By Natalie Stecker
ON Saturday 11 November, as every year, we celebrated Armistice Day, the day we commemorate the end of the “Great War”, the long-awaited day when a literal armistice, or ceasefire, was achieved. I made the decision this year to honour those who sacrificed their lives for us, in the hopes of a brighter future, by joining the throngs of people in London calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, part of the Occupied Palestinian Territories, where I served as a human rights monitor in 2018.
Many have falsely claimed that it was a “hate” march, or even, as one well known far-right figure suggested, a march of “Islamists”. Nothing could be further from the truth and it renewed my faith in humanity.
Let me share with you what I witnessed – a march of hope, a demonstration of love in action, every single colour, creed, ethnic group, age, gender and more was represented in what was estimated to be a mass of between 800,000 and one million people, the largest protest since Iraq in 2003. Notably, despite Wednesday’s parliamentary vote, 76% of the British public support a ceasefire, indicating how out of step our parliamentarians are with the general public and calling into question what kind of democracy we really have.
If we had a local poll, I believe we would similarly see overwhelming support for an armistice, despite our local government’s current positioning.
At the protest, I had the huge privilege of marching with the Jewish bloc, as I was in London to attend the 80th birthday of a good Jewish friend of mine, Glyn Secker, of Jewish Voice for Labour, who was also the captain of the Jewish boat for Gaza in the 2010 humanitarian flotilla attempting to break the siege of the coastal enclave. I was also staying with another Jewish friend, Leah Levane, of the same group and wanted to ensure that I did not lose them in the crowd.
The bloc was made up of around 1,000 Jews, including individuals from groups such as “Jews for Justice for Palestine”, “Na’amod”, “Jewish Socialists” and Jewish members of the “Black-Jewish Alliance”, many wearing their kippas and some their tallit, or religious shawls.
What really stood out to me as the bloc joined the main march, was the cheers and expressions of gratitude from others for the Jewish group, who had attended to make it clear that the war crimes being committed were not being done in their name.
Halfway during the march, around 200 of the group stopped on the side of the road and began to sing and chant at those walking by, who continued to display their gratitude. One of the most beautiful moments I witnessed, and captured on camera, was when Becky, a young Jewish woman from Winchester, whom I had met that morning, and a Muslim woman passing, spontaneously ran towards each other and started hugging each other and crying.
It really demonstrated to me two things: firstly, that we need to reject the conflation of Israel, and the political ideology that sustains the state in its current form, and the Jewish community, because they are not one and the same thing and it endangers Jews, as there is a significant portion of Jews around the world who do not support Israel as it commits its crimes against the Palestinian people, including the crime of apartheid and what has now been called by legal expert, Craig Mokhiber “a textbook case of genocide”.
Secondly, that no matter what our cultural, ethnic and religious differences might be, if we are brave enough, we can recognise and embrace the reality that we have so much more in common and it is our humanity that can and will unite us.
Some, of course, will focus on the ten individuals, proven to have held offensive or genuinely antisemitic signs, who should be held to account for these, but I would rather focus on the 799,990 people who came together to call for a ceasefire and to say that this great tragedy unfolding before our eyes must come to an end. For me, this was the most perfect way we could thank and honour our grandparents, who I like to imagine will be holding the light with us.
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Natalie Stecker is the founding member of the Jersey Palestine Solidarity Campaign.
