Thank you, thank you, thank you. I remember being in the Saban theater with you in LA, praying for peace and for healing between Palestinians and Israelis over a decade ago. You have always kept a keen eye on the events, hearts and minds of these two communities, and you have always given your heart and love to the vision of peace. I hold this vision with you. As you always say, dear God, we need a miracle. And so it is.
Thank god for the nuances. Real conflict solutions - lasting conflict solutions that happen with no need for compromise - come from a deep and profound understanding of "the other". We hold that opportunity open with you with open hearts.
If all people are going to live in harmony, than we need to understand we are all interconnected regardless of beliefs, religion or culture and killing each other isn't the answer.
Hamas knew how Netanyahu would respond, they counted on it. There was a movement afoot to remove him because of his changes to the judiciary that threatens Israel's democracy. That's just when Hamas decided to attack. They alone are responsible for every single death in this war, both civilians in Gaza and in Israel. Many people are unaware that Israel will warn an area they are about to bomb because a rocket has been launched from it, but Hamas will not let civilians escape. They want the excessive civilian deaths. There should be a Palestinian resistance movement on the same level as the French resistance to Hitler, since Hamas is even worse. Hamas is the reason Palestine lost its democracy and now is not even eligible to join the UN. Not being a democracy, they are not our ally at this point in time. The USA supports democracies. The anger has been misdirected at Israel and should be solely laser focused upon Hamas. They created this situation. They knew what they were going to do but did not lay in supplies to prevent starvation. They kick civilians out of safer areas and take them for themselves. They create military targets in highly populated areas. The war would end today if they would agree to the cease fire and release the hostages. They won't because they are delirious with joy that so many US campuses are misdirecting their anger at Israel and they want that to go on. So while protesters' hearts might be in the right place, they have aimed their wrath in the wrong direction.
Dearest Marianne - I support you with monthly campaign donations and would have loved to see you as the Democratic candidate. I am aligned with your platform and recommendations. But you're not the candidate.
Please pivot to talking with us about what we can do now to ensure that Trump doesn't win, and that Biden starts to speak from your playbook!
I think what we have is a leadership problem. Leadership is missing in action during these most volatile of times. And government agencies created to manage chaos are contributing to the chaos.
I’m sure that the youth who are protesting are doing it on behalf of the oppressed and the genocide being perpetrated by the IDA. Would it be better that they stay home and quietly ignore and suppress their outrage? I for one am hopeful when I see the young protesting. I’m truly sorry you feel so threatened, it’s understandable but what is the alternative for the youth and others who are outraged at the, despotism shown by Netanyahu and at the cowardice of most governments in the western world to stand against or even voice any semblance of outrage at what the Israeli government are doing to the people of Gaza. Indeed it would seem their message to him is, go right ahead….
"As President, I would not have been willing to give Netanyahu carte blanche support in the form of either money or weaponry. I would have demanded to know 1) his exact strategy for destroying Hamas’ tunnels and military operation, 2) how he planned to protect civilians in the process, and 3) what his plans were for the day after the cessation of military activity. Additionally, any plan would have had to include the discussion of a two state solution. In the absence of clear and satisfactory answers to the questions above, as President I would not have committed American support."
Here is the reality. You would have first consulted your State Department and military strategists, carefully reading and listening to their assessments, some of them publicly available and some deeply classified because this is *Israel, this is *Hamas, and Hamas is part of a broad network of agencies that are supported and cultivated by dangerously retrograde power(s) to its East. Then, you would have faced, if you were to consult with Israel's head of State, a man who had served in his own national military, supported by his own military consultants, with his own stubborn ideas on how to deal with a military attack that came to his nation, not yours, and he would see you - a woman - as someone without the proper training and life experience to advise him. If you flatly denied aid to Israel unless it met *your* demands - informed by nothing more than your clear desire to avoid war - Hamas would declare victory, continue to abuse and confine the captives, and plan the next attack.
For Hamas, this mass slaughter, human suffering, and global eruption was a *military, nor *policy calculation built into the tunnels they carved under the Palestinian residents of Gaza. They always knew that thousands of people would die. That the press would follow it religiously. That people would protest. That it would rip apart the heart of America and Europe. They PLANNED THIS INTO THE WAR FIELD THEY BUILT UNDER GAZA ten years ago, hoping that world support for Israel would collapse, others would join in their cause, and eventually the State of Israel would be no more.
Those dead, innocent Gaza residents are like bombs Hamas planned to throw at the Western Press, knowing our freedoms of speech could be used against us in the same way the Saudis who took down the Twin Towers used our own airlines to attack huge symbols of Western power and success.
It's like Golda Meir said "If the Arabs put down their weapons there will be no more violence. If the Jews put down their weapons there will be no more Israel."
Biden, Blinken, and a number of people in Qatar are doing all they can to bring a meaningful cease fire and an ultimate 2 State solution to this area. They've been balancing some *very tricky optics and politics in this matter almost from the beginning. They deserve, and have my respect for their efforts.
And you deserve, and have my respect for your understanding of ACIM.
I do like that quote, BTW. I hope that someday it may become a reality.
Marianne has such an intelligent and compassionate way of expressing the atrocities and the possibilities of hope in this horrendous situation! Imagine the good she could do as our President!!
It's astonishing that the threat of trump is of less concern to students and faculty in the US than the tragedy in the Middle East. Perhaps their youth gives them the passion to wish death for the Jews, blaming the global Jewish people for the Israeli government. The Israelis can't do anything about it just like we could do nothing about the white supremacist former president. My parents survived the Holocaust and taught me that we are not safe, for most of my life I resisted that fear and now I know they were right. It's not enough to mourn the extermination my extended family in Poland, when the enemies have called for the obliteration of Israel since 1948. We have been hated for centuries and that will continue. I have to learn to be brave. You are a beacon of hope. I'm voting for you.
The youth are not wishing the death of Jews. That narrative is what will cause more conflict. Open your eyes. It’s not about you it’s about what Netanyahu is doing in your name. Just like if trump wins it won’t be about Americans when he spreads his hateful policies it will be about what he doing in Americas name.
My eyes are open, perhaps the youth don't really want the death of Jews, perhaps they don't understand what these protests are doing to further add to the power of Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran. When the signs state things such as "Gas the Jews", "death to Jews" and "death to America" it's directing the blame on Jews around the world for the plight of Palestinians who elected a terrorist organization to run their country. Many of Israel's neighbors have sworn to wipe Israel from the map, they've been saying this since 1948. These countries expelled their Jewish citizens from those countries with no right of return as a form of ethnic cleansing. Where did these Jews go? To Israel, the homeland. The majority of Israelis hate Netanyahu and have been protesting his regime for over a year, all to no avail. These university students are ignorant but filled the passion of youth. Didn't we protest the war in Vietnam? Did we stop that war? No, it stopped because it was no longer profitable for the military industrial complex but we protested, we insulted returning troops and thought of ourselves warriors for peace. Perhaps the Germans didn't really believe the the extermination of the Jews in Europe would make their lives better, but hitler didn't work in a vacuum and the relentless attacks on Jews by his soldiers and collaborators had the impact that the nazis wanted. Many countries closed their doors to fleeing Jews, and today's hatred toward Israel doesn't differentiate between the government of Israel and the Jews of the world. I realize that many of us Second Generation Survivors have a different view of the world, and reading the names of my family on the concentration camp lists gives me a perspective that you cannot understand. My eyes are open and my job now is not to hate, but to love with caution. I dare not hang an Israeli flag in front of my house because we might become targets of the KKK, the Proud Boys and the right wing nuts. I hope you never feel the fear we live with. It's in our collective minds, it's multigenerational and cannot be understood even by good people such as I presume you are.
I am so sorry that you cannot safely celebrate your own flag, and its deeper spiritual symbolism, in public. That symbol has profound meaning for me. <3
I understand my parents' fear in a way I never thought I would. Often growing up, we the children of the survivors asked ourselves what we would do to survive and great regret that we were not able to help as we had not been born yet. That;s the journey that is hard to explain. Thank you for your kind words
I hear you. But you can’t speak for all the youth that are demonstrating nor all the Jews, many of whom are demonstrating along with the protesters as far as I am aware.
I speak for myself and my generation and my journey. I'm not wishing ill for Palestinians or anybody. I choose not to hate. I don't speak for other Jews because there are many ways to act/feel/believe in our personal Judaism, not as a religion or an ethnicity or a nation, but just the reality I carry in my cellular memory. I guess I'm not able to just sit back and wait for it to pass, as it will never pass. I can only spread my love and compassion to my family, my friends and my community. I can do nothing for a world run by despots.
As usual, Marianne has the most brilliant thoughts about the current situation in the conflict in Gaza. YOU should be our leader going forth in the future! Thank you for your brilliant thoughts and for being YOU!
I was reluctant to click “follow”because I do not know if different views are desired here. I believe in honest disagreement and friendly debate in the world of ideas, not blocking / cancelling / demonizing somebody you disagree with.
I think moral relativism is dangerous. All wars are Hell and all have an unacceptable human toll but that does not mean there is no such thing as a just and necessary war - such as Israel’s war to eliminate Hamas and free any surviving hostages.
I read Ecclesiastes to remind me that there is a time and place for every purpose, including a two-state “solution”. The writer seems to have a good heart, but her timing is way off. A Palestinian state should not be proposed as a reward for a massive terror attack that was obviously pure evil.
My view - there should be no consideration of a Palestinian state until Israel has a real partner for peace, and that means people who want Israel destroyed should be a pretty slim minority, not a majority. Without that understanding, reality is overlooked. All men are created equal does not mean there is moral parity between a group of people who would love to have a good neighbor and a group of people who predominantly want to kill their neighbor. I don’t know how many generations it takes for the Palestinians to have a change of heart, but it’s possible. The Japanese and the Germans did it. A group of people who prefer to live in hatred and cast themselves in the role of victim to play on liberal and leftist sensibilities should get a mirror and figure out who is at fault for their own misery.
My understanding is that Gaza would reelect Hamas in a heartbeat and if there were an election in the “West Bank” they would vote out the nearly as bad Palestinian Authority in favor of Hamas.
Has the author considered that Israel’s war council is a unity government in which Bibi’s chief rival Benny Gantz also advocates for the war to continue until Hamas either surrenders or is destroyed and hostages are freed? Pretending this is all Netanyahu doesn’t make it so.
Inability or unwillingness to understand how many times Israel has offered the Palestinians a state is the consequence of trying to overlook facts that do not conform to a pre-conceived narrative. I prefer to seek the truth, which includes Arafat rejecting Ehud Barak’s offer of 97% of what the Palestinians wanted in exchange for peace, and Israel receiving tens of thousands of dead Israeli’s in the second Intifada as it’s reward for its sincere offer of peace. If such actions justify saying hey, just give terrorists the power of a state, I have to respectfully disagree and reiterate the danger of ignoring reality on the ground and making false equations merely because moral relativism feels like being fair to both sides.
Sometimes we have to choose right over wrong and the lesser evil of finishing this war with the defeat of Hamas, and the release of hostages. To argue for anything less is to argue for the eventual destruction of Israel, the Jewish people, and ultimately the west. Hamas is Iran. Iran wants a worldwide caliphate- Sharia law. The more people who draw a line in the sand and choose a side, the better. Moral relativism sucks.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I remember being in the Saban theater with you in LA, praying for peace and for healing between Palestinians and Israelis over a decade ago. You have always kept a keen eye on the events, hearts and minds of these two communities, and you have always given your heart and love to the vision of peace. I hold this vision with you. As you always say, dear God, we need a miracle. And so it is.
Thank you for that, Jenny.
Thank god for the nuances. Real conflict solutions - lasting conflict solutions that happen with no need for compromise - come from a deep and profound understanding of "the other". We hold that opportunity open with you with open hearts.
Thank you, Madear ❣️
If all people are going to live in harmony, than we need to understand we are all interconnected regardless of beliefs, religion or culture and killing each other isn't the answer.
Thank you for staying present and fighting the battle of reason and compassion
Hamas knew how Netanyahu would respond, they counted on it. There was a movement afoot to remove him because of his changes to the judiciary that threatens Israel's democracy. That's just when Hamas decided to attack. They alone are responsible for every single death in this war, both civilians in Gaza and in Israel. Many people are unaware that Israel will warn an area they are about to bomb because a rocket has been launched from it, but Hamas will not let civilians escape. They want the excessive civilian deaths. There should be a Palestinian resistance movement on the same level as the French resistance to Hitler, since Hamas is even worse. Hamas is the reason Palestine lost its democracy and now is not even eligible to join the UN. Not being a democracy, they are not our ally at this point in time. The USA supports democracies. The anger has been misdirected at Israel and should be solely laser focused upon Hamas. They created this situation. They knew what they were going to do but did not lay in supplies to prevent starvation. They kick civilians out of safer areas and take them for themselves. They create military targets in highly populated areas. The war would end today if they would agree to the cease fire and release the hostages. They won't because they are delirious with joy that so many US campuses are misdirecting their anger at Israel and they want that to go on. So while protesters' hearts might be in the right place, they have aimed their wrath in the wrong direction.
All true, see my comments downthread
bc I do believe other comments here will be more popular.
Dearest Marianne - I support you with monthly campaign donations and would have loved to see you as the Democratic candidate. I am aligned with your platform and recommendations. But you're not the candidate.
Please pivot to talking with us about what we can do now to ensure that Trump doesn't win, and that Biden starts to speak from your playbook!
Thank you for these knowledgeable and clear-headed remarks and observations. I wish that President Biden would read them.
I think what we have is a leadership problem. Leadership is missing in action during these most volatile of times. And government agencies created to manage chaos are contributing to the chaos.
I’m sure that the youth who are protesting are doing it on behalf of the oppressed and the genocide being perpetrated by the IDA. Would it be better that they stay home and quietly ignore and suppress their outrage? I for one am hopeful when I see the young protesting. I’m truly sorry you feel so threatened, it’s understandable but what is the alternative for the youth and others who are outraged at the, despotism shown by Netanyahu and at the cowardice of most governments in the western world to stand against or even voice any semblance of outrage at what the Israeli government are doing to the people of Gaza. Indeed it would seem their message to him is, go right ahead….
Who said I feel threatened? That's your perception, not mine!
So beautifully articulated, Marianne. Thank you for sharing your wise, inclusive, and loving perspective. 🙏💗💕
You said:
"As President, I would not have been willing to give Netanyahu carte blanche support in the form of either money or weaponry. I would have demanded to know 1) his exact strategy for destroying Hamas’ tunnels and military operation, 2) how he planned to protect civilians in the process, and 3) what his plans were for the day after the cessation of military activity. Additionally, any plan would have had to include the discussion of a two state solution. In the absence of clear and satisfactory answers to the questions above, as President I would not have committed American support."
Here is the reality. You would have first consulted your State Department and military strategists, carefully reading and listening to their assessments, some of them publicly available and some deeply classified because this is *Israel, this is *Hamas, and Hamas is part of a broad network of agencies that are supported and cultivated by dangerously retrograde power(s) to its East. Then, you would have faced, if you were to consult with Israel's head of State, a man who had served in his own national military, supported by his own military consultants, with his own stubborn ideas on how to deal with a military attack that came to his nation, not yours, and he would see you - a woman - as someone without the proper training and life experience to advise him. If you flatly denied aid to Israel unless it met *your* demands - informed by nothing more than your clear desire to avoid war - Hamas would declare victory, continue to abuse and confine the captives, and plan the next attack.
For Hamas, this mass slaughter, human suffering, and global eruption was a *military, nor *policy calculation built into the tunnels they carved under the Palestinian residents of Gaza. They always knew that thousands of people would die. That the press would follow it religiously. That people would protest. That it would rip apart the heart of America and Europe. They PLANNED THIS INTO THE WAR FIELD THEY BUILT UNDER GAZA ten years ago, hoping that world support for Israel would collapse, others would join in their cause, and eventually the State of Israel would be no more.
Those dead, innocent Gaza residents are like bombs Hamas planned to throw at the Western Press, knowing our freedoms of speech could be used against us in the same way the Saudis who took down the Twin Towers used our own airlines to attack huge symbols of Western power and success.
It's like Golda Meir said "If the Arabs put down their weapons there will be no more violence. If the Jews put down their weapons there will be no more Israel."
Biden, Blinken, and a number of people in Qatar are doing all they can to bring a meaningful cease fire and an ultimate 2 State solution to this area. They've been balancing some *very tricky optics and politics in this matter almost from the beginning. They deserve, and have my respect for their efforts.
And you deserve, and have my respect for your understanding of ACIM.
I do like that quote, BTW. I hope that someday it may become a reality.
Typo - "...military **not policy calculation..."
Marianne has such an intelligent and compassionate way of expressing the atrocities and the possibilities of hope in this horrendous situation! Imagine the good she could do as our President!!
It's astonishing that the threat of trump is of less concern to students and faculty in the US than the tragedy in the Middle East. Perhaps their youth gives them the passion to wish death for the Jews, blaming the global Jewish people for the Israeli government. The Israelis can't do anything about it just like we could do nothing about the white supremacist former president. My parents survived the Holocaust and taught me that we are not safe, for most of my life I resisted that fear and now I know they were right. It's not enough to mourn the extermination my extended family in Poland, when the enemies have called for the obliteration of Israel since 1948. We have been hated for centuries and that will continue. I have to learn to be brave. You are a beacon of hope. I'm voting for you.
The youth are not wishing the death of Jews. That narrative is what will cause more conflict. Open your eyes. It’s not about you it’s about what Netanyahu is doing in your name. Just like if trump wins it won’t be about Americans when he spreads his hateful policies it will be about what he doing in Americas name.
My eyes are open, perhaps the youth don't really want the death of Jews, perhaps they don't understand what these protests are doing to further add to the power of Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran. When the signs state things such as "Gas the Jews", "death to Jews" and "death to America" it's directing the blame on Jews around the world for the plight of Palestinians who elected a terrorist organization to run their country. Many of Israel's neighbors have sworn to wipe Israel from the map, they've been saying this since 1948. These countries expelled their Jewish citizens from those countries with no right of return as a form of ethnic cleansing. Where did these Jews go? To Israel, the homeland. The majority of Israelis hate Netanyahu and have been protesting his regime for over a year, all to no avail. These university students are ignorant but filled the passion of youth. Didn't we protest the war in Vietnam? Did we stop that war? No, it stopped because it was no longer profitable for the military industrial complex but we protested, we insulted returning troops and thought of ourselves warriors for peace. Perhaps the Germans didn't really believe the the extermination of the Jews in Europe would make their lives better, but hitler didn't work in a vacuum and the relentless attacks on Jews by his soldiers and collaborators had the impact that the nazis wanted. Many countries closed their doors to fleeing Jews, and today's hatred toward Israel doesn't differentiate between the government of Israel and the Jews of the world. I realize that many of us Second Generation Survivors have a different view of the world, and reading the names of my family on the concentration camp lists gives me a perspective that you cannot understand. My eyes are open and my job now is not to hate, but to love with caution. I dare not hang an Israeli flag in front of my house because we might become targets of the KKK, the Proud Boys and the right wing nuts. I hope you never feel the fear we live with. It's in our collective minds, it's multigenerational and cannot be understood even by good people such as I presume you are.
I am so sorry that you cannot safely celebrate your own flag, and its deeper spiritual symbolism, in public. That symbol has profound meaning for me. <3
I understand my parents' fear in a way I never thought I would. Often growing up, we the children of the survivors asked ourselves what we would do to survive and great regret that we were not able to help as we had not been born yet. That;s the journey that is hard to explain. Thank you for your kind words
I hear you. But you can’t speak for all the youth that are demonstrating nor all the Jews, many of whom are demonstrating along with the protesters as far as I am aware.
I speak for myself and my generation and my journey. I'm not wishing ill for Palestinians or anybody. I choose not to hate. I don't speak for other Jews because there are many ways to act/feel/believe in our personal Judaism, not as a religion or an ethnicity or a nation, but just the reality I carry in my cellular memory. I guess I'm not able to just sit back and wait for it to pass, as it will never pass. I can only spread my love and compassion to my family, my friends and my community. I can do nothing for a world run by despots.
I love your perspective, and you're a better person that me to share it.
As usual, Marianne has the most brilliant thoughts about the current situation in the conflict in Gaza. YOU should be our leader going forth in the future! Thank you for your brilliant thoughts and for being YOU!
I was reluctant to click “follow”because I do not know if different views are desired here. I believe in honest disagreement and friendly debate in the world of ideas, not blocking / cancelling / demonizing somebody you disagree with.
I think moral relativism is dangerous. All wars are Hell and all have an unacceptable human toll but that does not mean there is no such thing as a just and necessary war - such as Israel’s war to eliminate Hamas and free any surviving hostages.
I read Ecclesiastes to remind me that there is a time and place for every purpose, including a two-state “solution”. The writer seems to have a good heart, but her timing is way off. A Palestinian state should not be proposed as a reward for a massive terror attack that was obviously pure evil.
My view - there should be no consideration of a Palestinian state until Israel has a real partner for peace, and that means people who want Israel destroyed should be a pretty slim minority, not a majority. Without that understanding, reality is overlooked. All men are created equal does not mean there is moral parity between a group of people who would love to have a good neighbor and a group of people who predominantly want to kill their neighbor. I don’t know how many generations it takes for the Palestinians to have a change of heart, but it’s possible. The Japanese and the Germans did it. A group of people who prefer to live in hatred and cast themselves in the role of victim to play on liberal and leftist sensibilities should get a mirror and figure out who is at fault for their own misery.
My understanding is that Gaza would reelect Hamas in a heartbeat and if there were an election in the “West Bank” they would vote out the nearly as bad Palestinian Authority in favor of Hamas.
Has the author considered that Israel’s war council is a unity government in which Bibi’s chief rival Benny Gantz also advocates for the war to continue until Hamas either surrenders or is destroyed and hostages are freed? Pretending this is all Netanyahu doesn’t make it so.
Inability or unwillingness to understand how many times Israel has offered the Palestinians a state is the consequence of trying to overlook facts that do not conform to a pre-conceived narrative. I prefer to seek the truth, which includes Arafat rejecting Ehud Barak’s offer of 97% of what the Palestinians wanted in exchange for peace, and Israel receiving tens of thousands of dead Israeli’s in the second Intifada as it’s reward for its sincere offer of peace. If such actions justify saying hey, just give terrorists the power of a state, I have to respectfully disagree and reiterate the danger of ignoring reality on the ground and making false equations merely because moral relativism feels like being fair to both sides.
Sometimes we have to choose right over wrong and the lesser evil of finishing this war with the defeat of Hamas, and the release of hostages. To argue for anything less is to argue for the eventual destruction of Israel, the Jewish people, and ultimately the west. Hamas is Iran. Iran wants a worldwide caliphate- Sharia law. The more people who draw a line in the sand and choose a side, the better. Moral relativism sucks.