This is from a post at Jeffrey Goldberg’s blog called “Why I’m Not Blogging More About Gaza.” So the words aren’t mine. I’ve merely put them into nice little verses.
Why I’m Not Blogging More About Gaza
Gaza has overdetermined
me into paralysis.
I actually feel too close to
this problem,
a problem
that symbolizes
all problems.
It’s true: I have friends in Gaza
about whom I worry a great deal;
I’ve seen many people killed in Gaza;
I’ve served in the Israeli Army in Gaza;
I’ve been kidnapped in Gaza;
I’ve reported for years from Gaza;
I hope my former army doesn’t kill the wrong people in Gaza;
I hope Israeli soldiers all leave Gaza alive;
I know they’ll be back in Gaza;
I think this operation will work;
and I have no actual hope that it will work
for very long, because nothing works
for very long in the Middle East.
Gaza is where dreams
of reconciliation go to die.
Gaza is where the dream
of Palestinian statehood
goes to die;
Gaza is where the Zionist dream
might yet die. Or,
more to the point,
might be murdered.
I’m not a J Street moral-equivalence sort of guy.
Yes, Israel makes constant
mistakes, which I note rather frequently,
but this conflict reminds me once again that
Israel is up against an implacable force, namely,
an interpretation of Islam that disallows the
idea
of Jewish national equality.
My paralysis isn’t
an analytical paralysis.
It’s the paralysis
that comes from thinking
that maybe there’s no way out.
Not out of Gaza, out of
the whole thing.