Saturday, July 27, 2024
The Israeli government attacks another school in Gaza
As of Monday, 83 percent of the Gaza Strip has been marked unsafe for Palestinian civilians by the Israeli military.
This big chunk of the beleaguered enclave has either been designated as a “no-go zone” by Israel or people there have been issued evacuation orders, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
While the remaining 17 percent is not subject to evacuation orders, residents in Gaza say no place is safe as Israeli attacks throughout the Strip have continued for more than nine months. More than 39,000 Palestinians have been killed.
Since the beginning of Israel’s most recent assault on October 7, almost all Palestinians in Gaza have been displaced from their homes, some even multiple times.
Entire neighbourhoods in northern Gaza, where Israel’s offence began, have been destroyed. So-called ‘safe zones’ in southern Gaza continue to shrink and deteriorate.
Since Herzog and others refuse to observe that reality, I guess we're all just supposed to pretend it never happened and that the Golan Heights was never stolen from Syria.
While he may not have the national name recognition that his fellow governors Newsom and Whitmer enjoy, Shapiro is considered one of the top candidates to potentially replace Biden.
The governor, who previously served as Pennsylvania’s attorney general, comfortably won his election in the Mid-Atlantic swing state in 2022. Since taking office, he has had positive approval ratings.
With regards to the war in Gaza, Shapiro has been a staunch supporter of Israel.
“The whataboutism used by some to justify Hamas’s unprovoked actions is ignorant and wrong,” he said last year. “There is no moral equivalency here. Israel has a right to defend itself.”
Shapiro has also been outspoken in denouncing what he describes as anti-Semitism by protesters who oppose the war in Gaza.
In April, he likened pro-Palestinian student protesters to the Ku Klux Klan. The campus protests, however, have been largely peaceful, and student leaders say accusations of anti-Semitism misrepresent their aim: to encourage their universities to divest from Israeli companies linked to the country’s human rights abuses.
“We have to query whether or not we would tolerate this if this were people dressed up in KKK outfits or KKK regalia making comments about people who are African American in our communities,” Shapiro told CNN.
This is a hopeful moment for the whole left-liberal coalition. The vibes, for once, are good. Almost every leftist I know is excited about Harris and thinks Trump is beatable. With a newly united party behind her, there are only so many ways Harris can screw it up, but one seems all too plausible: She could select Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro as her running mate.
On paper, it’s understandable why Shapiro is among the leading candidates reportedly being vetted by Harris. Like nearly all of the veep contenders, he’s a white male governor with a centrist reputation. At 51, he’s even younger than Harris and a fresh face, having only held his current job for 18 months. He has already shown himself to be a more than capable administrator, generating a lot of good publicity for repairing a damaged section of Interstate 95 within two weeks. Most importantly, Pennsylvania is the most valuable swing state in play, worth 19 electoral votes, and Shapiro is very popular there.
Unfortunately, Shapiro also stands out among the current field of potential running mates as being egregiously bad on Palestine. It’s not just that he, like many Democrats, is an outspoken supporter of Israel—though he certainly is, having championed Israel’s war against Hamas consistently and without any apparent concern for Palestinian civilians. Shapiro has, moreover, done far more than most Democrats to attack pro-Palestine antiwar demonstrators, in ways that call into question his basic commitment to First Amendment rights.
In his previous role as Pennsylvania attorney general, Shapiro championed the state’s constitutionally dubious anti-BDS (boycott, divestment, sanctions) law against Ben & Jerry’s after the ice cream maker refused to license its product for sale in Israeli settlements. “BDS is rooted in antisemitism,” Shapiro wrote in a statement in 2021, as he condemned a company named for its two Jewish American founders. “The stated goal of this amorphous movement is the removal of Jewish citizens from the region and I strongly oppose their efforts.”
As governor, Shapiro’s particular animus against pro-Palestine activism has only grown more apparent and troubling. Last December, he played an active role in the GOP-orchestrated sacking of University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill. During a visit to Goldie, the popular Philadelphia restaurant co-owned by the Israeli-born celebrity chef Michael Solomonov, Shapiro condemned Magill’s testimony on alleged antisemitism on the Ivy League campus before Representative Elise Stefanik, the MAGA right’s grand inquisitor. “That was an unacceptable statement from the president of Penn,” Shapiro said, referring to Magill’s unwillingness to accept Stefanik’s slippery framing on what constitutes antisemitism. “Frankly, I thought her comments were absolutely shameful. It should not be hard to condemn genocide.” Magill resigned four days after her testimony and three days after Shapiro’s statement, legitimizing the GOP’s wider assault on academic freedom, which would be repeated successfully against Harvard President Claudine Gay weeks later.
In April, Shapiro’s office baselessly claimed that a peaceful pro-Palestine encampment on the Penn campus threatened student safety. “If the universities in accordance with their policies can’t guarantee the safety and security and well-being of the students, then I think it is incumbent upon a local mayor or local governor or local town councilor, whoever is the local leadership there, to step in and enforce the law,” Shapiro told Politico at the time. In May, he urged Penn to shut down the encampment completely. “The University of Pennsylvania has an obligation to their safety,” he said, once again alluding to nonexistent threats to the physical well-being of Jewish students. “It is past time for the university to act, to address this, to disband the encampment, and to restore order and safety on campus.” The university complied; one day and 33 arrests later, Shapiro’s office said Penn “made the right decision.”
That same week, The New York Times profiled Shapiro as one to watch in his party with the headline “A Rising Democrat Leans Into the Campus Fight Over Antisemitism.” In that piece, Shapiro made clear the low regard in which he holds pro-Palestine campus activists. “If you had a group of white supremacists camped out and yelling racial slurs every day, that would be met with a different response than antisemites camped out, yelling antisemitic tropes,” he told the Times. (This echoed a statement made in an earlier interview in which he compared campus protesters to the Ku Klux Klan.) Then, in an executive order, Shapiro updated his administration’s code of conduct to forbid state employees from engaging in “scandalous or disgraceful” behavior, a vaguely worded instruction that civil libertarians immediately interpreted as threatening pro-Palestine speech.
Shapiro is an observant Jew with personal ties to Israel; on October 7, he tweeted, “Our family has shared many special moments in Israel and our hearts break for those living this horror now.” If selected as Harris’s running mate and subsequently elected, he would become the first Jewish vice president in American history (a distinction narrowly missed by the late Joe Lieberman when Republicans stole the 2000 election).
Donald Trump met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Friday, claiming that "no president has done what I've done for Israel".
The meeting signalled that both men are looking to ease tension that developed since Mr Trump left office in January 2021.
Warmly clasping hands, Mr Trump and Mr Netanyahu greeted each other outside the former president's home in their first face-to-face meeting in almost four years.
About 50 pro-Palestinian protesters were on the bridge leading to the resort.
Given a possible return of Mr Trump to the White House, Mr Netanyahu – whom CNN reported had requested the meeting – was expected to be driven to mend fences.
Gaza remains under assault. Day 295 of the assault in the wave that began in October. Binoy Kampmark (DISSIDENT VOICE) points out, "Bloodletting as form; murder as fashion. The ongoing campaign in Gaza by Israel’s Defence Forces continues without stalling and restriction. But the burgeoning number of corpses is starting to become a challenge for the propaganda outlets: How to justify it? Fortunately for Israel, the United States, its unqualified defender, is happy to provide cover for murder covered in the sheath of self-defence." CNN has explained, "The Gaza Strip is 'the most dangerous place' in the world to be a child, according to the executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund." ABC NEWS quotes UNICEF's December 9th statement, ""The Gaza Strip is the most dangerous place in the world to be a child. Scores of children are reportedly being killed and injured on a daily basis. Entire neighborhoods, where children used to play and go to school have been turned into stacks of rubble, with no life in them." NBC NEWS notes, "Strong majorities of all voters in the U.S. disapprove of President Joe Biden’s handling of foreign policy and the Israel-Hamas war, according to the latest national NBC News poll. The erosion is most pronounced among Democrats, a majority of whom believe Israel has gone too far in its military action in Gaza." The slaughter continues. It has displaced over 1 million people per the US Congressional Research Service. Jessica Corbett (COMMON DREAMS) points out, "Academics and legal experts around the world, including Holocaust scholars, have condemned the six-week Israeli assault of Gaza as genocide." The death toll of Palestinians in Gaza is grows higher and higher. United Nations Women noted, "More than 1.9 million people -- 85 per cent of the total population of Gaza -- have been displaced, including what UN Women estimates to be nearly 1 million women and girls. The entire population of Gaza -- roughly 2.2 million people -- are in crisis levels of acute food insecurity or worse." THE NATIONAL notes, "Gaza death toll rises to 39,258 killed with 90,589 woundedd." Months ago, AP noted, "About 4,000 people are reported missing." February 7th, Jeremy Scahill explained on DEMOCRACY NOW! that "there’s an estimated 7,000 or 8,000 Palestinians missing, many of them in graves that are the rubble of their former home." February 5th, the United Nations' Phillipe Lazzarini Tweeted:
Dozens of American doctors and nurses who volunteered in the Gaza Strip since October 7 have written to the White House to describe horrific conditions in the besieged enclave, where disease is rife and barely functioning hospitals lack even basic supplies.
The 45 physicians, surgeons and nurses told President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and first lady Jill Biden that they estimate more than 92,000 people have been killed in Gaza since October 7, about 4.2 per cent of the population.
The letter, sent on Thursday, and its supporting documents show “probative evidence that the human toll in Gaza is far higher than is understood in the United States”.
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Shrimp Scampi Skillet in the Kitchen2 hours ago
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Idiot of the Week3 hours ago
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Hell no to Shapiro3 hours ago
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Marvel doesn't like women over 509 hours ago
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Kathleen Hanna talks musicals and roller coasters22 hours ago
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Jody Watley - I'm The One You Need
Singer, songwriter, Grammy winner, fashion icon Jody Watley writes in "Jody Watley Commentary – Kamala Harris Empowering Change:"
![](https://i0.wp.com/jodywatley.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/VP-Kamala-Harris_Jody-Watley2022.jpg?resize=468%2C640&ssl=1)
Jody Watley Commentary – Empowering Change: Kamala Harris The Historic Path To A First Woman President and The Crucial Power Of Voting
*As a singer, songwriter, producer, and businesswoman who has long championed individuality and empowerment, I am filled with immense pride and hope as we stand on the brink of a monumental moment in American history.
The prospect of Kamala Harris becoming the first woman President of the United States is not just a symbol of progress but a profound testament to the power of perseverance, vision, and unity.
Kamala Harris’s journey from her early days in California to her role as Vice President has been nothing short of inspiring.
Her ascent to the highest office in the land would be a historic achievement, not only for women of all backgrounds but for everyone who believes in democracy, equal rights, and the promise of America.
It is a vivid reminder of how far we have come and how far we still have to go in our quest for true equality and representation.
Read the Full Op-Ed : Eurweb
DRUM CORPS WORLD July 26 2024 Issue
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Friday, July 26, 2024
Iraq snapshot
Videos. I often note YOUTUBE videos here. I'm not talking about music videos. We're months away from the election (I think it's November 5th). I will be voting for Kamala Harris. I think she would be a very strong US president. I have no hesitation about voting for her.
I do have hesitation about putting up videos by people who trash her. So when you come here and you think, "Mike hasn't noted X in a while, I wonder why?" That's your answer.
I think Donald Trump will destroy the country if he's back in the White House. This needs to be a win for Kamala. I'm not interested in people making fun of her.
They're stupid asses. Especially if they're supporting the racist Jill Stein. Cornel West is a real candidate. You want a third party or independent candidate, great, go for Cornel who is genuine.
Stein's 2016 campaign was heavily promoted by RT. She hasn't spoken much about the RT dinner, but in an interview with NBC News last fall, she deflected questions about her appearance, instead chastising the U.S. media for not paying attention to her campaign while RT gave it a lot more attention.
"And my own connection to RT, you know ironically, it takes a Russian television station to actually be open to independent candidates in this country and that is a shame. A shameful commentary on our own media," she told NBC's Alex Seitz-Wald.
(Stein did well enough to help Russia achieve its aims. Her vote totals in the crucial states of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan were all greater than Clinton's margin of defeat, and arguably denied Clinton an Electoral College victory.)
Listen and note how the same group of people keep popping up -- behind the scenes -- Bri-Bri, Jimmy Dore, Jill Stein, Cornel West, serial plagiarist Chris Hedges, Medea Benjamin, etc etc. As Jared pointed out, "the same people caught up in it. You've got Chris Hedges, you've got Cornel West, you've got Jimmy Dore, you've got talented microphoned, you know, spokespeople. You got somewhat celebrity -- football players, who ever."
I have known Cornel for many years. We drove together, leaving at 3:00 am from our homes in Princeton, New Jersey, to attend the trial at Fort Meade of U.S. Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning. I was in the visitors room at the prison in Frackville, Pennsylvania, as Cornel gripped the shoulders of the political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal and told him “You have Frederick Douglass in you, brother!” Tears streamed down Mumia’s face. Cornel and I held a People’s Hearing of Goldman Sachs in Zuccotti Park during the Occupy movement where those who were evicted and bankrupted by big banks testified against the heartlessness and greed of corporate capitalism. We have spoken together at rallies in support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against the Israeli-apartheid state. We walked three miles on a sweltering July day in Philadelphia with thousands of homeless people to the Wells Fargo Center during the 2016 Democratic National Convention, because housing is a human right.
I was with Cornel when Bernie Sanders delegates, disgusted by the machinations of the Democratic National Committee against their candidate and his endorsement of Hillary Clinton, walked out of the convention. Cornel turned to me and said presciently, “Bernie lost his political moment.”
We have taught classes together in East Jersey State Prison. We have spoken on stages at universities where Cornel has demanded reparations for Black people and called for a guaranteed income for all citizens. I have heard him denounce the prison industrial complex as “a crime against humanity.” I have listened to him call for universal health care, canceling student debt, free university education, freedom for Julian Assange and heard him thunder against those who deny women access to abortion.
Cornel officiated, along with the theologian Dr. James Cone, at my ordination as a Presbyterian minister. We spoke, and wept, at James’ funeral in 2018 at Riverside Church. James wrote that we must stand, no matter the cost, with the crucified of the earth.
Why didn't he?
Kamala Harris signaled a major shift on US Gaza policy Thursday, with the presidential hopeful telling Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to seal a peace deal and insisting she would not be "silent" on the suffering in the Palestinian enclave.
Ripping up outgoing President Joe Biden's playbook of mostly behind-the-scenes pressure on Israel, the vice president said after meeting Netanyahu that it was time to end the "devastating" war.
"What has happened in Gaza over the past nine months is devastating. The images of dead children and desperate hungry people fleeing for safety, sometimes displaced for the second, third or fourth time," Harris told reporters.
"We cannot look away in the face of these tragedies. We cannot allow ourselves to become numb to the suffering and I will not be silent."
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel.
The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue.
We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of Hamas for the atrocities of October 7 and ongoing acts of terror. Hamas must lay down its arms and release all hostages. We see no role for Hamas in the future governance of Gaza.
Israel must listen to the concerns of the international community. The protection of civilians is paramount and a requirement under international humanitarian law. Palestinian civilians cannot be made to pay the price of defeating Hamas. It must end.
An immediate ceasefire is needed desperately. Civilians must be protected, and a sustained increase in the flow of assistance throughout Gaza is needed to address the humanitarian situation.
We fully stand behind the comprehensive ceasefire deal, outlined by President Biden and endorsed by the UN Security Council. We call on parties to the conflict to agree to the deal. Any delay will only see more lives lost.
We are committed to working towards an irreversible path to achieving a two-state solution, where Israelis and Palestinians can live securely within internationally recognised borders. This is the only realistic option to achieve a just and enduring peace.
We call on Israel to respond substantively to the ICJ’s advisory opinion, and ensure accountability for ongoing acts of violence against Palestinians by extremist settlers, reverse the record expansion of settlements in the West Bank which are illegal under international law, and work towards a two-state solution.
We are gravely concerned about the prospect of further escalation across the region. We condemn Iran’s attack against Israel of April 13-14, call on Iran to refrain from further destabilizing actions in the Middle East, and demand that Iran and its affiliated groups, including Hizballah, cease their attacks. We also condemn the Houthis’ ongoing reckless acts, including their indiscriminate drone attack in Tel Aviv and ongoing attacks on international shipping.
We are particularly concerned by the situation along the Blue Line, including the escalation of hostilities and rhetoric between the terror group Hizballah and Israel. It has led to the displacement of thousands of Israelis along the northern border and thousands of Lebanese along the southern border. Further hostilities put tens of thousands of civilians in Lebanon and Israel at risk.
This escalation in hostilities only makes a ceasefire in Gaza more urgent. We urge all involved actors to exercise restraint and de-escalate. We support diplomatic efforts to implement UN Security Council Resolution 1701. A wider scale war would have disastrous consequences for Israel and Lebanon, and for civilians across the region.
The World Health Organization chief says vaccines will be administered over the coming weeks to prevent children being infected after the virus was detected in sewage samples.
“While no cases of polio have been recorded yet, without immediate action, it is just a matter of time before it reaches the thousands of children who have been left unprotected,” Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in an opinion piece for the UK’s The Guardian newspaper.
He wrote that children under five were most at risk from the viral disease, and especially infants under two since normal vaccination campaigns have been disrupted by more than nine months of conflict.
Poliomyelitis, which is spread mainly through the fecal-oral route, is a highly infectious virus that can invade the nervous system and cause paralysis.
Cases of polio have declined by 99 percent worldwide since 1988 thanks to mass vaccination campaigns and efforts continue to eradicate it completely.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: We’re continuing to look at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to the U.S. Congress and the protest outside the Capitol. We’re joined by two peace activists — one Israeli, one Palestinian — who are working together to end the war in Gaza and build a lasting peace.
Maoz Inon’s parents were killed during the Hamas attack on October 7th. Aziz Abu Sarah’s 19-year-old brother died in 1991 after being tortured in an Israeli prison. At the time, Aziz was just 9 years old.
Inon and Abu Sarah recently organized what’s been described as the biggest peace conference in Israel in 30 years. They also recently met Pope Francis.
On Wednesday, they took part in an event in Washington titled “Peace Is Possible: An Alternative Vision for Israel and Palestine.” Other speakers included Pramila Jayapal, chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, who boycotted Netanyahu’s speech to Congress.
REP. PRAMILA JAYAPAL: Speaking for myself only, the deep horrors of what is happening on the ground are not external to us, because the United States does remain the largest backer of military assistance to Israel, assistance that has been used to perpetrate these offensive attacks on a civilian population that’s been denied even the most basic of humanitarian assistance.
AMY GOODMAN: Maoz Inon and Aziz Abu Sarah join us now in Washington, D.C. Maoz, if you can start off by talking about what happened to your parents?
MAOZ INON: Hi, Amy. Good morning from D.C.
I was born in about a mile away from Gaza. And when I was 14, we moved to even nearest community to the Gaza border. And we lost contact with my parents on October the 7th, early morning. And in the afternoon, we learned from one of the neighbors that their house was burned into ashes, and he found two bodies inside. And on that day, I lost many of my childhood friends, their parents, their children, and it was the most dark time in my life.
And two days after, my young brother asked the family to send a universal message from our own tragedy, and he wanted this message to be that we are seeking no revenge. And in the same day, Aziz contacted me on Facebook. And I lost my parents, but I won a friend, I won a partner, and I won a brother, a brother to peace. And since that day, we’ve been working very hard to create and bring a new vision, a vision of hope, a vision of reconciliation, a vision of peace. And this is what we came here to do and say in D.C., that the future cannot and should not look like the present. The future must be a better future, and we are ready and eager to make it this way.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Aziz, could you explain what happened to your brother when you were 9 years old and why you reached out to Maoz after October 7th?
AZIZ ABU SARAH: Sure. Thank you, Amy, and good morning.
Yeah, my brother was arrested from home. We lived in the same — actually slept in the same room, me and him. He’s the one just older than me, Tayseer. And he was taken, on suspicion of throwing rocks, to detention. He refused to confess to the charges, and he was beaten up, tortured, until he eventually did. And by the time he was released from prison, he had internal injuries, and, soon after, he ended up dying from those injuries.
And unlike Maoz, I actually didn’t believe in peace right away. It took me quite a while to come to that conclusion, took me eight years, where I was very active, I was very angry, was very bitter, and I thought vengeance is the only way. I thought I had no choice. Honestly, only when I realized that regardless of what others do to you, you always have the agency and the ability to make your own choices. I was being a slave to the person who killed my brother. He killed my brother first and ruined my life second, because hate is very destructive, destructive thing.
And so, when Maoz’s parents were killed, I understood the pain he was going through. I understood that loss. I understood what it feels like to be subjected to this crazy reality that we live in, where death and killing is a reality. And I reached out and just told him that I care and love him and stand with him and that we are together into this, that it’s not Israelis versus Palestinians, that we are on the same side for justice, for equality, for dignity, and we shouldn’t be seeing it only as Israelis versus Palestinians. It’s those of us who fight for a future that is better, for a future that guarantees equality, ends the occupation, and those who don’t yet. And our message is trying to make sure that others can join us.
AMY GOODMAN: Maoz, if you can talk about what Netanyahu didn’t talk about? Yes, he brought with him, sitting next to his wife Sara, one of the hostages who the Israeli military freed. But he didn’t call for a hostage deal, as so many thousands in Israel have demanded, as hostage families demanded in the streets of Washington, D.C., this week in protest of Netanyahu’s address. Talk about what you feel needs to happen right now and how unusual or not unusual you are in this demand that the war end, that Israel’s assault on Gaza end now, as an Israeli hostage family member.
MAOZ INON: Yeah, I can definitely tell you what he has never done. He never called any of the bereaved families of October 7th, not him or not anyone from his government or his coalition. They didn’t come the shiva, the Jewish way of mourning. They didn’t send us a condolence letter or a call. They didn’t come. They didn’t show, like they didn’t show on October 7th.
Netanyahu and his government are accountable and responsible to my parents’ death. They are responsible and accountable to October 7th. And he never accepted this and took this accountability. And I was surprised and shocked from the members of the Congress that they are not forcing him to take responsibility and accountability to his failure leadership.
And this is what we came here to offer, a new vision. And Netanyahu lost the people of Israel. Before October 7th, the protests were: Should Netanyahu resign or not? But now there is a growing protest that Netanyahu — should Netanyahu resign before the war ends or after the war ends? And Netanyahu thrives and prospers on war, on bloodshed, on revenge. And we are here to say to the representatives and to the American people that Netanyahu lost the people of Israel. Seventy-two percent of the Jewish Israelis want Netanyahu to resign. Sixty-four percent of the Jewish Israelis believe in a conflict resolution that will be supported and championed by the U.S., a resolution that would lead to establishment of a Palestinian state and a normalization with the Arab world. And this is where the people of Israel are.
And we are here to say and to represent a growing movement, a peace movement, Palestinian-Israeli movement, that believes the war must end and conflict resolution must start now. We cannot wait, because the sorrow, the pain, the casualties, it’s — we cannot take it anymore. We cannot suffer more. And we deserve a better life, a normal life and a better future.
AMY GOODMAN: So, Aziz, if you could speak a little bit more about what you think could bring about this kind of peace, how at least to grow this peace movement, Israeli and Palestinian? And describe the day, which you’ve spoken about, in Jerusalem when suddenly you saw that everybody was standing still and you were the only person moving, and what that explained to you, what you saw in that moment.
AZIZ ABU SARAH: Right, yeah. So, I grew up, lived in Jerusalem all my life. And I want to just say it’s amazing how little we know about each other. I mean, I lived in East Jerusalem. Walking distance from my house is West Jerusalem. And Palestinians and Israelis really never get to meet, never get to talk to each other. And when I went to study Hebrew, I studied in West Jerusalem. It was my first interaction with Israelis and Jews who are not soldiers and who are not settlers.
And going to that classroom, there was a siren, and everybody just stood still, and I was the only person moving. Cars had stopped. People got out of the cars and just stood literally still with the siren going on. And I honestly thought this was like a sci-fi movie, a sci-fi book, like it’s just aliens controlling humans. And I ran away, because nobody would talk to me. And later, my teacher, my Hebrew teacher, explained to me that was the memorial for the Holocaust. That’s how people remember those who were killed in the Holocaust. I had no idea what she was talking about. And that’s how little we know about each other.
And honestly, this is how little we know about each other even now. I talk to people in Israel who have no idea what’s going on in Gaza, despite all the images and all the stuff on social media, actually not being able to see it. We don’t know the suffering. We don’t know the pain that is happening. And that is a key element of what keeps wars, what keeps conflicts, what keeps killing going on, because if you cannot humanize who’s on the other side, if you do not see them as normal people, you don’t see them as people with dreams, you don’t see them as people who want to live, then you don’t care if they’re alive or not. You don’t care what’s going on with them. And that’s — Martin Luther King had a saying where he says people hate each other because they don’t know each other. They don’t know each other because they are separated, because they don’t communicate.
And that’s an important element of what Maoz and I are trying to do, is saying: Don’t hear what corrupt leaders, who want to sell us this language of only through bombs, only through killing — as Netanyahu said yesterday, “If I only have a little bit more weapons, I’ll finish the job.” Don’t believe that. Instead, talk to us. He also said, “Oh, we’ll need a new generation of peaceful Palestinians.” Guess what: We are here. Peaceful Palestinians do exist. I’m here with Maoz because we are working together. We are showing what Netanyahu says is impossible. We are showing that there is an alternative to the language of bombs and to the language of killing. We are showing that we are not doomed to live in this cycle where we keep losing our loved ones. And our existence, in itself, the fact that Maoz and I together, is an answer to those who say, “Only through killing, we can achieve peace.” Well, no, that doesn’t happen. And we can see in reality where we are today, a century later, that we haven’t achieved peace through that. Israel hasn’t achieved peace with any country through war. It hasn’t achieved peace through bombs. The only peace it actually has achieved, by sitting down and saying, “OK, I’m willing to negotiate.” And that’s what Netanyahu doesn’t offer.
So, Maoz and I are showing that an alternative exists. The event you mentioned earlier, where thousands of people, Palestinians and Israelis, gathered together in Tel Aviv, saying it is time now to make a difference — we are telling people we can’t remain indifferent. We can’t remain silent. We have to come together. We have to build coalition together. We have to have values that we agree on, that equality and dignity is the most important. Safety and security for both Palestinians and Israelis is essential. We cannot leave that out 'til later, and that we can't wait anymore. It is now that peace is needed. It is now that the occupation needs to end. It’s not in 20 years. It’s not in the next generation. It must happen now.
And we need to organize. We need to organize in Israel and Palestine, and we need to organize here in the United States. As we heard before, Americans are very involved in this. They are very much part of this. And we need Americans’ not only thoughts and prayers, not only saying, “Oh, we’re not happy with Congress doing this and doing that,” and sending us tools of destruction and war machines instead of ways to come together and have peace. We need Americans to join this, because you are, Americans, we are a part of this, of what’s happening, and we are responsible and should be accountable.
AMY GOODMAN: Maoz Inon, you have said we have to go back to the overall deal that was on the table. Prisoners can play a significant role in reconciliation and peacemaking. If you can address the issue. I mean, you lost your parents in the Hamas attack on October 7th. Since that time, tens of thousands of Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military, and thousands of Palestinians imprisoned, like Aziz’s brother decades ago, but those thousands of Palestinians. Explain what you mean by “all for all.”
MAOZ INON: All for all, it’s the deal that was on the table already on October 7th evening: all the Palestinian prisoners kept in the Israeli jails in return to the all hostages that are kept by the hands of Hamas. So, this deal was on the table from day one.
And I also said earlier — I think it was in October — that the difference between Benjamin Netanyahu and his brother, Yoni, is that Yoni sacrificed his life to save the hostages in Entebbe, while Benjamin Netanyahu is sacrificing the hostages in order to save his position as the prime minister. And we must stop it. And it’s already too late for too many Palestinians, for too many Israelis.
And we are calling that, again, the only answer is peace. And the only way to bring security and safety, like Aziz said, is through equality. And those who believe that bombs will bring safety and war will bring security, they are naive, because it failed again and again. Again and again, it just brings more bloodshed, more revenge and more hate. And —
AMY GOODMAN: Israeli peace activist — we have to end now — Maoz Inon, who lost his parents on October 7th, and Palestinian peace activist Aziz Abu Sarah, who lost his brother decades ago in an Israeli prison. He came out after being tortured and died of his internal injuries. I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh. Thanks so much for joining us.
Gaza remains under assault. Day 294 of the assault in the wave that began in October. Binoy Kampmark (DISSIDENT VOICE) points out, "Bloodletting as form; murder as fashion. The ongoing campaign in Gaza by Israel’s Defence Forces continues without stalling and restriction. But the burgeoning number of corpses is starting to become a challenge for the propaganda outlets: How to justify it? Fortunately for Israel, the United States, its unqualified defender, is happy to provide cover for murder covered in the sheath of self-defence." CNN has explained, "The Gaza Strip is 'the most dangerous place' in the world to be a child, according to the executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund." ABC NEWS quotes UNICEF's December 9th statement, ""The Gaza Strip is the most dangerous place in the world to be a child. Scores of children are reportedly being killed and injured on a daily basis. Entire neighborhoods, where children used to play and go to school have been turned into stacks of rubble, with no life in them." NBC NEWS notes, "Strong majorities of all voters in the U.S. disapprove of President Joe Biden’s handling of foreign policy and the Israel-Hamas war, according to the latest national NBC News poll. The erosion is most pronounced among Democrats, a majority of whom believe Israel has gone too far in its military action in Gaza." The slaughter continues. It has displaced over 1 million people per the US Congressional Research Service. Jessica Corbett (COMMON DREAMS) points out, "Academics and legal experts around the world, including Holocaust scholars, have condemned the six-week Israeli assault of Gaza as genocide." The death toll of Palestinians in Gaza is grows higher and higher. United Nations Women noted, "More than 1.9 million people -- 85 per cent of the total population of Gaza -- have been displaced, including what UN Women estimates to be nearly 1 million women and girls. The entire population of Gaza -- roughly 2.2 million people -- are in crisis levels of acute food insecurity or worse." THE NATIONAL notes, "Gaza death toll rises to 39,145 with 90,257 wounded." Months ago, AP noted, "About 4,000 people are reported missing." February 7th, Jeremy Scahill explained on DEMOCRACY NOW! that "there’s an estimated 7,000 or 8,000 Palestinians missing, many of them in graves that are the rubble of their former home." February 5th, the United Nations' Phillipe Lazzarini Tweeted: