Boycott Protest an International Success

Members and friends of the Dearborn-based Jerusalem Committee traveled to the University of Michigan’s Rackham Auditorium last Thursday evening, to help bear witness to the plight of Palestinians to concert-goers and passersby alike. One man even drove in from Windsor, Ontario, lending international flavor to our protest. Thirty protesters – some in hijab, some in keffiyeh, and some in baby strollers – held signs and passed out flyers to those who would accept them. See flyer here.

A fall chill was in the air, but the cool temperatures did little to diminish hot tempers from some racist Zionists. The truth really got to one Russian Jew as he harangued every protester in sight, to the point of causing one UM police officer to intervene and guide the irate Zionist inside the building. However, more than one concert-goer said “We’re with you” in subdued tones.

We are happy that once again Jewish Witnesses for Peace and Friends were able to join forces with the Jerusalem Committee. They came equipped with nighttime video cameras to conduct live interviews, and their audio/visual department promises us some YouTube footage by next week. They also infused new energy and much needed youth into our protest; we look forward to working with them in the near future.

No “Occupation” – An Interesting Comment

Last week we discussed the hidden, Left-Zionist message in the phrase ‘End the Occupation.’ Two readers found grist in what we were offering, and agree with us, almost. One believes that ‘Occupation’ is merely a phrase invented to camouflage the outright theft of land that Jewish Zionists planned from the get go. His reply is worth the full read:

Many Jews, now aware of the injustice associated with the establishment of Israel, but still unable to relinquish their belief in Israel’s essential innocence, have congregated around the slogans: ‘End the occupation!’ and ‘Two states for two peoples!’ That there is no ‘occupation’, and that there will never be a true Palestinian state on the West Bank and Gaza, are simply denied.

The long-term Zionist strategy for the conquest of Palestine was always to wait for what Ben-Gurion called ‘revolutionary situations’, meaning situations which would provide cover under which the take-over of Palestine could be completed. The first of these ‘revolutionary situations’ presented itself in 1947 and 1948, when, under the cover of the conflict, 78 percent of historic Palestine was transformed into Israel. Another such situation presented itself in 1967.

Israel in 1967 was not the innocent party threatened with annihilation by the Arab states (though its population probably thought it was). Israel had been preparing for such a war for years. Neither was Israel’s victory anything other than totally expected by anyone who was even a little bit in the know. Like the 1947-48 conflict, the war of 1967 was an opportunity gladly taken for the take-over of the remaining 22 percent of Palestine. This was the fulfillment of Zionism’s historic mission.

There is, then, no occupation. There never was an occupation. If there had been an occupation, and the Israelis had the slightest intention of ending it they would have done so years ago. The fact is, that no Israeli government, either of the left or the right, has ever shown any intention of fully withdrawing back to the 1967 border. No Israeli government, left or right, has shown the slightest inclination to permit anything even remotely resembling a real Palestinian state to be established on the West Bank and Gaza. Any state that could emerge would be tiny, fragmented and weak, being simply a legitimization of Palestinian surrender. The occupation, in fact, has been a fig-leaf to conceal the reality of the final conquest of Palestine.

Nevertheless, for many Jews the occupation is the bedrock of Israel’s essential innocence. Occupations are temporary and can be reversed, and this one, they believe, was the result of a war which Israel did not seek. So, Israel and Zionism are still, at heart, innocent. The Jewish state, established at the expense of another people’s national life, is still blameless. It is the occupation that has ‘forced’ Israel into the role of oppressor, and if only Israel would withdraw to the borders of 1967 all would be as it had been, only better: the gains of 1948 would then be secured, Jews would have their Israel with its ‘moral foundations’, and the Palestinians would be contained within a bantustan with a semblance, but not the reality, of justice. For many Jews, this would mean that they could have both their empowerment and their consciences.

For a further developed treatise, see “Speaking the Truth to Jews” at

https://www.deiryassin.org/byboard17.html

Six Vigilers
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Henry Herskovitz
Jewish Witnesses for Peace and Friends