I don’t want to say much, but I do want to address this thing that has happened in the world: Hamas attacked Israeli towns. Israel is responding. Gaza has been a hotbed of violence, political dispute, and anger for…. 80 years?
Giant disclaimer: I don’t know shit. At the end of the day, I feel more lost than anything else when talking about peace/politics in Israel/Gaza/Palestine. I admire the people who make a living out of it, they are a bird of a different stripe.
It’s almost like the whole situation was destined to fail because no one really wants to compromise. To be fair, at this point we’re in one of those spirals where “his brother killed my cousin who killed his daughter who killed his kid who killed her cousin who killed ….” and at least three generations of political wrangling for power that has put in place atrocious policies.
This isn’t a “both sides are equally wrong.” With that said, I can’t and won’t try to figure out where that scale lands. In the past 80 years there have been bad actions, bad motivations, and bad people escalating conflict in this area. If you told me I had to call someone wrong, it would be Hamas – they have been a terrorist organization for 30 years and they threw the first missiles now. They have always used suicide bombers, attacked civilians, and overall raised the temperature to violence at every turn.
All that said – thousands of people are going to die. And there is no right that will make that wrong better. Hamas decided violence was necessary (despite Israel pulling out of Gaza in an attempt to work towards peaceful solutions). Israel is going to respond with violence (which I can’t entirely condemn because this was an attack on Israeli civilians).
I think what I want to say to sum everything up is that I am mourning the loss of life. I am mourning the loss of possible peace (if it was possible). I am angry that violence and death is so easy. I am terrified on behalf the civilians of every ethnicity, religion, and political persuasion who lives in the region – because they are the ones who are going to suffer for this war.
Edit: The Bulwark podcast said this really well: political murder is bad.
Dream by Day 