Here in America, we love our oversimplifications and tiny sound-bite answers. Recently, I saw on social media where someone had commented about Israel getting into yet another conflict. One genius took it upon himself to point out people have been fighting there for thousands of years. What an incredible insight and revelation! This is one of those statements that actually says and means nothing. Other than Antarctica, this statement is true everywhere. North America South America? Yes it's true native peoples were fighting each other long before the whites showed up. Empires rose and fell here too. Africa, yes the same story. Asia? You bet! India, another place with a long history of conflicts. Europe too, has a history of warfare stretching back to the beginnings of time. ‘They have been fighting there for thousands of years,’ I see as a statement from someone who doesn't want to think too deeply or too hard about history and geopolitics.
I guess we should throw up our hands and go watch a race or maybe some baseball? Nope, nothing to see here. That's always been going on, there's nothing we can do. Even in the land that elected Trump, we can do better. When Netanyahu invited Trump to participate in this new endeavor, Trump took a pass. I don't want to give him too much credit, we are still helping defend Israel after Israel started a shooting war with Iran. Trump and company, like Biden before are turning a blonde eye while Israel commits genocide. My understanding was Trump wanted to renegotiate a nuclear deal. I guess that was too slow for Israel. She may well indeed push back the clock on Iran getting nukes. But that comes with a price tag.
Israel has also ensured a boiling hatred from the next generation thus ensuring conflict far into the future. Unfortunately, that also drags Europe and the US into the hairball of mid East conflicts. With massive anti-Trump rallies here at home, will Trump see this as a chance to distract everybody by getting us into a new Mideast War? That will only further erode our image and security around the world. Israel will know no peace for the foreseeable future. The cycle of suicide bomber whack-a-mole will continue. A major war in the Middle East will not do any favors for the global economy. And I'm sorry to break it to you Trumpers but we are still a part of the global economy. But hey, they've been fighting there for thousands of years!
While this may be a truism, it's not an excuse to turn off our brains and ignore the problem. Maybe we should ask better questions? How can a just peace be achieved, what would that look like? Rather than bombing Gaza into the Stone Age, what if Israel along with the rest of the world invested in it? I'm sure we could come up with a better solution than open air prison or sight of an ongoing genocide. How can we bring Iran back into the family of Nations? Somebody say that's impossible with the current government there and they may be right. Does that mean we should not even try? Just like our government, the Israeli government and the Iranian government will not be here forever. What can we do to facilitate better change down the road?
Maybe I can just sit here with my head up my ass and repeat the mantra of ‘they've been fighting there for thousands of years!’ I have to do better and so do you.
No comments:
Post a Comment