Toxic sympathy

When we tolerate for others what we would never tolerate ourselves

Oct 23, 2023

There’s a skin-thin liberalism that is more upset by impoliteness than murder, and it’s been doing the rounds for years. It reared its reasonable-seeming head during the BLM protests, shedding tears over broken shop windows while black men and women were being suffocated next to police cruisers and gunned down in parks and their own homes with impunity. It tuts and shakes its almost always Caucasian coif at climate protesters desperate to save their world, for causing a disruption, for lacking focus, for making a scene. And, of course, it was there before, watching the struggle against Apartheid in South Africa and urging people who’d been patient for forty years (at least) not to lose their temper.

Now it’s on our TV screens, all over our social feeds and occasionally in our faces, scrupulously denouncing any and all Palestinian violence. Sometimes, it even denounces Israeli violence almost as much, and believes, in a heart as clean as a Waitrose floor, that this is fairness. Decency. Justice.

Toxic sympathy

This kind of sympathy (not empathy, not solidarity) pouts and frowns and pats the hand and agrees that it’s awful, isn’t it, before changing the subject to house prices and Brexit. Jammer om van jou kak te hoor1, as they say in Afrikaans.

This is toxic sympathy. It sees (or ignores) a group of people oppressed for generations, living under intolerable conditions, and demands, as a toll for its tutting and occasional equivocation, nothing less than perfect pacifism. A pacifism it does not require of others in similar positions, much less the people’s oppressors, or itself.

“The violence on both sides has been terrible,” we are told, earnestly, swiftly followed by calling the crimes of Hamas “brutal”, “savage” and “barbarous”. Shortly after, we might hear that “violence, especially terrorism, is never the answer.”

We hear this line so much it sounds perfectly reasonable. After all, killing and kidnapping civilians is brutal. And while calling it savage and barbarous carries some unpleasant colonial undertones, most of us would be comfortable using these words for what Hamas did two weeks ago. But why is it that we seldom hear the same people using those words when Israel kills civilians? Is it not brutal to kill children if you are wearing a uniform? Not barbarous to bomb hospitals, churches and mosques if you do so with artillery?

Strange arithmetic

By what strange arithmetic do we calculate the millions of people held captive by Israel in Gaza, starved of medicine, water, food and building supplies, to be less worthy of anguished concern? Are they not hostages also? What would we call those who kill hostages, were the killers not cloaked in the respectability our politicians and media confer on them?

And while we are talking about arithmetic, let’s total up the numbers of the dead. As ever in this conflict, the Palestinian dead more than double the Israeli dead. Palestinian wounded dwarf those on the Israeli side. By what logic should Israel be deserving of more sympathy?

Well, say the defenders of a country with one of the best funded militaries in the world that is currently bombing a civilian population they have trapped, the other side started it. The terrorists. They call the Hamas attacks of a few weeks ago ‘unprecedented’ and ‘unprovoked’.

But they were not unprecedented and not unprovoked. Again: history does not begin when one group suffers.

I can hear the bellowed objection as I type: Are you justifying terrorism? are you siding with Hamas? No. I am pointing out hypocrisy. I am correcting misinformation. To call armed Palestinian resistance unprecedented and unprovoked is inaccurate.

Is the regular killing of Palestinian civilians by Israeli forces not a precedent? Is it not a provocation?

Israeli forces had killed 263 Palestinian civilians over the year before the recent flare-up of violence (31Aug 2022 - 31 Aug 2023). Did you read about those deaths? Did you hear your leaders speak out against them? Would they not, had they happened here, have been considered a provocation? What is it about Palestinians that delegitimises their use of armed struggle to combat violence? What is it about them that makes nice liberals abandon them when they take up arms? It cannot be the use of violence alone. I know this, because when Ukrainians use violence to repel their oppressors, it is celebrated. I know this because I have heard the mantra “Israel has a right to defend itself” so many times it could be my ringtone.

My question is: why does Palestine, do Palestinians, not have this same right?

Please don’t get me wrong: all violence is a failure of humanity, every civilian death disgusting and tragic. I am just asking what we expect Palestinians to do? They have been living under military occupation for decades, watching their children jailed for minor infractions and their land stolen by illegal settlements. They have seen their journalists killed by Israeli soldiers and hundreds of their peaceful protesters murdered at once2.

“Both sides” I hear some say. Both sides have committed violent atrocities. True. Neither side has clean hands. In that period I mentioned, 2022-2023, Palestinian militants also killed Israeli civilians. Do you want to guess how many?

Two.

Palestinian militants killed two civilians over that period.3

Is that a provocation? Are the 3,000 Palestinian civilians killed by Israeli forces since 2014?4 Can we say that some hands are dirtier than others without being accused of justifying murder?

Hamas killed and kidnapped civilians in the attacks of early October — a war crime and moral outrage. But this did not happen in a vacuum. It was not the starting point of this conflict any more than Nelson Mandela planning a bomb attack on Apartheid South Africa was the start of that one. And Israel has responded with its own war crimes, only the casualties are far bigger.

Dictating to the oppressed

Which brings us back to our liberals. My people. Nice people. Not the racists and anti-Arab ideologues who froth and foam about the malign influence of Islam on the world. Not the apocalyptic oddballs who believe oppressing a nation is part of God’s plan to bring peace to the Earth. Just nice folks. Normal folks, who somehow can’t bring themselves to side with the oppressed in this one case because the oppressed have dared, occasionally to stand up and fight.

It’s time we call this attitude out as part of the problem. At best it is ignorance and apathy, at worst it’s white privilege presuming to dictate methods to oppressed people who have tried literally everything already.

I do not believe that this means supporting Hamas. I do not believe this means we abandon our call to be peacemakers. I do believe this means abandoning childish naiveté. I do believe it means recognising that peace without justice is just more oppression. It means recognising that if we truly want to call ourselves peacemakers, we have to work for justice. As long as injustice continues, it will be met with resistance.

This we know.

If we require the resistance to be passive and blameless, how many martyrs do we want them to offer up before our governments and allies stop arming and cheering the people who are shooting and bombing them?

Complicated and not complicated

Yes, it’s complicated. Geopolitics, American influence in a strategically important region, Joe Biden’s assertion that “if Israel didn’t exist we would have to invent an Israel for the sake of our interests”. And any country powerful enough to step in and fight for Palestine risks setting off a world war. Complicated.

But what is not complicated, right now, is the collective punishment of a captive civilian population. What is not complicated is the moral bankruptcy of the USA vetoing a UN resolution that would have demanded a ceasefire. What is not complicated is that collective punishment, denying water to civilians and bombing ambulances, escape routes , places of worship and ambulances are war crimes, even if your nation is reeling in understandable anger. What is not complicated is the fact that Israel has no monopoly on grief right now.

What is not complicated is your opinion. Taking a side. Speaking out. Recognising and expressing the disparity between Israel and Palestine, the historic injustice and the current war-crimes, which are not being committed at an equal rate or scale by both sides.

Either that or admit we don’t care about Palestinians. About brown people or poor people or weak nations with powerful enemies. Our outrage is selective. Putin bad, Netanyahu complicated. Resistance bad, Apartheid complicated. Terrorism by Hamas bad, terrorising Palestinian civilians… ?

Perhaps it is arrogant to believe our opinion matters at all. It didn’t when America went insane after 9/11 and, despite millions speaking out, Britain enthusiastically encouraged and participated in the mad whirlwind of indiscriminate bloodshed that followed.

Perhaps my irritation at lukewarm liberals is unfair. Perhaps many of them are motivated by that beautiful, ploughshare-beating spirit of pacifism that sees the legitimacy of repaying violence for violence and has the moral courage to choose another path. That’s a path I believe Christians should follow. It’s a path the forgotten Christians of Palestine follow even now.

But if we are going to advocate, primarily, for peace on all sides, we must at least be brave enough to speak truth, name injustice and and stand in solidarity with the oppressed. That at least is not complicated. That would make our sympathy seem a little less shallow.

On the podcast: Israel-Palestine episodes

The most recent episode of the Beer Christianity podcast features Laura and me (I’m Jonty btw), talking last week about the latest war on Gaza. If it’s your first time listening, it’s worth warning you: we get sweary on this show.

You can find the show on all major podcast platforms and here:

Episode 84: Stand with Gaza - Palestine, Israel and justice with peace

About Beer Christianity

Usually, at this point in the newsletter, there’s a long section about who we are that includes a bunch of ways to support us, from following and sharing to financial. But since we’ve had so many new follows (thanks to a shout out from our favourite festival, Greenbelt), that seems a bit weird and gross. Like asking visitors in church to give during the offering (or profiting off a large-scale human tragedy — whichever feels worse to you). Basically we’re a podcast featuring three lefty Christians: Malky (a former Piperist, post evangelical, in his 30s), Laura (living her backstory, sometime Baptist now on the move, 20-something) and this moi, Jonty (40something writer, former fundie, former missionary society comms guy, not entirely done with evangelicalism). We drink a bit, laugh a bit, and talk faith, politics and society, sometimes with guests.

You can find more of our stuff here: beerchristianity.co.uk

Or That’s a shame, as they say on Seinfeld. JOVJKTH defined here.

In 2018 they tried a rolling protest called the ‘march of return’ to Gaza. Over 150 of these demonstrators were shot dead by Israeli forces. What would think of our own government were it to shot that number of people in the streets? Would we believe they deserved unqualified support?

The numbers go up on both sides if you include civilian deaths at the hands of civilians, or combatants killed. You can look at all the numbers at https://www.ochaopt.org/data/casualties

Over the same period, 33 Israelis were killed by Palestinians.

Oh hi. You read the footnotes? Impressive. Thanks for reading. You can stop now. This is just me rambling. Not important. Just a lil’ postscript. This was hard to write. and Kind of scary. I am 95% pacifist and I love Jesus’ example of and encouragement towards a different way. But it’s just not okay to judge other people’s struggle when they are facing such unimaginable injustice and pressure. I have been so humbled and encouraged by Jewish groups around the world speaking out against genocide, ethnic cleansing and retributive violence against Gaza this week, and I recognise the collective trauma that may have been triggered by the sheer scale and surprise of the Hamas attacks, as well as the violence. Their courageous willingness to speak out against Israel’s actions has been such an example to me. Seeing Jewish people in huge numbers at Saturday’s march for Gaza was also so inspiring and humbling. And then, hearing Muslim sisters, brothers and others at the march chanting in support and love for Judaism while opposing Zionism was also beautiful. The Christian Church has, as far as I have seen, either been appallingly hawkish or lukewarm (with some notable exceptions). Perhaps that’s why I had to write this, because ‘my’ people (Christians, comfortable middle-classers, white men, etc) have lacked a lot of the moral courage I have seen exhibited by the relatives of those murdered by Hamas and Israel. I want us to do better. Anyway this was a long PS. I hope you have a lovely day.

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