<Bz10>July 8, 2006</*R> I SHARE many of Alvin Williams'
I SHARE many of Alvin Williams’ justified concerns with the more militant manifestations of Zionism. Zionism is not, as Mr. Williams correctly pointed out in his most recent Commentary<$> (Mid-Ocean News<$>, July 7), a religious or cultural movement but rather the secular Jewish political expression of 19th-century nationalism — the same nationalism that later inspired Independence movements throughout the world. Nationalist sentiment helped to break up the Austro-Hungarian, Russian and German Empires after World War One, leading to the creation of new European nations like Poland, Czechoslovakia, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Yugoslavia — countries all carved out of the old multinational empires.
Later this same nationalist philosophy spread to Europe’s overseas empires, leading to the long decolonisation period that lasted from the late 1940s through the late 1970s. The arguments the Zionists made when they declared the Independence of a Jewish state in Palestine in 1948 were the same ones heard in Nigeria, India, Pakistan, Jamaica, etc.
Nationalism, in its most potent and toxic form, is a chauvinistic, intolerant and racially or ethnically exclusive dogma that is impenetrable to reason. There are certainly troubling examples of such nationalistic fanaticism in Israeli politics and society.
However, there are also examples of such fanaticism in Bermuda. And I hope (but don’t really believe) that Mr. Williams can appreciate the irony of this. Because precisely the same extremism he chastises Israeli zealots for is all too evident in his one-sided, closed-minded writings on Bermudian Independence.
When he recently commented apropos the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya that the people there had to be stampeded to Independence largely against their will by these implacable and doctrinaire shock troops, my heart sank.
Was he suggesting such ugly tactics might be required in Bermuda where almost 80 per cent of the population opposes Independence?
Does Mr. Williams, like so many nationalists before him, believe his political dogma gives him a quasi-religious status? That he and like-minded Independence advocates are secular prophets who are entitled to bully, coerce and drag the rest of the population towards a “Promised Land” we don’t happen to believe in? Independence by any means necessary, Mr. Williams, is that your bottom line?
Mr. Williams, while I enjoyed your critique of Zionist extremism the sad fact of the matter is you have far more in common with its proponents than you realise.
Sandys Parish<$>Why does the world continue to support Israel?
WITH regard to the informative Commentary<$> article headlined “The Tragedy of Palestine: One Land, Two Peoples” by Alvin Williams (Mid-Ocean News<$>, July 7),
How the world’s major leading nations can support the state of Israel in spite of its defiance of United Nations Security Council Resolutions is a puzzle to most logical-thinking people.
How, for example, can the US be considered an honest broker when it sends billions of dollars to Israel to build settlements on stolen land on the West Bank that was to be used for the state of Palestine?
What is deeply troubling is that the rest of the world stands by and does nothing for fear of retaliation from the US no doubt. That the US has to borrow the billions it sends to Israel while it has one-in-five children living below the poverty line and one-in-three seniors unable to afford their prescription medication (as Israel boasts of being one of the world’s most wealthy countries) is a mystery to all.
It is interesting to draw the comparison between Ireland during the potato famine, when almost two million people died of famine and associated disease and the world stood by — especially England under Queen Victoria with Disraeli as Prime Minister. They did nothing to aid their neighbours and fellow British subjects. It seems as though history is repeating itself.
Bermudians could get an idea of the conditions Palestinians have been forced into if they think we are crowded here on our 21 square miles. Consider that the Gaza Strip is only about six or seven times larger than our island — but has over 1.5 million people crowded into refugee camps, etc.
If we were to put every man woman and child living in Bermuda on to St. David’s Island you begin to comprehend the human misery the Palestinians endure with no end in sight.
Now the Israelis have destroyed the power plant, schools, hospitals, even a football pitch in their search for a captured Israeli soldier. They also have killed innocent civilians firing missiles into these crowded refugee camps.
About 50 Palestinians have died but this number may rise dramatically as the loss of electricity will cause water and sewage problems will cause sickness and disease just as a crippled infrastructure has in Iraq.
How can any member of the human race not share their pain?
Warwick
Letter to the Editor
