‘From The River To The Sea’
JVL Introduction
The chant heard increasingly heard on pro-Palestinian demonstrations is “From the River to the Sea, Palestine shall be free”.
It expresses a longstanding aspiration as Maha Nassar clearly shows in this essay published in the Forward in December 2018. It is as relevant as when it was written.
Many Zionists have always treated this demand as expressing a programme of “throwing the Jews into the sea” (as many white South Africans treated opposition to apartheid) some even going so far as to call it a “warrant for genocide”.
It is no such thing.
As Amnesty International, following B’Tselem and Human Right Watch, have made clear there is already one regime from the river to the sea. What is at stake is the nature of the regime.
This historic slogan, alive once more, is a rejection of the current reality of settler colonialism, occupation and apartheid in favour of equal human rights and equal freedom for all in historic Palestine, whatever the political forms through which these goals are expressed.
This article was originally published by Forward on Mon 3 Dec 2018. Read the original here.
‘From The River To The Sea’ Doesn’t Mean What You Think It Means
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It is of course unbelievable that a call for equal right for all – Israeli Jews and Palestinians within 1 state is considered to be genocide of Jews. That is because an end to Jewish supremacy means an end to the Jewish state of oppression. There is nothing new in this. It is what Whites in southern Africa believed too.
It is also a sign of their weakness.
Likewise the claim that Israel is the world’s only Jewish state as if that is a good thing. States based on ethno-religious nationalism are always, without exception, repressive and racist and we should not be on the defensive about this.
It’s a pity that Marc Lamont Hill apologised. NEVER APOLOGISE TO RACISTS
Thanks for this..and the implied hope that peoples do change their minds and positions….sometimes for the best.
Nassar is worthy but a bit mealy-mouthed in implying that Zionist ‘militants’ – by ordinary definitions extremist outriders to a more moderate establishment – started the attacks on Palestinians, and only later did mainstream Zionism follow up. No, Ben Gurion was such a militant – read not only Ilan Pappe but also ultraZionist Benny Morris. Zionists did not stand idly by in the 1930s, either, when the might of the British empire was hurled for three years at the Palestinians – recall Bernard Montgomery, whom I should call ‘the Franco of the Levant’. Recall Orde Wingate and his storm detachments. That is one struggle the allegedly paltering British imperialists DID ‘intervene’ in!
“So what do we mean when we say ‘Palestine shall be free’? We mean free from oppression, free from apartheid, free from occupation and war.” https://jobird2.wixsite.com/website/post/shalom-alaichim
Westminster governed the 10,400 sq miles of Mandated Palestine for 30 years while denying suffrage to all inhabitants – numbering 1.9 million by 1947.
That same 10,400 sq mile territory has now been governed by the Knesset for 53 years and today suffrage is permitted to only about 9 million of the territory’s 14 million inhabitants.
What would be wrong with a demand for “one man, one vote” for all of voting age who fall under the governance of the Knesset?
A ‘One State Solution’ for the land of Palestine, where Jew, Arab & Christian can live together united in a quest to find peace & harmony in the ‘holy land’. If this is anti-Semitism then there is a problem with its definition; perhaps the ‘Nation State Law’ is just one indicator?
Response to Peter Jones – in 2022 it is rather inappropriate to be calling for ‘one man one vote’ – don’t you think? Fifty years ago, during ‘second wave feminism’, we were dealing the the exclusion of female existence by rejecting terms like ‘chairman’. Am disappointed to see this exclusion continues to be demonstrated on the JVL site – and also that the person posting JVL material didn’t take the opportunity to ask Peter if he wished to reformulate his last sentence somewhat.
And is this relevant to a discussion about Israel/Palestine? Well, it’s always relevant. Plus, as very many campaigning Jewish and Palestinian women complain – Jewish and Palestinian communities across Israel/Palestine are characterised by sexism and misogyny. So it’s especially important always to acknowledge explicitly – and crucially in a comment about democracy – that women in both these communities hold up 50% of the sky.
“While Palestinians viewed Zionists as akin to colonial settlers, Jews who were willing to live as equals with the Palestinians were welcome to stay.”
So how many Jews in Israel would be regarded as Zionists? What would they have to do to convince Palestinians they were willing to live as equals with them and what would happen to those who failed in this.
Peter,
“What would be wrong with a demand for ‘one man, one vote’ … ?”
Universal suffrage does not necessarily produce freedom, liberty, equality of rights and opportunities. It IS an important mechanism, but history is littered with examples of anti-democratic mechanisms and devices shaping political systems.