The Big 5-0

This summer is a landmark birthday for me. I turn fifty. Forty seems like nothing now. I worry how I’m starting to look so old. But then I think about how lucky I am to have reached this milestone. I think about my living in this little town in the Midwest and how odds are probably in my favor to reach fifty, sixty, or even seventy!

That led me to consider many around this planet not as fortunate as I. They live in poverty stricken countries and have really greedy leaders who live in the lap of luxury while they starve to death, or they are people who live in war torn countries, like Palestine. Their odds of reaching fifty may not be so good.

For all the time I’ve lived on this earth, Palestine has been in turmoil. I have gone through my first lost tooth, my first day of school, my graduation, the birth of two sons, my father's death, nine presidents, and still, this constant remains; Palestine is in turmoil. In fact, the problems we see now in Palestine started ten years prior to my birth! So the people living there have been living with the Nakba for sixty years now.

Most things, like my jowls, if not well maintained, begin to sag and wither after fifty years. In order to survive longer, things need to be nurtured, cultivated, or at least supported some how. Unlike my aging body, the unrest in Palestine seems to be humming along better than ever after sixty years. How could that be? Who would want a war to go on and on like that? Surely in that long a time someone could work out even a problem the magnitude of Palestine? It defies logic!

Then I remember, that I too have some problems I have been working on for over forty years. But I at least I feel I’ve improved on the problems somewhat. It almost seems like someone doesn't want to solve the problems there. Maybe they're in denial, or maybe there is someone in that region with an interest in keeping that conflict going. But that someone would have to have very deep pockets wouldn’t they? I mean wars aren’t cheap! All that fancy killing stuff you have to build.

Is Israel that rich? Certainly Palestine is not, since they are an occupied territory they have no real economy, no real military of their own, they have to look to the benevolence of the occupying power for sustenance.

What about that wall Israel is building? How much did that baby cost? How many social programs could they have run for the Palestinians to build good faith? How many roads could that concrete have paved? How many hospitals and water treatment facilities would that have provided?

Things don’t match up. They just don’t square. Why would Israel want to keep fighting with the Palestinians? Why would it want to keep them angry and flailing back? What is the benefit? Surely there is more to gain where peace and prosperity reign? Even in a two state solution, if you have peace you win right?

So why tear down the olive trees, why persist with the “terrorist” hyperbole? What is to be gained? Who is supplying the weapons to Israel? Can’t we sanction that country? Maybe if we do that, we can pressure them into forcing Israel to take the high road and develop some social programs to help start rebuilding Palestine. What is to be gained by a conflict with Arab states? Isn’t it high time for peace? Who is this rouge nation that keeps helping Israel perpetrate this holocaust?

Oh my, it’s the USA! What could we be thinking? Weren’t we against the holocaust? Don’t we abhor the wholesale murder of women, children, and civilians? Aren’t we supposed to be keeping the world in check? How can this be? What crimes against humanity have the Palestinians committed to have to pay this agonizing price for sixty plus years?

Is it their shear determination that so astounds and dismays the Israelis that they can’t understand how this little pebble in their shoe, this annoyance that is Palestine, could cause so much stress?

But how much could the US be supplying to Israel for its continuous war on the Palestinians? Let’s check and see… Oh here’s something…

Since 1976, Israel had been the largest annual recipient of U.S. foreign assistance. According to a November 2001 Congressional Research Service report, Israel: U.S. Foreign Assistance, U.S. aid to Israel in the last half century has totaled a whopping $81.3 billion.

In recent years, Israel remains the top recipient of U.S. military and economic assistance. The most commonly cited figure is $3 billion a year, with about $1.8 billion a year in Foreign Military Financing (FMF) grants from the Department of Defense and an additional $1.2 billion a year in Economic Support Funds (ESF) from the Department of State. In the last decade FMF grants to Israel have totaled $18.2 billion. In fact, 17% of all U.S. foreign aid is earmarked for Israel.

For 2003, the Bush administration is proposing that Israel receive $2.76 billion in foreign aid, with $2.1 billion in FMF and $600 million in ESF. An additional $28 million will go to Israel for the purchase U.S. manufactured counter terrorism equipment.
(Arms trade resource center; 2003)

So there it is, your tax dollars at work. Seems to me a little good will by Israel would go a long way toward peace. If they could cease their fire, knowing full well they are the superior military force (thanks to the US). Or could it be that there is more money to be made for the mad policy makers if the war continues ad infinitum?

If no one was trying to keep this war going, my guess is that it would’ve ended long ago. But there is money coming in. As long as there is a check coming in to the greedy defense contractors and as long as they keep the pockets of the US Senators full, Washington will turn a blind eye to everything Israel does to the people of Palestine. And as long as Israel gets a lot more cash for war than they do for economic development and good will policies, they’ll just keep on a fightin’.

Things in Gaza are reaching critical mass. The Israeli killing machine is nearly ready to devour the remaining people in the Gaza strip. The war of attrition, the myriad excuses to pull infrastructure funding and humanitarian aid have resulted in an ad hoc prison population weakened by disease and demoralization, but stiffened by the resolve of one who has nothing left to lose.

The genocide in the Gaza strip is not unprecedented, but matched only in its calculation and rationalization by the Nazis in WWII. The heartless massacre of Palestinians is a daily occurrence. The various ways to murder them seems to have no end. Whether by starvation, toxic water, rocket attacks, bomb attacks, sniper fire, settler murder, or lack of proper medical care, the grip around their necks is unrelenting. Would you fight back? Would you leave your homeland? What would you do?

How many more decades will this insanity go on? I suspect as long as there is money to be made from waging war. I hope we find a way to make waging peace more profitable. The problem with peace is that it promotes the well being of many, which makes the gargantuan profits of the weapons makers shrink. They hate that.

Wouldn't it be great if Israel extended some good will toward Palestine? So many hearts have been wounded, it will take a lot of good will to repair those wounds. It will be a long and hard road to peace and reconciliation, and that road must not be bordered with a 20-foot high concrete wall, and it must be open to both Settlers and Palestinians to travel. Stranger things have happened. It's not impossible.

I hope when I'm coming up on my sixtieth birthday, all this will be just a bad memory.