“The British and Americans are just doing what Israel tells them. They are nothing more than sheep”.
This was an argument- or rather a statement, posed by a young Muslim I was speaking to a few weeks ago, when discussing the Syrian crisis. I didn't think much of it at the time, but after reading Dominic Lawson's column in the Independent last week, the conversation makes me wonder whether Muslim communities- particularly in the West, use the Israel-Palestine conflict to rather disingenuous ends.
We've seen them before; passionate young Muslims who proudly boast Keffiyeh, wear 'Free Palestine' t-shirts and frequent social media with articles about more shootings, fighting and settlement building in disputed areas. Vociferous and enthralling- they denounce the selling of Israeli produce, and now in the latest brand of political protest, advocate the disassociation of Israeli universities in academic discourse.
Don't get me wrong- I believe that engagement with human rights activism should be applauded. The issue I have with Pro-Palestine demonstrations, and the rhetoric that surrounds it, is that it's far more suited to convey external grievances, preoccupied more by an assertion of identity than liberation and independence. And if that's the case, then regardless of how many meetings and protests Muslim students attend, little is really achieved in the way of Palestinian rights and representation.
In my opinion, much of this boils down to organisation- simply put, there's no clear objective as to what 'pro-Palestinian' activists actually want.
For example, if we wish to advocate for greater rights for Palestinian Arabs, then what groups do we actually want to denounce? The young student's response to this was “Israel”. I agree that Israeli government policy should be protested against (particularly in areas such as settlements, welfare and higher education) but should we not also be denouncing Hamas, who according to a report by Amnesty International, continues the practice of torture, ill treatment of detainees and public executions? Indeed, if we are to protest for the right of Palestinian self determination and dignity, then why not publically denounce Gaza police denying young men the right of self expression in what they choose to wear? . Certainly, if we are to advocate greater rights for Palestinians, our focus cannot be so narrowly defined and reduced to simplistic tales of good vs evil.
And for those who advocate the need for a legitimate Palestinian state (like myself), we also face complicated questions; Yes, Palestinians do deserve a state in which collective identity must be recognised, and the same should hold true for Israelis. “But the Palestinians were there first. The land belongs to them!” the student responds. A good point - and one that I originally endorsed. But unfortunately, it disregards the wider histories of the region.
Having had the privilege to write my university dissertation on the history of the Palestine prior to the establishment of British Mandate, in which much of my time was spent in the archives of the British Museum and other Middle Eastern institutes, it seemed evident that the land had been inhabited by a vicarious array of peoples prior to the First World War, including the Early Israelites, Romans and Arabs- all of whom remain woven into the fabric of the Levant. So if the claim to legitimate ownership rests on a historical foundation- as such assertions suggest, then both Palestine and Israel posses legitimate claims to their existence within the borders.
To ignore the complexity of the Israel-Palestine conflict- on both sides of the equation- does little but reduce the decades-old conflict to meaningless, and in many ways, condescending slogans. Spending a few hours on a Saturday afternoon chanting “Free,Free Palestine” may do wonders to soothe the moral conscience, but without a much broader understanding of both regular life of Palestinian families, or indeed an intimate knowledge of their history, how can we truly say that we are “speaking for the voiceless”? Should we honestly be part of a struggle in which real human suffering is reduced to ideological point scoring?
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