Special thanks for sharing the NY Times Opinion essay, Jess. Seems to me, Nir Avishai Cohen touches upon some of the most perplexing questions of our time, and of this moment in time. 🌏
Jessica, I can’t thank you enough for posting that opinion piece by that Israeli man who is returning from the United States to fight for his country. I imagine there are many more like him. War and bloodshed like we are witnessing here are always caused by a combination of factors, usually created by leaders and groups who do not have the best interests of their people at heart. Then many thousands of people suffer as a result of these selfish miscalculations. This is why it’s so sickening to see protests around the world over the past few days blaming Jews for these events. A very small number of power-hungry people caused these events. Let’s stop blaming the civilians on either side for what caused this horrific war. Let’s put blame where it is deserved.
I have heard that doctors without borders is on the ground in Gaza trying to deal with a huge number of casualties, and hospitals and medical centers are completely overrun. Plus there is the lack of water and fuel. They are crying out for monetary support. They have a very high charity navigator rating and a 98% transparency rating. I will be sending them a donation this weekend:
Hi, I think Robert Hubbell is going to post a newsletter tonight that includes a whole list of highly rated US and international aid organizations. He asked us to supply suggestions while he was doing this research, and I believe this will be his weekend edition of the newsletter. Thank you for everything Jessica, and I hope you can get some rest this weekend.
People really don’t understand this is not a “war” as we know it. It’s a slaughter. Please see “The Occupation of the American Mind” at OccupationMovie.org by Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters as a start. There is decades long documentation that this is not a war between 2 countries with fluidly equipped militaries. Instead, one side has heavily lobbied the US government since 1950 to get 52% of our ENTIRE forgoing military aid package to the world. For 6.3 million people. The geographic size and population of New Jersey. Egypt comes in second with 23% of our total foreign military aid package. Why? Israel heavily lobbied to secure the southern border of their open-air prison called The Gaza Strip, 2 million people squeezed into a space that is 5 miles long, 2.5 miles wide, as Israel restricts them from USING the other 1 mile, which is over the prison fence where they held a music festival, a concerted middle finger to the prisoners having to hear it behind their electrified fence. All life is so good for some. F the oppressed. But back to our aid. The REMAINING 25% of the US foreign military aid package must be divided somehow between 27 other countries! So in essence, 75% for Israel, 25% to the other impoverished and threatened countries. Yet somehow Israel feels “threatened” by Hamas? Like the US feels threatened by Mexico? Hawaii? Does any American look beyond what their told by mainscream media? In 1983, there were 58 total corporate owners for ALL US media, including tv networks, newspapers, magazines, radio, and limited internet sites. Due to capitalism, larger companies buy their competitors so that by 2020, the 58 total owners had dwindled down to a mere 16! By 2016, the total number of owners of ALL MEDIA, now US AND EUR, was only 5! What happens if you own ALL media? You control what gets said. That number is now down to 3 total owners that Rupert Murdock had “predicted” in 2017, him being one of them. All 3 support ISRAEL 100% and Palestine 0%. This is why in 2018 when a well known established MSNBC anchor reported on Israel in a brief 2-3 min story, but had a map behind get showing the country and the name “Palestine” on it, she was immediately threatened with being fired, along with her male co-anchor who said nothing during the brief blurb about Israel, if she did not retract the “map” and apologize on tv the next day, which she did. CNN’s Marc Lamont Hill was instantly fired for speaking at a UN meeting in his off the job time about the plight of Palestinians under occupation. He followed dozens of other reporters who had been fired for making some fatal mistake (reminds one of the “don’t ask don’t tell” policy silencing gay people in the US military. And the “don’t say gay” bill by Desantis. Except this is punitive silencing FROM a foreign country, not from the US government. And one wonders how Israel bombed the crap out of Gaza, with no where to flee, in 2014, killing (and I mean shredding the bodies) of over 2000 Palestinians, 532 being children under the age of 10, over 400 bring women, injuring over 10,000 Palestinians and making homeless over 20,000 Palestinians in the Gaza concentration camp. Yet NONE of the liberal tv media mentioned it, the news on CNN for 3 weeks was snoozy actually. The anchors themselves looked bored with what they were saying. AMERICANS DID NOT SEE IT!! Yet ot was live steamed on the ground like never before on social media! Why do you think Israel just BOMBED the telecommunications company in Gaza Tuesday? Americans DESERVE to KNOW. To SEE! In order to believe it. IfAmericansKnew.org
There is a very simple, clear way to end the siege of Gaza. Hamas can release the hostages they took during their barbaric murdering assault last week, alive, with no further harm. The Israeli government said the siege will continue until the hostages are released. To pressure for an end to the siege without mention of releasing the hostages is to ignore and thereby condone the terror and kidnapping.
That’s not the whole story, all the people of Gaza who are not Hamas still need to escape from the fighting.
Any plea for pressures from the US government that ignores the hostages sends a terrible message.
I already wrote back to you privately about this but I'll say it again: I’m not aware of a way to pressure Hamas directly. They are a terrorist organization. And I am CERTAIN that Biden is already doing everything in his power to negotiate the hostages’ release. Most of what I didn’t say in the letter are things I’m assuming either a) our opinion holds no power over or b) are already being done. I don’t know that attention to humanitarian aid in Gaza is being done. I DO know that retribution against Hamas and attempting to get the hostages back IS being done. See what I’m saying?
Joan I hope you know how devastated I am by Hamas's attack on innocent Israelis. I am gutted. I think I’ve made that clear. I am gutted by the loss of all innocent life. I don’t know how else to say that so it’s more clear.
I simply ask that anyone making that call asking the federal government to work to help the people of Gaza for humanitarian reasons, include asking the Senator or whoever to work for release of the hostages. The reason for the loss of electricity, aka siege, to Gaza, is that the Israeli government is saying they will turn it on when the hostages are released. You don't have to agree with the tactic. But to oppose it, to say you are advocating for humanitarianism, without even saying that the hostages must be released, is to speak as if the hostages do not matter. Hamas is already saying that they did nothing wrong, that the only problem is the Israelis fighting back. It's not about what I think you feel, Jess. It's about what we all say to each other and to the staffers answering the phones and reading the texts.
I understand and read Arabic, and Hamas has NOT said they did nothing wrong. They took hostages to secure the release of over 6,000 illegally held Palestinian prisoners that are left to rot in Israeli prisons until death, including over 600 minors kidnapped during night home raids, interrogated in Hebrew for hours until they pee their pants from fear and told their families will be killed, then imprisoned without charges for 3 months to 3 years, some longer, all to suppress any attempt at fighting armed soldiers in a liberal concentration camp. Tell the truth.
The Israeli military have been increasingly escalating their executions of Palestinians, 275 unarmed civilians killed so far in 2023 BEFORE Israel’s latest bombing “campaign,” what a word for killing, attacking, murdering. The language manipulation is transparent when talking about each side. Israeli military had been increasing attacking the very holy, beautiful, cherished, historic Al-Aqsa Mosque, storming the mosque with GUNS, yelling, threatening people praying. Recall they pray 5 times a day. They have begun restricting the hours worshippers can enter their own mosque to pray. Imagine the US army doing this in Synagogues! It feels as a direct threat to them and for them is a red line that can’t be crossed. Yet they’ve five it repeatedly. All at the instructions of the Israeli government and carried about by the Israeli people. Americans remain clueless and believe the terrorist bullshit we were all brainwashed to believe since Day 1 after 9/11. Now Israelis are calling the attack on Oct 7 a 9/11? Does this sound rational to you? No one should be killed. But Americans forget we have invaded every Arab country and murdered millions of innocent civilians. And OUR men did this in Viet Nam. Are the oppressed not permitted to fight back when their entire families are killed or imprisoned? Their children kidnapped from their beds? This is the side all of Europe knows that Americans do NOT know. Please process this situation. Their is Apartheid carried out by Israel with OUR MONEY and they are about to commit the genocide they have long planned for these poor people. Please speak up and see through the hypocrisy. This is our last chance.
Are you justifying Hamas butchering people - and butchering it was, body parts everywhere - whose homes they attacked, slaughtering 260 teenagers at a music festival, and another thousand across the area?
I agree that the occupation of the West Bank is wrong, I have objected to it from the start. I see the existence of Israel itself as an indigenous people returning to their land, and some of the people who had moved in in the meantime being hostile about it.
I'll skip the technical arguments about it not being apartheid when Israeli Arabs participate in society and government in so many ways, because they are not treated fairly whatever label is used.
Not apartheid? With Jewish-only roads and neighborhoods and communities? With illegal settlements/land theft? With cutting off basic life support (water, food, electricity, medical supplies, building supplies, humanitarian aid, communication wuth the outside world, money from family? Would YOU tolerate the conditions in the very occupied Gaza? The harassment and shootings and beatings in YOUR house of worship? Do you understand that the token Palestinians in the Knesset are yelled at and confronted physically when one of them voices objection to more brutality by Israel? Would you consider this “participating” and being “treated fairly”? As a woman standing up for women in congress to get yelled at and physically confronted by the men? Doubtful. In an odd twist of fate, against all of our expectations, it is incredulous that the Jewish people supporting Israel yet not supporting the Palestinian people who already lived there are NOW perpetrating EVERY prejudice, every discrimination, every harassment, every injustice, every insult, every form of violence, and every form of cruelty, every murder they say was perpetrated against THEM. That is a dysfunctional system and hard to wrap one’s brain and heart around. The abused are NOT supposed to become the abusers. And for women to lack compassion at all for other women’s children, I’ve never experienced in my lifetime until this situation that’s played out there.
I don’t know how you do it, Jess. I have no words, so I’ll use yours....”I am indescribably grateful” 💔💜
That's kind of you. Thank you!
Thanks for all that you do & share with us!
I'm so glad you're finding it helpful. Thank you!
Special thanks for sharing the NY Times Opinion essay, Jess. Seems to me, Nir Avishai Cohen touches upon some of the most perplexing questions of our time, and of this moment in time. 🌏
I thought so, too.
Thank you, Jessica. I am so glad to have found this team.
Thank you!
Jessica, I can’t thank you enough for posting that opinion piece by that Israeli man who is returning from the United States to fight for his country. I imagine there are many more like him. War and bloodshed like we are witnessing here are always caused by a combination of factors, usually created by leaders and groups who do not have the best interests of their people at heart. Then many thousands of people suffer as a result of these selfish miscalculations. This is why it’s so sickening to see protests around the world over the past few days blaming Jews for these events. A very small number of power-hungry people caused these events. Let’s stop blaming the civilians on either side for what caused this horrific war. Let’s put blame where it is deserved.
I have heard that doctors without borders is on the ground in Gaza trying to deal with a huge number of casualties, and hospitals and medical centers are completely overrun. Plus there is the lack of water and fuel. They are crying out for monetary support. They have a very high charity navigator rating and a 98% transparency rating. I will be sending them a donation this weekend:
https://donate.doctorswithoutborders.org/secure/give-monthly-double-your-impact-search-onetime-reverse
That's a great idea. I love Doctors Without Borders.
Hi, I think Robert Hubbell is going to post a newsletter tonight that includes a whole list of highly rated US and international aid organizations. He asked us to supply suggestions while he was doing this research, and I believe this will be his weekend edition of the newsletter. Thank you for everything Jessica, and I hope you can get some rest this weekend.
People really don’t understand this is not a “war” as we know it. It’s a slaughter. Please see “The Occupation of the American Mind” at OccupationMovie.org by Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters as a start. There is decades long documentation that this is not a war between 2 countries with fluidly equipped militaries. Instead, one side has heavily lobbied the US government since 1950 to get 52% of our ENTIRE forgoing military aid package to the world. For 6.3 million people. The geographic size and population of New Jersey. Egypt comes in second with 23% of our total foreign military aid package. Why? Israel heavily lobbied to secure the southern border of their open-air prison called The Gaza Strip, 2 million people squeezed into a space that is 5 miles long, 2.5 miles wide, as Israel restricts them from USING the other 1 mile, which is over the prison fence where they held a music festival, a concerted middle finger to the prisoners having to hear it behind their electrified fence. All life is so good for some. F the oppressed. But back to our aid. The REMAINING 25% of the US foreign military aid package must be divided somehow between 27 other countries! So in essence, 75% for Israel, 25% to the other impoverished and threatened countries. Yet somehow Israel feels “threatened” by Hamas? Like the US feels threatened by Mexico? Hawaii? Does any American look beyond what their told by mainscream media? In 1983, there were 58 total corporate owners for ALL US media, including tv networks, newspapers, magazines, radio, and limited internet sites. Due to capitalism, larger companies buy their competitors so that by 2020, the 58 total owners had dwindled down to a mere 16! By 2016, the total number of owners of ALL MEDIA, now US AND EUR, was only 5! What happens if you own ALL media? You control what gets said. That number is now down to 3 total owners that Rupert Murdock had “predicted” in 2017, him being one of them. All 3 support ISRAEL 100% and Palestine 0%. This is why in 2018 when a well known established MSNBC anchor reported on Israel in a brief 2-3 min story, but had a map behind get showing the country and the name “Palestine” on it, she was immediately threatened with being fired, along with her male co-anchor who said nothing during the brief blurb about Israel, if she did not retract the “map” and apologize on tv the next day, which she did. CNN’s Marc Lamont Hill was instantly fired for speaking at a UN meeting in his off the job time about the plight of Palestinians under occupation. He followed dozens of other reporters who had been fired for making some fatal mistake (reminds one of the “don’t ask don’t tell” policy silencing gay people in the US military. And the “don’t say gay” bill by Desantis. Except this is punitive silencing FROM a foreign country, not from the US government. And one wonders how Israel bombed the crap out of Gaza, with no where to flee, in 2014, killing (and I mean shredding the bodies) of over 2000 Palestinians, 532 being children under the age of 10, over 400 bring women, injuring over 10,000 Palestinians and making homeless over 20,000 Palestinians in the Gaza concentration camp. Yet NONE of the liberal tv media mentioned it, the news on CNN for 3 weeks was snoozy actually. The anchors themselves looked bored with what they were saying. AMERICANS DID NOT SEE IT!! Yet ot was live steamed on the ground like never before on social media! Why do you think Israel just BOMBED the telecommunications company in Gaza Tuesday? Americans DESERVE to KNOW. To SEE! In order to believe it. IfAmericansKnew.org
There is a very simple, clear way to end the siege of Gaza. Hamas can release the hostages they took during their barbaric murdering assault last week, alive, with no further harm. The Israeli government said the siege will continue until the hostages are released. To pressure for an end to the siege without mention of releasing the hostages is to ignore and thereby condone the terror and kidnapping.
That’s not the whole story, all the people of Gaza who are not Hamas still need to escape from the fighting.
Any plea for pressures from the US government that ignores the hostages sends a terrible message.
I already wrote back to you privately about this but I'll say it again: I’m not aware of a way to pressure Hamas directly. They are a terrorist organization. And I am CERTAIN that Biden is already doing everything in his power to negotiate the hostages’ release. Most of what I didn’t say in the letter are things I’m assuming either a) our opinion holds no power over or b) are already being done. I don’t know that attention to humanitarian aid in Gaza is being done. I DO know that retribution against Hamas and attempting to get the hostages back IS being done. See what I’m saying?
Joan I hope you know how devastated I am by Hamas's attack on innocent Israelis. I am gutted. I think I’ve made that clear. I am gutted by the loss of all innocent life. I don’t know how else to say that so it’s more clear.
I simply ask that anyone making that call asking the federal government to work to help the people of Gaza for humanitarian reasons, include asking the Senator or whoever to work for release of the hostages. The reason for the loss of electricity, aka siege, to Gaza, is that the Israeli government is saying they will turn it on when the hostages are released. You don't have to agree with the tactic. But to oppose it, to say you are advocating for humanitarianism, without even saying that the hostages must be released, is to speak as if the hostages do not matter. Hamas is already saying that they did nothing wrong, that the only problem is the Israelis fighting back. It's not about what I think you feel, Jess. It's about what we all say to each other and to the staffers answering the phones and reading the texts.
Absolutely. I assumed it went without saying that freeing the hostages is a top priority. But obviously it did not.
thank you
I understand and read Arabic, and Hamas has NOT said they did nothing wrong. They took hostages to secure the release of over 6,000 illegally held Palestinian prisoners that are left to rot in Israeli prisons until death, including over 600 minors kidnapped during night home raids, interrogated in Hebrew for hours until they pee their pants from fear and told their families will be killed, then imprisoned without charges for 3 months to 3 years, some longer, all to suppress any attempt at fighting armed soldiers in a liberal concentration camp. Tell the truth.
The Israeli military have been increasingly escalating their executions of Palestinians, 275 unarmed civilians killed so far in 2023 BEFORE Israel’s latest bombing “campaign,” what a word for killing, attacking, murdering. The language manipulation is transparent when talking about each side. Israeli military had been increasing attacking the very holy, beautiful, cherished, historic Al-Aqsa Mosque, storming the mosque with GUNS, yelling, threatening people praying. Recall they pray 5 times a day. They have begun restricting the hours worshippers can enter their own mosque to pray. Imagine the US army doing this in Synagogues! It feels as a direct threat to them and for them is a red line that can’t be crossed. Yet they’ve five it repeatedly. All at the instructions of the Israeli government and carried about by the Israeli people. Americans remain clueless and believe the terrorist bullshit we were all brainwashed to believe since Day 1 after 9/11. Now Israelis are calling the attack on Oct 7 a 9/11? Does this sound rational to you? No one should be killed. But Americans forget we have invaded every Arab country and murdered millions of innocent civilians. And OUR men did this in Viet Nam. Are the oppressed not permitted to fight back when their entire families are killed or imprisoned? Their children kidnapped from their beds? This is the side all of Europe knows that Americans do NOT know. Please process this situation. Their is Apartheid carried out by Israel with OUR MONEY and they are about to commit the genocide they have long planned for these poor people. Please speak up and see through the hypocrisy. This is our last chance.
Are you justifying Hamas butchering people - and butchering it was, body parts everywhere - whose homes they attacked, slaughtering 260 teenagers at a music festival, and another thousand across the area?
I agree that the occupation of the West Bank is wrong, I have objected to it from the start. I see the existence of Israel itself as an indigenous people returning to their land, and some of the people who had moved in in the meantime being hostile about it.
I'll skip the technical arguments about it not being apartheid when Israeli Arabs participate in society and government in so many ways, because they are not treated fairly whatever label is used.
Nothing can make the terror attacks acceptable.
Not apartheid? With Jewish-only roads and neighborhoods and communities? With illegal settlements/land theft? With cutting off basic life support (water, food, electricity, medical supplies, building supplies, humanitarian aid, communication wuth the outside world, money from family? Would YOU tolerate the conditions in the very occupied Gaza? The harassment and shootings and beatings in YOUR house of worship? Do you understand that the token Palestinians in the Knesset are yelled at and confronted physically when one of them voices objection to more brutality by Israel? Would you consider this “participating” and being “treated fairly”? As a woman standing up for women in congress to get yelled at and physically confronted by the men? Doubtful. In an odd twist of fate, against all of our expectations, it is incredulous that the Jewish people supporting Israel yet not supporting the Palestinian people who already lived there are NOW perpetrating EVERY prejudice, every discrimination, every harassment, every injustice, every insult, every form of violence, and every form of cruelty, every murder they say was perpetrated against THEM. That is a dysfunctional system and hard to wrap one’s brain and heart around. The abused are NOT supposed to become the abusers. And for women to lack compassion at all for other women’s children, I’ve never experienced in my lifetime until this situation that’s played out there.