So here we go, to where most of us prefer not to go. Hamas’s violent attack on Israel, itself the perpetrator of daily violence against the integrity of the Palestinian people, leads us to the edge of spreading global conflict.
No doubt, while the major global powers are focused on the war in Ukraine, lesser global powers will take advantage of the distraction to settle their disputes. We see this in the Armenia-Azerbaijan dispute over the Nagorno Karabakh region, increasingly in the Balkans between Serbia and Kosovo, and now, once again, between Israel and the Palestinians. The latter conflict, this time around, feels different, bigger, and more consequential.
Nations have increasingly lined-up in entrenched positions within global alliances while the nation states themselves are challenged by revolutionary and fascist movements. All of this is the result of an ideology of violence and war which spreads unchallenged in the minds and spirits of the people.
But to challenge this spirit of violence which spreads across the globe: undoubtedly fed by violent entertainment, games, and sports; needs to be the task of the highest priority among the broad mass of people who ultimately pay the costs of war through the loss of life, dignity, stability, and material well-being.
At this point it is only the broad mass of people, which can stand against the forces of violence and war, which can point the world in a different direction. It is those of us who understand that war, beyond short intervals, will never lead to peace, who must speak daily against the forces of violence. We need to speak against the programming towards war, against the corporate arms industry–the profiteers of war, and against politicians who wave the flag, talk tough, and then lead us to our demise.
We need to do this in our daily conversations; through the rejection of superfluous, indulgent violence, violence unnecessary to express a deeper point in the entertainment we consume and the games that we play; through organized mass movements which manifest on the streets, on social media, and through the vote against political-types who opportunistically harness the spirit of violence in order to promote their personal agendas.
It is only the broad mass of everyday working people who have the power to direct the world to a more peaceful future, otherwise the future itself is in doubt, and if the future does survive, it may not be a future worth living. The forces of death currently prevail, but hope also exists, but hope must be acted upon in order to grow, and to blossom, into a peaceful world.
Now is the time for would-be peacemakers to act, to speak loudly and clearly, against the forces of war and violence. Tomorrow might be too late.