This is an important article by Professor Stuart Rees of Sydney University. While many Australian academics are staying silent – fearing the repercussions should they speak the truth – Stuart Rees has shown himself to be as courageous as he is articulate.
Appeal to Parliamentarians: Resist Israel/US thuggery, be advocates for peace
As though infected by a chronic illness, news of unending death and destruction in Gaza and on the West Bank leaves millions feeling frustrated, angry, despairing and powerless.
Most federal politicians probably feel the same, though they have the chance to craft a humanitarian role for government but only if they perceive advocacy for peace as a political priority.
Obstacles to Australian politicians becoming sophisticated advocates for peace will have to be overcome. A first obstacle concerns the robot-like repetition that Australia is only a “middle power”, a fatalistic way of thinking which limits the mind and constrains vision.
A second obstacle is the unthinking, absurdly deferential statement, “Israel has a right to defend itself”. On other people’s lands in defiance of international law, it has no such right.
Reassured by the US, the might is right threats of Israel have meant building more settlements, using the most lethal arms, developing famine as a weapon of war and eliminating Palestinians. Realistic talk about peace means speaking frankly about such thuggery and thereby fostering policies to resist.
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Challenging liars
An earlier insistence, that thinking about peace depends on speaking frankly about violence, also means that apologists for war are not allowed to tell lies and that the media be discouraged from giving oxygen to those who make false claims.
A tendency to lie has reached new depths in Israeli spokespersons’ mind-boggling assertions that there is no famine in Gaza. As though schooled by the witches from Shakespeare’s Macbeth, even the Israeli ambassador to Australia has joined this chorus: ignore the pictures of emaciated children, beware or was it “be aware”, there is no famine.
Let’s concentrate for a minute on the behaviour of the major Israeli spokesperson, David Mencer, who is employed to dramatise Israel’s virtues. He is proud to do so but now plays a nauseous Orwellian role. In lugubrious, holier-than-thou style, he explains, there is no famine, that if by chance there is a food shortage, Hamas, or even the non-existent UN are to blame. “It’s not me sir,” said the bully of little children in the playground, “It is anyone but me.”
Being frank about peace requires sufficient insight and guts to call out the David Mencers. The pictures are telling and require comment. A plump, apparently overfed, well-upholstered, elegantly suited Mencer intones about food and drink. If telling lies is a virtue, then it’s obvious the people of Gaza can be, may even be, well-fed. The mismatch between corpulent Mencer and emaciated children must have dawned on at least a few peacemakers.
You can read the full article here.
