From the river to the sea…
JVL Introduction
Suella Braverman has condemned the chant “From the river to the sea…” as antisemitic, a call to destroy Israel.
So, routinely, do many Zionists – and the Board of Deputies, the Jewish Leadership Council and the Community Security Trust – though I don’t believe they uttered a squeak of protest when Netanyahu presented Israel as one-state from the river to the sea at the UN in September (see images below)
Observer/Guardian reporters bothered to ask demonstrators on the march what they thought the slogan meant and failed to find one antisemite amongst them.
Any genuinely disquieted by the slogan should see it as those who chant it do: as a plea and a rallying cry to end the occupation and apartheid throughout the historical region that was Palestine so that all may enjoy equal rights and freedom.
RK
PS: the “100,000-strong” demo was probably nearer 300,000. But as in the old Jewish joke, “Who’s counting?”
This article was originally published by Observer/Guardian on Sat 21 Oct 2023. Read the original here.
‘Simply a call for freedom’: marchers defend slogan at London Palestine protest
Police allow chant at 100,000-strong demo, despite the home secretary saying it calls for the destruction of Israel
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Good to see this opened up and to read what some marchers meant by the use of those words. Generally I don’t chant it at rallies since I am not sure what others mean by it. I raised it in my speech at an impressively attended Colchester PSC rally at lunchtime today (Sunday 22nd). I mentioned Ilan Pappé’s formulation of a single state in the area: ‘”a de-zionised, liberated and democratic Palestine, from the river to the sea”. That’s almost enough for me but I would also wish to. make its secular nature explicit. I could chant for that, utopian as it may be.. It would involve the dismantling or reformulation of the present state of Israel , and justice for those dispossessed in the Nakba. It would have a constitution that reflected the equal rights of all its citizens.
Would it be less controversial and perhaps more accurate to chant, ‘From the river to the sea, Palestinians will be free’?
As we passed the Cavalry & Guards Club in Picadilly (and you don’t get much more Establishment than that) 4 people came onto the balcony, some wearing their medals, and enthusiastically greeted the march. On the train to the march we had several passengers expressing their support. It was an inspiring day, in spite of the weather and travel difficulties. I just wish the people of Gaza could have seen it.
The Guardian has to get its anti-Corbyn dig (a baseless claim made by someone on the march that goes entirely unchallenged by the journalist) in what is otherwise a good piece of reporting.
Suella Braverman is fundamentally ignorant and in my opinion is a dimwit. But, sadly, I anticipate a Labour Home Secretary to be as biased.
There have of course been pro-Israeli protests, as some of its defenders are all too eager to point out; but nothing on the scale of the pro-Palestinian protests. These have been immense, even if the figures as presented by the msm proved to be accurate, which they very likely don’t.
And if I’ve understood this correctly, Braverman herself, as right-wing as any Tory politician dare go, and that’s pretty far, attended a so-called ‘peace walk’ in North London which was called off because of the quite imaginary threat emanating it was said from the very much larger Trafalgar Square demo taking place at the same time.
It’s becoming clearer by the day that the Hasbara has failed, that Israel has failed in its attempts to misrepresent its crimes as mere self-protection, that the msm has failed in its efforts to propogate Israel’s view of itself, and that public opinion is turning massively in the direction of Palestine’s efforts to govern themselves on their own terms.
Jews themselves, having been intimidated into comparative silence for so many years, are now standing up and telling Israel and the Hasbarists very loudly what they can do with their lies and their slanders
So why can’t the likes of Biden, Braverman and Starmer not see that their ‘unwavering’, ‘uneqivocal’ support for Israel is not only morally wrong but politically less and less justified?
What has to happen for them to realised that they are giving their support to men who wish to commit genocide? Why are they allowing themselves to be used by these men? What exactly is going through ther minds?
I hope that they will be confronted with these questions constantly and consistently until they are forced to answer them.