Who Wants to Read About Palestine?

Author: Ariel A. Ruff

Shortly after the recent attack on Israel which took place on Oct. 7th 2023 I wrote something about the conflict (which I will include in full at the end of the article). 6 days later to be exact. And its general point was “It becomes an issue when “Israel has a right to defend itself” becomes mass slaughter and destruction with zero push-back”. The point of prefacing this article with that is to emphasize how just 6 days into Israel’s war, I already could see where things were heading. Now, 6 months later more needs to be said. There are many places to start on this issue. And as someone whose only real tie to the conflict is my Jewish first name, I make no proclamation to be a professional here… other than an attempt to make salient, simple, irrefutable points which might help clear perspective on the issue. As many of you can tell, this issue is mired in talking points so I promise to try to avoid conjecture, speculation, or anything else that could leave room to discount what is said.

The origin of the issue is pretty clear cut, and I would urge readers to not let themselves be pulled away from the core of it with points which are outright made up. For example, you might hear reasoning for Israel’s whole existence get hinged on the idea that “Palestine was the only place in which Jews could have settled”. To which you have to ask… according to who? And if the answer to that question is anyone other than the Palestinians who were living there at the time, it kind of lays bare the invalidity of that statement for quite obvious reasons. For who can give permission to a people or proclaim a land belongs to those people, other than the owners of that land. While the history of Israel-Palestine might be complicated, the origin of the issue is indeed quite clear-cut. In short, and in very layman's terms; after all of the historically, well-documented, persecution of Jewish people worldwide (the holocaust notwithstanding), the Jewish people were looking to establish a country of their own so that they could realize a future in which all Jews have a place they can go and be free of persecution. Now, I should point out that there are details being left out here, such as the fact that the idea was tied to a specific ideology named Zionism, but fortunately, this isn’t relevant to my point. The place they chose was Palestine. The decision was based on a few things. Some of those things being, Jewish people’s historical ties to the area, a claim that the land was given to them (according to their religion), and the fact that some Jewish people already lived there. To keep things brief and clear. At the time that this decision was made, the land was controlled by Britain. Land they essentially obtained following World War 1 through the defeat of the Ottoman Empire. This right here, is a key point in understanding this issue. When it came time for Israel to be established, the permission for them to do so as well as the sale of the land, came from the British. Regardless of how you feel about the matter, the objective truth comes down to the fact that the Palestinian people (that includes Jews native to the land) had their land given away by people who had no true ties to the land and who were not Palestinians, the British. And this is the core of the issue. This is the beginning of all the strife, death, and conflict that exist between the two people till this day. There are many details in this sordid history. But without a clear understanding of the frame of the issue, the issue can never be fixed. Now that we know this, a few things can be understood. Because of the way Israel was established, land being stolen and… wait. You might ask, “Why is the land stolen”. Well, the answer is simple. How did Britain obtain the land? Well, they fought a war in which their side won and they kept the land. Stolen. If anyone has any other term for when property is taken through sheer force, they are very welcome to let me know because I struggle to find one more apt. With this in mind, Israel then purchasing the land does not somehow magically make it “unstolen”, no. It is still just stolen and held by someone else. Just as if someone were to steal your phone and sell it, it would still be stolen. As I was saying… Because of the way Israel was established, the land being stolen, what has resulted has been a long history of Israel trying to compartmentalize, contain, subjugate, and all around get rid of the (very understandable) hate, decent, resistance, that would come from any people who had their land suddenly occupied by outside people. And again, many people will point out persecution, things the bible says, or even the fact that some Jews already lived in Palestine. But I hate to say it, none of these things… not one of them gave them permission to migrate in mass to come take the land and establish a state. The hate the Jewish people have experienced does not somehow trump Palestinians’ right to their land, what the bible says is relevant only to those who believe in it, and even then, just taking land because of that in the mid-1900s just doesn't fly, at least if your claim is that it’s being done rightfully. And the fact that some Jewish people lived there already (which were a small minority) pretty obviously does not give them permission to bring related people and take the land. And so the problem becomes very clear. This whole issue can be summed as Occupier vs. the Occupied… and that’s indisputable. With this frame, Oct 7th becomes a bit clearer. Of course, over 50 years there has been back and forth ad infinitum. Which leads to Oct 7th. I’ll take this opportunity to remind the reader once again that there are so many details being glossed over here, in an effort to try to get the absolute essentials across, but once you have the skeleton, you will be able to add meat to the bones where needed, and I don’t need you turning into a skeleton yourself. So with brevity, we’ll continue. Why did Oct 7th happen? Well, because it had to. This is not to say the violence had to happen or that people should have died. This is to say some sort of kinetic reaction was going to come. On Oct 6th, we were in the year 2023, and these people who had their land taken from them, and who were pushed off their land 50+ years ago, had still not only not gotten their land back. But more importantly were still being subjugated with what can only be summed in brevity as a system of apartheid. In Gaza, no control over their own borders, no ability to leave freely, no control over their airspace (their only airport was destroyed in a previous scuff with Israel), no freedom over their water. No control over their electricity which for years Israel had forced draconian things like electricity for 4 hours a day. And the list of abuse goes on. Not subjective abuse, blatantly objective abuse much of which would be considered illegal in other situations. Glazed on top of all of this is what Palestinians and much of the world has come to realize. Israel had no intention of fixing that situation. So it is no wonder a fighting force would spend days, years, devising a plan to attack these people who not only had this control over them but who also had one of the most powerful military-industrial complexes on earth with which to continue domination. It’s sad. It’s sad exactly because one has to ask, what would motivate something like Oct 7th to happen. This right here is an interesting point. Because Israel would have you believe that in general, Hamas (the main attacking force) is just a terrorist group, who just wants to kill Jewish people and who are antisemitic. A key reason you might have heard Israeli officials push and push to get the slogan out there “Hamas is ISIS”. The only problem is… this couldn't be further from the truth. Hamas IS NOT ISIS, they have a clear goal behind their motivation and to be frank, to be honest with ourselves, its a just one. Freedom from Israeli oppression. But the reason behind this ISIS framing was in part to make people associate them with ISIS (the well-known terrorist group) in an attempt to essentially hide Hamas’ goal. They don’t want people to realize these people are fighting for freedom. They want you to think they are terrorists and nothing more. But they aren’t terrorists. Did they commit acts of terror? absolutely. But would you call the black slaves who committed terror in an effort to damage their owner’s power structure, terrorists? I don’t think you would… that is… unless you were one of those slave owners. No, the reality is that the Hamas resistance force, while not perfect, is made up of moms, dads, brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts, uncles, Palestinians who have decided that they are willing to put their lives on the line to do whatever they have to do to stop Israel's oppression. It’s sad… Because in many ways many see no other choice. This basic truth being established doesn’t excuse the killing (although regarding enemy combatants, according to international law, a resistance force fighting against their occupier is fair game). It doesn’t make what Hamas did right. But what it does do, is make so very clear why this response has been… well, there are no words for what Israel has done and continues to do under the guise of a response to what was a people THEY were oppressing fighting against that oppression. I want to say disgusting, gross, criminal. It’s so bad that even I, who rarely struggles to come up with something using all the freedom that words provide, can’t find the words. In my mind I can only describe it, I only see it, I can only define it… as a feeling of a massive cost Israel is building up. A price to pay, a feeling and notion of a price to pay, that Israel is making so high it actually makes me fear any sort of comprehension of its totality. lol TL’DR it’s like I can’t see what Israel is doing in totality but I can see the shadow, and it looks horrid. I’ll spare the details on why what Israel is doing is so bad because honestly, everyone can see it. And those can’t either just choose to ignore it because for whatever reason they think allegiance to Israel is more important, are too busy with life to pay attention, don’t know where to start, or just don’t want to know. But for those who don’t know where to start… Over 30,000 people killed, 13,000 of those children…children.70k+ people injured including thousands and thousands who are now missing body parts.100+ journalists killed, almost 200 aid workers killed.Almost every home in 3 cities destroyed, every university demolished and almost every hospital demolishedAnd the cherry on top is that Israel is still cutting electricity and choking the food supply.What the fuck are we doing? And by we, I mean what the fuck is Israel doing. In closing, I want to make a point on these numbers. There are no doubt people out there who take issues with the numbers, saying they're artificially high, we can’t trust them, so on and so forth. First of all, if I could take a second to take off my writer’s hat… c’mon bruh, stop. No but seriously. We are well beyond that argument. Even if the number were a fraction it would be too high, even if you removed the number completely, starving people is still a war crime, cutting water is STILL A WAR CRIME. These videos that IDF soldiers post on TikTok incriminating themselves like kids from the Bronx hyped to stunt with a Glock for the gram, except here it’s them shooting indiscriminately into apartments… are still war crimes. In other words, this whole thing is so obviously past the point of no return. But, and this is a big but to end on (those who know me know there are no jokes in my writing whatsoever), those people so strongly claiming the numbers are fake. Well, there is a solution to that issue. A tried and true salve so that none of us have to wonder what’s going on. Israel could let journalists in. And that’s where I’m closing, why is it that Israel doesn’t let reporters and other independent actors in to confirm and investigate what is so contested on the ground? Could it be because they’re afraid the journalists would get killed? Wait… who’s killing the journalists? For those who made it through this whole thing. First of all, not sure that even god COULD bless you lol. But be that as it may, I hope someone learned some, thing, here. More importantly, I hope everyone understands why there MUST be a cease-fire now! - Dedicated to Skylar Ruff: My lovely niece who took her life about a month after the conflict started. She was so truly concerned about this issue and couldn’t understand how everyone was just turning a blind eye. 6 months later, I’m still wondering the same. Rest in peace.

Something I wrote on Oct. 13th, 6 days into the war: If I had the unfortunate luck of being born in Gaza I would want someone to at the very least, say what I’m about to say.The history between Israel and Palestine is a long and complicated one but even if you would like to look at this in a vacuum there is a simple conclusion to come to.1. Of course the Israeli people being attacked like they did is bad.2. At the exact same time doing 10 times the damage to gaza (which was already in bad shape) and killing 5 and 10 times the innocent civilians in Gaza is not ok.It becomes an issue when “Israel has a right to defend itself” becomes mass slaughter and destruction with zero pushback. Even further, there are some saying those Innocents deserve it because they allow hamas to exist. But saying that is like saying Americans deserve to die because of the millions of people our government has killed. It makes no sense and it’s completely unfair/dishonest.I will forever be against the kind of thing that happened to Jews last weekend. But at the exact same time, I will never pretend that the response Israel has displayed thus far is anywhere near ok. Not to even mention denying food, water, and outside help to 2+ million people. It’s a disgrace.11 journalists killed so far from Reuters, Al Jazeera, BBC and others.11 UN workers killed so far.How many people who have absolutely nothing to do with Hamas are ok to kill?