Wissot: A callous disregard for life — but not genocide
The words you choose to use and the symbols you elect to display in protesting politically controversial events are like landmines on a battlefield wired to explode. Words and symbols are subject to multiple interpretations which reflect the clash of opinions in high-stakes political conflicts. They also can reflect the ignorance of protesters who foolishly use disinformation gleaned from TikTok and Instagram as the basis for their protests.
The recent flap over the town of Vail rescinding an invitation to Native American artist Danielle SeeWalker to participate in an artist in residency program this summer is a good example. SeeWalker was uninvited after town officials said they received criticism from residents about an online posting of a painting of hers titled, “G Is For Genocide” which depicted a woman wearing a keffiyeh and a feather. Seewalker’s explanation for the painting was that it linked the genocidal treatment of Native Americans in this country’s history with what was in her opinion Israel’s similar treatment of Palestinians in Gaza.
SeeWalker was on firm factual ground in using her art to decry this country’s history of committing genocide against Native Americans. There were the brutal military massacres at Sand Creek in 1864 and Wounded Knee in 1890. In 1830, the Indian Removal Act was passed which ultimately led to the painful uprooting and bitter relocation of 60,000 native men, women and children from their homes in Florida and Georgia to reservations in what is now Oklahoma.
Extending similar motives, however, in her controversial painting to the Israeli government for the current horror show in Gaza doesn’t hold water.
Here’s why. Over 20 percent of Israel’s population is comprised of Palestinians. There are also four times more Palestinians than Israelis living in the West Bank. What is happening to civilians in Gaza is a tragedy of epic proportions, but it’s not motivated by a desire on the part of Israel to rid Gaza of Palestinians like the Nazis wanted to rid Europe of Jews. Israel doesn’t want to purge Gaza of Palestinians any more than it wants to evict Palestinians living within its borders or in the West Bank.
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Palestinians don’t need to be liberated from Israel — they need to be liberated from Hamas, the terrorist group that has turned their towns into bomb factories and villages into missile launching pads. The only product Hamas exports is terrorism and the only thing it’s doing for Palestinians is offering them up as sacrificial lambs in a deadly combat zone. It’s a remarkable irony when illiterate American college students chant “from the river to the sea” and echo Hamas’s call for the destruction of Israel and a reenactment of the biblical exodus of the Jews — only this time not from Egypt and without Moses to lead them.
Seewalker got into trouble with the artist in residence committee by placing the blame for the humanitarian crisis in Gaza on Israel. To be fair to SeeWalker, I think the committee was cowering to the crowd in rescinding its invitation to her. I wonder if officials would have objected to her posting a painting online titled “M is For Murder” which decried the beheading of babies in Israeli villages? Vail isn’t Berkeley, and Seewalker would have likely found Boulder a more receptive audience for her politically charged art.
None of what I have written should distract from this: Israel’s war campaign has been an unmitigated disaster. There have been too many “tragic accidents” like the errant missile strike that killed 40 civilians sleeping in tents earlier this week in Rafah.
Israel didn’t have to invade Gaza to defend itself after the Oct. 7 attacks because Hamas had no place to go and nowhere to run. Its members were trapped in Gaza along with the Israelis they had abducted and the Palestinians they were willfully allowing to be slaughtered by Israeli bombardments. Hamas’ ability to carry out another massacre inside Israel was effectively stymied by the fact that the Israeli military was fully deployed and not shamefully unprepared as it was before the war began.
The only way Benjamin Netanyahu could have prevented the humanitarian crisis that took place was to delay the Israel Defense Forces’ full-force military assault until an agreement with Egypt was reached to allow as many civilians who wanted to flee the war zone to escape through Southern Gaza’s Rafah border crossing into Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. Egypt, of course, would have resisted allowing that to happen because it no more wanted Palestinian refugees potentially escaping to Cairo than Israel would have wanted them decamping in Tel Aviv.
The United States could have and should have applied pressure on the Egyptian government by reminding officials that the $1.3 billion Egypt receives annually in military assistance has strings attached to it. The time had come to pull those strings and force Egypt into permitting Palestinians caught in a war zone to cross into the relative safety of the Sinai Peninsula. Despite Egyptian objections, creating the world’s largest refugee camp in the Sinai would have been infinitely better than what turned out to be the world’s largest mortuary in Gaza.
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Choosing words and symbols carefully is how to avoid substituting chants for facts and painting pictures that distort cause and effect. It will be up to respected and reputable international courts to decide if the loss of civilian life caused by both Hamas and Israel constitutes war crimes. Comparing Israel to Nazi Germany, however, as did a prominent Jewish-American writer, is downright stupid.
What I find truly tragic is that Israelis and Palestinians, eternal enemies in the Middle East, share a common bond: they are both widely despised and live in one of the most violent neighborhoods in the world. The United Nations has treated Israel with almost antisemitic contempt for decades. The Arab countries in the region refused to accept Palestinian refugees after Gaza turned into a killing field. Anti-Jewish and anti-Muslim hate crimes have risen alarmingly in this country over the past eight years.
It would be a godsend if the two groups on the receiving end of so much vitriol and violence could join forces to fight against the hatred targeted at them instead of directing it at each other.
Jay Wissot is a resident of Denver and Vail. Email him at jayhwissot@mac.com.
