The Wisconsin Green Party recognizes the intricacies of the Israel/Palestine conflict and offers this statement in support of the victims on both sides and in criticism of the violence deployed and deplored.

The Green Party stands against violence, whether that violence comes from state or non-state aggressors. “Terrorism,” a term used by state actors to hypocritically smear non-state actors, becomes a meaningless term when examining states and social conditions where the right to coerce populations through the employment of fear and violence forms the crux of the conflict. Neither Hamas nor the state of Israel has a legitimate right to make civilians live in fear of death and displacement. Instead, the Green Party urges the grassroots formation of cooperative groups against nationalism, without interference from either the state of Israel or Hamas.

As to the role of the United States in perpetuating this conflict, we do not doubt for a moment that, considering the role the US has played in genocidal conflict and anti-Semitism in the past, that their support for Israel is much more than cynical geopolitical power politics. The United States has always been an inspiration and a home for militarized, fascist movements, whether authoritarian or decentralized. The goal for the United States is not peace but power.

Therefore, the Green Party calls for an immediate and unconditional end to military aid for Israel. While pundits talk about Israel’s “right to defend itself” from an internal population (more fascist rhetoric), the fact is Israel already has one of the most advanced militaries on the planet thanks to US weapons manufacturers. The Green Party demands civilian funding for Hamas to either become a humanitiarian government institution, or make way for a Palestinian organization that will take civil institution building more seriously. US funds should be used for peace and plenty. We demand that Israel end its anti-Muslim propaganda in schools. Both Israel and Palestine must recognize that they form a multicultural society now and they need to act and organize accordingly. The Green Party stands firmly against the creation or perpetuation of any embattled ethnostate. The right to self-defense belongs squarely with institutions which support democratic and inclusive values, and we do not recognize nondemocratic, nonconsensual institutions as legitimate or necessary.

Israeli citizens are not Nazis, but this fact does not shield them from charges of fascism. Likewise, if Hamas’s only response is to fight fascism with fascism and to fight an ethnostate by forming an ethnostate, they cease to be valiant underdogs in this fight and just become future fascists-in-waiting. The violence is extremely disproportionate, but this does not absolve Hamas of its own violent wrongdoing and common negligence of its own people’s well-being. The Green Party cannot at this time support any militants engaged in such struggle in uncritical support, no matter what side. Burning people, books, and buildings based on the ethnicity of the enemy constitutes genocide.

The time for armed conflict is behind us. The Green Party welcomes the latest ceasefire but until the groups are ready to dialogue like adults, this hateful, anti-human spiral will only continue.

The Israel/Palestine conflict has thrown back the curtain for all the world to see what comes of authoritarian governments. An embattled attitude, peering out from the fortress walls, trusts no one and demands the entire world conform to its paranoic, “us-versus-them” worldview. If we allow authoritarian impulses to continue, whether in the United States or anywhere on Earth, Israel and Palestine show us precisely the nightmare ahead of us.

The Green Party stands for one alternative that is in fact a plurality of futures, a multiplicity of beautiful futures. A Green Party-led nation state serves as damage mitigation for a world on fire. We stand as a vehicle for reparations, redistributing universal goods and services to the people who need it most. In the United States, we move to decentralize and redistribute the legacy of colonialism in the form of spoils – land, wealth, and health – with the aim of restoring indigenous sovereignty, or perhaps an indigenous-authorized, multicultural society. Naturally the expression of our values here will look different than the expression of our values elsewhere, but we call on our kinfolk in the embattled Middle East to discuss these values with us and move past the decades of hate and fear that have locked them in a pyrrhic struggle.