PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania — The Gaza Youth Committee’s concept of self-determination was short-circuited by Hamas, which rules Gaza with a tight grip.
The decade-old committee has spent the last half of its existence virtually meeting with Israelis in small-scale video chats targeted to develop a new generation of leaders who seek to live in peace. Last week, Hamas pulled the plug when it arrested the committee’s leader and several others who participated in its latest video chat on Zoom, the popular teleconferencing platform, The New York Times reports.
“Normalization in all its forms and activities is treason, a crime, and religiously, nationally and morally unacceptable,” declared the Hamas armed wing and other militant groups in a joint statement.
So a group of young Palestinians who practiced self-determination by speaking freely were blocked by a movement that has long been demanding self-determination from Israel.
Literally and figuratively, the Palestinians in Gaza have no First Amendment unless its people sound off on the same message as Hamas. On the West Bank, any Palestinian who sells land to Israel is committing treason and could suffer a death sentence.
Is this what Palestine will resemble if a Palestinian state is established? I have feared such for a long time. This is not necessarily their fate if the Palestinians formed a state, but current practices should make us wonder.
A two-state solution has been the conventional answer to the conflict for as long as I can recall, yet what form will it take? In all the discussions and debate, has a plan ever been presented to govern a Palestinian state? I sure do not remember anything remotely like that.
The chance of Israel and the Palestinian leadership negotiating an independent state is remote in itself, but let’s project that it happens. How will the leaders govern? What kind of agencies and programs will they establish? Will services be provided on an equitable basis? Will all citizens be granted basic freedoms?
Or will the average person on the street face oppression if they are not favored? Will they be denied the very freedom of speech and religious expression allowed in democratic countries?
Rami Aman, 38, who founded the Gaza Youth Committee, was punished for exercising what in America is known as our First Amendment rights, that of freedom of speech and religious expression. Hamas charged him with “holding a normalization activity” with Israelis after he held a video chat on Monday last week (April 6) that attracted more than 200 participants, according to the Times. Iyad Al-Bozom, a spokesman for the Hamas Interior Ministry, said that Aman committed a crime that amounted to the “betrayal of our people and their sacrifices.”
Aman and other Gazans spent almost two hours describing life under the 12-year Israeli-Egyptian blockade. In response to an Israeli man’s question, committee member Manar Al-Sharif said the best way to prevent people from being raised to hate was for both sides to talk instead of depending on the news for information about one another. The very act of speaking with Israelis sparked angry denunciations that were posted on Facebook and brought to the attention of Hamas officials.
After Aman and his friends exercised what would be our right to freedom of speech, the Hamas military prosecution issued an arrest warrant, the Times reported. A family member said that Aman surrendered at Internal Security headquarters in Gaza City a few days after the video was produced.
The military prosecution is responsible for contending with accused collaborators with Israel, would-be suicide bombers and other serious security threats. How was it a security threat for Arabs and Jews to exchange attitudes in friendship?
In America, it is healthy for those of different backgrounds to learn about one another. Most of us celebrate rather than punish it. Israel lacks a constitution itself, but it needs no First Amendment. Just try stopping a group of Jews from gabbing, whether they are criticizing the government or cracking corny jokes.
If Aman’s arrest for doing what we take for granted is a sign of how a Palestinian state operates, where do Palestinian leaders find the nerve to declare their need for self-determination? Self-determination for whom?
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Bruce S. Ticker is a freelance writer based in Philadelphia. He may be contacted via bruce.ticker@sdjewishworld.com