Last night, I attended a screening of a movie called “Palestine Under Siege” at the Capri Theatre. It was a special screening co-hosted by Amnesty International.
It was strange because I’d just mentioned the other day that I wanted to make a $50 donation to the Australian Friends of Palestine Association, and they were also co-hosting the event.
I don’t claim to know everything about the Israel-Palestine conflict. The reality is, I learn most of what I know by watching the news and reading the paper. But what I do know is that Israel is committing, and has a history of committing, war crimes and crimes against humanity in Palestine.
I agree with the International Criminal Court (ICC) seeking arrest warrants for Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel’s Minister of Defence, Yoav Gallant.
The ICC is also seeking arrest warrants for:
-
Yahya Sinwar — Head of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) in the Gaza Strip
-
Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri — more commonly known as DEIF, Commander-in-Chief of the Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas
-
Ismail Haniyeh — Head of the Hamas Political Bureau
I view seeking arrest warrants for the leadership of both Israel and Hamas to be of equal value and equal significance.
What I find hard to believe is that there are people who can justify Israel’s actions by labelling anyone who opposes them as anti-Semitic. I don’t believe being Jewish exonerates anyone from committing the most heinous crimes.
The following are the war crimes the ICC is seeking arrest warrants for against Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant:
- Starvation of civilians as a method of warfare as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(b)(xxv) of the Statute;
- Wilfully causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or health contrary to article 8(2)(a)(iii), or cruel treatment as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i);
- Wilful killing contrary to article 8(2)(a)(i), or Murder as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i);
- Intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population as a war crime contrary to articles 8(2)(b)(i), or 8(2)(e)(i);
- Extermination and/or murder contrary to articles 7(1)(b) and 7(1)(a), including in the context of deaths caused by starvation, as a crime against humanity;
- Persecution as a crime against humanity contrary to article 7(1)(h);
- Other inhumane acts as crimes against humanity contrary to article 7(1)(k).
- Extermination as a crime against humanity, contrary to article 7(1)(b) of the Rome Statute;
- Murder as a crime against humanity, contrary to article 7(1)(a), and as a war crime, contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i);
- Taking hostages as a war crime, contrary to article 8(2)(c)(iii);
- Rape and other acts of sexual violence as crimes against humanity, contrary to article 7(1)(g), and also as war crimes pursuant to article 8(2)(e)(vi) in the context of captivity;
- Torture as a crime against humanity, contrary to article 7(1)(f), and also as a war crime, contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i), in the context of captivity;
- Other inhumane acts as a crime against humanity, contrary to article 7(l)(k), in the context of captivity;
- Cruel treatment as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i), in the context of captivity; and
- Outrages upon personal dignity as a war crime, contrary to article 8(2)(c)(ii), in the context of captivity.
Attending this movie was good because, before it started, a man from the Australian Friends of Palestine Association gave a speech about the current situation in Gaza. I learned a lot by listening to him, and I now better understand what people mean when they say Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians.
The movie itself was good — an informative documentary without a lot of controversy. Cinema Nova summed up the film with the following:
"Shot in Palestine on West Bank and in Jerusalem in June and July, this recently completed documentary features Australians, Dr Peter Slezak UNSW Honorary Associate Professor of Philosophy and his two companions, Rand Darwish, Australian Palestinian student and former Greens Senator, Lee Rhiannon and assisted by Bashir Sawalha, President of the United Australian Palestinian Workers Association, spent time talking to Palestinians and Jews in Lebanon and Palestine on the themes of the 1948 Nakba, settler colonialism and the apartheid nature of the Israeli state."
I have a pet peeve, and that is people who talk during a movie. I don’t understand it. If they wanted to talk, why did they go to a movie?
The two people sitting behind me talked through the whole thing. I turned around once, and they apologised and stopped for a while — but then they started up again. It wasn’t the end of the world, though.
There was meant to be a Q&A with the directors of the movie after it finished, but there were difficulties with the sound, so we weren’t able to go ahead with it. I think they said that if anyone had questions, they could email them directly.
After the movie, I was finally able to make the $50 donation to the Australian Friends of Palestine Association, just like I’d wanted to, and I also took two photos that I wanted to share with you below.
I taped the show, and when I got home, I watched it. From my perspective, I know antisemitism is a terrible, terrible thing. I’m not antisemitic in any way, but I do think the current wave of antisemitism isn’t the traditional “Jews drink blood” conspiracy-driven kind of antisemitism — I think a lot of it has to do with Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.
Josh’s show wasn’t balanced — but neither was “Palestine Under Siege.” That said, this one really annoyed me. He interviewed John Howard, Anthony Albanese, Julia Gillard, who was actually really good, Peter Dutton, as well as an ex-ASIO chief, and several Holocaust survivors and Jewish Australians who have faced persecution because of antisemitism.
The show was exactly what you would expect it to be — and I found it offensive. They kept repeating “never again”, but the reality is that it is happening again now. What was once inflicted on them, they are now inflicting on another people — and any opposition to this gets filed under the guise of antisemitism.
My mother calls me a champagne socialist, and she also calls me a communist. I don’t think I’m either of those things.
First of all, I don’t have enough money to be a champagne socialist. But even if I did — and even if I was — I don’t really subscribe to any ideology. I don’t even know what the ideology is.
I have certain thoughts about the equality of all people, about injustice, and I have some ideas about how to express that through my artwork and writing. But apart from that, I’m just your average woman, minus any strong political leanings.
Last night, though, put things into perspective for me — in terms of how something so incredibly unjust can be happening, and how countries like Australia and the United States not only justify it, they support it.
There must be a word or ideology for this — I just don’t know what it is.
