No One Owns the Future

And Hebert was influenced by Aaron Bushnell, also an active-duty airman, who stood in front of the Israeli embassy in Washington, D.C. on Feb. 24, doused himself in flammable liquid, lit a match and set himself on fire, shouting “Free Palestine!” as he burned to death.

War is personal, even when it’s occurring on the other side of the planet — or it can be. Hebert and Bushnell — and all the others on the planet who feel the same connection with the victims of war— aren’t simply “being critical” of how Israel is “conducting” its war. They’re screaming from their souls: “No! No! No! Stop blowing the limbs off children! Stop killing moms and newborns! Stop dehumanizing them, stop doing what you’re doing. War is wrong!”

And here in the United States, this cry is directed at the president, Genocide Joe, and his ever more wimpy “expressions of concern” about Netanyahu’s conduct of the war, even as his administration supports it and supports it and supports it, recently, for instance, transferring “billions of dollars in bombs and fighter jets to Israel” — including thousands of 2,000-ton monster bombs. Use them carefully, Benjamin!

And we can’t refuse to vote for Biden without bequeathing another term in office to would-be dictator and Bible salesman Donald Trump — wow, what a lovely democracy we have here. Maybe Palestinian children are terrified, but the Military Industrial Complex has nothing to fear.

Attention, patriots! Attention, mainstream journalists! Waging war doesn’t keep us safe. Diminishing the humanity of others, then killing them and stealing their land, while it may be embedded in our history, doesn’t make anyone safe. It guarantees endless hell. But guess what?

“Just as individuals can relinquish their righteous rage and compulsion to punish indiscriminately, so, too, can groups and nations. But doing so requires leaders who can reach across divided communities and provide hope in a seemingly hopeless time to override the all-too-human drive to retaliate.”

These are the words of psychiatric researchers Jessica Stern and Bessel van der Kolk, who continue: “They must understand that a legacy of trauma makes Israeli Jews and Palestinians vulnerable to reactive violence, leading to a seemingly endless cycle of bloodshed.”

Think of Mahatma Gandhi. Think of Martin Luther King. Think of Nelson Mandela or Susan B. Antony or Frederick Douglass or a million others. Real change is possible, and it’s rarely — perhaps never — violent, but creating it involves the loving wholeness of who we are. The future is a vast unknown, but no one owns it. We have to create it together.

========

(Robert Koehler is an award-winning, Chicago-based journalist and nationally syndicated writer. His book, “Courage Grows Strong at the Wound,” is available. Contact him at koehlercw@gmail.com, visit his website at commonwonders.com. His newly released album of recorded poetry and art work, "Soul Fragments," is available here: https://linktr.ee/bobkoehler.)