This blog was intended to celebrate the passing
of the Civil Rights Act, fifty years ago. However, the murder of three Israeli
boys, Gilad Shaer and Naftali Fraenkel, both 16 and Eyal Yifrah, 19, brings to
mind a shocking event in 1964, three weeks before the passing of the Civil
Rights Act.
In the early 1960s Mississippi, like most of the
South, was in defiance of federal authority concerning black civil rights. The
National Guard was called upon frequently to quell civil disturbance. Supreme
Court rulings, particularly Brown v Board
of Education, Topeka, had infuriated
the white establishment which responded with bombings, murders, vandalism, and
intimidation. Mississippi was no stranger to such outrages.
The establishment of the Freedom Riders, blacks and whites alike, usually from the northern United States, challenged
the segregation laws and voting rights imbalances in the South and supporting the
black underclass in its demand for change. Among the Freedom Riders were three
young men, Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andy Goodman, who in June, 1964,
headed for Mississippi.
The White Knights, a splinter group of the Mississippi
Ku Klux Klan, militaristically prepared for the anticipated Freedom Rider invasion.
Media reports overstated the number of youths coming to Mississippi to set up
voting registration drives. The reports influenced many white Mississippians who
joined the White Knights. More belligerent than other KKK groups, the White
Knights had a following of nearly 10,000.
On Memorial
Day, 1964, Schwerner and Chaney spoke to the
congregation at Mount Zion Methodist Church in Longdale, Mississippi; they
talked of setting up a Freedom School and a voting drive in Neshoba County. The
White Knights learned of the event and plotted to hinder the work and destroy
efforts to help the black community. The White Knights beat the congregation
members and then torched the church, burning it to the ground.
On June 21, 1964, Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner
drove to Longdale, Mississippi, to investigate the destruction of the Mount
Zion Church. After visiting Longdale, they headed west on highway 16 to
Philadelphia, planning to take the southbound Highway 19 to Meridian.
Their station wagon had barely passed the
Philadelphia city limits when they were stopped. Chaney was arrested for
driving 65 mph in a 35 mph zone; Goodman and Schwerner were held too.
They were taken to the Neshoba County jail. There is no need to go into gory
details. Suffice it to say that Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner were shot, soon
after their release from the jail. Their bodies were taken to a remote farm and
buried.
Now, some fifty years later, three more young
boys have been found murdered on the Israeli border. It seems they were
abducted while hitch-hiking. Whilst Hamas has not claimed responsibility for
the atrocity, it has praised the kidnappers. Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli
prime minister, has accused Hamas, the Palestine Islamist group, of the murders.
Israel has bombed Gaza. Palestine now holds its breath as more Israeli
reprisals are expected. As yet,
the collateral damage, a euphemism for innocent civilian casualties, is not
known.
Why are young men, whether American or Israeli,
pawns in a larger game? How can white supremacists fifty years ago or
Palestinian “freedom fighters”, otherwise known as thugs, possibly justify the
abduction and murder of young people as a proper way of advancing a cause? And
how is further killing in the name of reprisal warranted.
Both killings, albeit fifty years apart, are
appalling and inexcusable. In the case of the Americans, guilty men were
brought to justice, one as late as 2005. In the case of the Israelis, how many more
innocent Palestinians will lose their lives in revenge attacks for the loss of
three boys?
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