Personal evolutions on Palestine

Across the border from Palestine

This reflection has been brought about, of course, by the landslide vote at the UN General Assembly to grant Palestine the status of "observer state." But most of all, this has been influenced by the recent attack on Gaza. The terrible images and news coming from the Strip were harrowing—I am haunted by these photos of the howling pain of grieving fathers.

I have considered myself to be a supporter of the Palestinian cause for a long time. But there is a specific privilege that comes with supporting the abstract notion of the rights of a given people from thousands of miles away. The privilege of oversimplification, of even-handed assignment of blame, and most of all, the privilege of being able to shut out information whenever needed or desired.

Coming to Lebanon hasn't completely taken that privilege away from me, but the consequences of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have become realer to me—and the implications of my opinions, inescapable.



Meeting more and more Palestinians, both from occupied territories and refugees in Lebanon, has opened my eyes to a fact I could no longer ignore: that in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, abuses of power are not a bug, but a feature of the system.

One needs to look no further than what just happened in Gaza. Those who argue that Hamas started the conflict and posed the biggest threat in this situation are either uninformed or disingenuous. The PR machine of the Israeli army might have touted its "targeted killings" and precise artillery, but the fact remains that at least 167 Palestinians were killed in Gaza, 30 of them children, versus five Israelis. Allegations that Hamas fighters used civilians as human shields are grossly disingenuous. The Israeli army might have dropped leaflets warning people to steer clear of Hamas members, but in this crowded open-air prison with a population density of more than 4,000 per square kilometer, there is nowhere to run.

But the obvious injustice of confrontations like the one that took place in Gaza too often distracts the international public from the broader, everyday humiliation and suffering of the Palestinian people, whether in the occupied territories or abroad.

Equally as important, big catastrophes erase small-scale stories of hope and perseverance. One Palestinian man I met who lives in a camp in Lebanon, told me and a friend about how his toddler son often asks him when they will return to "the red house" — the one his grandfather had to leave in Palestine two generations before. So much for Ben Gurion's "the old will die and the young will forget" prophecy.

Being put face-to-face with these truths has meant coming to terms with the fact that I can no longer believe the two-state solution is the just answer to decades of colonization and humiliation of Palestine and its people.

This hasn't been an easy realization to come to. I certainly don't want or advocate the elimination of Israelis. But ultimately, the only position that makes sense to me as someone opposed to the wrongdoings of the Zionist project is a one-state solution that abolishes the apartheid that has effectively taken place in Israel-Palestine, allows for the prosecution of human rights violations that have been standard procedure for the past 60+ years, and guarantees a right of return for Palestinians who have been displaced.

I fully realize the utopia of such a proposal. Even Hamas leaders have said they would commit to a two-state solution—so much for being uncompromising terrorist lunatics. And their decision makes sense. With the ongoing situation, it seems like the easiest way to bring about one united Palestinian state is to build a time machine.

If by some miracle a two-state solution were to emerge, it would be a momentous victory for Palestinians. But it wouldn't do justice to the small boy with the red house.