Published: 7 June 2018
Last updated: 4 March 2024
“If that occurs it will be irreversible and anyone who cares about Israel has to be concerned about that,” Gvarayhu told an audience of about 300 people who turned up to Paddington Town Hall for an event organised by the New Israel Fund Australia.
Gvarayhu, along with Australian author Geraldine Brooks and Israeli writer Assaf Gavron, were speaking at the launch of a book, Kingdom of Olives and Ash: Writers Confront the Occupation. The book is a collection of essays about the occupation of the West Bank written by leading novelists including Americans Michael Chabon and Ayelet Waldman, Brooks, Gavron and the Peruvian Mario Vargas Llosa.
Since it started in 2004, BtS has collected the testimonies of more than 1,000 soldiers about their experience of the occupation and has become a lightning rod for debate about Israeli politics inside and outside the country. “Were not a majority voice in Israeli society but we are a thriving voice,” Gvarayahu told the Sydney meeting.
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For its airing of dirty washing, BtS has been demonised and accused of being traitorous by the Israeli government and groups associated with the government, an attitude that has spread to other countries.
The Jewish Independent understands that NIF invited the leaders of major Jewish community representative organisations to a private roundtable with Avner Gvaryahu in Sydney and Melbourne but they declined to attend. No community leaders were identified at the public event in Sydney on Wednesday night.
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Brooks acknowledged the complex feelings about Israel felt by many Jews in the Diaspora. “Many of my Jewish friends says they couldn’t come tonight because they couldn’t bear this sort of discussion, which surprised me. “But I think Jews in the Diaspora have to balance a reluctance to respond with the responsibility to address it.”
She summed up the importance of discussing the occupation: “There’s more than one way to live in Israel and more than one way to support it.”
Gvarayahu said that members of BtS are constantly aware of the accusations that they’re “fuelling hatred. It’s something we think about. But the price of keeping silence is much higher.”
Not everyone at the event agreed with him. One member of the audience insisted that BtS causes “damage by not questioning the actions of the other side, by telling a truth but not the whole truth. We are so good at criticising ourselves but do you ever think about whether there is a BtS on the Palestinian side?”
Avner: “I am Israeli I’m not Palestinian. What BtS says is that we’re taking responsibility. The problem is not individual soldiers, it’s the system.”
Assaf Gavron had the last word, and its gravity echoed across the room. “Asking for symmetry between Israelis and Palestinians is wrong.
“We are the ones with the power.”
Gvaryahu and Gavron will also speak at Limmud Oz in Melbourne from June 9-11
Main image: From left, NIF Vice-President Steven Glass, BtS Executive Director Avner Gvarayhu, moderator Debbie Whitmont, Geraldine Brooks and Assaf Gavron
All photos by Kent Johnson
