The Israeli attack on Palestine must stop. We at Suspension Coffee add our voice to the many voices, both Jewish and otherwise demanding an immediate ceasefire and a permanent end to the conflict. On this we all agree. Palestine must be free.
What follows is my opinion. I Michal Golski, as a director of Suspension Coffee, think it only reasonable to make it clear and public that we do not and will not stand by the justifications of the Israeli government for this inhumane treatment of the Palestinian people. This is a genocide, make no mistake.
I must admit to and apologise for my ignorance. I did not know until recently much of the history of Palestine and Israel. I did not know about the Nakba, the forced displacement of the Palestinian people. I did not know that The West bank and Gaza were essentially refugee camps formed by the creation of the state of Israel and that these displaced people have been stateless and oppressed since near the end of WWII.
As a person with a Polish Jewish background, father and grandparents, I had a Yiddish speaking Babcia. Being Jewish is a part of my being that I have always been proud of; It is with absolute horror and shame that we witness, on the news and on social media, the murder, displacement and now corralling of the survivors toward an unknown fate in Rafah. I am terrified for these people.
All my life, as a person with Jewish family and friends, I have heard stories of the persecution of Jews under Nazi occupation, my father and grandparents were lucky enough to escape a concentration camp and survived the war. I used to spend an evening every week, writing down and recording the stories of a Jewish woman, who was a young woman in WWII, they were stories that she told me, because no-one wanted to hear them. I will always cherish that time we spent together and admire her courage and determination. Those stories read like the stories of many Palestinian people that I am hearing now.
I am not racist, nor am I religious. The treatment of the Jewish people in WWII was borne from racism, as is the treatment of the Palestinian people now. To me there is no difference. I do not believe that because one group contains elements of my ancestry that it is more important than the other. I stand alongside my colleague and barista friend, Rema, whom I work with here at Suspension Coffee, they are queer Palestinian. They don’t even know if their family in Palestine is still alive.
I am a citizen of the UK, Australia and I am entitled to Polish citizenship, perhaps even Israeli. The state of Palestine is not recognised by Israel, Australia, the UK or the US (among many more). This leaves the Palestinian people effectively stateless. I urge all nations to recognise Palestine and demand an immediate and permanent ceasefire.
I align myself and many of my views with the Jewish Voice for Peace (@jewishvoiceforpeace), @apan4palestine, @jews4Palestine, among many others to show that this genocide is not a Jewish cause. There are many Jewish people who oppose Israel and recognise Palestine. I also align myself with the Palestinian LGBTQI+ community and the Palestinian feminist movement who cannot make their voices heard with the backdrop of war and genocide.