Politics / Local people express horror at Gaza suffering and demand ceasefire
- MP calls for Israeli arms embargo and the recognition of the Palestinian state
- Local writers sign public letter calling on the world to end the collective silence
MORE THAN £30,000 has been raised in Shetland over the last two years towards helping to alleviate the human suffering in Gaza.
Calling for peace and justice and for an immediate ceasefire to stop Gaza being erased by Israeli forces, a dozen local people gathered outside the parliamentary office in Lerwick’s Commercial Street for a vigil on Saturday.
Photo: Hans J Marter/Shetland News
They have been coming together for the weekly Gathering for Peace every Saturday (with very few exceptions) since early 2023 in response to the ever-deteriorating humanitarian situation in the region.
On Saturday, they also launched their week-long Grand Art Sale at the Toll Clock Shopping Centre to raise funds for charities such as Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) as well as in support of communal kitchens in Gaza.
Group co-ordinator Leanne Goodlad said local artists have a wide variety of works for sale. Last year a similar arts sale raised around £10,000 and she hopes a similar amount could be reached again.
Goodlad said a ‘mixed bag’ of people have come together under the Palestinian Solidarity Shetland umbrella, people of different ages, experiences and across the political spectrum, all “brought together by the shared values of peace and justice”.
Part of the hour long gathering every Saturday is a two minute long silence for Palestinians and Israelis and “for those who are suffering and those who have been killed”.
Goodlad said the gatherings are an opportunity for locals to show their concern about the humanitarian suffering at Gaza publicly, adding the support in the community is much larger than the size of the group holding up posters might suggest.
“Coming from the middle ground of peace and justice, these are values that most people want to uphold,” she said.
“It is really good to get that sense of community across.
“I know politics around this can be very divisive, but we want to bring it back to the shared values. The fact that we do these gatherings in silence does help reduce some of the negativity that we might have had.”
One of those attending regularly is Hilde Bardell, who has been visiting Gaza and the Westbank as part of her church group to meet people who worked across the religious divides in the area.
She said she continues to be in touch with many of those she met all these years ago, and feels heartbroken at the ongoing violence.
“Since then, really, it has got worse and worse and worse,” she said.
“We are still in touch with some of the people we met back in the 90s, and we watch in wonder how some of them still refuse to hate even when they are in this constant situation.”
She said there are “little flickers of hope” as people try to get dialogue going. “When Leanne started this, Peter, my husband, and I had to join,” she said.
Goodlad said they have had discussions with MP Alistair Carmichael who is supportive of their cause, and who has been to Gaza as part of a delegation in 2007.
Speaking on Monday morning the MP said: “There has to be concerted international pressure on Israel to allow aid into Gaza to avert what is going to be a humanitarian disaster.
“It is easier to build consensus in that if governments like ours would take a lead on that.
“We also need to look on a total arms embargo on Israel for as long as this conflict continues.”
He said that this would not end the war in Gaza, but Britain would be seen doing this by others, and that in itself would make an impact.
He added: “Every possible pressure has to be put on Hamas to release the remaining hostages. That should be everybody’s priority including that of Benjamin Netanyahu.”
Finally, Carmichael said, it was high time for the Palestinian state to be recognised by the UK.
Meanwhile, four local authors, or those with a connection to the isles, have put their name to a public letter last week calling on the world to end the “collective silence and inaction in the face of horror”.
Donald Murray, Malachy Tallack, Sally Huband and Bristol-based Marianne Brown, who published a book on the Viking wind farm earlier this year, joined many internationally known writers in demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
“Palestinians are not the abstract victims of an abstract war. Too often, words have been used to justify the unjustifiable, deny the undeniable, defend the indefensible. Too often, too, the right words — the ones that mattered — have been eradicated, along with those who might have written them,” the letter reads.
Murray told Shetland News that “in some ways” signing the letter had been a “very difficult task to do”.
“I have always been acutely aware of the suffering that Jewish people experienced in Europe throughout much of that continent’s history, whether in Spain, France, Russia, Germany or elsewhere – even sometimes within a great deal of the United Kingdom and neighbouring Irish shores. Clearly this made me sympathetic to them.
“However, the last while has made me reach a point where I can no longer remain silent about the suffering that the Netanyahu government has inflicted on the people of Gaza.
“They are not the only ones guilty in this situation. Clearly Hamas also bears a great deal of responsibility for what has happened, especially in terms of the attack they led against Israel in October 2023 and the consequences thereafter.
“Despite this, no one can defend the scale of the cruel and vindictive behaviour of Israeli forces over the last few years. It has been utterly excessive and immoral, a disgrace not just for that country but one that affects all humanity.”
Brown added: “Through the window of social media, we are all witness in real time to the unendurable suffering of the Palestinian people. We all have a duty to shout as loud as we can to stop the genocide.”
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