Aussies Protest over Gaza Bombings by Israel

Local Australians and Muslims leaders joined today in protest over Israels attack in Palestine.

"Shocking cynicism of a poisoned homeland"
Sarah Dowse in Sydney Morning Herald, January 8, 2009.

It has taken me days to begin writing this, so horrified have I been by Israel's latest actions. My sense of justice, however - as a mother, a Jew, and above all as a human being - impels me to try.

The massacre in Gaza has its roots in virulent European anti-Semitism and the 1917 Balfour declaration, when the British government promised Zionists that Jewish people would have a homeland in Palestine if Britain was victorious in World War I.

The key word here is homeland, and it should be remembered that the promise was qualified by the condition that such a homeland would "not be to the detriment" of the Palestinians. The steady increase in Jewish immigration under the British mandate provoked riots and protests, but Palestinians were still in majority until, in the aftermath of the Holocaust, the Zionists unilaterally declared an Israeli state.

Despite the suffering of the Palestinians, whose land was taken from them, for many years the sympathy of the developed world was with Israel, refuge for the survivors of the Nazi slaughter of European Jews, and beleaguered by surrounding hostile Arab states.

With the 1967 occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, Israel could no longer be accepted as a victim. Yet it has continued to play on the sympathies of Western governments, most particularly the US, and Jews of the diaspora. In reality, Israel has been a colonising state, masquerading as the most democratic, most humane, most modern nation in the region. It has served the Western powers to have such a proxy in the Middle East, and most recently, under the Bush Administration and in concert with the Israelis, they have played a cynical game of divide and rule, encouraging the Israelis in their blind refusal to negotiate with Hamas, just as for years Israel refused to negotiate with the Palestine Liberation Organisation, the forerunners of Fatah, whom they now support.

Hamas is not a terrorist organisation, but the legitimate, democratically elected government of the Palestinian Authority. We may not like what it stands for, but that is no reason for sidelining it. Undermining that government by Israel and the West is but one of a string of cynical actions on their part.

The rationale that Hamas has refused to accept Israel's existence or to eschew violence is yet another example of how the truth has been twisted. What Hamas rejected was the continued, barbaric Israeli occupation of the West Bank, and the laying down of arms against an aggressive military occupation. I have heard with my own ears the Hamas Prime Minister, Ismail Haniyeh, say exactly that. Is he to be trusted? It would have been worth a try. And who now would trust Israel?

So here we have it: a tough, technocratically savvy, nuclear power with the backing of the largest military power the world has known, bombing, then invading, a territory the size of a small city, with a population of 1.5 million, most of whom are civilians, to "defend our citizens".

The ceasefire was meant to lift the Israeli blockade on Gaza, but it didn't. It was meant to facilitate the release of Palestinian prisoners, many of whom were members of the elected Hamas Government, but it didn't.

Israeli planes raided southern Gaza in November. The Hamas rockets continued. Which side broke the ceasefire? Hamas may not be blameless, but the situation is far more complex than Israel claims. The fact that more than 600 people have died because in a couple of weeks the US will have a new government and next month Israel will have an election, is the most shocking form of cynicism the Palestinian people have yet faced.

Since the 2006 invasion of Lebanon I have undergone what for me, as a Jew, has been an agonising realignment of my feelings about Israel. I have come to believe that a specifically Jewish state has been a terrible mistake.

A homeland is different from a state. There have been examples throughout history and there are in our own time polities with mixed ethnic populations and official sanction for their living in harmony together. Australia is one.

I don't know how it will come about - I hope with as little bloodshed as possible - but I look forward to the distant day when the land becomes a multicultural country again, perhaps as a federation, perhaps in another form, but similar to what it was before it was destroyed with the poison of ethnic territorial nationalism.

Sara Dowse is an author who wrote Sapphires, a novel about three generations of Jewish women.

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[birdsIview85]

thanks for the comments awas123456789,

however i don't really agree in what you say because there is no JUSTIFICATION for killing!

Morris Gleitzman may have done what you said but ask yourself does two wrongs make a right?

Ghandi also said if everyone were to take an eye for an eye then we would all become blind.

Ironically enough he seems to be right because alot of people are blind about how significant the gift of life is and why its worth preserving.

[cecesivan]

any nation who enjoys bombing themselves and hiding behind their own civilians to send rockets do not deserve any land. How does anyone justify these people? They believe in bombing and killing in their bible... I just dont understand. When your neighbors send rockets into your country, id like to see what u would have to say then, till then stay quiet, cuz you dont know what israelis go through each damn dayy!!

[birdsIview85]

To say they believe bombing and killing in their bible (Qu'ran) you need to back it up with the relevant passage. The solution to this problem is easy, Egypt doesn't want Gaza, Israel probably doesn't want it too (they withdrew occupation in 2005) then why don't Israel give Palestine their land back. True I don't know what it is like to bombed everyday however Palestine is on the receiving end as well albeit a more forceful one.

[birdsIview85]

I may not be Palestinian or Israeli however where I live in Sydney, I am able to talk to many refugees whom have been affected by Israel occupation and I have heard horror stories. The humanity side of this is often forgotten, two - three Israelis compared to four hundred (a whole school) when you look at the numbers it's hard to support such an aggressive country.

[birdsIview85]

Although I don't support the U.N., even the U.N. believes what Israel is doing constitutes to war crimes.

"UNITED Nations human rights chief Navi Pillay has called for an independent investigation into violence in the Gaza Strip and Israel and warned that some reported violations may constitute war crimes."

[DoomzRXMoney]

Dammm she's fine. And u white aussies tried to wipe out abos :P Or is he sum else. Black Power tho Fire Pon Israel.

[chugalongway]

More like Israel must be stopped

Israel is a country gone mad

[assviolations]

these sand nikkas should not be in australia, knowumsayin?

[Mr1234patriot]

Israel doesn't need the support they can survive on their own and does anyone see these muslims are liars!!! i wont read replies.

[lamborghinifan8]

wat did isreal do?

[fundamentalistish]

False flag is carried out by Christian peado's

[fundamentalistish]

they are allowed to use fireworks in their own country just like you are in yours. There fireworks don't cause any deaths. Unlike the Jewish God that fires Johovahs bombs that kill children as there so called god only chose the Jews. Jewish god sounds like the devil to me.

[shafahmeds]

why should it be ur UGLY face

[RebelRay]

I wonder if these people ever protested the thousands of rockets and mortars fired by Hamas at Israeli civilians.

[fundamentalistish]

Why is this ugly black women a presenter in White Australia?