Tuesday, 29 July 2014
We are all culpable
I have stopped posting on politics for a number of reasons, but I feel that today, I want to share this powerful video.
I have watched with horror, disbelief and incomprehension what has been happening in Gaza recently. Incomprehension because I cannot believe that the world is allowing this to go on.
And I feel so powerless.
Chris Hedges' speech in 2010 after Israel's attack on Gaza in 2008-09 is as relevant today as it was then, and points to the sustained campaign to exterminate the Palestinian people in Gaza. He accurately predicted that 'Israel will from now on, speak to the Palestinians in the language of death'.
He says that 'the lesson of the Holocaust ... is that when you have the capacity to stop genocide and you do not, you are culpable, and we are all very culpable'.
It seems to be a sad truth that tribal behaviour does not diminish with civilisation. It merely becomes more sophisticated either in the use of technology, or in the deployment of rhetoric - or both. The pinnacle of acquisition usually turns out to be power through wealth rather than understanding through knowledge. The poor it seems are always expendable, and the powerful have restricted sight - whichever side one considers.
ReplyDelete(By the way, the video did not play when I tried it.)
I agree, Olga, and as you say, the poor are always expendable. What is horrendous about what is going on in Gaza is that it's a population of civilians, and a large number of children, who are being bombarded and murdered by a nation that has very sophisticated weapons of war. I find it unbearable.
DeleteI just tried the video in my post and it did play. It might be worth trying again. I don't know what else I could do as my knowledge of these things is very limited. It's a very powerful video and it would be a shame if you could not get it to play.
It played OK this time, Eirene, thanks.
DeleteI have always wished that those who wish to engage in war had to be the ones who themselves actually go into face to face combat. We would then very quickly have peace!
I'm glad it played, Olga. I know so little about these things, and I get very frustrated.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, they have the power and money to be able to send others to war and to not put themselves to danger.