Gaza Strip

I watched the Vienna Philharmonic’s New Year’s Day concert with my young friend Melissa. We waited, knee-deep in Strauss, for Barenboim to start ranting about Gaza. But he didn’t. Instead expressing hope that 2009 would be a “year of peace in the world and of human justice in the Middle East”. Very dignified. How the lunatic Israeli right must hate him.

If it were just a question of what’s happened in the last few months Daniel Barenboim’s comments would look a lot more reasonable, but when set in the context of the history of Palestine throughout the 20th century and particularly since the setting up of the state of Israel in 1948 and the associated ethnic cleansing of the region, to name only events in the Palestinian area itself, any even-handed attitude really has to see the Israeli state as having been consistently aggressive since its very foundation (and indeed beforehand if one looks at the actions of the terrorist cells who later provided its political class). If you oppress, impoverish and radicalize people as constantly and brutally as that, subjecting them to every possible indignity over a period of decades, they will fight back in whatever limited ways they can.

While in no way approving of terrorism, whoever carries it out, I think it’s worth mentioning that the Palestinians have suffered having their own country taken from them by terrorist gangs (who subsequently transformed themselves into respected statesmen), being confined to the poorest corners of that country which are cut to pieces by high walls and dotted with illegal settlements populated by armed fanatics, being denied many basic human rights, having every attempt to use political channels to better their situation (including the passing of numerous UN resolutions) blocked by the state of Israel and the imperial superpower which supplies it with free weapons, and every desperate attempt to fight back met with disproportionate and overwhelming brutality. To say there’s any equality between the two sides in this struggle is to swallow US/Israeli propaganda hook, line and sinker.

Hamas fires home-made rockets into Israel. These rockets cause some damage to property and few, if any, casualties. The Israeli army – using the latest state of the art military hardware – launches an airborne attack in which hundreds of civilians are killed, following a period of extended (and, in spite of the theoretical ceasefire, tightening) blockade which has denied the people of Gaza some of the most fundamental basics of life.

The Israeli attacks come during an election campaign in which the opposition – led by arch-warmonger Netanyahu – has accused the Government of being soft on security.

All with the tacit support of the British government.

Tags: barenboim, gaza, israel, melissa, palestine, vienna philharmonic