A group of Jewish mothers, grandmothers, and great-grandmothers plans to set up a large tent in London on Thursday 11 June to highlight the living hell children in Gaza have been living through during Israel’s genocide there. Several members of the group – Jewish Peaceniks UK – told the Canary more.

Jewish mothers opposing the ‘barbaric cruelty as the world stands by’

Sonja Linden told us that the women wanted to put up their Gaza Tent Installation:

Because we want people to realise that children in Gaza are still living in hell. Quite apart from the fact that the bombing and killings continue – despite the so-called ceasefire, into their tents, which offer flimsy protection at most, come mice, rats, scorpions, spiders, snakes, cockroaches, mosquitoes, flies, leading to an estimated 70,000 cases of ectoparasitic infections and rodent-borne illnesses in Gaza.

She added that:

The most basic elements of what we would consider to be normal living conditions are missing – like toilets, for example, which are not allowed in by Israel, or refuse collections, so that mounds of garbage provide nesting ground for rodents that feed on the decomposing bodies still under mountains of rubble. This is apart from the continued food and water shortages.

And it is the children who are sent off to seek water, and wood to make fires, and find scraps to sell to make a minimum of money in an economy that has completely collapsed; children who have lost one or two parents or whose parents are too injured to support their own families; children whose development, education, indeed whole lives have been put on hold for the past two and three-quarter years.

With all of this in mind, she concluded:

We are horrified as Jewish mothers, grandmothers and great-grandmothers that this barbaric cruelty is happening in plain sight, nominally ‘in our name’, as the world stands by.

Fellow Peacenik Lyndall Stein echoed this sentiment, stressing that:

There are a million children trapped in Gaza. So many have already been murdered, maimed and mutilated – so many suffering from malnutrition.

Nobody should stand by and do nothing. But we, as older Jewish women, feel a special responsibility to stand up for these innocent children.

Challenging the “wicked, overblown and very deliberate” attempts to smear Israel critics and ‘erase Palestinians from our consciousness’

Marsha Sanders, meanwhile, highlighted the importance of bringing:

attention back to the ongoing genocide in Gaza and, particularly to those remaining children who have not been slaughtered but are suffering so much physical and psychological trauma.

Other national and international events have dominated the news more in recent months, she said, but the genocide in Palestine and attempts to ‘erase it from our consciousness’ remain prominent in UK politics. As she asserted:

Focus has been diverted from Palestine because of the war in Iran and our own dramatic local political developments. And this suits Israel’s purpose, which is to erase Palestine and Palestinians from the map, from history and from our consciousness. But we won’t let this happen.

In particular, she mentioned efforts to weaponise antisemitism allegations to silence expressions of pro-Palestinian solidarity, insisting:

As a Jew I am furious about the prevailing narrative regarding antisemitism which is a wicked, overblown and very deliberate fabrication used to smear anybody who dares to condemn Israel’s war crimes and crimes against humanity and to confer impunity on Israel, the latest being the report on ‘antisemitism’ in the NHS.

I wonder how many of those alleged 779 cases of antisemitism had links to UK Lawyers for Israel, the Campaign Against Antisemitism or the Community Security Trust, all organisations whose mission is to inflate and weaponise antisemitism in the service of Israel and genocide denial.

I have had multiple visits to my local hospital in North London – a substantial number of whose doctors in very senior positions are Jewish – and have never been subject to antisemitism, nor has anyone I know. But I’d be quite hesitant to wear my watermelon or ‘Jewish not Zionist’ badges or my keffiyah.

Will the mainstream media keep refusing to cover Jewish voices opposing Israel’s genocide?

The Canary has regularly reported on the activism of Carolyn Gelenter, another member of Jewish Peaceniks UK. And ahead of the Gaza Tent Installation event, she explained:

I am proud to be part of a small group of older Jewish women who continue to raise our voices against the genocide in Gaza – sadly and shockingly 3 years on. As women, we are appalled at what these children are suffering as part of a deliberate attempt to annihilate the Palestinian people, their heritage and their land.

As Jewish women we say there is no other word but genocide and there is no other choice but to keep protesting, to keep raising our voices, as mothers, grandmothers and great grandmothers, as children of Holocaust Survivors and in the name of humanity and the future of the Palestinians and for all our children.

She also slammed media outlets that shamefully ignore Jewish criticism of Israel’s genocide, saying:

It is shocking that the mainstream media refuse to cover any Jewish voice that speaks out about Israel’s actions, that calls a genocide for what it is, and that refuses to recognise Israel as our country. The genocide continues, the West Bank is under attack, and so is our democracy.

Mainstream media propagandists regularly seek to defend Israel by questioning expert opinion on Israel’s genocide. And their efforts are very much part of a repressive ecosystem, including the pro-Israel lobby within the UK government, that seeks to weaken or silence expressions of solidarity with the Palestinian people.

Whether mainstream journalists cover their activism or not, though, Jewish Peaceniks UK have a clear commitment to keep raising their voices. And as the hellish suffering of Gaza’s children continues, with the complicity of our government, the message of these mothers remains essential: silence is unacceptable.

Featured image via the Canary

By Ed Sykes

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