radiofree.asia

Jewish woman has faced “hate campaign” of violent attacks over pro-Gaza protest

Nadia Yahlom is a Palestinian-Jewish woman. In a peaceful protest, she cut yellow ribbons off the railings of a public park near her home. As a result, she has faced a “targeted hate campaign” from pro-Israel agitators.

Nadia Yahlom

As she explained to the BBC:

I have been the subject of physical attacks, of a doxing campaign, threats of assault and rape and violence that have been threatened against me and my family on the basis that the people behind that campaign want to silence me.

She insisted:

I am a Palestinian-Jewish woman living in that community who has every right to take a stance against genocide – a genocide that is being conducted in my name

She responded to critics of her action by saying:

I think it’s antisemitic to imply that a Jewish person who is standing in principled opposition to a genocide is driven by hatred.

Pro-Israel extremists cry over ribbons, but not over the murder of 20,000 children

Israeli occupation forces have killed over 20,000 children in Gaza since October 2023. The ribbons, meanwhile, represented the remaining 20 Israeli prisoners of war in Gaza. As Nadia Yahlom stressed:

To me, it’s astonishing that there can be moral repugnance about a handful of ribbons being cut and not generations and generations and generations of bloodlines [in Gaza] being cut.

And she noted the difference between the response to her action and her own response to the destruction of Palestinian symbols in public. Pro-Israel agitators routinely rip down such symbols (whether flags or stickers), and she said:

I myself once encountered a woman in Muswell Hill taking down a sticker with a Palestinian flag, I engaged her in discussion about it… What didn’t happen is that I called a mob to attack her, intimidate her, threaten her, film her without her consent, and subject her to a ceaseless campaign of physical attacks, threats against her life and threats against her family…

Nadia Yahlom described how she considered the yellow ribbons to be ‘offensive, intimidating and threatening’ because they suggest that “the only lives worth commemorating, the only lives that have any value, are Jewish lives”. And this is what the mainstream media has done consistently throughout Israel’s genocide in Gaza, and amid this week’s exchange of hostages. It emphasises the humanity of 20 Israelis leaving captivity, while failing to do the same for 2,000 Palestinian hostages leaving captivity, the thousands that remain in Israeli torture centres, or the many thousands of civilians Israel has killed in the last two years and beyond.

Consider the coverage of Israeli soldier Matan Angrest‘s release:

And then consider the many scenes of Palestinian hostages that social media has shown us but mainstream media outlets haven’t:

And remember, Israel has no problem taking children hostage:

Nadia Yahlom is absolutely right. The implicit racism of the yellow ribbons, and the thugs who come after you if you touch them, is offensive. The ribbons have become a symbol of selective sympathy from ethnic supremacists who defend genocide. And in the interests of humanity, we must challenge that. Because neither Palestinians nor Israelis will be truly safe until Israel’s decades-long colonial oppression ends.

By Ed Sykes

This post was originally published on Canary.