Seven Oaks Magazine.

I woke up last Friday morning at 5:30 am to the sounds of CBC radio news, announcing that the International Court of Justice had indeed found Israel’s “separation wall” illegal and that it infringed on the rights of Palestinians. In my euphoria upon hearing this, I thought “What the heck -- I can sleep another five minutes.” Soon, after pressing the snooze button a few too many times, the joy of being on the side of the vindicated was wearing off each time the buzzer sounded beside my ear. I started to realize this verdict may mean absolutely nothing at the end of the day, if we don’t seize this opportunity to really educate people about it and to work towards the destruction of the wall to which it pertains.

We know Israel is in violation of UN resolution after UN resolution. Virtually the totality of military and political realities with which we associate the state are illegal, so why the hell should they care about this verdict? Well, they are pretending they don’t. A few hours after the verdict came out Israeli representatives were, not surprisingly, denouncing the decision, as they claimed the court held no jurisdiction over this conflict.

Israel should care because they have provided a new dynamic to this conflict. I recognized this a few months ago while watching a homemade video clip someone had taken of the wall. I thought a lot about how I was reacting to these images that I was seeing. I recognized in that moment that the human psyche turns off at a certain point when it is inundated with images and facts about this conflict; another 10 deaths, another bombing, another peace agreement, etc. It starts to turn people off because it is a continuous cycle that they have been hearing about for so long. You are able to separate yourself the more and more it goes on, myself included. To see images of this wall though, something ignited in me. It left me absolutely dumbfounded to see the 25-foot high walls, to see how towns have literally been split into two. The Apartheid Wall gives the everyday person something to condemn Israel for without having to know very much about the politics behind it. It is a new concept to the conflict that is making my job as an activist trying to expose Israeli apartheid a heck of a lot easier. It is an easy concept; if you enclose people behind slabs of concrete, or barbed wire fence, people will become incensed, and I don’t just mean Palestinians. This is the real security threat Israel faces.

Of course, the argument Israel gives for the construction of the wall is for their security and to keep suicide bombers out. Ludicrous to say the least. I have spent a lot of time in my short stint of Palestine solidarity work having Zionists scream in my face, “What about the suicide bombers!?!”

What about them? They’re abhorrent. But one of the most sincere understandings behind suicide bombings that I have heard -- and that provides a good reason why the wall is a ludicrous idea for preventing suicide bombers -- was from a John Pilger’s documentary, Palestine is Still the Issue. It came from a father whose own daughter was killed by a suicide bomber. This father understood that if you cage someone in like an animal, take away their livelihood, leave them absolutely nothing but the body to which their soul once belonged, a person will react with anger and channel their anger towards a form of resistance that will harm their oppressor.

The Apartheid wall will not serve Israel’s purpose for security. The verdict last week and whether or not it is binding (which it is not) is irrelevant, because Israel has provided us with the perfect symbol to resist.

Optimism is not my strongest suit, but I feel that if we are able to keep up this momentum galvanized in the World Court’s decision, world opinion against Israeli state crimes should become more vocal. I am certain in the coming months that Israel’s steam will be lost and that their ‘little wall that could’ will leave them with a world outcry they never thought possible.