Burning Man: Aaron Bushnell’s message to us all

A few days ago, on 25 February, US serviceman Aaron Bushnell set himself on fire in front of the Israeli Embassy in Washington in protest at the US and Israel’s genocidal actions in Gaza.  His last words on this Earth, as the fire consumed him, were: “Free Palestine!” 

On video an officer desperately tries to put out the blaze, shouting at another officer who is mindlessly pointing his gun at the flaming Aaron Bushnell: ”I don’t need guns!!  I need a fire extinguisher!”  From Washington to Rafah those words hold true. 

The mainstream media quickly moved on from the story. We shouldn’t. New Zealand and Australia have troops in the Middle East, supporting America and Israel. We need to wake up to what is being done in our name. 

When I was a child a Buddhist monk set himself on fire in Vietnam to protest the religious and social discrimination of the US-backed government of President Ngo Dinh Diem. The Americans soon tired of President Diem and the CIA organised for his capture, murder and replacement the same year. 

The image of the flaming monk, Thich Quang Duc, slowly burnt its way into my consciousness as the photo appeared and reappeared throughout the long years of America’s – and our – war on the Vietnamese people.  We butchered millions, yet orange-robed Thich Quang Duc sitting erect and seemingly serene as the orange flames engulfed him has endured.  And so did the resistance his self-immolation ignited.  

Among his last words were:

“Before closing my eyes and moving towards the vision of the Buddha, I respectfully plead to President Ngô Đình Diệm to take a mind of compassion towards the people of the nation and implement religious equality to maintain the strength of the homeland eternally."

Less well known is that several Americans followed his example and used self-immolation to protest America’s crimes against the Vietnamese people. The first was an 82-year-old Quaker Alice Herz who appealed to people to “awake”.  As she set herself on fire she said she was protesting “the arms race and a president using his high office to wipe out small nations.”  We should remember Alice Herz – and her message. 

As the US-backed Arab oligarchs of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf States mumble protests against the genocide in Gaza, trying to contain their own populations’ outrage, we should always remember the name and never forget the sacrifice that that a desperately poor young fruitseller named Mohamed Bouazizi made in 2010 in Tunisia, setting himself alight after police confiscated his scales and fruit for refusing to pay a bribe. It was the match, the spark that lit the Arab Spring.  His uncle recalls the last words we have of a young man who struggled to feed his family: 

‘I’m so fed up and tired,’ he told him. ‘I can’t breathe anymore’.”

I can’t breathe. These were also the last words of Eric Garner whose strangulation by police  triggered the Black Lives Matter movement.  We need to join the dots. 

My family is from Cork and members of it were active in the struggle to drive the British out of Ireland.  My grandfather suffered destruction of property, imprisonment, years on the run, and other hardships which drove him to an early grave. But his comrade in the struggle Terence MacSwiney paid a greater price. It was not a match or lighter fuel that killed him but his hunger strike. Terence MacSwiney was the Lord Mayor of Cork, and like Thich Quang Duc, like Aaron Bushnell, and like so many Palestinian people, he just could no longer tolerate the injustice being inflicted by the powerful of this world.  He died in a prison in England in 1920.  At the end he said:

“It is not those who can inflict the most but those who can endure the most who will conquer.”

One man who was impressed by the actions of Irishmen like Terence MacSwiney and my grandfather Dermot O’Brien was Ho Chi Minh who, in time, would inspire generations of Vietnamese to fight for independence. He was working in London when MacSwiney died, and was one of the tens of thousands who attended his memorial service. Ho said at the time, "A nation that has such citizens will never surrender".

The Irish got their freedom after centuries of struggle. Ho Chi Minh did not live to see the Red flag rise over Saigon or the last defeated Americans flee in chaos by helicopter from the roof of the US Embassy, but he knew the Vietnamese would get their freedom after centuries of brutal colonial rule - and they did.  One day the dark night of the Palestinian people too will end if enough good people stand and fight for justice. 

I’m shocked, horrified and deeply moved by the sacrifice Aaron Bushnell made.  A young, white American serviceman has done the unthinkable: he has turned his living body into a burning spear of protest shaken in the face of Israel and America. Without endorsing the form of protest, we should at least pause and reflect.  As he calmly walked up to the perimeter fence of the Israeli Embassy, he said:

“I am an active duty member of the United States Air Force. I will no longer be complicit in genocide. I’m about to engage in an extreme act of protest, but compared to what people have been experiencing in Palestine at the hands of their colonisers, it’s not extreme at all. This is what our ruling class has decided will be normal. Free Palestine."

Earlier that day, Aaron posted this on X as he set up the livestream: 

“Many of us like to ask ourselves, “What would I do if I was alive during slavery?  Or the Jim Crow South? Or Apartheid? What would I do if my country was committing genocide?” The answer is, you’re doing it. Right now.”

EUGENE DOYLE

Eugene is a community organiser based in Wellington, New Zealand. His first protest was at the age of 12 against the Vietnam War.