The Israel-Gaza tragedy

Why I've been silent. Why I'm now speaking.

It's almost two and a half months since Hamas attacked Israel, killing 1,200 people and kidnapping another 240, and seven weeks since Israel started the bombing campaign in Gaza that so far has killed an estimated 18,000. It's taken me this long to put a single word on paper.

Normally I'll write about almost anything with a Jewish angle. I drafted an entire novel about Israel and the Palestinians in my 20s. I launched a blog to opine about my adult Bat Mitzvah in my 50s. I deliver several commentaries on the weekly Torah portion each year at my synagogue.

But here? I couldn't, for multiple reasons which I'll go into. Now, though, I've reached a point where my need to say something outweighs my reluctance.

Why I’ve been silent

At first it didn't register. The initial news reports of the October 7 Hamas slaughter were so unexpected, so unimaginable, that it took the better part of a week to sink in—the scale of the attack, the numbers of victims, the complete destruction of communities, the undifferentiated slaughter.

Then I felt unqualified. I'm not Israeli or Palestinian; I haven't had to hide for my life in bomb shelters or suffer through humiliating, dangerous border checkpoints. I didn't have relatives killed or captured as hostages. My Israeli friends were experiencing a level of grief and fear that was so much more immediate and all-encompassing than my view from distant, safe California. I was not confident in my ability to grasp and bring insight to the situation.

Then I felt redundant. There are dozens—hundreds?—of experts opining every day on this thing, the Tom Friedmans and Yossi Kleins and Rashid Khalidis of the world. They have PhDs, they've spent decades studying the Middle East, they've taken part in peace talks and served in government posts. They all know more than I do. And even they seem useless. I'm sick to death of pundits blathering on with abstract analyses and ideal solutions in this far-from-ideal conflict; the world didn't need yet another opinion from me.

Then it was all too fluid. Whatever I felt one day shifted by the next day. It shifted with the latest news; it shifted with the most recent person I was listening to or arguing with. How could I write something when I knew I would feel differently in ten or twenty hours?

I’ve felt somewhat guilty about my silence. But as I think about it: Sometimes silence isn't bad.

This may sound strange coming from a writer, and from a political culture that often says silence = complicity or silence = death, but in fact sometimes it is better to be silent.

Silent so you can listen to others. Silent so you can learn. Silent so your inner self can have time to work out what you think and feel.

Here in the U.S. we are in a maelstrom of shouting. Protestors shouting down city councils, college students shouting down their fellow students, baristas shouting down their customers, congresspeople shouting down university presidents.

Not all of the shouting is done with vocal cords—some is done online and some with graffiti, some with congressional hearings and some with guns—but it is shouting nonetheless. It is aimed at silencing those who disagree.

What we need is listening—listening to the other. The history of Israel and Palestine is complex. There are victims and victimizers on both sides, even if Israel currently has vastly greater power. There are hawks and doves on both sides, zealots who would commit mass murder for their cause and parents who want nothing more than to raise their children in peace. Reducing this conflict to slogans and self-righteous shouting doesn't help anyone.

So perhaps the silence that comes from humility, and a desire to learn, is not a bad thing.

Up to a point….

If I were queen

Here's what I would have done if I were Queen of Israel on October 7th:

1.     Immediately secure the border with Gaza.

2.     Negotiate for return of the hostages, using international outrage at the attack to put pressure on Hamas.

3.     Once the hostages are home (or negotiations hit a dead end), carry out targeted military operations against Hamas's leadership and military infrastructure to ensure they cannot carry out this kind of attack again. Note the word "targeted," which means minimizing civilian casualties.

4.     As quickly as the situation permits, revive a negotiating process to create a Palestinian state alongside Israel, both of them stable and secure.

But we all know I am not Queen of Israel. I am not an experienced military general; I am not an elected leader who must respond to a traumatized and furious public; nor am I an unpopular prime minister under indictment who will do anything to keep himself in office and out of jail.

So we're left with what really happened over the past two months, which is that Israel has conducted massive bombings that have killed an estimated 18,000 Palestinians and displaced an estimated 1.7 million. (Those numbers come from the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry and may very well be exaggerated, but even if they are wrong by 20 or 30 percent, it is still A LOT.)

Early in the war, Israelis tried to convey the horror of the massacre by converting the death toll into comparable American numbers. The U.S. has a population of 332 million; Israel has 9.4 million. So:

• 1.200 Israelis killed in a single day was the equivalent of 42,300 Americans killed—as much as fourteen World Trade Center attacks.

• 240 hostages in Israel were the equivalent of 8,500 people being kidnapped and held hostage in the U.S.

Truly horrific. Now let's look at the Palestinian numbers, with 2 million residents of Gaza, that same way:

• 18,000 Palestinians killed in Gaza is the equivalent of three million Americans dying in bombings over a two-month period. That’s the same as 1,000 World Trade Centers.

• 1.7 million Gazans displaced from their homes is the equivalent of 282 million Americans being displaced—as if all of America's large cities were suddenly uninhabitable, their residents made into refugees.

The suffering of Palestinian civilians is immense, and the world’s sympathy is justified. But for those of us who care about Israel, there are additional costs to the bombing:

Each additional death creates another Palestinian family with a very personal reason to hate Israel, and makes permanent peaceful coexistence even harder to reach.

Each additional death devalues the Israeli hostages and victims. At first, 1,200 Israeli dead and 240 hostages seemed like a shocking outrage. But the bombing makes Hamas’s atrocities seem puny. It’s hard to ask the non-Jewish world to worry about the 150 remaining hostages when over 10,000 Palestinians have been killed, with hundreds more being killed each day. 

Each additional day of bombings pushes world opinion further away from Israel.

I feel myself being pushed away too. For many weeks, I deferred to the Israeli government's resistance to a ceasefire. A people who have been attacked have the right to defend themselves; imposing a ceasefire right after the Hamas massacre would have left the aggressors unimpeded. It would have been like calling for a U.S.-Japan ceasefire a few days after Pearl Harbor.

But as one would say in Hebrew: dai. Enough. Over 10,000 dead civilians, including children? There has got to be a better way.

Israel manages to assassinate Iranian nuclear scientists in the middle of the day in their own country. It's conducted hostage-freeing operations under seemingly insurmountable circumstances and is home to some of the most advanced high-tech companies in the world. If the goal is eliminating Hamas's leadership, Israel should be able to figure out how to do that without leveling entire neighborhoods. Even with Hamas callously using Gaza's residents as human shields, Israel should be able to neutralize their tunnels without such a gargantuan human toll. It would take time and patience, but it should be possible.

So yes, now that I'm writing about this, I need to write:

Ceasefire now. Stop the killing.

And yet….

Why I won’t go to rallies

I won't go to pro-Palestinian rallies.

I support creation of a Palestinian state, I oppose Israel's occupation of the West Bank, I have lived with a broken heart for decades as a people—my people—who were oppressed for centuries gradually donned the clothes of the oppressor.

But the pro-Palestinian rallies—at least in their current configuration—appall me. A complicated issue gets reduced to slogans. Many of those slogans and banners such as "From the river to the sea" call for elimination of the state of Israel.

(Yes, I know that slogan means different things to different people. And that many of the young Americans chanting it don't even know what river or what sea it refers to. But the message conveyed to the observing world is obvious and cannot be denied in good faith — a call to establish Palestine as one state, from the Jordan to the Mediterranean. Which doesn't leave any room for Israel and its 9 million residents.)

This conflict is complicated. There are two peoples, both with survival needs and self-determination needs and past traumas. Each of those peoples is also complicated within itself, with religious zealots and secular folks, leaders who are rigid and those who will compromise, advocates for democracy and corrupt authoritarians.

Both of those peoples exist. Neither is going anywhere and neither can be "wished away" by rhetoric or historical arguing or violence.  Both have a valid claim to this land.

I refuse to support an agenda that values one people at the expense of the other. I won't go to pro-Israel rallies at this point because I don't want my presence to be taken as support for the mass bombing, the right-wing Netanyahu government, and the status quo of occupation. And I won't go to pro-Palestine rallies because of the anti-Zionist messaging, the refusal to acknowledge that Israelis have an equal right to self-determination, and the lack of criticism of Hamas terror.

Here's what I would like to see and take part in:

Massive rallies around the world of people carrying both Israeli and Palestinian flags. With posters saying "Two states now," or "No bombing, no terror," or "Enough war, time to negotiate."

College students organizing teach-ins where each side shares its history and its narrative, where genuine listening and learning takes place.

Worldwide effort to promote the peacemakers on both sides—to highlight, fund, and protect organizations and leaders who are committed to securing the rights of both peoples.

I'm not going to propose details of a solution—two states, or a confederation with open borders, or some other model—because if there is the will on both sides, those details can be figured out by the experts. The problem isn’t the details but the lack of will, and a lack of visionary, courageous leadership on both sides.

Self-righteousness and sloganeering don't help. Arguing over "who was here first" or "who is the most oppressed" or "who screwed up the last set of peace talks" doesn't help.

Two people here now. Neither going away. They both need peace, security, freedom, self-determination, and a chance to give their children better lives. That's what matters.

So this is where I've ended up with my little voice in this big world of woe. Rather than denounce and oppose, I choose to highlight instances of hope. I want to amplify the voices of the peacemakers—in particular, those Israelis and Palestinians who are working together even in this most polarized moment to create a better future.

I'll share a couple of links and maybe add more in future posts.

Standing Together (Omdim B’Yachad)—A grassroots movement mobilizing Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel in pursuit of peace, equality, and social and climate justice. Over the past few years, they’ve worked on issues such as raising the minimum wage that benefit all sectors of Israeli society. Since the war, they have focused on staving off inter-communal violence in Israel’s mixed-population cities, providing humanitarian aid to people in need, and bringing Israeli Jews and Palestinians together to discuss their shared grief and hopes.

Their web site says, “We know that a negotiated peace agreement is the only way to ensure safety, freedom, and equality for both peoples. As a progressive grassroots movement, we are focused on building the political will in Israeli society to reach a political solution by building a mass movement of Jewish and Palestinian citizens who truly believe that such a shared future is possible.”

A Land for All (Eretz LeKulam)—Organization of Palestinians and Israeli Jews promoting a goal of one shared homeland with two democratic sovereign states. Their vision differs from the typical “two state solution” in that they ultimately envision open borders, where both Jews and Palestinians can live and travel anywhere within the two states, but will be voting citizens of their respective state. For instance, West Bank settlers could be citizens of the Jewish state and Palestinians living in Haifa or Jaffa could be citizens of Palestine.

They believe this vision will speak to the deep emotional connection of both Jews and Palestinians to the entire land, while also allowing each group a state of their own. Personally, I’m skeptical that it is feasible. But A Land for All acknowledges that this is a vision for the distant future, not something anyone could implement in the near future. They view it as a starting point for discussions among Israelis and Palestinians, aimed at “reconciliation based on correcting past wrongs without creating new wrongs and without forcefully uprooting communities and people.”

Seek light

If either of these organizations resonate with you, please join their email list and share information about them with your friends and social media. If you know of other sources of hope, please share them with me and your friend networks too.

There is a lot more I could say, including thoughts on the rise of anti-Semitism here in the U.S., which is unprecedented in my lifetime. (Just this Tuesday night, in fact, a large public Chanukah menorah on Lake Merritt in Oakland was destroyed by vandals.) But this is enough for now. Time to go light my own menorah.

Be well. Seek hope. Find light where you can in these winter holidays, and amplify it.