gave us ample time to talk to them on Thursday and on Friday; we spent the
morning planting trees in threatened private lands. We were proud of young
and old, internationals and Palestinians, working together, some 150 people
in all. Even a bus of elderly from the elderly home in Beit Sahour showed
up to help. My 77 year old mother was among them. It was such a meaningful
thing. The day before was meaningful in a different way. The hours we
spent talking to soldiers on Thursday was important too we believe. Foot
soldiers in an army of occupation know so little other than what their
government tells them. They tell them lies about Arabs "terrorism", Jewish
eternal "victimization", the need to be strong to "defend" a country
created so that they could simply live alone away from the anti-Semites (who
are essentially all the Christians and the Muslims). They tell them that it
is an unexplainable phenomenon this hatred of the Jews and it has nothing to
do with what Jews do or did. It is almost a genetic thing.
A friend wrote to me that
" My visit to Yad Vashem in 2006, during the war with Lebanon, was a painful
lesson. The museum of the Shoah is being used to indoctrinate young
Israelis, esp. the military, that the whole world is and always has been
against the Jews, and that the only solution is for Israelis to be firm and
resolute against the whole world, even if it means being inhuman to the
Palestinians. The "righteous among the nations" are cited as flukes, as
anomalies, with no explanations offered for their sacrifices because for the
Israelis though these people did something good, their motivations MUST
remain in the shadows (e.g. Christian faith; social justice; their own
experiences of oppression, etc.) so that the survival of the State of Israel
can remain the one and only center stage concern. Yad Vashem is an immoral
propaganda museum, and as such is a disgrace to the State of Israel and to
Jewish moral and prophetic tradition. There is great risk in this symbol of
moral obtuseness: if the Jewish people are AGAINST the whole world, then
Israel's role as the priestly people, as the people through whom God has
revealed himself through the Torah is fundamentally undermined. The Jewish
people thus LOSE their spiritual role in the history of the world, fail in
their duty of faithfulness to the Mosaic covenant, and run the risk of a
kind of spiritual suicide. Anyone can see that this spiritual suicide might
become a prelude to a material one, alas. The individuals you mention who
have the courage to oppose the apartheid policies of the State of Israel are
in fact true heirs of the Biblical prophets, whose messages of apocalyptic
warning were meant to show a "way out" when the ancient people of Israel had
lost their way. It is pretty clear that the Israelis of today have truly
lost their way both spiritually and politically, and absolutely need the
help of prophetic voices."
Explaining reality to these young kids (and 18-22 year olds are younger than
my son) who are guarding bulldozers engaged in colonization efforts inside a
Palestinian is not easy but is doable. We explain to them things they did
not know and some indeed begin to shed the self-imposed chains. That is why
officers have instruction to prevent these kinds of dialogs. Zionism
resulted in dozens of massacres and left 2/3rds of the total population of
natives (Christians and Muslims) as refugees or displaced people. Even
Moshe Dayan stated: "Jewish villages were built in the place of Arab
villages. You do not even know the names of these Arab villages, and I do
not blame you because geography books no longer exist. Not only do the books
not exist, the Arab villages are not there either. Nahlal arose in the place
of Mahlul; Kibbutz Gvat in the place of Jibta; Kibbutz Sarid in the place of
Huneifis; and Kefar Yehushua in the place of Tal al-Shuman. There is not a
single place built in this country that did not have a former Arab
population."
For more on this, see the book by Jewish-Israeli professor Ilan Pappe on
"The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine." Rather than being a victim, Israel is
in violation of dozens of UN resolutions and has violated just about every
article of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights per International human
rights organizations (and even Israeli ones like B'Tselem). Israelis who
discover this dark history have two choices: either leave or stay and
struggle with eth natives to transform this country to a just place for its
entire people.
Palestinian Families Appeal to UN Over Israeli Construction of "Museum of
Tolerance"
on Jerusalem's Historic Mamilla Cemetery
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/2/10/palestinian_families_appeal_to_un_over
For what you can do on this, see
http://www.mamillacampaign.org
A respectable Think Tank describes the growing campaign around the world
against Israeli apartheid and calls on the Israeli government to treat it as
a "Strategic threat". Of course it is growing and it is a strategic threat
to an apartheid state structure. The comments on the article in Haaretz are
split between those who still buy the notion that wanting to stop Israel
from its policies of apartheid and ethnic cleansing is somehow
"delelegitimizing" because of anti-Semitism and those (Including Israelis)
who say enough is enough.
Think tank: Israel faces global delegitimization campaign
"The Tel Aviv-based security and socioeconomic think tank called on
ministers to treat the matter as a strategic threat."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1149274.html
Must see Video is going viral:
Gaza in Plain Language
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFK5TNcmEmg
(youtube flagged this because of Zionist pressure) but here is an
alternative site for the same video
http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/02/video-gaza-in-plain-language/
Another video: Did You Know Gaza
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bznLR3-kCtU
Mazin Qumsiyeh, PhD
Popular Committee to Defend Ush Ghrab (PCDUG)
A Bedouin in Cyberspace, a villager at home
http://www.pcr.ps
1 comment:
Eric Kirk asks on his blog,"Why are so many Jews liberal?
I ask,why are so many more neoconservative imperialists?
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