Note: As I was writing this I became aware that I was spelling Nehenyahu’s name wrong, but I’m not going to change it and spell it correctly, because he deserves far, far worse than the indignity of having his name spelled wrong.
We all knew it was going to be a massacre when Israel went into Rafah. And we all knew that Israel was going to go into Rafah. It was horrifying. Everyone who was fighting for Gaza, had to accept Israel going into one of the few parts of Gaza that were somewhat safe, as being as inevitable as the sun rising.
The sun will rise. 2+2=4. Israel will murder more innocent men women and children tomorrow. It feels inevitable. How do you not feel powerless?
If we march in the street, if we vote in candidates who are dedicated to stopping the slaughter of Gaza, if we boycott Israeli products, none of this will cause the carnage to instantly end. Still, sadly, and it breaks my heart to say it, a lot more innocent people will die before this madness comes to an end.
So, this post isn’t just to try and help other people, it’s also to help myself. Because after all the actions taken to support Gaza, and right after that, Nehenyahu just confidently carrying out his plans anyway, I think for many people, the question will sometimes be asked.
What’s the point?
And it’s okay to ask that question. Humans do not have an infinite capacity for optimism and hope, and humans do not have infinite perseverance. Human beings’ ability to stay strong, in the face of a massacre that seems as inevitable as the sun rising, is not an infinite resource.
So, I’m going to try and answer for myself, and hopefully this answer will be useful to others, what is the point of boycotts, of protests, and of learning about new ways of being an ally to the Palestinian people, when that fucking prick Nehenyahu is doing whatever he wants without any consequence.
The conclusion I’ve come to is this. Even a minute matters. What do I mean by this?
Let’s say I have perfect knowledge of the future, somehow, because aliens did something to my brain for the purposes of this thought experiment it doesn’t matter how. Okay we’ll say wizards did it! So in this thought experiment, I am psychic, and I know what will happen if people just give up on protesting for Gaza and go home, and I also know what will happen if people keep fighting for Gaza.
So, in this hypothetical scenario, I know that the genocide, the inhuman massacre, will go on for another six months if we do nothing. Six months is 262,980 minutes. If that’s wrong you can blame whatever months to minutes calculator I used.
But I also know what will happen if we put all of our efforts into helping the people of Gaza. If we put all of our energies into protesting, into boycotting Israeli products, into not going to see that new Marvel film next year that has an Israeli Mossad agent in it (yeah that’s a thing that’s happening), with my psychic powers, I know for a fact that, the genocide will go on for:
262,979 Minutes
In this hypothetical scenario involving wizards, countless hours of activism means we will only shorten the duration of the genocide by one minute. Just sixty seconds. So if that were true, it would be clear that all of this activism was pointless, and it would mean we should all just go home.
Wouldn’t it?
NO! NO! A MILLION TIMES NO!
Yes, that is exactly what I’m arguing. Even, in the extremely depressing scenario, where all we can do is bring the duration of this bloodbath from 269,980 minutes down to 262,979 minutes, we should still keep going. We should still be protesting in the street. We should still be trying to educate our friends and relatives about the horrors of Gaza. We should still be sharing videos of the genocide on Facebook, even though Facebook will lower them in the feed because fuck Facebook and its stupid algorithm and Zuckerburg is a prick.
Okay, stay on topic!
Think of the person you care about most in the world. Your wife or husband, your child, your sister, your grandfather, whoever that person is that you care about most on this planet. Imagine an IDF soldier has a gun trained on them. Their life is about to end. There doesn’t seem to be anything to prevent the person you cherish most in the world having their life so cruelly ended. Then, at that exact moment, the soldier’s commanding officer tells them to stand down, and the soldier returns to their base.
And the person you care most about in the world, is still alive. You run over to embrace them, and you think of the fact that, if another minute had passed without the order to stand down, the person who is your everything, your reason for getting up in the morning, would be lying dead.
This is why. This is why, even if we, somehow, knew as an absolute fact, that all we can do is shorten the length of the genocide by sixty seconds, we should not lose even a fraction of our resolve.
I’m sorry that I have to tell you that more innocents will die tomorrow. I’m sorry that I have to tell you that tomorrow there will be more images of murdered children, possibly as young as two years old. And I’m sorry that I have to tell you that tomorrow, that monster Nenenyahu will go to sleep in a nice comfortable bed while many Gazans have nowhere to sleep.
I am sorry to tell you that, if you have even a fraction of empathy for the people of Palestine, then tomorrow is going to be A REALLY FUCKING SHITTY DAY!!!!!
Many will die. Today, tomorrow, and the day after that. But many can be saved.
But it would be worth all of this, all of the protests that many of us are doing, if we could save just one person in Gaza. If, we could say with certainty, that all of our efforts could only save one Palestinian life, then that would be worth it. Because that one person is someone’s everything. Someone’s mother. Someone’s husband. Someone’s child. We shouldn’t stop, shouldn’t even consider stopping, even if we knew that just one person, just one, was all that could be spared in this carnage.
It’s not always going to be easy to keep motivated. Nehenyahu seems to be committing his monstrous acts with complete confidence, it doesn’t look like he’s the least bit concerned about the boycotts or the protest. But I’m equally sure that, at first, the government of South Africa wasn’t in the least bit concerned about protests against apartheid, that the government of the United States wasn’t the least bit concerned about protests against segregation, and I’m sure when the government of Germany began its persecution, and eventual genocide, of the Jewish and Romani people, and many others, that they were confident that they would never be stopped.
But they were stopped. Because people with a conscience weren’t willing to sit around and do nothing while these horrors were being perpetrated.
So, it’s not always going to be easy, seeing the Israeli government commit their monstrous acts no matter how much you protest, but you are making a difference! You would be making a difference if your actions along with the actions of other dedicated people shortened the length of this genocide by just sixty seconds. You would be saving the most important person in the world, to someone in Palestine, if your actions saved just one life. And the more effort we put into helping the people of Palestine, the more lives we will save. Many will die, and I wish that wasn’t so, but also, many will be saved. I’ll repeat that.
Many will be saved.
So please, no matter how bad things feel, don’t lose hope! The people of Palestine are depending on you.
I’ll leave you with this video of this amazing speech by Sinn Féin politician Thomas Gould. All of us need to feel the pain that this man was feeling when he made this speech, and then turn that pain into action, so that we can end the absolute madness that is happening in Gaza:
Ponderings Of An Autist 