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If you are someone who isn't particularly caught up on the current goings on in the Middle East regarding Israel/Palestine, I did my best to explain here. In the time since I originally wrote that article, some things have changed. I will do my best to update details here.
I: 100 Days
As of this writing, it has been 100 days since October 7th.
When this writing is published, more bombs will have been dropped, and more civilians, including woman and children, will have been murdered using American bombs.
Those 100 days. Man. I don't even know what to say about them. And I'm a white American man living thousands of miles away from this ongoing, inhumane atrocity.
My heart breaks for the people of Palestine. My soul aches. My head hurts. I find it difficult to focus on work, on hobbies. I cannot help but feel that what is happening to the people of Palestine is an existential threat to humanity as a whole. I don't know why I feel this way, but I can't escape the feeling itself.
There is something deeply, deeply evil happening to the Palestinian people. This supersedes borders, religion, ethnicity, race and creed. They are facing erasure. Complete and total ethnic and human erasure, from an occupying force that stole their homeland at gunpoint, and continues to steal their homes and territories at gunpoint. In a lot of circumstances, the land is not stolen after the guns are pointed, but rather when the bullets have shredded through Palestinian natives inside of their own homes, fired by religious extremists that consider their brutal violence to be justified by God.
Far right Israeli extremists murder Palestinians in broad daylight, and then claim they were sanctioned to murder by God.
I will never get over this. This is sick. Evil. The people responsible for this mass murder and attempted ethnic cleansing of an entire people need to be brought to justice in front of the entire world. History needs to be written to reflect their true plight, and not re-written with their blood by an occupier who not only justifies their actions as Holy, but are also carrying out this mass slaughter and displacement using guns, bullets, rockets and bombs that were supplied to them by the only source in the world that is capable of arming such a genocidal force: The United States of America.
In these last 100 days, Israel has murdered over 100 journalists attempting to report the facts on the ground from the Gaza Strip.
In these last 100 days, Israel has forcibly displaced over 1 million people.
In these last 100 days, Israel has blockaded food aid to civilians.
In these last 100 days, Israel has murdered UN Staffers.
In these last 100 days, Israel has murderd 23,700 Palestinian civilians and injured 60,000.
In six weeks after October 7tth, Israel dropped 22.000 bombs, provided by the United States, on the Gaza Strip.
Twenty Two Thousand Bombs in Six Weeks.
Twenty Two Thousand Bombs in Six Weeks.
Twenty Two Thousand Bombs in Six Weeks.
What could Gaza possibly look like after 100 days of this?
II: Someone is finally doing something.
The charges are as follows:
Mass Killing of Palestinians
Bodily and mental harm to Palestinians as a whole
Forced displacement of Palestinians
The blockading of food to Palestinian refugees
Destruction of the Gaza healthcare system
South Africa argues these points from a position of experience, as South Arica exists today due to their historical accolades of having defeated their own Apartheid.
You see, Apartheid is an Afrikkan word. It is native to South Africa. The concept resulted in some of the most influential global social movements of the 20th century. Translated to "seperateness" or "aparthood", the word and concept of an apartheid nation was born in South Africa, when an all white government seized control of the government overseeing a majority black population, starting in 1948.
This apartheid was ended in 1994 after Nelson Mandela, through universal suffrage, was elected President of South Africa, ushering in a representative democracy, and founded the Truth and Reconciliation commission which investigated human rights violations under the apartheid regime. Nelson Mandela and South Africa not only overcame oppression and apartheid, they provided a blueprint for oppressed peoples to overcome their own oppressors through a system of bureaucratic accountability via the courts.
As I stated before, South Africa is uniquely suited to accuse another nation of apartheid and genocide, and bring these accusations to the International Criminal Court. As such, this trial should be taken very, very seriously, as the decision made will quite literally impact the way history is written. The International Criminal Court does not have an enforcement mechanism to arrest those it finds guilty, so the decision handed down will be mostly symbolic. If you feel discouraged by this, try to remember that the International Criminal Court prosecuted the Nazis, and defined the 1940's by their prosecution and exposure of the horrors of the Holocaust.
Israeli Government Response is "No, You"
Unsurprisingly, Israel flat out denies the charges brought against them. In fact, they went so far as to argue that there was a genocide being carried out against the Israelis, referencing the attacks on October 7th. They invoked all the same justifications they have been using since the start of the invasion and occupation into northern Gaza, which is that Hamas maintains control over Gaza, and utilizes all infrastructure in Gaza, including schools and hospitals accessible through a complex tunnel system underground. This designation of civilian infrastructure being used for Hamas terror purposes is their justification for sending targeted munitions at non-combatant targets and infrastructure.
Benjamin Netanyahu tweeted the following in response: "We are fighting terrorists, we are fighting lies... Today we saw an upside-down world. Israel is accused of genocide while it is fighting against genocide," he said.
It's quite interesting that Israel can defend itself inside territory that is not legally theirs. I suppose, by this logic, I can defend myself against a bully by simply walking into their house and beating them up inside their own bedroom, under the premise that if I don't find and assault the bully, he will find and assault me. But I digress.
Israels entire recorded defense can be found here.
What now?
Well, we just.....wait. Unfortunately for anyone with a conscious, this decision could take years, and will mostly be symbolic. As I mentioned before, the Hague doesn't have an international enforcement mechanism for arresting and jailing those it finds guilty. However, the injunction being sought by SA to put a temporary stop to the gunfire and bomb-dropping is intended to allow aid workers and journalists into Gaza so that the international community is able to confirm that Israel is truly justified in their actions.
It cannot be overstated that an enormous amount of the criticism that Israel has received for their actions in the Gaza strip since October 7th are largely motivated by the international communities inability to put journalists on the ground to corroborate the stories of the Israeli government. The case South Africa brought to the Hague uses evidence extrapolated from various international news agencies reporting from outside Gaza, evidence provided by surviving Palestinians, as well reports from organizations like Doctors without Borders, The Red Cross, The United Nations, and just about any group that has spent the last 4 months taking to social media to beg and plead with the world to acknowledge the plight of the Palestinian people.
If Israel is not guilty of the charges brought against them, if they are not actively committing a litany of war crimes in Gaza, if the IDF is not killing mothers with sniper rifles, if the IDF is not blowing up hospitals and schools, if the IDF is not using "dumb munitions" in an effort to level the Gaza strip and displace 2.2 million people.....
Then why is the Israeli government so vehemently against a ceasefire? Why is the Israeli government so vehemently against the idea of non-Israeli journalists gaining access to the Gaza strip, and reporting to the world what they see there? Why is Benjamin Netanyahu so insistent that Hamas has tunneled a headquarters into the skull of every Palestinian child?
If Israel is morally correct in their reaction to October 7th, why not allow the world to corroborate that? That they are actively differentiating between citizens and combatants, that they are actively targeting Hamas infrastructure rather than collectively punishing the land and people, that they have any concern at all for Palestinians, or that they even actively acknowledge the Palestinian right to exist?
Is Hamas such a threat to the Israelis that a cease-fire for international investigation would cause that many more Israeli deaths?
Is Hamas such a threat to the Israelis that even in spite of being the center of attention globally, Hamas would still be able to carry out a second Holocaust in the time that it took the International Community to investigate the claims of the Israeli Government?
Or is Israel just hiding something?
Conclusion and my take
Personally, I don't have to wait. I know what I'm seeing with my own eyes.
Israel is an apartheid ethno-state that is currently carrying out an ethnic cleansing of Palestine in Gaza.
This has absolutely nothing to do with the average Jewish person.
In fact, I would argue that once again, Judaism is being exploited by murderous psychopaths to do land grabs and commit genocide, as the religion has been exploited historically before. Except this time, the exploitation isn't being justified to kill Jews, its being justified to kill Palestinians in an effort to establish a Jewish homeland, which is being executed by psychotic far right politicians like Netanyahu, Shmotrich, and Ben Gavir.
The anti-antisemitism and Islamophobia that has sparked from this event are inexcusable.
Casual observers of Judaism and Islam are not loading weapons and launching bombs. They are just like you and me. They just exist. They were born into this world and ideological hardliners pull them into conflict both physically and emotionally, exploiting their faith to attempt to radicalize them into committing violent acts in favor of a belief system that discourages violent acts in their scripture.
There is no God here. There is only suffering, hate, and prejudice.
South Africa, through this case, is seeking something in this conflict that the world desperately needs. Something that South Africa once used to defeat their own oppressors.
Something that this world cannot function without: Truth and Accountability.
Will we get it? I don't know.
But someone has to try.
"Confusion is not an obstacle, nor clarity a solution"
-Dan Greene of The Armed