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<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
By any other name<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n <\/span>by Stuart McFarlane<\/em><\/p>\n Now the school of semantics is fully enrolled, By any other name by Stuart McFarlane Now the school of semantics is fully enrolled, we begin to believe the lies we\u2019re being sold. \u2018Proportional response\u2019, \u2018Collateral…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":692,"featured_media":16458,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1660],"tags":[3047,2845,2866],"class_list":["post-16461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry-2","tag-ceasefire","tag-gaza","tag-genocide"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/692"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16461\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16458"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
we begin to believe the lies we\u2019re being sold.
\u2018Proportional response\u2019, \u2018Collateral damage\u2019.
\u2018It\u2019s a situation we feel we can manage\u2019.
Politicians, as ever, so sensible,
queue up to defend the indefensible.
The Israelis freely act without constraint.
The Americans continue to urge restraint.
Schools, housing, hospitals; all are destroyed,
yet, still, euphemistic terms are employed.
Artillery posts now even have trouble
finding a building to reduce to rubble.
And, as Gaza withers, festers and rots
the diplomats tie themselves up in knots.
\u2018Not a ceasefire, a humanitarian pause\u2019.
Treating the symptoms, not the underlying cause.
But Israel miscalculated, and crossed a red line,
in denying the idea of a Palestine.
For an idea does not so easily die;
all the dead children of Gaza so testify.
How can the fighting now ever cease?
There\u2019s not the faintest prospect of peace.
By conducting such a senseless war
they’ve only ensured centuries more.
You can justify anything, if you try hard enough
but, deep down, do we realize, it\u2019s all so much guff.
So, don\u2019t pretend, as you kill, wound and maim,
it’s not murder; by any other name.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"