Every morning for the past few months, I walk along Gaza St. in Jerusalem towards my yeshiva. Every morning, I walk past the house of the Prime Minister of the State of Israel. Every morning, a volunteer for the campaign to free Israeli prisoner of war Gilad Shalit asks me to sign a petition.
The Gilad Shalit camp is elaborate. Banners and a counter for every day he has been gone. Table and chairs. A tent to protect against the elements. And a rotating army of volunteers. A few weeks ago there was a large rally. When I walked along Gaza St. that night it was littered with protest debris.
Yesterday, while I sat through an epic Shabbat service, Gaza was attacked by Israel. As we sang Hallel for the new month, the bombs fell. During our prayers for the festival of Hanukah, fires raged. While we read from three different Torah scrolls, 280 were murdered. The haftarah was read from the Book of Isaiah, the prophet so famous for saying “They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”
This morning, as I walked past the Prime Minister’s house and the camp for Gilad Shalit, the only difference was one man. No crowd. No megaphone. Just one man with a sign calling for the end of the attack on Gaza.
I asked him, “Why isn’t there a bigger demonstration?”
He looked at me sadly, “She’elah tovah”. Good question.
3 Responses to “She’elah Tovah: Good Question”
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This poster is sold signed. Half of the proceeds goes to Parners in Health for earth quake relief. PIH is the grassroots organization established in Haiti by Dr. Paul Farmer. It is Haitian-led and provides direct assistance in Haitian communities without the costs of an administrative bureaucracy. Thanks, Ricardo www.rlmarts.com
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rozele
December 29th, 2008 at 11:02 am
gilad shalit is not a political prisoner, by any meaningful definition of the term. he is a prisoner of war: a member of a state’s armed forces captured by another military force against which his government has been waging a war.
while this distinction may seem pedantic, it is fairly crucial. without it, there is no way to condemn the u.s.’s guantanamo/bagram/abu ghraib gulag, which attempts to redefine both prisoners of war and political prisoners into non-existence. without it, there would have been no way to condemn the south african government’s treatment of ANC political prisoners; no way to condemn the british government’s treatment of IRA prisoners of war; no way to condemn the israeli government’s imprisonment of conscription resisters.
here’s the crucial difference:
prisoners of war are held according to well-established international law, codified under the geneva conventions. their treatment must accord with certain norms, and they are understood to be held only due to the war they have been participating in.
political prisoners – those jailed because of their stated or alleged political beliefs or affiliations – are by definition illegally held. international law demands their immediate release.
to accept the fantasy that shalit is a political prisoner does two things, and two things only – both of which are the precise reasons why the israeli right propagandizes the notion:
it denies that the israeli government is, and has been for decades, engaged in a war on palestinians. a war in which it has killed over 300 people in the past few days alone, destroyed countless acres of farmland and thousands of houses in the past few years alone, and held 1.5 million civilians captive in the gaza ghetto for months for the specific, state purpose of starving them into submission.
it insults the brave israeli and palestinian prisoners held by the israeli government for their political beliefs: both the palestinian non-violent resisters held indefinitely without trial in ‘administrative detention’ and the israeli conscription resisters held on endlessly renewable sentences for their refusal to participate in the israeli state’s war on palestinians.
if you want to make a show of support for shalit, call for him to be treated as a POW under the geneva convention. but don’t undermine basic distinctions of international law and human rights by calling him a political prisoner.
Alana Alpert
December 29th, 2008 at 11:47 am
my mistake ~ thanks for pointing it out, rozele. post is amended.
daniel
December 29th, 2008 at 1:19 pm
thanks! very much appreciated…
i’m a bit touchy on the subject, having had a few too many folks in my life who’ve spent time as political prisoners, but i do think it makes a big difference when we’re clear on these things…