Let It Be

Emmy Adamczyk

“An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind.” Mahatma Gandhi’s statement applies directly to the conflict between Israel and Palestine. Jerusalem is the “holy” land as many call it, however now unholy due to the continuous violence and commotion that was inflicted by dispute between the Israelis and Palestinians. The rest of the world seems to be sitting idly by, unsure of how to fix this situation because it is too difficult to pick a side. On one hand the Israelis, straight from World War II, had no place to call home and in need of help went seeking to the holy land to recover from the torture they were put through. However, the Palestinians, who also see it as their holy land, had already occupied Jerusalem. Israel, being the dominant fighter in the battle, has made the Palestinians refugees in their own territory.. After many years of this stalemate, there have been, since 2000, about 5,315 casualties of both Palestinians and Israelis. This is only a fraction of the 14,500 deaths since the conflict originally began, and on average there are 100 Palestinian deaths for every Israeli death. Even though adults and students can’t physically do something to stop attacks, we can raise awareness to help any Palestinians or Israelis who are caught in the midst of it all.

Palestinian children stand in rubble after an Israeli strike on a house in Gaza City on Nov. 20.

(Source: AP Photo/Hatem Moussa)

     There is no side of this dispute that is better off. Israelis kicked the Palestinians out of their homes, with no care whatsoever, so they would finally have a place where they could rebuild their lives anew after the Holocaust. Who’s to blame them? They are a major one group that has suffered, and has been even at one time been shamed into feeling less than humans. They have lost more than anyone could ever fathom; they lost their families and humanity. So after establishing Israel and having the Palestinians attack them a day after, no one blamed them for fighting back or argued as to why they moved Palestinians to places where they felt suited. Israelis have also been under constant terrorist attacks, such as Intifadas, that were the main cause of their casualties. I believe that we are not capable of judging the Israelis completely for what they are doing now to the Palestinians because of what they have been through. However, what they are doing now is a form of genocide, though no one really seems to acknowledge that. Genocide does not have to deal with mass murders, which in this case some times occurs, it is the extermination of a complete race. When learning about this in school, I felt that I heard mostly about the effects on Israel and the terrorism of Palestinians. Though Israel has the support of the UN and the American government, Palestine is left to fend for itself.

Activists from Anarchists Against the Wall in West Bank.

Sign reads "resistance" in Arabic and Hebrew (Source: Tamimi Press)

   It can be said that what the Palestinians are going through for around 66 years is genocide. In class, I read The Hour of Sunlight, a touching personal story about the author’s true journey and struggle with Israeli occupation. Sami Al Jundi deals with losing his childhood home to Israeli civilians, constant violence, and even torture that he endured during his 10 years in prison. Through life’s dealings he stands strong to his religion and nationality, not caving into the Israelis. In the beginning he believes that by throwing rocks or even building bombs is the way to get rid of the occupation, but when his group’s bomb explodes prematurely and he ends up in prison he starts to believe that peace is the only solution. Sami is unsure of whether he could be close to an Israeli and at one point he says, “Everyone agreed: peace was impossible. But it didn’t feel impossible when I greeted Galit, Morris, and Reuven the following morning…. Was I a traitor, developing warm relations with the enemy? (Jundi, 83) Relating back to Mahatma Gandhi, the world is truly blind when there is only revenge to think about, talk about, or even write about. We get lost in the fighting and need to be right that we forget we are all human. Although many see Palestinian’s as terrorists that massacred innocent Israeli civilians, the majority are good people whose aspiration is to have peace in their lives.

Protest against the Israeli attack on the Palestinians of Gaza (Source: Wikimedia Commons)

  The true conflict we have as bystanders to this dispute is how to settle it. There is really no way to pick a side, because both Israelis and Palestinians have suffered a great deal. As many other problems arise from this fighting, I feel like this situation does not have the attention it deserves. This situation could well be classified as a full on war, for it has lasted 20 years longer than the Cold War itself. As individual civilians, we do not have the power or technology to stop the violence, but we do have voices and the written language. We can at least try to get it through to them that fighting is never the way to resolve it. I recall a quote I learned in class where John F. Kennedy stated, “the instruments of war have far outpaced the instruments of peace.” This is a clear statement that there have been many wars and technologies contributing to war than there were attempts of peace. We have still yet to learn our lesson, that war will never be the solution.