The world of October 6

AJV remarks to the October 6 Pōneke / Wellington event: Past, Present, Future

Kia ora koutou,

I whakakaupapa māua ko Fred Albert i te rōpū Alternative Jewish Voices

Ko Marilyn Garson taku ingoa.

A year ago today, four generations of Palestinians had lived under an illegal occupation. The population of Gaza had grown 29 times in the same space. How would Pōneke / Wellington feel with 6.1 million people behind a blockade wall?

Young Jews were still being told that we could live a pioneering Jewish life right next to that wall. As if confining two million Palestinians would bring their humanity into question, rather than ours.

I lived in Gaza through four of its 17 blockaded years. Driving along the back road, I could see that the land on the other side of the wall was irrigated. There were lights at night.

I used to wonder, what happens to children who grow up seeing rubble every day? How do you relate to the world, when every horizon of your world is armed? What do you dream, when an air force bombs from the sky? Who do you reach for when an army has always prevented you from driving one hour to meet your West Bank whānau?

Israeli opinion surveys approved of what they called conflict management. They no longer thought that they had a Gaza problem, but Gaza never stopped having a blockade problem. Diplomacy hadn’t had an idea for decades.

Two years ago, Israel elected a proudly fascist government. Itamar Ben Gvir was no conflict manager. He called for attack and expulsion. We heard his genocidal intentions. In the West Bank pogroms we saw them. One year ago, 2023 was the deadliest year for West Bank Palestinians.

But the world had gone numb. Palestinians knew it; Israel’s Cabinet was counting on it. Genocide always glides past the indifference.

Then the clock struck midnight. The illegal billion-dollar barrier that held the world’s greatest power disparity in place, turned out to be just a fence. The horror and the violence became a shared reality for one day. For 365 days since then, we have seen the genocidal violence of Israel’s government and military. We see the US arming and participating. Today we see them reaching into Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Iran.

We, AJV, acknowledge the history of Palestine’s pain. We hold people accountable for the illegality. These days we struggle to hold our outrage and our horror, without conceding to hatred and despair. We cling to the vision of a dignified future for all who live between the river and the sea. Our protest is our demand that we must all be loved and safe and self-determining – and free.

The International Court of Justice has instructed us, Palestine must be free.