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Some say Palestinians are not a people. But indigenous Palestinians, Jews (kingdoms from 1020 BCE to 70 CE), and Christians (calling themselves Jews or “The Way” until late first century) have lived for millennia in the land. It has been called by many names –Israel-Judea; Roman province Palestina, which was derived from Greek Philistia, land of the Philistines; Ottoman Empire; British Mandate Palestine, etc.
Then in the late nineteenth century Austro-Hungarian journalist and political activist Theodore Hertzl published Der Judenstaad in 1896, envisioning a Jewish homeland in Palestine (emphasis added). In 1897, he convened the first in a series of Zionist Congresses. The first mass immigration of Jews to Palestine, then the Ottoman Empire, was in 1882. The immediate provocation for the mass migration of European (Ashkenazi) Jews were the pogroms, sponsored by the tsar and other authorities, and the Okhrana (Russian secret police), and carried out largely by Cossacks and also antisemitic Christians led by Eastern Orthodox priests. There was a first pogrom (“wreak havoc” in Russian) in 1821, but the one beginning in 1881 and lasting three years and the one from 1902-1906, were much more vicious and genocidal, with mobs attacking, raping, and slaughtering Jews in 166 and 690 towns and villages, respectively. Thousands of Jews were murdered, including many children and babies, and hundreds of women were raped. In the Crusades (eight of them between 1096 and 1291), countless Jews were deliberately murdered (and Muslims, of course). Then in the European Black Death of 1347-51, when Jews followed the religious practice of washing the hands while Christians generally didn’t, Jews were blamed for poisoning the wells. By November 2, 1917, when the British Empire had all but conquered the Ottomans, Lord Arthur Balfour issued the Balfour Declaration, stating that the British government looked favorably on the establishment of a “national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine (emphasis added). Then we come to the six million Jewish victims (among others) of the Nazi Holocaust. No wonder so many got on the Zionist bandwagon. However, when British Mandate Palestine became the State of Israel in 1948, resident and emigrating Jews didn’t buy land they didn’t already own from the Arabs (Palestinians), as had been the case since the 1880s, instead the Jewish military forced 750,000 Palestinians from their homes, an event termed the Nakba (“catastrophe” in Arabic) Therefore, 2023 is the seventy fifth “anniversary” of Israeli occupation of stolen Palestinian lands. And the shrinking of Palestine continues. I condemn the 10/7/23 massacre of 400 military personnel and 800-1000 civilians by Hamas (acronym of al-Muqawamah al-’Islamiyyah, “Islamic Resistance Movement” in Arabic). But could this be a long-simmering reaction to previous events? Just consider Gaza. After Israel released the Strip from a 1967 takeover in 2005, which was 38 years of occupation, the IDF (Israel “Defense” Force, emphasis added) bombed that densely packed community in 2008/2009 for 22 days, killing 1400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis. Then there were eight days of bombing in 2012, killing 160 Palestinians and 2 Israelis; seven weeks in 2014, killing between 2,200 and 2,400 Palestinians and 73 Israelis, six of them civilians. This was after Hamas kidnaped and killed three Israeli teenagers. In 2018-2019, during the weekly Gaza border wall protests, “The Great March of Return,” Israelis killed 223 and injured 9,204 peaceful protesters, with snipers shooting people’s knees for permanent crippling injury. Israel bombed Gaza for 11 days in 2021, killing 256 and injuring 2,000, after injuring hundreds of Palestinians at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. In 2022, Israel conducted 147 airstrikes in Gaza for three days, and Palestinian militants fired 1,100 homemade rockets into Israel, 20 percent of which misfired and caused 14 of the 49 Palestinian deaths. “Israel has a right to defend itself,” many say. Yes, but according to international law, a nation that is occupied by a military power has a right to defend itself – even violently. Armed struggle is actually endorsed by the 1949 Geneva Conventions. Again, I condemn Hamas killing mostly innocent civilians. But Israel’s reaction is overkill. Might there be a financial resources factor in this equation? A very little-publicized fact is that ever since the 1990s, Israel, a resource-poor country, has been not only scheming to take over land for colonization, but also coveting – and exploiting – petroleum and natural gas (methane) rightfully owned by Palestine. New discoveries in the Levant Basin indicate about 3.45 trillion cubic meters (122t trillion cubic feet) of methane, while recoverable oil is estimated at 1.7 billion barrels. All together this is worth about $524 billion. Israel has been working with British Gas and taking Palestine’s methane reserves, with nothing reserved for the Palestinians. In the West Bank, Israel has taken control of the Meged oil and natural gas fields. Guess how much revenue goes to the colonized territories? However, Jewish and rabbinic ethics for thousands of years condemn exploitation of others’ lives and resources. Going back to Abraham, a sacred Jewish precept is welcoming the neighbor.
Israel must not only cease hostilities, but must allow Palestinians their fair share of profits from fossil fuel recovery (and creation of clean energy industries). Both go hand in hand, and both are necessary for removing triggers for conflict and creating peace. And what can we do? As always, we organize, communicate, demonstrate, and take well-planned and coordinated actions. Which is happening all over the world, including right here in the Bay Area where protesters on November 16 blocked the Bay Bridge for three hours. Sources: Theodore Hertzl, Wikipedia; Flashpoints with Dennis Bernstein, KPFA Radio 11/8, 11/10/23; Letters and Politics with Mitch Jezerich, KPFA 11/9/23; What Were Pogroms;? Hila Ratzabi, My Jewish Learning; KPFA Evening News 11/16/23; Gaza-Israel conflict, Wikipedia; Palestine’s forgotten oil and gas resources, Mahmoud Elkhafif, Al Jazeera 6/21/21. Barry Barnett is an activist and writer with works published at CounterPunch.org/ archives, Bohemian.com/archives, and at Patreon.com/BarryBarnett. |
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