동아시아의 평화와 화해의 정치학 Scrapbook: Quakers, Palestinians, Israel : r/Quakers

2023-10-26

Quakers, Palestinians, Israel : r/Quakers

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18 days ago

NateGoat

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Quakers, Palestinians, Israel

Quakers have a long-standing policy of supporting the Palestinian people. Likewise, Quakers also support the people of Israel. The argument being that both people have a right to self-government.

This has, occasionally, gotten Quakers in trouble in the US. Maybe 5-6 years ago a New York Times op-Ed called out the Quakers as being anti-Jew. Regardless of accuracy, simply being named as such has repercussions.

The question now is how should Quakers talk about the current Israeli-Hammas conflict? Clearly, Hammas attacked first. Clearly, Hammas is funded by destabilizing regimes. And clearly, Israel has a right to defend itself.

Yet israel at least in part created the situation; when a people have no political power, violence is almost inevitable. Also, Hammas is not exactly working for the everyday Palestinian. And Israeli actions like cutting off electricity to the Gaza Strip sounds an awful like like ‘kill them all and let god sort them out’.

The AFSC has a circulating petition against the Israeli apartide regime. Should Quakers still support this petition? How should we talk about this conflict?

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Special_Wishbone_812

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18 days ago

Quakers believe that peace means standing up for people like the Palestinians, who have been oppressed by the government of Israel. However, it’s a stance based on respect for all people and a rejection of all forms of violence. In fact, that the violence that Palestine experiences gets transformed into further violence and retaliation is proof enough of why peace and trust are the only ways to end conflict. Innocent people are being hurt and killed and kidnapped and it’s all wrong and has always been wrong.

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u/RimwallBird avatar

RimwallBird

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18 days ago

I am reminded of a classic story of how a leading Friend (Quaker) responded to a champion of war:

After general Washington was elected president of the United States [he was President 1789-1797], Warner Mifflin went to visit him at New York…. In the course of the interview, the president recollected what Mifflin had said to him at [the battle of] Germantown [condemning revolution and “all changes of government which occasion war and blood-shed”], and thus addressed him: “Mr. Mifflin, will you please to inform me on what principles you were opposed to the revolution?” Mifflin answered, — “Yes, friend Washington; — upon the same principles, that I should be opposed to a change in this government. All that ever was gained by revolutions, are not an adequate compensation to the poor mangled soldier, for the loss of life or limb.” After some pause and reflection, the president replied, “Mr. Mifflin, I honour your sentiments; — there is more in that, than mankind have generally considered.”

— Noah Worcester, “General Washington and Warner Mifflin”, repr. in John & Isaac Comly, eds., Friends’ Miscellany V:5 (Fourth Month, 1834)

To that tale might be added a passage from an author writing about the last months of World War II:

“You’re getting tired of hatred and bloodshed,” said Segal. “I can understand that, after all this time.”

“Myself,” said the major, “I never wanted it. Look at me. Fundamentally, I’m not a soldier. Come to Germany after the war and I’ll sell you a Citroen. I’m an automobile salesman, with a wife and three children, dressed in uniform.”

“Maybe,” said Segal. “Maybe…. Now we will hear that from many people. Fundamentally, I am not a soldier, I am an automobile salesman, a musician, a pet-fancier, a stamp-collector, a Lutheran preacher, a schoolteacher, anything…. But in 1940 we did not hear that as you marched down the boulevards. There were no automobile salesmen then — only captains and sergeants, pilots, artillerists…. Somehow, the uniform was not such an accident in 1940.”

They sat silent. A passing automobile backfired twice, and one of the sleeping soldiers screamed in his sleep, the noise echoing strangely in the sunny square.

— Irwin Shaw, “Retreat”, in Act of Faith and Other Stories (1946)

Too, there are

…the terrible words spoken by the French teacher and philosopher Émile-Auguste Chartier, who called himself Alain, and who was immensely influential in France before and after the First World War. When his fellow-soldiers complained at finding themselves in misery and mortal danger in the trenches, he said, “But you shouted ‘Vive l’Armée’ or ‘Vive l’Alsace-Lorraine.’ That has to be paid for. Now it is necessary to die.”

— William Pfaff, “Oz”, The New Yorker (September 15, 1986)

Let us beware the pseudo-wisdom that comes packaged with war fever, the delusion that swept up Alain’s fellow soldiers and the German recruits and General Washington too. There is truly nothing that can justify fighting and killing, with all the evils these things do to the victors as well as the vanquished, and above all to the innocent bystanders. A. J. Muste, who was briefly a Friend, nailed it long ago:

There is no way to peace. Peace is the way.

— letter to the New York Times (1967)

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u/brandeis16 avatar

brandeis16

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18 days ago

It’s possible to support full statehood for a people while condemning attacks carried out by a minority of those same people.

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Content_Ad8658

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18 days ago

I’m honestly worried about an uptick in antisemitism even within Quaker communities. It seems like people are quick to want to hold all of the Jewish people responsible for what the Israeli government is doing. I’ve even heard my Jewish friends talk about there is really Palestinian conflict as a test to see if they are “a good” Jew.

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JohnSwindle

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18 days ago

Copied and pasted in case any find the original format hard to read.

Quakers have a long-standing policy of supporting the Palestinian people. Likewise, Quakers also support the people of Israel. The argument being that both people have a right to self-government.

The AFSC has a circulating petition against the Israeli apartide regime. Should Quakers still support this petition? How should we talk about this conflict?

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u/generallydisagree avatar

generallydisagree

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17 days ago

Why would anybody support an organization (AFSC) that supports terrorists?

Simply read AFSC Jennifer Bing's article on 5 ways to help Palestinians. There is zero responsibility taken or even notes for the acts of the terrorists (Hamas, JIP, etc. . . ) - only endless blame of Israel.

AFSC is nothing more than a US based fundraising organization for Palestinian terrorists - steeling the traditions of Quakers to con people into unknowingly make donations to terrorist organizations.

People donating to AFSC are donating to terrorists.

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u/belindasmith2112 avatar

belindasmith2112

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17 days ago

Condemning Apartheid is the correct response- Condemning the Ethic Cleansing that Israel has been doing for the last 10 years is why we’re where we are. You have to remember- Israel Government is Secular and very right winged - The Two party state is where we should have been all along.

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keithb

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18 days ago

Quakers are for peace, justice, and human rights. We should not be against any regime. Time and again we’ve seen that the best way to be able to help folks on the ground who are caught in conflicts is for no side to think that we must be “up to something”. If all sides in a conflict believe that we are for peace and not against them we can go to places that no one else can and we can work for peace and help people on the ground that it can be hard for anyone else to reach. And we can support efforts to de-escalate conflict that no one else can support. But it needs all sides to trust us, so we must not be against any side.

In Palestine, we have made a mistake. We allowed our compassion for a people beset at least as much by their own supposed leaders as by any supposed opponent to cloud our judgement. We’ve also fallen prey to a hidden antisemitism that runs through left-wing politics in the west, one which deliberately confuses us about the State of Israel and its current policies and the Jewish people.

We should be for peace.

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u/panelakpascal avatar

panelakpascal

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18 days ago

Thanks for this post, nothing to add but I've found it and the comments really helpful. Greetings from France.

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u/generallydisagree avatar

generallydisagree

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17 days ago

Is AFSC a terrorist support network trying to raise funds to launder money to Hamas and other terrorist organizations?

In reviewing Jennifer Bing's article on "5 Ways you can support Palestinians in Gaza" she goes on to cover a sweeping list of anti-Israeli actions, bombings in Gaza, etc. . .

Yet, never once points out that Israel responds to terrorist attacks originating by Palestinians in Gaza. Gaza and the Palestinians ongoing support and promotion for the terrorist. The fact that the Gaza/Palestinian terrorist set up their facilities next to schools, hospitals and mosques so that when Israel targets the terrorists in response to the terrorist attacks against Israel - some innocent civilians die in Israel's response.

Why is the AFSC and Jennifer Bing not pointing out that the deaths of these "innocent" civilians at the hands of the terrorist who are using them as shields?

AFSC and Jennifer Bing sure seem to have a lot of love for Hamas and the terrorists and a lot of hate for any and all Jewish people!

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thefinanceguy123

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18 days ago

this is what happens when you colonize another nation there will be resistance. Israel has been brutally treating the Palestinians for years its no surprise they finally fought back. No different from Ukraine defending itself.

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wactuallyyours

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13 days ago

Hamas doesn't represent Palestinians. Attacking civilians is very different from Ukraine defending itself.

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abitofasitdown

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5 days ago

This wasn't "the Palestinians". You cannot attribute Hamas atrocities to the whole Palestinian community.

(And murdering civilians isn't "fighting back".)

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Jmacaroni408

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17 days ago

I'm just praying for the our fellow Friends in Ramallah Palestine and all the Palestinian Christians that suffer at the hands of the Zionist and may the Lord's justice be delivered

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Illithilitch

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6 days ago

I pray for the Israeli people. I pray for the Palestinian people. I pray for the Ukrainian people. I pray for the Russian people. I pray for peaceful resolutions.

I don't pray for nations. They are notions.

I'm not able to help in any meaningful way, and the situation is so complex that forming a cogent opinion is difficult.

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Punk18

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18 days ago

Make Palestine its own country out of "Israeli" land. Then, everyone gets a country

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u/belindasmith2112 avatar

belindasmith2112

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17 days ago

It was Palestine before it was “Israel” the continued ethnic cleansing make this the incorrect response

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2023-10-26

Quakers, Palestinians, Israel : r/Quakers

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