IN a week’s time, a Falls Road white line picket will mark two years since the beginning of the Israeli Gaza onslaught.
As we write, a new plan to end the slaughter has been forwarded by President Donald Trump. It reads like an Israeli wish list. While no definitive response has been issued by Hamas at the time of writing, it’s clear that the plan is held in contempt by them.
Meanwhile, those pathetically few riders in the plan that actually require Israel to commit to something positive were immediately disavowed by Benjamin Netanyahu on his return home from Washington.
The desire for the genocide to end is strong and growing around the world, but a plan which predicates an end to the slaughter on demands made without consultation with or reference to the group of whom the demands are being made is destined not only to fail, but to fail disastrously. Meanwhile, in response to President Trump’s unsubtle threat about what lies in store for Hamas and Gaza if the plan is rejected, we would only ask: What are you going to do, Mr President? Start a genocide?
If so, the bad news is that the Israelis have beaten you to it.
A big turn-out at next week’s Falls Road event is assured, but let’s all do that we can to make it a massive one. Sometimes it can feel as though we as individuals are powerless in the face of such overwhelming hate and cruelty, but we see in the BDS campaign that a single person’s modest contribution can make a huge difference. Refusing to buy Israeli goods – supermarket couscous or fruit, for instance – not only allows a person to think that at least they are doing something, but the truth is, as we have seen in media reports on the precipitate fall in demand for Israeli goods, a person doing that small bit is in reality doing something huge.
So with this white-line protest. That idea of small contributions adding up to something immense should animate those concerned about the continued slaughter in Gaza to take the time to join the thousands taking to the streets next Wednesday. A big protest only becomes a mammoth one when you join in.
Persuading the international community – and in particular the West – to do more than spout rhetoric about the Gaza genocide has at times felt like a pointless and thankless task, but the dial of disdain is not only starting to move, it is starting to speed up. The sight of 90 per cent of the audience walking out of Netanyahu’s address to the United Nations in New York last week was perhaps the most powerful message ever sent to Israel. It told the apartheid ethnostate in no uncertain terms that it is an international pariah, that it is held in contempt and that its actions in Gaza will echo down through the decades and centuries.
As the deeply flawed Trump plan is mulled over in capitals around the world – and in Europe in particular – let’s not assume that our individually modest but collectively powerful efforts can slow down or stop. Get out and make yourself seen and heard next Wednesday.
