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|  | Palestinian protestors in Gaza on Monday Photo: Reuters
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A small ray of hope
Is Hamas starting to realize that one good protest is worth a thousand rockets?
B. Michael
Had it not been for the daily dosage of blood – four Palestinians killed in the morning and an Israeli child seriously wounded in the afternoon – perhaps we could have clung to a small ray of hope. Thousands of Palestinian demonstrators, mostly women and children only armed with posters, flags, and hoarse throats, expressed the protest along the Gaza Strip.
Is it a first trace of non-violent popular resistance? Are the Palestinians finally getting the right idea? Could it be that even Hamas’ leaders are starting to realize that one good protest is worth a thousand rockets?
Unfortunately, there is insufficient evidence to confirm this ray of hope. The demonstration was too small, the media coverage was, naturally, too meager, and the proper rhetoric was not uttered by any of the protest organizers. Yet we must not lose hope: Perhaps another month or two of wild siege would do the trick.
The demonstrations will grow, the speeches will become wiser, the media will celebrate, and the Palestinians will finally discover the true strength of unarmed civil disobedience, which is both more moral and more effective than any kind of violent terror.
Yet until they come to this wisdom, we can amuse ourselves by examining the panic attack that overcame Israel ahead of the Gaza protest. Tanks were positioned across the fences, pilotless drones were prepared, the Air Force went on alert, artillery batteries moved into range, rows of troops armed to the teeth walked back and forth, and thousands of police officers were deployed.
Death zones were outlined and declared. Excited public debates were held on “whether we should shoot them from a safe distance or from just 200 meters away,” and whether to shoot to kill immediately or fire at their legs first.
“They won’t get through,” generals and former generals reassured us in a deep and authoritative baritone voice. They were not far from embarking on a medley of Yugoslav underground songs originally sang in preparation for yet another encounter with the Nazi war machine.
As if a few protesters scaling the fence would mark the end of Zionism; as if trampling on some sections of barbed wire is a second Holocaust; as if several thousands of protestors facing the fences of their prison, and even climbing them, would mark the entire Jewish people’s demise.
And this determined war machine, even in the view of the most pessimistic observers, was deployed to face 50,000 women and children. At most.
What exactly are tanks supposed to do against women and children? Who exactly was to be targeted from the air? Who would the artillery batteries pound? Who would the rows of soldiers storm? Only a few years ago (actually, many years ago) we would see water cannons being dispatched for such protest. Perhaps also a few dozen mounted troops, police officers with bats and handcuffs, and just to be on the safe side, a few crates of tear gas.
Yet in the meantime, death has become so cheap. So readily available. So frequent. So permissible. There is no longer any need for water cannons to face unarmed protestors. Snipers can do the job. There is also no need for police officers. Tanks would be better.
And in the best tradition of Israeli chutzpah, we heard the customary condemnations regarding the “use of women and children” by the Palestinians. This is rather hollow criticism when it comes from a State that sends families with many children to take over occupied land, or when it comes from people who hide behind their babies during protests, or from politicians who just a moment ago argued that the settlers, with their women and children, serve to protect the lazy bums of Tel Aviv with their bodies.
However, as noted, the protest ended meekly. The IDF’s long, muscular, and panic-stricken arm was left,
thank God, unused. The thousands of women and children returned to their besieged homes. And we can, although not easily, again cling to the elusive ray of hope.
Perhaps it was a harbinger of things to come? Perhaps the conflict is finally embarking on a new path? Perhaps we will see genuine, non-violent civilian disobedience emerge here after all?
Let’s hope that’s the case – because this is the only chance for mutual salvation.
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