by Ray McGovern, July 09, 2011
"We passengers on the U.S. Boat to Gaza represent a cross-section of America. Yet, if there is an emblematic trait that sets us apart from "mainstream" America, it is a common, radical determination to take risks to bring Justice for the oppressed — in this case, the 1.6 million people locked in an open-air prison on a narrow strip of land called Gaza.
While most of those calling us "radical" hurl the word as a barb, we welcome the label — but radical as derived from the underlying meaning of this word, "root." Like radishes, we are rooted in soil, the soil of Justice.
"Extremist?" Yes, we confess to that too — as Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. did in his Letter From the Birmingham City Jail.
Replying to those who threw the "extremist" epithet at him, Dr. King acknowledged that he was, indeed, an extremist — "an extremist for love.".....
What a wonderful reminder that relying on Israeli kill-power rather than Justice for the Gazans is not truly Jewish. Nor is it safe. As one of my mentors, Daniel Maguire, Professor of Moral Theology at Marquette University, has put it:
"A tribal ‘Jewish’ state that ignores the prophet Zechariah’s warning that Zion cannot be built on injustice and bloodshed will, as the prophets of Israel warned, fall into the pit it is currently and frantically digging.""
"We passengers on the U.S. Boat to Gaza represent a cross-section of America. Yet, if there is an emblematic trait that sets us apart from "mainstream" America, it is a common, radical determination to take risks to bring Justice for the oppressed — in this case, the 1.6 million people locked in an open-air prison on a narrow strip of land called Gaza.
While most of those calling us "radical" hurl the word as a barb, we welcome the label — but radical as derived from the underlying meaning of this word, "root." Like radishes, we are rooted in soil, the soil of Justice.
"Extremist?" Yes, we confess to that too — as Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. did in his Letter From the Birmingham City Jail.
Replying to those who threw the "extremist" epithet at him, Dr. King acknowledged that he was, indeed, an extremist — "an extremist for love.".....
What a wonderful reminder that relying on Israeli kill-power rather than Justice for the Gazans is not truly Jewish. Nor is it safe. As one of my mentors, Daniel Maguire, Professor of Moral Theology at Marquette University, has put it:
"A tribal ‘Jewish’ state that ignores the prophet Zechariah’s warning that Zion cannot be built on injustice and bloodshed will, as the prophets of Israel warned, fall into the pit it is currently and frantically digging.""
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