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The Only Democracy? » Discrimination, Featured, Human Rights Activists in the Crosshairs » Julia Chaitin: First They Came for the Boycotters

Julia Chaitin: First They Came for the Boycotters

July 15th, 2011 | Add a Comment

Instead of blogiating myself about the wonderful new “Boycott the Boycott” Law the democratic geniuses in the Knesset have just cooked up, I am crossposting what Dr. Julia Chaitin just wrote on her blog.

Julia (bio) is a lecturer in psychology at the Sapir College in Sderot. She specializes in long-term social trauma, from Holocaust to Occupation, and on its healing. And she walks the walk, active on Bedouin rights, dialogue across the Gaza border, and on and on.

Without further ado:
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As our democracy slips further and further into the Mediterranean, it is past time to wake up.
The New World Order is upon us, and a sad one it is at that.

First, there was the boycott law (see information on law and Association for Civil Rights response here).

Then there was the proposed law to investigate Israeli human rights organizations (see Ha’aretz article on this proposed law).

Then there was the proposal to have kindergarden children begin each week with a raising of the flag and the singing of Hatikva (and see the Haa’retz op-ed on this initiative).

My dear Israeli (and other) friends: WE HAVE ENTERED THE DOOR OF THE FASCIST STATE. If we do not take notice and change course, we will only have ourselves to blame for what follows.

I sadly close this week with new verses to a well-known poem –

First they came for the boycotters,
but I loved my Ahava lotion,
so I did not speak out

Then they came for the human rights organizations,
but I was busy
planning my vacation,
so I did not speak out

Then they came for the parents
who did not want their babies
to have to sing
Hatikva
every Sunday morning,
but I was busy
buying my grandson a new toy car,
so I did not speak out

Then they came for me,


and there was no one left to speak out

Related posts:

  1. My Home is Everything: the People of Susiya Speak to the World, and other updates
  2. Major Israeli Theaters Embrace The Settlements (+BIG UPDATE)
  3. Juliano Mer-Khamis, in his own words

Written by

Assaf Oron works as a statistician and moonlights (voluntarily) as a human-rights activist and blogger. He arrived in Seattle from Israel in 2002 for studies, and for now is sticking with the local greyness, dampness and uber-politeness, while plotting his glorious repatriation to the land of eternal sunshine and rudeness. Meanwhile, he tries to explain to anyone who cares to listen, what the Occupation is and why it must be ended now, not later. Assaf is webmaster for the Israeli human rights organization "Villages Group"

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