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Aug. 16th, 2005 04:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
violachicDeadline for Gaza Pullout Expires
If you pray, pray now. Its going to get way messier before it gets better.
I have such a mixed bag of feelings.
I feel so strongly that the settlers shouldn't have been allowed to settle on that land to begin with. It belonged to people, and it was taken away from those people to build the settlements.
But I also am connecting with what I think is very apparent pain of those being uprooted once again.
Pain breeds anger; anger breeds hate; hate breeds violence.
There's this really amazing organization in Bethlehem called Wi'am that works with Palestinians, especially children, in addressing the continual trauma they live with, in an effort to give them a better life. Addressing the trauma they experience now greatly reduces the chances of that trauma turning into the cycle of violence later.
I guess that's just one of the very many mistakes made in how the creation of the state of Israel was handled to begin with: Did anyone actually think to address the trauma that the Jewish people had just undergone before shipping them off to Palestine in 1945?
We want to wage wars, bring retribution, and give reparations to people. We destroy their cities and then rebuild them. Sometimes we apologize for having destroyed the cities; sometimes not. But do we ever actually look into people's eyes and say "You have pain. Lets heal this pain. What can I do?" No, we don't. At least, not enough, we don't.
The Palestinian/Israeli conflict is complex, multi-layered. I'm not saying I have a solution, I'm not even saying "hey, I could have done that better". I'm just saying that I know what perpetuates the cycle, and that too few people seem to care to stop it.
Yes, I suppose I could label myself "pro-Palestinian"; I do believe they have the right to a safe and secure autonomous state. But in a way, I suppose I could also label myself "pro-Israeli", because I believe they also have the right to a safe and secure autonomous state- behind the 1967 lines, of course. It would be nice if we could go back to the early 1900's, back to the days of the British Mandate, and make it go smoother- but what would that entail, and what would that look like? I have no idea.
I'm just sayin...
Scary, scary stuff in a scary, scary time.
If you pray, pray now. Its going to get way messier before it gets better.
I have such a mixed bag of feelings.
I feel so strongly that the settlers shouldn't have been allowed to settle on that land to begin with. It belonged to people, and it was taken away from those people to build the settlements.
But I also am connecting with what I think is very apparent pain of those being uprooted once again.
Pain breeds anger; anger breeds hate; hate breeds violence.
There's this really amazing organization in Bethlehem called Wi'am that works with Palestinians, especially children, in addressing the continual trauma they live with, in an effort to give them a better life. Addressing the trauma they experience now greatly reduces the chances of that trauma turning into the cycle of violence later.
I guess that's just one of the very many mistakes made in how the creation of the state of Israel was handled to begin with: Did anyone actually think to address the trauma that the Jewish people had just undergone before shipping them off to Palestine in 1945?
We want to wage wars, bring retribution, and give reparations to people. We destroy their cities and then rebuild them. Sometimes we apologize for having destroyed the cities; sometimes not. But do we ever actually look into people's eyes and say "You have pain. Lets heal this pain. What can I do?" No, we don't. At least, not enough, we don't.
The Palestinian/Israeli conflict is complex, multi-layered. I'm not saying I have a solution, I'm not even saying "hey, I could have done that better". I'm just saying that I know what perpetuates the cycle, and that too few people seem to care to stop it.
Yes, I suppose I could label myself "pro-Palestinian"; I do believe they have the right to a safe and secure autonomous state. But in a way, I suppose I could also label myself "pro-Israeli", because I believe they also have the right to a safe and secure autonomous state- behind the 1967 lines, of course. It would be nice if we could go back to the early 1900's, back to the days of the British Mandate, and make it go smoother- but what would that entail, and what would that look like? I have no idea.
I'm just sayin...
Scary, scary stuff in a scary, scary time.
