The idea of Israel 🧻

Toilet thoughts...

I’ve spent a lot of time on the toilet this weekend.

And as I do every time I flush the toilet or have a hot shower over the past three years, I think to myself “wow, I’m soooo lucky.” Because I’m painfully aware of how something so mundane and simple, is only a dream for those in Gaza.

I honestly can’t imagine dealing with tummy bugs and periods when there’s only a shared communal “toilet” for hundreds of people.

I’m not sure how many toilet visits it took for me this weekend to stop thinking “I’m so lucky”…to changing it to “Israel is so barbaric”. And that’s what should be the focus. Because what they are doing is DELIBERATE.

They are deliberately withholding basic necessities from the families in Gaza.

So I’m sitting on the toilet thinking about this, and also reflecting on the film NAZA that I watched the other night. And I’m thinking about how awful so many Israelis are. Not just to Palestinians….but to each other.

It’s something that we don’t talk enough about.

But most Israelis are aggressive, rude, selfish and dismissive.

And maybe it was the lack of sleep or the 3am brain…

But I had this image of a beautiful old stone house. That a Jewish guy stole in 1948 from a Palestinian family. He moved into the house with his relatives.

A lot of the Palestinian family were killed or moved overseas, but for the remaining family members half have been forced to move into the back rooms of the house.

While the other half have been relocated into the backyard where a fenced off area is now their “home”.

The Jewish family now call themselves Israeli. And claim that their house is Israeli. Even though it belongs to the Palestinian family. The part of the family that got locked into the back rooms keep getting more and more of the space taken away from them. And the teenagers from the Israeli family love nothing more than bashing them up. Even though the Israeli family agree that they don’t really like what the teenagers are doing, no one actually stops them. And to be honest, according to them, maybe it’s good that someone keeps the family in the back rooms scared. And they keep being told they should be thankful, because at least they have it better than their family members that ended up in the fenced off backyard. Because for the past three years they have been starved and slaughtered like animals.

Now it would be easy to assume that the Israeli relatives that live in the main part of the house have a pretty idyllic life because their home is so beautiful.

There is this idea that things are wonderful. They are good looking. They’re great at starting up tech companies. They make incredible food. And they have somehow managed to convince the rest of the street that they’re the good guys.

Reality is that most of them hate each other and it’s a completely toxic situation.

Lots of them have actually moved out because they just can’t handle the intensity. But for those who have stayed, nothing will deter them. For some it’s because they love this house and if they leave, they won’t be part of the inheritance. For others it’s sheer stubbornness. If they leave, then the Palestinian family will take the house back. They will continue to exist in this toxic home while telling themselves that they are living the dream.

So here’s the thing.

There’s an idea about what Israel is. For those living in the country. And for those on the outside looking in.

The idea is not based on reality. It’s an illusion. For some it’s a mishmash of visuals of what living on a kibbutz might be like. For others it’s an extension of what they imagined from their Bible stories.

I don’t know what it would take for this illusion to burst…because if what we’ve seen for three years on our screens won’t snap people into reality…NOTHING will.

This is why we can’t rely on some magic shift of consciousness to occur. Too many precious lives will be sacrificed before that happens.

WE MUST INSIST ON SANCTIONS ON ISRAEL.

This is the ONLY way to stop them.

While Israelis live in comfort and generate money…THEY WILL NEVER CHANGE.

I’m not sure about the rest of the world, but something practical you can do here in Australia is to write to these two genocide supporters and tell them they must reverse their position and support the Senate Inquiry into the Red Lines Package when Parliament returns in October.

foreign.minister@dfat.gov.au – Penny Wong, Foreign Minister

senator.katy.gallagher@aph.gov.au – Katy Gallagher, Senate Manager of Business

And of course for all of us around the globe, BOYCOTTING all Israeli products and encouraging our circles to do the same.

If you have other suggestions then please comment below with them.

I will repeat….SANCTIONING ISRAEL IS THE ONLY WAY TO STOP THEIR ALMOST EIGHTY YEARS OF BRUTALITY.