#ask uz

[screamingfromuz]

Hi there! I am reaching out because someone sent me a question about how to help Gazan civilians without accidentally helping Hamas or spreading more hate against Israelis. I honestly feel lost on this myself, but as far as I can tell you are someone who has done real activism in Israel. Do you have suggestions for diaspora Jews who want to help fight for peace?

So a small disclaimer to the Gaza problem. We have 2 main problems with getting aid into Gaza, the first is the limited amount of aid that is allowed in, sending more money cannot make it go in faster. Problem number 2 is that much of the physical aid ends in Hamas's hands or in the black market and there is nothing we can do with that. I have heard recommendations to wait and see who opens a field hospital on the Rafah border crossing, and donate to them. Despite that, here are some charities to help Palestinians both in and out of Gaza.

I will admit, most of my activism is focused on deradicalization on the Israeli side and solidarity work, so I had to ask around for some of those charities. Some of the groups I know of do not currently have an international donation link, so if I get more good ones, I'll make another post.

Gaza:

Medical aid for Palestinians-

Donate today - help us provide urgent supplies to Palestinians in need

Your donation today can help us supply life-saving medicines such as anti-viral drugs, inhalers to treat asthma and food packs for malnouris

Anera-

Help Refugees In Palestine, Jordan & Lebanon | Anera

Anera is delivering food and hygiene kits right now in Gaza, helping families displaced by the war. HELP GAZA NOW! FAQs about our Gaza respo

Doctors without borders-

Home | Doctors Without Borders - USA

Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) treats people where the need is greatest. We are an international medical humanitaria

Palestinians outside of Gaza and Peace movements:

Palestinian red Crescent- they also work in Gaza, but as the main source for Palestinian ambulances in the WB, I put them here.

PRCS

mistaclim (Looking the occupation the the eye)- this group is helping to protect Palestinians from the illegal settlers

מסתכלים לכיבוש בעיניים | Looking The Occupation In The Eye

We are a group of Israeli activists, who care about human rights and the future of Israel. We act in order to bring occupation apartheid of

Keshet- this is a big one. they support Bedouin communities in normal times, and now they are working on getting bomb shelters to the unrecognized villages, and providing a mental health first aid line.

ארכיון Bedouin Communities - עמותת קשת

standing together- totally biased, as I am a member of this organization.

English | standing-together

Standing Together is the grassroots people’s movement in Israel. We organize Jews and Arabs, locally and nationally, around campaigns for pe

Women wage peace- a feminist based solidarity group

Women Wage Peace - Women Wage Peace

Yes, there’s another waysee how our unique WORK PLAN › encourages a favorable outcomeYes, we have international backingconsider the power of

Haqel- they represents Palestinians in cases related to land ownership and access. there work is still ongoing even during the war

Haqel - In Defense of Human Rights

Haqel is a human rights NGO working on behalf of Palestinian landowners in the occupied Palestinian territories tackling land rights violati

Center for Jewish non Violence - a diaspora org that also does a lot of work in the South Hebron Hills.

Donate to CJNV

Now is the time for solidarity. Your support helps to continue our year-round solidarity presence on the ground, our education and internati

[screamingfromuz]

You're blatantly lying to yourself if you don't think what's happening in Gaza is genocide. Entire bloodlines have been wiped out. They're not “going after Hamas” they are purposefully targeting civilians

I was gonna post about it anyway, so I'll just answer you instead.

I'm not denying all the death and destruction, I just don't consider genocide the right term. I will accept the term Policide for Israel's intentions toward Hamas, but toward Gazans? Genocide is the wrong term. Genocide means there is an intention to eradicate, the problem here is not intention to kill, the problem is the complete and utter disregard for human life. If there is a chance to kill one Hamas leader, to destroy one launch site, to disturb Hamas in any way, the IDF will take it, human cost be dammed. what is it that have been chanted in "pro-palestinian marches"? "by any means necessary?" well, this is what this looks like, horrific isn't it?

and what you children need to understand is that things doesn't have to be "the worse term you can think of" to be horrific. This kind of military tactics, that honestly is way to prevalent in urban warfare, which is most of the warfare nowadays, and is practiced by literally anyone who can pull this off, is as and sometimes even more scary to me then Genocide. Because this "by all means necessary" mentality is far harder to get rid of. Hate? I can work with hate. Dehumanization? You can work with that as well. Apathy? this is the hardest to combat. Because knowing the consequences but not caring? accepting it as an unfortunate but necessary sacrifice? This is one of the hardest mentalities to combat, because the dissonance here is so massive that it is nearly impossible to break it.

The point is, saying it is genocide ignores the actual problem, not only in the IDF, but a world wide problem. We need a better word for this, the disregard of mass death of civilians during military campaigns (ahem the entire cold war for example). And me saying we need this conversation is not ignoring the horrors in Gaza, but truly understanding them.

p.s.

why does it have to be a genocide? would you stop caring if it you couldn't call it genocide?

[screamingfromuz]

Living on stolen land is violence inherent. If you’re so sad about the state you’re protected by inflicting violence on the Palestinians, then maybe you should think about how you get to live there in the first place. If the violence of the Israeli state didn’t exist, then you wouldn’t have peace the way you know it. Move. Leave. If you don’t want to be passively participating in apartheid

sweetheart, I understand you bough to to propaganda, that results from white colonizers projecting their guilt on Jews. I know how I got to live here, some my relative immigrated here back in the 18's century or fled here due to genocide through the centuries. funny enough, one of my ancestors fled to region after he was told to "go back to were you came from you dirty Jew".

I am aware of the violence from both sides, and never justified it, this is a shit show and telling people to before refugees (again) or die a "justified" death is a horrible horrible mindset darling. I will keep doing as I do, and if you don't see that here, it is because I mostly act in the real world, where stuff happen.

I know the history of this conflict, probably better then you due to the facts that 1) I live here and experience this conflict in all it's complexities daily 2) this is stuff I literally learned about during my BA in political science. I have a degree.

I understand if you made your mind and you will refuse to deconstruct your believes and examine them, it is not my job to do that thing for you, only you can make yourself go through that process. I will ask that you will take this passion and donate to Magen David Adom and the Palestinian Red Crescent who are working to rescue and treat civilians.

https://afmda.org/donate/

https://www.palestinercs.org/en/Donation

[screamingfromuz]

I agree that, academically, what is going on in Gaza is not genocide as defined by the UN in 1948. It shouldn't require that term to be critiqued.

And we indeed know that Hamas and its affiliates is proudly genocidal.

However, we also know that there are plaformed individuals in the government who have genocidal intent (if they don't mind promoting ethnic cleansing in public, what are they thinking in private), and they are clearly trying to steer the ship through policy and extremist groups. Moreover, there is verifiable rhetoric aimed at (especially through certain musicians) and within the IDF (of course, not everyone or even a majority) that promotes at least dehumanization and ethnic cleansing.

That in itself can end up affecting the conduct of military operations, regardless of the intent of the immediate commanders (I am deliberately excluding your commander in chief as well as minister of national security).

So no, it is not genocide. But under the current action without a long term plan to actually improve the lives of Palestinians and give them a path to self-determination, my concern is that Bibi and his allies are pushing the needle towards (instead of away from) the likelihood of that getting kicked off.

that is a take I fully accept. Furthermore, for me, this is another reason we need to be precise, so we could point out bad actors, and not call the entire ordeal a thing it is not. There are still good apples here, no need to get rid of the entire barrel.

I will point out, that the disregard to human life is a whole problem to be addressed that get buried under the "genocide" screams, which is more of my problem. This is not just an Israel problem (even though it is being taken to the extreme here), and ignoring the systematic problem is not going to solve it.

I will say, the municipals were rescheduled for next month and I am having both high hopes and utter terror of what will happen

[screamingfromuz]

I feel like I’m in an alternate universe, I’ve never seen anything like this. Not directed to Russia, or Iran, or China, or even the fucking US, which most of these people hate with a burning passion. I hate the likud government and I think the fact that Bibi is in power while on trial for three years and not in jail is horrendous, of course I do, Israel is the place of my parents, my grandparents, and my great grandparents, but this is clearly a double standard, right? I’m not going insane? The world just can’t let go of Jews, we’re the ultimate stain on the world to them

You are not going insane. this is the world right now and always been, we got our own special double standard to hold onto

[screamingfromuz]

Hi do you have any posts on the BDS movement? I think most don’t oppose it solely because it calls for a boycott of Israel, but because the org has unnecessarily called for boycotts found unjust and apparently doxxed Jewish people.. do you know anything about that?

I have a rant on them here, but not a lot else. But put simply, I think they are evil. they have doxed Jewish people, there was the whole map debacle, and they often used highly antisemitic rhetoric.

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!

the art boycott is pissing me off. working to isolate Israel from the global art world is fucked (how are people supposed to be exposed to other opinions if you refuse to let them interact?), but the people that suffer the most from it are Palestinian. the worst tendency of it is that if a Palestinian artist want to preform before Palestinians within the green line, they face huge backlash, and often just cancel their shows. And I can tell you that arranging shows in Gaza in fucking hard due to both Hamas's religious fundamentalism and Israel and Egypt's sieges, and the West Bank is tough because of Israel's tight ass border control that is so fucking annoying that many artists don't have the ability to fight with! So they are helping to keep Palestinians culturally isolated!

AND this block Israelis from interacting with big name international Palestinian artists which is making my life harder when I am trying to expose Israelis to Palestinian culture in order to deradicalize them! Also, I have some Palestinian artists I would like to see and it suck that the BDS will give them such hell for that, that it might not be a possibility.

I understand the desire to vote with your money, to boycott, and I give zero fucks about it. your money, your choice. My problem is how violent it is, how it attacks everyone, how they spew hate and malice. I have no problems for the original core values of the BDS (ending the occupation in the west bank, having full equality for Arab-Israelis and following Resolution 194), even if I disagree with the phrasing of some. but over the years there have been calls for violence against Jews (shoot a Jew is one of the more blunt ones), death threats against people who wanted to go to Israel, doxing and working with SJP (Students for Justice in Palestine). SJP in a shit show by itself, and often tokenise and drown Palestinian voices so a bunch of white American colonizers could play their fantasies of being oppressed and getting to be violent.

[screamingfromuz]

I’m asking this here because I don’t really know where else to— do you have any good recommendations for Palestinian bloggers here who are for peace, and also not antisemitic? I’ve seen that a lot of the big ones have some stuff that goes from iffy to horrible and I just cannot engage with it in a way that is not emotional self-harm. This site hates Israeli-Palestinian solidarity, but I know there are so many of us that just want to live together in peace, and I think we all really need that energy right now

I am sure there is. From the supportive anons my mutual and I have been getting to some common sense (they exist in real life, surely they are in tumblr as well), it is only reasonable.

but here is a very sad truth, I cannot name a single one. The truth is anon, that I am a bit of a coward. I am honestly terrified from looking through the tags on the wider tumblr due to the amount of nasty shit thee is. I just home to stumble upon them on my dash. I have even refrained from checking pro Palestinian tags and reblogging posts about the suffering of Palestinians that are not from mutuals to avoid interacting with people who call for making me a refugee or calling for my death.

I am sure I missed people BTW, that I was so afraid from another disappointment that I never bothered checking more.

So I am sad to say, that despite knowing several Muslims, I do not have any recommendation for Palestinian blogs. For solidarity, I go to outside of the internet.

If any Palestinian blog stumble upon this, and you are a supporter of a peace solution that doesn't erase any of us, and would like some Israeli Mutuals, feel free to make contact.

[screamingfromuz]

Jfc I'm not even Jewish and tumblr has been so antisemitic and vile against Israel for the past week that yeah I get Zionism now. I went from fairly critical of Israel to "yeah Jewish people need to have their own state and the ability to protect themselves militarily" really really fucking fast.

glad to see something semi-good coming out of the vile behavior on this website!

but in all seriousness, this suck so much, because there is a conversation to be made on proportional response, and what is acceptable and included in military self defense, but you cannot have this conversation if no one accept you are allowed to protect yourselves militarily!

and the whole "Jews need a place for themselves" is a conversation that often get buried under denying antisemitism!

so yeah, thanks Anon