Bill C-51 was passed in Parliament and it may soon be illegal to criticize Israel. For the general good of all people, it’s not a “hate” crime to criticize and satirize what other humans do. It’s necessary and healthy, and Israelis are all humans too.
The Parisian response to the murders of the “Charlie Hebdo” satirists/journalists/staff by Muslim extremists last January was a perfectly healthy response. The Golden Rule applies to all humans equally and it can only be violated by lies and violence. We must resist both: Resist violence actively or passively, but always resist lies with questions, debate, criticism and satire.
It’s an individual human right and a societal obligation.
However self-righteous people may get, it’s not a hate crime to debate with and satirize them. However, if it is a crime, I would like to be the first to be prosecuted by remembering the Nakba while Israeli and Canadian media neglect mentioning it. You may ask, what’s a Nakba and who cares?
May 15 is Nakba Day, or “Day of the Catastrophe,” as Palestinians put it. It was a number of days in 1947-48, just before the modern state of Israel was founded. 700,000 Palestinians were forcibly deported from their land during the 1948 Palestine war. This was 80 per cent of Palestinians who lived there.
For several years prior, pro-Israeli militias have been burning, terrorizing and murdering Palestinians, and finally forcibly deported them: men, women, children, bedding, carts, donkeys and goats.
The cornerstone of modern Israeli history from Israeli proponents is very different. The modern take says Palestinians rejected the partition UN plan (that would turn Palestine into Jewish and Arab states), and left their homes and fields willingly, they tell us. Why would they reject the partition but then willingly walk away, leaving their homes and fields to Israelis? What’s the difference between these two accounts?
One is a bloody story of terror and ethnic cleansing. The other is not true.
If you care about the truth and human safety, you ought to care about this. Israel cannot start its glorious modern history of returning to the biblical promised land by admitting it started with terror and ethnic cleansing. If it did, people would be asking if Israel has a right to exist at all.
And today, we hear in our media about the “peace process,” and the “two-state solution” to the “Palestine-Israeli” conflict, while the Israeli army, one of the biggest military forces in the world, has never stopped murdering, terrorizing and dispossessing to take more and more Palestinian land for living space.
“Pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living,” Mother Jones once said.
Let’s defend and honour Palestinians and remember the Nakba every May 15.
