hard places

i struggle to even imagine the degree of suffering in haiti right now, and as the world turns its head to that region we all wonder, "why do these things happen?" i mean, haiti, new orleans, pakistan, china, all these natural disasters that leave people and communities devastated. some of the situations are obviously compounded by a pre-existing condition where resources are few, keeping the population vulnerable as it is. that is clear in haiti, and the argument has certainly been made for new orleans. in many ways, in a natural disaster what emerges as the most distressing thing is the human responsibility in it. because natural disasters happen, and they are tragic, but they are beyond our control. but the human element, the social element is what we control. if infrastructure wasnt so vulnerable and pathetically supported what sort of situation would we be looking at? if we could mobilize resources immediately to disaster areas rather than focusing our billions on war.
these natural events become disasters because of our human role. and we leave a scar on collective humanity when we acknowledge that we could have done something different.
and its this awareness that makes me return to the palestinian issue. it is not a humanitarian crisis because that would be the result of some natural disaster which would beg the assistance of the world. it is exclusively a human construction, and the ideology behind it is as vile as the science of the atomic bomb. brilliant minds put their efforts behind devising a plan that can only result in destruction and pain. minds that are fooling themselves if they believe that what they are doing is in the name of some objective science, for the benefit of all. this is a political situation, a human situation, and for that it seems to me all the more tragic. we have the ability to influence things here, yet we stand back and watch, let it happen, as if its as inevitable or uncontrollable as an earthquake or a tsunami.