Since October 17th, when I published my first blog post talking about IsraeI and PaIestine, I have received many, many comments, emails, texts, and private messages on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook from many of you, expressing sadness and disappointment in my words. Over the next several months, I doubled down, condemning Israel’s relentless slaughter of untold children and civilians. I encouraged actions such as contacting elected officials and demanding they support a permanent ceasefire. I called for us in this sector to support an end to Israel’s settler colonial occupation and apartheid regime, and for a Free Palestine.
So many of you tried to reach me to help me see the errors of my ways. I appreciate the thoughtful funder who called my friend and asked him to relay the message to me that I had offended the “entire Jewish community” in his city by mentioning in a different keynote about how we in the US have been funding g3nocide with our tax dollars and are complicit in IsraeI’s continuing massacre of PaIestinian civilians including over 15,000 children and the injuries of thousands more, and we must as a sector publicly acknowledge it and do everything we can to stop it.
But I have been so stubborn and dismissed the dozens of messages you’ve sent me. At my last presentation, one colleague told the event organizer how disappointed they were that I condemned g3nocide but did not even once call for the release of hostages. And then, when made aware of how upset this colleague was, I further hurt their feelings by calling for the release of ALL hostages: the ones held by H@mas, as well as the nearly 10,000 PaIestinians held by IsraeI, including hundreds of children.
I finally saw the light when a colleague who, upon hearing my words on a virtual panel on reimagining our sector, wrote this message on the evaluation form:
“I am offended by the tone and potential impact of frequent references Vu Le made to US money to support IsraeI[‘s g3nocide of PaIestinians] during today’s closing keynote about overhauling the nonprofit sector. I am neither IsraeIi nor Jewish, and I’m not an expert on the war or politics. I have no credentials upon which to speak out against his comments, but I feel a responsibility to log my dissent, because I keep thinking how terribly hurtful his comments likely were to a community of people who are suffering. Is there a more appropriate forum for me to provide additional context to my concerns?”
It has been eight months now, and I will understand if this is too little too late, but I would like to apologize for my hurtful words and actions. First, to the colleague above and so many others, I am very sorry for my tone. I have been angry and sad, and that made me forget the even in speaking out against injustice, we must try not to offend people’s delicate sensibilities. I now realize that sounding angry when calling out IsraeI’s bombing of refugee camps, hospitals, schools, and mosques, and murdering PaIestinian civilians nonstop with US tax money and weapons, is just as bad as doing the above things. I am so sorry for upsetting you with my brusque tone of voice.
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