I’m not a ‘self hating Jew’, I just hate (more like pity) my fellow brethren and sisters who continue to follow a blind path of pro-Israel dogmatic untruths. But worse than that is the unavoidable feeling that many of my fellow Jews believe that a Jewish life is quite simply worth more than a Palestinian life. I just cannot subscribe to this way of thinking. This must be underlying their unequivocal belief that Israel’s actions are always justifiable no matter what and that the Palestinians are getting what they deserve as they are pummeled and bombarded by Israeli air and ground forces.Am I speaking of all Jews? No. I will label them MAINSTREAM JEWS as I feel this accurately describes their social and cultural position as well as referring to their endless source of limited news and information – the mainstream press.
If it’s true that our beliefs are guided by what information we choose to absorb, this explains much about why mainstream Jews believe what they believe. But there’s also a deeper wound which strikes at the heart of this. So much of the mainstream Jewish slant on Israel is tied up with the murder of six million of our grandfathers and grandmothers. The idea that never again can we allow ourselves to be the victims.
But here’s a news flash, I’m the son of two Holocaust survivors who met as teenagers and fell in love whilst they were prisoners in a concentration camp. All four of my grandparents were murdered by the Nazis (and countless other relatives). I spent my primary and secondary school years at a Jewish school where the history books taught us a very particular version of the history of the state of Israel. In the decades since, I have opened up to be informed by other perspectives of this history and now I cannot turn back. If I (with my family history) can open up to seeing this conflict differently, any mainstream Jew can too. They just have to WANT to and for some reason that seems to be a mighty large leap. It helps too that my motivation to seek out alternate perspectives and sources of information is deeply rooted in a humane outlook rather than a perverted hierarchy of human life and a stale, outdated moral high ground.
If Jews can find a way to defend and justify the intentional bombing of hospitals and UN schools/shelters in Gaza then I’m losing faith rapidly in any hope whatsoever for a rational humane perspective to emerge. And it only solidifies my earlier theory that there is some twisted notion of Jewish lives being more valuable than Palestinian ones.And no, that doesn’t mean I’m justifying Hamas sending rockets into Israel. Why would I attack one group for intentionally bombing a hospital but support another for indiscriminately trying to kill civilians!?
Murder is murder. War crimes are war crimes. It’s incredible how mainstream Jews cry out that the media has an anti IsraeI bias when in reality, the Palestinian voice is barely represented at all. Just watch this if you need some clarification:
http://youtu.be/JS9nah3cpU8?list=UUzuqE7-t13O4NIDYJfakrhw
I pray for the truth, the detailed truth to become headlines in the mainstream press. Pathetically though, I really doubt even that would change the thinking of the mainstream Jews. They’d probably claim it was just more anti-Israel bias. I have more faith in the Israeli government changing its thinking than the stubborn, blind made-up minds of mainstream Jews.
1 comment:
Well said!
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