The Israelis Don’t Care How Many Palestinians Die for Lack of Food, just as Long as “Those Militants” Stop Firing Off Those Rockets…

Assalamu alaikum, I’d woken up to pray this morning, and had laid back down after praying and was trying to go back to sleep. NewsHour had come on on the BBC World Service, and I was listening to it, and they were talking about how Israel had pretty much blocked off all of the border crossings into Gaza, were hardly letting anyone in, and that they’d even blocked humanitarian aid, such as you know, food, water, stuff that would actually keep people alive, from getting through! Ostensibly, this was done to “punish Hamas”, but as these things go, it’s punishing the civilians more, something the Israeli government doesn’t seem to care about.

And this nonchlance toward the suffering of the Palestinian people was demonstrated by this guy they had on to represent the Israeli side,I can’t remember his name, Bender somebody or another, some attache to the Israeli Embassy or something like that. When the presentor, I think her name was Clare Bolderson, asked him, after he’d said that the borders have to be closed to protect the security of Israel and to keep “militants” from shooting rockets across the border into Israel, when she mentioned the humanitarian crisis, and that the UN had called this “barbaric”, he said “I understand, but…”. And then went right on talking about how they had to close the border crossings because of something about bombs being planted, or some other such excuses.

Translation… We don’t give a crap about the Palestinian people, they could die for all we care, ’cause we’re Jews and we’re better than they are anyway! Besides, all this land belongs to us anyway. I’m telling you, his excuses, ’cause that’s what they were, were so bad, his reasons were so flimsy, that I could almost hear the presentor smirking, almost laughing at him, she had that “you’ve really got to be kidding me” tone in her voice.

When he was going on and on about borders and security, and not even answering her question about why the Israelis were denying humanitarian aid from getting through to Gaza, she tried to get him back on message, but oh no, he didnt’ want to talk about that, and his English was horrible! “Crossing borders”, instead of “border crossings”, he kept saying “crossing borders”, and that was like nails on a chalkboard to me! Not to mention he could barely speak coherently, I’m not sure if it was because he was trying to BS his way out of having to answer the question he was being asked, or if his English was really that bad!

I just love it when you get someone like that, who’s really on the bad side of things, morally, and the presentor asks them to explain themselves, and they, well, can’t! And usually, when Israel has to explain why they bombed someone’s house and killed 19 people or so, along with a bunch of small children, or why they cut off fuel and electricity in the middle of winter, or some other such atrocity, they normally have someone more well-spoken, that doesn’t do such a horrible job as this “Bender” guy…

Anyway… it made me so angry I couldn’t get back to sleep. I mean, really, both the Palestinians and Israelis really need a change of strategy, because obviously, the so-far-deployed tactics aren’t working! Closing border crossings, cutting off food and fuel supplies hasn’t met the Israelis’ objective of “stopping militants” anymore than bombing buses, pizza parlors, and firing off rockets has helped the Palestinians’ cause.

You’d think that some forward-thinking people would sit down and say “hey, maybe we should try something different, because this isn’t working! What that “something” is, I’m not sure, but obviously, the tactics so far haven’t worked. And I’m all about fighting oppression, however, I’d think a change of strategy would be needed as suicide bombings, rockets, etc., are doing nothing more than hurting your own people! And I’m not saying that the Israelis have no part in the suffering of the Palestinians, as clearly they do, but firing those rockets into Israel is just giving Israel the excuse they want to oppress you even further, so why even go there!? Has anyone tried or thought of nonviolent forms of resistance? I’m just sayin’…