Feeling safer on the home front
Portland’s divestment from Palestinian oppression makes me feel safer here as a Jew.
Imagine the places in Portland where you feel safe. For me, it’s our public spaces: Harbor View Park, Evergreen Cemetery, Burbank Branch Library, Reiche Pool. How would your life change if you lost any one of the spaces in which you feel safe? There are no more public and civic institutions in Gaza, no beautiful and safe outdoor spaces. Israel’s campaign of destruction targeted schools, hospitals and mosques in particular. Open spaces have been transformed into shelters for families forced to move again and again – and these shelters have been targeted and bombed.
How would we call for help if it was our schools, our hospitals, our houses of worship? I am certain that we would ask the world around us to cut off the supply of money and investment to the people causing us harm. I hope that we’d ask for much more. By voting to divest from Israel’s occupation and genocide of Palestinians, our city acts with justice. Our city acts toward others in the way that we would want others to act toward us.
Seeing a Palestinian flag wave, hearing a chant for liberation, learning that my city has no financial stake in genocide: none of these things make me feel unsafe as a Jew in Portland. I feel safer knowing that I live in community with those who will stand up for the oppressed, even when it isn’t comfortable.
Leo Hilton
Portland
Siding with the savages is shameful
Based on the Press Herald account of the Portland City Council meeting in which it voted unanimously to divest from companies doing business in Israel, Mayor Mark Dion must have taken a few too many blows to the head back when he was sheriff. Dion claimed that Israel was laying waste to Gaza for “retribution.”
Retribution? Is Dion kidding? Did he not see or read the reports of the cold-blooded executions last weekend of six Israeli hostages (including American citizen Hersh Goldberg-Polin) who were held in Gaza by the terrorist Hamas organization? One of them, 24-year-old Eden Yerushalmi, had been starved to 78 pounds over the last 11 months when she was shot in the head.
There are another 101 hostages (including Americans) still being held captive by Hamas. That – and the fact that Hamas invaded Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, and slaughtered more than 1,200 innocent people and vow to do it again and again – is the reason Israel is at war in Gaza. It’s not retribution.
Hamas could end the bloodshed in five minutes, by agreeing to give up the hostages and relinquish power in Gaza, where they’ve held their own people in a backward, Islamic fundamentalist hell for over 18 years. But they choose not to, forcing more death and destruction on their own people. And Portland, Maine, my hometown, decides to side with these savages and sanction Israel. Shame on you.
David Brinn
Jerusalem, Israel
A proud day for Portland
I am a Jewish Portlander who is proud of the Portland City Council for its unanimous vote for the resolution calling for the city of Portland to divest.
My family came to Portland as refugees from Ukraine in the late 1800s. They fled pogroms and made their new lives here in Portland. The freedom of movement my family had as refugees and new Mainers is the freedom that all people should have. I believe that Jewish people, and all displaced people, should be welcome everywhere. I do not believe that there should be a nation state that singularly prioritizes Jewish people – or any people – over others.
Our voices matter. In the midst of an ongoing genocide – something my people have also faced – it is everyone’s responsibility to do as much as we can to stop it. I am so proud that Portland chose to not be complicit in the violation of international human rights. I am so proud that Portland’s money will not be invested in corporations making this genocide possible. I am so proud that Portland’s money can instead be invested in ways that support our values – in housing, climate resilience, Wabanaki sovereignty, refugee resettlement and the arts.
Portland is the first major East Coast city to sign a divestment resolution. We know we’re small, but we also know we are influential. I hope other cities across the country follow our lead. We can divest from violence and destruction and we can invest in freedom and justice.
Jeyn Levison
Portland
Don’t stop with Israel
Regarding the Portland City Council’s decision to divest the city from investing in businesses that do business with Israel, here’s a suggestion. Why doesn’t the city do the same with China, Russia and the Arab nations that have been imprisoning and murdering their own citizens and dissidents for years? And that also support terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah?
Also, the Council may not have noticed that none of the Arab nations are supporting the Palestinians or offering to take them into their respective countries.
Jon Spinner
Scarborough
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