The Elephant at the Protest

 

I am completely opposed to the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Gaza, I genuinely think the Rafah operation will be a bloodbath and should be reconsidered, and I am highly skeptical that the eradication of Hamas is fully possible without what already are proving to be unacceptable human casualties. I want to believe that in a different political situation, Gazans might want something more like Fatah (which Hamas exterminated in that region) leading them in an autonomous state. I support the free speech rights of the protesters at various colleges, even to the extent that I am dubious of the effect of the protests and don't truly believe they are as well-informed as they need to be.

I do not want a recap of National Guard breaking heads at Berkeley, or Kent State. Reactionaries are looking for the opportunity to have hardhat riots and so on, and some people are openly fantasizing about the Democratic National Convention being another 1968. 

Given my feelings about all of the above, let me be that wet-blanket Gen X asshat who wants to tell the children, ever so delicately--the hell you are doing the same thing my parents' generation did. When pro-Palestinians all say "Genocide Joe", maybe they think they are just echoing their grandparents' asking LBJ how many kids he killed that day. But Joe isn't dropping the bombs, and Israel is getting incoming missiles all the time from Hamas, Hezbollah, and there is a threat of war from Iran.

Which leads me to point out that young man in the picture above with the Hezbollah flag--with a machine gun on it. Almost a gentle hippie, just repping something that is by no means a peace movement, but terrorism. 

When 1968 begat Nixon, he prolonged the Vietnam War. No, really. My dad's generation was drafted. He (Nixon) on the advice of Kissinger, prolonged the war. 

I want to believe we learn from history. I want to believe we can admit that today's protestors can recognize the sprinklers not being turned off because they are on a timer is NOT the same thing as firehoses being turned on civil rights protestors. (This is a slip'n'slide. Enjoy the temporary waterworks if you plan to stay. I swear to god you have other clothes. .A firehose batters your whole ass up against a wall. These folks are like babies.) 

When leaders of the supposedly peace movement talk shit and get caught out--question why they had such vehement antisemitism. That isn't someone "misspeaking". That is someone who knew nothing about the situation a minute ago and got their head full up somehow--that is a problem.

The same thing pertains to signs like the one above, that says "Students will go back home when Israelis go back to Europe, US, etc. (Their real homes.)"

The ignorance about this! Look what the genealogy of Netanyahu is--his people are from the area--not a transplant. More than 50% of Israelis have a lineage from the area. Zionism started before the European Holocaust (take a look at Misrahi Jews that came from Spain--roughly around the time Colombus was supposedly discovering the New World). Jewish people, in the run-up to the European Holocaust, were kicked out of Yemen, Iraq, etc. because of the antisemitism exported from Europe. (Some very definitely from Russia.) 

The 7 million or so Jews of Israel aren't going anywhere. This is why I feel like "Zionism" or "anti-Zionism are foolish terms to use today--these people are here! The slogan "from the river to the sea" says something about where these people are supposed to go--where? The promise of "intifada" doesn't mean the same thing to today's kids as it does to people who know suicide vest bombers, even recruited from teenagers, killed so many civilians in Israel in the 1970s and 80s.

Why did this movement go from "ceasefire" (which Hamas rejects, as well as playing stupid about where the hostages all are) to "Free Palestine?" Why ignore that the stated policy of the US is the two state solution and that the US is involved in trying to produce a ceasefire as well as release the hostages? 

When people try to talk about antisemitism, they miss this part--the go back home part. The telling people they aren't where they belong because they just came from somewhere else.  I guess I could go back to Scotland, Ireland, Germany, England, or whatever as a stranger. But I am an American. My husband's parent are from Reggio Calabria. (He has a home, kind of, to go back to.) But he's American.  Israel is a lot like the US in that you can belong there even if you aren't from there. 

I am not trying to cancel the protests by saying there is something ill-informed about a lot of what is going on there--I really think maybe there could be some kind of teach-ins to try to correct a lot of the stupid parts that really are trending antisemitic and encourage people to excommunicate people who are obvious bad actors to not discredit the whole thing. And I note that Jewish students are also participating, and hopefully, are not being judged against the behavior of people they have no control over. 

I just want the protestors to be very aware they are going to be manipulated and used. And to not be "useful" to a narrative they never asked for. 

I have said of MAGAs that they should know once they see Confederate flags or Klan paraphernalia or Nazi stuff, it was time to leave. Is it okay to rep ISIS? Hezbollah? Speak as if 10/7 was a resistance? Absolutely not. Time to leave. 

This needs to be the dealbreaker--yes, Palestinian state--no, not a Jewish massacre to create it. I am not sure all these protestors get that.