netanyahu is a large part of the current problem, this has been an issue long before Netanyahu came to power, including when there have been more moderate govrnments. What is needed is for the US to stop supporting Israel to act in defiance of the UN and international law.
I tend to disagree
I think Netanyahu fundamentally changed the equation
As I said Netanyahu is a large part of the current problem, but he was not elected (and re-elected) in a vacuum. The first illegal Israeli settlers were in 1967. The international falure to respond effectively to that set the scene. Persecution of Palestinians has continued since then and disproportionate Israeli resposes to Palestinian attacks (including Palestinian atrocities) has been the norm.
Tuesday Reuters reported President Obama “The Israeli government’s decision to cut off food, water and electricity to a captive civilian population (in Gaza) threatens not only to worsen a growing humanitarian crisis; it could further harden Palestinian attitudes for generations, erode global support for Israel, play into the hands of Israel’s enemies, and undermine long-term efforts to achieve peace and stability in the region.”
In his post Presidency book The Promised Land he wrote ”
just about every country in the world considered Israel’s continued occupation of of thePalestinian territories to be a violation of international law. As a result, our diplomats found themselves in the awkward position of having to defend Israel for actions that we ourselves opposed. U S officials also had to explain why it wasn’t hypocritical for us to press countries like China or Iran on their human rights records while showing little concern for the rights of Palestinians. Meanwhile, the Israeli occupation continued to inflame the Arab community and feed antiAmerican sentiment across the Muslim world. ”
He faced lots of criticism if he wasn’t ‘strong enough in Israel’s defence.’
From what I read the strongest pro-Israel lobby is the Evangelical vote. They have an interpretation of the Bible which can be traced back to John Nelson Darby, founder of the Plymouth Brethren. It is based largely on quotes from Daniel and Revelation. It is not shared by churches in Europe or any who examine the writing in context. (Not enough room to go into detail in this post) It seems the prophecy is two-thirds of Jews will die and the others convert. It is derided by Israelis in private, I gather, but is useful in securing support. But here’s the thing, The younger generation of American Evangelical Christians don’t accept it to the same extent. Younger Jews don’t give uncritical support to Israel as their parents did. It is so tragic that religion is a source of the violence and division.
The US has cast 34 vetoes (AL Jazeera this week) at the UN in support of Isreal. But its continued support can’t be taken for granted. The US let down the Kurds after the Gulf War and Trump withdrew support from them. The US withdrew from Vietnam and Afghanistan. The real friends of Israel (not the MPs who who belong to the Conservative or Labour Friends of Israel (e.g. Cleverly or Starmer) need to warn them continued support can’t be relied upon.
My suspicion is that the graphic scenes we have seen (Channel 4 being very good, I think) has shifted opinion and the party leaders haven’t realised this yet.
I assume Netenyahu wants the Palestinians gone so he can have the gas from the unexploited Gaza Marine field off the Gaza coast. I’m assuming too that he and the Israeli top brass were well aware of what Hamas was planning and deliberately let it go ahead to give them sufficient political excuse for clearing Gaza of everyone and everything living so the Israelis can move in and start exploiting that rich field. I assume too our political classes are happily going along with this in return for promises of cheap energy. The battle here then is not so much between right and wrong or Israel and Palestine as it is between ordinary people, horrified by what’s happening, and our political class, who disconcertingly give every appearance for the most part of simply not caring a jot. If we want to stop instances like this from happening, we need a completely new societal structure, not simply a ceasefire. Will a ceasefire in Gaza help those being bombed out of existence in the Yemen, for example? Of course not. What we’re being horrified by now is just one conspicuous manifestation of a problem which has been occurring daily elsewhere which we’ve all been able to shunt to the back of our minds. Nothing really new going on in Gaza, just lots of the same old, same old. This is who we are writ large. Don’t like it, change who we are. We need new leaders, better ones. We need new thinking.
Are you overthinking the conspiracy element in this?
Time will tell!
Thank you, both.
There’s nothing conspiratorial about what Bill says.
The gas fields in the area have caused Israeli territorial disputes with Lebanon and Cyprus.
There are also Israeli exploited concessions in the occupied Golan Heights.
My former employers HSBC, BNYM, Barclays and Deutsche have facilitated such investments.
An interesting point raised by Bill, Israeli intelligence has be renowned to usually be on point. In the days after Hamas’s horrific actions it was suggested on the media that the Israeli government would have questions to answer on how their intelligence services failed so badly this time… Questions I feel have yet to be answered!
Did they fail? Aren’t they doing what was intended all along?
From what I’ve read, not in MSM, obviously, they were told by both Egypt and Hamas what Hamas intended doing days before and did nothing.
Nearly 190,000 signatures now on that petition.
The Gaza-Israel situation is summarized rather well in the HonestGovernment ad clip – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0Zb9iUi0JM. Ceasefire now!
Absolutely – politicians call for ‘humanitarian aid’ – clearly meaningless and impossible, without a ceasefire.
Its so visceral – even just listening to a studio discussion about horrific details of what happened to yet another of the Oct 7th Israeli victims , knowing that maybe more tens or a hundred Gazans will be killed during the discussion.
Did agree with those who said Netenyahu is self defeating – doing what Hamas’ wants him to do – but this piece by Jonathan Cook
https://www.declassifieduk.org/israels-long-held-plan-to-drive-gazas-people-into-sinai-is-now-within-reach/
is quite persuasive that Netenyahu might conceivably achieve the long term aim of cleansing Gaza – making it uninhabitable
The latest ledbydonkeys infograph on Facebook compares the deaths of Palestinian and Israeli children over the years from 2000 until today.
It puts things into perspective and should be shown to everyone who thinks what Israel is doing is acceptable.
https://countingthekids.org/
Absolutely shocking. And this graphic should be viewed in conjunction with reading George Monbiot’s excellent article on the ‘rules of war’: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/oct/18/rules-of-war-israel-hamas-crimes-violence
The government petition to call for a ceasefire has got over 138,000 signatures already. (where is everybody else?)
All we get in response is links to the speeches that Sunak has already given in parliament, where he most definitely did not call for a ceasefire.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/648292/signatures/new
For anyone who hasn’t signed it already.
I wonder how Sunak gets on with his sister who works for the UN?
I have now signed
The legalities or otherwise are covered here
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/oct/18/rules-of-war-israel-hamas-crimes-violence
Bravo Richard for what you say.
I think Ian Stevenson’s reply highlights the current swing towards a more sensible approach, albeit far too slow.
His reply is possibly one of your “Guest Submissions”.
The best way to reflect on Gaza is to look back and deal with human reality.
After the second world war, the extent of Nazi cruelty was revealed and the scale of the determined and driven extermination of the Jews was exposed. Throughout their long history, persecution has accompanied it – even by so-called ‘Christianity’ – and Jewish persecution Nazi style had reached some sort of point of no return – a nadir. This was going too, too far. The worst of the worst. Enough was enough.
The ‘success’ (the proof if you like) of that extermination can still be seen in places like Poland which once I understand had one of the largest groupings of Jews in Europe. Now, it is is seen as a pre-dominantly Catholic country. My God………………..the Jews have gone forever in some places and we all poorer for it. Humanity is poorer for it. Peace is poorer for it.
Since then Jews have quite rightly lived in fear of this happening again. What could have driven it in the first place? It was almost too much to take in. But it happened. Oh yes. The Shoah happened for sure. Stare it in the face. And what is was, was a political expedience based in the politics of Fascism.
The other telling thing that happened after the cessation of hostilities was revenge. Yes, allied soldiers and civilians of occupied territories summarily killed many German soldiers, collaborators, SS. Ben Ferencz – the young lawyer at the Nuremberg trial who only recently passed away – bless his soul – recounted seeing concentration captives burn one of their captors alive in a camp oven and from what I gather he did not interfere.
And then the German people – women, children & elderly who had emigrated to occupied lands were expelled en masse from countries, even from countries where German speaking peoples – like the large Jewish community in Poland – had lived for centuries in peace – like Hungary – who cynically perhaps took the opportunity to make itself less German and more Hungarian,
more homogenous. Some argue – and I think intelligently – that WW2 left Europe for less racially integrated than before and that is promotes nationalistic tendencies that can be exploited and exported.
The cruelty of the expulsions, the conditions German speaking women and children and vulnerable people endured and died in during the expulsion were harsh and extreme, if not sometimes mimicking that which the Nazis had dealt out themselves (those ex Nazi camps especially in Eastern Europe came in handy for revenge programmes and the condition of the transport trains into Germany were redolent of the transports of Jews to extermination camps ). Is this ringing any bells yet? I hope so.
There are a number of books and documentaries about the ‘reckoning’ dealt out to the Germans, but the one I would recommend is R.M Douglas’ sober book ‘Orderly and Humane: The Expulsion of the Germans after the Second World War’ (2012). The facts – painstakingly researched – speak for themselves and are worthy of any truth and reconciliation commission.
The Germans called this the ‘Vertreibung’ – expulsion or eviction. And now Gaza faces its own version perhaps?
So why do I mention this? Well, I mention it in despair and sadness. And frustration. And almost exhausting familiarity. Regarding Gaza, we’ve been here before – and how many times before that? Humanity has ‘previous’ – hmmm?
The Religious angle:
Religion would say that we are all sons and daughters of Abraham. But in practice I think not. And some of us think we are more holy and closer to God than others. I don’t think so, because He/Her apparently made everything!! But don’t worry – I’m not religious, and I’ll look after my own soul thank you. It’s my responsibility.
In her 2021 book ‘The Vanishing: The Twilight of Christianity in the Middle East’ Janine di Giovanni rightly points out her worry that what was once a crucible for all faiths is rapidly becoming – if not already- a place of separation and mono culture. A place once a fusion of cultures and values and understanding each other was being pushed apart leading to………..well, lets move on.
The Political angle:
We made a huge, catastrophic mistake – due I think to North American interference after the second world war – in not eradicating Fascism and the political science and tools it uses. It’s methodology of dehumanising those who do not agree with those in charge should have been defined and outlawed by international law. All of a sudden, Fascism and its heinous crimes against the Jews and all humanity was replaced by Communism as the new threat to the world.
The pursuit of Fascists was stopped and too may were simply left to rejoin society again (although the heroic efforts of a few Jews and their allies to bring Nazis to justice never stopped, but also never received the public support it warranted). Lessons learnt were forgotten and even Fascist political science was all too often unconsciously copied without censure world wide in the name of geo-politics against communism, within religion and even domestic political opponents in the pursuit of power (are you reading ‘Bibi’? How many terms is it that you have had in power now?).
So I’m struck by a number of things about our human societies when reflecting on Gaza:
How those who are persecuted, learn how to persecute themselves as a defence out of fear. It’s a cycle of negative cognition that needs to be broken.
How we seem to want to claim victimhood as a status for ourselves and not others – related to exceptionalism. Even others’ babies are not allowed to be victims it seems.
How we seem to be drawing up draw bridges everywhere and becoming more isolated and fearful, having less knowledge of each other, of our neighbours and fellow humans.
And, in our insularity or pain, how we fall prey to the political extremism of Fascism and how some of us see this as an opportunity for power.
And a common root seems to be a lack of something – security and integrity of our lives whether because of a lack of means – money or other resources in a resource and money rich world which fails to allocate resources adequately. Again, refusing and denying resources – whether justice at the UN or economic or life giving funding is part of the Fascist, even Nazi playbook.
So I will end my post on Fascism:
Fascism is death. It’s cult even rules over religion. War and death are lurking once again. We need I beg you in the name of humanity to deal with Fascism and its political methodologies. Once and for all.
And now I’ll leave you with the words of a fictional Jew – Shakespeare’s character Shylock – who speaks for ALL humanity believe it or not even if it were not intended:- those yet to be born, those born and those dead:
“I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands,
organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with the same
food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases,
heal’d by the same means, warm’d and cool’d by the same winter
and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If
you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?
And if you wrong us, do we not revenge? If we are like you in the
rest, we will resemble you in that.”
The Merchant of Venice, Act 3, Scene 1.
But Shylock did not get his revenge, did he? He lost everything, forfeit to the duke, and even had his daughter marry a Christian.
400th anniversary of Shakespeare, and that’s his most anti-semitic play. The way Shylock was treated in that play made me feel sorry for him.
Jen
My point is that when Shylock describes a Jew in this play, he describes humanity. That is all. Whether Jewish, Israeli, Palestinian, Muslim, Christian, whatever. That’s what it means to me every time I see that play, or read that soliloquy .
Now seems to be a good time to use those lines in that way as they seem to me, whether the play is anti-Semitic or not or whatever happens to Shylock. That soliloquy is a window into the world of the oppressed. The play after all is considered to be a tragedy and we are in the midst of one now.
In all such tragedies, perpetrators are often victims and vice versa.
What a mess…………………………………………..
Just signed the petition,
Current numbers are 160,917 signatures
“But we cannot ignore what Israel is doing either. It is not proportionate.”
What in your opinion would be a proportionate response?
Defence of the border.
Exceptionally targeted attacks on proven Hama sites and senior personnel. Technology allows this.