The HyperTexts
Striking Parallels: Gaza, the NAKBA, the American Holocausts and the Jewish Shoah
by Michael R. Burch,
an editor and publisher of Holocaust and Nakba poetry
When I wrote the missive below, I had a sudden feeling—an intuition—that
these are important points, and that we may be closer to peace than we think if
only we act in accordance with our ideals, so please consider sharing this
article with other people who believe in equality and justice for everyone,
regardless of race or religion. A wise friend of mine pointed out that not
everyone may agree with some of my stronger words and assertions, so after
each section of this article I have included an "Evidence" index for anyone who
may be unconvinced.
If Jewish children had been imprisoned in Gaza and were being denied freedom,
justice and basic human rights, all the Jewish world would be in an uproar, and
rightfully so. The Jewish people would all cry with a single united voice, "This
is a new Shoah, a new Holocaust, a new Warsaw Ghetto!" And of course they would
be correct, because for innocent children to suffer so terribly, with no hope of
relief, while the world does nothing to help them, is a horror beyond
imagining.
But because the children suffering so terribly in Gaza today are "only"
Palestinians, the government of Israel and its propagandists insist that the
world look the other way and become like so many Germans who lived in denial
during the Holocaust. To ignore this new Holocaust, however, would be antisemitism because the
Palestinians are Semites, like the Jews.
Ironically, Israel has become an antisemitic nation. For instance, Israel has
marriage and citizenship laws that can rip families apart if its citizens have
the audacity to marry Semites not approved of by the government. Israel’s
marriage laws are so grounded in racism and religious intolerance that one in
ten couples must marry abroad because they can't marry legally in Israel. Obviously, there is something terribly wrong when
a government tries to dictate who can marry whom, based on race and religion,
and can separate mothers from their husbands and children based on their
spouses’ genetics. Israel’s marriage and citizenship laws are similar to those
of the Confederacy and Nazi Germany because they attempt to enforce racial
“purity” and thus must be considered outrages by anyone who believes in equality
and justice.
And of course we should not ignore or deny self-evident catastrophes brought
about by racism and religious intolerance running amok, regardless of what
propagandists say. When we see multitudes of completely innocent children being
collectively imprisoned and punished for the “crime” of having been “born
wrong,” and see mothers being separated from their children for the sake of
racial and religious “purity,” we need to remember that throughout history
oppressors have always dehumanized their victims.
Such “thinking” led to three American Holocausts: those of Native Americans,
African Americans, and today, of Palestinians.
The white supremacist government of the United States and its white
supremacist presses called Sitting Bull a “terrorist.” However today we know
that he was a man who longed for peace, but quite understandably could not abide
his people’s women and children being subjected to ethnic cleansing and
genocide.
The white supremacists of the Confederacy whipped and beat slaves who
rebelled or tried to escape, while preaching them sermons on “Christian” ethics,
but today we know who the guilty parties really were.
Nazis blamed all the woes of the world on the Jews, but today we know better
than to believe their racist propaganda.
So when will the world open its collective eyes and see that the children of
Gaza are suffering a very similar fate, for very similar reasons: the racism and
fascism of their oppressors? Today there are encouraging signs that more and
more of the people of world see the reality for what it is, and are no longer in
denial. Consequently, more and more people are in an uproar, as they should be.
This gives me hope that things can change for the better, hopefully soon.
To understand why Israel is wrong, we only have to consider the horror of our
own children being imprisoned in Gaza by one of the most powerful nations on
earth, and their spirits being crushed while the megaphones blare, "We are God's
gift to the earth, and they are just dirty creatures who don't matter, compared
to us." But of course the children of Gaza really do matter, and that is what
the Nazis once said about themselves and their innocent Semitic victims.
Americans who believe in equality and justice should ask themselves if there
are clear and striking parallels between this new Holocaust, the Nakba of the
Palestinian people, and those of Native Americans and African Americans. If the
answer is “yes” then we should not do what our ancestors did, and suffer through
massacre after massacre, when the nonviolent solution is to achieve peace
through justice.
Related pages: American Fascism,
The American
Holocausts,
Parables
of Zion,
Let Freedom Sing, The
Nakba: The Holocaust of the Palestinians
The HyperTexts