StFX Silence on Palestine vs Solidarity with Ukraine: Inconsistent or Intentionally Hypocritical
/(This article was finished on March 18, 2024)
It's been over 5 months. 163 days.
There is nothing neutral about silence. Silence implies apathy. Apathy is the opposite of care, compassion and community. Something StFX seems to champion so heavily. Something dangles to prospective students as a staple element of the university.
Okay, fine. StFX hasn’t been entirely silent. Oh? You didn’t know? They posted the following text on their Instagram story back in October, which reads: “Recent days have brought unprecedented events in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including the outbreak of war over the weekend. The escalating conflict has brought horrifying and shocking attacks on civilians. There is deep concern within our community for those affected by the violence and loss of life. The voice of our community is added to those around the world calling for a peaceful resolution”. Posted for the 24-hour time limit of an Instagram story. Then nothing. Silence. No emails. Nothing.
“Conflict”. “War”. No mention of genocide.
Meanwhile, StFX didn’t hesitate to show its support for Ukraine in 2022 via an email sent out by university president Dr. Andy Hakin, and again in 2023 by university admin. An email sent out nearly a year ago by university admin, under the subject line “We Stand with Ukraine” reads: “The violence Russia has imposed upon the nation of Ukraine has brought immediate devastation to its citizens and threatens the country's sovereignty. As people around the world come together in support of Ukraine, we, too, must demonstrate our support”. It didn't take long either for them to hoist the Ukrainian flag, along which a flag-raising ceremony took place. But now, months into, which is evidently a genocidal campaign, a massacre of innocent civilians, which many of us witness in real time on our mobile devices, merely a peep has been heard from the StFX administration.
It begs the question: Is this silence, aka this stance of silence and so-called ahistorical “neutrality” that the university has decided to take regarding the Palestinian genocide, a mere inconsistency, or is it intentional? I mean, we can’t expect the university to speak up on every international issue, so they might as well stay silent for this one. Right? I assume that is what some of you might be thinking right now. Shame on you. I find it hard to believe that you don’t know what's going on right now. If you don’t, it doesn’t take very long to educate yourselves. Why shouldn’t StFX say something? This is a genocide happening in real-time. It is inescapable. If not the Congo, Yemen, or Sudan, why not Palestine?
Once it was easy to numb myself to these things. But this time it was different. I found I couldn't numb myself anymore. It stares at me, glares at me, right in the face. I could no longer choose escapism, bound by my privilege. Once religious, I could no longer pray for the pain away when people are murdered by what is quite frankly, a state-run terror regime backed by countries like Canada and the U.S. Yes. Canadian and U.S. arms manufacturers are quite literally what Israel “soldiers” are using to kill innocent civilians. Babies. Children. Mothers. Men. Women. People. “If Jesus were alive, he'd be in the rubble”, I saw on a post. I was awake. Thank God. And I couldn't go back to sleep. If you are a human on this planet, you should care about Palestine. Because it could have been you. You cannot build your holy land on the mass graves of children.
It is not a “war”. It is not a “conflict”. It is a genocide.
The Israeli occupation wants to eradicate the Palestinians residing in Palestine. And they are nearly there. If they won’t get them by bomb, snipers, or by burying them under the rubble, they will get them by forced starvation. The alarm should have gone off months ago. To bear witness and not say a word is appalling. StFX, to only have an Instagram story and nothing else is embarrassing.
It is ethnic cleansing. The naming of Palestinians as “children of darkness” (whereby the Jews are “children of light”) by Israels prime minister and the terming of Palestinians as “human animals” by Israel/Zionist state military forces performing the genocidal and murderous acts against Palestinians confirms this. The complete establishment of an Israeli state implies no room for a sovereign Palestinian one, as comments made by Israel's prime minister Netanyahu indicate.
It has been reported on in numerous articles that the Israeli occupation is placing Palestinians in a perpetual state of apartheid. Whether or not the state of Israel was created as a “safe place” for Jews, it seems rather a relentless mobilization to eradicate Palestinians and their territory, as many of us are witnessing in real-time. The argument that “Israel has a right to defend itself” has long lost any poignancy, given the mass atrocities that the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) has inflicted on innocent Palestinians. It is so clearly a genocidal campaign backed by ethnic cleansing.
Since October 7th, over 40,000 Palestinians residing in the Gaza strip have been killed. Over 14,000 of which are children. Over 70,000 civilians were injured. Over 130 journalists were killed. Over 400 schools have been damaged. And the list goes on. The numbers are staggering. And, these aren't just numbers, these are people. Human beings who once had hopes, dreams, entire lives. Once again, StFX, to have said but a peep is pathetic. As a school so keen on land acknowledgements, StFX seems to have little issue letting this be another empty one.
What brings me real hope is that people are still waking up. But, to StFX I say quite frankly: It's getting a bit late. Isn't it?
As a post-secondary institution so focused on “Community”, so much that it is a selling point for many, championed by current and former students, shouldn’t we address more impactfully, as a community, the genocide we are witnessing in real time? Should we not limit ourselves to the campus community, but the global community?
Free Palestine. Ceasefire now.
References:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/2/15/which-countries-have-stopped-supplying-arms-to-israel
https://time.com/6334409/is-whats-happening-gaza-genocide-experts/
https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/direct-action-confronts-canada-israel-arms-trade
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2022/02/israels-system-of-apartheid/
https://www.vox.com/23924319/israel-palestine-apartheid-meaning-history-debate
