Too often, analysis of Gaza is reduced to bumper-sticker declarations: "Israel has a right to defend itself" or "10,000 rockets was enough." But the story of the siege on Gaza is far more complex. Involving decades of Israel’s occupation and colonization of Palestine, this story dates back to 1948, when the establishment of Israel resulted in the displacement of more than 700,000 Palestinians.
It’s a story that prompted dozens of Honolulu residents to gather downtown on four successive Tuesdays — and on Aug. 13 in front of the East-West Center, when Secretary of State John Kerry visited — to say that on peace and justice, Hawaii stands in solidarity with the people of Gaza.
The organizers, Hawaii Coalition for Justice in Palestine (HCJP), include professionals, academics, students, retirees, peace activists, the young and the old, Hawaiian sovereignty advocates and members from Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Christian and Buddhist backgrounds. The rallies attracted both residents and visitors.
We call for a just peace in Palestine. We echo The Elders — Gro Brundtland, Hina Jilani and Archbishop Desmond Tutu — who will be in Honolulu this weekend to share their vision of "A Just and Inclusive Global Community." A "just and secure peace based on international law and human rights principles," they say, is the only path to "guaranteeing the right to all Palestinians and Israelis to live in equality, dignity and security."
Israel and the U.S. regularly dismiss anti-Zionism, or indeed any solidarity with Gaza, as anti-Semitic. But increasingly, even those who once defended Israel as a Jewish state are insisting on the difference between being Jewish and supporting Israel. This includes Michael Lerner, editor of Tikkun Magazine, and rabbi of Beyt Tikkun Synagogue-Without-Walls in San Francisco and Berkeley, Calif. In calling for an end to the occupation of Gaza, he declares himself "in mourning for a Judaism being murdered by Israel."
HCJP is working to make people more aware of how their tax dollars — more than $3 billion annually in aid to Israel — are being used to support the occupation of Palestine.
Despite some expressions of concern, U.S. aid bankrolls Israel’s bombing of schools, U.N. shelters, hospitals and homes; the use of illegal weapons; and the destruction of the infrastructure of Gaza, an "open-air prison" in which the 1.8 million Palestinians struggle to survive, their food supply severely restricted, their water contaminated and their only power plant bombed.
In addition to the deaths that will result from the devastation Israel has wreaked on Gaza, its military has killed more than 2,000 people; one-third of these, children.
The National Catholic Reporter recently observed, "The goal of this latest invasion, like the others, was to continue to destabilize Palestinian society and fracture the Fatah-Hamas unity government and in that way to destroy all chances of an independent Palestinian state. "
In mid-July, four days after Operation Protective Edge started, Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel would "never relinquish security control west of the Jordan." David Horovitz, founding editor of The Times of Israel, points out that this "quite simply, spells the end to the notion of Netanyahu consenting to the establishment of a Palestinian state."
We understand why the people of Gaza refuse to give up.
HCJP invites the public to join us in the call for a just peace in Palestine at a rally before the Pillars of Peace event with The Elders on Aug. 31. (See details on Facebook at Pillars of Peace: Peace with JUSTICE for Palestine.)
