The U.S., like Israel, is wielding the violence of an occupying power
By Mairav Zonszein – June 1, 2020 - +972 Magazine
▻https://www.972mag.com/george-floyd-us-israel-occupying-power
As I watch everything unfold, I cannot help but notice the striking parallels between George Floyd’s murder and the countless Palestinians killed at the hands of Israeli forces. I write this as someone who is neither Palestinian nor Black, but as a journalist and activist in solidarity with both communities, who has witnessed such events both in the United States and Israel-Palestine.
While there are substantial differences between the two countries and their circumstances, the mechanisms of state violence and repression ultimately operate in the same way. There is a clear “us” and “them.” A sense that there is the occupier and the occupied. If you are Palestinian under Israeli control, you are a target. If you are Black in America, you are a target. And when you take a stand, you are beaten or shot down.
Israeli police arrest a Palestinian protester outside the new U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem. May 14, 2018. (Oren Ziv/Activestills.org) In both countries, like many others, the state wields brutal violence to preserve the structural inequalities on which it stands. Those defending the sanctity of Black lives in the United States, like those standing with Palestinians against Israeli authorities, are finding themselves face-to-face with armed forces that are fulfilling the role of a hostile occupying power.
The parallels grew even more resonant last week when, just a few days after Floyd’s murder, a 32-year-old Palestinian with autism, Iyad Hallak, was killed by Israeli Border Police in Jerusalem’s Old City. The officers claimed they believed he was holding a gun, yet there was none. When they ordered him to freeze, Hallak, out of fear, ran and hid behind a dumpster. One of the officers shot him multiple times, reportedly even after his commander told him to stop.
Last week’s killings, along with many others, illustrate how the two countries mirror each other’s experiences of discrimination and brutality. Here are just some of those commonalities. (...)