Max Blumenthal reporting from Mondoweiss
On June 5, when several hundred Israelis marched from Tel Aviv’s Yitzhak Rabin Square to the Israeli Defense Ministry to protest the anniversary of the Six Day War, I was able to meet some of the country’s most vociferous cheerleaders of Barack Obama. In complete contrast to the characters who appeared in my video report, “Feeling the Hate in Jerusalem,” those I interviewed at the demonstration (organized by the Israeli left-wing party Hadash) were invigorated by Obama’s speech in Cairo, and excited by the prospect of an American president who would pressure Israel into making meaningful concessions towards peace. As one demonstrator remarked to me, “[Obama] must save us from ourselves.”
(snip)
“You see how few we are,” said a demonstrator holding a sign reading “Obama, Yes-U-Can.” “This is about all the Israelis who really oppose the Occupation — it’s very small. Most of the Israelis don’t care about the Occupation and what goes on in the Occupied Territories and about the suffering of the Palestinians. I think it must come from the — the pressure must come from the outside… From here, there’s not enough.”
The sad thing that emerges from this report are phrases such as, left wing support “very small,” most Israelis “don’t care” about the occupation and Palestinian suffering, and “from here (Israel) there’s not enough.” Jeff Halper, the founder of Israel Committee Against House Demolition (ICAHD), recognized that peace must come from the outside a few years ago when he opened branches of ICAHD in Britain and the United States, and continues to lecture there and in Canada and Australia as well. Given recent developments, one would have to agree that the Obama peace mission is the best bet to achieve peace in the Middle East: it comes from the outside.
