Today is Indigenous Peoples’ Day in the United States. While it is important to talk about the oppression of the indigenous people here at home, due to recent events today I’m going to focus on the indigenous peoples of Palestine.
Never in history has violence been initiated by the oppressed. How could they be the initiators, if they themselves are the result of violence? How could they be the sponsors of something whose objective inauguration called forth their existence as oppressed? There would be no oppressed had there been no prior situation of violence to establish their subjugation. - Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed
On December 15th, 2022, the United Nations reaffirmed the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, including the right to an independant state of Palestine. This was just the latest of many resolutions reaffirming this right. Here is a quote from a resolution on the Question of Palestine from 1990:
1. Calls upon all States to implement fully and faithfully all the resolutions of the United Nations regarding the exercise of the right to self-determination and independence by peoples under colonial and foreign domination;
2. Reaffirms the legitimacy of the struggle of peoples for independence, territorial integrity, national unity and liberation from colonial domination, apartheid and foreign occupation by all available means, including armed struggle;
3. Reaffirms also the inalienable right of the Namibian people, the Palestinian people and all peoples under foreign occupation and colonial domination to self-determination, national independence, territorial integrity, national unity and sovereignty without foreign interference;
4. Strongly condemns those Governments that do not recognize the right to self-determination and independence of all peoples still under colonial domination, alien subjugation and foreign occupation, notably the peoples of Africa and the Palestinian people;
5. Calls upon Israel to refrain from deporting any Palestinian civilians from the occupied Palestinian territories and to release immediately all Palestinian detainees;
6. Strongly condemns the constant and deliberate violations of the fundamental rights of the Palestinian people, as well as the expansionist activities of Israel in the Middle East, which constitute an obstacle to the achievement of self-determination and independence by the Palestinian people and a threat to peace and stability in the region;
According to the United Nations, Palestine has the right to resist Israeli occupations by all available means, including armed struggle. Yet according to United States officials, Palestine has launched an unprovoked attack on Israel. National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in an official statement, “The United States unequivocally condemns the unprovoked attacks by Hamas terrorists against Israeli civilians.” Senate Intelligence Chair Mark Warner said, “Today, Hamas terrorists launched an unprovoked and despicable attack on Israeli civilians. The United States must stand firmly beside our friend and partner Israel as it defends its security and its citizens.” The use of the term unprovoked is familiar to anyone who has followed theUkraine war. We explained why the US is to blame for the Ukraine war on Crawdads and Taters:
The same is true with Israel and Palestine - it is not the Palestinians who are to blame for the conflict. As the UN has consistently confirmed, they have every right to resist Israeli occupation. As the old saying goes, violence begets violence.
Ofer Cassif, a member of the Israeli Knesset and leftist Hadash coalition has commented on the war saying, “The Israeli government, which is a fascist government, supports, encourages, and leads pogroms against the Palestinians. There is an ethnic cleansing going on. It was obvious the writing was on the wall, written in the blood of the Palestinians – and unfortunately now Israelis as well.” Haaretz, the longest running newspaper currently in print in Israel, stated that “Netanyahu Bears Responsibility for This Israel-Gaza War.” The IfNotNowMovement, an American Jewish group against Israeli apartheid released a statement:
There can be no doubt that this recent outbreak of violence was provoked by Netanyahu’s fascist regime. DemocracyNow reported on October 5 that Israeli snipers were targeting Palestinians lower legs:
Israeli forces, including snipers, appear to be deliberately shooting at Palestinians’ legs and ankles — wounds that are extremely difficult to treat and can lead to amputations. Human rights groups also say the brutal tactic is unlawful. Recent protests in Gaza have condemned Israeli raids in the West Bank, the storming of East Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa compound by Jewish settlers and the blockade of the Gaza Strip.
These events did not occur in a vacuum. Israel has been carrying out genocide against the Palestinian people. It should not be surprising to anyone that Palestine has responded to the daily violence carried out against them. As Professor Rashid Khalidi explained on DemocracyNow today:
The idea that you can coop up 5 million people, put them behind walls, tighten the siege on them, use an eyedropper to allow them some food, some water, some electricity, that idea has exploded as a result of the horrific events of the past two-and-a-half days. This cannot continue. It’s not just a matter of occupation. We have to recognize that you cannot treat an entire people the way Israel, not just under this neofascist government, but under all of its previous governments, have treated them. You cannot expel three-quarters of a million people in 1948 and not expect the return of the repressed. You cannot commit daily violence against Palestinians — one Palestinian has died every day this year — in fact, slightly more — in the occupied West Bank. You cannot expect that not to lead to a reaction. The reaction will be violent. The reaction sometimes may include things that are unquestionably war crimes.
Though violence is not lawful, when it is offered in self-defence or for the defence of the defenceless, it is an act of bravery far better than cowardly submission. - Mahatma Ghandi, Between Cowardice and Violence
Palestinian resistance is violent, but it is in self defense. They have this right according to the United Nations and just war theory. Were not the Taino people justified in resisting their Spanish invaders? Were the people who rose up in the Warsaw Ghetto terrorists? These people were fighting in self defense against oppression just as the Palestinian people are today.
The day after meeting with Secretary of State and pawn of the military industrial complex Lloyd Austin III, Israeli Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant said:
"I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed.”
"We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly," he added.
This is genocidal rhetoric coming from Israel. Meanwhile, similar calls for genocide are coming from the United States. Senator Marco Rubio tweeted:
Israel has no choice but to seek the complete eradication of Hamas in Gaza. There simply is no diplomatic solution or “measured response” available This tragically necessary effort will come at a horrifying price. But the price of failing to permanently eliminate this group of sadistic savages is even more horrifying.
The mask is off - Democrats and Republicans have united in their support for the apartheid regime of Netanyahu in Israel. Neither wing of the corporate duopoly is anti-war. The simple fact of the matter is collective punishment as is being carried out by Israel right now is against the Geneva Convention.
Article 33 of the Geneva Conventions states:
No protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed. Collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited.
Pillage is prohibited.
Reprisals against protected persons and their property are prohibited.
The United States claims to be for the international rules based order, but those rules apparently do not include the Geneva Convention. The United States has no problem when the war crimes are being carried out by Israel or Ukraine. Suddenly the rules don’t apply. US support for Israel has been promised and is unconditional. President Biden tweeted, “I affirmed to Prime Minister Netanyahu that the United States will continue to make sure Israel has what it needs to defend itself and its people.” Israel is not defending itself or its people, it is attacking children in Gaza.
As holocaust survivor and trauma specialist Gabor Mate has said, “The disproportion of power and responsibility and oppression is so markedly on one side, that you take the worst thing you can say about Hamas, multiply it by a thousand times - and it still will not meet the Israeli repression, and killing, and dispossession of Palestinians.”
I do not get it. No matter how much a hammer it in, that most of the Jews in Israel came from Russia, Europe, or elsewhere, and that the Palestinians are the closest genetic stock to the Jews who roamed the area during Jesus time, they just do not get it. So many tell you that there was no such thing as Palestine. Where did they hear such fucking rubbish??
Right on target, thank you for this post!