Only grassroots can change US policies

Q: Mr. McGovern, it seems that you attended today’s rally in Washington. First of all tell us how did the demonstration go?
 
McGovern: The demonstrations went extremely well. There were thousands and thousands of people there and we marched and we listened to various talks and then we demonstrated in front of the White House itself. It’s the biggest demonstration we have had in a year or two.
 
Q: And of course speaking about the power of the people which can be manifested in these demonstrations, how much power do the people have to stop the Israeli war and to stop America’s support for Israel?
 
McGovern: We have to depend on grassroots now. The administration has been supporting Israel and the point that I made when I made my little speech was simply that as the massacre continues and the enabling voice, the enabling force happens to be the United States, we need to act and what I referred to is two prophets. One was Abraham Heschel, a Jewish scholar who said indifference to evil is worse than evil itself and he added that there are times when not all of us are guilty but all of us are responsible.
 
And that speaks to me because if it weren’t for US support for this terrible aggression by Israel, Israel would not be able to do it. Isaiah was the other prophet in our common tradition, our Abrahamic tradition whom I quoted. Isaiah happened to go around stark naked for two years and the people said what does that mean? And Isaiah said I stripped myself off my clothes and you say oh isn’t that terrible? You Israelis, you are stripped off the vision with which Yahuwah blessed you. A vision of justice, shalom and that is far more reprehensible than stripping.
 
That is what we need to do right now to point out that if there is to be shalom, if there is to be salaam, it has to be based on justice.
 
Now many of us, I myself included, were arrested on Wednesday for blocking the Israeli embassy and we were put in jail. That has to happen. We need to put our bodies into this machine. We have a tradition in this country called civil disobedience and Henry Thoreau and Emerson, Emerson was the teacher and Thoreau was his student, now Thoreau went to jail for civil disobedience and Emerson visited him there and he said what are you doing in here Henry? And Henry said Ralph, Ralph Waldo Emerson, the question is what are you doing out there?
 
So I ended my speech by saying there are times when we have to act on our conscience and if that means disobeying, if that means civil disobedience, then we can fill the prisons.
 
During Occupy Movement they put us in prison, they put us in jail. Well now we need to fill the jails. Where are they going to put us then? Where are they going to arrest us? We will be in jail.
 
    What we need to do is put our bodies into this struggle because the only thing that the US government will listen to is grassroots civil disobedience. That is what we are now and the thousands that showed up today integrate hope that the Americans do care what happens to the children, women and the men of Gaza and we will rise up and change our nation’s policy. It is going to take a strong effort but I think it can be done. 
 
 
Q: And you spoke of justice, what is the likelihood that the Israeli perpetrators would be brought to justice?
 
McGovern: Well you know sometimes it takes a long time. A lot of people have not been brought to justice in even our own country. President Obama yesterday said we tortured some folks but hello, are those people not to be brought to justice?
 
The answer is yes they will be, perhaps not this year but the following year or five years. Justice is a long arc but it bends and it bends towards implementing justice even when perpetrators escape for the nonce and we have a whole bunch of people in this country and of course in Israel as they continue this onslaught on Gaza who will be brought to justice and I would say from my own faith tradition if not in this world then in the next.