|
|
|
| |
| |
Monday, July 31, 2006
America is not the light of the world and the hope of the world. The light of the world and the hope of the world is Jesus Christ. -- Rev. Gregory A. Boyd, of the Woodland Hills Church, an evangelical church that has seen 1,000 members leave because he has said "the church should steer clear of politics, give up moralizing on sexual issues, stop claiming the United States is a "Christian nation" and stop glorifying American military campaigns."
The arrest of Mel Gibson on drunk driving charges was only interesting because of what he told the officer who picked him up: "F----ing Jews" and "The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world" and, to the cop, "Are you a Jew?" You know the phrase "in vino veritas"? It means: In wine, there is truth. Or, you don't lie when you're plastered. Mel has, correctly, issued an apology for his hateful words. And an explanation: He has an alcohol problem. One thing he doesn't have: a truth problem. He told it like he thinks it is. Like a lot of people think it is. Not so much in this country as in Europe--over dinner, some titled Belgians told me the trouble with America was that "Jews own the media"--but there is enough still anti-Semitism here for Jews to worry about "Wall Street Yids" and "Jewish publishers" in case the economy tanks and someone needs somebody to blame. (And don't forget all the Jews who "didn't go to work" at the World Trade Center on the morning of 9/11.) Rehashing some of this history, Mrs. Uptown remarked: "I don't know why Jews worry so much much about Muslims--it's the Christians who are their greatest threat." As luck would have it, a few hours after the (Jewish?) press got hold of Mel's remarks, Kingdom of Heaven" was on TV. We'd skipped Ridley Scott's account of the Crusades when it was in theaters (Orlando Bloom? Who he?) but were riveted by the battle scenes on the small screen. The final assault by the Muslims was grist for some of the bloodiest action sequences ever filmed--it was mostly hand-to-hand combat with swords and axes, with blood spouting everywhere and the ground slick and red. When it was over, the landscape looked like Gettysburg: a sea of bodies. And what was all that death about? The need to have total possession of real estate sacred to two religions. Hundreds of years later, not much has changed. As Billmon reports: A high-ranking IAF officer caused a storm on Monday in an off-record briefing during which he told reporters that IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Dan Halutz had ordered the military to destroy 10 buildings in Beirut in retaliation to every Katyusha rocket strike on Haifa. Billmon's comment: "For every one of ours; ten of yours. In Roman times, it was a hundred." My pro-Israel friends shrug off this kind of revelation. They tell me, "The Arabs do worse." And so they do. But since when is the bar set by the worst offender? Is Abu Ghraib okay because at least our soldiers didn't use electric drills on their victims' eyes? As long as Israel doesn't decapitate Arab prisoners, should we speak of Israel's "mercy"? As I write, there is a scandal about Israel's most recent artrocity: a couple of dozen children dead in Lebanon, some of them all the kids in a family. The Israeli line is that Hezbollah used this apartment building to hide bombs, that the residents were warned several times. Yet, oddly, no one seems to have left. The repoorts suggest that residents felt safe moving to lower floors. And so the bombs killed them as they slept. Zionists who froth at the mouth--I'm thinking of Alan Dershowitz--say this is all Hezbollah's fault for using civilians as shields. Even if you agree, so what? People who bomb kids get hated for it, period. As even Israel should know. You want to create sympathy for people you call terrorists? Kill kids. Works every time. (Of course, it is disingenous to argue that civilians are not the target of modern wars? They are. In fact, as Chris Hedges argues in " War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning," killing civilians is the entire object of modern war strategists.) The only pleasing moment for me was the look on Condi Rice's face when she was disinvited by the Lebanese government from her scheduled drop-in. All that neo-con theory was supposed to work! But here she was--in real time, with the world watching--being handed her hat. Worse for poor Condi, she has to be aware that this Israel-Hezbollah mess is starting to look like a Xerox of Iraq: Everyone but Tony Blair hates the United States. This was probably inevitable, as our strategy here was as flawed as our strategy there. We are checkers players who have been forced to play chess--we don't grasp the game is won by thinking ahead by several moves and on several levels. Pakistan: we're selling them more atomic material (why?) so that if they topple their dictator they can move other atomic material to anti-Israel groups. Iran: We've strengthened the hardline right. And Lebanon: we've pounded and weakened the area's one democracy for its failure to control Hezbollah (like we do such a great job containing the Mafia). And turning Israel into our Middle East sock puppet--a role Israel was happy to play, just to get all that military hardware--was nothing short of idiotic. Let me say it again: I have no affection for Hezbollah. But my affinity for Israel is dwindling fast. Yes, many of its enemies have wanted you dead. Now more do. And now a cease fire will look like a defeat for Israel--which it will be. But the alternative would be no better: Israel continuing on this rampage with nothing to show for it but the bodies of dead children. Is there worse PR possible? Maybe there's no solution here. Maybe all sides are so far gone that no one can see a generation or two down the line and propose something better than endless war. Maybe these people--on all sides--have so much invested in being right that they prefer war to compromise. My friends ask: So, Mr. Smartie, what would you do? I say: establish a Palestinian state. They say: And that would change the hatred in Arab hearts? I say: Not right away. But all I know is, when you've got a house and your kids can play outside without fear and there's enough food and water, it's harder to get upset about Other People. (As proved by our countrymen daily: fat, dumb and happy, in the main.)
Monday, July 24, 2006
No one [back home] had the vaguest idea what we were in for. The wisest were just the poor and simple people. They knew the war to be a misfortune, whereas those who were better off, and should have been able to see more clearly what the consequences would be, were beside themselves with joy. -- All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque
My dear friend Sally Swift--you can read her at DailySally.com--was visiting her family in Israel when the war started. (If it looks like a war, sounds like a war and kills like a war, we might as well call it a war, don't you think?) There was no news on her blog, so I emailed her: "Are you home? Are you safe? Am I the only Jew who is sick of Israel?" With that, we began an exchange that is, I'll bet, a rarity among American Jews-- two comrades on opposite sides of the hottest-button issue around having a civil debate. After a while, the thought occurred to both of us: Let's share this. So…here goes (because, as the Sufis say, "The guest is God," Sally gets the last word): SALLY (7/13): Home now. Learned the news on layover in Frankfort today. Was unaffected and largely unaware. Will address your question tomorrow. The next day, Sally blogged on the Israel/Hezbollah conflict. In that piece, she wrote: "What's the Foreign Fear Factor? It's the overreaction of those abroad and in America to any news of death and destruction anywhere in Israel." JESSE (7/14): I'm confused. "Overreaction?" Is the front page stuff on today's NYT overreaction? And about the death and destruction in Gaza some weeks ago? I quoted Steve Clemons at The Washington Note, who condemned the kidnapping of an Israel soldier--as well as "the disproportionate force that Israel has unleashed in response to this provocation." SALLY (7/16): I wasn't making a political statement, but a personal one. I was saying that whenever bombs go off anywhere in Israel, those at home think all Israelis and tourists throughout the country are in immediate danger--when in fact most are geographically removed from real peril, especially true of our family there. As to the political debate, I'm working on a piece now…. JESSE (7/17): sends preview of last week's blog, " Bummer in the Summer," in which I argued that Israel cares nothing about the Arab children it's killing with its indiscriminate bombing. SALLY (7/18) answers me first on her blog: My friend Swami posits, "My Zionist friends like to say that every Arab hates Israel and wants every Jew dead. I've never bought this line. In my--granted--limited experience, most people want to be left alone to muddle through life with their loved ones nearby. Nobody I know wants to kill a neighbor's child before the neighbors throw bombs into nurseries."Oh Swami, it's far more complex than that. Yes, most people want to be left alone ... individually. But collectively, it's a different story. A society of people worn down by conflict and poverty and displacement, then spoon-fed images of an evil scapegoat and uplifted by promises of milk and honey in return for rage will respond in kind. How could they not? Those people don't live in a vacuum. They live in communities, they talk to each other. Tell tales. Promote urban legends. Share outrage. Pass on to each new generation a legacy of centuries-old distrust and animus. SALLY (7/20), emails me: Sadly, we are worlds apart on this one. Do you honestly believe Israel is deliberately killing children to incite a response of blind rage? Wow. Is Israel engaged in calculated over-reaction? Yes. But tell me, what would you do to protect your own children? And when was the last time your mother strapped a bomb to her body in furtherance of a fanatical political cause? Last week after the family wedding in Israel we attended seven nights of "Sheva Brouchas"--seven blessings for a happy union--hosted by friends and family. For the Sheva Broucha that fell on Shabbos we stayed in the bride's home town of Betar on the other side of the Green Line, butting up against the Arab village of Bitar. The entrance to Betar is protected by Israeli military security gates, but the homes in the two towns are separated by only a shallow ravine. One Arab custom to celebrate a wedding is to light fireworks ...our religious family can't light anything on the Sabbath, but their Arab neighbors lit spectacular fireworks to honor the Jewish bride and groom... the bride, if you read my earlier piece, lost her father in a Jerusalem bus bombing 2 years ago. So when you talk about people wanting to be left alone to live their lives--there's your answer. But of course, Hamas and Hezbollah don't hang out in Betar... Back to my question: Do you really believe Israel is deliberately killing children? JESSE (7/21): I think Israelis believe an Israeli life is worth 2 Arab lives. I believe Israel is careless in its targeting, on the theory that Hezbollah hides bombs/rockets in civilian homes. I do not believe Lebanese uniformly hated Israel before. I believe Israel is teaching them to do that now. So, to answer: I don't think Israel cares very much about Arab kids, SALLY (7/21): But Hezbollah does hide bombs/rockets in civilian homes. If not in, then near--that's a time-honored terrorist custom. As for Israel teaching Arabs to hate them... Israel doesn't have to teach them, their leaders do that. And what about Haifa? Netanya? Ma'alot? Who should Israelis hate for the Katyushas pounding those and other cities? JESSE (7/21) I just got an "open letter" from an old friend who has become a rabid Zionist. She believes EVERY Arab wants EVERY Jew dead. I don't think you believe that. SALLY (7/21): No, of course I don't. And of course all Arabs don't want all Jews dead--but the terrorist leaders who claim to speak for them act as if they do. It's bad PR turned inward, corrupting their own. JESSE (7/21) I sent Sally a New York Times piece about an Israeli helicopter launching a missile on a truck that was following Israeli instructions to evacuate. A man, his wife and six children died. If this isn't a war crime, I asked, what is? SALLY (7/21): Gruesome... horrendous... Shall I send stories of equally barbaric acts perpetrated by Arabs on innocent Israelis? A quote from a survivor's mouth in the NYT piece: "The Israelis can't understand that we are people, too. Should they wonder why so many of us support the resistance?" Well, if they support Hezbollah, it follows logically they do want Israel destroyed... How could the Israelis know for sure that truck wasn't carrying bombs? And what if it was? Hardly unprecedented. The cycle is unendingly vicious... How many times today and throughout history have Jews (and Blacks) said "(fill-in-the-blank) can't understand that we are people too"? These are ALL war crimes, I don't excuse ANY of them... but why do we hold Israel to a higher standard than even our own country can claim? I'll say this again (and I'm in good company with the New York Times editorial board): Israel has reached a decision to send terrorist groups and the governments supporting them a clear message by acting forcefully when all else has failed and will continue to fail. Much as I disagree with virtually all Bush policies (and believe he doesn't comprehend most of our foreign policy), I am heartened by America's support for Israel. This quote from John Bolton is especially on point, "I want someone to address the problem (of) how you get a cease-fire with a terrorist organization." JESSE (7/23): A lot seems to depend of what you read and watch. In this country, Fox had Ann Coulter and a clown of a private detective named Bo Dietl on as military experts. They applauded Israel--but then, apart from the usual progressive bloggers on the Web, who doesn't? The Israelis seem to have declared war on Lebanon; no one here notices, no one asks why, no one speaks out against yet another pre-emptive invasion in the Middle East. In Europe, it's the reverse: Everyone condemns America. Even some of Tony Blair's key advisers condemn the US/Israel assault on Lebanon. As for the French, the Germans: no way they're signing up for any more US-led coalitions. In Lebanon, according to some accounts, Israel has been blowing up TV stations and communications transmitters, both to keep the population in the dark and to prevent images from getting out I'm reminded of the "secret bombing" of Cambodia thirty-five years ago. Yeah, it was a secret--from Americans. The Cambodians, in contrast, saw the bombs falling. It was no secret from them. Although I do not have information that satisfies me, I fall back on one truth. So far, Bush and his advisers have been wrong about every single thing in this region. They let Osama slip through their fingers at Tora Bora. They've made Iraqis nostalgic for Saddam. And now this fervor to cheer Israel on before we call for a cease fire. When someone has been as wrong as often as Bush, it would be a miracle if he actually got this one right. I don't believe in miracles where this idiot is concerned. At the end of the day, what Bush sees as a worthy crusade must be viewed through a skeptic's lens--as a slaughter house where far too much of the blood is on Israel's hands. SALLY (7/23): Jesse, you promised me the last word, so here goes. I think Bush and his handlers have stumbled on the Right Thing for the Wrong Reasons. Bush doesn't see this war as a worthy crusade, but as a way out of his own man-made doghouse at a lesser people's expense. Ask yourself just three questions about America, Israel and the Middle East: Question: Does Israel have a right to defend itself? Answer: Yes. The US had the same right after 9/11. But we went after the wrong targets. For bogus political reasons. And we still haven't found or routed the real bad guys. Israel historically does not make those mistakes--at least not all at once. Question: Is Israel currently overreacting to real and perceived threats? Answer: Maybe. The threats are real now and have been real enough in the past. Imagine how much greater the danger would become--to America and the world--if Hezbollah and Hamas were allowed to continue to grow unchecked, underwritten by Syria and Iran. Which America has been unwilling and unable to stop. The Jackpot Question: Why is the Bush government supporting Israel in this conflict? Answer: Let the Jews do the dirty work of smacking down rogue Middle East governments we can't control and eliminating terrorists we can't find. Let them put their soldiers in harm's way and bomb the hell out of the Middle East for a change. Let them take the blame now--and especially later, if the plan fails. Bonus answer: Takes the war in Iraq off the front pages. At the end of the day, as seen through my lens, while there is certainly blood on Israel's hands, far more blood drips from the hands of the Middle Eastern countries that shelter and support terrorist groups and the rabid, hateful causes--especially genocide--they espouse. They MUST be stopped. And the process will never be pretty. Let's face it, my friend, when it comes to the Middle East, nobody's hands are clean.
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
"For a long time his [Edward FitzGerald, translator of "Omar Khayyam"] attendance at church had been little more polite observance of social custom, but now he ceased going almost completely. The rector called on him: 'I am sorry, Mr. FitzGerald, that I never see you at church.' FitzGerald replied: 'A man has not come to my years without thinking much on these things. I believe I may say I have reflected on them fully. You need not repeat this visit.' " -- The New Oxford Book of Literary Anecdotes
The Mideast is going to get worse before it gets better. Didn't have to be this way. An American president who held the moral high ground might be able to leverage his authority to cool things off on all sides. Bush not only doesn't have it, he doesn't want it. Indeed, at the G-8, his big urgency was to get the hell outta Dodge. He had things to do at home, he said--gotta fix that bike chain. It's clear now: Bush wants to be President as little as we want him to be. (Except, of course, for all the people who were turned off by Kerry's wife or that windsurfing photo and decided that an idiot bully made more sense in the Oval Office.) His take on the crisis: "I feel like telling Kofi to get on the phone with Assad and make something happen." Right. Make it the responsibility of the U.N.--which John Bolton is crippling in every possible way--and Syria’s president. “See, the irony is that what they need to do is get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this shit and it’s over,” Mr. Bush said. It's always "they," isn't it? From The Guardian: "Anyone who understands anything about this country knows the government is powerless to stop Hizbullah. With that information at hand, one wonders why the Israeli government is taking these actions. What do they hope to achieve, except the destruction, wholesale, of a country's economy and life-line again? Imagine France bombing Heathrow, Gatwick, Tower Bridge, London Bridge, the M1 and M25, as well as strategic locations in the north in order to force Tony Blair to control those Al-Qaeda elements that operate from London. That is what is happening here." I've said it before and I'll say it again: Nothing we have done in this region has been more useless than the blank check--the $3-4 billion blank check--we give Israel every year. Israel now has fantastic military resources; its adversaries have much less. Nonetheless, enough damage has been done to Israel for it to justify hitting the Arabs with massive firepower. The results are grotesquely disproportionate. Arab casualties are comparatively massive--or is it that Israel's precision bombs just happened to stray into civilian areas? U.S. Ambassador John Bolton has said there's no moral equivalence between the civilian casualties from the Israeli raids in Lebanon and those killed in "malicious terrorist acts" in Israel. Big surprise--we never say a word against Israel. (It's soooo important for the Jews to hold Jerusalem when The Rapture comes.) The result is one of Israel's famed "we are fighting for our very lives" campaigns. Which only Americans really believe. My Zionist friends like to say that every Arab hates Israel and wants every Jew dead. I've never bought this line. In my--granted--limited experience, most people want to be left alone to muddle through life with their loved ones nearby. Nobody I know wants to kill a neighbor's child. Until, that is, the neighbors throw bombs into nurseries. But there are Jews--many, I suspect--who believe otherwise. And, by now, there must be many Arabs who believe the Jews want them dead. The line got crossed--who remembers when?--the first time the targets were civilian. And, especially, children. Don't give me that crap about bombs going awry. It's brilliant strategy to kill kids. That kind of murder at once depresses and enrages the enemy--and makes him react with the kind of blind rage that is never productive. In my Sunday school days, I planted trees in Israel. How long ago that seems. Now I am as ashamed of "my" people as Arabs ought to be of Hezbollah. I can't believe I'm saying this, but in the absence of sanity, a cease-fire or a sign from God....a plague on all their houses.
Dare you to read this piece from the Times of London? The assessment here? Shia and Sunni death squads roam Bagdhad at night, knocking on doors on the hunt for fresh victims. The US military does nothing to stop them: "It's like chasing ghosts." Civil war? Oh, we wish it were only that. More like "total breakdown."
What do Americans want from network news? Katie Couric has criss-crossed America, talking to folks just like you and me, and she thinks she has a clue: "They [Americans] want more perspective, more stories put in historical context. They want us to go a little bit deeper. We also heard that the news is too depressing. Obviously, we can't sugarcoat [things], but we can be more solution-oriented." Hmm. Solutions. This could be interesting. But wait....aren't solutions ...political? Like global warming. What's a solution that doesn't involve forced conservation, new mileage rules for car manufacturers and a harsh look at our relationship to the Saudis? Yeah, that's gonna fly on CBS --- for about a day.
Monday, July 10, 2006
But if the cause be not Just, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at such a place;' some swearing, some crying for a surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left. I am afeard there are few die well that die in a battle; for how can they charitably dispose of any thing, when blood is their argument? Now, if these men do not die well, it will be a black matter for the king that led them to it.
--Shakespeare, "Henry V," Act IV, Scene 1
The Uptowns spent the last three weeks in Aspen. The Little One went to her first camp, Mrs. U hiked hundreds of miles of mountain trails, I wrote. And, last week, I co-hosted Plum TV's coverage of the The Aspen Ideas Festival. Aspen is $6 million houses with "pilot's quarters" and hotels with a "ski valet" and Prada/Dior/St. Laurent, but it's also a place of great natural beauty. And nothing is more pristine than the Maroon Bells, giant peaks that reach 14,000 feet. There's a lake at their base. And great hiking trails. You have to be an idiot--or infirm--to come to Aspen in warm weather and not hike here. So we went. I'd acclimated to the height. Or so I thought...but at 11,000+ feet, you don't walk easily. There are fields of "scree"--loose, rocky debris--that make walking difficult. You pick your way up the trail like a smart horse, paying total attention to every step. Every once in a while--or more often, if you're me--you stop. You gasp for air like a hunched-over basketball player during a time-out. And you look up. And around. The most important event in this place occurred maybe 300 million years ago. And no humans were involved. The force that was--for ease of use, I'll call it "God." Because another force is even more beyond my understanding. It's not just the height and the clarity of the sky and the way the clouds nestle around the peaks. It's the shades of green, the distant pine trees looking like the tiny toy trees that come with model train sets, the absolute majesty of nature. And then there's the human factor. These mountains are called "the Deadly Bells" for a reason. As a warning sign indicates, the snow is "poorly consolidated" and avalanches can occur without warning. Experience is no help in that case. All you can do is try to make it to clumps of mature trees and hope they're equal to the assault. God the magnificent. God the destroyer. Man in the middle. I got that clearly at the Bells. So if you ask me about the Festival, I'd say: "A great experience. You ought to consider going." Ask me about the Bells? No contest, they're an absolute must.
Guy standing on train tracks. Train slowly approaching behind him. "I don't have to worry about global warming," he says. And steps off the tracks, leaving behind his terrified daughter.
Nicholas Kristof, in his latest New York Times column (subscription required), writes again about the genocide in Darfur: "The Darfur Peace Agreement, signed on May 5, signaled a ray of hope in a desperate land. But on the ground, its deadlines are not being met, security is deteriorating, and the violence is rippling from Sudan ever wider into both Chad and the Central African Republic." "One measure of how awful the situation has become in eastern Chad is that at least 15,000 villagers have fled ... into Darfur!" "In one broad swath of the Chad border region, the only Westerners brave enough (and crazy enough) to stay are French doctors with Doctors Without Borders. Hats off to them." Those doctors and nurses are unspeakably brave. Yes, there are plenty of Americans who need our help. But if you're thinking globally.... Doctors Without Borders.
Monday, July 03, 2006
You think that their
dying is the worst
thing that could happen. Then they stay dead. --Donald Hall, our newly appointed Poet Laureate
Perhaps you have seen The New York Times article about the death of one soldier in Iraq. His name was Sgt. Terry Michael Lisk. He was 26, from Zion, Illinois. His death was meaningless to the men who had sent him to the desert to risk his life for no reason anyone outside the administration believes is true, but it was meaningful to those who served with him. And, as the article attests, they paid him the last full measure of respect. Death has that effect, when you're close up. Only presidential speechwriters and munitions manufacturers believe that anyone "wins" a war. The cost is so high and the scars are so deep that "victory" is a non-start as a concept. That is why any politician mouthing large about Terry Lisk's "sacrifice" is so nauseating--what does a guy on lease to a lobbyist know about primal emotions, about flying bullets and screaming children, about the shock of a fatal wound? Military men know, and military men have had enough of it. They tell Jack Murtha that this war is a disgrace, and, hero that he is, he shouts this news so loudly that the Ann Coulters of the world wish him dead. Gen. George Casey Jr.--commander of American forces in Iraq--must suspect it, for although there are no signs that the Iraq army is standing up, he is drafting a plan for real troop reductions. And the generals at the Pentagon know it, for they are trying to stop the bloodthirsty Vice President and the idiot Secretary of Defense--and, I almost forgot, their mouthpiece, the President some of you voted for--from bombing Iran. Isn't that amazing? The military men don't want to fight. And they want not to fight so badly they have thrust themselves into backstage Administration politics, in a desperate attempt to avoid getting orders they dare not disobey. "Cut and run" cowards? In the Pentagon? Now that's a story. Seymour Hersh reports it in The New Yorker. You can be sure the administration will find some way to distract you from this news. With luck, maybe someone will pick up on the hate that's being spewed against journalists and--in the land of the brave, home of the free--cap some editor who crossed the White House. And then won't we all feel more free? A country is a good idea when it provides basic services for its citizens, protects the environment, and leaves people free to find their personal destinies. Our government, having failed the first two, is working on the third. So too bad about Terry Lisk. Too bad about the 2,500 others, and the Iraqi children, and the Iraqi men with their hands bound and their eyes drilled out. And, on our birthday, too bad about us too.
The kidnapping of an Israeli soldier, 18-year-old Cpl. Gilad Shalit, has led to one of those Israeli reactions that makes Fox News cheer. They took our boy; we blasted them. And will until we get him back. The problem is that the poor people being bombed in Gaza almost certainly do not have Shalit. But they are ideal to be punished for this kidnapping, if only to signal Hamas that Israel means business. Which is just the problem. Israel seems to know nothing of proportionality. James Wolcott directs us toVirginia Tilley's piece: "...on Wednesday, Israeli war planes repeatedly bombed and utterly demolished Gaza's only power plant. About 700,000 of Gaza's 1.3 million people now have no electricity, and word is that power cannot be restored for six months." "It is not the immediate human conditions created by this strike that are monumental. Those conditions are, of course, bad enough. No lights, no refrigerators, no fans through the suffocating Gaza summer heat. No going outside for air, due to ongoing bombing and Israel's impending military assault. In the hot darkness, massive explosions shake the cities, close and far, while repeated sonic booms are doubtless wreaking the havoc they have wrought before: smashing windows, sending children screaming into the arms of terrified adults, old people collapsing with heart failure, pregnant women collapsing with spontaneous abortions. Mass terror, despair, desperate hoarding of food and water. And no radios, television, cell phones, or laptops (for the few who have them), and so no way to get news of how long this nightmare might go on." "But this time, the situation is worse than that. As food in the refrigerators spoils, the only remaining food is grains. Most people cook with gas, but with the borders sealed, soon there will be no gas. When family-kitchen propane tanks run out, there will be no cooking. No cooked lentils or beans, no humus, no bread--the staples of Palestinian foods, the only food for the poor. (And there is no firewood or coal in dry, overcrowded Gaza.)" "And yet, even all this misery is overshadowed by a grimmer fact: no water. Gaza's public water supply is pumped by electricity. The taps, too, are dry. No sewage system. And again, word is that the electricity is out for at least six months." "The Gaza aquifer is already contaminated with sea water and sewage, due to over-pumping (partly by those now-abandoned Israeli settlements) and the grossly inadequate sewage system. To be drinkable, well water is purified through machinery run by electricity. Otherwise, the brackish water must at least be boiled before it can be consumed, but this requires electricity or gas. And people will soon have neither." "Drinking unpurified water means sickness, even cholera. If cholera breaks out, it will spread like wildfire in a population so densely packed and lacking fuel or water for sanitation. And the hospitals and clinics aren't functioning, either, because there is no electricity." On Sunday, Israel allowed supplies into Gaza. Not enough, and not to the point--what are these people supposed to do about electricity and water next week? How will they sleep with sonic booms blasting overhead all night? I understand that Israel is a sacred cause among many of my fellow Jews. And I know that some of them excuse atrocities like this on the theory that "They want to kill us all." Well, if a million or so people didn't want to kill Israelis before, they surely do now. This is progress?
|
|
|
|
|
|
Home
