My Cause is Peace

If you don't follow me on Jewish Twitter (Jewitter), you might be surprised that I haven't spoken much about the horrors carried out by Hamas recently, or the terrors by the Israeli government.

But I was and have been. Just not here. Because this wasn't the place or the time for me to emotionally process burned and behead Jewish babies alongside the corpses of Israeli women who were raped. The Gazan children orphaned, facing starvation and dehydration while bombs and rockets dropped on their homes.

Still, after the initial shock and grief over the loss of life on every side, and after frantic concern for my family in Ramat Gan as well as my wife and children and synagogue (because violence in Israel-Palestine always spills over onto our respective diaspora communities), I'm ready as I'll ever be.

Let me be clear: I'm a Zionist and a Palestinian Nationalist. I support a pluralistic and democratic Israel that endures as the fulfillment of the Jewish people's right to self-determination in our ancestral homeland after millennia in diaspora. I also support a free Palestine that is independent, contiguous, and liberated from all oppression as the dream of Palestinian statehood.

I oppose the blockade of Gaza, the occupation and settlements in the West Bank, as well as the xenophobic corruption in the Israeli government. I oppose the terrorism of Hamas, the incompetence of the Palestinian Authority, and the antisemitism inflicted on Jewish people in their name.

There are many opinions by well-intentioned allies and subversive bigots, among others. But very few people actually know what they're talking about when it comes to this conflict, from the history of Israel before 1948 to the course of the Palestinian struggle since 1948, and especially the truth about the many clashes between them. Facts on the ground are as hard to verify as they are unheard by anyone even when confirmed. Instead, people use Jews and Palestinians as political footballs for their own petty grievances rather than recognizing our shared humanity.

Do you want to know what side I'm on? Peace. My side is peace. No matter how bleak. No matter how impossible it may seem, I seek peace and that is the hill I will gladly defend with every fiber of my being. I'm proudly, progressively Jewish and that's why I know even one life saved is as if the whole world has been saved.

Take note and take care.

Am Yisrael v' Palestine Chai.