Excessive pro-Palestine activism could be hazardous to your health and others.
The horrific act of self-immolation by a US Air Force airman on Sunday at the Israeli Embassy is yet another case of unhealthy obsession with the Palestinian cause.
Sunday in a tragic act to symbolize his objection to US policy regarding what he considered a genocide perpetrated in Gaza by Israel, Aaron Bushnell committed suicide by self-immolation at the Israeli Embassy in Washington, DC (see above). To me it is irrelevant what cause he was doing this for. I have known enough people that either committed suicide or attempted it to know that expressing ill will is the worst gesture to make at a time like this. When I see posts either mocking him from the pro-Israel perspective or on the other hand glorifying him from his pro-Palestine cohorts, it is hard not to think that basic decency has died after four months of war.
On Sunday I published an article on Ganesse Moreno/Escalante and other foreigners who committed acts of violence or self-sacrifice on behalf of Palestine without having any known personal connection to it. To this we can add Bushnell, and another protester who attempted to burn herself alive at the Israeli consulate in Atlanta last December. One could ask why I dwell on the acts of these individuals, some of whom had documented psychological issues. This isn’t just an issue of dumping on the Palestinian cause. I wrote three articles for American Greatness criticizing the phenomenon of Americans and other westerners signing up to fight in Ukraine, stating that they were enlisting for an army that probably would or could not see to their welfare. In November three Canadian troops were killed fighting in Avdiivka, a Ukrainian city that was the sight of a major battle that recently concluded with Russia winning.
While Bushnell's death is indeed tragic, those inspired by it have sunk into a very low place. Case in point is Mohammed El-Kurd, a poet, activist and Palestine correspondent for The Nation who lamented the fact that a certain list of activities are proscribed from being acknowledged as legitimate acts of protest by society. The only problem was that included in it were airplane hijackings, molotov cocktails, and self-immolation, all illegal acts of violence. Former Pink Floyd bassist Roger Waters declared that Bushnell is an "all-American hero". Comedian/commentator Jimmy Dore and Australian political activist Maram Salousi shared a tribute video to Bushnell by Angelo Gage, an actual white supremacist, who has stated his view that it is Jews, not Zionists, that are the problem in the Middle East.
Cornel West and Dr. Jill Stein, two presidential candidates running on the far left, have both praised Bushnell, with the latter eulogizing him with the slogan “rest in power”.
What makes it all the more frustrating about prominent voices glorifying an act of self harm is that it obscures the issue of real violent elements within the pro-Palestine activist community. As usual I will reiterate that I am not talking about those that are simply exercising their free speech in a lawful way and have a right to say their piece regardless of how objectionable or disturbing it may be to others. Rather I am referring to those that would do harm to themselves or others and their property, or make threats and engage in intimidation tactics. On Feb. 27, as Bushnell was still alive, Australian media reported the arrest of Laura Allam, a Lebanese Australian pro-Palestine activist and mother, and two accomplices for facilitating the kidnapping and torture of a person for the transgression of working for a Jew. Weeks earlier a list of hundreds of Jewish Australians with personal information was leaked from a Whatsapp group by pro-Palestine activists leading to a rash of threats of violence and intimidation against them. In November Ali Bazzi, a Lebanese Australian was killed with his Lebanese wife and brother in the Lebanese village of Bint Jbeil by an Israeli airstrike as part of cross-border fighting. Both brothers were members of the military branch of the terror organization Hezbollah, and all three were buried in coffins draped with its yellow and green banner. It is not known yet whether Allam's crime was committed in an independent local capacity, or perhaps was part of a broader network, however the incident highlights several facts in sharp relief:
With the death of Ali Bazzi it is known that a Hezbollah operative lived in Australia and was not deterred from voyaging back to fight for a terror group there.
Hezbollah functions as a parallel "state within a state" in southern Lebanon, but it has operatives throughout the world having committed terror acts in places such as Bulgaria and Argentina and operatives have been arrested in the USA, including two in 2017 and another in 2019. Three operatives were arrested in November 2023 in Brazil while plotting to attack Jewish targets.
The radicalization of American activists provides fertile ground for accomplices in terror plots or alternatively self-starting attackers, and they now have a martyr of their own in Aaron Bushnell for whom there have already been tributes and vigils.
Apart from domestic threats there is also the potential that malign operatives are entering the US through the southern border with the intent of committing crimes or acts of terror here. Nine days after the Oct. 7 attacks Texas state law enforcement divulged that four Iranian illegal aliens had been caught recently, two on the terror threat watchlist, which raises the question of how many are entering undetected.
As noted in previous articles, the pro-Palestine movement's followers dominate many institutions and civil sectors in the country including teacher unions, schools, academic associations, charities and churches. We have already seen one follower, in the military no less, spiral to his death and the reaction of the movement has been to heap praise on him. Will someone seek to imitate or outdo him? Let’s hope we don’t find out.