“All bleeding the same red blood”

This article, by Julie Ward and Pete Sagar, is reposted from North East Bylines.

In early October last year Chanelle, a young Israeli citizen, made her way to the Nova music festival on the edge of Israel, looking forward to what is known to be one of the best and most popular festivals in the country. On arriving at the festival, Chanelle has said “…the energy levels were indescribable. Stands, two giant stages, thousands of people, Israelis, tourists, people from almost every corner of the world were there.”

Then at shortly before 6am on the morning of 7 October, missiles were fired at the area. Chanelle and her friends weren’t sure what to do, so they returned to their car. It was then that they heard gunshots and frantically got into their car… only to discover that they were being attacked from both sides. Around them other festival goers were desperately trying to defend themselves with pieces of broken glass, while missiles were exploding all around them.

After hiding for a while and managing to return to the car, Chanelle and her boyfriend were able to miraculously make it out of the carnage. Her friends who left the festival early are still missing and their families are helpless, while Chanelle now feels she can’t leave the house or do things alone. She pleads for an end to the violence.

Two months before the attack on 7 October, Hanan al-Bayouk had travelled for a high-risk birth, from Gaza to Israeli-occupied Arab East Jerusalem. In the end, Hanan gave birth to triplets, which were born prematurely and underweight. Thankfully, they are now doing well, but Hanan had to leave her triplets shortly after they were born and she does not know when she will be able to hold them again.

Because of Israel’s restrictions on the movement of Palestinians 26-year-old al-Bayouk had to return to Gaza, while her babies were still in intensive care for fear of falling foul of the law. By the time they were strong enough to be ready to go home, the war had broken out. Hanan got stuck in Gaza and was only able to keep in touch through video calls.

Dr. Hatem Khammash, director of neonatal intensive care at the hospital had apparently said that the triplets were developing normally, with …

“good mental development, also their breathing is good. The only thing that makes us sad, is that they are far away from their mother.”

Stories not numbers

We have become familiar with logging numbers over the last year as the war in Gaza has continued. It was reported in November 2023 that about 1,200 Israelis had been killed in the appalling attack by Hamas, while the deadly Israeli military actions in Gaza were said to have killed 41,821 by mid-September 2024.

These are the death figures. But the stories of Channelle and Hanan above remind us of the pernicious, wider human cost of this tragic conflict. They remind us that not only have many thousands been killed, but thousands more have suffered and continue to suffer in so many heartbreaking ways. Those who have survived the Hamas attacks or the bombing by Israeli planes are still suffering in a myriad of ways. Others have been separated from friends or family and are paying a high emotional price. Millions have been displaced and as the Israeli forces step up operations into Lebanon more and more innocent civilians are being killed, wounded and forced to flee their homes.

Behind the statistics, the figures, the numbers, are individual human tragedies. It is only when you add up all these terrible human tragedies that you can begin to understand the appalling scale of human suffering in the region today.

Real suffering on both sides

Both peoples, Palestinians and Israeli Jews, have suffered, and continue to suffer. The stories above, and indeed the statistics, demonstrate that. Certainly, the death toll on the Palestinian side is far higher than on the Israeli side, and the Palestinians have been systematically subjugated by Israeli occupation for decades, perpetuating a fundamentally unequal relationship. But let us not forget that all those caught up in this conflict are victims. And they all have families and loved ones, friends and neighbours – and they all bleed the same red blood when their skin is cut.

What is happening in the West Bank?

Gaza is of course not the only Palestinian territory; there is also the larger occupied West Bank. And sadly, the situation there is also deteriorating. It was noted on 12 September that Mahmoud Hamadneh, a buzz-cut devotee of computer games, was one of two teens killed that morning by a sniper. He was 15. His father responded to his death by saying: “He didn’t do anything. He didn’t make a single mistake.”

Mahmoud is not the only young Palestinian killed in this way. It was noted that, “As the world’s attention focuses on the deadly war in Gaza, less than 80 miles away scores of Palestinian teens have been killed, shot and arrested in the West Bank, where the Israeli military has waged a months-long crackdown. More than 150 teens and children 17 or younger have been killed in the embattled territory since Hamas’ brutal attack on communities in southern Israel last October, igniting the current hostilities. Most died in nearly daily raids by the Israeli army that Amnesty International says have used disproportionate and unlawful force.”

Mahmoud’s father, an unemployed construction worker, added: “If he’d been a freedom fighter or was carrying a weapon, I would not be so emotional… But he was taken just as easily as water going down your throat. He only had his books and a pencil case.”

The Israeli army said in a statement to the Associated Press that it has stepped up raids since 7 October 2023 in order to apprehend militants suspected of carrying out attacks in the West Bank and that, “the absolute majority of those killed during this period were armed or involved in terrorist activities at the time of the incident.”

Back in May of this year, Human Rights Watch claimed that Israeli security forces had unlawfully used lethal force in fatal shootings of Palestinians in the West Bank, based on documentation of several cases. Research into eight deaths in four incidents between July 2022 and October 2023 concluded that Israeli forces wrongfully fatally shot or deliberately executed Palestinians who posed no apparent security threat.

It was further noted that, “Human Rights Watch and other human rights groups have long documented the unlawful and excessive use of lethal force by Israeli forces in the West Bank and the Israeli government’s failure to hold those responsible to account. According to the United Nations, Israeli security forces killed more than twice the number of Palestinians in the West Bank in 2023 than in any year since systematic data collection began in 2005, and the rate of killings was even higher during the first quarter of 2024.”

Bringing people together

The only answer to this spiraling deadly conflict is to find ways to bring people together to seek a just and equitable solution. Unfortunately, at present, there is both a physical wall between Israelis and Palestinians in many places, and sadly also a wall in some hearts and minds.

This is where the organisation Standing Together comes in. As they state on their website:

 “Standing Together is a progressive grassroots movement mobilizing Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel against the occupation and for peace, equality, and social justice. We know that the majority have far more in common than that which sets us apart and only a tiny minority benefits from the status quo. The future that we want — peace and independence for Israelis and Palestinians, full equality for everyone in this land, and true social, economic, and environmental justice — is possible. To achieve this future, we must stand together as a united front: Jewish and Palestinian, secular and religious, Mizrahi and Ashkenazi, rural and urban, and people of all genders and sexual orientations. As the largest Jewish-Arab grassroots movement in Israel, we are committed to creating an alternative to our existing reality and building the political strength to make this transformation possible.”

Protests in Tel Aviv

Standing Together is of course far from a voice in the wilderness in Israel today. Quite the opposite. Indeed it was noted on 8 September that an estimated 750,000 Israelis had taken to the streets in what was described as “…one of Israel’s biggest-ever protests as they demanded that the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu strike a deal to free remaining captives in Gaza. The record number of demonstrators comes a week after the Israeli Army announced it had recovered the bodies of six captives from a tunnel in southern Gaza.”

750,000 is a huge number of protestors by any standards, but when one considers that given the relative populations of the UK and Israel, the equivalent number of demonstrators in this country would be well in excess of five million, you can imagine just how huge this protest was. The level of dissatisfaction with the leadership of Benjamin Netanyahu is enormous. Indeed it is also reported that,

“Family members of Israeli captives and groups representing them blame Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and his government for failing to secure a truce deal that would secure their release.

There are said to be still over 100 captives still remaining in Gaza, but about one-third of them according to the Israeli military are believed to be dead.”

The huge numbers on the streets beg a vital question; has a tipping point being reached? It does appear that a large number of the Israeli population want the country to move in a different direction. As in other conflicts, has the weariness with the violence and the senseless killing overcome the fear of the other in Israeli society? Time will tell, but it does appear that there is an appetite for the measured and compassionate approach represented by the work of Standing Together.

What is Standing Together doing?

Standing Together works on a wide range of issues, using a number of techniques and strategies. They operate eight regional chapters and a number of university-based groups. Standing Together also has a nation-wide climate justice chapter. Their website states that they “…organize protests across the country demanding economic equality, climate justice, and an end to the occupation. [They] hold workshops on grassroots power, organize get-out-the-vote campaigns, and run candidates for student union elections. Our alternative media outlet, Rosa Media, produces Hebrew and Arabic podcasts highlighting underrepresented political stories and perspectives from across Israeli society. [They] maintain a robust presence in Israeli social media – combatting extremist voices and advancing hope.” 

During the current conflict Standing Together has collected food aid from people within Israel to send to those besieged in Gaza who are living under terrible conditions, and organised safe convoys to deliver the aid, protecting the trucks from settler violence in the process. It is not a new organisation. It was founded in 2015 as a progressive grassroots movement campaigning for an alternative to the right wing neo-liberal agenda of Netanyahu’s Likud party. Supporters in the UK can join Friends of Standing Together (FOST) which organises solidarity events and visiting speakers (online and in-person). There are now several local FOST groups in the UK, and the authors are keen to know if any of the North East Bylines readers would be interested in forming a NE FOST group. To find out more, check out the website.

To register your interest in a potential NE group please send an email to editor@northeastbylines.co.uk with the header “FOST”. [Anyone interested can also email UKFoST directly at ukfriendsofstandingtogether@gmail.com.]

Posted on 7 October