Recognising Palestine is a distraction. We need sanctions to stop Israel killing my people
I am the granddaughter of Nakba survivors. In 1948, my grandparents were expelled from Lydd, Historic Palestine, along with 80 per cent of its people by Israeli militias. My father grew up in a refugee camp, no home, no stability, only the dream of return. I grew up with their stories, and I grew up watching Israel's ongoing crimes: the occupation of the West Bank, the siege of Gaza, the ethnic cleansing of villages across Palestine. I never needed a state to tell me I was Palestinian or grant me my self-determination. We did that ourselves by keeping our struggle alive.
Witnessing these injustices gave me the determination and stamina to fight for my homeland. For years, I have witnessed institutions of power fail us, allow crime after crime to occur against the Palestinian people with full impunity. I knew it was us, the people, the masses, who could end this torture.
For nearly two years, I have organised weekly rallies with the Palestine Action Group to stop what Amnesty International, B'Tselem (the Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights) and the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories have called by its name: genocide.
Last week, we led one of Australia's largest ever demonstrations on the Sydney Harbour Bridge. We were driven there by the images from Gaza: children starved to skeletons, families crushed under rubble, messages from our families pleading that we fight, and a disgust that our government – by its inaction – is complicit in this slaughter. We also knew that a march this big and this symbolic could never be ignored. Our demands were clear: sanctions on Israel and an end to the two-way arms trade.
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And yet, the government instead offers us 'recognition' of a Palestinian state, as though that is what we have been demanding. Recognition, while I watch my homeland be exterminated, while Netanyahu vows to occupy Gaza indefinitely, while Israel expands its settlements across the illegally occupied West Bank, is as hollow as the condemnations Western leaders have offered as Israel's crimes escalate.
Recognition is not enough. You cannot 'recognise' a state while you allow Australian-made components to help arm the regime destroying it. You cannot fight for the dead while helping make the weapons that kill them.
And I don't mean that metaphorically. Lockheed Martin, one of the world's largest weapons manufacturers, has made record profits on the back of the genocide and has confirmed that every single F-35 jet contains Australian parts and components. (I note that I can no longer find this mention on its website.) UN experts have noted that exporting parts could be a violation of international law.
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