Israel, Palestine supported in separate Halifax demonstrations
Hundreds gathered at separate rallies supporting both Israel and Palestine on Monday in Halifax.
They come after Hamas attacked Israel by land, sea and air this weekend.
At least 900 were killed in the attacks that appear to have taken Israeli security forces by surprise. Of those, an estimated 260 were young people gunned down while attending a music festival. Some 100 Israeli civilians and military personnel have been taken hostage, with Hamas threatening to execute them.
Israel responded by declaring war on Hamas, which governs Gaza.
According to Gaza’s health ministry, some 550 civilians have been killed in Gaza as of Monday afternoon as Israel launched air strikes on what it says were Hamas positions in the densely populated area.
At the pro-Israel protest held on the corner of Spring Garden Road and South Park Street, Pavel Jelovdovski lit a candle for his cousin, Alexei Shmakalov.
“He was a brilliant young man, loved by his family and a beacon to his community,” said Jelovdovski.
Shmakalov was in one of the first responding Israeli Defense Forces units to the Hamas attack on Sderot.
The city of 30,553 bordering Gaza was overrun by armed men who shot civilians in the streets.
“His whole unit was destroyed trying to protect civilians,” said Jelovdovski, himself an IDF veteran.
“There were too few against too many.”
Down at the pro-Palestine protest along the waterfront, Free Palestine Halifax member Lovai Abdul cautioned that they “don’t necessarily support Hamas’ actions, but the action of Israelis have far exceeded the actions of Hamas.”
Asked how Nova Scotians should view the targeting of civilians, Abdul said, “Lots of Europeans defend their homes and they’re labelled as heroes. If an Arab defends his home he’s labelled a terrorist.”
In this long-running conflict, there is also a battle over language itself.
“At this time the world stands with Israel. But I have a fear that in two weeks or a month as Israel defends itself, the media will begin calling them ‘militants’ and ‘combatants.’ They are not, they are terrorists and murderers,” said Rabbi Yakov Kerzner.
“The world needs to know they can’t create a moral equivalency between one side and the other.”
At the pro-Palestine protest speaker Mohamed El-Attar countered that, saying, “The media has been covering this like this all began two days ago, completely ignoring seven decades and more of oppression and occupation. Completely ignoring the fact that Israel has been committing terrorism for years against the Palestinians … resistance is not terrorism, resistance is an international right.”
The Gaza Strip is a 365-square-kilometre area bordering Israel on its northern and eastern sides and Egypt in the south. Some 2,375,259 people, primarily Palestinian, live in the impoverished region, making it the third most populated area of the world.
The majority of its residents are descendants of Palestinians who either fled or were expelled from the area that became Israel after the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.
Hamas, an Islamic fundamentalist militant organization long supported by Iran won a majority in the 2006 Palestinian legislative election and has controlled Gaza ever since.
Israel has kept strict control over access to Gaza by air and sea and land, other than its border with Egypt. Israel also controls its access to water, electricity and telecommunications.
Asked Monday whether he thought there was a path to peace for Gaza and Israel, Rabbi Kerzner responded, “Four days ago I would have said there is clearly a path, the Arab governments are on a path to making peace with Israel. But now I don’t know what to tell you. I have been wrong so many times before.”
Asked if he thought there could someday be peace in Gaza, Abdul said, “I hope.”
