Some days, I can't fathom what is happening on our planet.
I don't ever watch TV news. Instead I find out what's going on in real-time on Instagram and TikTok. Here, I find trusted journalists from around the globe who report what is happening immediately, and I often know things before the nightly news televises it.
I'm writing today with little prior knowledge about the Middle East. My lack of insight hasn't been on purpose, but whenever I try to understand, I get lost in the complexity of the cultures that have intersected in that area of the world.
I'd have to take a college course to understand it all.
Admittedly, I have been ignorant about the capturing and recapturing of a tiny strip of land, a hotbed for strife for centuries by Persians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Fatimids, Seljuk Turks, Crusaders, Egyptians, Mamelukes, Islamists, and others.
The Jewish people, whether or not they live in Israel, Gaza, or someplace else in the world, have known persecution for centuries. I acknowledge and despise how the Nazis and their collaborators killed 6,000,000 Jewish people during the Holocaust.
It is an ongoing lesson on how easily depravity can gain a foothold.
The Jewish ancestral trauma shows no sign of going away due to the flames of right-wing extremism reigniting. Anti-semitism and violence against the Jewish people has never stopped.
They are a people who continue to live and die by the sword.
The current Israel-Hamas War adds to the tumultuous worldwide terror in places like Darfur, Sudan, Ukraine, and Myanmar. There are many other locations to add to the list.
The pileup of atrocities of radicalized groups here in the United States has been overwhelming. School and mass shootings put me over the edge each time they happen.
Men of every skin color are behind the travesties, as are corrupt governments. War is, after all, big business.
And yes, I’m calling out the men because it certainly isn’t women. Please don’t bother digging up a crazed murderous female because, by and large, it has been males who have been the most violent of the species.
I never understood the rules of war despite having worked for the military-industrial complex for over two decades.
A while back, I read a book (I can't recall its name) about how the leaders of warring parties decide the best places geographically to drop their bombs to cause the most strategic damage. Their thought process is whether to maim their enemy's economic capabilities by destroying commercial and industrial areas or if it is better to kill more people by decimating the most densely populated areas.
My God.
This is what men of war design and blame it on the need to protect us.
Who do we really need protection from?
Helplessness in the face of such evil has forced me to want to turn away. I’m not proud of that. Despair has strangled me into complacency.
How are you coping with this, dear reader?
"There was never a good war or a bad peace." Benjamin Franklin
To better manage my mental health, I am educating myself about Gaza's history, even though I know rushing to learn won't capture the critical nuances.
But I have to start somewhere.
I've learned it is wrong to equate Jewish people with the Israeli government and Benjamin Netanyahu, as it is to equate Hamas with Palestinians.
To achieve balance and truth, I follow both pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian social media creators. I receive conflicting information, but I have managed to hold both data sets without my head exploding.
My efforts may land me somewhere in the vicinity of the truth.
I follow Shaun King on Instagram, a brave activist who previously focused on racism in America. He regularly gets hateful comments and was doxed. He and his family regularly receive death threats. Mr. King now posts only about the war in Gaza. Shocking photos of wounded and dead Palestinian children populate his posts.
His work almost always contains a content warning, and I have avoided looking at photos marked this way. Rai King, Sean King's wife, has admitted to stopping following her husband's account because she can't look at any more horror. This week, my finger must have slipped while browsing, and I caught a look at one of King's horrifying posts.
I can't unsee the five soot-covered bodies of small children killed by a bomb.
Reuters has reported the current death toll exceeds 10,000 people, of which 4,104 are children.
"Gaza is becoming a graveyard for children. Hundreds of girls and boys are reportedly being killed or injured every day," UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said.
As of this writing, Hamas has killed 1,400 people in Israel and seized more than 240 hostages. I can't find information to report how many of them are children.
Not that it’s a contest.
Click here to see data on child casualties in war conditions to understand the scale of what’s happening to Palestinian children.
The Associated Press reported that more children have been killed in just over three weeks in Gaza than in all of the world's conflicts combined in each of the past three years, according to the global charity "Save the Children."
When did war devolve into something even more debased and horrifying than it ever was?
National and international leaders are calling for a cease-fire and I pray that it happens soon. Israel has every right to defend itself, with the assistance of its allies, including the US. Yet, innocent children should not pay the price for retribution to Hamas.
The madness has to stop.
What Can We Do
First, let’s start with what we can’t do. We can’t keep our ears plugged singing “la la la.” There is evil in the world and it’s trying to expand.
In the urgent words of
in her weekly newsletter, “Ignorance will not stop what is happening . . . the agenda is strong as it has been planned and put into place for thousands of years. Executed from the highest level, right down to the ground, a force of anti-life beings has worked its way into all spheres of human existence.”Humans deserve to live in safety and freedom.
To wake up alive in the morning, to eat nourishing food, to have access to clean water and air, as well as electricity, plumbing, and the internet. All should have the right to go to school and work, be with family and friends, get medical care, and feel safe.
War is not the answer. The good news is there’s hope.
Let’s heal our earth by starting by creating peace internally for ourselves. What we do for ourselves, we do for the world.
On Monday, November 13th at 7 p.m. EST I invite you to join me for a Zoom meditation. It will take about a half hour of your time.
Mark your calendar. I’ll send the link to all subscribers on Monday morning. You can forward the link to your friends who would like this experience.
Your presence alone will begin to set the transformation for those around you.