The Show Must Go On

7 October 2024

There is a certain unreality to continuing with my day after I look at high resolution videos and images of dead children. It's difficult not to become numb to the inevitability of it all. Of course more bombs are being shipped overseas, of course more innocent people will die in the name of security, of course any resistance effort will be diffused, of course rationals will rationalize, of course bystanders will stand by.

I grew up under an illusion that we collectively learned from the past and strove to create a world that would prevent us from making the same mistakes. Then, I watched as that illusion came undone like a piece of woven cloth unraveling thread by thread. Looking back, I should've seen the signs. It should have been obvious when the most powerful people in my country decided to start a chain of forever wars in the Middle East that would end up destroying millions of lives. I don't think there's ever been a period in history that we've been capable of something greater than this, and I don't know how it will ever change.

On October 7, 2023, members of the militant group Hamas and several other aligned groups of Palestinian fighters invaded Israeli-occupied territory. They seized control of military outposts and murdered around 1,200 Israelis, taking several more as hostages. In a stark parallel to events that happened in the United States on September 11th, 2001, this was the flashpoint for a renewed conflict that would soon destroy the lives of an exponentially larger group of people.

This conflict, dubbed the Israel-Hamas War, is presented as beginning on October 7th and exists separately from historical context in the minds of the American media class. In reality, Israel has undergone a campaign of mass surveillance, suppression and colonization over people living in Gaza and the West Bank for longer than I've been alive. Many independent human rights advocacy groups condemned Israel as an apartheid state years prior to the conflict. The International Court of Justice eventually followed suit in July 2024, in addition to a full-throated condemnation of Israel's presence in occupied Palestinian territory. As of October 2024, Israel's armed retaliation has led to the deaths of over 40,000 Palestinians and created nearly 2,000,000 more refugees.

Israel is a global technological hub for the latest and greatest in crowd control. You may not be aware that Israel is one of the largest exporters of surveillance technology in the world; in addition to military-grade spyware, the Israeli Defense Forces also deploy facial recognition technology to indirectly suppress Palestinians. An Israeli company developed a spherical camera device that can be thrown like a grenade into a hostile area and relay 360 degree video feeds for up to two hours, used both by the IDF and foreign law enforcement agencies. American police commonly travel to Israel to collaborate with the IDF on tactics and training methods.

The IDF has access to some of the most advanced military technology that is currently available. It has a powerful anti-rocket defense system not afforded to any other nation or military force in its vicinity. It operates multiple variations of the Hermes drone, a warplane-like unmanned aircraft that can fly long distances at high altitude and survey large areas, in addition to several smaller and more specialized drones for more localized use cases. It then uses AI algorithms to generate kill lists for airstrikes based primarily on data harvested from these drone surveillance operations.

In Israeli society, technology is used to maintain order and spread propaganda. Palestinian captives kept at the Sde Teiman holding center were raped to death, at least one with an electrified rod. Israeli lawmakers discussed during a televised meeting whether raping Palestinian prisoners is a justifiable act, setting the Overton window for a grim public discourse as Israeli journalists, podcasters and right-wing protesters cried out for the rights of IDF soldiers to rape and murder Palestinians. Elsewhere, the Israeli Cyber Unit works with big tech companies to censor pro-Palestinian voices on popular social media platforms, catering the message to their interests across the globe.

Israel has all the advantages any nation could ask for, backed by some of the most powerful military and economic forces in the world. It has completely subjugated a shrinking population outside of its border walls using sophisticated methods. It has erased a way of life for millions of people because it keeps trying to hit a moving target.

Israel must continue escalating violence because its leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, must maintain the war effort to stay in power. Not long after several pager devices and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah operatives in Lebanon were detonated remotely, killing at least 30 and injuring thousands, Israel began a ground invasion in Beirut. Israeli airstrikes killed the longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah after he had already agreed to a ceasefire. Volleys of airstrikes are now being traded back and forth between neighboring countries, pouring gasoline on an ignited conflict that could blow up into the next World War.

The United States must continue supplying Israel with munitions because it is pot committed to maintaining a toxic relationship with the so-called "only democracy in the Middle East." It must suppress dissent through police violence and institutional power to keep the machine running. It must let dark money flow into elections to defeat any candidate that poses even the smallest threat to the unified mission. It must continue approving billions of dollars in foreign aid at the expense of its citizens' decaying living standards. The show must go on.

I'm an American citizen who lives below the poverty line. A glance behind my apartment reveals broken down buildings, rubble and trash strewn across the alleyways. My ability to live a full life is undermined by an increasingly authoritarian, corporatist state. I share more in common with Palestinians I've never met than certain fellow countrymen who actively benefit from the collective misery of the global underclass.

I'm supposed to show up to the ballot box next month and sign off my support for the second-in-command of an administration responsible for fueling this bloodstained march through the neighborhoods, schools and hospitals of countless innocent people. If I don't follow through with this, I risk the opposition party taking control of the executive branch and doing something even worse. The thing is, it's difficult to imagine how the situation could get any worse.

There are meaningful differences between the two major parties in American politics, but for people who live on the fringes—on either side of the border line—you have to squint pretty hard to see them. The use of drone warfare, immigrant cages and anti-unhoused policies have all expanded under the purview of national, state and local leadership from both parties. A year after a deadly pandemic began ravaging the country, bipartisan votes approved a $778 billion increase to the defense budget just a handful of months after nixing a national $15 minimum wage. In late 2023, congress members of all stripes reached across the aisle to pass legislation condemning anti-Zionism to the glee of their AIPAC benefactors.

Something that scares me more than the bleak state of the American political system is the general apathy people have toward an ongoing genocide. I want to believe that people just aren't fully informed or are captured by propaganda because the alternative is deeply depressing. I am worried it may be true that people simply don't care about the Palestinian struggle because they can't see the ways they are similar to somebody that lives in the Middle East.

Foreign policy concerns are practically a non-issue in the mind of the average American voter. To be fair, we have a long list of problems to deal with at home. For people forced to work multiple jobs so they can afford bare minimum living expenses, to live without access to quality healthcare or reliable infrastructure, there isn't much time left over to care about anything outside of day-to-day survival.

It shouldn't be up to the downtrodden of society to impede a megalomaniacal war machine. Powerful figures that wield such an outsized amount of influence over global affairs should be held more accountable for their actions. Many Americans think they live under a democracy, but the popular will is almost never turned into broad, demonstrable political action. For a nation that is styled as the beacon of the free world, the definition of freedom is as clear as mud.

The Democratic presidential hopeful openly seeks endorsements from former Republican politicians, the same people who stole hope from millions all those years ago. On the issues of Israel, Palestine, war and weapon shipments, the party duopoly is in lockstep. No amount of voting can solve this problem in the near-term and it's dispiriting to witness how few people demonstrate an understanding of this or even care about it. Democratic voters broadly seem to crave a return to civility in politics, an environment where they won't be exposed to unspeakable things the American state gets away with on a daily basis.

It frustrates me to have to frame this discussion within an American-centric lens, but I can only see what's in front of me. An electronic viewport presenting flashes of lived experience from thousands of miles away is just that, to the point that it all seems to exist outside of physical reality. My understanding of a situation on the other side of the world is filtered through text, secondary voices, video clips and still images. The fact that I am able to continue living as normal, to receive information on demand, to host an online blog and express subversive ideas without realistic threat of retaliation is an incredibly privileged position to be in when untold numbers of people will never have that chance.

In a more equitable world, people who are affected by such repressive policies would have more of a say in what goes on. Because America is so powerful and its Platonic Ideals of Americanness are so thoroughly encoded in people, its political discussions almost exclusively center around what affects Americans. The quintessential American need to be convinced of right and wrong in a battle of ideas is not only a symptom of western privilege, but also a reflection of the American exceptionalism much of the global population is subject to.

The only thing I can do to stem the flow of this overpowering current is to start small, try to make people see that what's going on is an affront to what I hope are shared concepts of morality and human decency—that's part of why I decided to write this. I don't think there's much I can do to help however many Palestinians are left in Gaza and the West Bank, but I couldn't live with myself if I stood idly by and said nothing about what's happening. If my words could convince at least a few people to think outside themselves, maybe I could convince myself that I'm pulling my weight.

Ask yourself: if you lived under constant surveillance and threat of violence every day of your life, if you were forced out of your home by a xenophobic settler, if you had to hold the severed head of a child in your hand, what would you do? What would you do if you saw the disfigured faces of your children poking out from a pile of misshapen concrete slabs and twisted rebar beams? What would you do if you had to leave your life behind for good, flee to a designated safe zone and live under the threat of bombs dropping anyway?

To those who look at Hamas as an abjectly evil, bloodthirsty organization run by some mustache-twirling villain and not as a last gasp of desperation for a population stuck in an impossible situation, how can you justify the IDF's response in this conflict? I fear that many people in this crowd would say that Palestinians are subhuman dogs who deserve this treatment. I can't sit here and say I endorse the beliefs and actions of every Palestinian, but that doesn't matter.

Anybody who isn't wrapped up in an ideological web should understand that we need to recognize a baseline of common humanity. Citizenship status, skin color, religion, none of these arbitrary classifications should be an excuse to support mass murder as a legitimate cause. I can't believe this is a stand I have to take.

Yes, we should pay our respects for the people who died on October 7th. I just hope we can leave some room in our hearts for the people who died on October 8th, October 9th, October 10th, October 11th, October 12th, October 13th, October 14th, October 15th, October 16th, October 17th, October 18th, October 19th, October 20th, October 21st, October 22nd, October 23rd, October 24th, October 25th, October 26th, October 27th, October 28th, October 29th, October 30th, October 31st, November 1st, November 2nd, November 3rd, November 4th, November 5th, November 6th, November 7th, November 8th, November 9th, November 10th, November 11th, November 12th, November 13th, November 14th, November 15th, November 16th, November 17th, November 18th, November 19th, November 20th, November 21st, November 22nd, November 23rd, November 24th, November 25th, November 26th, November 27th, November 28th, November 29th, November 30th, December 1st, December 2nd, December 3rd, December 4th, December 5th, December 6th, December 7th, December 8th, December 9th, December 10th, December 11th, December 12th, December 13th, December 14th, December 15th, December 16th, December 17th, December 18th, December 19th, December 20th, December 21st, December 22nd, December 23rd, December 24th, December 25th, December 26th, December 27th, December 28th, December 29th, December 30th, December 31st, January 1st, January 2nd, January 3rd, January 4th, January 5th, January 6th, January 7th, January 8th, January 9th, January 10th, January 11th, January 12th, January 13th, January 14th, January 15th, January 16th, January 17th, January 18th, January 19th, January 20th, January 21st, January 22nd, January 23rd, January 24th, January 25th, January 26th, January 27th, January 28th, January 29th, January 30th, January 31st, February 1st, February 2nd, February 3rd, February 4th, February 5th, February 6th, February 7th, February 8th, February 9th, February 10th, February 11th, February 12th, February 13th, February 14th, February 15th, February 16th, February 17th, February 18th, February 19th, February 20th, February 21st, February 22nd, February 23rd, February 24th, February 25th, February 26th, February 27th, February 28th, February 29th, March 1st, March 2nd, March 3rd, March 4th, March 5th, March 6th, March 7th, March 8th, March 9th, March 10th, March 11th, March 12th, March 13th, March 14th, March 15th, March 16th, March 17th, March 18th, March 19th, March 20th, March 21st, March 22nd, March 23rd, March 24th, March 25th, March 26th, March 27th, March 28th, March 29th, March 30th, March 31st, April 1st, April 2nd, April 3rd, April 4th, April 5th, April 6th, April 7th, April 8th, April 9th, April 10th, April 11th, April 12th, April 13th, April 14th, April 15th, April 16th, April 17th, April 18th, April 19th, April 20th, April 21st, April 22nd, April 23rd, April 24th, April 25th, April 26th, April 27th, April 28th, April 29th, April 30th, May 1st, May 2nd, May 3rd, May 4th, May 5th, May 6th, May 7th, May 8th, May 9th, May 10th, May 11th, May 12th, May 13th, May 14th, May 15th, May 16th, May 17th, May 18th, May 19th, May 20th, May 21st, May 22nd, May 23rd, May 24th, May 25th, May 26th, May 27th, May 28th, May 29th, May 30th, May 31st, June 1st, June 2nd, June 3rd, June 4th, June 5th, June 6th, June 7th, June 8th, June 9th, June 10th, June 11th, June 12th, June 13th, June 14th, June 15th, June 16th, June 17th, June 18th, June 19th, June 20th, June 21st, June 22nd, June 23rd, June 24th, June 25th, June 26th, June 27th, June 28th, June 29th, June 30th, July 1st, July 2nd, July 3rd, July 4th, July 5th, July 6th, July 7th, July 8th, July 9th, July 10th, July 11th, July 12th, July 13th, July 14th, July 15th, July 16th, July 17th, July 18th, July 19th, July 20th, July 21st, July 22nd, July 23rd, July 24th, July 25th, July 26th, July 27th, July 28th, July 29th, July 30th, July 31st, August 1st, August 2nd, August 3rd, August 4th, August 5th, August 6th, August 7th, August 8th, August 9th, August 10th, August 11th, August 12th, August 13th, August 14th, August 15th, August 16th, August 17th, August 18th, August 19th, August 20th, August 21st, August 22nd, August 23rd, August 24th, August 25th, August 26th, August 27th, August 28th, August 29th, August 30th, August 31st, September 1st, September 2nd, September 3rd, September 4th, September 5th, September 6th, September 7th, September 8th, September 9th, September 10th, September 11th, September 12th, September 13th, September 14th, September 15th, September 16th, September 17th, September 18th, September 19th, September 20th, September 21st, September 22nd, September 23rd, September 24th, September 25th, September 26th, September 27th, September 28th, September 29th, September 30th, October 1st, October 2nd, October 3rd, October 4th, October 5th and October 6th.