Since the October 7th Hamas attack on Israel that left 1,200 dead and hundreds kidnapped, Israel has carried out a bombing campaign and ground invasion that’s killed around 13,000 Palestinians — including at least 5,500 minors. Activists in the WAMC listening area have taken to the streets to call for peace.
In Pittsfield, a rally brought out dozens of attendees holding Palestinian flags and signs calling for an end to the bloodshed.
“There's a group called Anti-Imperialist Solidarity that is myself and a few friends who are mothers. We wanted to organize events, that we're in solidarity with any anti-imperialist struggle around the world and at home," said organizer Lillian Volat of Great Barrington. “We are standing in solidarity with Palestinians who are resisting occupation for the past 75 years of Zionist settler colonialism. And we are organizing events, with just friends and people out in Berkshire County who are in solidarity with Palestine, to raise awareness, to organize better, and to determine what we want our communities to look like. Do we want them to be militarized and fascist in the future? Or do we want them to be collective, supportive, and not producing weapons that are being sent across the world to kill people for profit?”
Volat contends calling on elected officials to support a ceasefire barely scratches the surface.
“The elected officials are representing the interests of the capitalist ruling classes, and they're not representing the interests of the people," she told WAMC. "Even if they say they are, they are not materially. And even Bernie Sanders, who is ostensibly here for the working class, is standing up for capitalists who want to make money. Elizabeth Warren is the one bringing Department of Defense funding to Massachusetts. Ed Markey is the one bringing Department of Defense money to Massachusetts. So, they are war mongers. They're not here to support the interests of the global people. They're here to support the interests of the capitalist ruling classes. So, to them I say, no thank you.”
Judd Maltin of Hillsdale was wearing a shirt emblazoned with a slogan popular among American Jews calling for Israeli violence against Palestinians to stop: Not In Our Name.
“What is actually transpiring in the outposts of the American Empire is unacceptable," he told WAMC. "I love that we’re, the Jews are well represented here. I love that Palestinians are speaking here, and we're giving them the as much presence as we can to feel heard, because they are not a people who are heard in mainstream media.”
Maltin’s journey away from Zionism as an American Jew began decades ago.
“I was raised in a Zionist household and I spent five years doing graduate work in East Jerusalem," he explained. "And I witnessed the beginning of the Second Intifada, and was present at the peace rally when Prime Minister Rabin was assassinated, and I witnessed firsthand the actual apartheid going on amongst inflicted by the Israelis on the Palestinians, and how my young in-laws even would serve their reserve duty with lust for the mayhem that they could introduce into the lives of the people who were of the Palestinians and the joy they took in it.”
Maltin says what he saw in Israel left him with a deep sense of disgust, and his position on the country has left him separated from his community.
“Now, unfortunately, I'm at the stage of life where I can't even really go to my synagogue anymore because the Zionism there is so exclusive, it's so- It rejects anybody who criticizes Israel," he said. "So, it's only actually in communities like this that I feel safe, that I feel that I can learn and speak my mind safely without being rejected by my community.”
Along with his partner, Maltin attended the rally with his two children.
“Because this is an important part of who I am, and to show them that their father will stand up for other people," he told WAMC. "I'm very privileged, I've got a great job, we make plenty of money, and my life is very comfortable. But I see that these people who are sensibly cousins of ours, the Palestinians, are treated terribly. So, I want my children to see that it's the right thing to do to stand up for other people.”
Mohammed Tamimi, a Palestinian, has lived in the United States since 2010. A resident of New Jersey and a business owner in Pittsfield, he wore a scarf with a Palestinian flag design and held a sign that read “Imagine a child seeing murdered children.”
“Imagine a child seeing another child murdered," he said. "Just think about that for a second. You have grown adults than ever seen a dead body, let alone children seeing another child, somebody who's exactly their size, their age and all of that, in pieces. It's one thing to have somebody gets shot, but the way it's happening is just- Man, it's out of a horror movie. You have people who are looking for little pieces of bones of their family members to have something, because they're just gone. The bombing would be so bad, you have simply a bunch of pieces, blood, and rubble.”
Tamimi noted that for Palestinians, Israeli violence and oppression has simply become the norm since 1948 — a war celebrated by Israelis as one of independence and mourned by Palestinians as the Nakba, or the catastrophe.
“And the saddest thing is, is that our own tax money in this country funds all of this," he told WAMC. "So, it's not like, hey, we're just, we're fighting for peace, we want these people to get justice- It's our own tax money. We're paying for this genocide. So, it's like, too messed up. It just doesn't make any sense.”
Israel has received around $3 billion from the United States annually for the past 50 years. Amid the chaos that’s followed October 7th, President Biden has sought to secure another $14 billion for the country’s military.
“Before October 7th, we had a protest because my two 2-year-old nephew got shot in the head alongside with his father who got shot in the shoulder," Tamimi continued. "So, my nephew got murdered, rest in peace, and we were protesting for that. So, this was before October 7th. So, this is nothing new. This is like- It's all, in a sense, just systematic. Every single, every single murder, you feel like it's the same thing over and over. So over there in Palestine, when you protest anything, no matter what it is, you protest, you're going to be met with tear gas, most of the times rubber bullets, but occasionally live ammunition.”
Tamimi worries about the misinformation that’s accompanied the extreme violence in Gaza, which the UN has declared genocidal and ethnic cleansing.
“Look out for that propaganda, man," he told WAMC. "It's so deep. I'm on social networks, I'm seeing millions of people who are like calling for the the complete eradication of Palestinians, when these are kids, women. Most of the men are in prison. Most of the men, like, anybody who has a way to defend himself is imprisoned, just, automatic. Kids and women, man- It's, it's not right. It's just not right.”
