{"id":218228,"date":"2022-08-22T12:00:07","date_gmt":"2022-08-22T11:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=218228"},"modified":"2022-08-19T15:00:29","modified_gmt":"2022-08-19T14:00:29","slug":"when-roger-waters-cried-has-any-israeli-shed-tears-for-a-boy-from-gaza","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2022\/08\/when-roger-waters-cried-has-any-israeli-shed-tears-for-a-boy-from-gaza\/","title":{"rendered":"When Roger Waters Cried: \u201cHas any Israeli Shed Tears for a Boy from Gaza?\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote><p>11 Aug 2022 &#8211;<em>Roger Waters <\/em><em>cried yesterday. It was on his Twitter page, as he read, on camera, an essay he had read on the Mondoweiss news website the night before. It was about a boy from the Gaza Strip.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>\u201cI really wish I could rest, or have some psychologist help me like other people in the world who suffer wars,\u201d said Mohammed. \u201cNo one during or after the war asks me or my family \u2018How are you doing?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He\u2019s the family breadwinner, a boy of 13. And only his crying,\u00a0<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/mondoweiss.net\/2022\/08\/the-aftermath-in-gaza\/\" >wrote Tareq Hajjaj<\/a>, \u201cmelts the manly shield\u201d he is forced to wear. \u201cI do not want my mother to suffer like the mothers of the kids who were killed,\u201d the boy sobbed.<\/p>\n<p>Mohammed wished he could have grown up somewhere else, where he would only die \u201cwhen his body is fully grown,\u201d Hajjaj wrote. And this is where Waters could no longer restrain his tears and burst out crying. No decent person could remain indifferent to the sight of the musician\u2019s tears. Waters, the great man of conscience.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">What is Wrong With Them?<br \/>Love<br \/>R. <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/UzSb7AGajD\" >pic.twitter.com\/UzSb7AGajD<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Roger Waters \u270a (@rogerwaters) <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/rogerwaters\/status\/1557109596917039106?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" >August 9, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>But for Israelis, this was a performance from a different planet. They have a thousand defense mechanisms against Waters\u2019 tears. Let\u2019s even assume that Waters really is an \u201cantisemite\u201d and \u201csomeone who hates Israel\u201d \u2013 which he isn\u2019t. But crying over a boy from Gaza? What about\u00a0the children of Sderot?<\/p>\n<p>Has any Israeli shed tears for a boy from Gaza? Are many Israelis even aware of what happened to children in Gaza during those three days of colossal success that deluged Israel in waves of pride and self-satisfaction such as we haven\u2019t seen here in a long time? There hasn\u2019t been a success like this since Israel\u2019s victory in the 1967 Six-Day War. Another few days of fighting and there would even be albums.<\/p>\n<p>Only the death of Zili, a Border Police dog, in Nablus \u2013 which garnered a front-page headline in the Yedioth Ahronoth daily, along with his funeral, the tears, the grave, the eulogies and the official statement of mourning by the prime minister \u2013 weighed a bit on the intoxicating mood of victory. It wasn\u2019t disturbed for a second by the scenes from Gaza, because scenes from Gaza were never shown here. Never before has there been such a sterile killing operation here. The Israeli media showed nothing this time, absolutely nothing.<\/p>\n<p>This was one of the most corrupting operations in Israel\u2019s history. Instead of being priced at a steep discount, like its predecessors in Gaza,\u00a0it was completely free. Not a drop of Israeli blood, not a single destroyed home and no condemnations from the world, not even lame ones. With a zero cost like this, the appetite for further operations will obviously grow. In Nablus on Tuesday, it would at least have been possible to argue about the results.<\/p>\n<p>The usual arrogance was accompanied this time by the addictive feeling of a sweet, easy victory. Just bring us more wars at rock-bottom prices. After all, no one was killed and almost no homes were damaged in last weekend\u2019s Operation Breaking Dawn.<\/p>\n<p>But it\u2019s impossible to ignore another factor that fed these feelings of victory. This time, the operation was launched\u00a0by the good Israelis. They\u2019re the ones in power now. Look at how they embarked on this war, with flying colors.<\/p>\n<p>Consequently, this was the most political war Israel has ever fought. The right was united; it can never utter a word of criticism about killing Arabs. The center-left was bursting with pride \u2013 what a success, what management, what daring. The flattery for the operation\u2019s commanders \u2013 Prime Minister Yair Lapid and Defense Minister Benny Gantz, who are two of \u201cour own\u201d \u2013 ran overtime.<\/p>\n<p>Yossi Verter\u00a0described\u00a0how Lapid\u2019s wardrobe changed due to this success. His \u201cempty suit has been filled,\u201d he wrote understatedly. And the next day he added, \u201cWithout a doubt, this is a feather in the cap\u201d for Lapid (Haaretz, August 8). The suit that was filled (with blood) and the feather in the cap are the real spoils of this war, which ended in \u201ca dream for Israel.\u201d A dream of war.<\/p>\n<p>Verter was soon followed by Uri Misgav, who shed all the disguises. The real victory picture from this war, he wrote, was that of Lapid briefing opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu (Haaretz in Hebrew, August 7). It was worth going to war for this victory picture. For Misgav and his ilk, nothing could be sweeter.<\/p>\n<p>Roger Waters cried. \u201cWhat is wrong with the fucking Israelis? What is wrong with them?\u201d he asked, in anger and despair. I just wish I knew how to answer him.<\/p>\n<p><em>___________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/roger_waters2-620x412.jpg\" ><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-58365\" src=\"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/roger_waters2-620x412-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"100\" height=\"66\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"><em>Roger Waters, an activist and human rights advocate, was the singer, songwriter and bassist for the British rock band <\/em>Pink Floyd<em>. He also has had an extensive solo career.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.globalresearch.ca\/when-roger-waters-cried\/5790446\" >Go to Original &#8211; globalresearch.ca<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>11 Aug 2022 -Roger Waters cried yesterday on his Twitter page as he read, on camera, an essay at the Mondoweiss news website about a boy from the Gaza Strip. \u201cWhat is wrong with the fucking Israelis? What is wrong with them?\u201d he asked, in anger and despair.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":58365,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[928,532,101,100,2898,87,865,2414,2415,2416,767,771,427,85,2897,880,99,92,1025,886],"class_list":["post-218228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-palestine-israel-gaza-genocide","tag-bds-boycott-divestment-sanctions","tag-colonialism","tag-cultural-violence","tag-direct-violence","tag-ecocide","tag-gaza","tag-genocide","tag-israeli-apartheid","tag-israeli-army","tag-israeli-occupation","tag-middle-east","tag-nakba","tag-palestine","tag-palestine-israel","tag-sociocide","tag-state-terrorism","tag-structural-violence","tag-violent-conflict","tag-west-bank","tag-zionism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218228"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218228\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}