Blood lines
I am writing to ask two questions in relation to the proposals announced by the UK government to ‘proscribe’ Palestine Action, a group which works to highlight the genocide in Gaza. This means Palestine Action is now classed as a terrorist organisation.
The justification given is the recent nonviolent protest in which members entered a RAF base and spray-painted two aircraft with fake blood, to represent the bloodshed in Gaza.
However, I know of several Quakers who have entered RAF bases in protest against war and the military.
Moreover, I also know of Quakers who not only blood-painted but allegedly damaged the nose cones of British war jets destined for Indonesia. At the time, Indonesia was committing genocide in East Timor, using British weaponry in its assault against an unarmed populace.
My two questions, therefore, are: Are Quakers now a terrorist organisation in the eyes of the law? Is this a case of ‘First they came for Palestine Action…?’
Eduardo Gonçalves
Kinship and anguish
Richard Romm (Letters, 20 June)is right to draw our attention to the terrible and widespread nature of conflict in the world, and to question our disproportionate focus on the Israel-Gaza conflict.
Until recently our focus was largely on Ukraine. That our current concentration should be so much on Israel and Gaza has many reasons. Here again is a conflict that is relatively close to home. We have had a long-standing presence in the form of the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme, and some of us are therefore particularly well-informed. On top of that, Jewish history, culture and religion have had a huge influence on Western civilisation, in terms of art, music, philosophy, and mathematics. There are shared religious foundations. We have Jewish members of the Society, many of whom are deeply distressed by what is happening.
All these factors leave us agonised that such an integral part of our own civilisation could be acting in the way that it is – especially in view of what happened to the Jews under Nazism. It is our own values and standards that seem under threat. How can such a civilized country be acting with such disregard of international law and a rules-based order?
On top of that, our capacity as Quakers to monitor and engage with conflicts throughout the world is limited. On the other hand, we do have an ability, albeit limited, to influence Israeli opinion, and an element of Israeli society thinks very much as we do. We have no such entry in, say, Myanmar or Sudan.
Finally, what is happening in the Middle East is no inherently limited conflict, but one with the capacity to become a regional conflagration and to draw in outside powers, and (in terms of realpolitik) to affect us economically. The US bombing of nuclear enrichment facilities in Iran greatly increases the gravity of the situation.
Most of all, I think we are so involved out of feelings of deep religious kinship and anguish. We sense what the Peace Testimony could bring about and the need for both sides to reach out and for compassion and understanding. Our influence may be very limited, but it is not to be dismissed. And, yes, we must hope that our newly formed QPSW International Conciliation Group will help us engage more actively with other conflicts in our troubled world.
Jan Arriens
