ALL OF IT

"Can I ask what you're doing here today?"

"We're just out supporting the cause."

"But I believe that's the flag of Hamas. And the chant earlier was a call for intifada, a global intifada. Is that right?"

"Yes."

"And some were holding signs and chanting about their rejection of the idea of the Jewish homeland and the whole Zionist project."

"Uh, yes. That's right."

"And that imam they brought up back at the podium, you heard him, he was literally calling for god to 'kill the enemies of the people of Gaza' and 'kill them all.'"

"Yeah, we're speaking out, man."

"But, I mean, given that Gazans brought Hamas to power, with a policy of no negotiation Israel or recognition of their right to exist, aimed at their obliteration, doesn't it seem like anyone opposed to any part of that could easily be viewed as an 'enemy of the people of Gaza'?"

"You're the only one doing that math."

"But these words are universally understood to mean at best violent civil unrest. Or, what, is your sense? That this is about campaigns of awareness? Charitable giving? Humanitarian aid?"

"What are we doing here, man?"

"Well, I'm trying to figure that out. The leadership behind that flag are Holocaust-denying sponsors of indiscriminate violence directed at civilian minorities. And they also wish to see an end of the state of Israel. And the religious are forever telling us that god works through them. And the fellow brought up to speak certainly wasn't careful to define terms or spell out who he was talking about. Right? Like, the US supports Israel. And they do so with tax dollars. So if you're an American who pays taxes it's not irrational to think you're being targetted by this very call to vioence. Right?"

"We are carrying symbols of a global movement for peace and justice. Which is what everyone wants."

"But you could have chosen anything. You opted for those chants and those flags whose dominant meaning, particularly at this time and in this place, is one of hate and horrific violence; whose end may be peace, if that's what you want to believe, but the means is, again universally understood to be, anything but dialogue and negotiation."

"Well, that's not what we're up to."

"Okay. Your t-shirt. The slogan on your t-shirt."

"What about it?"

"That line is endlessly repeated in children's shows and cartoons produced by jihadists trying to normalize hate and brainwash kids into committing acts of barbarism against their neighbours."

"And?"

"And, well, I wonder why you're wearing it?"

"Solidarity, man. The people offering this are being brutally oppressed and killed."

"Agreed."

"Right."

"And I suppose we disagree by whom they are being oppressed and killed."

"Don't you think the people using this slogan know?"

"What I know is that the last people employing these symbols and chants shared with us videos of what they were up to, while they and their supporters paired that with a call for global solidarity and action. And that's just what you're doing. And so people are concerned about your beliefs, commitments, and intentions (stated or unstated, conscious or unconscious.)"

"Peace and justice. That's what we're up to."

"Right, it's '69 and you're John and Yoko. But I imagine you're not big fans of all sorts of symbols and slogans. So I wonder what makes those inappropriate or evil?"

"The whole motivation and intent here is positive, man."

"But why would your assertion be the only or foremost consideration? You're being told by the impacted minority that these symbols and words are understood by them and many in their community, precisely, to mean that they have no right to exist. And we also know many of those gathered here (who are not at home hoping and praying but have gathered in the streets) have written and are singing and saying that they feel the Zionist project is invalid, that the Jewish homeland is illegitimate, that in the future they want, maybe you want, no one to call themselves Israeli: because you and your cause will have ended it. That seems pretty explicit. Doesn't it?""

"Just peace, man. We just want peace. And justice."

"But can you hear why this sounds to many as though folks here and elsewhere are normalizing calls to genocide?"

"No. And we're stopping a genocide."

"By calling for it?"

"We're not."

"I would dispute that. But what's not in dispute is that this and much more is the aim of millions of people as well as the organizations and states they belong to. And that those ideas are not the outputs of some fringe, online troll farm."

"Maybe not, but it sounds like you are."

"I mean, the reason you're in the street is the recent actions of those who have running on their operating system what I just spelled out. And what they mean when they use those slogans and wave those flags is at minimum all the mayhem and ending and death I'm talking about."

"I don't see those people."

"Millions, even community leaders, college history instructors, politicians, and preachers calling to crowds of thousands here, and in countless rallies just like this one, in your own city and elsewhere, tell us they wish to take it way further and that they pray to god to make that happen. And that everyone else should, too. How are you not hearing and seeing this at the event you are attending?"

"None of that is happening. Everyone just wants to be happy and do good things and get on with their life. And some people are being prevented from doing that."

"Oh, I'm not suggesting folks believe what they're up to is evil. On the contrary. To support or celebrate or commit acts of barbarism, most people would have to sincerely believe what they're doing is either good or necessary. Why would any of the thousands of people (many of whom were regular Palestinians and even kids, not hardened warriors) who poured over the fence into Israel to go medieval on their neighbours feel this was unjustifiable or the wrong thing to do? They didn't. They knew it to be the best thing they could do and were excited to show off their good deeds to their families, friends, and community."

"What, are you aspiring to be the next Ben Shapiro?"

"Is none of what I said accurate?"

"I don't know, man."

"Well, you know professors and faith leaders across this continent have collectively gone on the record in recent days sanctioning anything, literally anything. 'You may do anything you'd like to your neighbour,' they say, 'so long as you and your friends first conceive of your neighbours as the worst of all vile creatures: settlers (a particularly gruesome class of oppressor); after which, kidnapping, torture, and disembowelment are merely ugly dysphemisms for justice.'"

"Decolonization is always bloody."

"That's what they say. And we all agree that these terms are thrown around without definition or context or evaluation and applied at whim. And they eagerly do so even where we can show far more oppression going in a direction reverse to what's being claimed."

"I don't see that."

"Yeah, I think that's what I'm saying.

"Well."

"Well. And you're out here, like everyone who has ever made excuses for murder and genocide, and even celebrating it, under what you tell me is a banner of peace (which you tell me is another word for decolonization, which the good professor says is another word for war) and shouting what you say are slogans of justice (which is another word for decolonization, which, as we all have seen, is another word for burning families alive in their homes and kidnapping tourists and immigrants.)"

"And?"

"And you're insisting on doing this while folks watching what's happening from the outside are politely explaining to you that there are more people not participating in your rally who think you're endorsing, implicitly or explicitly, wittingly or otherwise, a death cult hell-bent on genocide (a genocide fully endorsed by states and institutions, scholars and religious communities) — all while employing none of your own thoughts or language and explaining away your borrowing of all of their chants and slogans while justifying your actions only by quoting the words and figures of their propaganda corps."

"Look, don't tell me what I'm doing. And piss off. I've listened to you long enough. Move along."

"Well, maybe you can help me?"

"Gladly. You definitely need help."

"What part of what I've said is incorrect?"

"All of it."