There are several examples of courage in the world. However they are almost always only recognised in the rear view mirror.

In the United States of America for example, recent history is replete with examples of tremendous courage shown by people who we look back at in awe, as we acknowledge them as principled catalysts of change, prime movers in shaping moral positions that we take for granted today. Mohammed Ali, Angela Davis, Nelson Mandela, Ed Blankenheim, James Baldwin, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Daniel Ellsberg. Their stature and fame often reached such heights that we lose sight of how reviled they were by society at the time that they made their mark.

There are still others who we have never heard of because they disappeared into the ether,  bulldozed aside under the crushing weight of the unyielding status quo. For voyagers on the path of courage, success is by no means a given, I wonder how many black people may have refused to give up their seats on Alabama buses before Ms Parks was catapulted by kismet into history? How many young black men left prison determined to challenge the system, as Malcolm X did, only to end up as statistics used to justify zero tolerance policing?  No, courage is not easy, and not many people are possessed with the wherewithal to rise to historical moments when they present themselves.

As the United States Democratic convention in Chicago approached, I wondered if the party would have the courage to articulate a position on the horrors being perpetrated in the Middle East. In the end they opted to remove the Palestinians from the equation. They rightly gave the stage to an Israeli/American couple, who eloquently made a case for their abducted son, who was at the time, languishing in Hamas captivity in Gaza. The Palestinian-Americans on the other hand, who have relatives on the sharp end of tons of American ordnance supplied to the IDF were given no voice to speak. The contrast might not have seemed so stark had the tenor of the entire event not set such  high bar in order to reclaim the moral spirit of America from Trumpism.  In my naiveté, I thought surely it would be too hypocritical for them to scale those moral peaks and then stop at the US coastline. I was wrong. They were not expansive enough to address human rights, they only had American rights in mind. It was for me like taking a fist to the solar plexus to hear Ms Harris forcefully parroting Zionist talking points. “Israel has the right to defend itself and I will always make sure it has the wherewithal to do that.” Followed by the mandatory assurance that she and President Biden were working tirelessly towards a ceasefire with the ultimate goal being the establishment of a ‘two-state solution’. To still be hearing this at the highest level of government is really disappointing. If Ms Harris didn’t know, her retinue of staff and brilliant advisers certainly know the laws and obligations as regard self-defence between states and the responsibilities of occupying states to occupied territories far better than I do. She also knows the long term folly of ignoring international jurisprudence on the ongoing bombing which is being facilitated and diplomatically protected by their administration; the abuse of their veto in the UN being perhaps the most egregious assault on the rules- based international order. They also know the ‘two-state solution’ for the red herring that it is. In the short term, to achieve Zionist objectives, she has the power to talk this foolishness, but she knows that in the long term, it is unachievable. One state, with equal rights for everyone between the river and the sea, is the courageous goal that the world should be aiming for.

Perhaps she is grappling with a dilemma; defend apartheid zionism or lose the support of the zionist lobby for her candidacy and as a result possibly lose the ability to ever influence the situation? Cold comfort that would be for the person who American munitions will kill tonight. A difficult choice to be sure, and I’m happy that its her choice not mine. However if she is in this dilemma, it is because her vaunted boldness and ability to do the right thing in difficult situations, her prosecutor’s instinct and commitment to the law, is being stress-tested before our eyes. Who knows what  ripples of progress would be set in motion by a principled stand today? This is where the rubber of courage meets the road of destiny and it requires uncommon strength and belief, not political calculation.

I do not doubt Biden, Blinken, Harris and company when they say that they are working to get a deal. However the difficult part is to get a deal that is acceptable to their apartheid partner, who uses terror tactics to perpetuate its rule. In this matter, the USA is far from being the honest broker they pretend to be. They openly support a government who signalled their intent right from the onset. A government who they enable politically and materially, a government who the US can force to a deal simply by upholding US laws about arming regimes that commit human rights abuses. A government they ask to investigate itself for its blatant abuses, a government whose survival in power is dependant on the perpetuation of the killing.

A friend of mine, who is well connected to the Democratic Party, told me that though he hated to say it, the inability of the party to be strident and principled stemmed from the unfortunate fact that running the electoral numbers convinced the campaign that there were not enough voters interested in the ongoing killing in Gaza to affect the outcome of the election and so they would not risk crossing the Zionist lobby. I fear that they may be badly wrong in this assessment and even if they  are right, in the long run, they are still wrong.

In American politics, I consider myself independent, independent because I know enough about US politics to know that I would have made common cause with the Radical Republicans of the 1850’s even in the face of their strains of nativism and anti-catholicism because of one issue, their insistence on ending slavery. I also understand that next week we will be basically presented with a binary choice, Kamala or Donald; which is no choice at all. Donald Trump is entirely unfit in civil life, not to mention for the US presidency, but on one issue there appears little daylight between him and Kamala Harris and that is their enabling of the Zionist project in the Middle East. Some say that Donald Trump would be worse. I am yet to hear what for the victims in Gaza could be worse. This is obviously not a case for Donald Trump but an illustration of the impossible position that the Harris stance leaves many of her supporters in.

The Israeli government forbids foreign journalists from entering Gaza to report what they see, they then kill as many of the journalists who already live there as they can, to date more than any war of comparable length in history. Then they challenge the veracity of any reports that do not emanate from them. They claim to be ‘the most moral army in history’, and both major American political parties say that Israel is defending itself. This would be comical were it not so macabre.

What are we to make of all this? The major ‘western’ media are in lockstep with their governments as they run interference for the Israeli rampage. They report the unprecedented targeting and murder of their own colleagues in Gaza as if it is the normal.

It is the courage of a small group of independent broadcasters who ensure that no one, except the wilfully ignorant, will not know that Israel has been taken before the International Court of Justice on genocide charges, that justices of the International Criminal Court are deliberating over a request for arrest warrants for the Prime Minister and Minister of Defence of Israel for a variety of war crimes against the Palestinian people and three leaders of Hamas for crimes against the Israeli people.

 

 U.S ELECTION 2024: Harris or Trump?

To my mind, there is really no comparison between the two.Trump has never been a fit and proper person to occupy any position of authority. So Harris is the obvious choice. I think that even against a more sane opponent, a Harris presidency will still be a healthy contribution to the growth and maturation of the United States of America. It will be a major step in the  delegitimisation of both the subliminal and overt racist, misogynistic underlay that exists beneath a significant percentage of American society. Her election will advance the cause of forging a more perfect American union. Therefore I encourage anyone with that aim in mind to vote for her. I however see my reflection in the mirror every morning when I brush my teeth, I have to answer to that guy and he asks me if I can vote for a deliberate enabler of genocide? When faced with the choice between two enablers of genocide, should I try to look for the lesser of the two evils? That is a nonsensical question when both evils are genocide. Are there degrees of death? Trump says that Netanyahu should finish the job, Harris is already letting him do just that.