Zionism is Racism—50 years since UN Resolution

A review of the meeting by Steve Halpern 

A few days ago, I attended a meeting titled Zionism is Racism—50 years since UN Resolution 3379 sponsored by the Unitarian Society of Germantown in Philadelphia. This meeting protested the unimaginable Israeli organized genocide against the Palestinian people.  

About 200 people came to fill the church for the meeting. There were four important speeches. These were by Noura Erakat, a Palestinian attorney and professor in the Department of Africana Studies at Rutgers University, Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, a professor of African American studies at Princeton University, Emmala Gelman, the director of the Institute for the Critical Study of Zionism, and Arun Kundnani, a member of Philadelphia Parents for Palestine. 

Many groups co-sponsored this event. Those groups set up tables we all could view after the formal meeting. Food was served, but the ample amount of prepared food ran out because of the large number of attendees. 

I was glad I attended the meeting for a few reasons. While I’ve been reading a lot about the Zionist organized genocide in Gaza, I learned many things from the speakers. This meeting was organized to allow the speakers to give extended presentations so those who attended would be better prepared to advance the demand of Ceasefire Now and support for Palestinian liberation. The theme of the meeting was “Zionism is Racism—50 years since UN Resolution 3379.” The speakers gave the long history to underscore the argument. It was encouraging to see all the people who came out to support the movement in some way. However, I felt there was also a limitation to the meeting.

The dictatorship of Donald J. Trump

When I attended school, my teachers argued that we not only live in a “democracy”, but that the United States is the “greatest democracy in the history of the world.” When we look at the facts, it becomes clear that this country was never a genuine democracy. 

The government has always made it their top priority to support the interests of the most affluent people who live here. So, I believe we live in a plutocracy or a nation where the government serves the interests of the wealthy. We can also say that this has been a brutally ruthless dictatorship. 

Donald Trump has removed the democratic veneer that hid this dictatorship. Now we can say that the United States government is about doing basically whatever Donald Trump wants. The Democratic Party and the courts have shown that they have no serious interest in challenging Trump’s dictates. 

This meeting and many others demonstrate that there are large numbers of people who disapprove of Trump’s dictates. Around the world there have been continuous demonstrations of hundreds of thousands who are enraged by the crimes of the Israeli government in the Middle East.

I have attended many Ceasefire Now demonstrations in Philadelphia, Washington DC, and New York City. During the initial months of the genocide hundreds of thousands of people attended these demonstrations. However, while large demonstrations continue erupt in other countries, currently the demonstrations here are smaller and sporadically organized.

Today many people who are demanding an end to the genocide are not convinced that large demonstrations are fundamentally important. They see how there have been large actions and the genocide continues. As a result, there are several groups organizing small actions. So, my question is: Are demonstrations the most effective way to protest Israeli organized genocide?

A short history of the mass movements in the United States

First, we can look at history to see how demonstrations were effective. During the 1930s the labor movement erupted with the formation of the Congress of Industrial Organizations. At that time workers found it difficult to feed and house a family on the wages they received. There was a reluctance to protest these conditions because of the huge numbers of workers who were unemployed. 

Then in San Francisco, California, Toledo, Ohio, and Minneapolis, Minnesota workers went on strikes that won real gains. The success of those strikes came about because of mass determined support from working class communities. That movement continued and established the beginnings of what was once a powerful labor movement in this country.

A few months after the lynching of Emmet Till, Rosa Parks refused to sit in the back of a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Because of the Jim Crow laws, the police arrested Parks for her act of defiance. The Black community responded to the arrest of Parks with a boycott of the busses in Montgomery. That boycott lasted for over a year. Other mass actions followed for several years. Then in the mid 1960s the federal government passed the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts. Those laws as well as the changing consciousness made possible by the civil rights movement effectively did away with Jim Crow segregation.

Women needed two waves of protests to win many of the rights they have today. The first wave of feminism won the right for women to vote. President Woodrow Wilson was adamantly opposed to this right and ordered the arrest of suffragettes who demanded the right to vote in front of the White House. In prison the suffragettes went on a hunger strike. Prison guards responded by inserting a tube into the throat of the leader Alice Paul to force-feed her. This was how women won the right to vote in this country.

Before the 1970s most women were not allowed to wear pants at work. They were not allowed to have a credit card or purchase birth control if they weren’t married. Abortion was against the law and many women lost their lives or were mutilated because of injuries sustained in back alley illegal abortions. 

Then a mass movement erupted that changed the consciousness in this country. Clearly much more needs to be done so women and Black people will have full equality. However, when we look the environment before the movements for Black and women’s rights there have been significant changes.

Few people protested the war the United States organized against Korea in 1950. In the early stages of the war against Vietnam, few people protested. Then as people began to see the horror of that war on television, and saw young people drafted to fight in that war, many asked the question: Why the war was happening? 

As a result, the demonstrations against the war became larger. However, the unimaginable horror of the war continued, and some people argued that the movement needed to have a different strategy. This strategy called for deliberately breaking the law in order to make spectacular statements that might draw more attention.

The news media went along with this strategy and consistently publicized demonstrations that broke the law where people were arrested. The media gave little coverage to the much larger demonstrations that were legal. (We should keep in mind that the armed forces of the government murdered several people who legally demonstrated against the war.)

The anti-war movement responded to this situation by forming national coalitions that held conferences where the different strategies were discussed and debated. Those conferences didn’t oppose the actions that violated the law. However, the majority of the attendees at those conferences voted to organize legal demonstrations. Those actions would be defended by trained participants who were assigned to be marshals. Fred Halstead reported on this history in his book Out Now. 

While it took several years for the war against Vietnam to end, Eventually, about 80% of the population in this country opposed the war. President Lyndon Bains Johnson refused to run for reelection because of the anti-war movement. President Richard Nixon was booted out of office because of the changing atmosphere in this country caused by the anti-war movement. However, we should make no mistake, the primary reason the armed forces of this country left Vietnam was because of the national liberation movement in that country.

Ceasefire Now

When we look at the contrast between the consistent mass demonstrations in other countries to the Ceasefire Now movement here, I believe we can learn something. On the one hand, there is an international mass sentiment that is willing and able to protest the unimaginable genocide that continues to be inflicted on the Palestinian people. However, while huge actions are taking place in other countries, here the initially large actions have tapered down to smaller and sporadic demonstrations. 

This is in no way due to an unwillingness to protest against the genocide. In my opinion, the main reason why larger actions aren’t happening is because of a lack of appreciation for how large demonstrations are the most effective way to advance the movement. So, what needs to happen?

Just as in the movement that protested the war against Vietnam, we need a national coalition that is in solidarity with Palestinian liberation. There was a recent conference in Detroit where people came together to discuss solidarity. However, from what I can tell, no mass actions are being organized. If mass demonstrations are planned, I see no publicity for those actions. What does this state of affairs tell us?

At the Zionism is Racism meeting many groups summarized their actions. In my opinion, all those groups need to make it their top priority to come together and organize more educationals, mass meetings, and national demonstrations.

We’ve seen how there is little opposition within the government to Donald Trump’s dictates with respect to Palestine, deportations, the termination of federal employees, the right to freedom of speech, as well as the right to an education free of government censorship. 

The history of this country gives us a clear message. Since the courts and the Democratic Party aren’t making a serious attempt to stop Trump’s dictates. Therefore, all the people who want the genocide to stop and support Palestinian liberation need to find ways to come together. We have the potential to make a difference. Why engage in many small actions when we can come together week after week and build towards the largest demonstrations this country has ever seen?    

Two meetings I attended after the No Kings demonstration

Image by Käthe Kollwitz

By Steve Halpern

This past Saturday I attended the No Kings demonstration in Philadelphia. An estimated 100,000 people participated in Philly and about five million throughout the country. While the primary issue of these demonstrations was many of the dictatorial decisions of Donald Trump, there were many protesters who had a specific focus. These included opposition to the mass deportations, opposition to aid for the Israeli organized genocide, as well as Israel’s current war against Iran. 

I believe there was fundamental agreement that there are serious problems in this country. The Democratic Party isn’t offering any responsible opposition. As a result, about five-million people felt the need to come out in the streets.

After the demonstration, I attended two meetings where I got a feel for what people are thinking. The first was an educational organized by the Party for Socialism and Liberation that focused on the Juneteenth national holiday. The other was organized by local Philadelphia politicians to discuss issues people are concerned about. Those politicians also attended the No Kings demonstration.

Juneteenth Educational

About thirty people attended the Juneteenth educational organized by the Party for Socialism and Liberation. Most of the people were young and I appeared to be the old head at 72 years of age. Several speakers spoke about the significance of Juneteenth, the background, the aftermath, and how this holiday is relevant for us today. 

I didn’t expect to agree with all of the arguments, but that wasn’t the point. All of the speakers were well informed and the audience clearly appreciated their efforts. The presentations started with the history before the Greek and Roman Empires. This is when humanity lived in difficult times, but there was genuine equality. We were introduced to little known highly developed African civilizations. Those empires influenced the Greek and Roman Empires we learned about in school. 

Then we learned about how the Civil War was, in reality, the Second American Revolution. While capitalists in the north profited from slavery, they also developed interests that would eventually cause them to go to war against the slave owners.

Then, a speaker introduced us to W.E.B. DuBois book Black Reconstruction in America. This book gives us a feel for the transforming effect of the reconstruction governments after the Civil War. It also argued that the participation of former slaves was necessary for the Union victory. Hundreds of thousands of former slaves left the plantations and this meant the confederate army had extreme difficulty in finding food. The Black soldiers also played a pivotal role. The Union army needed soldiers because of deaths, injuries, and desertions. 

Then, for a time, there was a genuine effort to bring equality to the former slave states in the reconstruction era. This attitude, no doubt, gave Black people who lived in Galveston, Texas reason to celebrate Juneteenth when they learned of the abolition of slavery. Black people went from being slaves to sitting in government positions. The educational system was transformed. Many Blacks and whites began attending school for the first time. 

However, as with all revolutions, there was a backlash. Many former abolitionists adopted themselves to the new reality where the terrorist Ku Klux Klan organized to strip Black people of their citizenship rights. After the Union Army withdrew from the former slave states terrorists organized to go to war against those who defended reconstruction. 

The defeat of reconstruction laid the foundation for the Jim Crow laws that flagrantly violated the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution. The government adopted those Amendments after the Civil War. While the Supreme Court isn’t supposed to have the power to violate the Constitution, that is exactly what they did in several decisions in support of Jim Crow segregation. 

So, when we think of the repressive policies of the Administration of Donald Trump this is nothing new. However, both the Civil War and the Civil Rights Movement give us evidence of how masses of working people organized to force the government to change its policies. The people who attended this educational were engaged with these issues and most participated in the discussion.

The meeting of the politicians

Tarik Kahn and Vincent Hughes were two of the politicians who organized this meeting held at the Roxborough Memorial Hospital. They are both members of the Democratic Party. I believe they both attended the No Kings demonstration. About 100 people might have attended this meeting and they were of all ages.

We all received copies of the summary of the budget the Democratic Party supports in Pennsylvania. The politicians all spoke about the enormous cuts proposed by the federal government. These would affect the public transportation system known as SEPTA. Many people in the Delaware Valley depend of SEPTA to go to work. It is extremely challenging to commute to and from center city Philadelphia without public transportation. 

Other proposed cuts are of Medicaid. Today there is an opioid epidemic throughout the country and the cuts in Medicaid would adversely affect this horror. Two of the participants in this meeting had sons who died as a result of this epidemic. Vincent Hughes reported that there are many rural hospitals in Pennsylvania that would close because of the proposed cutbacks in Medicaid. 

Then, these politicians suggested that people contact the two Senators from Pennsylvania, Dave McCormick and John Fetterman. The idea is that if enough people call these senators, they will be motivated to oppose the proposed cutbacks of the federal government. 

For about a full hour people in the audience were allowed to raise their concerns. I had the impression that most people feel we are confronting profound problems. However, it appeared that most people also supported the efforts of this politicians to deal with these problems. 

Then someone spoke about the lack of air-conditioning at Roxborough High School. This person appeared to feel a genuine concern for the students who had to sit in sweltering classrooms trying to learn something.

Then I was allowed to speak and attempted to argue for a different perspective. I started by giving an answer to the question as to why there is no air-conditioning in Roxborough High. The reason is that the state and federal governments are in flagrant violation of the law. Commonwealth Court Judge Renée Cohn Jubelirer wrote a 780-page decision arguing that the inequality in funding for education in Pennsylvania violates the Constitution. 

On the Philadelphia side of City Line Avenue, per student funding for education is about $10,000. When we walk across the street on City Line Avenue, we enter the Lower Merion School district. There per student funding for education is $26,000. I’m sure that students in the Lower Merion School district aren’t sweltering in classes with no air-conditioning. This is the gross disparity in funding that Judge Jubelirer argued is unconstitutional. 

One of the reasons given for this gross disparity in funding is the difference in real estate taxes. However, Philadelphia has several billion-dollar buildings and many that are worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Lower Merion doesn’t have real estate with those values. However, the most expensive buildings in Philly are commercial and that is the rub. 

While Judge Jubelirer’s decision was not binding, the New Jersey Supreme Court made a decision in the 1981 Abbott v. Burke case that was binding. The court ordered Governor Florio to come up with $700 million for underfunded schools in the state. 

The governor could have at least made an effort to get that money from the most affluent people who lived in the state. However, Governor Florio and the New Jersey state government chose not to take that road. Instead, New Jersey residents pay some of the highest property taxes in the nation. Yet, in spite of massive funding, inner-city schools continue to be underfunded in New Jersey.

Then there is the issue of funding for health care. While many Pennsylvania hospitals are being threatened with closure, 700 hospitals have already closed throughout the country. This is in spite of the fact that the United States pays more for health care, per person, than any other nation in the world. Yet, there are about 45 nations that have higher life expectancy than the United States.

While 700 hospitals have closed, Jefferson University and the University of Pennsylvania Hospitals invested billions of dollars in new construction in Philadelphia. Apparently, these investments are about maximizing the profits taken from health care. 

For instance, Jefferson University finished their billion-dollar Honickman Center last year. This expensive building has no beds, no maternity care, no pediatrics, no mental health, and no primary care. Yet we might speculate that the banks who invested in the Honickman Center expect payments on their investment every month. Those payments include interest, much of which goes to some of the most affluent people in the world. 

Then there is the idea of calling the Pennsylvania senators and asking them to oppose the cuts in federal aid to Pennsylvania. Senators McCormick and Fetterman are both ardent supporters of the Israeli organized genocide against the Palestinian people. I asked the question as to why would we expect anything from these senators when they gave a standing ovation to Benjamin Netanyahu, who, in effect ordered the mass murder and starvation of babies?

So, if the strategy of the politicians isn’t going to be effective, then what would be an effective strategy? I spoke about how the driving force for change in the country has always been the participation of masses of people in struggle. This started with the American Revolution, then there was the Civil War, the labor movement, the civil rights movement, and the women’s movement. I mentioned that today women feel comfortable in wearing pants and not dresses. This was a conquest of the women’s movement during the 1970’s

All this means that we need a mass movement that has realistic goals. Instead of thinking about how much money will be allocated for programs, I believe we need to talk about political rights that we all need. These would be lifetime rights to food, clothing, a place to live, education, and health care.

I received an ovation for my remarks. The politicians had nothing to say in response. My opinion is that people liked the fact that I expressed an anger at what is happening today. On a certain level, they share that anger. However, after the meeting, only a few people approached me thanking me for my remarks. 

Conclusion

In the Juneteenth meeting, I gave my opinion as to why racist discrimination has been so persistent in the history of this country. The capitalist system needs to grow continually. We see this in the obsession by politicians and the news media to support growth of the stock market. The question is, where does the money come from to finance this growth?

This comes from a reality that every worker is aware of. This is the obsession of the owners of corporations to continually cut costs. When employers can pay Black workers less than white workers, this is one way they can minimize their expenses. So, while Judge Jubelirer rules that inequality in funding for education is illegal in Pennsylvania, the state government feels free to essentially ignore that decision.

However, things are changing in the world today. The power brokers in the United States no longer dominate the world as they did in the past. There is nothing democratic or republican politicians can do about that. Their inability to make meaningful change has made this country even more repressive than it was in the past. ICE agents now are illegally arresting and deporting people who lived and worked here for decades. Even Senator Alex Padilla was assaulted, pushed to the floor, and handcuffed, for merely asking a question to Homeland Security Secretary Kristy Noem.

However, while the government makes this a more repressive place to live, working people will continue to find ways to resist and overcome the recent madness we are being exposed to.

The International Campaign to Deny Genocide

 

By Steve Halpern

Recently I listened to a 95-minute YouTube video titled: The elephant in the room: the anti-Semitism that has taken over in the universities. This video appears to be a polemic against the newly released film The Encampments. The Encampments gives the background to the demonstrations on university campuses protesting the genocide against Palestinians. I haven’t seen The Encampments because it’s only showing in select theaters. Then there is the Oscar winning film No Other Land that is a depiction of the brutal repression against Palestinians who live in the West Bank.

A theme of the film: The elephant in the room is the idea that the political movement of Zionism is a core expression of what it means to be Jewish. Looking at reality from that perspective, all the demonstrations that protest Israeli organized genocide would be viewed anti-Semitic. Based on this twisted logic, the film supports withholding federal funding from any university that allows demonstrations protesting Israeli organized genocide. 

The law they point to is Title Six of the Civil Rights Act. That law prohibits federal funding for universities that allow for discrimination based on race, color, or national origin. This film also advocates for firing university professors who openly oppose Israeli organized genocide. Zionist student organizations on several university campuses are promoting this perspective. 

The film also attempts to show how the struggle to defend Israeli organized genocide is analogous to the struggle of many Jews who supported the Civil Rights Movement. That movement forced the government to outlaw Jim Crow segregation. There were a few African American supporters of Zionism in the film who also felt that supporting civil rights for Blacks is analogous to supporting Israel. 

To put this absurd argument into context, we need to look at a bit of history. There was a time when Jim Crow segregation was the law in the United States. During those years it was illegal for Blacks and whites to use the same restaurants, hotels, or even bathrooms. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 effectively abolished Jim Crow. So, Title Six of the Civil Rights Act declared that schools, hospitals, and transportation facilities that received federal funding would be denied that funding if they discriminated against Black people.

There is a fundamental difference between vicious discrimination against African Americans and criticism of the state of Israel. Abolishing discrimination against Blacks merely recognizes the fact that everyone in this country is entitled to equal rights. The state of Israel became a nation because terrorist gangs expelled the majority of the indigenous population who happened to be Palestinians. The current genocide organized by the Israeli government against Palestinians is a continuation of the terrorism organized by the Hagenah, the Irgun, and the Lehi around the year 1948. The initial Israeli government felt that those terrorist actions were necessary to establish an overwhelmingly Jewish state in what used to be Palestine. 

I happen to be Jewish and attended Hebrew school as a child. There I, like most Jewish children, was indoctrinated with the Zionist idea that the state of Israel is a homeland for all Jews. At the age of nineteen, a young Palestinian woman introduced me to the unvarnished history of the repressive nature of the state of Israel. I’ve been learning about that history and have been participating in Palestinian solidarity demonstrations since that time. 

Ilan Pappe is one of the few Israeli historians who has uncovered the true history of Palestine. The title of one of his books is The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine. Pappe, like many historians critical of Israel has labelled that nation as a colonial settler state. There are many similarities between the repressive nature of Israel and the repression in apartheid South Africa, and the British domination of Ireland.

The United States was also a colonial settler state with respect to Native Americans. Just as the U.S. government drove the indigenous inhabitants off their land, the Israeli government has been forcibly expelling Palestinians from their homeland. 

Racist discrimination in the United States and Israel

However, the institutionalized racist discrimination against African Americans wasn’t driven by colonial settler motives. Black people were kidnapped from Africa, sent to the Americas, and coerced to labor under unimaginably horrendous conditions. Then with the Civil War and the defeat of radical reconstruction the government allowed for systematic discrimination with Jim Crow segregation and the less open discrimination in the rest of the nation.

Clearly the history of racist terror in the United States and Israel have similarities. Today there is a memorial to over 4,000 people who racists lynched located in Montgomery, Alabama. While there is no memorial to all the Palestinians murdered by Zionists before and after the establishment of the state of Israel, that number might be over 100,000. 

In the United States, the Ku Klux Klan worked to terrorize the Black community into accepting a second-class status. For over 76 years, the Zionists worked to create an Israeli state that is overwhelmingly Jewish. Today about half of the people who live in Israel and the occupied territories are Palestinian. In 2018 the Israeli government adopted a law stating that Israel is a state for Jewish people. This law, as well as the 76-year history of Israel makes it clear that the Zionists never had any intention of supporting genuine equal rights for Palestinians.         

In 2018 Robert Gregory Bowers murdered eleven Jews in the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. Those murders were clearly and unequivocally anti-Semitic and should be condemned by anyone who has a conscious. Yes, real anti-Semitism continues to exist. However, protesting those murders is clearly different from defending the state of Israel. 

Robert Gregory Bowers and Benjamin Netanyahu, in my opinion both committed horrendous crimes. However, while a court sentenced Bowers to death for his crimes, Netanyahu received close to $20 billion from the United States to carry out a genocide against Palestinians. 

The Israeli government argues that its genocidal actions are only a response to the October 7 Hamas organized raid into Israel. Part of their argument is the accusation that Hamas is fundamentally anti-Semitic.

I don’t support Hamas. Targeting civilians only tarnishes the legitimate demands of the Palestinians. Both Nelson Mandela and Fidel Castro did not target civilians in the revolutionary movements they participated in. 

However, about half of the Jews who live in the world live in the United States. Hamas never made statements against Jews who lived outside of Israel. So, while I don’t support Hamas, their actions were only directed against Israeli apartheid and not Jews who live outside of Israel. Therefore, it is clear that Hamas isn’t anti-Semitic, but opposed to Israeli apartheid.

The International Holocaust Remembrance (Forgetting) Alliance

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance began its activities in 1998. This organization responded to arguments that belittled the severity of the Nazi organized Holocaust that murdered about six-million Jews. The IHRA presented the evidence showing that a Nazi organized unimaginably horrendous holocaust was a historical fact. Many governments in the world signed on to the objectives of the IHRA.

The Israeli government dominated this organization and gave their definition of the word anti-Semitism. This definition states that anti-Semitism is an expression of “hatred toward Jews.”

The Israeli government broadened that definition to include the following statements. “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination e.g., by claiming that the existence of the State of Israel is a racist endeavor.” “Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.”

When we look at the IHRA’s definition of anti-Semitism in the current context of the Israeli organized genocide against the Palestinian people, we’re looking at a profoundly strange point of view. Over the past eighteen months, the Israeli government has made it a routine policy of mass murder, starvation, and mutilation of the 2.3 million Palestinians who live in the Gaza Strip. Yet according to the IHRA definition, criticism of that genocide is anti-Semitic. Comparing that genocide to the Nazi organized Holocaust, according to the IHRA is also anti-Semitic. 

One of the many flaws in the Zionist argument is that anti-Semitism if different from other forms of racist discrimination. They argue that because of the anti-Semitism in the world, Jewish people need to have their own nation. 

Lord Balfour who wrote his 1918 Balfour Declaration was a British politician who first supported the idea of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Balfour also favored legislation that limited Jewish immigration to Britain. In other words, Balfour preferred to have Jews live in Palestine rather than Britain.

Zionists also made the Haavara (Transfer) agreement with the Nazis in the 1930s. Jewish people in the world initiated a boycott of Germany protesting the Nazi organized brutality against Jews. The Zionists agreed to work against the boycott of Germany.  In return, the Nazis agreed to export commodities to the Jewish community in Palestine. As a result, about 60% of the imports to the Palestinian Jewish community came from the Nazis while they were in power.

This history points to the fact that the state of Israel was created because of support from viscous anti-Semites. Yet today, the IHRA, as well as the Anti-Defamation League argue that criticism of Israel is anti-Semitic.    

The news media routinely reports that there is a war in the Gaza Strip and that war started on October 7. This blog argues that there is, in reality no war, but a decision by the Israeli government to commit mass murder. That genocide is being made possible because of the massive aid Israel receives from the United States and other nations. 

The solution to this horror is to give Palestinians living in the world the same rights in Israel as Palestinians have who live in the United States. This sentiment is reflected in pro-Palestinian demonstrations that have erupted all over the world. The demand is, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.” Many Zionists feel this demand is anti-Semitic. Why?

Obviously, this demand doesn’t include Jews who also live in this area. However, those Jews already have equal rights. No one is demanding that Jews be denied equal rights. However, arguing for equal rights for Palestinians goes against the core of what the state of Israel has been about for 76 years.  

The fundamental problem Zionists have with genuine Palestinian freedom is how that idea would compromise Jewish supremacy in Israel. We need to put this absurd idea in context.

Today Black and white people are supposed to have equal rights in the United States. Blacks and whites are supposed to have equal rights in South Africa. However, the Zionist movement argues that Jews and Palestinians should not have equal rights in the nation that used to be Palestine.

Like all the monstrous regimes of the past, the Israeli government appears to be invincible. However, the state of Israel also appears to be falling apart. It has become a pariah state in the world. Many Israelis don’t believe that nation has much of a future. 

That said, I will continue to march in demonstrations demanding Ceasefire Now!!! I will do this because I believe in the possibility that in a future Palestine where Jewish and Palestinian children will play together in peace. 

The General’s Son—Journey of an Israeli in Palestine

By Miko Peled

Published by Just World Books 2016

By Steve Halpern

Over the past 16 months the world witnessed the unimaginable genocide organized by the Israeli government. This was made possible by massive support from the United States. I happen to be Jewish. Clearly there are growing numbers of Jews who find this genocide to be repugnant. However, large numbers of Jews, especially the ones who live in Israel support the genocide. 

Miko Peled’s book The General’s Son—Journey of an Israeli in Palestine gives a unique perspective to the cause of Palestinian liberation. Miko Peled’s father was Matti Peled. His father was a leader in the Jewish terrorist organization known as the Hagenah. 

Ilon Pappe’s book The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine gives a comprehensive history of how the Hagenah along with the Irgun and Lehi coerced about 750,000 Palestinians to leave their homes in 1948. At that time Palestinians were the clear majority of the population in the nation now known as Israel. However, the Hagenah wasn’t able to absorb the West Bank and Gaza Strip into Israel at that time.

General Matti Peled

With the establishment of the state of Israel, Matti Peled became a General in the so-called Israeli Defense Force. The IDF replaced the Hagenah and the other Jewish terrorist organizations. 

Then in 1956 Israel briefly took control of the Gaza Strip. Matti Peled became the military commander of that area. To better understand the problems of the Palestinians living in Gaza, Matti Peled learned the Arabic Language. He would eventually become a professor of Arabic literature. 

In his conversations with Palestinians, Peled was surprised by what they had to say. He expected that they would want revenge for being forced from their homes. However, his overall impression was that the main priority of the Palestinians was to live in peace.

After Israel gave up the Gaza Strip, they went to war again in 1967 and took control of the occupied territories that also included the West Bank and Golan Heights. After the 1967 war, something happened that would begin to change the course of the life of General Matti Peled.

The IDF forced about 30 Palestinian men above the age of thirteen from their homes. The IDF then executed those Palestinians and ran over their bodies with a bulldozer.

General Peled could not reconcile this mass execution with the army he was a leader of. Miko Peled gave the following summary of his father’s thinking after the 1967 war.

“Immediately after the war, while still in uniform, my father said that Israel must recognize the rights of the Palestinian people. He said that if we don’t do this, the Israeli army would become an occupation army and would resort to brutal means to enforce the Israeli occupation on the Palestinian people. He said this while still in uniform, and he never stopped saying it and advocating for Palestinian rights till he died.”

One of General Peled’s initiatives in attempting to advocate for peace was to establish relations and become a personal friend with Dr. Issam Sartawi. Sartawi was a confidant of the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. General Peled was alone within the Israeli establishment for initiating this overture. This is how Miko Peled summarized his father’s thinking.

“Will we be allowed to live our lives in peace and security…and be masters of our own destiny? Anyone who allows us to do this is a friend. Is the man with whom I am speaking willing to be our friend?”…” “Can reality be transformed?” “Anyone who does not believe it can is depriving himself of the great powers that nature has bestowed on mankind.”

Miko Peled

The life experience of Miko Peled was different from his father’s. While Miko became critical of the Israeli government, initially he wasn’t an activist. He studied Karate and spent two years in Japan developing his skills. Eventually he wound up in the San Diego area of California and opened a dojo. 

While he was away from Israel, he continued to have an interest in finding a way of promoting the beliefs he gained from his father. So, he joined a discussion club of Jews and Palestinians in California. 

There Miko began to learn that the fundamental ideas he was raised with in support of Israel were all fabrications. The Jewish armed forces didn’t carry out a heroic struggle in 1948 to establish the state of Israel. No, in fact the Jewish forces outnumbered the Arabic armies and had more arms than their adversaries. The war of 1948 wasn’t a heroic battle by Jews, but a genocidal campaign to steal the homes of the majority of the population of Palestine. 

This new knowledge, as well as his background convinced Miko to become more active. He worked with the Rotary Club to import wheelchairs for Israelis and Palestinians. This effort had no problem with sending the wheelchairs to Israelis. However, the attempt to send wheelchairs to Palestinians proved to be an arduous campaign. 

Then, Miko visited Palestinians in the occupied territories. He wrote about his gripping fear of entering an area where Arabic people lived. This was due to his upbringing where people with power instilled in him the idea that the number one priority of Arabic people was to murder Jews. This myth, as well as many others gradually evaporated with his discussions with Palestinians, as well as his exposure to their world.

An interesting aspect to this book was Miko Peled’s description of Palestinians who served time in Israeli jails. Most Palestinians living in the occupied territories have served time or have family members who served time in Israeli jails. The IDF is the organization that brought charges against those prisoners. Since the IDF doesn’t pretend to represent Palestinians, all those charges are bogus. 

Miko Peled reported that Palestinians organized a sophisticated educational system within the walls of the prison. There they learned Palestinian history, as well as the Hebrew and English languages. Palestinian leaders formed an alliance with imprisoned Israeli gangsters. So, even when leading Palestinians were held in solitary confinement, messages would be sent to other Palestinian prisoners by way of the Israeli gangsters.

Miko Peled’s life changed when he learned that two Palestinian suicide bombers blew themselves up in Jerusalem in 1997. Killed with that explosion was Miko Peled’s niece Smadar, who was almost 14 years old. 

Ehud Barak, who became Prime Minister of Israel came to the Peled home to pay his respects for their loss. Barak was running for office and said he couldn’t declare he was working for peace because he felt that would mean losing votes.

Barak’s statement made Miko Peled erupt in anger with the words: “Why not tell people that this and other similar tragedies are taking place because we are occupying another nation and that in order to save lives the right thing to do is to end the occupation and negotiate a just peace with our Palestinian partners?” After 28 years, the Israeli government has yet to give a rational answer to that question. 

Miko Peled differed from his father and other members of his family when he argued for one democratic-secular Palestine. This disagreement centered on the idea of whether Palestinians and Israelis were capable of living in one state with equal rights for all. 

Clearly the people of South Africa managed to live in one nation after the government abandoned its apartheid laws. Clearly people in the United States managed to live in one nation after the government abandoned the Jim Crow laws. 

However, the Zionist movement has argued that the only way to fight anti-Semitism in the world is with an exclusively Jewish nation. That argument ignores the fact that Jews and non-Jews lived in Palestine in relative peace for centuries before Israel became a nation. That argument also ignores the fact that the seven million Jews living in the United States live in a safer environment than Jews who live in Israel.  

The Israeli organized genocide the world witnessed over the past 17 month is teaching millions of people the true nature of Israeli apartheid. Miko Peled’s book The General’s Son gives us a unique perspective in support of unconditional Palestinian liberation.