Month: April 2025

What now? The blog has been quiet. 2025 has blown the doors off their hinges. Israel has openly, as a matter of stated government policy, starved 2.3 million people for two months while our government has looked quietly on. I have had no words for that, only mounting desperation.

The lives of powerless people outline the reality of surviving genocide. I have worked with Cambodian colleagues who hoarded rotting food in their desks in order to soothe their bodies’ memories of the wracking pain of starvation. Friends who recalled eating grass. Colleagues of stunted growth, colourblind, developmentally impaired . . . Palestinians will be accumulating these lifelong effects now.

Violence is futile, always. It can destroy bodies and things but it cannot address cause, establish co-existence or validate its users. Israel’s violence, too, will do none of those things. How many people will be allowed to die before our government says that out loud? From a population the size of Auckland and Northland, Israel has killed more people than live in Porirua or New Plymouth. New Zealanders in our tens of thousands have demanded intervention in our names.

We shouted for help through bombardment, displacement; the shattering of Gaza’s infrastructure, shelters, universities and hospitals. A century’s work to limit the harms of war has drained away through our fingers like water, as Israel sneered at the very notion of distinguishing civilians from combatants. International courts issued warrants for the arrests of Netanyahu and Galant for crimes of genocide. In vain, we expected our government to review our relations as the courts have directed.

Finally, having devastated every facet of Gazan life while the arms kept flowing in and its diplomatic standing was undisturbed, Israel’s government felt sure enough of its impunity to openly starve the survivors. Israel’s end game is underway.

Israel feels sure of our indifference. And damn it, they have been right. We, Aotearoa, have done officially nothing to disrupt starvation. Not a peep, not a tourist visa withheld or a diplomatic please-explain. That fact has broken my understanding of our governing institutions.

I have tried to work for change within the politics of the institutionally possible. Even through 2024, I continued to speak about the equal rights and dignity of human beings, because I believe it and because I believed that we are governed by people who share the cornerstone value of human life across the differences of our national politics. That cornerstone compels us to intervene when we see genocide.

I was wrong. Now we are governed by people who have not so much as cleared their throats.

So, what now? What comes after f*** you?

Martin Buber, a Jewish anarchist, wrote that protest is a demand that all people should be loved. Buber located his anarchism in the choice of means to the ends. The ends – saving life and providing what people need to live well – do not change.

We protest in front of government buildings and I have given up on the people inside those buildings. But institutions are more than buildings. Mostly, they consist of our habituated, unexamined behaviours. When you break the habits and disintermediate the institutions – when you look through the buildings – you come freshly to our choices.

Then a whole cascade of our anti-life choices comes into focus: military spending over peace, foreign policy from the lemming side of history at the expense of our planet and our place in the Blue Pacific, landlords eating children’s school lunches. One-tenth of us are indebted to social welfare institutions, serving the institutions at the expense of their own daily prospects. Write your own list.

Our deadly forfeit on Gaza is of a piece with all these. Act for Gaza as part of all this. But act. That must be the conclusion of this moment. We do not have the luxury of giving up while hunger is mounting by the hour.

When it feels futile, find the people who are not afraid. A neighbour reminded me as we huffed and puffed up a steep walking path this week, “Empathy is never futile. Hope is resistance now.” This neighbour wakes up each morning and writes an email to an MP. MPs may not reply, but they can count.

Turning up is a performance of imagination now.

Today, Palestinian women and children will bring their pots in a desperate hunt for food. Give them your voice: bang a pot in the ears of our indifferent bureaucrats.

Join the funerals of Palestinians who are being bombed, burned, starved this day. Pay your respects by shaming every last yawning member of our government.

Israel’s policy of starvation is before the World Court right now. Stand in the gallery and dare the judges to do right.

Let the doors blow off their hinges. Look freshly at the choices that weave our politics together. Attach this issue to that one. Then we are not powerless. We are merely out of power and preparing to take it back.

Kia kaha, arohanui – stand strong, in abundant love

Marilyn Garson

This letter was written by a Palestinian New Zealander who has good reason to use a pseudonym. Call him Goliath. Please share his message widely: there is so much that we can do, including those of us who might not stand on the front lines. Take the private, cumulative steps that every New Zealander can take. Our choices count, either as passive permission to continue or as effective pressure to end this nightmare.

LEST WE FORGET TO LEARN

I want to talk about something that I believe is incredibly important—not just for those involved, but for all of us: the situation in Gaza, and why it should matter to us here in New Zealand.

As a nation, we pride ourselves on fairness, on standing up for what’s right. We have taken a stand against apartheid, and against nuclear weapons.

We understand that silence in the face of injustice is complicity.

Israel’s genocide in Gaza and its broader military aggression are driving instability that reaches far beyond the Middle East. This is not just a regional issue; it’s a global one.

Here’s why you should care:

• It is the ethical and moral thing to do; plain and simple. Amnesty International investigation concludes Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.
• Aotearoa is a small remote country, and we rely heavily on imported fuel and consumer goods.
• Israel’s genocide in Gaza and its push for wider war is fuelling global instability.
• Trade routes are under threat, making goods more expensive and travel more difficult.
• The economic impact is already raising food and fuel prices, worsening our cost-of-living crisis.
• Geopolitical tensions create financial instability, which in turn causes inflation, eventually pushing interest rates up. This could make our mortgages more expensive.
• Military escalation risks involving the USA and its allies directly, just as “our allies” dragged us to war in Afghanistan, in Iraq, Vietnam, and indeed WW1 before that. All this means that New Zealand could face pressure to support military interventions, risking the lives of young Kiwis in conflicts we did not create. LEST WE FORGET TO LEARN.

I know that we have urgent issues here at home that needs our attention, but living in such a way that contributes to sustaining Israel’s apartheid regime does nothing to solve our domestic problems. In other words, these are two separate issues.  

Silence is not neutrality; it’s complicity. And it will backfire on us. We do not need to “fix” anything overseas, we just need to stop funding oppression.

Here’s what we can [and should] do with almost zero inconvenience to ourselves:

• Boycott – download the No Thanks or Boycat app to make ethical shopping choices.
• Divest – check where your Kiwisaver is invested at Mindful Money and move to an ethical fund.
• Support local & second-hand businesses – Avoid companies profiting from apartheid.
• Learn about BDS – The Palestinian-led movement to hold Israel accountable through economic pressure.
• Stay informed – follow, engage and support PSNA, Justice for Palestine, Alternative Jewish Voices, and others on social media.
• Take political action – Sign petitions, write to MPs, and participate in demonstrations.
• Share this letter with as many people as you can.

We cannot continue to ignore the fact that our lifestyle and the choices we make every day—where we shop, where our investments go, our silence—contribute to maintaining a criminal and dangerous status quo.

Thank you for taking the time to read this and for your participation.

Arohanui.

Jewish groups call for resignation or removal of Stephen Rainbow as Chief Human Rights Commissioner

In a recent meeting, Dr Rainbow made Islamophobic comments to Philippa Yasbek, spokesperson for Alternative Jewish Voices and Dayenu: Jews Against Occupation.

“Dr Rainbow asserted that the SIS threat assessment shows that Muslims pose a greater threat to the Jewish community in New Zealand than white supremacists. I was shocked that Dr Rainbow is so prejudiced that he misrepresented the SIS report to say the complete opposite of what is written in the document. The SIS report states that it should not be used to single out any ethnic community as a threat. It also says that white supremacists make up the bulk of violent extremists in Aotearoa,” says Philippa Yasbek.

“The Human Rights Commission is meant to promote human rights and racial equality, as well as encourage harmonious relations between diverse groups. Dr Rainbow’s comments in our meeting were Islamophobic and completely contrary to everything that the Human Rights Commission is supposed to stand for. He is clearly unable to perform the role of Chief Human Rights Commissioner. He should immediately resign or be removed by the Government,” says Philippa Yasbek.

The Prime Minister said in Christchurch on 15 March “Islamophobia – like all forms of hatred – has absolutely no place in New Zealand, and it is our duty to challenge it wherever it appears, whether it’s in words, policies or in the silence that allows prejudice to fester.” “I expect the Government to live up to these words. I have written to Paul Goldsmith, the Minister of Justice, asking for an independent investigation into Dr Rainbow’s fitness for the job. This is the first step to remove him from the role,” says Yasbek.

ENDS 

Text of the letter of complaint to the Minister of Justice, Paul Goldsmith, by Philippa Yasbek concerning Dr Rainbow, can be assessed here: https://ajv.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/rainbow-complaint-to-pg_redacted.pdf

Links to other stories about this issue:

https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/02-04-2025/chief-human-rights-commissioner-accused-of-islamophobia-by-jewish-groups

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/556990/chief-human-rights-commissioner-apologises-to-muslim-community

https://www.tickaroo.com/e/FPyBiaHkaQ3alXfVhttps://www.1news.co.nz/2025/04/03/stoush-between-human-rights-commissioner-and-jewish-leader/