Peace by peace
(In response to Oday Shahin’s Aug. 24 column “Deconstructing Gaza.”)
In reading over the content appearing in the State Press over the last few weeks —beginning with Oday Shahin’s courageous article “Deconstructing Gaza” on the issue of the United States, Israel and the Palestinians — I am touched by the overwhelming amount of praise Shahin and the State Press have received for highlighting the Palestinian experience and perspective woefully underreported in the U.S.
I would like to add my voice to the mix, speaking as a Chicano-Jewish person opposing ongoing U.S.-Israeli crimes in the occupied territories, their past and possibly future invasions of Lebanon as well as the grave threats the two countries pose to other areas in the region.
The Arizona Chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace, based on the UA campus, is an affiliate of the largest Jewish-American group of the same name dedicated to supporting justice, equality, democracy, self-determination and human rights for Israelis and Palestinians.
In Arizona, the extent of U.S.-Israeli militarization is egregious and far-reaching. The border wall — a major part of a vicious U.S. “deterrence strategy” — has contributed to at least 5,000 migrant deaths since 1994 (ACLU report “Humanitarian Crisis: Migrant Deaths at the U.S.-Mexico Border, Oct. 2009), and extends roughly 700 miles along the US-Mexico border.
To build the wall, the U.S. awarded a $2.5 billion shared contract to Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest private security firm, enabling the company to enjoy matching funds with the $2.5 billion the Elbit received to handle Israel’s notorious Separation Wall, illegally built deep within Palestinian land and dividing many West Bank communities from each other and vital resources such as water and farmland.
Furthermore, companies such as Motorola and Caterpillar benefit from these same abuses in the Arizona borderlands while reaping profits from their military contracts with Israel allowing crucial aspects of the occupation (house demolitions, unlawful killings, etc.) to continue.
In the U.S., we have our work cut out for us as we continue to bear a very serious burden of guilt that should move us to do everything we can to stop our government from providing the means for Israeli aggression, harsh violence and repression of Palestinians under occupation.
In the wake of Israel’s murderous assault on Gaza last year, Malcolm Smart, the Middle East director of Amnesty International, stated: “To a large extent, Israel's military offensive in Gaza was carried out with weapons, munitions and military equipment supplied by the USA and paid for with US taxpayers’ money,” adding that we, as Americans, must bear some responsibility for Israel's actions.
At the time of Smart’s comments in February 2009, Amnesty International called on the United States to immediately suspend all military aid to Israel, and to issue a comprehensive arms embargo on the state in order to investigate violations of U.S. law and bilateral arms agreements with Israel.
We would do well to pressure our government to comply with U.S. law, which is the minimum of our obligations, while Palestinians and to a lesser but significant extent Israelis, Americans and everyone in the international community continue to be polluted and shamed by a brutal 43-year-old military occupation that concerns us all.
Gabriel Schivone
Jewish Voice for Peace, Founder of the Arizona Chapter
