Theme
12:35am July 18, 2014
Anonymous asked: Opinion on the current slaughter of thousands of innocent Palestinian civilians (children women and men included); and more broadly your thoughts on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict?

Terrible suffering.  Terrible reactions to suffering.  Needless death and destruction.  Lots of ideological bullshit driving the destruction.  Lots of people on all sides who won’t bend, even if it means horrible suffering and death for them or others.  Lots of ideology.  Lots of hurt and suffering transforming itself into hate.  Whatever the solution is – and it won’t be simple or simplistic – there will be lots of people on all sides who oppose it, and that will make it even harder to solve.  That’s all I know, and I don’t know nearly as much about the subject as most people seem to.  And of course any specific slaughter is horrific no matter who is involved.

I often feel unqualified to offer my opinion on this topic, however.  Because it’s not something I’ve looked into in depth.  Everything I’ve just described comes from looking at how patterns of people’s lives and deaths seem to fit together.  I have no friends or family over there, no ties to the region.  The last time I studied anything about the conflict was in Arabic class, where my teacher took great pains to show us material (including lots of movies and documentaries and other videos) from every side of the conflict and discouraged us from seeking simplistic solutions.  

I don’t think my mind is capable of any solution, simplistic or otherwise.  But I do know from elements of how the patterns fit together, that if someone comes up with the perfect solution… there will be too many people with such a personal stake in the fighting that they will oppose any halfway-good solution.  Unless a solution can be created that takes that into account – which would be brilliant and foresighted.