Category: News and Views
I find this piece very interesting, and posted here to share with you folks.
A Plea from Israel
Come, Obama, Change My Life
By Eanetti
Edna Canetti wrote this for MachsomWatch. Ther piece was translated from Hebrew by George Malent.
November 07, 2008
---
Obama my dear, they tell me that you are going to change the world. Do me a favor, come and change my life personally.
Come to Israel, grab its stupid leadership by the throat and take its foot off the neck of another people. Come and force us to do what is clear, and written, and fitting, and necessary, come and get us out of the Territories, if necessary do it with a smile that reveals million-dollar teeth. If necessary bare your teeth and force us
to do it.
Make it so that I don’t have to get up in the morning – I who hate to get up early, to go to the checkpoints, to watch and to weep. Make it so I will not have to see 19-year-old children who have been duped into believing that they are defending the
home front by pointing rifles at five-year-old children.
Make it so that when my daughters take a shower for half an hour I don’t have to think about Ayad’s family from Awarta that puts buckets under all the washbasins in order to reuse the water which is more precious than gold. Because the settlements
need the West Bank’s water more than the Palestinians do.
Make it so that when I sit in a traffic jam I don’t have to think about the vast numbers of cars that are standing at the entrance to Tul Karem while each one is checked by soldiers and dogs because there has been a warning that they’re about to blow up Tul Karem.
Make it so that when my sister urgently rushes to the hospital to give birth and when I rush my husband to the hospital practically with red lights flashing, I don’t have to think about the women giving birth and the heart patients and the wounded people who are stopped at the entrance to Nablus because their vehicle has no permit
to enter.
Make it so that when I see a soldier in uniform on the street I do not wonder what he did last night. What house he entered in a “Straw Widow procedure”,* what boy he beat up in the alleys of Hawara because he smiled the wrong way.
Make it so that in the morning I don’t hear the satisfaction in the voice of the radio newsreader who relates that the IDF has killed six terrorists.
Obama my dear, this autumn I did not go to the olive harvest. It didn’t work out. Please make it so that I will not suffer from pangs of conscience because I am not doing enough. That I am living my own good life, pursuing my career, while for the
other people just to get home safely is a career in itself.
Please relieve me of this pain that I have all the time deep in my belly. It never lets up, I can never really enjoy life, children, friends or work, because my mind
is preoccupied with the image of the shepherd in Baq’a standing by the locked gate and shivering with cold because the redhead with the key has not showed up, and the bound blindfolded boy, and the three-year-old girl who got hit on the head by the carousel at the checkpoint, and the barriers of dirt and the concrete blocks that
stop the lives of so many people from flowing smoothly.
Come, Obama, come and save us from ourselves.
And if that is what they mean when they say you are not a friend of Israel, then don’t be a friend. We have already had friends who arm us and justify every horror we carry out and save us from the international courts. Be a true friend. Save us
from ourselves. And don’t do it for the world, do it only for me, so I can have peace.
You owe it to me. I do not believe in God but still I prayed for you.
*The IDF practice of forcibly occupying private Palestinian homes temporarily, for tactical purposes
– translator
that's very nice, and so true. thanks for sharing, chris
that is verry nice...
Ah Happy Chris. :)
UM, Not sure I'd call it nice, but I know what you mean. A'azizi, thanks for posting this. we need more people like this person thinking like that. As powerless as they may be to do anything themselves, perhaps, just perhaps, if enough of us bring it to the attention to powers that can do something, they just might. Many maybes, many perhapses, but without hope, there'll never be peace, and a liberation of an oppressed and violated people. One day, enchaa ullah.
Some said I was trying to get girls. Guess What I am!!
Ur what was the point of the above post?
Yeah... what was that about?
Anyway, wow... I hope for the best for the people of Israel.
I wouldn't last a day there; I'd get myself killed, because there's no way in hell I'd let anyone oppress me like that.
Becky
Becky, Israel is the oppressor, and that is the point of the entire piece. The author is an Israeli Jew who is sick and tired of her country oppressing the Palestinians. She is calling upon the new American administration to pressure her own government to opt for peace with the Palestinians instead of its policy of genocide against them.
wow, thats a really powerful piece. just wow, lol
Ah, I see. I know a fair amount about world politics, but the Palestine/Israel deal is not something I know much about. At any rate, I wish the best for the people being oppressed.
Becky, hugs, you and me both on the glad I'm not there thing. If you want to know more though hit me up, I have some great news sources and an article or two written in English by an Egyptian newspaper about the Nakba and the events that followed it. Cris of course knows more, but I can vollanteer him lol. Seriously let me know. The more people that get interested in this and get others interested, the better. This can't go on being brushed under the carpet. It just can't.
Ur amendment. . Cris knows more, but I *can't* volanteer him.
Ah and Cris, the what was that about, was directed at for real's comment about getting girls. A little bit off topic that.
Back to the subject at hand though, I'd like to hear people's oppinions on this one. What in your oppinion will be the effect of the recent presidential ellections in the US, on issues such as the Palestinian struggle to gain back their freedom and end the genicide over there? Given that he still has to stick to policies and so on, (if reforms happen they are to happen slowly I'm guessing), how effective will he really be?
As for me, I know little to nothing about the American administration, and just as much about the UK one. What I do know is this:
In recent years the US have given the Israeli administration billions of dollars in aid. I don't know how much the UK has supported this effort but I haven't seen any protesting about it from our government. There is a lot of support for the state of Israel as a whole by non-Israeli jews and christians on the grounds that if Israel were to fall we'd be faced with armagedon and so on. Israel has a lot of very powerful allies, as I just said, the US among them.
On the plus side Obama promises change. I'm sorry to stereotype him, but because of his familial background I'm guessing he'd be no stranger to prejudice. There have been reforms, throughout the years in getting rid of Apartheid in south africa, and the emancipation of black people in the US. Speaking of getting rid of Apartheid, I have a very interesting piece, Cris sent me a while back via email, about that very subject. It talks about a boycot of businesses that promote the state of Israel and so either turn a blind eye to, or appear to be in favour of the persecution of the Palestinian people.
Like I said, I know bits, and the bits I know I don't like. For my part then, I am cautiously optimistic. If he delivers what he promises, then we can hope for reforms. It's our job then to keep this in the public eye so that people don't forget, and people say at long last, enough is enough. Just a layman's view.
Cheers,
Simon
Are you fucking kidding me??? *That's* why we're helping Israel? Because of some religious superstition? I see! So WHAT if scores of people are being killed and oppressed, so long as we're not pissing God off! Because of course, if we help innocent people, God will bring about the end of the world!
Give me a fucking break! If I had a dollar for everything on my ever-growing list of reasons religion should be taken out of ALL government, I could fix the economy of the entire world!!!!
Nope, not kidding. There are those that believe that. That's the thing though Becky, religion isn't at fault, it's man's interpretation that is. Some interpretations that is. Not every Christian thinks like that, just as not all Muslims are terrorists lol.
As for the dollars upon dollars that Israel has received from western countries, I think that's more to do with political, rather than salvational ends. Although what the hell Israel as a state has to offer a super power such as the US and even us lot over here, is beyond me. But then I'm all for nonsensical things such as human rights, treating people as equals and ... well just plain not killing people and stuff. Rediculous I know.
This is why it's such a wonderful change to see people like that Jewish lady speaking out like that and making a plea to the president elect to do something about it. It almost gives you hope in the human race doesn't it.
Cheers,
Simon
lol Simon, how dare you care about things like saving lives. Haha. Yeah, I know all Christians aren't religious fanatics, and I respect the ones who don't try to shove it in your face, but the diversity of views in religion becomes a problem when you have the arrogant holy rollers in positions of power, which is why religion has no place in government.
I will be very proud of Obama if he does something to help those poor people being oppressed.
lol, I know. Well there's a lot to be said for nonconformity.
Seriously, as will I Becky, as will I. 67 years and more of oppression, brutality adn murder is too much. Far, too much.
Cheers,
Simon
Perhaps this ansewrs my question above, about Obama being a change for the situation in Palestine. Check out this link from www.counterpunch.com and see what you think:
Israel's Settlement on Capitol Hill
I love being helpless.
Cheers,
Simon
Well.
I don't know a lot about politics myself but we can all hope. Because without hope, then what is there left?
Not sure Jame, realism? I suppose though even the biggest realist has hope in them somewhere.
As for not knowing a lot about politics, in this case at least, you don't really have to. I mean the lady Cris quotes in the original post says all you need to know to formulate an oppinion on the subject, doesn't she? Sure the situation out there, as with all political situations is intricate, but murder and oppression is murder and oppression, regardless of why it's done. It is that, that this and posts like it call for an end to.
Cheers,
Simon
It's like I said on another board: Change will come; we're just gonna have to fight like hell for it.
Namaste,
Becky
*smiles* It's people like you that the world needs more of Becky. Optomistic and not afraid to say what needs to be said, do what needs to be done. The more people like that join the ranks pushing for reform in these areas, hope just might turn into possibility.
Cheers,
Simon
I'd like to bring this to the front again, so that it can be read with Cris's other post entitled "Jews in solidarity with Palestine". I'm mainly doing this to show that either post isn't a one-off, but that I for one am seeing more and more of these. If Jewish people, no matter how small the number, can see how wrong the way the Palestinian people are being treated is, then why can't more of us? The time to stop being ostriches and pull our heads out of the sand is now.
Cheers,
Simon