A Population With Nothing To Lose

The problem with oppressing a population with maximum force is that at some point they start figuring they’ve got nothing to lose by fighting back.

Do I think this latest uprising will end in more positive results than negative for Palestinians? No. Does that mean I’ll condemn the Palestinian resistance for fighting back? Also no.

This is because doing so would be nonsensical, for a couple of different reasons. Firstly, because nobody can tell me what the Palestinians should do instead that is both realistic and reasonable. It would be easy for me to sit here in my armchair and say the Palestinians should either maintain the status quo or lie down, relinquish their homes and homeland and accept whatever table scraps they’re able to get, but we can see from the Palestinian perspective that that’s not reasonable. It would be easy for me to sit in my armchair and argue that Palestinians should just focus on securing a one-state or two-state solution, but we can see from the Israeli political landscape that that’s not realistic.

So what else can they do? What reasonable and realistic options do they have? No one can provide me a satisfactory answer.

Secondly, it would be nonsensical for me to condemn the actions of Hamas on the grounds that it will make things worse for the Palestinians because the fact that Israel always responds to Palestinian resistance by killing a lot of Palestinians is itself a very concrete manifestation of the abuses the Palestinians are resisting. It would not be legitimate for me to sit in my armchair and tell someone to stop resisting their abuser just because it will cause them to receive more abuse; that’s not a valid reason to condemn resistance.

Ultimately this is just Palestinians doing what they feel they need to do out of total desperation, because they feel backed into a corner with no other options. And they feel backed into a corner with no other options because that does appear to be the case. There are a lot of people I could blame for their being in those circumstances, but the very last on that list would be the victims of the abuse themselves.

Israel apologists will brand anyone who criticizes Israel an anti-semite while adamantly denying that they include “criticizing Israel” in their definition of anti-semitism. If you ask them to name a forceful and sustained critic of Israel’s abuses who is not an anti-semite they generally won’t be able to, because they absolutely do regard all critics of Israel as anti-semites, but they can’t admit that they do this because they know the public is catching on to this tactic and they know it hurts their propaganda efforts.

In this way they’re exactly the same as people who brand all critics of US foreign policy toward Russia as Kremlin propagandists and all critics of US foreign policy toward China as secret agents of “the CCP”. Ask anyone who accuses you of being a Kremlin troll for criticizing Western proxy warfare in Ukraine to name one forceful and sustained critic of that war who they don’t consider a Kremlin operative; they won’t be able to. This is because their definition of “Kremlin operative” actually includes “anyone who criticizes US foreign policy toward Russia”. But they can’t admit this, because they know it makes them look ridiculous.

Sure glad Trump lost because otherwise a border wall would be getting built and kids would still be in cages and the Iran deal would still be dead and the military budget would still be inflating and Roe v Wade would’ve been killed. That psycho would probably have us on the brink of World War Three by now.

They threw Uyghur separatists into Guantanamo, then concern trolled about the Uyghurs.

All my work is free to bootleg and use in any way, shape or form; republish it, translate it, use it on merchandise; whatever you want. My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, throwing some money into my tip jar on Patreon, Paypal, or Substack, buying an issue of my monthly zine, and following me on Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud or YouTube. If you want to read more you can buy my books. The best way to make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list on Substack, which will get you an email notification for everything I publish. For more info on who I am, where I stand, and what I’m trying to do with this platform, click here. All works co-authored with my husband Tim Foley.