talking to sahar from a payphone in the mission and we decide to meet at the israeli consulate. the email from sarah in beirut yesterday. the news – hezbollah’s bold kidnap move yesterday, immediately met by the israeli collective /civilian punishment called “Operation Just Reward”, one of these nasty belligrent eufemisms meaning air strikes on Lebanon. yesterday, or perhaps it all happened earlier, this part of the world runs hopelessly behind…
on the BART i see a young guy with the imprint of a fatima hand dripping blood and “Jews for a Free Palestine” on his t-shirt. i ask him and yes, he’s going to the demo. on our way he tells me about the groups that took the initiative: Al-Awda (The Palestine Right to Return Coalition) and a Palestine Solidarity alliance in which his group participates. he also gives me the latest news: the airport in Beirut is bombed. and he mentions that there’s a pro-israel counter demo (strange how that possibility hadn’t crossed my mind…)
while the protesters denouncing israeli violence stand on the side-walk in front of the israeli consulate, people are facing the other side of the street, where israeli flags and peace signs prevail. traffic on montgomery street continues as usual – we are not many, perhaps 150, they are not many, perhaps a bit less, not enough to occupy the street. and then police makes sure both sides remain on their side-walk. so we shout at/against each other. (those who are there to denounce isreali violence have an advantage: we have a microphone.) meanwhile cars drive by and people on both sides ask them to honk for support. of course, a drive-in demo, why would you get out of your car for anything, after all this is america…
disheartening in many ways. the tiny small number of people. with a few exceptions, a striking absence of comments on the attacks on lebanon or the war-waging in gaza of the last couple of weeks. instead the same old slogans, with a déjà -vu feeling that didn’t give us much hope that a demo like this would change a thing. and most of all: the rhetorical monopoly on the word “peace” on their side. “Israel wants peace”, “pro-Israel pro-peace”. at some point the zionist crowd began to chant “Where are your peace signs?” accompanied by righteous attitudes and triumphant smiles. “No justice no peace” was the (amplified) response. which is very true, but it didn’t work to break the framework that a regime that causes so much violence is really about peace and security…
we were there because of this consuming urge “to do something”. but the whole spectacle made us feel even more powerless. still, there is no other option than to do something. but we’ll need all the brains and hearts and hands we can get to figure out what can be done…
for more on this and other actions over here in the bay area, see http://www.indybay.org/international/palestine