In 1877, General O.O. Howard gave the Nez Perce 30 days to leave the Wallowa and get themselves to the much-reduced reservation at Lapwai in Idaho. Other “non-treaty” bands on the other side of the Snake River were given the same orders. There were killings of settlers—who had themselves killed Indians—and then a five-month, 1200-mile fighting retreat toward Canada. Sitting Bull was in Canada, waiting for the fleeing Nez Perce.

Today, Prime Minister Netanyahu gives the Arabs, clinging to ancient space in Gaza City, hours—or in some cases minutes—to leave. To go to some “safe place,” which might not be a safe place hours later. There is no “diminished reservation” for fleeing Gazans—although ever changing “safe zones” are advertised with air-dropped notices. And there is no powerful potential ally like Sitting Bull waiting across an international border that can give hope.

In the runup to Nez Perce removal, there had been a series of negotiations, treaties, and one short-lived executive order “Reservation for the Roaming Nez Perce of the Wallowa Valley in Oregon,” which would have left the Oregon Nez Perce a piece of the Wallowa Country. In all cases—negotiations, treaties, reservations—the ultimate goal of government actions was to make the land available for white settlement. It was to move Indians to an ever-shrinking smaller bit of land “reserved” for them, allowing the settlers to move onto the lands they were leaving.

Israeli—Gaza negotiations have been numerous and years-long. But, In my brief reading of the early Zionists, it was always about displacement. And they found example and hope in the way white Euro-Americans had displaced Indians across a continent. The far-right members of Netanyahu’s cabinet and a large number of settlement Israelis on the West Bank now see fulfillment of Euro-Jewry’s Zionist dream, a holy land occupied and governed by their descendants.

Our president Trump is chorus to that dream. He dislikes the starving Gazan children, and seems a little uncomfortable with the daily bombings and deaths of Arab civilians, but he ultimately weighs in with Netanyahu. He will not cut off the arms our government provides that are being using to decimate Gaza. He will not condemn Israeli actions at the United Nations—while most of the world and many American allies now do.

Donald Trump has had his own idea of how Gaza could be cleansed of its current residents and we—America—would come in, clean up the rubble, and create a “new Riviera.” We could govern for ten years and then turn it over to some unnamed entity. The Gazans could go to “someplace nicer,” also unnamed, or maybe some of them could return after the cleanup. It’s all a bit fuzzy—at least the part about what happens to the Gazans. There is no Canada and Sitting Bull.

Are comparisons a stretch? The Nez Perce were hundreds; the Gazans are millions. Travel was horses; now it is planes and tanks. Arms were bows, rifles, spears, bayonets, and a lone howitzer; arms now start with small bullets from high-powered rifles and work their way up to armed drones, bombs dropped by planes, and exploding missiles. Nuclear hovers in the background, hinted at in raids on Iran. Awkward to talk about, but always there.

There was no nuclear in 1877. New to warfare were those big guns and the telegraph, the information carrier that Joseph came to understand as the tool that kept bringing more American armies to the fight. Maybe the telegraph was the day’s drone. Conveyer of information, but they can be armed as well.

It’s almost 150 years since the flight of the Nez Perce. Miraculously, they are still here. Scattered on reservations in three states. Some still in Canada (yes a few did make it across that border). But still here. Today, a growing number of non-indigenous Americans, descendants of mostly white Euro-American immigrants who have settled Indian lands across a continent, welcome the Indians home. We praise their ancient knowledge—and their attachment to place.

Can we trade minutes for weeks, months for years, years for decades, and envision a holy land which includes Gazans in a matter of years? The numbers and stakes are so much higher now, the power to kill is so much greater. The bigger world’s understanding of justice is so much larger than Netanyahu’s or Trump’s. The urgency is so great.

What/who can put it together. I think none of the current players, and wait for something or someone new.

# # #

Photo: Nez Perce National Historical Park. War in Yellowstone.