It’s taken me too long to get write this. I still don’t feel like I have enough information to write and I’m sure I might offend some in my posting.
On October 7th, 2023, Hamas lead a suprise attack on Israel. They launched over 3000 rockets, they sent militants into Israel and committied attrocities. There were many types of violence. In the ensuing conflict, Israel has launched a counter offensive against Gaza and Hamas.
As someone brought up Jewish, but having never been to Israel and experience any of these attrocities, my experience has been sheltered. I do not, to my knowledge, have family in Israel. I do not have a direct connection to anyone being attacked. I’m as distant as could be and still call myself Jewish. The most I’ve seen is an additional security guard at the local Synagouge patroling and keeping the space safe. There has been no direct impact on my life.
My pain comes from those who attack Israel and Judism from afar. There is pain on all sides of this conflict. As I understand it, the land that Israel occupies was at one point in the past home of Palestine. The area was given to the Jewish people in the aftermath of the Holocost. Palestinians were forced to leave their homes to provide a space for the Jews, and this was in tangible history, circa 1948.
While it is crazy to think about removing a people and giving space to another, my question concern has always been that this land was originally occupied by the Jews. At some point the past they were removed from their homes and it feels like Israel is a return to an older time. Does it hurt to be displaced, yes, but as people, we have been displaced, enslaved and worked to our deaths at least twice in history (Holocaust and Egypt) and deserve a place to exist as well.
My other concern is with Hamas. Hamas is the ruling party in Gaza. Hamas has shown time and again that they are terror organization. They are focused on killing Jews. Not the proliforation of Palestinians, not the creation of a state, but the eradication of the Jewish people. How can Palestinians in Gaza not revolt against this leadership? How can we take the Palestinians seriously if they are ruled by an organization that is so focused on the destruction of the Jewish people?
This isn’t an equal argument about being on the right side of history for me. I am not for the death of Palestinians. I’m not even for the death of all of Hamas. I’m strongly against any people looking to murder others.
It’s a little sophmoric, but I think of a movie I watched with my fraternity brothers in college.
Now, we must all fear evil men. But there is another kind of evil which we must fear most, and that is the indifference of good men.
I’d extrapolate it to people, not just men. I would also add that we must also try and adjust the pain and hurt that has come from previous attrocities as we look towards the future. There have been horrible acts on both sides. It makes it a difficult conflict to resolve. There are no easy solutions or they would have already been proposed and acted upon.
What spurred this writing was listening to these two conversations: