Recent Speech by Vivienne Porzsolt HOPE IN THE DARK SPEECH TO HARMONY GROUP DINNER Armidale Saturday 20 September 2014 Greetings, my friends I would first like to acknowledge that we stand on Aboriginal land and I pay my respects to their elders past and present. I am delighted and honoured to be asked to speak with you here today. I am a secular Jew. This means that while I do not adhere to the Jewish or any religion, I identify historically and culturally as a Jew. You may well ask why I as a Jew stand in solidarity with Palestinians when the majority of my fellow Jews do not. Let me tell you something of my personal journey. My parents got out of Prague in central Europe the day the Nazis marched in and found safety in New Zealand where I was born. I grew up as an immigrant child in a very Anglo insular environment in Aotearoa - new zealand. My secular Jewish heritage gives me a strong humanist framework where my values in life are rooted. This means a sense of the equality and value of all human beings. A sense that every human being has great potential if s/he is given a chance. A sense that there is much more that unites us as human beings than divides us. Many, many of my relatives were gassed and incinerated in the Nazi death camps. The Nazi holocaust, primarily against the Jews, but also Romani, gays and political opponents, is a strong marker of my identity as a human being. For me, never again means never again for any human being, not just Jews. Against the hate and exclusion of the vile racism of the Nazis, I embrace the universal value of humanity. My friends, we indeed live in dark times. We have just witnessed the horrific onslaught on the people of Gaza. Even more horrific is the way the world has moved on so very quickly. Hamas gained the kudos of not being wiped out by the vastly superior Israeli weaponry. The courage of their fighters and the people of Gaza who supported them and withstood the onslaught have added greatly to their mana. And what has Israel gained? Nothing except increased ignominy in the world and the prospect of increasing isolation under the global boycotts, divestment and sanctions movement. BDS on steroids, as US Secretary of State, John Kerry put it. And a majority of their own people think nothing was gained by the war. A war that was instigated by Israel itself. This is contrary to the narrative they have relentlessly promulgated. In fact, the current conflict began when Israel withdrew from the so-called peace talks when Hamas and Fatah formed a unity government. What an outrageous provocation that unity agreement was! Israel then upped attacks on presumed Hamas members in the West Bank. They killed 9 Palestinians before the 3 Jewish settler teenagers were kidnapped. We heard nothing of this in our mainstream media. And then there was a great geshrei in Israel and around the world about the 3 Israeli teenage settlers. Netanyahu claimed, without any evidence whatsoever, that Hamas was responsible. He used this claim to up the attacks in the west bank and then complained that there were rockets coming from Gaza – rockets that caused no Israeli deaths till after the attack on Gaza. There had been no, nil, zilch Israeli deaths from Gazas rockets from November 2011 until after the commencement of Operation Solid Cliff (usually mistranslated from the Hebrew as Operation Protective Edge). How is this an existential threat? The lies and the complicity of the media in promulgating the official Israeli narrative, largely out of laziness, take ones breath away. And the Israeli-Palestinian conflict does not stand in isolation from what is happening in the rest of the region and world. Now we are confronted with the horror of human beings having their throats cut on YouTube for instant broadcast round the world. Terrible as this is, is this any more terrible than the over 2100 innocent souls killed in Gaza? Is it more terrible than the millions killed in the civil wars in Sudan? Is it more terrible than the over 160,000 deaths in the last three years of the war in Syria? Is it more terrible than the 195,000 people killed in Iraq since the US-led invasion in 2003, 145,000 estimated to be civilians? Is it more terrible than the dozens of other murders committed every day in Iraq as we speak? This slaughter comes in the wake of the chaos unleashed by the United States and its henchmen, including Australia, when the so-called West intervened in Iraq for a variety of false reasons. Even larger than the political disasters we face, is the threat of global warming to our planet. And the political will to address it with mechanisms we know will work is constantly subverted by the overweening power of big business. While I love the United States when I am there, its role in the world and the capitalist system it defends are, in my view, the source of a good part of the worlds troubles. Insofar as the US version of globalisation prevails, it is a threat to democracy, to material progress for the needy of the earth and to the survival of the planet. Through agreements like the Transpacific Partnership (TPP), it seeks to impose conditions that favour the interests of big business and corporations against those of flesh and blood people.. In particular, the Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) provisions are pernicious. They pose a major threat to our democracy and our planet. Governments which move to protect the economic, environmental,cultural or social interests of their people, may face costly litigation if these interests negatively affect corporate interests. Thus we find corporate global power backed by the US pitted against the rights of people and their needs, the greedy against the needy, the 1% against the 99%. This rise of neo-liberal economics greatly facilitated the expansion of global corporate power. The rule of the market and the prioritisation of economic considerations at the expense of all other human considerations, follows Margaret Thatchers dictum there is no such thing as society. Policy that measures the price of everything and knows the value of nothing. But people on our side of the values divide are for humanity and social ties that support and connect us. Here in Australia we are witnessing an unprecedented attack on our standard and quality of life. Through a government committed to defending their interests, the forces of corporate power are pitted against the flesh and blood and human needs of people. In education, in health, in social welfare, in the environment, resources are being wrested from the 99% to give to the 1%. This attack is shrouded in a smog of mendacity. We are told there is a budget crisis. There is not. We are told that this is the end of the age of entitlement, but we find in practice that this applies only to the needy. We are told we are going to fight in Iraq for humanitarian reasons. We were committed to a fully-fledged armed attack in Iraq even before the US committed to it. We were told we supported Israels attack on Gaza because Israel was under existential threat and Israel has a right to defend itself. And this kind of dishonesty goes on and on, totally distorting the realities of the world we live in. The level of deception is phenomenal. And the solutions offered by political so-called leaders so often are irrational, costly and ineffective for their stated purpose. For example, in regard to responding to the refugee crisis. Would it not make much more sense to assess people for refugee status in Indonesia where they are already and fly them to Australia, as Clive Palmer suggests? Would not substantially increasing our refugee and humanitarian intake and supporting people in the community be vastly cheaper and more humane and more in accordance with our international legal obligations? Why are we, apparently without any thought or plan, launching with unprecedented weaponry into Iraq in a way that must fan the ISIS flames? Phyllis Bennis of the US Institute for Policy Studies suggests a number of initiatives which could be more fruitful and certainly less destructive. The first is for the us to engage with Iran which has a shared interest in promoting an inclusive, representative government in Iraq. Such a government would engage all sectors of the Iraq i community to resist ISIS. As it is, too many Iraq i sunnis have been driven into their arms by the sectarian nature to date.of the Iraq i government, installed by the us. The new Iraq i government has yet to prove itself in this regard. This would require real respect and acceptance by western powers of iran as a regional power. Secondly, stop the hugely dangerous arms shipments to the region. The likelihood that these would fall into the hands of ISIS are high. Thirdly, work with russia to resolve the syrian question, even dealing with assad to find common ground against ISIS. And fourthly, pressure Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey to stop sending arms to the Syrian opposition. Most of these arms fall directly into the hands of ISIS. And fifthly, bring in the United Nations by going to the Security Council seeking a joint resolution to challenge ISIS. The fact that so many states share an interest in defeating the advance of ISIS is a ray of light in this situation. Using the UN as the focus of these shared interests would revitalise it in a way we badly need. Bennis says these initiatives would require the US to stop using the UN as an extension of [its] own foreign policy, but instead...to try to transform it into a real centre of diplomatic power based on a real coalition of shared interests. The attacks on our civil liberties in Australia continue apace. As Edward sSowden has so bravely revealed, the forces of the state have unprecedented access to our emails, our phone calls, our associations. Since the revelations by Assange, Snowden and Manning, we have become aware of what has been termed the Deep State, the state beyond democratic control and usually public knowledge. It operates on agendas quite distinct from us as citizens, mostly in contradiction to our values and interests. Thanks to Snowden and the other heroes, we now have some awareness of its existence and operations. So what are we to make of the current reports that our brave (mainly) boys in blue and khaki have just foiled a plot to seize an Australia at random and behead her on you tube? Is this true? Or are the recent mass arrests on the very same day as Australian troops depart for Iraq part of an elaborate theatrical performance devised by the Deep State? Are they embroiling us in a conflict without consent of parliament, without limits, without rationale? And whose interests are they defending? We can be sure these interests are not ours, the 99% The great public intellectual, Noam Chomsky, recently wrote a grim assessment of our times. He considers that the era of human civilisation may...Now be approaching its inglorious end. He says what is happening in the middle east provides painful lessons on the depths to which the [human] species can descend. He notes that the conflicts ignited by the [US-UK] invasion [in 2003] have spread beyond and are now tearing the entire region to shreds. In the context of this dark world, the Israel-Palestine conflict seems like a side-show. It used to be the nodal point of united states power in what we esterners like to call the Middle East. We are witnessing the unwinding of the colonialist carve-up of the region which was formalised in the Sykes-Picot pact between the British and the French during the first world war. In this carve-up, Britain was awarded a mandate to rule Palestine by the new league of nations. At the same time, there were many movements for national liberation from the old empires. The Zionist movement arose in this context. It is an ambiguous movement: at once a national liberation movement of the Jewish people and a colonialist enterprise. Its peculiarity was that its aspirations were to take up a land occupied by another people. All other national movements sought independence on land they already inhabited but under the yoke of one or other of the empires. The Zionist movement proclaimed that the only solution to the persecution of the Jews in Christian Europe was the re-establishment of a homeland in Palestine. A homeland where most Jews had not lived for over 2000 years. Zionist ideology shares some ugly similarities with anti-semitic propaganda. Anti-semites say Jews are alien to Europe and dont belong there. Zionists agreed. Antisemites say Jews are degenerate and physically inferior. Zionists agreed, Part of the Zionist project was to revitalise the degenerate Jew of the Diaspora with manual labour. Anti-semites accused Jews of being rootless cosmopolitans. Zionism agreed. It said Jews could be redeemed from their degenerate Diaspora state by returning to their roots in the promised land. Such is the weakness of narrow nationalistic thinking. Like other European colonialists, the Zionists gave no thought or consideration to the peoples in the lands they conquered. It was in the context of the colonial carve-up in the Sykes-Picot pact, rubber-stamped by the mandate, that Britain adopted the Zionist movement in the famous Balfour Letter. In this letter, Sir Arthur Balfour, the British Foreign Secretary wrote to the leaders of the Zionist movement in 1916: His Majestys Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a National Home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country. Note that it talks of a Jewish homeland in Palestine and that the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine should not be prejudiced. This is a far cry from the expansionist Zionist project we see today. Clearly, the British saw the Zionist movement as a convenient stand-in for their interests in controlling the region and access to the black riches of its oil. The secret Sykes-Picot agreement was contradicted by the McMahon Letters between the British High Commissioner in Egypt, Sir Henry McMahon and the Sharif of Mecca, Hussein Ben Ali. These letters had declared that the Arabs would revolt in alliance with the United Kingdom, and in return the UK would recognize Arab independence. Perfidious Albion as the French had always dubbed England. The British empire was at it again, dividing and ruling. In November 1947, the General Assembly of the United Nations passed Resolution 181. This resolution recognised the partition of historic Palestine into 2 states: a state for the Jews and a state for the Palestinians. Much is made of the fact that Israel supported this resolution while the Arab states rejected it. The Palestinian had no say. First, the General Assembly had only advisory power. Its resolution 181 could only make recommendations to the Security Council. Under the UN constitution, the Security Council had no power to partition a country. And certainly not when the people historically inhabiting the land were in total opposition to such a partition. Nevertheless, the Zionist leadership on 1 May 1948 declared the establishment of the State of Israel on the basis of UN Resolution 181. They then conquered far more land than had been allotted them under the plan recommended to the UN. So they can hardly claim to have accepted that plan any more than the Palestinians did. As with other colonialist projects, the State of Israel was established by murder, ethnic cleansing, dispossession and destruction. As we have just witnessed for the umpteenth time, this continues to be the name of the Zionist game. The brand of Zionism that won out historically was only one of several different visions for a Jewish homeland. It did not necessarily mean a state dominated by Jews. For some, it did not mean a state at all, rather a cultural spiritual affirmation of roots and a place of belonging. Some visualised bi-national Zionism established in negotiation with the local Palestinians. In fact Mahatma Ghandi, in an article published in 1938, warned of the immorality of the imposition of the Jews on the local people. “What is going on in Palestine today cannot be justified by any moral code of conduct. The mandates [of the League of Nations] have no [moral] sanction but that of the last war. Surely it would be a crime against humanity to reduce the proud Arabs so that Palestine can be restored to the Jews, partly or wholly, as their national home. The nobler course would be to insist on a just treatment of the Jews wherever they are born and bred. . I have no doubt that [the Jews in Palestine] are going about it in the wrong way. The Palestine of the biblical conception is not a geographical tract. It is in their hearts. But if they must look to the Palestine of geography as their national home, it is wrong to enter it under the shadow of the British gun. A religious act cannot be performed with the aid of the bayonet or the bomb. They can settle in Palestine only by the goodwill of the Arabs. They should seek to convert the Arab heart.” In the same year, Albert Einstein also publicly stated reservations about the proposal to partition Palestine into independent Arab and Jewish countries. In a 1938 speech, he said I should much rather see reasonable agreement with the Arabs on the basis of living together in peace than the creation of a Jewish state. My awareness of the essential nature of Judaism resists the idea of a Jewish state with borders, an army, and a measure of temporal power, no matter how modest. I am afraid of the inner damage Judaism will sustain—especially from the development of a narrow nationalism within our own ranks, against which we have already had to fight strongly, even without a Jewish state.” But this bi-national model by negotiation was not the model of Zionism that prevailed historically. This model is violent, racist, militaristic. And it was so from the beginning. It may surprise you to learn that, until after World War II and the horrors wrought by the Nazis, only a minority of Jews world-wide supported the Zionist movement. As I noted earlier, the state of Israel was created by dispossession, massacres and ethnic cleansing and it is maintained in its current form by dispossession, massacres and ethnic cleansing. It is increasingly fascist in character, even against its own Jewish dissidents. “Death to Arabs and leftists is a not uncommon catch-cry. The Zionist movement has shamefully misused the traumatic experience of the Holocaust to whip up support among Jews for its nationalistic, increasingly oppressive project. The culture of victim-hood is relentlessly promoted with a strong Israel presented as the vital protector for Jews. For the Zionists, Never again means Never again only for Jews and the devil take the rest. The Zionists constantly nourish fears of dissent and division. They find anti-semitism everywhere. The Australian Jewish News is filled with alarmist headlines. In particular, there is something they describe as the new anti-semitism. Opposition to the State of Israel is said to be anti-semitic. Though the Zionist propagandists always say reasonable criticism of Israel is ok, it hard to see what criticism they will accept or what criticism they will express. So all criticism of Israel is dismissed as anti-semitism. There is a lot of guilt among Westerners for what happened in the Holocaust and the failure of Western governments to do anything to defend Jews. So many who are not Jewish are silenced by that accusation. At the same time, labelling criticism of Israel as anti-semitic also trivialises the real anti-semitism unleashed by the conduct of the State of Israel. Old fashioned anti-semitism has become, to some extent, acceptable, even in progressive circles. We hear about Jewish power and the Jewish lobby, good old-fashioned anti-semitic tropes. Of course there is a Jewish lobby and a mining lobby and a doctors lobby. They are regarded as legitimate in our form of democracy. But exaggerated powers are attributed to the Jewish/Zionist lobby. It is often depicted as having mysterious powers and devious control. However, its power is much exaggerated and resides more in the guilt and anti-semitic projection of the wider society. If people stand up to it, it is seen to be a paper tiger. If the cry of anti-semitism seeks to silence criticism from outside the Jewish community, the pressures against dissent within the Jewish community are strong. We Jews who challenge the dominant narrative are labelled as self-hating Jews and not real Jews. This threat and actuality of exclusion has a strong silencing force, especially to Jewish criticism outside the fold. We formed Jews against the Occupation in 2006 to challenge this iron wall against dissent. We came up against the full force of the Zionist leadership and communal fears and the Zionist propaganda which nourishes it. Jews like us are blacklisted by Jewish officialdom and many in the organised Jewish community. However, we manage to maintain relationships with fellow Jews in the more liberal parts of the community. These Jews tend to take the approach of the French philosopher Voltaire: I disagree with everything you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it. The views of Jews in what I call the organised Jewish community are not as monolithic as you might think. Unfortunately, because of the pressures to conform round issues connected with Israel/Palestine, these differences are expressed behind closed doors. By speaking outside the walls of the self-imposed ghetto, we break an important taboo. And by breaking the taboo, by speaking out against the monolithic ideology of the Zionists, we help to break down the walls of the mental ghetto, brick by brick. We launched ourselves a couple of months before Dr Hanan Ashrawi came to Sydney to be presented with the Sdney peace prize. She was greeted with a storm of protest from the chasbarah brigade. (Chasbarah is the Hebrew word for advocacy, usually applied to advocacy for Israel. It is in fact a highly organised propaganda machine. The diaspora Jewish communities around the world are issued with a song sheet by Israeli government agencies and they sing from it in unison). Dr Ashrawi was accused of supporting terrorism. This is totally untrue. She has been a proponent of a third democratic way, the Palestinian National Initiative. She has said that nowhere in the world had she been faced with such animosity and falsehood as she faced from the organised Zionists in Australia. Jews against the Occupation sent her a bouquet of flowers. She displayed them on the stage when she gave her peace lecture and pointed them out and their sender to the audience. It was such a beautiful counter to the ugly hatred and lies of Jewish officialdom. Around the world, more and more Jews are revolted by the atrocities committed in their name by the state of Israel. They are breaking the taboos, breaking the chains. They are speaking out. The latest development is in the US in the wake of the recent attack on Gaza. Young American Jews are flocking to a new organisation If Not Now, When? They are fed up with the official leadership which marches in lockstep with whatever Israeli government is in power. The anti-Zionist website, Mondoweiss reports: The rise of If Not Now, a group whose founding members are deeply rooted in Jewish communal life, is just one of the latest signs that dissent on Israel is rising amongst young people. Many young Jews are no longer content with officially sanctioned discussion on Israel. That rising dissent is leading to turmoil within Jewish congregations and institutions who are becoming increasingly split over the question of Israel.” In speaking out and taking action, we contribute to the liberation not only of the Palestinians but also of ourselves. We work for a time where Jews and Palestinians can reach out to each other in our shared humanity. Surely, with our shared history, our shared land and our respective histories of persecution, we have so much in common. We can and must live side by side in peace and equality in the land of Palestine/Israel. So given the dark times we are in, how do we find hope in the dark? The late Howard Zinn wrote an essay entitled The Optimism of Uncertainty. He says: I am totally confident, not that the world will get better, but that only confidence can prevent people giving up the game before all teh cards have been played. The metaphor is deliberate: Life is a gamble. Not to play is to foreclose any chance of winning. To play, to act is to create at least a possibility of changing the world.” Zinn notes the utter unpredictability of history. Who would have predicted the fall of the Berlin Wall, the overthrow of the apartheid regime in South Africa or the peaceful resolution for Northern Ireland immediately before they happened? When the future is unforseeable, giving up on the possibility of a better world is not an option. Giving up can result only in failure. Staying the course is our only hope. We must not be crushed by the mill-stones of despair, fear and hatred that seem to land on our backs so inevitably. To stay the course we need to counter these mill-stones by their counterweights: These are our capacities for faith, hope and love. I seem to recall that there was some Jew a while back who taught these things. These emotions are the nutrients of action and the affirmation of our humanity. It seems to me that we keep hope alive by connecting and working with others who share our vision for a better world. A world where people and their well-being is the focus for our concerns and striving. For myself, I find it in the work I do connecting with people in so many diverse networks to open up possibilities for peace. When I take part in international actions like the international vigil for Mordechai Vanunu, the Israeli nuclear whistle-blower or the flotilla trying to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza, I am inspired by the wonderful human beings I meet. These are not ideologues, fighting for the victory of their world view or their particular political grouping. They are just people with love and courage in their hearts who want to make a difference, to act against injustice. I find these connections working with fellow Jews in the mainstream Jewish community who do not share my views but accept my right to speak them. I find connection addressing a dinner of hundreds of Moslem women who may never have encountered a Jew before, let alone one who is in solidarity with Palestinians. I get a buzz from challenging peoples pre-conceptions, prompting them to see things in a new way. We need to diversify our modes of communication and the ways we reach out to people. I can march under banners and speak to a crowd though a loud-hailer with the best of them. And these are valid forms of communication and demonstration for a political goal and point-of-view. But these days I feel particularly drawn to what I call slow politics. I find working in small groups allows a different kind of conversation. I badger my friends to have a few friends around over coffee or pasta and I share my experiences and pictures drawn from over more than 20 years visiting Israel-Palestine. The personal connection with the host and the intimacy of a private home allows people to come without feeling they have to meet any expectations or, heaven forbid, get involved. This is a kind of political Tupperware party, a very successful marketing strategy. This allows me to reach out beyond the converted to people with often little knowledge of the issues. They often are amazed at what I tell them which so contradicts the official Israeli story found in our mainstream media. I offer them our Jews against the Occupation leaflets and I take their contact details if they want to give them to me. They then go on my information distribution list and the information-sharing continues. Next time there is a news item on the radio or television, they may well sit up and take notice. These kinds of gatherings are personal and enriching and energise me in my work We find energy and hope in our work connecting with each other and sharing a vision of human possibility. We need not be lost in the dark of fear and hatred that seems to surround and overwhelm us. In these dark times, we need each other more than ever. Let us support each other in maintaining the vision and lighting our path with hope.
Posted on: Sun, 28 Sep 2014 02:54:12 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015