The Other 228: A Taiwanese American reflects on Palestine

Content warning: frank discussion of violence and ethnic cleansing

Let me start with a story of my people.

The year is 1947, in Taiwan. World War II ended two years ago, and with it came the collapse of the Japanese Empire, which once ruled the island. Half a century of harsh Japanese rule has come to an end, but in its place is something more sinister: the Republic of China. The past two years of Chinese rule have seen thousands of settlers arrive in Taiwan from all different regions of the mainland. Their clothes and their languages are varied, but something in their eyes always looks the same. For this, they believe, is their land, and they will take what they want from it.

Within a short time frame, the island is essentially looted. Stockpiles of sugar and coal from the war are shipped off to the mainland at exorbitant prices by government officials. Native Taiwanese, barred from investing in productive industries during the Japanese era, are once again locked out under the Chinese. Mismanagement of everything from rail lines to public waterways upends the social services that have held Taiwanese communities together. ROC police harass the locals and turn a blind eye to gangs of thieves (when not directly aiding them, of course). Everywhere, there is blatant oppression, and eventually, the tension snaps.

On February 28th, two Taipei policemen beat a woman illegally selling cigarettes; when a crowd shows up to protest, two are shot and one is killed. The island erupts in an even larger riot, finally fed up with the corruption of the new government. A committee writes up a list of thirty-two demands, reforms that would give the Taiwanese more political power and bring the riots to an end. But for many it is already too late. Barely a week has passed when mainland troops arrive on the island in droves. Over the next month, any Taiwanese person with even the slightest connection to the rebellion is identified, taken from their home, and shot. When the dust settles, the Republic of China has Taiwan locked in its grip, and over 100,000 people have been killed.

This is 228, the catalyst to the Taiwanese independence movement, and kind of the reason I’m here at all.

After 228, many Taiwanese people fled to Japan, Hong Kong, or the United States, including my own grandparents. Growing up, I heard stories—not terribly often—about 228 from my older relatives. I heard bits and pieces, the fragmented memories of a generation still traumatized. I learned most of the details years later from George Kerr’s book Formosa Betrayed, one of the few English-language texts about the subject. Kerr was an American diplomat who lived in Taiwan during 228 and knew many of the individuals targeted, granting him a uniquely personal perspective on the events that unfolded. It is a book as remarkable as it is flawed. Kerr’s research is in-depth and formidable, but he struggles to solve a particular challenge: how to make his American readers actually care about Taiwan?

Kerr compares the events of 228 to other, more well-known revolutions: the Poznań protests in Poland, the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, even the American Revolution itself. In each case, Kerr carefully handpicks his examples to evoke maximum American sympathy. The Taiwanese, in his world, are rebels, but they’re the good kind. Movements designated “terrorists” or “radicals” are absent from his analogies. It’s a framework crafted to make Americans feel like they can still be the good guys, that allows them to be comfortable with their existing worldview and avoid substantially changing it.

I wonder what happens when we try to make them uncomfortable.

Let me take you to a different place and a slightly different time. The year is 1948, in Mandatory Palestine. World War II ended three years ago, and with it came a serious blow to the British Empire, which still rules the area. The war has weakened their control, and it will soon come to an end, but in its place is something more sinister: the Zionists. The past decade has seen thousands of Jewish settlers arrive in Palestine from all different regions of Europe. Their clothes and their languages are varied, but something in their eyes always looks the same. For this, they believe, is their land, and they will take what they want from it.

Indeed, for years Jewish colonists have encroached on Palestinian land, backed by the British Empire, which has steadily promoted Zionism over the years. Zionist militias carry out bombing raids on Palestinian villages, as well as the British themselves when they start restricting Jewish immigration into the region. The Jewish National Fund buys up swathes of land in Palestine for new settlers, displacing residents who have lived there for generations. Everywhere, there is blatant oppression, and eventually, the tension snaps.

On May 15, 1948, the British leave Mandatory Palestine, and the militias invade Palestinian territory in full swing. Upon hearing the news, a military coalition from the Arab League marches into Palestine, hoping to defend them from the new colonizers. But for many, it is already too late. The Jewish forces, with superior training and weapons from the British, utterly defeat the Arab army, and proceed to burn and pillage hundreds of Palestinian towns. When the dust settles, the State of Israel has Palestine locked in its grip, with 15,000 Palestinians dead and almost a million displaced from their homes.

This is the Nakba, the catalyst to the Palestinian liberation movement. Or as I’ve come to refer to it, the other 228.

Now obviously, there are major differences between Taiwan and Palestine. Primarily, while the Taiwanese ended martial law in their own country in 1987, the occupations of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank are still very much ongoing. Hence why the Nakba simultaneously refers to the war of 1948 and the recurring oppression of Palestinians that has happened in the seventy years since then. Still, the similarities are too strong to ignore, and the historical lessons to take from both are immensely revealing.

For what is the most significant parallel of them all? Between the Republic of China and the State of Israel, between Chiang Kai-Shek and David Ben-Gurion, one thread ties them together stronger than any other: Neither regime would have been able to maintain its dictatorial hold without the support of the United States. It was the US that labeled Chiang’s ROC as “Free China” even as Taiwanese dissidents were “disappeared” by the secret police. It is the same US that insists today that Israel’s indiscriminate bombing of Palestinian cities (and now its invasion of Lebanon) are merely “defending itself.”

It's been said that history never repeats itself, but it does rhyme. I would add that history rhymes because certain people have a vested interest in making it rhyme. In this sense, neither Taiwan nor Palestine is unique: they are part of a global network of imperial subjects under American control that stretches back decades. They are joined by Syngman Rhee’s South Korea, Suharto’s Indonesia, Augusto Pinochet’s Chile, and Mobutu’s Congo, among numerous others. George Kerr, for all his good intentions, never would have made the connection, so committed to Americans being “the good guys” as he was. He rightly points the blame for 228 and the resulting ROC dictatorship on the United States. But his proposed remedy involves placing Taiwan under UN trusteeship or even direct American control. Spoilers from history: it was not American intervention that eventually saved Taiwan. It was the Taiwanese people who organized themselves, who staged protests and created alternate systems of governance, that finally ended one-party rule in their country. The same thing has happened across the world and will undoubtedly happen in Palestine too.

One last flashback, to—of all things—a cookbook. Sami Tamimi’s 2020 cookbook Falastin is a beautiful celebration of the culinary heritage of Palestine. Many of the dishes are similar to those from other Middle Eastern countries; all are slightly different and uniquely Palestinian. The whole book expertly weaves those similarities and differences together. One section describes the long journey of a tahini press: a slab of stone from Egypt is cut by a stonemason from Lebanon to be used grinding Palestinian sesame seeds. There’s an undeniable sense of a pan-Arab kinship in the book, that uplifts one another despite the separation of borders. It’s that spirit that I want to extend and to amplify. Palestinians are Asians, are they not? A statement from this magazine is long overdue.

The situation of Palestinians, already dire, is looking even more grim—Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, bolstered by a soon-to-be second Trump regime, threatens to obliterate human life in Gaza entirely. In the chaos that will no doubt arise in Trump’s wake, that cannot be forgotten. I will be protesting. I will be doing anything. In the name of all the Taiwanese people, I must. There are plenty of Americans who say they care so deeply about the freedom of Taiwan and yet cannot dare to imagine a liberated Palestine. Such people are, in so many words, utter hypocrites. History demonstrates all the ways in which they mirror each other. The colonized peoples of the world stand behind Palestine; I am proud to include myself among them.