Documentary Israelism Inspires locals to speak out
Last month the San Pedro Neighbors for Peace and Justice or SPNPJ and Codepink San Pedro collaborated on its second community film screening, this time featuring the award-winning documentary Israelism, at Collage. The film focuses on two young American Jews who are raised to defend the state of Israel at all costs and underscores the portrayal of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict in American Jewish institutions. The screening was followed by a discussion with a diverse audience, including Jews and Muslims — some who testified to their experiences since Oct 7, 2023. The purpose of the event was to gather in fellowship, to strengthen the call to end the U.S. weapons sales to Israel, and to strengthen local Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions or BDS efforts.
Interviewees in Israelism include Noam Chomsky, Cornel West, Jeremy Ben-Ami, and Sami Awad. The film is shown from the perspectives of Simone Rimmon Zimmerman (co-founder of IfNotNow and formerly the Jewish outreach coordinator for Sen. Bernie Sanders) and a former Jewish American IDF soldier identified only as “Eitan.” It walks viewers through Zimmerman’s and Eitan’s original understanding of Israel, learned through attending their Jewish day and religious schools, summer camp and organized trips. That understanding evolves once they trek to Israel and see the reality of the lives of Palestinians. Upon the “Birthright Israel” initiation at 17 to 18 years of age, Zimmerman, and Eitan (through his IDF training) come to witness a different reality from what they were taught. As the film highlighted, “Some American Jews who come here say: ‘We came to Israel and we left from Palestine.’”
They were shocked at the reality on the ground, at the border wall between Israel and occupied territories, how Palestinians have to go through countless checkpoints just to get to work, to the market, wherever, to see how IDF soldiers treat Palestinians with intimidation, brutality and surveillance. They realized they were not told the truth about Israel’s existence, while they were taught to believe that “the only way Jews can be safe is if Palestinians are not safe.”
The film documents the systematic indoctrination that is applied to grooming young Zionists through the subject’s perspectives and it unveils the apartheid state the Palestinians are forced to “live” under.
The event was well attended, bringing a full house and a potluck. SPNPJ and Codpink SP’s first screening featured the award-winning film Where Olive Trees Weep. San Pedro Neighbors for Peace and Justice, and Codepink San Pedro have longtime standing in this community educating and activating against war and racism, and for justice and security for all people. Preceding the event, the group held its weekly vigil for Gaza at 13th and Gaffey street in San Pedro. This vigil began within a week of the Hamas attacks on Oct. 7, 2023 and has continued consistently since then. The first vigil took place at the USS Iowa, where the activist groups called for “hospital ships, not warships.” It was there that the activists made their first contact with the local Palestinians and the larger Middle Eastern community. SPNPJ then decided to restart its weekly peace vigils, this time in particular for Gaza. Since then, the groups have held banner drops at the San Pedro welcome bridge, incorporating drone photography and posting on social media about the action.
Addressing Representatives
The peace activists make it a practice to inform local representatives ahead of their scheduled rallies to invite them to come outside to meet and engage in discussion on the issues and their demands. Earlier this spring, they contacted the Harbor region’s Rep. Nanette Barragán’s office and held a rally in front of her Long Beach office to urge her to act specifically on behalf of the children murdered in Gaza and to call for a ceasefire.
The group did the same at LA city councilmember Tim McOsker’s office in July. This rally was to address a potential vote for a $2-million grant program to increase LAPD presence for security for nonprofit groups and places of worship. The proposal resulted after Palestinian solidarity activists protested a meeting, outside of a Los Angeles synagogue, to discuss real estate deals on Israel’s West Bank, and where the activists were attacked by (Zionist) real estate interests (other publications have described the incident as a violent confrontation between protesters). SPNPJ and Jewish Voice for Peace also had a face-to-face meeting with Tim McOsker at his office urging him to vote against the motion which would have directed $2 million dollars of city funds to IDF or Israeli Defence Force trained police in LA.
Additionally, the peace activists have rallied in front of Dana Middle School in San Pedro to call attention to the scholasticide — the massive destruction and total erasure of the Palestinian educational system at every level — including universities, in Gaza.
Brunke said, last May, San Pedro’s Peace Week (which happens alongside the annual Fleet Week to highlight peace efforts) was dedicated to drawing attention to the growing genocide and the use of U.S. weapons, U.S. tax dollars and U.S. personnel to carry out the genocide by Israel. She also noted that the feminist grassroots organization Codepink reaches far and wide and during the weekly rally they see new people joining them all the time.
“We have had people from San Clemente, from the Inland Empire, from the Ventura area and our rally has spurred another weekly rally in Redondo Beach every Sunday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on the corner of Hawthorne and Redondo Beach Boulevard,” Bruhnke said. “We have also been featured a few times on KPFK Rebel Alliance News and we participated in the vigil against Maersk “Mask off Maersk” (an action that took place against the world’s second-largest container shipping line in August in San Pedro for the company sending weapons to Israel).
The peace activist group’s calls to action are:
1) To invite and include the local councilmember, congressmember and county supervisor to each community event they hold, to engage in discussion and hear the communities concerns.
2) Join another screening of Israelism at Pacific Unitarian Church in Rancho Palos Verdes at 7 p.m., Dec. 6 as part of its social justice movie night series. The free screening is being hosted by PUC’s new pastor, Joshua Berg who is also a member of Jewish Voice for Peace.
In an effort to encourage discussion, Bruhnke shared with Random Lengths News the letter the peace activists sent to local representatives to tell them about the recent screening they were invited to.
The letter below has been edited for length:
“It was sad, though.
Muslims shared the frightening anti-Arab discrimination they have long felt in our area, and the anguish they and their community are experiencing having family members affected or in fact, killed, in the year-long U.S.-backed Israeli assault on Gaza. One attendee was Lebanese, who sobbed as she described the Israeli bombing right now all around her family in Southern Lebanon.
Teachers and parents shared their horror at the images and videos of the carnage against children by U.S.- made and funded Israeli bombs. Over 15,000 those killed so far have been children. Many thousands more are trapped under the rubble or shoveled into mass graves. The trauma to the survivors will last for decades.
Jews at this event shared the frustration and outrage they feel that in their name and against their will, their religion and heritage, built over millennia, they are being used to justify the current slaughter of Palestinians and the widening of this war. Two Jewish groups who have members in our area are “Jewish Voice for Peace” and “If Not Now.” The film, in fact, ends with the voices of these groups, showing the profound struggle for justice that is at the heart of Judaism. It was rousing and righteous.
Despite some people in the U.S. not wanting this film seen by other Americans, we were proud and satisfied that we fully exercised, and will continue to exercise, our 1st Amendment Rights, which are self-evident and inalienable.
Together as humans, we can solve the problems of war, racism and the fight over the earth’s land and resources, which will only get worse and more global if we don’t address them with reason, equity and sustainability.
Peace is not only the desired end result. It is the very way to that end.”
