I wrote A Hill High Enough and tossed a rough demo out into the world in about a day and a half (that’s very fast for me). It felt important to set it free immediately, at this moment. I was prompted to do so by feelings of dread and dismay.
The response to the song was generally curious confusion. So I have spent a lot of time and spilled a lot of ink today unsuccessfully trying to explain to people what it is about.
Ultimately, this is the best explanation that I can manage.
I was inspired to write this song by two things:
1. I have an Israeli friend who is on the ground in Israel. He is convinced that the terrorist strike could not have occurred without the government allowing it to happen. He says Israel is in full mobilization for an all out war. The country is a powder keg. He is terrified of the US getting involved and escalating the conflict. He believes an Israeli invasion of Gaza is imminent and that people will die by the thousands. He has a respected friend who believes the war will see a death toll in the hundreds of thousands in Gaza.
In an apocalyptic scenario (which I see no reason to rule out completely), with the US involved in the war and using Israel as a staging ground, Syria presents the next target. Then Iran, the confiscation of Iranian oil, and from there on to Russia and WWIII.
2. An associate of mine, a wealthy, entitled white person, is staying at a luxury resort in a country close to the conflict zone. She is interacting with Israeli “refugees” (i.e. wealthy evacuees to a luxury resort). These are people with whom she can identify and sympathize. She does not relate to poor brown people who don’t speak English or one of the European languages she knows. From the outside it seems like she cannot see poor brown people as human. She has begun spouting hateful, violent expressions of desire to eradicate the Palestinians once and for all, because they deserve it. She isn’t Jewish, and she lives in North America.
I have no idea what will happen from here, but I have a feeling of dread. I believe that the chances of multiple cascading holocausts is significantly higher than 0%. And I feel anger and dismay at the range of sentiment I am seeing directed towards Palestinian HUMAN BEINGS ranging from disregard to utter contempt.
In the song, as the grandson of a holocaust survivor, as someone who is highly sensitized to the centuries of horrific and repeated traumas that the Jewish people have experienced, I am saying –
“I REALLY get why you want to fight. But please don’t do it. There are a lot of powerful interests itching for a war. There are crusaders who are eager for a holy war. But you are being manipulated, and the results could be catastrophic.”
The Daily Stone
It’s all quite horrible, made worse by the public’s general ignorance. My mom looked up the Wikipedia article for Zionism and thought it seemed like a legitimate movement, even as a friend and I told her the noble goals were just a veneer used to mischaracterize cruel conquest. To find the culprit, one only need follow the weapons: Israel is stacked, Gaza is not. As soon as the “civilains are evil just for existing on this land” rhetoric starts coming out, you know it’s going to get really ugly.
We poor human beings are tragically easy to manipulate.
This post was actually the third and shortest piece I wound up writing to explain what I was trying to express in this song. The first and second were very linear and analytical, which works great for very linear and analytical thinkers. But I think most people don’t really think that way, so I was still getting feedback from listeners that they were confused.
With this attempt I took the approach of telling a story, which it seems most people can relate to much more easily. But in the first “essay” I expressed that my sympathies will always lie with the underdog in a conflict. In this scenario that is so clearly and obviously the Palestinians.
In a perverse inversion, a people who were pushed out of society, consolidated into ghettos, then physically walled in by the millions to be denied food and water and subjected to periodic execution have turned around and done the same thing to another group.
But it’s very complicated. From my own philosophical perspective, I don’t really believe in good guys and bad guys. We’re all just fucked up humans who are basically doomed to inflict upon others the same misery that was inflicted upon ourselves. And the root of the misery doesn’t even have to lie in our own lifetime – the traumas are somehow perpetuated throughout generations.
It’s SOOOO easy to identify a bad guy. And from there it’s a natural step to “othering” – dehumanizing them for their differences. And it’s something that we ALL seem to fall victim to.
The Israel/Palestine situation is a like a worst-case scenario for horror and tragedy and absurd, almost farcical inversions. But it is unbelievably complex and convoluted, and filled with horror on each side. I can’t even begin to tease out the intricacies or pretend I have an idea for a solution.
And I think even the issue of “Zionism” is in the same boat. It’s a huge, complex topic full of all kinds of people with lots of different ideas and behaviors, and frankly I do not feel qualified to have a cohesive opinion on the merits of the idea or on the movement in its myriad of iterations and numerous faces.
BUT, in MY opinion, whatever the intentions and objectives may have been for establishing a nation for the Jewish people IN PALESTINE, and without even trying to get into the weeds of what actions by which actors led to the situation we see today, the result is clearly an unending crescendo of catastrophe that threatens to have global repercussions. And to this point, the lion’s share of the suffering has been borne by the Palestinians.
But I have to point out that this song wasn’t meant to wrestle with that huge Gordian Knot. I CAN state that it is an expression of staunch opposition of “MILITANT Zionism.”
I have been debating whether or not to create a post based on those first two analytical and linear essays. As one of my two commenters, I would be happy to post that more thorough discussion if you thought it would be of interest 🙂
Thanks so much for your feedback so far! I really appreciate it! And please post some more content on your blog too when you can!!!
WORD.
😆