Los Angeles Protests Gaza Massacre

By Sarah Price

The Independent Monitor, February 2009

Since the beginning of the Israeli offensive in Gaza on 27 December, there have been hundreds of protests, with hundreds of thousands of participants, staged worldwide. The first two in Los Angeles were held on 30 December.

The first was organized by LA Jews for Peace and was held at the Federal Building at Wilshire and Veteran in Westwood; the second, organized by the ANSWER Coalition, was staged in front of the Israeli consulate at Wilshire and San Vicente. Unlike demonstrations in protest of previous Israeli sieges on the Gaza Strip, these ones are garnering a lot of attention from local and national media, and many of them have been present for the protests that have been occurring since the start of the war.

There were many supportive car horns, but one protester at the Federal Building held a sign that read, “Honking is not enough” on one side, and “Stand with us” on the other.

The demonstration attracted protesters who were a mixture of Jews, Arabs, and other backgrounds. As well as standing together in protest, many of them found themselves in discussion with each other, until one man approached them to make his own message clear: he claimed the Palestinians could have shared in the prosperity, but chose not to, so they now have what they wanted.

“They just hate Jews and want to kill them all,” he shouted, “so they have to have a wall to keep them out. If they didn’t follow the Quran so much, they could live in harmony with them. But they don’t look at Jews as human beings – they look at them like a space alien would look at a human.”

One journalist, a young Muslim woman, asked for his name, but he refused to give it.

“You don’t want your name associated with your comments?” she asked.

He replied, “No, not really.”

Code Pink representatives were there collecting signatures for a petition they intend to deliver to Condoleeza Rice at the State Dept. At the time of the protest, they had collected more than 3000 names. They have been involved with protests all over the country, including one in front of California Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s house in San Francisco. But, says one organizer, it isn’t just about the current situation.

“Our call is bigger than this moment,” said Code Pink’s Jodi Evans. “Israel is unconscionable and we need to speak to that.”

She is just back from Iran and says that Palestine is the big issue there. “This started with the way we have treated human rights. Allowing people to be kept in a prison affects our relationships in the Middle East. The US leadership has corrupted the leadership in the Middle East with its ‘you’re with us or against us’ policies. Leaders in the Middle East who want a relationship with us are forced to turn a blind eye to what’s happening. That this can happen in the 21^st century is unconscionable. They haven’t learned that the more you kill, the more you foster hate.”

Jerry Rubin, a Jewish protester, said that whenever he speaks out, he’s called a self-hating Jew. “As a Jew, it is incumbent on us to speak out for peace and that’s what I’ve been doing for decades. People say if we don’t live in Israel we shouldn’t have an opinion, but I don’t agree. The heartbreaking thing is that the closer we get to peace, there are always people there to ruin it. This is the time we should be doubling our efforts.”

He was planning a Bye-Bye Bush Fast for Peace and Positive Change, to last from New Year’s Eve until Inauguration Day.

An Arab protester who identified himself as Hamoud said, “the American media is very selective. In the international media you see more reason. The US government unconditionally supports Israel, right or wrong. All Americans, whatever their background, are for justice, but they are not well informed about the Palestinian people. Our government is always supposed to be for justice, human rights and respect for international law, including the UN resolution related to the Palestinian issue, number 338 [UN Security Council Resolution 338, passed in October 1973, for a ceasefire in the Ramadan War]. But there is no justice applied to them. Hamas elections were monitored and democratic. You have to deal with the whoever the people choose. You have to deal with your enemies, not just your friends. When you bomb and kill women and children and call it collateral damage, you dehumanize them.”

At the Israeli consulate, thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters were challenged by a few hundred pro-Israel demonstrators, kept separate, and on opposite sides of the street, by police in riot gear. Rush hour traffic was backed up for a mile, approaching the site. Crowds were loud and passionate, but peaceful and caused no problems. Despite a large police presence, there were few incidents. One man was arrested after a scuffle with an officer, reportedly because the officer had asked his wife to move back, putting his hand up and inadvertently touching her. The man was offended by this and reacted physically to him. The organizers saw the arrest, made an announcement about it to the crowd and got the crowd chanting, “Let him go!” He was later released and returned to the protest site, to the cheers of the crowd.

Carlos Alvarez, a 22-year-old legal assistant running for mayor of Los Angeles in March 2009, spoke to the crowd. He is very pro-Palestinian, and says Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is absolutely not, and should be removed from office immediately for his blind support of Israel. Mayor Villaraigosa has recently defended his support of Israel, saying, “If someone was launching rockets at us, do you think we would wait for 6,000 rockets to respond? Of course not. We would respond almost immediately.”

At the time of the protests, the bombing campaign was entering its 5^th day in Gaza, and the death toll had reached 400, with nearly 2000 injured. Due to the lack of medical equipment, supplies and medicine, and space and medical personnel in the hospitals, many of the injured were not expected to survive. An aid boat carrying needed medical donations, as well as doctors who planned to stay and help in the hospitals, was intercepted by the Israeli navy, rammed three times by one of the vessels, and forced to dock in Lebanon.

At the time of press, two weeks later, there were more than 900 dead and nearly 4500 injured. More than 1300 of the dead and injured were children.

Former Soldier Works for Peace in Israel/Palestine

Refusing the occupation: an interview with Rotem Mor

Sarah Price, The Electronic Intifada, 13 October 2008

Rotem Mor leading a tour group through occupied East Jerusalem. (Photo courtesy of Rotem Mor)

Like most Israeli youth, at age 18, Rotem Mor readied himself for military conscription. In the army, he was a liaison soldier with foreign armies at the Port of Egypt, but was kicked out of the unit for under-performance. After that, he was a soldier-teacher working with civilians, and spent a year in Jerusalem, working with disadvantaged kids. But he wasn't happy.

Mor began to have misgivings about the army even before he joined. He felt he had a responsibility to himself and his society. "I stopped blaming the army for my misery and took a stand," he said. He began serving in February of 2000, but by August 2001, he knew the army was not the place for him, and he sent a letter requesting exemption for reasons of conscience.

In the two weeks between his refusal and discharge, he tried to prepare himself for prison, where he knew he would be sent for refusing, but he had no regrets. "I went from a depressed soldier to attention and exposure," he says. "I worked a lot harder trying to get out of the army than I ever did while I was in it."

But there was a lot of uncertainty in standing up to a system with more power than he. "They could hold me in prison for a long time," he says. "The main thing that scares people away [from refusing], is not knowing what will happen to you. You can be tried again, once you get out of prison." In the end, he spent 28 days in jail.

"More people are speaking out," he says, "but it's still quiet. Not like it was 10 years ago, though. There's a lot more support now. In some places, refusing is the norm, in others, not, and those places can be right next to each other."

According to Sergeiy Sandler of New Profile, a movement working to demilitarize Israeli society, it's difficult to determine how many refuseniks are ideological, because there are so many other ways of avoiding service that don't lead to prison sentences.

"Some are not called up to begin with -- even though by law they are supposed to be," Sandler says. "Those are most of the members of the Palestinian minority among Israeli citizens, making up roughly 20 percent of the relevant age group among Israeli citizens. Religiously observant Jewish women are exempted upon submitting a simple declaration often made by not-so-observant women as well; about one-third of all Jewish women are exempted on these grounds."

Medical discharges, and especially psychiatric ones, he adds, are quite common, especially for those who've already been enlisted and have decided then to opt out. Ultra-Orthodox Jewish men, who decide to be full-time students of religious colleges, or yeshivoth, get a complicated scheme of deferral of military service. Declared conscientious objectors are a relatively very small group to be added on top of that.

"There are negative consequences," says Sandler, "but they are usually not very substantial. There is a considerable deal of discrimination against those who have not served in the military in the labor market, for example, but most of it is due to the large proportion of security jobs in the general job market in Israel, and a lot of it is just a thin disguise for ethnic discrimination against Palestinians."

But the public condemnation for avoiding military service is far more pronounced, although it has decreased in recent years.

"Up to some 20 years ago," says Sandler, "military service was considered some sort of sacred duty by most Israelis. It often still is, but overall, as the numbers of those deciding not to serve rose, the decision to avoid military service was beginning to be considered increasingly more legitimate. Nevertheless, the pressure to enlist is still exceptionally high, and includes an enormous amount of military presence in culture and education, from kindergarten on."

Rotem Mor

This is an action that Mor has taken issue with. In a letter to foreign organizations, asking for their help to further his case, at the time of his refusal, he wrote, "questions began arising long before I was recruited. They stemmed from information I had been acquiring about the Israel-Arab conflict and the discovery of the disinformation I had been subjected to over the years about it. I found that the more I educated myself, the less I believed the 'official' Israeli version of events. This point of view is the moral premise on which most Israeli youths justify their army service. I had begun to realize how much hate and fear were instilled in me from a very young age. I found that I do not believe in the existence of an 'enemy,' but of people of another culture who were just as scared and angry as I was."

Increasing attitudes like Mor's among Israeli youth has caused the government to take action to renew public dedication toward service.

"The recent year saw a concentrated public campaign by the military itself and some civil-society groups sponsored by it to restore the old attitude," says Sandler.

"It is too early to judge how effective this campaign will turn out to be," he adds. "My own guess is that they won't be able to turn the clock backwards after all."

"The message from the government about service is that it's your national duty, it builds the country, and it's good for your career," says Mor. "But they skew the messages based on the class of people they are talking to. If you are in the lower echelon, it's a lot harder."

He feels that Israel's classification of itself with Europe and the US, and its attempt to remove itself from identification with the Middle East, as well as determined separation from Palestinians, has a lot to do with the state of conflict today.

"The overall opinion about Palestinians seems to be getting worse, and I feel it is because of more separation," he says. "People in Israel are recognizing more political rights for the Palestinians, but they are afraid to speak out."

"There are very few initiatives inside Israel [directed toward unity]. If there is going to be a peaceful Jewish existence, they have to be part of the Middle East, and not so aligned with Europe and the US. Israel is portrayed as a united society, but has a lot of small subgroups with a lot of different opinions and experiences. In a broad sense, the US is seen as protector and ally, but also as someone telling Israelis what to do and how to do it."

On the subject of the Israel lobby's influence in the US, he says, "Each side can use the other to blame because they can say they are being told what to do. It's very convenient to have someone to blame."

He adds: "I think we need to learn more about where we live."

To that end, he has headed up a number of initiatives in the seven years since his refusal and discharge.

After his release, he spent a year traveling to different countries, meeting with political activists and talking to them about his experiences. Upon his return to Israel, he began running seminars for young people who were contemplating their own refusal. "These two-day seminars created a safe space for young people to contemplate their army service and refusal," he later wrote. "The seminars also provided youth with a variety of information and strategies for carrying out their decision to refuse."

He also worked with the American Friends Service Committee to strengthen the Israeli conscientious objector movement, including organizing meetings between Israeli conscientious objectors and Palestinians, living both in Israel and in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. In addition, he was involved in the nonviolent movement against Israel's wall in the West Bank.

Currently, he is studying Middle Eastern classical music through a program at the Center for Middle Eastern Classical Music in Jerusalem, called Promoting Middle East Culture through Peace, which he describes as "a project acting to empower and promote Middle Eastern culture in Israel as a means of integrating Israeli society into the Middle East. Despite the seldom-mentioned fact that the majority of Israel's population (Jewish, Muslim and Christian) is of Middle Eastern origin, Middle Eastern culture (in all its expressions: music, cinema, theater, religion, history and heritage) has only a marginal space in Israeli society and mass culture."

"In school, there is a lot of racism and prejudices present, but I think it opens up a lot -- learning about another culture opens you up to them," he says. "Some of the students, even though ideologically they stood with the Palestinians, there was still a divide. Learning about another culture is like learning another language and speaking the same language brings people together."

In the meantime, Mor continues to spread his message of unity in any way he can, believing that this is the only way to really have peace. He is currently writing a book about his experiences, which he hopes to finish next year.

Sarah Price is an American freelance journalist based in Los Angeles, CA. She recently visited the occupied Gaza Strip.