‘Power To The People’
The invasion of Ukraine is hate and bullying in the largest sense
My friend, the filmmaker, Sarah Koskoff posted the above photograph. It is her family coming to America from Ukraine more than 100 years ago. They are Ukrainian Jews fleeing the hate and anti-Semitism of the region.
Here’s what Sarah wrote:
These Ukrainian Jews are my great grandfather and grandmother, her parents (great greats) and a few great aunts and uncles circa 1902. They escaped Pogrom ravaged Yelizavetgrad (now Kirovograd) and came to New Haven where my grandfather and his six siblings (in the second photo) were able to study classical music. If you’ve ever played the Jewish gameshow “Which Pogrom Was It?” you know that Russians have been pummeling Jews and other minority groups for centuries. Zelensky, that unlikely Goliath fighter, does the ancestors proud. And his transformation to me echoes that of Henry in Shakespeare’s Henry V. “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more…” And life continues to surprise…#ukraine #davidandgoliath #standuptobullying#powertothepeople
The city Sarah mentions is in central Ukraine today. Her story is familiar to many refugee families of the world, to many peoples victimized by war, hatred, and crazy geopolitics.
Her family’s story has direct relationship to the war now because her family was forced to leave by a Russian Pogrom against Jewish people, and we all know, a Pogrom is a genocidal invasion.
Sarah’s family is just one of millions of Jewish people who had to vacate because of hate and violence and depraved values. It is the madness of geopolitics which has not been unstable like this for a long time.
Leaders pursue crazy, made up agendas and the people always are caught in the crosshairs of their nascent bullying and warcraft.
Putin is a pathetic, corrupt bully. Ukraine was an easy target and he knows it. The egg has been cracked now too. We all know the most difficult thing to do in a war is once the guns are out, it is hard to put them away.
The U.S. over the decades has engaged in this kind of geopolitical bullying as well. Anyone remember Grenada in 1983, or Panama, 1989–90? People were the casualties of some mad agenda then as well.
Putin has used this notion of the U.S. protecting its own turf to justify his incursion into Ukraine. He is right the U.S. has been guilty of bullying; he is completely wrong that his move on Ukraine is justified because of that. It isn’t. His is the disturbed rationale of an authoritarian dictator.
Yet, I am not here to defend the U.S.; I am here to condemn war, violence, and hate and stand with ordinary people suffering in the conflict and any such conflict.
Every time there is a war or a terrorist attack anywhere that is who I think about mostly. We have to stand with the people of Ukraine as Bernie Sanders said. When the U.S. invaded Iraq, I know millions of people opposed it and stood with the people of Iraq. I know I did.
And like in Iraq, people are leaving Ukraine now and don’t want to leave. People are being killed and wounded. People who just want to live their lives, raise their children, water their plants, make great art, and live a dignified life of happiness, whatever that means.
Like Sarah’s family, in the photo, forced to leave their home because of a Russian Pogrom against Jewish people. This is not how things are supposed to be and we all know it.
#PowerToThePeople
