There is not much more to say about the genocide of Gaza’s people -assuming that the reader has at least followed the media coverage of what is happening in that traumatized strip of land. It comes as no surprise that Gazans have resorted to euthanasia to end the lives of thousands of newly hatched chicks, for even Gazan birds would prefer dying with honor over being victims of starvation. There is nothing exceptional about Gazans keeping their children alive with animal feeds, because even those who know nothing about Gaza are aware that this is only one of the means used by its people to save the whole area from a definite death. The only shocking aspect of the whole current scene is that as much as Gazans are trying to convince their children that this life has at least some goodness that makes it worth clinging to, the rest of the world still strives to disprove such theories and establish in the minds of those children that in this life they deserve the curse of Gaza.

So the reader doesn’t imagine that ‘the world’ above belongs somewhere else, I must make it clear that the world I’m referring to is actually “us”: you and me. It’s easy for us to mourn Gaza’s people, and it’s easy to pray for their patience and persistence, and it’s easy to condemn the Israeli slaughter of 1.5 million people in Gaza. What seems impossible, though, is our confession that we are the ones besieging Gaza, and that all our condemnations, protests, prayers and writings -unless accompanied by genuine acts on the ground- are a reflection of our insouciance toward the ongoing massacre against Palestinians in Gaza, and the lack of any desire from our side to take serious and practical actions to break the siege on the strip.

A reader may wonder at my demands. “Genuine acts on the ground?” they ask. “Me?” The wonder should disappear as soon as we realize that peaceful and nonviolent resistance to injustices throughout history has been as effective as armed resistance – if not superior in many cases. Let’s remind ourselves and remind Egypt – Israel’s partner in the shedding of Palestinian blood in Gaza – that Egypt itself wouldn’t have gained its independence from colonialism in 1923 without the 1919 revolution – which was peaceful in most respects- and the civil disobedience that followed the arrest of the leader of the Wafd Party, Saad Zaghloul. It was that revolution which finally forced the colonizers to surrender to the will of the Egyptians and declare Egypt’s independence.

Let us also remember that Mahatma Gandhi’s peaceful non-cooperation movement in India between 1920 and 1922 and then his famous Salt March in 1930 are what broke the back of British colonialism and forced it to recognize the independence of India in 1947. The determination of a man who just entered his seventh decade to walk a distance of 390 km in order to reach the Arabian Sea and break the British Raj Salt Laws, preventing the extraction of salt, may be seen by many as an act of madness, but when this old man attracts more than sixty thousand Indians on his way to the coastal village of Dundee and inspires millions to join the disobedience, the questioning of the fruitfulness of the pilgrimage to salt itself becomes the madness.

History is full of examples of peaceful and nonviolent resistance methods that the ninety-year Palestinian struggle – since the 1917 Balfour declaration– could have learnt from. So why is it that Palestinians have not yet managed to achieve what others have achieved in the same, or shorter, time span?

The success of other nations’ struggles rest on their unity around one focal idea and their dedication to realizing it. If Palestinians carefully diagnose their failure to achieve freedom then they would most probably trace the reasons back to the lack of those very attributes. I’m almost confident that Palestinians never agreed on one focal target: if you ask Palestinians for their thoughts on the best methods to achieve their freedom I trust you would be able to collect enough material to fill several volumes with scarcely any consistency between those methods. To stay within the article’s theme I shall say: The national consensus and participation of all sectors of the population are necessary conditions for the success of any initiative of nonviolent resistance that can be considered synonymous – or even a substitute – for armed resistance.

We started with the siege on Gaza and here we are talking about nonviolent resistance, so what’s the point of all this? What I’m trying to say is that peaceful and nonviolent resistance benefits from an added value compared to armed resistance; that it is not limited to a certain segment of the nation, and that it allows for the contribution and involvement of all peoples of the world – as well as the victimized nation itself. The people of Gaza have prompted us to launch a non-violent resistance against the blockade when they rebelled against the siege and dismantled the separation wall on the Egyptian border to breathe in the scent of freedom for a few days before Egypt forced them to return to their big prison and suffocate inside their cells.

Only a few understood the Palestinian hint at the time and started developing the idea, and so emerged the Free Gaza movement and its brilliant idea of running vessels to break the siege on the Gaza Strip by sea. Despite their limited financial and physical capabilities, the small group succeeded in proving the feasibility of their idea by repeating it three times, the latest of which was the boat carrying parliamentarians who resorted to the genius idea after they were prevented by the Egyptian regime from entering to Gaza by land.

It is enough of a pride for the Free Gaza movement that they innovated the “Freedom Boats” idea and implemented it on the ground. What remains is the most important part: the collective action: by me and you, our families, neighbours, friends, colleagues, and all those who believe in the righteousness of the Palestinian struggle and that they too, share the responsibility to achieve the freedom of Palestine. The Freedom Boats can move from being just a nice idea to an effective nonviolent resistance weapon only when the monthly trips become a continuously active and regular ship line, and when a fleet of ships replace the small boats, and when the programme organizers are forced to delay the travel of some passengers due to the overbooking of volunteers from all parts of the globe, and when each of us becomes a partner in accomplishing the idea by contributing toward the financing of the cruises or covering the expenses of volunteers. Only then can we hope for a near collapse of the Israeli siege on Gaza, a collapse that we achieve with our own blood, tears and sweat rather than hopelessly begging for the sympathy of politicians and international bodies.

The decision to continue or end the siege on Gaza is neither an Israeli, Egyptian nor International decision: it is our – and only our – decision. If we are to accept the facts on the ground we should have no reason to expect neither a little sympathy from the Israeli occupier, nor to move the heart of the Egyptian regime. On the other hand, by putting in “new facts on the ground” through nonviolent resistance, Israelis will have no option but to accept that the end of their savageness. The freedom of Palestine is definitely on its way, and the Egyptians will be reminded once more of their leader, Saad Zaghloul’s, saying “Right is above might and the nation is above the government.”

This website uses IntenseDebate comments, but they are not currently loaded because either your browser doesn't support JavaScript, or they didn't load fast enough.