Human rights activists: your silence is noted.
An open letter to those who have opposed Israel in the name of human rights.
An open letter to those who oppose Israel in the name of human rights:
On Monday morning, I sat watching a video posted by an Israeli journalist of paragliders from Gaza landing at a music festival near Kibbutz Rei’m and opening fire on the crowd of 20-somethings, killing 260 of them, 200 more than were murdered in the 2017 Las Vegas Shooting at the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival.
I watched as Hamas terrorists dragged off young women to hold them hostage.
I watched a video of a family held captive in their home, trying to calm their two younger children, and keep them on the ground as rockets and bullets rained over their house, while explaining to them that their 18-year-old sister, who had been kidnapped by Hamas, was not coming back.
I read posts from a family whose daughter was taken from the music festival, whose parents were forced to listen on speakerphone while their daughter as raped and murdered by Hamas.
I saw footage of a girl, younger than me, who learned her grandmother had been murdered by Hamas when her grandmother’s captors took her phone and posted themselves shooting her in the face on her grandmother’s Facebook account.
I have seen more and more posts on Facebook and Instagram by parents begging for their kidnapped children to be returned to them.
I have watched videos of politicians in Iran celebrating the actions of Hamas in their murder of Jews in Israel.
I have seen photos of windows smashed on Jewish businesses in London by supporters of Hamas’ terrorist actions, and of rallies calling to “gas the Jews” in London and Sydney.
On Monday, Hamas announced that they would begin killing hostages.
On Thursday, Noa Argamani, the young woman being taken away on the motorcycle in the first video linked above, turned 26. At the time of writing this, her condition and location remain unknown.
So, I have some questions for anyone who has joined in chanting “from the river to the sea” without researching the full extent of what that actually means; for the person who told me that they disagree with the B’nai Brith’s “foreign policy”; for the girl in front of me in line at the Chicago Art Institute on Sunday expressing her disagreement to her friend at statements that “America stands with Israel”; for anyone who didn’t think that “by any means necessary” didn’t mean exactly this, or who had been somehow convincing themselves otherwise.
In normal times, I am open to listening to your perspective and engaging in difficult discussions with you. But these are not normal times.
My understanding has long been that those in the West, particularly those who identify as liberal, holding Anti-Israel views are doing so out of a belief around human rights and liberties.
Is this what achieving or protecting human rights looks like to you?
If you oppose the existence of the State of Israel because of a purported belief in human rights: what are you telling yourself right now? Because you have at best remained silent, and at worst chosen the side of the terrorists raping and murdering Jewish women and children.
So I want to know, what is the story that you are telling yourself to look away from what is happening in Israel right now; to look away from Hamas showing you exactly who they are and always have been? What story are you telling yourself to not have to reach out to your Jewish friends and colleagues who are hurting, right now? What are you telling yourself to absolve your conscious for not standing up for human rights in this moment when it involves Israeli Jews? What do you plan to tell yourself when it involves Jews everywhere?
I get it, you don’t want to have a hard conversation about the gruesome reality of what “from the river to the sea” actually means; of what calling for the destruction of the State of Israel actually means. I can only pray that this is challenging some of your beliefs and making you question whether you ever really had even the slightest understanding of dynamics at play in the Middle East. I hope this makes you want to educate yourself better.
If you stand for human rights, women’s rights, LGBTQ+ rights, or oppose the murder of children and seniors then you have run out of places to hide from the hard questions about your views on Israel. You no longer have the luxury of hiding behind vague buzzwords and catchphrases about “open air prisons” and “colonialism.”
We simply no longer have time for this.
You don’t have the privilege of looking away right now just because suddenly, it’s more complicated than you’ve been insisting it is, or bloodier than you thought it would be. If you want to have an opinion on any of what is going on, then you need to look at what is actually going on. You all had so much to say about how much you didn’t think Israel had a right to exist two weeks ago. You were so confident in the correctness of your position that you brought it up to me casually, and at inappropriate times. Where did you go? Why did you decide that suddenly you don’t have anything to say? Will you be able to look me in the eye when this is over? We will remember that you stayed silent now, when we needed you.
Go online and read the words of families and friends begging to have their loved ones returned to them. They are everywhere. If I don’t get to look away then neither do you. This is real. This is happening.
You say that you care about human rights? Jews in Israel are humans too. And I’m sorry if that makes you uncomfortable. I’m sorry if having to acknowledge the humanity of Israelis is a lot for you. But honestly, it’s about time.
You had so much to say to me about Israel before. Why are you so scared now that it matters?
Note: I was originally planning to include a lot more links to videos from social media in this letter. I have chosen not to do that for two reasons. The first, is that I felt the more I could pull from well-recognized news sources, rather than independent journalists, even if I personally trust them to have verified their material, the better. The second, is that I think my Jewish readers in particular don’t need to see more distressing footage going into Shabbat, and these are all things they have likely already seen. If you would like access to the other footage I was going to include, please reach out and I will share it with you. I had originally included a section of this letter clarifying some of the misinformation about Israel and Gaza. I did not feel that it made sense in the context of this letter from a writer’s standpoint, and will share that information subsequently on social media, where hopefully it will be easier to disseminate.
The videos are difficult to watch and the violence impossible to understand. Heartbreaking stories but they need to be told. Good work Sadie
Thank you Sadie-Rae. Excellent as always in your moral clarity.