Statement by ANSWER National Director Brian Becker on the
Self-Immolation of U.S. Airman Aaron Bushnell at the Israeli embassy
in Washington D.C.
The decision by U.S. Airman Aaron
Bushnell to set himself on fire in front of the Israeli embassy while
condemning the U.S.-backed Israeli genocide being carried out against
the people of Gaza was a desperate act designed to arouse public
outrage. He made the ultimate personal sacrifice to end a genocide
that the entire world has been witnessing for the past
months.
This was an act of martyrdom by a
U.S. service member who was outraged by the actions of a government
that speaks in his name. Aaron said as he set himself on fire, “I will
not be complicit with genocide”.
His actions cannot but remind one
of the self-immolation of 22 year-old anti-war activist Norman
Morrison, who doused himself in kerosene and set himself on fire below
the office of then-Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara at the
Pentagon to protest the escalating genocidal war waged by the United
States against the people of Vietnam. Six months before Norman
Morrison took his own life, president Lyndon Johnson had authorized
the mass use of napalm against the people of Vietnam and escalated the
carpet bombing that was killing thousands of civilians each week.
Morrison’s act was also in line with the self-immolation protests
carried out by Buddhist monks in South Vietnam to protest the South
Vietnamese puppet government. Daniel Ellsberg witnessed Norman
Morrison’s self-immolation. He was horrified and cited it, along with
the mass anti-war protests sweeping the country, as one of the factors
that affected him deeply as he moved into active opposition to the
war. He ultimately released the Pentagon Papers to the media, which
revealed that the U.S. government had been lying about the Vietnam War
for a decade.
People all over the United States,
in the millions, have been involved in mass actions to protest the
U.S. support for Israeli genocide against the Palestinian people in
recent months. People have also engaged in civil disobedience actions
of many types. Many have been arrested and are facing trial, including
many whose constitutional rights were violated by violent police
repression.
Aaron Bushnell’s action is a
reflection, an indicator, a marker, of the profound change in
consciousness in the United States. The previously dominant narrative
that backed the Israeli apartheid government is dramatically giving
way to a narrative based on the truth: that the Palestinian people
have been the victims of dispossession, ethnic cleansing, violence of
all types and now a genocidal killing spree in Gaza. And people in the
United States and around the world are horrified and are mobilizing on
multiple fronts in support of Palestine.
Aaron Bushnell’s sacrifice takes
place on the eve of a planned invasion of Rafah by the Israeli
military. People all over the United States are coming together on March 2nd for mass actions in cities and towns across
the United States as part of a global day of protest demanding no
invasion of Rafah, a ceasefire to end the Israeli killing spree and
the lifting of the siege of Gaza.
We send our sympathy and solidarity
to Aaron Bushnell's family and loved ones. He has made the ultimate
sacrifice in a quest for justice and in solidarity with the oppressed
people of Palestine.
Brian Becker, National Director, ANSWER
Coalition
|