Free Palestine

Warning: Jewish Discussion Below! If It Sounds Like We’re Yelling, That’s Just How We Talk!

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In the winter between 2016 and 2017, I went on Birthright. It was fun. It was ten days with 25 horned up college students and eight hardbodied IDF soldiers with official orders to tactically seduce us by any means necessary, hermetically sealed into a coach bus to prevent any pheromones from leaking out. We listened to Israeli pop music, which, despite every songwriter in the world being Jewish, sucks ass. We smoked disgusting, brown weed that looked like goose poop. We drank beer at a bar overlooking the spot where Jesus was baptized and almost peed in the river before realizing that. They made us listen to Sheldon Adelson speak at a giant Hannukah party, and even from the back row, I could see his horrendous physical condition. The evil force which inhabited his physical body had no more use for his corporeal form, and was laying one final batch of demon eggs within him before finally allowing him to die. 

Birthright is a billionaire-funded, masterfully-designed Zionist immersion program. It follows a similar trajectory to a cult induction. The first night, they get personal. They ask you why you came, what you love about Israel, and what you doubt about it. Then they get to know you more personally. They make it fun. The whole time, you are kept so sleep-deprived that it is impossible to think critically. At times, the propaganda is heavy-handed: visiting a daycare and playing with cute babies while hearing about how they cry during the constant rocket attacks. Most of the time, it is subtle. Shakshuka, markets, nightclubs. Then, just as you’re coming to like the place and think it’s pretty cool, BAM. Holocaust museum. It’s the saddest thing you’ve ever seen in your entire life, everyone’s crying, and you feel the strange sensation that you’re Jewish, always will be, and it doesn’t matter how Jewish you feel or whether you grew up Conservative but kinda prefer Reform because the rabbi has a guitar, because when someone wants to kill Jews, you’re Jewish. Then you drive straight to the Dead Sea, the salt makes your urethra burn but it doesn’t matter because the sexy soldier is covering herself in mud ten feet away, and that’s when you’re meant to feel it, powerfully and permanently: I love Israel!

It didn’t work on me. But I can say now that I understand Zionism, or rather, I understand the argument. It started in the 1800s. Jews everywhere are persecuted, as they have been for thousands of years, so people begin making plans for a Jewish state. Many places are considered: Uganda, Japan, Madagascar, etc. Isn’t that colonialist? Of course! But that’s just how things were. Then 7,000,000 Jews are killed -- half the Jews on Earth. It’s perhaps the most evil, devastating act in human history. And the Jews say, Now we definitely need our own state. We’ve had enough. We’re going to have it in Israel, because we got kicked out 2000 years ago and it’s time to go back. We want our State and we want that piece of holy land we’ve been fighting over for millenia and half of us were just murdered, so we’re going to damn well get what we want for once. 

That’s the logic. If it resonates for you, then ok. To each their own. But if you can watch what’s happening this week -- shooting up al-Aqsa Mosque, cheering as it burns, bombing the tallest apartment building in Gaza -- and not be disgusted, we’re not talking to the same God. 

I’m not writing this for the diehard Zionists. Your mind is hardened and your heart calcified. I’m not sure if we have a Hell, but if we do, enjoy it. This is for the Jews who grew up like me. We were told constantly that Israel was our second home. That we had to love Israel and support Israel and cherish Israel. They brainwashed us. The paratrooper who visited your Hebrew school wasn’t chill; he had brain damage from all the ayahuasca he took in Peru trying to drown his IDF memories. There’s no way Tel Aviv Pride is actually as fun as they make it sound. That stuff with the cucumbers isn’t really called Israeli Salad. Do you really think Jews invented a salad?

Listen to that feeling in your gut that knows this is all completely wrong. That’s the Jew in you! You are appalled by injustice because you’re a Jew. You value and cherish every human life because you’re a Jew.  You know, deep down, that Palestine should be free because you’re a Jew. 

I don’t love Israel. My brother lives in Japan, so I’ve been there three times. I like Japan more. There are less capri pants, the food has flavors other than garbanzo bean and olive, and Japanese people are nice to me, unlike Israelis (except the ones on military orders to do so.) Israel is not the Kingdom of God on Earth. It’s a country. It’s run by politicians -- very, very corrupt ones. Every day, they use you, your family, and your history to justify the murder of Palestinians. They use you to justify stealing Palestinian land. They use you to justify denying Palestinians food and medicine. They use you to justify stealing a Palestinian’s home so some fat fuck from Crown Heights who cut you off in his minivan and barely even thinks you’re Jewish can build a vacation home with a pool in the middle of the desert.  

This is my message to all the Jews who grew up like me: You don’t need to support Israel. You don’t need to buy every new seltzer machine they invent. You don’t need to visit and get sunburnt and ripped off on a bunch of chamsa jewelry. You don’t have to donate to any dumb charity just because it has Israel in the name, whether it’s the Israeli Dog Obesity Foundation or the Israel Straight Men’s Choir or the Burn A Candle Program, which gets Israeli and Palestinian kids together to light each others’ farts on fire. 

Criticizing Israel is a very, very brave thing to do in the United States. Professors get fired and college students get punished for it. In many places, politicians must swear to protect Israel. (Dual loyalty, anyone?) Texas teachers had to sign an oath to defend Israel. American Jews must speak up, since we can. An entire industry of the most cynical, craven, whiny Jews (and that’s saying something!) exists to immediately label any criticism of Israel as anti-Semitic. While temples are shot up and Nazis march across the country, they still go after anyone who questions why we give billions of dollars to an apartheid regime. Israel uses us Jews to justify its crimes, so we Jews must be the first to condemn them. We are (sort of) allowed to criticize Israel, so we must do so, and lift up every other voice besides us. Jews must help free Palestine.

On the first night of Birthright, they asked us what we thought about Israel. I said I felt no connection. My ancestors are from Eastern Europe. They told me that many people feel that way, but only because their thinking is limited in time. They said my ancestors were only in Eastern Europe because thousands of years before, they got kicked out of Israel where my real roots are. Well, guess what. Two thousand years ago, my ancestors probably didn’t even know how to wipe their asses. If I went back in time and gave them one sip of Mountain Dew Baja Blast, they would die on the spot. I’ve got about 90 years on this planet (75 if I keep eating like this) and I don’t intend to spend them hashing out ancient beef. My job while I’m here is tikkun olam - repairing the world. Free Palestine!