Thank God the Israeli Hostages Are Coming Home

A list of ways to help Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.

If you’re in the US, consider joining the nationwide No Kings protests on October 18.

This Friday’s Zoom call will be at 1 PM Eastern, our usual time. Our guest will be Israeli-born historian Ilan Pappe, author of the new book, Israel on the Brink. I’ll ask Pappe why he chose a life of political rebellion against the state in which he was born and what he thinks the ceasefire in Gaza will bring. We’ll also talk about his book, which suggests that in the coming decades, Israel may cease to exist as a Jewish state.

Cited in Today’s Video

Naftali Benett asks why Palestinians and their supporters aren’t happier about the Trump deal.

Things to Read

(Maybe this should be obvious, but I link to articles and videos I find provocative and significant, not necessarily ones I entirely agree with.)

In Jewish Currents (subscribe!), Abdullah Hany Daher reflects on the two years since October 7, 2023.

James Talarico on why requiring Texas schools to post the Ten Commandments violates the Ten Commandments.

Libby Lenkinski on how reparations for the Holocaust helped her family build a new life, and why Jews must demand reparations for the genocide in Gaza.

Shaul Magid on being human after the destruction of Gaza.

See you on Friday,

Peter

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:

I’ve been struggling for days to try to find the words to express how I feel about the Trump deal because my feelings are so, like, profoundly conflicted. When this airs on Monday, it looks like the remaining Israeli hostages, and the bodies of the dead hostages will be returned. This is a kind of catharsis for Jews, for me, that is really one of the most profound and powerful things that I think I will have ever experienced in my life.

This entire experience of Jewish solidarity over the last two years has been extraordinary. I mean, it really has been one of the most powerful manifestations I’ve ever seen of this, you know, phrase that people use a lot, Kol Yisrael Arevim Zeh Bazeh, that all Jews are responsible for one another. I am kind of in awe of the people in my synagogue, and that I see around New York, who I see have been wearing dog tags to remember the hostages every day. I hear stories about people, you know, who have had a place at their table for a particular hostage now for the last two years. You know, in my tiny way, I’ve had the names of the hostages on my refrigerator door. We pray for them every week.

I mean, this has been incredibly, incredibly powerful. It’s been one of the most powerful Jewish experiences of my life, and I want to think tomorrow, as those hostages are coming home, and think about the Trump deal only through that vein, only through this vein of Jewish solidarity: us as a small, often brutalized, persecuted people who have learned and in accordance with our traditions, to really care for one another, to care for one another. And there’s so many people who have manifested that stuff so powerfully.

And to see the joy of those families returning their loved ones, and to see the way that people rally around them in this moment, and rally around those who don’t have loved ones who are coming back, is… I wish I could just stop there. I really wish that that would be the end of my message. And I thought a lot about just saying that, just saying that. Because I know that there are a lot of people who think that people on the left, like me, who criticize Israel, we don’t feel those things. And I know for me, it’s not true. I feel them like they’re some of the most profound feelings I feel.

But we’re also being told that the Trump deal should be a cause of celebration for Palestinians, right? Again and again, I’m seeing on social media people taunting, you know, pro-Palestinian activists. Why aren’t you celebrating? You claim this is a genocide. Why aren’t you celebrating? You’re unhappy because all you want is for Israel to be blamed. Now that actually something is good is happening to Palestinians and Israel, you can’t recognize that.

But this isn’t a day of celebration for Palestinians because it’s not fair to ask Palestinians to celebrate simply for not being bombed, right? The standard should be higher than that. Yes, it is, of course, a terrific thing that the bombs hopefully will stop, at least for a while, that Palestinians will get more food in. But if we see Palestinians as full human beings, as full human beings, we have to understand that the bar is a little bit higher than that. How dehumanizing is it to suggest that Palestinians should leap for joy and celebration simply because a genocide may be ending, and they’re returning to a state of apartheid? A state that, you know, as even Israel’s own human rights organizations have stated, a situation of blockade.

I mean, look at what we know about the Trump deal. It offers no path, no path, for Palestinians to gain citizenship, the most basic fundamental right that all human beings deserve, the right to be a citizen of the country and you’re in. And beyond that, Israel is now, as in the first phase of the Trump plan, Israel sits on 53% of Gaza. And in the second phase, if this Arab stabilization force comes in, it’ll go to 40% of Gaza. I think, based on what I’m reading, it’s very unlikely that this deal will ever go to the third phase, in which Israel would control 15% of Gaza. It would still mean that Palestinians will have less access to Gaza than they had before, but I don’t think Palestinians are going to get 85% of Gaza because the third withdrawal requires Hamas to demilitarize, which even Israel’s own security forces don’t think will happen.

So, it seems the very likely outcome of this is that Palestinians are basically going to be on 60% of the Gaza Strip. This is already one of the most overcrowded places on Earth. It was declared unlivable by the United Nations before October 7th. My friend Mohammad Shehada said that everyone he knew growing up in Gaza before October 7th contemplated suicide because of what it was like to live every day in what Human Rights Watch called an open-air prison.

And now it’s been bombed to absolute rubble. The UN says there’s 17,000 unaccompanied children there. There is no prospect, really, of Gaza being made livable. Yes, more humanitarian aid may come in. There may be better quality tents. But Israel will control all access in and out, and there’s very little prospect, based on past Israeli behavior, that Israel is going to allow in the heavy-duty construction that would be allowed Gaza to truly rebuild because Israel will claim that those are dual-use items that could be used for weapons, as Israel has claimed for, you know, for a long time.

So, to tell Palestinians that they need to celebrate that, that their lives are worth so little that they should be jumping for joy simply because they may not be killed by a bomb tomorrow? That doesn’t recognize Palestinian humanity, doesn’t recognize that Palestinians are human beings created equal in the image of God, equal to everybody else. And that’s why, it seems to me, I can’t see this deal and what will happen tomorrow only as a celebration. As profoundly as it matters to me that we as a people, begin to heal as Jews, and that our hostages are returned, I simply do not believe in Judaism as a purely tribal creed, in which we think only for ourselves and demand and expect that other people deserve less. That’s not Judaism to me.

Judaism is based on this profound and remarkable tension between the idea that we have a special relationship with God, and the idea that God sees all human beings as being equal in the image of God. So, yes, I will be celebrating and perhaps crying tomorrow along with so many other people, when we see these hostages come out. But I’m not gonna get up here and say that Palestinians should be thrilled to live under permanent subjugation in a hellhole, without the basic necessities of life, and without freedom, which they deserve just as much as everybody else.

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