Ola Larsmo about the unforgiration of the debate about Israel and Gaza

I sometimes think that just my generation – I was born in 1957 – belongs to those vaccinated against utopias. It is both good and bad. Sometimes you may have to be able to imagine the world as it should be. But I react with suspicion when someone uses phrases like « admittedly, but … ». Especially when it comes to any of the human -induced disasters of history.

It goes like a wound through as many contexts I end up in. The unforgivation. The desire to turn away from the real suffering of real people. I’m not standing out with it.

One month after Hamas terrorist attack on October 7, which cost at least 1,200 people their lives, and when Israel’s retaliation war against Gaza has begun, what has now demanded between 40 and 60,000 dead, I wrote a text on Facebook that received many upset comments. (You then become « rewarming », this strange but apt modern word.)

I wrote:

« But what I cannot understand is the operation of putting brackets around one or the other group’s suffering and violence against one kind of civilian. (…) I can, without bottoming at all, understand some of the hatred such abuse gives birth. It is understandable. But I cannot understand those who, like me, are phasing at a distance but means that someone is less important. Bottom Line Here is the ridiculous international law, but we have nothing. But don’t ask me to close your eyes to one or the other eye. « 

At the same time I see parts of the acquaintance circle now terminate contact with each other, little as I assume happened in Trump’s US

I do not understand how some people, which I otherwise respect, manage to put some special group’s death and pain in brackets. At the same time, I see parts of the acquaintance circle now terminate contact with each other, little as I assume happened in Trump’s United States. Jewish friends are subjected to bizarre hopes or pressure, and I often think of a few words by British writer David Baddiel: « To assume that I have a basic opinion on Israel is racist. »

My weekend was characterized of two shocking experiences. Last Saturday I listened to a seminar in Uppsala with Palestinian Christian theologian Mitri Rheb, who talked about how the hometown Bethlehem increasingly became a prison camp and how the Israeli state seized water resources. How civilian growers are treated by settlers. Representatives of Swedish aid were in place and demanded that food for starving be passed through Israeli roadblocks – without being looted by Hamas. At Saturday’s seminar, several times Pilate’s word « See man » was repeated – as a reminder of real suffering beyond ideological dimmers.

On Sunday, together with, among others, SKMA’s chairman Ulrika Knutson, I proved the unveiling of the new memory board over the Holocaust victim behind Stockholm’s large synagogue. On the trees outside the memory site hangs yellow bands, which will be reminiscent of the hostage held by Hamas – 59 people, of whom we do not know how many live. During the memorial, there was talk of the refugees from the terror of Nazism who were allowed to come to Sweden – and those who were kept away by a « restrictive refugee policy » and therefore went down.

In March 1938, police took Hans Szybilski for adapting from Sweden, after which he repeatedly hit his head in the wall. He was murdered by SS in an Estonian forest in 1943

I thought of Hans Szybilski, which today has a « stumble » on Apelbergsgatan in Stockholm. In March 1938, the police retrieved him for adapting from Sweden, after which he repeatedly hit his head in the wall. He was murdered by SS, probably in an Estonian forest in 1943. That we today feel anger against and distaste for such politics is due to the fact that the years were made « admittedly, but … ».

But who do we want then Exclude the equation to keep us well with friends, to be part of an opinion community? And more important: Who can, with any power behind the words, tell Netanyahu and Hamas that it is over now – according to international law, churches and hospitals are not bombed, even though terrorists have dug into tunnels under them. The Declaration on Human Rights took Form in 1948, after the Second World War, precisely on the basis of the insight into what a world looks like where such rights were abolished.

Therefore, the Swedish government must undoubtedly and clearly, at EU level, requires that international law apply in Gaza. For it is the one at stake

Right now, the world order that is based on the idea of ​​a universal right is attacked by various right -wing populist rulers. The time for such regulations is over now, they say openly. But this despised legal order is also our own protection. Therefore, the Swedish government must undoubtedly and clearly, at EU level, requires that international law apply in Gaza. Because it is the one at stake. Now that opinion leaders from left to right seem to agree that what is wearing us all must come to an end. No more bombs against civilians, release the hostage immediately – why does it seem so difficult to say in the same sense?

The necessary and uncompromising defense of human rights and international law is because it is the only real utopia we have. Without it, we are all extradited to a world of « each one and God against everyone ».

Read more:

Björn Wiman: The inevitable truth about the war in Gaza

Kristina Lindquist: Should we wait to talk about genocide until everyone is gone?