Israel x Palestina

ليه أنا مؤيد لإسرائيل؟

2012-01-31T13:27:00.001-08:00

أكبر صدمة حضارية أصابنى بها الإسرائيلين كانت حينما شاهدت لأول مرة فيديو زيارة السادات للكنيست الإسرائيلي عام 1977 ... المشهد الذى علق فى ذهنى و لم أستطع نسيانة ، لم يكن مشهد السادات أو أحد مرافقيه ، و لم يكن أحد السياسيين الإسرائيليين المشاهير و المحترمين ... المشهد الذى أثر فىّ هو حجم الجموع التى تزاحمت حول الكنيست لترحب بالرئيس المصرى ... كنت أعلم أن هناك أنصار للسلام فى إسرائيل، لكنى لم أكن أتوقع أن أرى ألوف البشر، جميعهم يرتدون الملابس البيضاء والوردية، و يحملون الزهور، و يقفون فى الشوارع بالساعات ليحيوا رئيس الدولة التى حاربتهم قبلها ببضعة سنوات ... حميمية الاستقبال المذهلة، و منظر ضباط الشرطة الإسرائيلية و هم يقومون بدورهم فى تنظيم الحشود المرحبة بالرئيس العدو- الصديق ، كانت من بين المشاهد التى غيرت حياتى ... يومها سألت نفسى: هل إذا جاء إلينا فى مصر مسئول إسرائيلى يدعم السلام ، هل سيجد نصف هذا الترحيب من المصريين ؟

لا أنكر أنى أشعر كثيرا بالذنب تجاة قراءى المصريين ، الذين صدمتهم حين قلت أنى برو-إسرائيلى ( مؤيد لإسرائيل) ، وأصدمهم باستمرار بمواقفى الداعمة للسياسات الإسرائيلية باستمرار ... أشعر بالذنب لأنى لم أشرح لهم أسباب مواقفى هذه، و لم أطلعهم على ما أعرفه عن جيراننا الإسرائيليين، ثم أطلب منهم أن يتفهموا موقفى و يتقبلونى بكل تسامح ... موقف صعب، أعذرهم عليه.
نفس الشعور بالذنب أشعر به تجاه الكثير من قراءى الإسرائيليين، الذين ألاحظ الدهشة وعدم التصديق فى تعليقاتهم ... فمنهم من يظننى مجنونا غير واعى بأبعاد ما أقول، ومنهم من يظننى فخ مخابراتى لخداع الشعب الإسرائيلى فى أطار الشعور بالمؤامرة الكبرى على الشعب اليهودى ... هم أيضا معذورون، لأنهم أيضا لا يعرفون دوافعى و أسبابى التى بنيت عليها مواقفى السياسية.
هذا المقال هو محاولة منى ، لشرح الأسباب المنطقية التى جعلتنى مؤيدا لإسرائيل. الأسباب التى تجعلنى حريصا على دعم استمرار دولة إسرائيل فى الوجود، والأسباب التى تجعلنى مؤيدا لعلاقات كاملة وحقيقية بين الشعب الإسرائيلى و سائر شعوب المنطقة.
فى الحقيقة، دعمى لإسرائيل ليس هو دعما لإسرائيل ذاتها، بقدر ما هو دعما للقيم التى تمثلها دوله إسرائيل فى المنطقة ... فالقضية ليست أن هذا يهودى وذاك مسلم، و ليست أن ذاك عربى و هذا عبرى ... القضية فى نظرى أن هذا ديموقراطى و ذاك أستبدادى، وهذا ليبرالى و ذاك شمولى ... و بالتالى فانحيازى لإسرائيل هو انحياز لقيم الديموقراطية و الحداثة التى تمثلها إسرائيل - شئنا أم أبينا - فى المنطقة.

و سأحاول هنا أن أسرد بنوع من التفصيل ، بعض النقاط التى ستوضح وجهه النظر التى أطرحها:

1- السياسة - إسرائيل هى أكبر و أقدم الديموقراطيات فى المنطقة.
النظام السياسى فى إسرائيل هو النظام البرلمانى ... نظمت أول انتخابات شعبية فى 25 يناير 1949 ، ليبدأ الكنيست الأول، و الكنيست الحالى هو الكنيست الثامن عشر فى تاريخ إسرائيل ... طوال هذه الفترة ترأس دولة إسرائيل 9 رؤساء، بداية من الرئيس شيم ويزمان (1949) حتى الرئيس الحالى شيمون بيريز (2007) ... و كل كنيست جديد كان يأتى بحكومة جديدة فى إسرائيل، أى تقريبا 18 حكومة إسرائيل ية فى 60 عام ( تقريبا حكومة جديدة كل ثلاث سنوات و ثلث ) ... و فى كل مرة تمر الانتخابات الإسرائيلية بسلاسة، بلا انقلابات مسلحة، بلا ادعاءات بتزوير الانتخابات، بلا نتائج انتخابية من نوعية ال 100% و ال 99.9%
فى ال 60 عام الأخيرة ، بينما حكم إسرائيل 18 حكومة مختلفة، حكم مصر 6 رؤساء (الملك فاروق ، الملك أحمد فؤاد ، محمد نجيب، عبد الناصر، السادات، مبارك) ... الثلاثة الأوائل تركوا السلطة نتيجة انقلابات أو حركات عسكرية ، و الرابع (عبد الناصر) ظل على عرشة حتى الموت، و لو لم يكن مات لكان سيظل حاكم مصر إلى يومنا هذا، هذا بغض النظر عن إشاعة موته مسموما ... والخامس السادات خرج من السلطة مقتولا ... و السادس باقى فى منصبة منذ 30 عام، ولا نعرف وسيلة لإخراجه من السلطة ... ففى الوقت الذى تبادل فية حكم إسرائيل 18 حكومة ديموقراطية، حكمنا 6 أشخاص، لم يصل أيا منهم للسلطة من خلال انتخابات ، ثلاثة منهم تركوا الحكم مجبرين بقوة انقلاب، و اثنين خرجوا من مناصبهم بالموت، والسادس نبحث عن وسيلة لإخراجه من السلطة لمدة 30 سنة بدون فائدة ... أعتقد أن المقارنة واضحة
يمكن لأى منا أن يفتح أى خريطة للشرق الأوسط، ولن يبذل مجهود ليكتشف أن إسرائيل هى أعظم ديموقراطية فى المنطقة ... الشرق الأوسط لم يعرف نظام ديموقراطى سوى إسرائيل حتى الغزو الأمريكى للعراق فى 2003 ... فتركيا وإيران لديهم ديموقراطيات مشوهه، فإيران تمنع العلمانيين من الترشح فى الانتخابات، و تركيا تمنع التيارات الدينية من الترشح فى الانتخابات، فما فائدة الانتخابات إذا كان المشرع قد سبق واختار للشعب أيديولوجية حكامه ؟ ... بعد إيران وتركيا، لا يتبقى فى المنطقة من أنظمة ديموقراطية غير لبنان و العراق، والاثنان ديموقراطيتان حديثتان، العراق بعد الغزو الأمريكى فى 2003، و لبنان بعد ثورة الأرز فى 2005، و كلاهما ديموقراطيات مشوهه بسبب التقسيمات الطائفية التى تسيطر على العملية الانتخابية ... وباقى دول المنطقة هى إما ممالك بدوية (مثل المملكة العربية السعودية و قطر)، أو شموليات عسكرية (مثل سوريا و مصر و السودان و ليبيا) ... كل هذا يجعلك لا تجد فى المنطقة كلها نظام ديموقراطى حقيقى سوى إسرائيل.
بل الأبلغ من كل هذا ... ديفيد بن جوريون ، الذى يعتبره الكثيرين مؤسس دولة إسرائيل ... هو من أعلن إعلان استقلال دولة إسرائيل، وشغل منصب الرئيس المؤقت لدولة إسرائيل لمدة يومين فقط، ليسلم رئاسة الدولة لرئيس الدولة الأول شيم ويزمان ... ديفيد بن جوريون لم يتحنط على كرسيه كما يفعل الرؤساء المسلمون والعرب (القذافى فى السلطة منذ 41 عام، ويسعى لتوريث الحكم لأبنه)، بالعكس ديفيد بن جوريون تنازل عن السلطة أكثر من مرة ... فعلى الرغم من كونه رئيسا للحكومة الإسرائيلية فى الفترة ما بين عامى 1948 و 1954، إلا انه خرج من السلطة فى عهد الكنيست الثانى ليخلفه موشى شاريت فى الفترة ما بين 1954 و 1955، ثم عاد بن جوريون ليرأس الحكومة الإسرائيلية بعدها ... و طوال حياة بن جوريون، كان يشغل مناصب كثيرة، و يتركها بعدها بفترات قصيرة فى تبادل سلمى وسلس للسلطة ... فمن منكم رأى رئيسا عربيا يتنازل عن منصبة لهذا الشكل السلس؟ فما بالكم وأننا نتحدث عن شخص يكاد يكون هو مؤسس الدولة ذاتها ... إذا كان عبد الناصر، لمجرد أن استطاع السيطرة على ضباط انقلاب 52، نسب لنفسه نجاحات أكبر من حجمه بمراحل، وبقى فى منصبه 16 عام ... وحسنى مبارك، الذى نسب لنفسه نصر أكتوبر كله، بقى بحجة هذا النصر ثلاثون عاما فى رئاسة الجمهورية ... فما بالكم بمؤسس دولة يترك رئاستها بعد يومين، ويترك رئاسة الحكومة بعد 6 سنوات؟ ... ألا تستحق ديموقراطية مثل هذه ان نعطيها احترامها اللائق ؟

2- العمل و الانتاج - الإسرائيليين بنوا دولة كاملة من الأبرة للمفاعل النووى فى أقل من 50 عام
إسرائيل بشكلها الحالى، هي دولة حديثة الوجود فى المنطقة ... إسرائيل القديمة التى انتهت فى القرن الأول الميلادى، لا تعنينى فى مقالى هذا ... إسرائيل الحالية بدأ الشعب اليهودى فى وضع أساساتها منذ ما لا يزيد عن قرن من الزمان ... بنوا المزارع و المدن والمصانع، و كل هذا ليس دولة... أول ظهور لدولة إسرائيل كان بعد انتهاء الانتداب البريطانى عن هذه المنطقة، ولهذا فان عمر دولة إسرائيل يبدأ تقريبا منذ عام 1948 بغض النظر عن ان بدايات هذه الدولة تم وضع أساساتها قبل ذلك بعقود.
استطاعت إسرائيل، واستطاع الشعب اليهودى، فى أقل من 50 عام، بناء دولة قوية متكاملة تغطى كافة نواحى الحياة ... فقد أقام الشعب اليهودى دولة مؤسسات كاملة، بها فصل كامل بين السلطات، بها نظام سياسى برلمانى من أفضل النظم السياسية فى العالم، و برلمان يقوم بدور رقابى وتشريعى متميز، وقضاء نزيه ومحايد حاكم أكبر السياسيين فى إسرائيل بنزاهة لم يشكك فيها أحد ... وما نقوله عن السياسة نقوله عن الزراعة و الصناعة و السياحة و التكنولوجيا.
هنا أن أقدر قيمة الإبداع مع الزمن، فنحن المصريين الذين نتفاخر اننا أبناء حضارة عمرها أكثر من 5 آلاف عام، إلا أننا لم نستطع بناء مفاعل نووى واحد (إسرائيل لديها تقريبا 4 مفاعلات نووية) ، وحينما فكرنا فى إنشاء مفاعل نووى سلمى، بدأنا البحث عن شركات فرنسية وبريطانية لتتولى عمليه إنشاؤه، وحتى يومنا هذا لازالت البيروقراطية المصرية تعطل قيام المفاعل النووى المصرى الأول ... نفس الشئ يقال عن الأقمار الصناعية، ففى الوقت الذى تقوم فيه إسرائيل بتصدير الأقمار الصناعية الخاصة بالتجسس للهند، لم تستطع مصر تصنيع أقمارها الصناعية بنفسها واشترتها من شركات فرنسية ... و فى الوقت الذى تقوم فيه إسرائيل ببيع الأسلحة لروسيا (وريثة الاتحاد السوفيتى)، تقوم المصانع الحربية فى مصر بصناعة البوتاجازات والسخانات التى لا ترضى حتى المستهلك المصرى ... و العاملون فى مجال الصناعة يعلمون جيدا كيف أن هناك صناعات بأكملها لا توجد فى الشرق الأوسط كله ، إلا فى إسرائيل
كمصريين يجب أن نعترف بالفجوة التكنولوجية التى تفصلنا عن إسرائيل ... يجب أن نعترف أن هناك شعب (وإن اختلفنا معه، إلا أن هذا الشعب يقدس العمل والإنتاج والإبداع ، شعب لا يسمح للبيروقراطية و الفساد بتعطيل مسيرة تقدمة ... شعب تجاوز صعوبات مستحيلة مثل القلة السكانية و حالات الحروب المتواصلة و العزلة بين جيرانه و التضارب العرقى والثقافى، و صنع حضارة ودولة متكاملة . بينما معظم دول المنطقة تعيش فى سلام متواصل و مع ذلك تغرق فى الكساد، و تعيش على استيراد غذائها وملابسها و احتياجاتها الأساسية، و يحكمها مجموعة من اللصوص بينما أغلب شعوبها مشغولة بالقات و الحشيش و الدين.

3- الثقافة - أفضل جامعات فى المنطقة
إسرائيل لديها 8 جامعات ... أقدمهم الجامعة العبرية فى أورشليم (القدس) التى تأسست عام 1918، أى بعد جامعة القاهرة ب 10 سنوات ... فإذا استثنينا الجامعة المفتوحة فى إسرائيل، و التى تأتى متأخرة فى الترتيب العالمى، فإن باقى ال 7 جامعات تأتى بين أفضل 500 جامعة على مستوى العالم (أحيانا تتأخر جامعات بار أيلان وحيفا بضع أرقام بعد ال 500 فى بعض التصنيفات) ... بينما تشغل الجامعة العبرية فى أورشليم ترتيب ال 77 على مستوى العالم، بما يجعلها أفضل جامعة فى الشرق الأوسط
إلى وقت قريب لم تكن هناك جامعة عربية واحدة بين أفضل 500 جامعة على مستوى العالم، و إلى يومنا هذا لا توجد جامعة مصرية أو عربية فى قائمة أفضل 200 جامعة على مستوى العالم، بعد أن استطاعت بعض الدول العربية دخول قائمة أفضل 500 ... الطريف فى الأمر، أن الجامعات المصرية بدأت تبحث عن تصنيفات أقل شهرة عالميا، او تصنع بأنفسها ترتيب للجامعات على مستوى العالم، لتستطيع أن تضع نفسها فى قائمة أفضل 200 أو أفضل 500 ... و قد كان بالأولى للجامعات العربية، أن تبحث فى أسباب فسادها وانهيارها، و تقوم بإصلاح و تطوير نفسها، بدلا من اختلاق تلك التقييمات المزيفة.
لن نتعجب أيضا حين نعرف أن إسرائيل هي أكثر دولة فى العالم تنفق على البحث العلمى (بالنسبة للدخل القومى) ... فإسرائيل تنفق حوالى 4.7% من إنتاجها الوطنى GDP على البحث العلمى، وهو رقم ضخم جدا إذا علمنا أن الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية تنفق فقط 2.6% من إنتاجها المحلى على البحث العلمى .... ماذا تنفق الدول العربية على البحث العلمى ؟ ... إجمالى ما تنفقة إسرائيل سنويا على البحث العلمى، يفوق ما تنفقة جميع الدول 22 الأعضاء فى جامعة الدول العربية على البحث العلمى.

منذ اعوام تم نشر إحصائية تقارن بين معدلات الثقافة و القراءة بين دول العالم ... المواطن الإسرائيلى يقرأ فى المتوسط 40 كتاب سنويا ، بينما كل 8 مواطنين مصريين يقرأون كتاب واحد سنويا ... معنى هذه المعلومة أن ما يقرأه إسرائيلى واحد فى 10 أعوام، يحتاج المواطن المصرى ل 3200 عام لكى يقرأ نفس الكمية .... فارق كبير حينما تقارن بين دولة العلم و التكنولوجيا (إسرائيل) ، وبين الجهل المستشري فى الدول الناطقة بالعربية.

4- حقوق الإنسان - أعظم مساحة حريات فى المنطقة
لى صديقة إسرائيلية من أصول عربية ... فوجئت بأنها رجعت من مدرستها مبكرا فى أحد الأيام، فظننتها مريضة ... سألت عليها لكى أطمئن على صحتها، فأخبرتنى أنهم (فى إسرائيل) فى شهر رمضان يسمحون لطلبة المدارس العربية بالرجوع مبكرا (مراعاة لصوم رمضان ) ... الصدمة الحقيقية أننى لا أنسى كيف ظللت طول حياتى فى مصر يتم إجبارى على أن أجتاز إمتحاناتى أيام أعيادى الدينية (فترة اعتناقى بالمسيحية) ... فالمسيحيون المصريين الذين يعيشون فى مصر منذ بداية التاريخ (بغض النظر عن تاريخ تحولهم للمسيحية) لا زالوا حتى اليوم هدفا لتعنت المسئولين الحكوميين الذين يتعمدون إجبار الطلاب المسيحيين على إجراء امتحاناتهم فى أيام الأعياد، أو اليوم الذى يلى العيد .... هذا هو الفارق بين أوضاع الأقليات الدينية فى مصر و إسرائيل.
إسرائيل - على عكس ما يظن العرب - لديها مستوى عالى من حقوق الإنسان لا يوجد فى أى دولة عربية ... فإسرائيل مثلا لا توجد لديها عقوبة الإعدام، ولا أى عقوبة بدنية أخرى ... فى الشرق الأوسط كله لا يوجد إلا تركيا لا تطبق حكم الإعدام، و بعض الدول توقفت عمليا عن ممارسته دون تقنين ذلك (المغرب – تونس – الجزائر) ، فى الوقت الذى لا تزال فيه الكثير من الدول الاسلامية (مثل إيران والسودان والسعودية) تطبيق العقوبات البدنية مثل الجلد و قطع الأيدى والرجم ... ما يقال عن الإعدام و العقوبات البدنية، يمكن قوله عن حقوق الطفل والمرأة، و حرية الرأي و العبير ... إسرائيل لا يوجد لديها خانة ديانة فى البطاقة الشخصية ... إسرائيل هي الدولة الوحيدة فى الشرق الأوسط التى يستطيع فيها المثليين تنظيم أنفسهم فى تنظيمات حقوقية ... إسرائيل هي الدولة الوحيدة فى الشرق الأوسط التى يستطيع فيها الملحدين تكوين تجمعات إلحادية قانونية، ونشر أفكارهم الإلحادية بكل حرية ... إسرائيل هي الدولة الوحيدة التى يمكنك أن تكون مواطنا فيها، ومع ذلك لا تعترف بحقها فى الوجود، و فى نفس الوقت لا يتم سحب الجنسية منك أو سجنك أو حتى رفع إعانة البطاله عنك ... إسرائيل هي الدولة الوحيدة فى الشرق الأوسط التى يستطيع فيها الإعلام نشر فضائح للجيش (تذكروا فيلم روح شاكيد)، وهي الدولة الوحيدة التى يمكن أن يقوم تليفزيون الدولة الرسمى بنقد دين الأغلبية بكل بساطة و دون أن تعلق المقاصل لأحد.

إسرائيل وقفت بجانب كل ضعيف و مظلوم فى المنطقة ... دول أفريقية لا نعرف عنها شيئا، وإسرائيل ترسل لهم معونات باستمرار ... أهالى دارفور المسلمون، الذين تعرضوا للإبادة الجماعية والاغتصاب و التهجير على يد إخوتهم المسلمين من نظام البشير الإسلامى ... أهالى دارفور هؤلاء هم الذين يهربون من خلال الأراضى المصرية ليدخلوا إسرائيل لينالوا حق اللجوء السياسى، و يعيشون كبشر أحرار ... ماذا فعل العرب والمسلمون للأكراد أو لأهل دارفور؟ ... كم مظاهرة خرجت فى مصر تضامنا مع أهل دارفور؟ كم مظاهرة خرجت فى مصر تضامنا مع الأكراد ضد المجرم صدام حسين الذى قتل ألوف الأكراد بدون ذنب؟ ... نحن المصريين لم نكتفى بالصمت، ولكننا قتلنا السودانيين وسحلناهم وعذبناهم فى وسط شوارع الجيزة أمام أعين الجميع بلا رحمة ... كل هذا وأهل دارفور مسلمون، والإسرائيليين يهود، ولكن الدولة الإسرائيلية تتجاوز حدود العرق و الدين لتقف بجانب المضطهدون، بينما العرب لا مانع لديهم من الصمت على ظلم إخوتهم بدون حتى مبرر منطقى لهذا الصمت، بالضبط كما فعلوا حينما صمتوا حينما قام صدام باحتلال الكويت، ثم ثاروا وهاجوا وماجوا حينما شاركت مصر فى تحرير الكويت من الاحتلال الصدامى ... ألا يتساءل المصريين حول مشاعر إخوتهم الكويتيين حينما يرون هذه الأفعال؟
منذ اشتعل ملف دول حوض النيل فى الشهور الأخيرة، وبدأت أجهزة الدولة المصرية فى الترويج لسيناريو المؤامرة الإسرائيلية فى دول حوض النيل .... بالنسبة لى، لا أرى أى مؤامرة على الإطلاق ... فالمصريين لم يسألوا أنفسهم ماذا يعرفون عن أثيوبيا و ماذا قدموا لها ؟ ... ماذا يعرف المصريين عن الفقر و الأمراض والفياضانات وباقى الأمور التى تعانى منها أثيوبيا ؟ لماذا لم يتعاطف المصريين مع أخوتهم الأفارقة الأثيوبيين فى مشاكلهم ؟ ... إسرائيل تعاطفت مع أثيوبيا منذ سنوات طويلة ، و تقدم لها الكثير من المساعدات لتحاول مساعدة الشعب الأثيوبى فى التخلص من مشاكلة ... فمن الطبيعى أن تكون هناك علاقات إسرائيلية أثيوبية قوية ... وفى نفس الوقت من الطبيعى ألا يكون هناك ود متبادل بين المصريين و الأثيوبيين فى ظل الاستعلاء العنصرى الذى يتعامل به المصريين مع السود (اسألوا النوبيين إن كنتم لا تعلمون)، و فى ظل تجاهل انشغال المصريين بتمويل الحركات الإرهابية فى أفغانستان وفلسطين واليمن ... فإذا كانت غزة أكثر أهمية بالنسبة للمصريين من أثيوبيا، فلماذا يتضايق المصريين حينما يفقدون علاقتهم بأثيوبيا التى تجاهلوها إنسانيا لعقود طويلة ؟

5- السياسة الخارجية الإسرائيلية مبنية على المصلحة مش على العنصرية
الأصل فى الأمور، أن السياسى هو شخص اختاره الشعب لتحقيق مصالحهم، وليس لتحقيق وجهات نظرة الأيديولوجية الخاصة ... هذا بالطبع لا ينطبق على السياسيين العرب الذين وصلوا للحكم بالدبابات، ولكنه بالطبع ينطبق على إسرائيل فحزب الليكود مثلا، والذى يتهمه العرب باستمرار بأنة حزب يمينى متطرف، هو ذات الحزب الذى قام بتحدى أيديولوجيته فى فتره قصيرة جدا، ووقع اتفاقية السلام مع مصر، و قام بإرجاع سيناء بأكملها بدون مقابل تقريبا (باعتبار حق إسرائيل فى الملاحة فى المضايق الدولية حق وليس منحة )... لا يسأل المصريون أنفسهم : كيف يكون حزب متطرف ويقوم بعقد اتفاقية سلام (رغم أنه يسيطر على كل سيناء تقريبا ) و يترك سيناء للمصريين بدون حرب ؟ ... الفكرة أن الساسة يهمهم مصلحة إسرائيل، أكثر من الأيديولوجيات النظرية .... و مصلحة إسرائيل أن تعيش بسلام وسط جيرانها ... لو بدلنا المواقف وقتها ، وكانت مصر فى مكان إسرائيل، لم تكن مصر ستتنازل عن شبر واحد من سيناء بالسلام، بالضبط كما تفعل في تمسكها بالأراضي السودانية التي تحتلها حاليا (حلايب و شلاتين).
نفس الشئ يمكن قوله عن المفاوضات مع الفلسطينيين والسوريين واللبنانيين ... فالعرب ظلوا لعقود يرددون كلاما أبلها عن الأمبراطورية التى من النيل للفرات، ولكن إسرائيل هدمت كل هذه الأطروحات العربية فى لحظة واحدة على مائدة المفاوضات، حينما أمرت بتفكيك مستوطناتها فى غزة ... يومها وقف الجيش الإسرائيلى بنفسه يباشر إجلاء المستوطنين الإسرائيليين من منازلهم التى بنوها فى غزة ، ليتركوها للفلسطينيين ... فإذا كانت إسرائيل ترغب فى التوسع فى المنطقة (الأيديولوجيا) ، فلماذا فككت مستوطناتها فى غزة أو انسحبت من سيناء (المصلحة) ؟ ... هذا لأن السياسة الخارجية الإسرائيلية تغلب المصلحة على الأيديولوجيا.
العكس موجود عند السياسيين العرب... فالسياسيين السوريين يعلمون جيدا أنهم بإمكانهم أجراء اتفاق سلام بسهولة مع إسرائيل، ولكنهم لازالوا غير قادرين على تغليب مصلحة شعوبهم على أيديولوجياتهم الضيقة الرجعية ... الأحمق وحده هو من يعذب شعب كامل من أجل أيديولوجيا حمقاء... فى نقاشاتى مع المسيسين السوريين، لم يعطونى ردودا منطقية حول فكرة السلام مع إسرائيل، كل كلامهم عبارة عن كلمات عبثية عن أن إسرائيل كيان صهيونى و ليست دولة، وان القضية هي قضية فلسطين و ليست سوريا ... هل انت مسئول فلسطينى أم سورى؟ أنت مسئول سورى وظيفتك تحقيق مصالح الشعب السورى. فبأي ذنب تجبر الشعب السورى على الحياة فى حاله حرب متواصلة (يلتهم فيها الجيش الجزء الأكبر من ميزانية الدولة) لمجرد أن هناك أيديولوجيا تطلب منك أن تظل فى حالة حرب أبدية مع دولة تفوقك عسكريا عشرات المرات؟
ما يقال عن السياسة يقال أيضا عن الثقافة ... إسرائيل بها متطرفون أيضا ، كل دول العالم بها متطرفين ... لكن الدولة الإسرائيلية لا تعرف أى نوع من العبث الخاص بالغزو الثقافى والحفاظ على الهوية القومية والبلا بلا ... الأفلام العربية (والمصرية تحديدا) تذاع باستمرار فى التليفزيون الإسرائيلى، و يشاهدها الإسرائيليين بدون حساسية، بينما نحن تتزلزل الدنيا عندنا إذا ما قام مركز ثقافى بعرض فيلم إسرائيلى يدعو للسلام بين الشعبين ... اللغة العربية لغة رسمية فى إسرائيل، ولديهم فى إسرائيل مجمع للغة العربية مماثل لمجمع اللغة العربية الموجود بالقاهرة ... لا ينظر الإسرائيليين للغة العربية على أنها تهديدا لثقافتهم وهويتهم أو وجودهم، بل يرون أن مصلحتهم فى التعايش مع جيرانهم ... الشعوب العربية تفهم الهوية بمعادلة "أنا موجود، إذن أنت غير موجود"، بينما المصلحة تحتم أن يستمر كلانا فى الوجود، ونتوقف عن محاوله محو الآخر من الوجود.

خاتمة
المقارنات السياسية والإجتماعية والأنثروبولوجية بين المجتمع الإسرائيلى والمجتمعات العربية، موضوع ثرى لا يمكن حصره فى مقال واحد ... أردت هنا فقط أن أوضح النقاط الرئيسية التى تميز المجتمع الإسرائيلى عن باقى المجتمعات التى تحيط به فى الشرق الأوسط .... و هذه الفروق هي التى تفرض علي أن أنحاز لحق دولة إسرائيل الكامل فى الوجود بسلام فى المنطقة، وهي نفسها التى تفرض عليا الوقوف بجانب إسرائيل كدولة ديموقراطية حداثية يعيش شعبها كمواطنين أحرار فى منطقة من العالم يعتبر فيها التفكير فى الحرية جريمة.
بالطبع ، موقفى هذا لا يعنى أنى أتفق مع إسرائيل فى كل صغيرة وكبيرة، ولا يعنى أنى أدعم إسرائيل فى أى موقف خاطئ تتخذة ... فالإسرائيليين أنفسهم لا يتفقون على أى شئ، بما فية حق دولة إسرائيل فى الوجود ... فإذا كان لا يوجد مواطن إسرائيلى يتفق مع سياسة دولتة فى جميع المواقف، فبالتأكيد لا يمكن أن يوجد داعم لإسرائيل يتفق مع السياسات الإسرائيلية جميعها ... أنا فقط أدعم حقوق دولة إسرائيل، و أدعم الكثير من الخطوط العريضة فى السياسة الإسرائيلية، لأنى متفهم لدوافعها و حيثياتها.
و هذا بالتأكيد يعنى أن هناك نقاط اختلاف بينى وبين السياسات الإسرائيلية ... منها على سبيل المثال الموقف الرسمى فى إسرائيل من السلاميين الإسرائيليين ... فأنا لازلت غير قادر على تصديق أن الشعب اليهودى الذى عانى من الأضطهاد ما يقرب من 20 قرن بسبب معتقدة الدينى، حينما يؤسس دولة يبدأ فى اضطهاد بنى شعبة بسبب معتقداته الضميرية !!! ... لا أنكر أنى شعرت بالخجل حينما تم إعفائى من الخدمة العسكرية فى مصر بعد إعلانى أنى لن اخدم بالجيش بسبب معتقداتى السلامية ، بينما زملائى السلاميين فى إسرائيل فى السجون الإسرائيلية ... هذه نقطة تحتاج للمراجعة فى السياسة الإسرائيلية.

Tuba Zanghariya mosque fire was set by Muslims

2012-01-29T00:56:00.000-08:00

http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/

I trust that many of you remember the Tuba Zanghariya mosque fire back in October, and all the Israeli politicians tripping over each other to apologize to the 'Israeli Arabs' and to blame the evil 'settlers' for another 'price tag' attack. If you don't read French, you probably don't know that the crime has been solved. I know you'll all be shocked to hear that no 'settlers' were involved. The Tuba Zanghariya mosque was burned down by Islamists (link in French).

As it happens, my French is quite poor (I haven't really used it in nearly 40 years), so I'm going to post a Google translation, and if anyone speaks French and can make it clearer, please chime in. There's also a video report I'm posting at the end of this - that's in Hebrew.

On October 3, an AFP report, published by L'Express among others, and taken up by many French media reported the arson of a mosque in a Bedouin village in northern Israel, Touba-Zangariyya .

The Express attributed, without nuance or reservation or doubt expressed in the "settlers" in Israel.

Criminals who left behind them on a wall in the place of worship burned, the inscriptions "price tag" the price. Words that had been used by extremists of Jewish settlements, tagged with graffiti on a mosque in the West Bank Arab village of Yatma, two months earlier.

The initial police suspicion fell upon Israeli extremists with an identical profile, but failed to identify the culprits.

Mena had reacted immediately upon the announcement of the fire, in a dispatch dated October 3 (Fire of the mosque in the Upper Galilee: rogue!), Writing that it was highly unlikely that this event is the result of a political act committed by Jewish settlements.

Analysts at the agency, like many people in the upper Jordan Valley, in fact, knew enough about their region and the peculiarities of the village concerned, to issue this warning.

...

At Mena, we felt very strongly a new scrambles, telling us that everyone was wrong. But intuition is not a certainty for a journalist, and certainly does not replace the need to conduct a thorough investigation. That we did. It is in that context that I went to Touba-Zangariyya to meet with an important chieftain (Visit to Dalton City, Galileo). In writing, we did not cease to follow the evolution of events.

And, as usual, a few months after the crime, the languages began to loosen. Until a resident of Touba-Zangariyya, Bassem Souad, a Sunni Muslim, does not reveal the essential elements of the identity of criminals.

The man, under clear from the very imposing stature, took only a few minutes before giving me the interview I had to ask. A few hours later, he gave me a demonstration of what it was impossible that the fire has been committed by Jews. Conversely, Souad showed me that this act of arson was committed by people of his village.

"This mosque was burned Zangariyya" (Zangariyya-Touba is the result of the unification of the two villages and Zangariyya Touba), explain my interlocutor.

"Individuals from outside would have set fire to the mosque of Touba, the single entry of the two villages. For those of Zangariyya to join, you have to take a long road begins with Touba, and, above all, through the entire village. Arsonists Jews, burning a mosque under these conditions, with constant tension prevailing in the village, and dozens of machine guns and grenades in it, had virtually no chance of coming out alive.

On the other hand, the impact that media seeking the perpetrators of this mischief, there was no difference between destroying the mosque Zangariyya, or of Touba, located only a few steps from the exit of the village. Sensible person would have taken a risk as useless! "Says our man.

"For the rest," said Bassem Souad, "entries drawn on the ruins of the mosque have been using a piece of coal. It is a means commonly used by the Arabs, unlike the Jews, who, at all price tag in the West Bank, have used sprays.

This crime, "says the 43 year old man," was committed for political reasons. It is the prerogative of a small Islamist faction of Touba, recently formed, whose aim is to cause trouble between Jews and Arabs. Everyone in the village knows what group it is, but one is to tell the police as informers in our tradition, part of a crime more serious than that which was committed. Still, this small group tried awkwardly to imitate the way of acting Jewish extremists in order to be accused of this act. "

In advancing such remarks, Bassem Souad knows he risks his life. But that does not stop men like him to do what they consider just and necessary. It should be noted that, like other Bedouin, Souad is a reserve lieutenant colonel in the Israeli army, he spent over twelve years in Lebanon as such, most of them at the head of commandos special.

Still, the risk is very tangible. Thus, hours after the broadcast of an interview on Israeli Channel Two television, despite the security measures deployed around his home, the men shot at his house and its occupants live ammunition. They have missed the head of his 16 year old daughter a few centimeters.

His 17 year old son, who also prepares to join the ranks of the IDF in a month, was almost murdered. A hooded man, probably one of the Islamists, threw himself on the young man with the intent to stab him. Fortunately, the villagers who were nearby were able to repel the potential murderer.

A-Zangariyya Touba, we do not resolve their disputes in court, but stab wounds, machine guns, grenades and firebombs. These are four good reasons why the locals to remain silent, even if, privately, they say they revolted by the crimes of the Islamists.

Islamists, who may also make future costs of these laws Western, even though nothing in the words of Souad, evokes the possibility.

Read the whole thing. And here's the video of the Channel 2 interview with Mr. Souad, referred to above. Unfortunately, it's in Hebrew only, without subtitles.

Let's go to the videotape.

By the way, this story is two weeks old, and there is not a single link in the Google search that is not in French. At least until now.

For you non-Israelis, you may not realize just how big a deal was made of the Tuba Zanghariya mosque fire - for which 'settlers' were blamed - in October.

UPDATE 12:37 AM

Here's a Hebrew blog about it in December telling the same (ignored) story. I doubt you'll see it in the New York Times tomorrow either.

UPDATE 1:12 AM

Here's the original Channel 2 report (the one I showed you earlier was the one on the shooting at Souad's house). This is the report where Souad says that the mosque was burned by Muslims. Again, sorry, but it's Hebrew only with no subtitles.

Let's go to the videotape.

Identity Among Middle East Christians

2012-01-25T08:54:00.000-08:00

by Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi
The American Spectator
January 5, 2012

In the course of the present unrest across the Middle East and North Africa, it has become clear that questions of identity are going to be extremely important in deciding the future paths of the various countries in turmoil, not only as regards the divide between Islamists and secularists, but also concerning ethnic and sectarian tensions in countries like Syria, Yemen, and Libya.

For Christians in the region, the issue of identity will similarly be important in determining ways to adapt to the changing political order. This naturally raises the problem of how exactly these Christians define themselves. For example, what does it mean to speak of an "Arab Christian"? Which Christians in the region feel the strongest affinity with such a description? Which ones reject it most vehemently?

It is often said that the concepts of Arab nationalism and pan-Arabism were formulated in significant part by Christians who did not wish for their communities to continue enduring discrimination. For instance, one could point to the fact that Michel Aflaq -- a founder of the Ba'ath Party -- and George Habash, an Arab nationalist thinker who founded the Marxist terrorist group known as the "Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine," were both Christians.

However, what is often overlooked is that these Christians who were the most vociferous and staunch proponents of Arab nationalism and the notion of "Arab Christians" have been either Antiochian Greek Orthodox or Melkite Greek Catholics, two Christian sects concentrated in Syria, Lebanon, and the Palestinian territories. Aflaq and Habash were Antiochian Greek Orthodox, but a case in point for the Melkite Greek Catholics is the current patriarch of the church: Gregory III Laham.

In an interview with the Italian monthly magazine "30Giorni" back in 2005, Laham even went so far as to state that "the Melkite bishop Edelby… would always repeat: we are Arabs, not Muslims…. I add: we are the Church of Islam."

As for the terrorist attack in October 2010 on the Syriac Catholic "Our Lady of Salvation" church in Baghdad and similar assaults on Christians in the region, Laham characterized the persecution as a "conspiracy planned by Zionism and some Christians with Zionist orientations… that aims at depicting Arabs and Muslims in Arab countries as terrorist and fundamentalist murderers," according to a report in Lebanon's Daily Star.

Meanwhile, when it comes to the uprising in Syria, Laham has condemned the Arab League's suspension of Syria from the organization on the grounds that the move has caused separation in the Arab world, with the Patriarchate Council affirming the following, as noted by the Syrian Arab News Agency: "The criterion of the Arab League's success will be through its capability to solve the Palestinian cause, not through division or hostility."

In contrast, among the Maronites in Lebanon and the Copts in Egypt, the sentiment is more divided. One will almost certainly encounter members of both groups who identify as "Arab Christians," yet there has been a counter-trend on the question of identity that has never existed for the Antiochian Greek Orthodox or the Melkite Greek Catholics. For the Maronites, an alternative identity has been offered in the ideology of "Phoenicianism," which traces a link between the ancient Phoenicians and the Lebanese of today, besides taking pride in Lebanon's multicultural nature. A notable proponent of this view has been the well-known poet Said Akl, who reached his centenary last July.

Among Copts, there is the notion of "Pharaonism," which prefers to stress Egyptian identity as a combination of descent from the Ancient Egyptians, Egypt's historically close links with the Mediterranean world, and individual nation-state patriotism. This sentiment is shared by some Egyptian Muslims, and one of the most prominent advocates of Pharaonism in the 20th century was the liberal Muslim intellectual Taha Hussein.

Finally, one comes to the issue of identity among the Christians of Iraq. In this case, we find a virtually unanimous rejection of the term "Arab Christians." Instead, Christians in Iraq identify as ethnic Assyrians, although among some Chaldean Catholics there is a preference for a distinct Chaldean identity.

There is even a political party for Assyrians known as the "Assyrian Democratic Movement," which aims to secure an autonomous province for Assyrians in the northern Nineveh plains of Iraq.

One might note in objection to my point that Tariq Aziz -- the vice-president of Iraq during Saddam's rule -- was a Chaldean. On the contrary, he is overwhelmingly viewed as a traitor by Assyrians. Not only did Aziz drop his Christian birth name Mikhail Yuhanna, but he also abetted Saddam's Arabization policy in the north of Iraq, which led to the destruction of numerous Assyrian villages and the inhabitants' forced resettlement in Baghdad and points south in order to make way for Arab settlers.

What is apparent from these observations is that the degree of absorption of the Arabic language into the various churches correlates with the prevalence of the concept of "Arab Christians." In the cases of the Antiochian Greek Orthodox and Melkite Greek Catholic churches, Arabic has come to dominate as the main liturgical language over Byzantine Greek.

The Maronites and Copts used to maintain Syriac and Coptic respectively as their sole liturgical languages even after the Muslim conquests, but have gradually come to incorporate Arabic to a limited degree as their adherents have adopted Arabic as their language of everyday communication. However, the Assyrian churches, whose adherents primarily speak various Eastern Neo-Aramaic dialects as their mother tongue, still maintain Syriac as their sole liturgical language.

In short, the degree of linguistic and cultural Arabization over time has played more of a part in the formulation of identity among Middle Eastern Christians than a simple desire to avoid persecution at the hands of the Muslims majorities.

Marx in Palestine

2012-01-23T20:36:00.000-08:00

Even before the creation of the [modern] Zionist movement (its first convention was in 1897), Jews were already the majority of Jerusalem's population - as reported by Karl Marx, based on the Ottoman census.

“the sedentary population of Jerusalem numbers about 15,500 souls, of whom 4,000 are Mussulmans and 8,000 Jews. The Mussulmans, forming about a fourth part of the whole, and consisting of Turks, Arabs and Moors, are, of course, the masters in every respect... Nothing equals the misery and suffering of the Jews at Jerusalem, inhabiting the most filthy quarter of the town, called hareth-el-yahoud, this quarter of dirt between Mount Zion and Mount Moriah, where their synagogues are situated – the constant objects of Mussulman oppression and intolerance, insulted by the Greeks, persecuted by the Latins"

Quotation taken from Marx's "Declaration of War – On the History of the Eastern Question".
The article was originally published in the New York Daily Tribune on 15 April 1854, after his trip to Palestine.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1854/03/28.htm

Israel’s immoral novelists

2012-01-22T10:04:00.001-08:00

Op-ed: Italian journalist says likes of David Grossman, Amoz Oz promote vicious distortions about Israel

Israeli authors have never been shy. They have always commented on their governments and always speak about politics in their novels. But the best-selling Israeli writers are now captives of a dangerous syndrome. One can legitimately criticize Israeli governments, their errors and deafness. But a dark malaise is now driving these authors to toe the line with the worst emotions of global public opinion.

Peaceful Gesture?

Amos Oz sends book to jailed Barghouti / Zvika Brut

Acclaimed Israeli author sends Palestinian prisoner convicted of several terror attacks book with personal dedication: 'Hope to meet soon in peace and freedom'

Full Story

This is the same public opinion that in essence boycotted the tragic news about a large, beautiful and caring Jewish family destroyed in a minute, when terrorists burst into their home in Itamar with one aim in mind: To murder as many Israelis as possible.

There is now a deep chasm between the pretension of the "good conscience" of these writers and the crude realism of history. This is even sander and more significant because we are not talking about writers who hate Israel or novelists who pontificate against the Jewish State from abroad, but rather, about locals.

Amos Oz and David Grossman, Israel’s most popular authors, have a track record of genuine Zionist endeavor. But Oz just got in touch with Marwan Barghouti, the Palestinian terrorist leader convicted of murdering five Israelis and planning several terrorist attacks. The Israel Prize recipient sent the Palestinian prisoner one of his books with a personal inscription wishing him a speedy release from prison: “This story is our story. I hope you read it and understand us better, as we attempt to understand you. Hoping to meet soon in peace and freedom.”

Indeed, the gap between these authors and the guillotine threatening Israel grows larger every day. David Grossman, whose son Uri was killed in the Second Lebanon War, was the first Israeli writer to explore the psychology of the Israeli occupation after 1967. Since then, Grossman’s paradigm, simply put, was always the same: Israel must end its role of occupier and oppressor if the horror of terrorism is to end.

Israel deserves better

It seems as though Grossman’s conscience as an intellectual hasn't been shaken by the Twin Towers attack, by the 1,600 Israeli civilians killed in terror attacks, by a decade of rockets on southern Israeli cities or by Iran’s atomic death cult.

Shortly after the Gaza war, Grossman called for an independent inquiry into the conduct of the IDF, paving the way for the biased Goldstone’s report. He also urged dialogue with Hamas. When Grossman went to collect a cash prize funded by the Israeli state, he refused to shake hands with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

After the flotilla incident, Grossman charged that Israel behaves like “a band of pirates.” He said the blockade on Gaza was “despicable,” attacking the Israeli government “which is prepared to embitter the lives of a million innocent people in the Gaza Strip, in order to obtain the release of one imprisoned soldier.”

Indeed, the morality of Israeli writers is not longer in tune with reality and its contradictions, Israel’s security, very existence, identity and memory. These authors’ publications attract so much attention abroad because of the baleful influence they have on Israel’s reputation, as they promulgate the most vicious distortions about Israel.

When Ariel Sharon sent forces into the West Bank to defeat the terrorists, both Grossman and Oz went to help the Palestinians with their olive harvest. Their noble generosity didn’t stop Hamas from slaughtering two Jewish girls in a nearby settlement, Linoy Sarussi and Hadas Turgeman. Now, again, after a new Jewish family was destroyed in Itamar, the writers chose to send postcards and books to the terrorists. Israel deserves better bards.

A verdade sobre os palestinos

2011-12-27T12:46:00.000-08:00

Sob Obama, os últimos três anos de troca da verdade a respeito de Israel pelas mentiras palestinas tornaram a região menos estável, Israel mais vulnerável e os Estados Unidos menos respeitáveis.

Recentemente, o primeiro colocado entre os pré-candidatos do Partido Republicano à presidência dos EUA, Newt Gingrich, ex-presidente da Câmara, fez algo revolucionário. Ele falou a verdade sobre os palestinos. Em uma entrevista ao Jewish Channel, Gingrich disse que os palestinos são um povo “inventado”, “sendo, de fato, árabes”.

Sua afirmação sobre os palestinos foi totalmente precisa. No final de 1920, o “povo palestino” foi formado artificialmente de entre a população árabe da “Grande Síria”. A “Grande Síria” incluía a atual Síria, o Líbano, Israel, a Autoridade Palestina e a Jordânia. Isto é, o povo palestino foi inventado 91 anos atrás. Além disso, como observou Gingrich, o termo “povo palestino” somente se tornou amplamente aceito depois de 1977.

Como registrou Daniel Pipes, em 1989, num artigo sobre o assunto no Middle East Quarterly (Periódico Trimestral do Oriente Médio), os árabes locais, no que se tornou Israel, optaram por uma identidade local nacionalista “palestina”, em parte devido a seu sentimento de que seus irmãos na Síria não estavam suficientemente comprometidos com a erradicação do sionismo. (The Year the Arabs Discovered Palestine)

Desde que Gingrich se pronunciou, sua declaração factual precisa tem enfrentado ataques que partem de três direções. Primeiro, sua declaração tem sido atacada pelos apologistas palestinos no campo pós-modernista. Falando à CNN, Hussein Ibish, da Força Tarefa Americana Sobre a Palestina, afirmou que a declaração de Gingrich foi uma afronta porque, embora ele estivesse certo sobre os palestinos serem um povo artificial, na visão de Ibish, os israelenses são tão artificiais quanto os palestinos. Isto é, ele igualou o nacionalismo dos palestinos, de 91 anos, com o nacionalismo dos judeus, de 3.500 anos.

Em suas palavras: “Chamar os palestinos de “um povo inventado”, em um esforço óbvio para enfraquecer sua identidade nacional, é uma afronta, especialmente porque não existia algo como um “israelense” antes de 1948”.

O absurdo da afirmação de Ibish é facilmente descartado por meio de uma simples leitura da Bíblia hebraica. Como qualquer pessoa semialfabetizada em hebraico reconhece, os israelenses não foram criados em 1948. Três mil anos atrás, os israelenses foram liderados por um rei chamado Davi. Os israelenses tinham uma comunidade independente na Terra de Israel, e sua capital era Jerusalém.

O fato de que 500 anos atrás o rei Tiago renomeou os israelenses como “israelitas” (na Bíblia King James) é irrelevante para a verdade básica de que não há nada de novo nem de artificial a respeito do povo israelense. E o sionismo, o movimento de libertação nacional dos judeus, não surgiu em competição com o nacionalismo árabe. O sionismo tem sido uma característica central da identidade judaica por 3.500 anos.

A segunda linha de ataque contra Gingrich nega a veracidade de sua afirmação. Um dos luminares palestinos, Salam Fayyad, o primeiro-ministro da Autoridade Palestina, que não foi eleito, falou à CNN: “O povo palestino habitava aquelas terras desde o despertar da história”.

A afirmação de Fayyad, não substanciada historicamente, foi, a seguir, expandida pelo membro do Conselho Revolucionário do Fatah, Dmitri Diliani, em uma entrevista na CNN: “O povo palestino (é) descendente da tribo canaanita dos jebuseus, que habitavam o antigo sítio de Jerusalém em torno dos anos 3.200 AEC (Antes da Era Comum)”, enfatizou Diliani.

A Terra de Israel apresenta a maior densidade de sítios arqueológicos do mundo. Judéia, Samaria, Galiléia, Negev, as Colinas de Golan, e outras áreas do país estão repletas de evidências arqueológicas das comunidades judaicas. Quanto a Jerusalém, literalmente cada centímetro da cidade possui provas físicas das reivindicações históricas do povo judeu com relação à cidade.

Até hoje, não foi descoberta nenhuma evidência arqueológica, ou outra, que ligue os palestinos à cidade ou aos jebuseus.

A partir da perspectiva política doméstica dos Estados Unidos, uma terceira linha de ataque contra a declaração factual de Gingrich tem sido a mais significativa. Os ataques envolvem as pessoas bem informadas e conservadoras de Washington, muitas das quais são defensoras sinceras do principal rival de Gingrich para a nominação presidencial republicana, o ex-governador de Massachusetts Mitt Romney.

Até agora, a representante mais forte dos que estão atacando tem sido Jennifer Rubin, blogueira do jornal Washington Post. Essas pessoas bem informadas argumentam que, embora Gingrich tenha falado a verdade, essa foi uma irresponsabilidade e não está de acordo com o que se espera de um estadista.

Como disse Rubin: “Será que os conservadores realmente acham que é uma boa idéia que seu pré-candidato contrarie décadas da política americana e negue que existe uma identidade nacional palestina?”.

Segundo a visão deles, Gingrich é um incendiário irresponsável porque está voltando suas costas a 30 anos de consenso bipartidário. Esse consenso se baseia em ignorar o fato de que os palestinos são um povo artificial cuja identidade não surgiu de uma experiência histórica compartilhada, mas da oposição ao nacionalismo judaico.

O objetivo da política do consenso é estabelecer um Estado palestino independente a oeste do rio Jordão, que viverá em paz com Israel.

Essa política foi obsessivamente promovida durante os anos 1990, até que fracassou completamente no ano 2000, quando o líder palestino Yasser Arafat rejeitou a oferta do então primeiro-ministro de Israel, Ehud Barak, e do então presidente dos Estados Unidos, Bill Clinton, de estabelecer um Estado palestino, e deu início à guerra terrorista palestina contra Israel.

Mas, em vez de reconhecer que essa política - e a defesa da identidade nacional palestina em seu cerne - havia falhado, e de considerar outras opções, as lideranças políticas americanas em Washington apegaram-se a ela com unhas e dentes. Republicanos, como o mentor de Rubin, Elliot Abrams, ex-vice-Conselheiro de Segurança Nacional, prosseguiu apoiando entusiasticamente a entrega de Gaza por Israel em 2005, e insuflando a participação do Hamas nas eleições palestinas de 2006. Aquela retirada e aquelas eleições elevaram o grupo de terrorismo jihadista ao poder.

O consenso que Gingrich rejeitou ao falar a verdade sobre a natureza artificial do nacionalismo palestino se baseou na tentativa de conciliar o apoio popular a Israel com a propensão da elite por apaziguamento. Por um lado, devido ao tremendo apoio público em favor de uma aliança forte dos Estados Unidos com Israel, a maioria dos que decidem os rumos da política americana não ousou abandonar Israel como aliado dos EUA.

Por outro lado, os líderes políticos americanos têm se sentido historicamente desconfortáveis por terem que defender Israel diante de seus colegas europeus anti-Israel e diante de seus interlocutores árabes, que compartilham da rejeição dos palestinos ao direito de existência de Israel.

O esforço de buscar combinar uma política de apaziguamento árabe (anti-Israel) com uma política anti-apaziguamento (pró-Israel) foi defendida por sucessivos governos dos EUA, até que foi sumariamente descartada pelo presidente Barack Obama três anos atrás. Obama substituiu a política de duas cabeças por uma que busca puramente o apaziguamento árabe.

Obama foi capaz de justificar sua mudança porque a política de dois rumos fracassou. Não houve paz entre Israel e os palestinos. O preço do petróleo foi às alturas e os interesses dos EUA em toda a região estavam cada vez mais ameaçados.

Por seu lado, Israel estava muito mais vulnerável ao terror e à guerra do que havia estado há anos. E seu isolamento diplomático era agudo e estava aumentando.

Infelizmente, tanto para os EUA quanto para Israel, a quebra do consenso por parte de Obama desestabilizou a região, colocou Israel em perigo e arriscou os interesses dos EUA num grau muito maior do que haviam estado durante a política de dois trilhos de seus predecessores. Por todo o mundo árabe, as forças islâmicas estão em alta.

O Irã está às portas de se tornar uma potência nuclear.

Os Estados Unidos já não são vistos como uma potência regional confiável à medida que retiram suas forças do Iraque sem obtenção de vitória, paralisam suas forças no Afeganistão, sentenciando-o à pauperização e à derrota, e abandonam seus aliados em um país após outro.

O rigoroso contraste entre a rejeição de Obama ao consenso fracassado, por um lado, e a rejeição de Gingrich ao consenso fracassado, por outro lado, indica que Gingrich pode muito bem ser o contraste perfeito para Obama.

A disposição de Gingrich de afirmar e defender a verdade sobre a natureza do conflito palestino com Israel é a resposta perfeita para o discurso desastroso de Obama “ao mundo islâmico” no Cairo, em junho de 2009. Foi naquele discurso que Obama abandonou oficialmente o consenso bipartidário, abandonou Israel, a verdade sobre o sionismo e os diretos nacionais judeus, e abraçou completamente a mentira nacionalista palestina e seus direitos nacionais.

Tanto Rubin quanto Abrams, assim como Romney, justificaram seus ataques a Gingrich e sua defesa ao consenso fracassado ao observarem que nenhum líder israelense está dizendo o que Gingrich disse. Rubin foi tão longe a ponto de alegar que as palavras verdadeiras de Gingrich sobre os palestinos ofenderam Israel.

Isso, logicamente, é um absurdo. O que muitos americanos deixam de reconhecer é que os líderes israelenses não são tão livres para dizer a verdade sobre a natureza do conflito como são os americanos. Em vez de olharem para a liderança de Israel nessa questão, os líderes americanos fariam bem em ver Israel como o equivalente da Alemanha Ocidental durante a Guerra Fria. Com a metade de Berlim ocupada pelo Exército Vermelho e com Berlim Ocidental servindo como estopim para a invasão soviética à Europa Ocidental, os líderes da Alemanha Ocidental não eram tão livres para falar a verdade sobre a União Soviética como os americanos.

Atualmente, com Jerusalém sob constante ameaça política e terrorista, com todo o Israel cada vez mais rodeado por regimes islâmicos, e com o governo Obama abandonando o apoio tradicional dos Estados Unidos a Israel, está se tornando cada vez menos razoável esperar que Israel tome a liderança retórica para falar verdades importantes e difíceis sobre a natureza de seus vizinhos.

Quando Romney criticou a declaração de Gingrich como sendo pouco útil a Israel, Gingrich replicou: “Sinto-me bastante confiante de que um número espantoso de israelenses achou bom que um americano dissesse a verdade sobre a guerra no meio da qual eles estão, sobre as perdas que estão tendo, e sobre o povo ao seu redor, que diz: "Eles não têm o direito de existir e nós queremos destruí-los”'.

Ele está absolutamente certo. Foi mais do que amável. Foi encorajador.

Trinta anos de mentiras americanas pré-Obama sobre a natureza do conflito em uma tentativa de equilibrar o apoio a Israel com o apaziguamento dos árabes não tornaram os Estados Unidos mais seguros, nem o Oriente Médio mais pacífico. Um retorno àquela política sob um novo presidente republicano não será suficiente para restaurar a estabilidade e a segurança da região.

E a necessidade de tal restauração é aguda. Sob Obama, os últimos três anos de troca da verdade a respeito de Israel pelas mentiras palestinas tornaram a região menos estável, Israel mais vulnerável, os Estados Unidos menos respeitáveis, e os interesses americanos mais ameaçados.

A declaração de Gingrich sobre a verdade não foi um ato de um incendiário irresponsável. Foi o início de um antídoto para o abandono da verdade por Obama e para as argumentações em favor de mentiras e apaziguamento. E, como tal, não foi um motivo para irritação. Foi um motivo para esperança.

Saudi school textbooks show the right way to chop off hands and feet

2011-12-26T05:10:00.000-08:00

Twelfth-grade Saudi textbook: The Struggle with the Jews is religious, not political

Just look what 9th and 10th graders are being taught in the Islamic kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

The books were published and handed out to 9th and 10th-graders despite Saudi Arabia's promises to clean up textbooks in the kingdom.

Ali Al-Ahmed, director of the Institute for Gulf Affairs, told Fox News: 'This is where terrorism starts, in the education system.

'They show students how to cut (the) hand and the feet of a thief,' he said.

The textbooks were printed for the 2010-2011 academic year and translated from Arabic by the institute.

In one, for ninth-graders, students are taught the annihilation of the Jewish people is imperative.

One text reads in part: 'The hour (of judgment) will not come until the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them. There is a Jew behind me come and kill him.'

According to the translations, women are described as weak and irresponsible.

Mr Al-Ahmed said the textbooks also call for homosexuals to be put to death 'because they pose a danger at society, as the Saudi school books teaches'.

Mr Al-Ahmed said: 'If you teach six million children in these important years of their lives, if you install that in their brain, no wonder we have so many Saudi suicide bombers.'

Tom Friedman’s losing battle

2011-12-25T21:49:00.000-08:00

By CAROLINE B. GLICK

Is Friedman right? Do he and his friends on the Israel-bashing Left own the future? Are their efforts to convince young Americans to reject Israel working?

For decades New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman balanced his substantively anti-Israel positions with repeated protestations of love for Israel.

His balancing act ended last week when he employed traditional anti-Semitic slurs to dismiss the authenticity of substantive American support for Israel.

Channeling the longstanding anti-Semitic charge that Jewish money buys support for power-hungry Jews best expressed in the forged 19th century Protocols of the Elders of Zion and in John Mearshimer’s and Stephen Walt’s 2007 book The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy, Friedman denied the significance of the US Congress’s overwhelming support for Israel.

As he put it, “I sure hope that Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, understands that the standing ovation he got in Congress this year was not for his politics. That ovation was bought and paid for by the Israel lobby.”

It would be nice if Friedman is forced to pay some sort of price for finally coming out of the closet as a dyed-in-the-wool Israel hater. But he probably won’t. As he made clear in his column, he isn’t writing for the general public, but for a very small, select group of elitist leftists. These are the only people who matter to Friedman. And they matter to him because they share his opinions and his goal of indoctrinating young people to adopt his pathologically hostile views about Israel and his contempt for the American public that supports it.

It doesn’t matter to Friedman that overwhelming survey evidence, amassed over decades, show that the vast majority of the American public and the American Jewish community support Israel. It doesn’t matter to him that the support shown to Netanyahu in Congress last May was a reflection of that support.

As he put it, “The real test is what would happen if Bibi tried to speak at, let’s say, the University of Wisconsin. My guess is that many students would boycott him and many Jewish students would stay away.”

Embedded in this statement are two key points. First, Friedman assesses that the prevailing view on US college campuses are his own radical views. And he is convinced that college students share his views.

As he sees it, if college students share his views, then it doesn’t matter that Congress supports Israel today. Through the youth, he and his anti-Israel colleagues will own the future.

THE KEY question then is is Friedman right? Do he and his friends on the Israel bashing Left own the future? Are their efforts to convince young Americans in places like University of Wisconsin to embrace leftist dogmas, including rejection of Israel’s rights working? Is support for Israel diminishing? A plethora of data indicates that while the picture is mixed, the dominant trends do not favor Friedman’s views. This is true not only in the US but in Israel as well.

For instance, last week the Washington Examiner’s senior political commentator Michael Barone noted a massive deterioration of US President Barack Obama’ support levels among voters under 30 years old. Whereas Obama won this demographic in the 2008 elections by a 2-1 margin, two recent surveys show that if elections were held today, he would receive the support of just over a third of young voters.

Barone hypothesized that young Americans’ disenchantment has to do with their generational individualism bred of their limitless ability to express themselves through technology. This individualism has nothing in common with Obama’s economic and foreign policy collectivism.

As for young American Jews, according to a study published in August 2010 by Brandeis University’s Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies, the ratio of young American Jews who feel attached to Israel – while lower than that of older Jews — has remained constant over the past twenty years. Moreover, Brandeis’s researchers told the Forward that “Every generation goes through a normal ‘lifecycle,’…in which attachment to Israel grows as people get older.”

Even more notable than the consistency of support levels over time is the fact that researchers discerned no difference in levels of support for Israel across the political spectrum. As the study reported, “We found that conservatives were no more likely than liberals to feel connected to Israel or regard Israel as central to their Jewish identities. These findings are remarkable given that liberalism is associated with reduced support for Israel in the broader American population.”

So not only have Friedman and his colleagues on the far Left failed to convince the general public to give up support for Israel, they have failed to get young American Jews to give up support for Israel.

THE FAILURE of Friedman’s fellow radicals to convince university students to abandon support for Israel or to water it down to the point of meaninglessness was demonstrated last month by Berkeley’s Jewish Student Union.

In recent years, Berkeley’s Hillel has come under withering criticism from pro- Israel activists on campus and countrywide for its leadership’s willingness to accept anti-Israel groups as members of its community of sponsored organizations.

Hillel-sponsored groups like Kesher Enoshi have welcomed the virulently anti-Israel Jewish Voices for Peace group into the Hillel tent. Hillel groups have participated in Israel Apartheid Week activities and supported university divestment from Israeli-owned firms. So too, Hillel’s leadership has held dances on Memorial Day for Fallen Israeli Soldiers, published fliers demeaning observant Jews and discouraged students from flying Israel’s flag at demonstrations.

Last month, Berkeley’s Jewish students took a step to regain control over their community from the anti-Israel radicals running Hillel. On November 16, Berkeley’s JSU voted to deny membership to J Street U, the college wing of the anti-Israel lobby J Street.

Speaking to the local Jewish paper j.weekly, Jacob Lewis, co-president of the pro-Israel student group Tikvah explained, “J Street is not pro-Israel but an anti-Israel organization that, as part of the mainstream Jewish community, I could not support.”

Hillel’s leadership is up in arms. Rather than respect the decision of the JSU, Hillel’s professional “grown-ups” are urging them to reconsider.

In a letter to Haaretz and to the j. weekly, Berkeley Hillel’s board president Barbara Davis and its executive director Rabbi Adam Naftalin-Kelman wrote, “We respect the right of the Jewish Student Union…to make its own decisions, but we encourage JSU to reconsider its vote and include J Street U as a member.” The two then pledged that despite the verdict of Berkeley’s Jewish students, Hillel will continue to find J Street U’s programming.

THE SITUATION on Israeli college campuses is similar. Here too, Israeli students are in revolt against post-Zionist and anti- Zionist academics. Here too, the best efforts of radical professors to convince their students to abandon Zionism seem to be faltering. A poll of young Israelis taken last year by Dahaf for the German Friedrich Ebert Foundation indicated that young Israelis are far more politically conservative than their baby boomer parents and professors. And this disparity is apparent on university campuses.

Last year the Im Tirtzu student group published a report on the state of Political Science studies in Israeli universities. In a follow-on report, it placed a spotlight on the situation at Ben Gurion University’s Politics and Government Department.

Both reports were attacked by the media and by the professoriate as cheap, academically shoddy attempts to harm academic freedom.

Im Tirtzu’s reports were based on an analysis of course syllabi at all university departments and they concluded that there was a clear far left ideological bias inherent in course materials. Pro-Israel and non-hostile books and research were almost entirely absent from the curricula, they alleged.

As for Ben Gurion University’s Politics and Government Department, the Im Tirtzu report claimed that aside from political bias reflected in the course curricula, the department’s faculty is dominated by anti-Zionists. It charged that nine out of 11 permanent faculty members were involved in “radical left-wing” political activities and that six signed a letter supporting refusal to serve in the IDF.

While the media and the professorate pilloried their reports, the group’s charges caused the Council for Higher Education to form a blue ribbon committee last November comprised of seven political scientists – three from Israel and four from abroad — to conduct a study of all of the political science departments in Israeli universities. Last month the committee presented its conclusions to the CHE. And they were devastating.

The committee’s general recommendations involved requiring professors at all universities to make a differentiation in their classrooms between facts and their political opinions. It also called for a more theoretical approach to political science with emphasis on research methods rather than activism and ideology. University departments were urged to use more politically balanced curricula.

As to Ben Gurion University, the commission said the Politics and Government Department needs to clean up its act or be shut down. Not only is it giving short shrift to the academic foundations of the discipline in favor of activism, its instructors use the classrooms to indoctrinate students.

So too, due to the department’s academic inadequacy, the committee claimed its master’s program’s “value…is doubtful,” and said that the faculty could not adequately educate doctoral students.

On November 29, the CHE unanimously adopted the committee’s findings and recommendations.

It gave Ben Gurion University until April to enact the required changes in its Politics and Government Department or shut its doors.

It will be interesting to see how events progress at Ben Gurion in the coming months, but one thing is clear enough, like Friedman and the Berkeley Hillel, its professors will no longer be able to pretend that they are fair and balanced professionals.

Their bluff was called.

On December 7 Politico’s Ben Smith published a detailed report about how two of the Democratic Party’s core institutions, the Center for American Progress and Media Matters are waging a concerted, continuous campaign to diminish left wing Democratic support for Israel. Media Matters official M.J. Rosenberg acknowledged that given the depth of popular support for Israel in the US, chances are remote that their efforts will pay off in Congress today. He explained that his goal is to shift the Democratic Party’s position on Israel through its younger generation.

As he put it, “We’re playing the long game here.”

Happily, to date, they are losing the long game as well as the short game both in Israel and the US. While it is important to remain on guard against radicals like Friedman and Rosenberg and their fellow travelers on campuses, it is also important to recognize that despite their powerful positions, they remain marginal voices in both Israel and the US.

O chocante amor árabe por Hitler

2011-12-20T19:37:00.000-08:00

Escrito por Walid Shoebat | 19 Dezembro 2011

Pesquisar por “Hitler” em árabe foi uma jornada a um túnel de escuridão deprimente.

A extensão do amor ou ódio do público a personagens históricos talvez possa ser determinado digitando o nome desse personagem na ferramenta de busca do Google. Hoje em dia, digitar o nome de ditadores árabes em caracteres árabes mostra uma insatisfação geral que os iguala a tiranos como Hitler. Mas e se você digitasse o nome do próprio “Hitler” em caracteres árabes no Google? O que vai encontrar? “Hitler” em árabe tem tantos resultados quanto o número de judeus que ele assassinou: mais de 6 milhões. Embora seja impossível ler 6 milhões de blogs e sites para apurar o que o mundo árabe pensa sobre ele, ler atentamente algumas centenas deles pode deixar os ocidentais chocados ao perceberem que a maioria dos comentários, de uma maneira ou de outra, elogiam ou glorificam Hitler.

O primeiro site árabe possui um blog que o apresenta da seguinte forma: “Hitler não era um homem comum para ser esmagado pela roda do tempo e deixado para trás como poeira, para ser esquecido neste vasto universo. Tampouco era o rei apenas da Alemanha. Ele é um dos grandes entre poucos. É o rei da história”. Os ocidentais poderiam pensar que o primeiro comentário em um artigo como esse seria de repúdio. Nada disso. Muhammad Jasem postou: “Se os maiores líderes se juntassem, não se igualariam em magnificência a Hitler”. O restante dos comentários não focou longe disso. O segundo resultado foi um vídeo do Youtube intitulado “Os Judeus São Covardes”, mostrando um imitador de Hitler andando pelas ruas, com transeuntes judeus, supostamente apavorados, desviando-se dele. Isso “prova que judeus são covardes”, interpretavam os comentários.

A citação mais popular de Hitler em sites árabes é uma em que ele supostamente diz: “Eu poderia ter destruído todos os judeus, mas deixei alguns para que o mundo saiba um dia por que eu os matei”. O resultado seguinte é um vídeo do Youtube intitulado “A Declaração de Hitler sobre a Aniquilação dos Judeus”; o primeiro comentário dizia como Hitler “respeitava o Islã” e como ele chegou a convocar uma unidade muçulmana da SS e lhes conceder as pausas para orações.

Lendo com atenção, centenas de sites árabes mostram conteúdos similares.

Alegrei-me ao ver o que pensei ser o primeiro comentário positivo, à maneira ocidental, entre milhares, que dizia: “Hitler era um psicopata. Ele também teria matado todos os muçulmanos” mas logo me decepcionei com “mas, para ser sincero, eu adoro o Hitler por sua capacidade de liderança”. É claro, isso foi rapidamente repreendido por outros: “Se Hitler odiasse os árabes, por que ele iria convocar soldados muçulmanos para os seus postos? Isso deve ser propaganda sionista”.

Acusações de “propaganda sionista” e teorias da conspiração empesteiam a internet em língua árabe; a história factual é descreditada como “conspiração sionista”. Concluí das minhas próprias experiências antissemitas da minha infância que uma cultura empesteada de teorias da conspiração geralmente é a mesma que as produz.

Um comentário bastante típico afirmava: “Hitler deixou a outra metade [dos judeus] viva para que a profecia de Maomé seja cumprida e abra o caminho para o Islã destruir o restante”. No site Alsaha.com, principal fonte de notícias do Golfo Árabe, uma notícia sobre um filme recém-lançado em Paris retrata pela primeira vez como a Mesquita de Paris salvou guerrilheiros da resistência judaica e muçulmana durante a Segunda Guerra Mundial. Os comentários mais comuns vão de negadores do holocausto, longos posts de como o Grande Mufti Haj Amin Al-Husseini, líder palestino que fez aliança com Hitler, era um grande herói e como Hitler havia supostamente citado o Corão: “a Hora está próxima, e a lua foi feita em pedaços”. A citação do Corão supostamente dita por Hitler era tão comum que Ayed Al-Qarni, um dos mais respeitados teólogos sauditas, observou que Hitler havia gravado essa frase nos canhões e tanques das tropas da SS.

De acadêmicos muçulmanos a referências históricas, Hitler é um herói.

Objeções ao amor de Hitler existem, mas raramente são isentas de contradições nos mesmos termos. Um comentário criticava tal amor: “Hitler era um nazista que acreditava na raça ariana… É óbvio que Hitler elogiava o Islã porque estava aliado aos otomanos. Mas por que nós árabes temos que insistir nesse amor por Hitler? Só porque ele fez uma limpeza dos judeus? Maomé, e Omar depois dele, limparam Jerusalém deles muito antes de Hitler”. Se os ocidentais equiparassem Maomé a Hitler, a reação seria imensa. Mas não é incomum encontrar sites árabes afirmando que Hitler era um modelo que seguiu os passos de Maomé. “O único personagem na história que foi capaz de ganhar os judeus para mutilá-los foi Maomé”, Hitler foi citado dizendo. E é claro, consideraram um elogio.

Os comentários árabes não deixam de usar Hitler como exemplo para comparar tiranos árabes e para combater o extremismo. O site de notícias do Oriente Médio Walfajr.net publicou um artigo escrito por Al-Baqer Ali Al-Shamasi intitulado “Os Tambores Sionistas Tocam para a Guerra”. Ele escreve: “Hitler, esse nacionalista extremista, e seu amigo Mussolini, vieram e desencadearam uma guerra mundial que vitimou 60 milhões de pessoas”. Até aí tudo bem. Até que algumas linhas depois: “Quando Hitler fez o que fez com eles [os judeus], os sionistas usaram táticas para inventar o Holocausto”. Aceitar o Holocausto como uma realidade e negá-lo na mesma argumentação não é incomum nos sites árabes. Isso é sinal de um mentiroso patológico.

Pesquisar por “Hitler” em árabe foi uma jornada a um túnel de escuridão deprimente. “Hitler, o artista”, dizia um artigo. Hitler até mesmo “descobriu os desenhos de Walt Disney”, afirmava um comentário. Foi “Hitler quem desenhou pela primeira vez a ‘Branca de Neve e os Sete Anões’”. Do primeiro ao último comentário, o artigo foi um deleite.

O último comentário dizia que “Hitler odiava os judeus porque o médico de sua mãe, que era judeu, não cuidou dela e a deixou morrer. Foi um judeu que comprou as primeiras peças de arte de Hitler e lhe pagou pouco por elas, para depois revendê-las muito mais caro. Hitler mais tarde descobriu o roubo da sua arte pelos judeus. Essa foi a história que despertou a família de Hitler para quão trapaceiros são os judeus”.

Tudo isso me faz lembrar dos meus primeiros dias de escola na cidade de Belém, quando estudávamos os escritos do mais respeitado e eminente escritor egípcio, Anis Mansour, que uma vez escreveu: “Pessoas de todo o mundo vieram a se dar conta de que Hitler estava certo, pois os judeus são sanguessugas… interessados em destruir o mundo inteiro, que os enxotou e desprezou por séculos… e os queimou nos crematórios de Hitler… 1 milhão… 6 milhões. Se apenas ele tivesse terminado o serviço!”

Anis Mansour não passava de um marginal. Eu sei que isso pode irritar centenas de milhões de pessoas no mundo árabe que o respeitam. Talvez digam que eu fui infectado por uma conspiração americana. De fato, eu fui: chama-se “pensamento crítico”.

Tradução: Luis Gustavo Gentil

Título original: The shocking Arab love for Hitler

Twelfth-grade Saudi textbook: The Struggle with the Jews Is Not Political but Religious

2011-12-19T12:51:00.000-08:00

Saudi Textbook: The Enmity between the Muslims and the Jews Is Everlasting

A twelfth-grade Saudi textbook titled Studies from the Muslim World includes a chapter on Palestine and the Palestinian cause, which deals extensively with the Jews. The chapter presents the conflict over Palestine as a religious struggle between the Jews and the Muslims that goes back to the era of the Prophet Muhammad. It states that there is no hope of ever making peace with the Jews because they do not believe in peace, but only strive to spread corruption and instability throughout the world, for they are liars, connivers and cheats by nature. It also stresses that these negative traits of the Jews are described in the Koran, and quotes verses to prove this. Finally, the chapter states that the only way to liberate Palestine is through jihad.

The following are excerpts:

The book's title page

The Struggle with the Jews Is Not Political but Religious

Page 91 reads: "Whoever studies the nature of the conflict between the Muslims and the Jews understands an important fact, [namely that] this is a religious conflict, not a dispute about politics or nationality, or a conflict between races or tribes, or a fight over land or country, as some describe it. This is a deeply rooted enmity, a conflict between truth and falsehood, between monotheism and polytheism, between heresy and faith. The enmity between us and the Jews will not cease under any circumstances until one of two things [happens]: either they join our religion and become Muslims, or we abandon our religion, God forbid. [Allah], may He be exalted, said [in the Koran]: 'They [the Jews] will not cease fighting with you until they turn you back from your religion, if they can' [Koran 2:217]; 'And the Jews will not be pleased with you, nor the Christians, until you follow their religion' [Koran 2:120].

"They are jealous of the fact that the Seal of the Prophets [i.e., Muhammad] came from among the Arabs and not from among the Children of Israel, and [because] they know well that our master, Muhammad, Allah's prayer be upon him, was the Prophet of Allah... [As it says in the Koran:] 'Those whom We have given the Book recognize him as they recognize their sons, and a party of them most surely conceal the truth while they know (it)' [Koran 2:146]. Once we realize the essence of this conflict, and that this enmity cannot cease, we understand how much those who say the conflict can be settled are misleading [us].

"Our conflict with the Jews clearly began following the hijra of our master, Muhammad, Allah's prayer be upon him, to Medina. It was then that the plots and schemes against the first Muslims began. [These Muslims waged] prolonged jihad against [the Jews], who were expelled from Medina in stages. The Banu Qaynuqa' [tribe] was the first to be expelled, following the incident of the Muslim woman.[1] Afterward, the members of the Banu Al-Nadir tribe were expelled, having tried to assassinate the Prophet, Allah's prayer be upon him, and then, the Banu Qurayza [tribe], who breached their covenant with the Muslims and joined the camps [of Muhammad's Meccan enemies] in the Battle of the Trench [in 627 CE]."

The Jews Spread Corruption, Fitna, and Conspiracies

Pages 91-92 read: "Throughout Islamic history, the Jews have striven to destroy the [Islamic] religion and spread fitna among the Muslims. All know about the fitna caused by the Jew 'Abdallah bin Saba during the time of 'Othman bin 'Affan, may Allah be pleased with him."[2]

"In modern times, Jewish influence has cut deeply into several Western countries, and [the Jews] have taken control of their economies and media. These countries were exploited for the Jews' benefit, and the two sides [i.e., the Jews and the West joined forces and] combined their interests in order to wipe out Islam. After Sultan 'Abd Al-Hamid, Allah's mercy be upon him, stood up to the Jews and rejected their tempting offers in exchange for Palestine, the Crusaders and Jews decided to destroy the Ottoman Islamic Caliphate so that Palestine would be handed to the Jews, and so that the imperialist countries could divide the Islamic world among themselves.

"[After] the Jews strayed from the correct religion brought [to them] by Moussa [Moses], peace be upon him, they did not take root in any land, nor did they legally own any land. They wandered in [various] regions, for wandering from place to place and being divided is in their nature. The Jews lived as oppressed minorities throughout the world, and caused corruption in every land they entered. In every country where they settled, they were a source of trouble and fitna. They build up their confidence by frightening others, which is why the peoples hated them and why they came to be known for their deceit and cunning."

Page 106 reads: "Zionism does not aspire to win over the friendship of others, for it does not want them to join it. Therefore, the Jews' relations with the nations among which they live have been characterized by tension and instability, which caused the peoples to support one another against [the Jews], to molest them, to deal them bitter blows, and to expel them. Since the Jews have been in the Diaspora, they have not known peace with any nation because they have [always] striven to [perpetrate] fraud, deceit, and cunning. There is no better proof of this than the Muslims' experience with them in Medina – [which caused] the Prophet to expel them and order to banish them from the Arabian Peninsula – and what happened to them in countries such as Germany, Poland, Spain, and elsewhere.

"Throughout their history, the Jews have never attributed any importance to peace... believing it impossible to establish peace with other nations. They even believe that the nations around them must live in perpetual strife that will undermine their stability, so that they will be unable to fight [the Jews]. This may explain the Jews' aspirations to spread destruction and corruption by various means, even in countries with which they claim to have what they call 'peace agreements.'"

The Jews' Corruption Is Described in the Koran

The textbook informs the pupils that the Jews' characteristics and traits are described in the Koran, and goes on to list and explain them. Pages 92-94 read: "The noble Koran is the best source to acquaint us with the [Jews'] personality and psychological makeup. The expressions 'Jews' and 'Children of Israel' appear more than 63 times in the book of Allah, may He be exalted. They were the nation charged with ruling the earth, but Allah took their [role of] leadership away from them due to their corruption and destructiveness, and because they killed the prophets. The following are a few brief descriptions of some of their traits, as they appear in the noble Koran:

"1. Attacking the very essence of Allah, may He be exalted: No one will be spared their mischief, even the very essence of Allah [himself], may He be exalted. [Allah], the mighty and exalted, said: 'And the Jews say: The hand of Allah is tied up! Their hands shall be shackled and they shall be cursed for what they say' [Koran 5:64]... 'Allah has certainly heard the saying of those who said: Surely Allah is poor and we are rich [Koran 3:181].

"2. [Spreading] corruption in the land: They are the people of corruption and destruction. They cast doubt on da'wa [calling to Islam], and spread rumors regarding the wives of the Prophet, Allah's prayer be upon him, and spread evil among the Muslims. [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'Their effort is for corruption in the land, and Allah does not love the corrupters' [Koran 5:64].

"3. Killing prophets: [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'They went on rejecting the signs of Allah and slaying His prophets without just cause. This is because they rebelled and went on transgressing' [Koran 2:61].

"4. Lying, spreading rumors and distorting [truths]: They are the people of lies, which are [all] they listen to, and they are the masters of falsifying and distorting the truth. Not even the prophecy of Allah escapes their distortion, and their Torah proves it. [Allah], may He be exalted, said: 'The Jews (are) men who will listen to any lie and listen even to others who have never so much as come to you. They change the words from their (right) times and places' [Koran 5:41].

"5. Deception and misleading: [Allah,] may He be exalted, said of them: 'They say: There is no call on us (to keep faith) with these ignorant (pagans)' [Koran 3:75].

"6. Rushing to [commit] sin: [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'And you will see many of them racing one another to [commit] sin and exceed the limits' [Koran 5:62].

"7. Inciting to wars and fitna: [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'Whenever they kindle a fire for war, Allah puts it out' [Koran 5:64].

"8. Breaching covenants and agreements: They are the nation best known for this characteristic. [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'Because of their breach of their covenant, We cursed them' [Koran 5:13]. They breached their covenants with the prophets, [including] the Prophet Muhammad, Allah's prayer be upon him, more than once, most famously when they breached their covenant with the Muslims and joined the polytheists on the day the [latter's forces] invaded [Medina]." (According to Muslim tradition, the members of the Kuraish tribe, who were enemies of the Prophet Muhammad in Mecca, convinced the Jews to cooperate with them and to attack on Muhammad in the battle of Al-Khandaq in 627 AD).

"9. Racist tendencies and scorn for the other: They think they are God's Chosen People. [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'And the Jews and the Christians say: We are the sons of Allah and His beloved ones' [Koran 5:18].

"10. Lust for life – any sort of life, even if it is despicable. [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'And you will most certainly find them the greediest of men for life' [Koran 2:96].

"11. Love of forbidden money: They hoard money by any means [possible]. [Allah,] may He be exalted, said of them: '(They are fond of) listening to falsehood, of devouring anything forbidden' [Koran 5:42].

"12. Cheating: This is manifest in the story of their fishing for a big fish on the Sabbath, when they are forbidden to work. They cheated when they set the net before the Sabbath with the intent of bringing it in after [the Sabbath]. [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'And ask them about the town which stood by the sea; when they exceeded the limits of the Sabbath, when their fish came to them on the day of their Sabbath, appearing on the surface of the water, and on the day on which they did not keep the Sabbath, they did not come to them; thus did We try them because they transgressed' [Koran 7:163].

"13. Argumentativeness: The loathsome manner of their argumentativeness is manifest in the story of the cow and their violation and trickery in the matter of [the cow's] ritual slaughter. [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'And when Moussa said to his people: Surely Allah commands you that you should sacrifice a cow; they said: Do you ridicule us? He said: I seek the protection of Allah from being one of the ignorant. They said: Call on your Lord...' [Koran 67-68. See also verses 69-71].

"14. Their great hatred for the Muslims: [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'Certainly you will find the most violent of people in enmity for those who believe (to be) the Jews' [Koran 5:82].

"15. Cowardice: In their hearts there is fear and anxiety, especially of the Muslims. [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'They will not fight against you in a body save in fortified towns or from behind walls' [Koran 59:14].

"16. Envy: [Allah,] may He be exalted, said of them: 'Many of the followers of the Book wish that they could turn you back into unbelievers after your faith, out of envy from themselves' [Koran 2:109].

"17. Obstinacy: Regarding this, Allah, may He be exalted, said: 'They said: We hear, and we disobey' [Koran 2:93]." (This is based on the biblical verse "We hear and obey").

The Jews Will Be Forced Out of Palestine through Jihad

Among the reasons given for the Arabs' defeats in their wars with the Jews are the following, which appear on page 105: "[One reason is] Islam's estrangement from the domain of [religious] struggle with the Jews, and the appearance of false calls and slogans such as Arab nationalism and socialism. [Another reason is that] many in the ummah disregard the [true] essence of our conflict with the Jews, which is a purely religious struggle, with the Jews drawing their principles from their distorted books. Allah, may He be exalted and glorified, commanded us to pin our hopes on Him. [Allah,] may He be exalted, said: 'And hold fast by the covenant of Allah all together and be not disunited' [Koran 3:103].

On page 112, the book enumerates a Muslim's obligations, including the following: "To overcome the spiritual defeatism that has harmed many of us. We are, as described by God, may He be praised and glorified, the greatest nation to have risen among mankind, and the Jews, as they are described by the noble Koran, are the most cowardly and life-lusting people, as has already been proven by the conflicts with the Jews throughout history.

"Jihad for the sake of Allah is the only path to liberating Palestine. Only through jihad did the Muslims conquer Jerusalem, and only through jihad did the Crusaders leave Palestine. Likewise, only through jihad will the Jews leave Palestine.

"The only point of departure in our handling of the issue of Palestine [should be] absolute faith in Islam and in the fact that all rulings related to this issue must be derived from [Islam]."
Endnotes:

[1] According to Muslim tradition, the conflict between the Muslims of Medina and the Jewish tribe of Banu Qaynuqa' began after a Muslim woman visited the shop of a Jewish jeweler in the market, who demanded that she take off her veil. When she refused, he fastened her cloak with a pin in such a way that, when she got up, she was stripped naked. A Muslim killed the jeweler in retaliation, starting a chain of revenge killings between the sides.

[2] According to some accounts, 'Abdallah bin Saba was a Jewish convert to Islam who became a disciple of the fourth Caliph, 'Ali bin Abu Talib, whom he considered to be divine, and therefore incited against the third Caliph, 'Othman bin 'Affan, bringing about his murder.

Normas de reportagem para o Oriente Médio

2011-12-15T16:37:00.000-08:00

Da próxima vez que acompanhar o noticiário sobre Israel, assegure-se de saber ler nas entrelinhas.

Todos os meios de comunicação têm seu manual de estilo, elaborado de maneira tão clara e imparcial quanto possível. Hoje em dia, contudo, parece que o Ministério de Comunicação Palestino é quem publica e distribui seu manual a dezenas de jornais e outros veículos de comunicação.
Desde setembro de 2000, surgiu um novo “manual de estilo” de fato para os repórteres que cobrem a violência palestina contra Israel. Em alguns casos, as novas “normas de reportagem” são definidas pela própria linha editorial dos órgãos de informação.

Apesar do aspecto evidente de “jornalismo de encomenda”, é pouco provável que mãos conspiratórias estejam por trás de um desses manuais de estilo de fato. Na maioria das vezes, repórteres e correspondentes os adotam de modo informal, talvez até, de certa forma, sem plena consciência do que estão fazendo.

Invariavelmente, as novas regras são tendenciosas contra Israel.
Até agora, a tendenciosidade parece ter causado um impacto pequeno na opinião pública americana sobre Israel. Já na Europa, onde o tom antiisraelense é mais forte, mais estridente, o efeito é outro.
Seguem-se oito “normas” de reportagem sobre o Oriente Médio, extraídas de centenas de artigos e noticiários:

Regra nº 1 – Sensacionalize a intensidade e o alcance das ações militares israelenses.

Chame-as de “agressivas”, “devastadoras” ou “intensas”. Refira-se às incursões aos territórios palestinos como “de grande extensão”, mesmo quando se trata de apenas 250 metros.
Por outro lado, refira-se a ataques de morteiros palestinos como “ineficazes” ou “sem vítimas”, embora a intenção dos que atiram com os morteiros seja malévola.

Regra nº 2 – Suavize a violência palestina.

Não rotule as explosões de bombas e os tiroteios contra civis judeus como “terrorismo”, nem os perpetradores de “terroristas”. Diga “militantes” ou “ativistas”. Bombas plantadas no meio de mercados públicos israelenses não são “terrorismo”.

Manifestação de palestinos.

Justifique diferenças na abordagem. Por exemplo, ao referir-se a atentados do IRA como “terroristas”, a BBC News Online alegou: “Nosso noticiário doméstico sempre usou ‘terroristas’ para a Irlanda do Norte… mas a política do noticiário internacional é a de não qualificar ninguém nesses termos”. Segundo a editora da BBC Newshour, Maya Fish, “a palavra ‘terrorista’ nunca é usada em nosso noticiário internacional, não importa quem plante bombas, destrua ou mate.”

Regra nº 3 – Culpe os assentamentos judeus.

Atenue a agressão palestina chamando as vítimas israelenses de “colonos” e os locais dos atentados de “assentamentos” ou “territórios ocupados”. Designe os arredores de Jerusalém, como Gilo ou French Hill, por “assentamentos” e “enclaves de colonos” – ainda que esses locais sejam parte de Jerusalém há trinta anos e abriguem dezenas de milhares de famílias judias de classe média. Quando possível, também chame de “assentamentos” as cidades localizadas na Linha Verde*, como Sderot.

Vá além e refira-se a todas as vítimas judias como “colonos” – quer se trate de um garoto de quatorze anos ou de um bebê de dez meses.

Desumanize os residentes judeus de Jerusalém, da Cisjordânia e de Gaza reunindo-os em uma entidade civil ampla, como faz o The New York Times ao se referir a “soldados, colonos e civis israelenses”.

Regra nº 4 – Condene os líderes israelenses; solidarize-se com o Fatah e o Hamas.

Diga sempre de Netanyahu: “linha-dura”, “criminoso de guerra”, “repudiado pelos árabes” ou “demolidor”.

Nunca diga de dos políticos palestinos: “ex-terrorista”, “belicoso”, “corrupto” ou “despótico”.

Regra nº 5 – Culpe Israel por todas as mortes palestinas.
Culpe Israel, seja por “acidentes de trabalho” em fábricas de bombas palestinas, manifestantes atingidos por tiros palestinos destinados a soldados israelenses, ou feridos durante tumultos gerados por um atentado suicida ou uma explosão de ônibus.

Crianças israelenses que foram mortas em sua casa, enquanto dormiam, por um terrorista palestino.

Árabes mortos em acidentes automobilísticos também podem ser creditados a Israel. No começo de outubro de 2000, muitas versões culpavam os israelenses pelo espancamento seguido de morte de Issam Judeh Mustafa Hamed. Em 2 de novembro, patologistas indicados pela Autoridade Palestina concluíram que Issam Judeh havia morrido em um acidente de trânsito. É desconhecido o número de “mártires” que tiveram morte natural, ou foram mortos em acidentes e disputas internas.

Além disso, refira-se a crianças palestinas como traumatizadas, órfãs, assassinadas ou gravemente feridas – mesmo que pelas próprias balas ou bombas palestinas. Nunca mencione as crianças israelenses vitimadas pelos ataques palestinos.

Regra nº 6 – Empregue os verbos da maneira adequada.

Use a voz passiva para descrever as mortes palestinas – “foi morto a tiros” ou “foi abatido” por soldados israelenses.

Por outro lado, use o intransitivo para não evidenciar a culpa palestina. Diga que o tiroteio “irrompeu”. A manchete sobre a morte de Shalhevet Pass, o bebê de dez meses assassinado por um atirador palestino, dizia: “Criança judia morre na Cisjordânia”.

Quando possível, justaponha duas mortes, responsabilizando os israelenses por uma delas e deixando a outra sem autoria. Por exemplo: “Durante confrontos perto da aldeia de Dura, na Cisjordânia, um menino palestino de onze anos foi morto pelas tropas israelenses. Testemunhas dizem que o menino observava a troca de tiros entre soldados israelenses e atiradores palestinos, quando foi atingido no peito. Na segunda-feira, um bebê israelense de dez meses foi morto em tiroteio nas proximidades de Hebron”.

Regra nº 7 – Compense uma morte israelense, mencionando uma morte palestina sem qualquer relação com a primeira.

Compense uma atrocidade dos terroristas, como a explosão de um ônibus, com a morte de uma mulher idosa ou de uma criança palestina, mesmo que esta tenha ocorrido muito tempo antes da outra.
Noticiando a chocante carnificina de dois adolescentes israelenses perto de Tekoa, a CNN deu à matéria o título “Encontrados mortos dois adolescentes israelenses” e colocou logo embaixo a foto de um bebê palestino morto uma semana antes.

Em outra reportagem, a CNN noticiou: “Um israelense foi morto e outros ficaram feridos em atentados nas estradas da Cisjordânia nesta terça-feira. Os ataques aconteceram em seguida a explosões e confrontos em Gaza e na Cisjordânia que tiraram sete vidas palestinas”. Esse foi o relato, apesar das explosões em Gaza terem sido um “acidente de trabalho” em uma fábrica de bombas palestina.

Regra nº 8 – Invoque nomes árabes para os lugares santos.

Use termos árabes para os locais sagrados, mesmo quando o termo em hebraico for o padrão em qualquer enciclopédia, texto acadêmico, documento diplomático ou outra fonte aceitável no Ocidente.

Vista do Monte do Templo, que os árabes e grande parte da mídia chama de "Esplanada das Mesquitas".

Evite chamar o Monte do Templo de “o local mais sagrado do judaísmo”, ou Jerusalém de “a capital dos judeus há três mil anos”. Referências ao Monte do Templo devem ser qualificadas como meras pretensões: “que Israel reivindica ser o local do Primeiro e do Segundo Templos”.

De preferência, o Monte do Templo é “Haram al Sharif, o terceiro local mais sagrado dos muçulmanos”, ou “o lugar mais santo para os muçulmanos em Jerusalém”. Por contraste, nunca diga que Hebron, onde estão as tumbas dos patriarcas judeus, é “o segundo local mais sagrado do judaísmo”, nem que o sepulcro de Raquel, perto de Belém, é “o terceiro local mais sagrado para os judeus”.

Quando necessário, descubra um termo árabe bem obscuro, para aplicá-lo, por exemplo, à Porta de Jaffa, a entrada principal para a Cidade Velha de Jerusalém: “Bab al-Khalil”.

Regra nº 9 – Omita fatos que não se encaixem na narrativa "Árabes oprimidos, israelenses opressores" e não contextualize as informações.

Do início de 2011 até 17 de julho, mais de 160 foguetes foram disparados contra Israel - inclusive durante o peírodo de cessar-fogo e causando várias vítimas fatais. De 2001 até final de 2008 mais de 8600 foguetes foram lançados por palestinos.

No dia 11 de março de 2011 dois palestinos invadiram a casa da família Fogel no meio da noite e mataram a facadas pai, mãe e três filhos - um menino de 11 anos, outro de três e um bebê de 3 meses. O bebê foi decapitado (New Oriente Médio: Massacre em Itamar).

No dia 28 de setembro, durante o ano novo judaico, Asher Palmer (25) e seu bebê Yonatan morreram depois que o carro em que estavam perdeu o controle ao ser apedrejado por palestinos. Depois de morto o homem ainda teve seus objetos roubados pelos assassinos. (Israeli Father Asher Palmer, Baby Killed in Terrorist Attack)

Depois dos assassinatos os paletinos distribuíram doces nas ruas de Gaza comemorando o ocorrido (Gaza Residents Hand Out Candy to Celebrate Itamar Massacre).

Nenhum desses fatos foi publicado na grande imprensa brasileira. Mas quando jovens israelenses, revoltados com a violência palestina e a falta de resposta de seu governo, picharam "guerra" no muro de uma mesquita, o Jornal Nacional noticiou com estardalhaço os fatos. Sem informar a causa das manifestações ou motivo da escalada do setimento anti-árabe. Como se fosse apenas mais uma demonstração gratuita de intolerância e racismo.

Conclusão

Mesmo que não seja uma “conspiração”, estabeleceu-se uma “convenção” antiisraelense nos meios de comunicação. Como esse “manual de estilo” se desenvolverá nos próximos tempos? Tudo depende dos resultados dessa batalha que está sendo travada na mídia.

The Year the Arabs Discovered Palestine

2011-12-13T23:15:00.001-08:00

Judging from news reports, one might think that Palestinian nationalism has been active as long as Jews and Arabs have been living at the eastern edge of the Mediterranean Sea. And as Yasir 'Arafat rides high since his declaration of a Palestinian state, there is an understandable tendency in the West to accept at face value his insistence that the Palestinians have always sought an independent Palestinian state. In fact, this is far from the truth.

The idea of an Arab state resting between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea is, rather, a twentieth-century concept. Indeed, its origins can be traced with surprising precision to a single year — 1920. In January 1920, Palestinian nationalism hardly existed; by December of that critical year, it had been born.

The events of 1920 encapsulate the current successes and tribulations of the Palestinian movement. They foreshadow some abiding themes, such as the potential for rapid change and the major role of the Western powers. They also provide insight into the most widely supported but possibly the least successful nationalist cause of this century.

Early 1920: The Heyday of Pan-Syrianism

Palestinian nationalism cannot be age-old. To begin with, nationalism itself originated only in late eighteenth-century Europe, and took hold among the Muslims even more recently. Until the early years of this century, the ancestors of today's Palestinians had thought of themselves mainly in terms of religion. Islam emphasized bonds between fellow-believers, allowing little scope for territorially-bound loyalties among Muslims. Like it or not, adherents of other religions also found themselves arrayed along religious lines. Coreligionists shared strong bonds, but they had few ties outside their own community. Religious lines became residence lines; except for specific commercial or political purposes, little intermingling took place. A sense of common political identity was entirely lacking. In addition to religious ties, loyalties were tied primarily to family; then came other genealogical relations, as well as some ethnic, regional, linguistic, and class bonds.

When nationalism reached the Middle East from Europe, it captivated Middle Easterners as much as it did other peoples. The dream of governments embodying the spirit of their people was utterly alien, to be sure, but it excited many. The difficulty in the Middle East, as in most places, was exactly how to apply the national ideal. Where would the boundaries be placed? Did the Maronite Christians constitute a nation of their own? Did the Christians of the Levant? The Syrians? The Arabs? The Muslims? In the early years of this century, theorists took each of these peoples as the basis for grandiose plans for their favorite nation.

But not a single writer imagined a Palestinian nation, and for good reason. Palestine had always been, and at that time remained, a Jewish and Christian concept, utterly foreign to the Muslims. Eretz Yisrael and Terra Sancta have no analogue in Islam. Muslims look to the Hijaz, not Palestine, for their most sacred landmarks. Further, there has never been an independent state in Palestine ruled by Muslims; such states that were brought into existence were ruled either by Jews or Christians.

Muslim distaste for the very notion of Palestine was confirmed in April 1920, when the British authorities carved out a Palestinian entity. The Muslims' response was one of extreme suspicion. They saw the delineation of this territory as a victory for the Zionists; in their more paranoid moments, they even thought it reflected lingering Crusader impulses among the British. The Zionists, by contrast, rejoiced at the formal defining of a Palestine, correctly seeing it as a major step on the road to Theodor Herzl's Judenstaat. (In other words, the term "Palestine," which today symbolizes the Arab rejection of Israel, served the Jews not long ago as the symbol of Jewish nationalism.)

This point cannot be overemphasized. Palestine was brought into existence by British imperial authorities, not by Arabs; further, Muslims felt defeated by the British carving out of a distinct Palestinian entity. I know of no Palestinian endorsing this act when it took place in 1920. To the contrary, every recorded opinion suggests intense opposition.

What, then, was the objective of the Arabs living between the Jordan and the Mediterranean? What political unit did they endorse? To the extent that there was any proto-national unit to the east of the Mediterranean Sea, it was not called Palestine but Sham, the historic region of Syria which included the modern states of Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Jordan. This choice reflected a basic fact about the Levant, now often forgotten: Sham, usually translated as "Greater Syria," was a truly age-old ecological and cultural (but not political) unit.

Like Egypt, Arabia, Yemen, and the other large traditional units of the Middle East, it had geographic boundaries and ecological characteristics which made it distinct from adjoining areas. It constituted the western part of the Fertile Crescent, a dry region that supports life when—and only when—tended with great care. Residents of this area share a physical typology and an extended family structure. They speak Arabic with a distinctive lilt and prepare foods in a similar fashion. Just after World War I, a meeting of Arabs called for a united Syria on the basis that "the people speak Arabic; they are intermarried and have many links of kinship; and commerce has for ages moved freely between them."

Even so, Pan-Syrian sentiment was extremely weak before World War I; Greater Syria was, after all, only a proto-nationalist unit. Europeans and Westernized Syrians often remarked on the absence of national solidarity. Testimony on this subject is unanimous. The well-informed author of a British travel guide to Greater Syria noted in the mid-nineteenth century that "patriotism is unknown. There is not a man in the country, whether Turk or Arab, Mohammedan or Christian, who would give a para [penny] to save the empire from ruin; that is, if he be not in government pay ... The patriotism of the Syrian is confined to the four walls of his own house; anything beyond them does not concern him." Gertrude Bell, a knowledgeable British observer, wrote in 1907 that "Syria is merely a geographical term corresponding to no national sentiment in the breasts of the inhabitants." K.T. Khaïrallah noted in 1912 that "Syrian society did not exist in the past. There was nothing but distinct and often hostile groups....Society was based on a despotism of brutal force modeled on that of the ruler."

By the end of World War I in November 1918, however, the notion of a Syrian nation had made considerable headway among the Arabs of Palestine. They agreed almost unanimously on the existence of a Syrian nation. With few exceptions, they identified with the Syrian Arab government in Damascus, headed by Prince Faysal, a member of the Hashemite family. Palestinian enthusiasm for Pan-Syrian unity steadily increased through mid-1920.

There is ample evidence for this enthusiasm. Three major Palestinian organizations propounded Pan-Syrian ideas in the immediate aftermath of World War I: the Arab Club, the Literary Club, and the Muslim-Christian Association. (Note that none of these names makes any mention of Palestine.) The first two groups went furthest, calling outright for unity with Syria under Faysal. Even the Muslim-Christian Association, an organization of traditional leaders — men who would expect to rule if Palestine became independent — demanded incorporation in Greater Syria.

The Muslim-Christian Association held a congress in January-February 1919 to draw up demands to submit to the Paris Peace Conference. Representatives of fourteen Palestinian cities and towns presented a petition calling for Southern Syria to be "inseparable from the independent Arab Syrian government." The congress declared Palestine "nothing but part of Arab Syria and it has never been separated from it at any stage." The delegates saw Palestine tied to Syria by "national, religious, linguistic, moral, economic, and geographic bonds." On the basis of this view, they called for a Palestine that would remain "undetached from the independent Arab Syrian Government."

Musa Kazim al-Husayni, head of the Jerusalem Town Council (in effect, mayor) told a Zionist interlocutor in October 1919: "We demand no separation from Syria." According to Ahmad ash-Shuqayri (the man who headed the PLO in the 1960s), the ubiquitous slogan of 1918-19 was "Unity, Unity, From the Taurus [Mountains] to Rafah [in Gaza], Unity, Unity." The same appeal echoed from all corners. A singer in Ramla encouraged her "enraptured listeners" to join Faysal's forces. From San Salvador, of all places, a protest in March 1919 went out from the "Syrian Palestinians" to international leaders calling for "no separation between Syria and Palestine" and expressing hope that "Syria and Palestine remain united." The Salvadorans declared: "We trust that if Syria and Palestine remain united, we will never be enslaved by the Jewish yoke."

A congress of Palestinians met in Damascus in February 1920 and strongly advocated Pan-Syrian unity. One speaker suggested that Palestine stood in the same relationship to Syria as Alsace-Lorraine did to France. According to a contemporary newspaper report,

'Izzat Darwaza spoke about Palestine and [the need for] Syrian unity, then he submitted a statement for general opinion. No one disagreed with him. The discussion proceeded further on this matter; some participants wanted not to mention Palestine but to use the expression Greater Syria for all the regions of Syria, and they were applauded.

The Congress passed four resolutions. The first of them noted that "it never occurred to the peoples of Northern and Coastal Syria that Southern Syria (or Palestine) is anything but a part of Syria." The second called for an economic boycott of the Zionists in "all three parts of Syria" (meaning the whole of Greater Syria). The third and fourth resolutions called for Palestine "not to be divided from Syria" and for "the independence of Syria within its natural borders."

The crowning of Faysal as King of Syria in March 1920 elicited strong Pan-Syrian reactions among the Arabs of Palestine. The British military governor of Palestine received a petition (bearing Amin al-Husayni's signature) that demanded the eradication of borders with Syria and the inclusion of Palestine in a Syrian union. Musa Kazim al-Husayni broke his promise not to engage in politics and spoke from the municipality building's balcony in praise of Faysal. 'Arif al-'Arif led a mass demonstration in Jerusalem in which the participants carried pictures of Faysal and called for unity with Syria.

Then, in April, came the sobering news from San Remo that the British and French governments had decided to separate Palestine from Syria and to keep both territories under their control. This precipitated protests from all parts of Palestine. New calls went out for the independence of a united Syria stretching from Turkey to the Sinai.

These and many other indications point to two indisputable facts: until July 1920, the Palestinian goal was to join in a union with Syria, while the aspiration of an independent Palestinian state barely existed. Matters changed quickly in the next few months, however.

Late 1920: The Rise of Palestinian Nationalism

The French conquered Damascus and scuttled the Arab kingdom ruled over by Faysal in July 1920. One result was that Syrians came to devote almost all their attention to the issue of French rule, leaving very little time or concern for Palestine. Another was that, for Palestinians, the attractiveness of a Syrian connection faded away. Why be joined to Damascus, the Palestinians felt, if this meant rule by Paris? Palestinian leaders came to recognize that they were on their own against the British and the Zionists. From that point on, they sought to establish an autonomous Arab government in Palestine which would be ruled by themselves, not by politicians in Damascus. Herein lay the origins of Palestinian nationalism.

This reorientation was made formal by the Third Palestinian Congress, meeting in December 1920. Delegates at the Congress decided to drop the appellation Southern Syria and to stop demanding the joining of Palestine with Syria. At this moment, Palestine became acceptable to the Muslims; and it would not be long before they would actually find it appealing.

Subsequent meetings confirmed this new identity. When the Syrian Congress (the main exile organization dedicated to building Greater Syria) met in August 1921, Palestinians would no longer endorse the unity of Greater Syria. They even compelled the organization to rename itself The Syro-Palestinian Congress and to issue a statement calling for the "independence of Syria and of Palestine." A year later, Palestinians withdrew from this Congress.

This rapid switch suggests that, despite the apparent solidity of Palestinian interest in union with Syria, the sentiment was always precarious. In large part, this has to do with the two sides, Syrian and Palestinian, having had different expectations. Prince Faysal, who, along with many Syrians in 1918-20, saw the Zionists as a less pressing danger than the Maronites of Lebanon, was willing to work with the Jews if they could help him achieve his Greater Syrian goal. In January 1919, for example, he reached an agreement with the Zionists. In return for Faysal's promise "to encourage and stimulate immigration of Jews into Palestine on a large scale," he won Zionist backing for his campaign against the French. (But this agreement was contingent on Britain keeping France out of Syria; and since this was not done, the accord did not take effect.) Soon after, in a letter to Felix Frankfurter, Faysal noted that "there is room in Syria for both of us."

Palestinian leaders, in contrast, saw Zionists as the pre-eminent problem. In their eyes, Faysal's standing depended almost exclusively on his ability to help them against the Zionists. In late 1918, the Palestinians considered Faysal (in the words of a French diplomat) the only Arab leader "capable of resisting the Jewish flood" into Palestine. Faysal's subsequent willingness to deal with the Zionists diminished Palestinian backing for him.

This divergence in outlook created tensions between Syrian and Palestinian leaders from the moment World War I ended in November 1918. Signs of disaffection were apparent within three months of Faysal's arrival in Damascus, and they grew with time. Already in early 1919, the Muslim-Christian Association resolved that Palestine "should be part of Southern Syria, provided the latter is not under foreign control." The Association's Jerusalem branch went farther, calling for an independent government in Palestine to be only "politically associated" with Syria. It authorized Faysal "to represent Palestine and defend it at the Paris Conference," on the understanding that Palestine would enjoy full autonomy within a Syrian union. And while 'Arif Pasha ad-Dajjani, president of the Muslim-Christian Association, insisted that "Palestine or Southern Syria — an integral part of the one and indivisible Syria — must not in any case or for any pretext be detached," he also had doubts about rule from Damascus.

To be fair, it must be recorded that arguments against connections to Damascus appeared in the press as early as 1919. The Arab Club was the first nationalist institution to abandon Faysal's leadership. Despite its name, the newspaper Suriya al-Janubiya ("Southern Syria") led the campaign away from Pan-Syrianism, arguing that Syrians had become too absorbed in their conflict with France to pay enough attention to the Zionist challenge. In January 1920, when Faysal returned empty-handed from his second trip to Europe, some top Palestinians began to see him as not essential to their cause, an impression reinforced by the lack of Syrian response to the Jerusalem riots of April 1920.

But these strains had only limited importance. Syrian and Palestinian leaders effectively minimized their differences until July 1920, for both had an interest in Prince Faysal's success.

What accounts for the extremely rapid collapse of Pan-Syrian sentiment in Palestine? Yehoshua Porath, the leading historian of Palestinian nationalism, argues in his 1974 book The Emergence of the Palestinian-Arab National Movement, 1918-1929 that Palestinians supported Pan-Syrianism only as long as it served them but abandoned it when it no longer had utility. In contrast to Syrians, who tended to see Pan-Syrianism as an end in itself, he says, Palestinians saw it as a means, a weapon in the battle against Zionism; it was weak because it only served ulterior purposes. Being treated as part of Syria had three advantages in the years 1918-20.[xix] A joint Anglo-French declaration of November 1918 promised "to encourage and assist the establishment of native governments and administrations in Syria and Mesopotamia" — not Palestine. This declaration made it desirable for Palestine to be seen as part of Syria. Also, associating with the larger Muslim population of Greater Syria offered a way to overwhelm the Jewish immigrants demographically. And alliance with Faysal gave Palestinians a relatively powerful protector.

According to Porath, the French conquest of Damascus caused these advantages to disappear:

Disappointment over the moderation of the Syrians toward Zionism cooled the Palestinians' enthusiasm for the idea of Pan-Syrian unity.... The orientation towards Damascus was based less on the growth of nationalism around this area [i.e., Greater Syria] than upon a given political situation. When this situation changed, the foundations of the Pan-Syrian movement collapsed.

All these points are correct, but not the implication that Pan-Syrian nationalism was merely a tactic while Palestinian nationalism appealed to deep sentiments. The reverse is closer to the truth. Existing sentiments fitted better within Greater Syria than Palestine. Palestinians abandoned Pan-Syrianism and replaced it with Palestinian separatism for tactical reasons, not out of heartfelt sentiment. Porath himself quotes one Palestinian leader who openly admitted this. Only days after the fall of Faysal's government, Musa Kazim al-Husayni declared, "after the recent events in Damascus, we have to effect a complete change in our plans here. Southern Syria no longer exists. We must defend Palestine." Kamil ad-Dajjani explained many years after the event that "the collapse of Faysal's rule in Syria and the disappointment of the hopes which were pinned upon that rule, made Palestinians feel that the orientation toward a Greater Syria bore no fruit." Palestinian nationalism originated not in spontaneous feelings but in calculated politics, and a long time passed before the emotional appeal of this premeditated and novel allegiance matched that of Pan-Syrian nationalism.

In short, the Palestine concept served better than that of Greater Syria. It allowed the Arab leaders of Palestine to speak the same political language as the Zionists and the British. Rather than refer to some outside source of authority, they could claim sovereignty for themselves. In the process, they evolved from provincial notables into independent actors. Thus, tactical considerations caused the rapid rise of Palestinian nationalism.

Ultimately, Palestinian nationalism originated in Zionism; were it not for the existence of another people who saw British Palestine as their national home, the Arabs would have continued to view this area as a province of Greater Syria. Zionism turned Palestine into something worthy in itself; if not for the Jewish aspirations, Sunni Arab attitudes toward Palestine would no doubt have resembled those toward the territory of Transjordan — an indifference only slowly eroded by many years of governmental effort. Palestinian nationalism promised the most direct way to deal with the challenge presented by Zionist settlers — a challenge never directly felt on the East Bank.

Amin al-Husayni

The career of Al-Hajj Muhammad Amin al-Husayni (1895-1974), the long-time mufti of Jerusalem, dramatizes the switch from Pan-Syrianism to Palestinian nationalism.

Husayni began as a partisan of Greater Syria. He wrote sentimentally about ties between Syrians and Palestinians during World War I. When the Hashemites launched the Arab revolt, breaking the Ottoman Empire's four centuries' control over the Levant, Husayni saw this as a more effective way to block the Zionists. As Philip Mattar, a biographer of the mufti, writes: "Since it appeared futile for the Arabs to oppose British rule, Amin believed the only practical approach was to attempt to change the British Balfour policy by organizing mass support for reuniting Syria and Palestine, which would then work together against Zionism."

Husayni therefore deserted the Ottoman army and joined the Hashemites. He then became a leading agent of the Hashemites (an ironic development in light of his later mortal enmity with this family), recruiting about 2,000 military volunteers in 1918 and working actively on Faysal's behalf in 1919. At the Palestinian congress in January-February 1919, Husayni called for unity between Palestine and Syria. A British diplomatic report noted that Husayni's activities were directed "in favor of union with Sharifian [i.e., Faysal's] Syria."

Husayni served as president of the Arab Club, which was especially eager for union with Syria. Toward the end of 1919, this group tent a letter to the British military governor of Jerusalem declaring that "Southern Syria forms a part of the United Syria beginning from Taures [and extending to] Rafa, the separation of which we do not tolerate under any circumstances, and we are as well prepared to sacrifice ourselves towards its defense with all our power."

Returning from Damascus on April 1, 1920, Husayni introduced a new element into an already tense atmosphere in Palestine by reporting (wrongly) that the British government would be willing to recognize Faysal as ruler of Palestine as well as Syria. This report raised Pan-Syrian expectations to a fever pitch. Then came the Nabi Musa riots in Jerusalem on April 4, when Arab mobs attacked Jews; according to Horace B. Samuel (and the British police report corroborates his account), these disturbances were initiated by two young men who shouted "Long live our King — King Feisul." Taysir Jbara, a historian, believes that Amin al-Husayni was one of these two. The police sought Husayni, but he fled to Damascus, where he again worked to spread the influence of King Faysal. Although a Palestine court had sentenced Husayni in absentia to ten years in jail, the High Commissioner of Palestine, Sir Herbert Samuel, pardoned him less than five months after the Jerusalem disturbances had occurred. This permitted Husayni to make his way back to Palestine after the fall of Damascus.

Faysal's defeat caused Husayni, like the other leaders, to change ideologies without missing a beat, turning into an unbending Palestinian nationalist. He became mufti of Jerusalem in 1921, president of the Supreme Muslim Council in 1922, and president of the Arab Higher Committee in 1936. Each of these positions gave him new power; by the mid-1930s he had become the outstanding political leader of the Palestinians, the symbol and the bulwark of Palestinian nationalism.

Conclusion

Four major events occurred in 1920. In March, Faysal was crowned king of Syria, raising expectations that Palestine would join his independent state. In April, the British put Palestine on the map, dashing those hopes. In July, French forces captured Damascus, ending the Palestinian tie with Syria. And in December, responding to these events, the Palestinian leadership adopted the goal of an independent Palestinian state.

Having thus originated out of political calculus, not spontaneous feelings, Palestinian nationalism had to wait for many years to pass before it acquired real force. Still, what Palestinian nationalism lacked by way of natural origin, it soon made up for with passionate identification. How did a premeditated and novel allegiance come to exert so strong an emotional appeal? The logic of need caused Palestinian nationalism to flourish, and it became a popular cause.

So thoroughly has it come to dominate the current scene that its recent and utilitarian origins have been forgotten by all but a handful of scholars. To make matters worse, an informal campaign seems to be underway to suppress the fact that Pan-Syrianism predominated for two critical years. A number of solidly researched academic books of recent years wave this whole phenomenon aside in an effort retroactively to enhance the stature of the Palestinian nationalism of those years.

This rewriting of history serves to emphasize the abiding importance of 1920. A review of the events of that year points, first, to the fact that Palestinian nationalism is just one variant of anti-Zionism; in turn, others are always nipping at its own heels. Yasir 'Arafat and his followers can never rest easy, for they always have to contend with not only their Israeli enemy but also their Arab rivals. (Many of them are still based in Damascus.)

Second, 1920 demonstrates the extreme fickleness of the Arabs' nationalist loyalties. Only superficially grounded in nationalist sentiments, they found it easy to bounce from one formulation to another. Palestinian leaders supported the Greater Syria goal so long as it served their purposes; then, after the French capture of Damascus changed the premises, the leadership seamlessly adopted a new approach. During the 1950s, when Gamal Abdel Nasser and Arab nationalism were flying high, many of the Palestinian leaders moved into his camp. This could happen again. Were circumstances to call for another switch, say, to federation with Jordan, many of those Palestinians who now fervently espouse an independent Palestinian state might take up this new aspiration.

While it is true that the flexibility of 1920 occurred at a moment of special fluidity, and positions have hardened since that date, the Middle East remains the world's most politically volatile area. Major realignments take place almost predictably, about once a decade. Given that today's constellation of forces is unlikely to last into the distant future and that an independent Palestinian state does seem forthcoming, the primacy of Palestinian nationalism could eventually come to an end, perhaps as quickly as it got started.

UNRWA : LORDS OF MISERY

2011-12-12T15:58:00.000-08:00

According to UNRWA, a Palestinian " refugee " is someone who was living in the region of Palestine... two years before the state of Israël was born. This definition doesn't fit with international law. The grand son of a "refugee", born in another country, cannot be called "a refugee" himself. So, what is UNRWA's interest making sure Palestinians are not resettled ? That may be the key to this middle east conflict !

Israel x Palestina: A verdade sobre os refugiados

2011-12-11T08:33:00.001-08:00

Shlomo Sand - An Israeli Stalinist Professor’s War Against Israel

2011-11-30T03:17:00.000-08:00

Islamist fascism has a problem. It is that traditional Islam, and the Koran in particular, explicitly acknowledge that the Land of Israel belongs to the Jewish people. The war of Islamofascism against Israel and its population thus directly contradicts the teachings about Jews and Israel found in the Koran itself. The Islamofascists, however, have found a solution to this dilemma. And they are being provided with this “solution” by a notorious Jewish anti-Semite.

Let me explain.

The Koran itself is extraordinarily clear about the status of the Land of Israel in Islam. While in general criticizing Jews for their supposed sinfulness, something the Jewish Bible does quite a lot of also, the Koran relates in Sura 5:21, that Moses (a revered teacher in Islam) tells the Jews to “enter into the Holy Land which Allah has assigned to you.” Moses adds to his people, according the Koran:

“O my people! Remember the bounty of God upon you when He bestowed prophets upon you , and made you kings and gave you that which had not been given to anyone before you amongst the nations. O my people! Enter the Holy Land which God has written for you, and do not turn tail, otherwise you will be losers.”

Elsewhere (Sura 17, 104) the Koran proclaims: “And thereafter We [Allah] said to the Children of Israel: ‘Dwell securely in the Promised Land. And when the last warning will come to pass, we will gather you together in a mingled crowd.’” The founder of modern Zionism, Theodore Herzl, could not have said it better.

The legitimacy of Jewish claims to the Land of Israel is repeated in Sura 10:93-94:

“We settled the Children of Israel in a beautiful dwelling-place (Israel)…If thou wert in doubt as to what We have revealed unto thee, then ask those who have been reading the Book from before thee.”

The Koran also explicitly documents the existence of the Jewish Temples on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Sura 17:7 records the destruction of the First Jewish Temple by Babylon and the Second Temple by Rome, and Mohammed never contests the Bible’s claim that the Temples were in Jerusalem. Indeed, the return of the Jews to their homeland after centuries of exile can be seen as the fulfillment of Islamic prophecy. Sura 17:104 of the Koran says: “And we said to the Children of Israel afterwards, ‘Go live into this land (Israel). When the final prophecy comes to pass, we will summon you all in one group.’”

As noted by Prof. Khaleel Mohammed, from the Department of Religious Studies at San Diego State University, the medieval exegetes of the Koran – roughly analogous to the Talmud for Judaism – recognize Israel as belonging to the Jews, as their birthright given to them by God. Two of Islam’s most famous exegetes explained thus: ‘Ibn Kathir said: “That which God has written for you, i.e. that which God has promised to you by the words of your father Israel that it is the inheritance of those among you who believe.” Muhammad al-Shawkani interprets Kataba to mean “that which God has allotted and predestined for you in His primordial knowledge, deeming it as a place of residence for you.”’

From the above, one would think that Islamofascism faces a theological quandary in its attempts at conscripting Islam for a genocidal jihad against Israel and the Jews. But Islamofacsists have invented a solution. They can jihad all they want against Israel and the Jews, Islamic theology notwithstanding, because they claim that the Jews … are not the Jews. If modern Jews are really not Jews at all, then Israel is not a country of Jews, and so Israelis have no rights to sovereignty in their own homeland as promised in the Koran.

So just why are modern Jews not Jews, in the pseudo-theology of the jihadis? Because the Islamofascists are recycling the old mythology about European Jews or “Ashkenazim” being nothing more than converted Khazars. And the new guru of the “Jews-Not-Being-Jews” hoax is none other than Tel Aviv University history professor Shlomo Sand.

To explain this mind-numbing development, let’s take a few steps back. Yes, there was indeed a Kingdom of Turkic peoples living north of the Black Sea in the Dark Ages called the Khazars, and – yes – its ruling family and part of its population did convert to Judaism. The Khazar kingdom was largely destroyed by the expanding Russian kingdom in the tenth century, and anything remaining was destroyed in the Mongol invasions. What actually became of the Jewish Khazars is unknown. Some may have integrated themselves into other Jewish communities in the Middle East, Central Asia, and Eastern Europe.

Later a myth was created about the Khazars being an important component of European Jewry. This myth was to a large extent the invention of the 1976 book, The Thirteenth Tribe by Arthur Koestler, a writer better known for his lifelong battles against totalitarianism in all its forms. Koestler wrote his book largely in order to create interest and sympathy for Jews and Israel, believing the Khazar story would serve as a basis for respect and fascination with Jewish history. In reality, there is very little evidence of any type, from genetic markers to family and place names, that there is any significant Khazar “blood” among Western or Ashkenazi Jews.

Meanwhile, Koestler’s public relations ploy backfired. In recent years, the Khazar myth has been hijacked by Neo-Nazis and Islamofascists to invent a racialist argument against Jews being entitled to self-determination, independence, or a homeland in the Land of Israel. If Jews are nothing more than converted Khazars, or so goes the argument of the anti-Semitic racialists, then they are foreign interlopers in the Levant and have no right to statehood there.

Now, as a matter of fact, even if the Khazar myth were true, and Ashkenazi Jews were descendent from converted Khazars (and – we repeat – the myth is NOT true!), it still would not make the slightest difference. Jews never defined themselves in genetic or racial terms. They always saw themselves as an ethnic group marked off by religion, tradition, and language. Converts are just as Jewish as are those born to a Jewish mother and just as entitled to participate in Jewish self-determination. And, to top it all off, most Israeli Jews are not even Ashkenazi Jews.

Meanwhile, the popularity of the Khazar myth among anti-Semites represents a return of modern anti-Jewish bigotry to the racialism of the 1930′s and earlier.

Nearly every anti-Semitic and neo-Nazi website denounces Zionists and Israelis as “Khazars.” Web chat lists in which Jews defending Israel are dismissed as “Khazar usurpers” are too numerous to count.

The racialism once again in vogue holds that Jews would only have legitimate claims to the right of self-determination in their homeland if they were appropriately Semitic from a racial point of view. Palestine is part of the Semitic racial lebensraum and those who do not possess the correct pure racial markings have no business being there. Racial purity is suddenly the new basis for national rights.

If we take the racialist argument to its illogical conclusions, Palestinian Arabs have the right to exercise all claims to sovereignty in Israel due to their being true racial Jews, while Zionists are non-Jewish Khazars – racial imposters and usurpers. But to make things even sillier, Arabs themselves are, of course, a mix of racial strains, with a particularly large Caucasian component thanks to Arab intermixing with Spanish and Italian Europeans, Caucasian Berbers, Vandals, Goths, and even some Vikings.

Lest the world dismiss “Khazar Zionist” nonsense as something as pathetic as the conspiracist “911-Truth” form of mental illness, along comes an anti-Semitic pseudo-academic from Tel Aviv University itself to lead the racialist charge against the Israeli “Khazars” and against Jewish self-determination. Professor Shlomo Sand is a hard-core Stalinist and Jewish anti-Semite. He was active for a while in the 1960s and 1970s in a tiny Israeli Maoist splinter named Matzpen. From its ranks emerged an espionage ring of Israeli Jewish and Arab communists, who trained as terrorists in Syria and were jailed by Israel in the 1970s. Writing mainly in French, Sand has built much of his “academic” career on churning out Marxist boilerplate diatribes. He is a fanatic anti-Zionist and makes no attempt to hide his desire to see his own country obliterated.

Sand last year recruited himself to the aid of the Islamists seeking to annihilate Israel. So the Koran says the Land of Israel belongs to the Jews? In that case, Sand himself, a professor at Tel Aviv University, will recycle Neo-Nazi mythology about Israeli Jews being converted Khazar interlopers. The result was Sand’s book, The Invention of the Jewish People, a pseudo-history published in English by Verso Books, a publishing house set up by “New Left Review,” specializing in communist and Bash-Israel “books.”

Sand’s book about Jews being a fraudulent “invention” is amazingly un-original. If submitted as a student paper I suspect it would be rejected as plagiarism of the contents of anti-Jewish web sites. Sand’s book has been hailed as ground-breaking scholarship by Neo-Nazis, jihadists, terrorist web sites, anti-Semites and communists of all stripes. Serious historians have dismissed it as pseudo-academic poppycock, as fraud, and as little more than a comic book recycling of Neo-Nazi myths about Jews being Khazars. Sand’s conclusions from the imaginary “evidence” about the Khazar roots of Israelis resemble those of his jihadi groupies, namely, that Israel has no right to exist and that Jews are not Jews at all, certainly not any sort of a people. Tel Aviv University has won for itself the dubious honor of serving as home base for arguably the world’s worst “academic” anti-Semite, and has raised questions all over the globe about the academic standards it has obviously abandoned.

Meanwhile, we have grown accustomed in our 21^st century to the bizarre collaboration between Islamist fundamentalists and far-leftists. Even so, one cannot help marvelling at the spectacle of an Israeli Stalinist professor devoting himself so passionately to prolierating the myths required by Islamofascist fundamentalists, and by so doing grant them the means for ignoring the Koran itself.

Libertação do soldado custou a Israel muitas lágrimas e sangue. Vejam as histórias dessas duas terroristas orgulhosas de seus crimes bárbaros

2011-10-18T17:35:00.000-07:00

A Israel custou suor, lágrimas e sangue — muitas lágrimas e muito sangue — a soltura dessa primeira leva de 477 prisioneiros palestinos em troca da libertação do soldado Gilad Shalit, sequestrado pelos terroristas do Hamas em junho de 2006 e deste então mantido em cativeiro.

Amina, a que fez o garoto israelense se apaixonar pela internet para ser morto a tiros, quando era levada ao tribunal que a condenou à prisão perpétua (Foto: "An Nahar")

Para exemplificar o que escrevi acima, vou deixar de lado a enumeração dos assassinos frios, dos terroristas impenitentes e de tantos outros ciminosos que deixaram o duro cárcere israelense em troca do pálido, frágil Shalit, que parece tudo — estudante de filosofia, professor de matemática –, menos soldado, para fixar o foco em duas histórias:

História número um: armadilha mortal do amor

Janeiro de 2001. Ophir Rachum, um garoto tímido de 16 anos de idade de Ashkelon, cidade litorânea 50 quilômetros ao sul de Tel Aviv, desses viciados em internet e que quase não saem de casa, encontra uma parceira num chat. É uma judia recém-emigrada do Marrocos. Trocam mensagens cada vez mais quentes, até que combinam um encontro em Jerusalém. A garota ainda lembra: que ele não se esqueça de trazer camisinhas.

Encontraram-se na principal estação de ônibus de Jerusalém. Pegaram um táxi em direção a Ramallah, a capital da Autoridade Palestina. Perto da cidade, a garota disse que uma amiga os esperava em seu carro. Ophir, feliz da vida, dirigiu-se ao veículo – e lá estavam dois terroristas da milícia Tanzim, que o mataram a tiros.

A “garota marroquina” era na verdade a jornalista palestina Amina Joudah Manssi, de 21 anos, ou Amina Mouna, Amina Mona, Amina Muna, Amana Gouad ou mais meia dúzia de diferentes pseudônimos de que lançava mão na clandestinidade.

Três dias depois, foi presa. Levada a um tribunal, foi condenada à prisão perpétua.

“Estou orgulhosa do que fiz”, dizia, sorrindo, diante do tribunal.

A última mensagem de Ophir encontrada em seu computador dizia:

– Eu te amo.

O pai de Ophir, Shalom, não se conforma até hoje:

– Massacracam meu menino! Foram 28 tiros à queima-roupa! Ela é uma assassina asquerosa. Quando esses animais estiverem de volta às ruas, o terrorismo vai voltar.

Ahlam: rosto angelical, 15 mortos, 140 feridos e nenhum arrependimento. Agora, está livre da prisão perpétua

História número dois: a criminosa de rosto angelical

Agosto de 2001. Ahlam Tamimi, uma jovem palestina de 20 anos, sorriso claro e rosto angelical, estava assistindo a uma palestra em Jerusalém quando recebeu um telefonema. Era de um “chefe de comando” do Hamas que a conhecia e sabia de seu ódio a Israel. Convidou-a para um encontro, porque iria encarregá-la de uma “missão”.

Ahlam deixou a palestra pela metade e foi avistar-se com o homem, que estava acompanhado de um estudante de Jenin, na Cisjordânia – região sob controle da Autoridade Palestina . Chamava-se Izz al-Masri, era filho de um próspero dono de restaurante mas se candidatara a ser “mártir da revolução” e a “encontrar-se com Alá”.

A jovem prontificou-se a cumprir sua parte na “missão”: vestir-se com roupas características de uma israelense, esconder com ela 10 quilos de dinamite e levar al-Masri a um determinado ponto da cidade.

Pouco depois, a “missão” chegava a seu término: numa pizzaria do centro de Jerusalém, repleta de clientes, al-Masri explodiu o próprio corpo, matando 15 pessoas e ferindo 140. Entre os mortos, uma senhora brasileira: Giora Balash, 60 anos, de São Paulo.

Logo detida, julgada e condenada à prisão perpétua, Ahlam repetiu o refrão dos fanáticos palestinos: “Por que tenho que me arrepender? Não fiz nada errado. Não me arrependo”.

The Day of the Swine

2011-10-18T13:44:00.000-07:00

This morning at 2:30 AM, was the official start of the "Day of the Swine" -- as 477 murderous Palestinian, Islamic animals are being released from their pens. These swine who have butchered civilian men and women, boys and girls, and tiny infants in the name of Islam and Palestine, these worthless representatives of a fake collective called "Palestine", whose biggest claim to fame is their lack of a positive contribution to the human race, are preparing for a hero's welcome by their fellow animals.

Any Muslim, any Imam, any Muslic cleric who does not hang their head in shame at the release of these butchers -- over a thousand by the end of the exchange deal for kidnapped IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, is also part of the herd of swine.

How do they not weep that this exchange proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that the absolute value of a single Jew is worth more than over thousand of their fellow co-religionists? Islamic apologists point of the invention of the "zero" as one of the great contributions of Islam to the world. Today we see over a thousand zeros -- a thousand murderous animals, filthy swine being released, as Palestinians celebrate.

Collectively, they are even too stupid to even realize that this exchange minimizes their own self value.

There will never be peace with the Palestinian people. Any person who cheers this release will never desire peace, will never want peace, and cannot comprehend the concept of peace.

The butchers released today, their mobs of supporters, and every Islamic leader who does not denounce them, will rot in hell for eternity.

Gilad Shalit e o acordo com o Hamas

2011-10-18T07:39:00.000-07:00

O soldado Shalit, que nunca matou

Israel está pagando um preço exorbitante (intolerável para as famílias de vítimas do terror) para trazer de volta o soldado Gilad Shalit, sequestrado pelo grupo terrorista palestino Hamas em 2006. O preço são 1027 prisioneiros palestinos. Entre os libertados, estão militantes com as mãos sujíssimas de sangue (de acordo com Israel, entre os mais de cinco mil presos por razões de segurança, cerca de 70% têm “sangue nas mãos”). Está havendo uma troca, mas cuidado com equivalências entre combatentes. O soldado Shalit, recruta compulsório, nunca matou mulheres e crianças. Nunca matou. Eis a ficha resumida de alguns palestinos inseridos no acordo para a libertação de Shalit:

Hussan Badran: comandante militar do Hamas na Cisjordânia, condenado à prisão perpétua pelo planejamento de vários ataques terroristas, entre eles o atentado suicida na pizzaria Sbarro, em Jerusalém, em agosto de 2001, na qual morreram o brasileiro Giora Balazs, de 68 anos, e outras 14 pessoas.

Abdul al-Aziz Salaha: garoto-propaganda do terror. Entre seus crimes, esteve a participação no linchamento de dois soldados israelenses capturados em 12 de outubro de 2000, uma das imagens definitivas da segunda intifada (insurreição) palestina

Yehya Sinwar: um dos fundadores do braço militar do Hamas, as Brigadas Izzedin al-Qassam. Começou sua vida de assassino executando palestinos suspeitos de colaborar com Israel. Deverá ocupar alto cargo no Hamas, após 23 anos na prisão.

Walid Anajas: condenado a 36 sentenças de prisão perpétua por envolvimento em dois atentados terroristas. Um deles provocou 12 mortes no Moment Cafe, no coração de Jerusalém Ocidental em 2002, perto da sede da presidência israelense. O ataque no auge da intifada é considerado marca registrada do Hamas, motivo de júblilo para os simpatizantes do movimento. Eu espero que motivo de muita tristeza para os leitores.

Alone in the Muslim World

2011-10-09T15:01:00.000-07:00

Leon Panetta visited Israel to warn about its "growing isolation" and he is half right. Right about the isolation and wrong about the growing part.

Israel is isolated in the Middle-East, but its isolation is a constant reality, not a growing phenomenon. It is not isolated because of its policies, as its critics claim, but because its identity is at odds with a region dominated by Arab-Muslims whose national identities is closely tied to ethnicity and religion.

Israel is isolated in the same way that the United States and Canada are isolated among a hemisphere of Latino states or they would be if they paid attention to what was going on south of the border. But the North American anglos have enough land and population to ignore the commonplace hostility of their southern neighbors. Enough breathing room that most in the north are unaware that there is a rivalry in the south.

With its tiny territory, a sizable minority population that is from the regional majority (something that is also becoming an issue in the United States) and nothing in the way of a buffer zone, the isolation is much more extreme for the only non-Muslim and non-Arab state in the Middle-East. But there is one additional factor. Israel's difference is not merely ethnic or racial, it's also religious. And the religion it's surrounded by is a creed which views mass murder as an acceptable solution to religious differences.

If Sunnis and Shiites can't get along with one another, how exactly is Israel expected to overcome a much more fundamental isolation?

Israel will always remain isolated in a region defined by religion and race. There is no way around that and no amount of peace processes and policies will change that. There is a measurable distance between Iran and the rest of the region because it is Persian and Shiite. In the same way there is a distance between Turkey and the rest of the region because it is non-Arab. No matter how much Iran and Turkey get out front to lead the Jihad, they will always be on the outs.

There have only been two defining movements in the region: Pan-Arabism and Pan-Islamism. The protests and revolutions of the Arab Spring have only been a means of advancing the goals of Pan-Arabism and Pan-Islamism. Israel's Jews, like the Kurds, the Persians and the Turks, have no place in a Pan-Arabist region. Unlike all of them, Israel's Jews are completely on the outs in a Pan-Islamist scheme.

If Israel's isolation has grown, it is because the region has shifted further into the Pan-Islamist column after Turkey's Islamist rulers succeeded in bringing down the central pillar of the secular state. There is nothing Israel could do to reverse this isolation except convert en masse to Islam. And even if it that it would be the wrong kind of Islam as far as the Shiites of Iran or the Alawite rulers of Syria are concerned.

While the old British foreign policy hands, bastards though they were, innately understood all this, the Muslim world has successfully framed the conflict in terms of the Palestinian Arabs, whom they keep around as cheap labor and cheap killers. The drumbeat of pressure on Israel to somehow create a Palestinian state as a means of ending its isolation is a wrongheaded conclusion drawn from the cynical propaganda of failed regimes.

Israel cannot end its isolation, because its isolation is the product of regional identity, not policy. Much of the Middle East has backchannels to Israel and carries on covert forms of trade with Israel. At the same time their newspapers and television states attack Israel whenever a ruler needs a convenient scapegoat. Any normalization that happens will be equally impermanent and will be reversed the moment that the situation at home changes. This is what happened in Egypt.

Israel is hated because it is different and it survives because it is powerful. It is powerful because its military is used for external defense, rather than internal repression. This sets it apart from the Muslim world where militaries are used primarily for internal repression.

A Middle Eastern army that becomes strong enough is called a government. Middle Eastern countries that are large enough to field a large army rarely need it as a defense against an invasion and small countries are rarely capable of fielding a competent army because they lack the professionalism and don't see the point. Instead they rely on agreements with larger neighbors that keep them from being gobbled up.

Israel is the exception as a tiny country fielding a large army. It is able to do this because of its level of competence and because its internal stability means that the military does not need to be used for domestic repression, is not at risk of carrying out a coup and does not need to be composed of a ruling minority.

These are very important points and they form the backbone of Israeli exceptionalism. But they are also being eroded.

The drive to negotiate with the terrorists and appease by ethnically cleansing its own population has made Israel very unstable. The left is obsessed with using the military for the domestic repression of the right, while at the same time terrified that the majority of the military will soon be composed of a group that is culturally and theologically opposed to their agenda.

The Israeli military has always been mixed in with the government, and generals easily transition into politicians, but unlike the rest of the region it has never happened at gunpoint. However the left is intent on forcing the military to choose sides in the civil war that they are doing their best to create. The growing polarization is having a negative impact on the viability of the IDF as a fighting force and the Second Lebanon War tragically demonstrated that.

But the primary source of the instability is the pipeline of Muslim pressure on America and Europe, becoming American and European pressure on Israel, which turns into domestic instability at home. Usuing the West as a tool, the Muslim world has managed to destabilize Israel and that threatens its survival as a democracy, and its survival as a democracy threatens the viability of its defenses.

Israel is told to abandon much of its territory and its identity, and wreck its military by turning it against its own citizens in the hopes of normalizing relations with the region. If not, then it will face regional and global isolation. Either you kill yourself or I'll kill you.

It's a neat trap and a devil's bargain because most people will choose to take control of a situation even if it's to their own detriment. Given a choice between chopping off their own hand or being shot in the head, they'll choose the former. Worse yet they'll do it to show how cooperative they're willing to be. And once they've agreed to chop off their hand, then they can't very well argue over a foot or two.

Give your enemy a choice between safe passivity and foolish action on a single open path and you can crush his forces every time. Make the foolish action seem noble and inevitable and you can go home early.

The Muslim world can't maintain stability in its own countries, because its Pan-this and Pan-that which always leave someone one, but it is excellent at destabilizing other countries, at spreading rumor and innuendo, at playing the aggrieved victims, at street theater accompanied by bouts of violence.

As the saner parts of the world are losing their minds and agreeing to commit suicide, they expect Israel to follow suit. To jump into the sea in the name of some greater global harmony. Panetta is only the latest messenger boy toting a big briefcase filled with the same bad news. "You've got to work harder, really put your back into appeasing those terrorists. Throw in Jerusalem, Ariel and whatever else you've got."

But no matter what Israel does it will remain isolated and that's a good thing.

Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East. The only country without leaders for life or freedoms for no one. The only country where you don't lose any rights by being born with XX chromosomes and going to be a different house of worship does not make you an enemy of the state. It's a country bursting with ideas and debates, with technology and creativity and that offers a level of human rights completely foreign to the rest of the region.

Being alone in the Muslim world is not a bad thing morally, though it may be a bad position to be in defensively. That sense of isolation is wearying and dehumanizing, an endless horizon that seems as if it could be bridged with only a little effort. But that is an illusion.

On a map Israel seems isolated, but in truth it is the Muslim world which is isolated. It is the Muslim world that has carved itself up into tiny enclaves, each sect, each people, each street divided against itself. The chaos in Iraq, Syria, Egypt and Libya are a reminder of the internal fragmentation and isolation of the Muslim world. An isolation so pervasive that it cannot be overcome except through temporary alliances against a common foe. An ultimate "Other".

Israel has not been isolated by its choices, but by the cultural failures of its neighbors. As long as its neighbors deal with their own instability through war and tyranny in the name of collective identities that they cannot sustain, that will not change.

Arson in Galilee Mosque

2011-10-06T12:52:00.000-07:00

This past Sunday evening, someone torched a Bedouin Mosque in the Northern Israel town of "Tuba Zanghariya." Someone left behind some graffiti as well, indicating the arson attack was a "price tag" retaliation for the murder of the Palmers by Palestinian terrorists on Erev Rosh HaShana.

“What I can’t understand is why us? Why of all places would they come here?” asked resident Dr. Muhammad al-Haib, in a plaza outside the scorched entryway of the al-Noor mosque.

In a common sentiment expressed Tuesday, al-Haib said the people of the village are “completely Israeli” and see themselves as having a shared fate with their Jewish neighbors in the surrounding towns.

Al-Haib said the villagers celebrate [Israeli] Independence Day and do not identify with the “Nakba,” the Palestinian day that mourns the founding of the State of Israel.

Like others, al-Haib also expressed a sense of bewilderment and surprise at the suspected arson, rather than a desire for revenge.

“When this happened, people were very angry and asked: ‘Why us?’ We’re together, we’re not fighting one another here. We serve together [in the IDF], we live together, we’re very close. Somebody wrote ‘revenge’ on the wall, but why do you want revenge on me?”

Al-Haib, who serves as the Education Ministry’s national director for education in the Beduin sector, described the village as completely cut off from the greater Arab sector in Israel, with the closest Arab villages over half an hour away, much farther than Rosh Pina, only a couple kilometers away. (JPost)

_______________________________________________________________

Tuba is considered a loyal village and its residents have served in the IDF [Israeli Defense Forces] since 1948.

And in an unrelated case: "Muslim Arrested in Mosque Arson case" / Muslim community member charged in Marietta mosque fire.

Australian Imam vandalizes own Mosque, then claims it was done by someone else

73 Years Ago Today Arabs Massacred 21 Jews in Tiberias, The British Reacted With Appeasement

2011-10-03T11:35:00.000-07:00

Three Victims of the Massacre -Deborah,Rebecca and Haya Mizrahi

Tiberias is one of my favorite cities in Israel. It was the home of many Great Rabbis who lived in or were buried in there. The Sanhedrin, the famous Jewish court, fled from Jerusalem during the Great Jewish Revolt against the Roman Empire, and after several moves eventually settled in Tiberias. Many scholars believe that the Mishna and the Jerusalem Talmud was compiled in by Rabbi Judah haNasi in Tiberias.

One part of Tiberias history occurred 73 years ago today. On October 2 1938, an organized groups of Arab attackers massacred 21 Jews three of the victims were women and ten were kids younger than twelve. The victims were stabbed shot and burned.

The New York Times described the brutal rampage:

Not since the riots of 1929, when Arabs fell on Jewish men, most of whom were rabbinical students, as well as women and children, in the ancient towns of Hebron and Safed, has there been in Palestine such a slaughter as the attack of last night. The main synagogue of the town was destroyed by fire, and the district offices, the police station and the British police billet were fired on.

The attack apparently was well organized, since the Arab gang, before descending on Tiberias, cut all telephone communications. Coming in two parties from opposite directions at a given signal, which was a whistle blown from the hills surrounding the town, the firing began simultaneously in all quarters...

...The bandits rushed to the central synagogue and, finding there a beadle named Jacob Zaltz, killed him and then set the building afire...

...the Arabs broke in and stabbed and burned to death Mr. Kabin [an elderly American Jew who had recently come to Palestine] and his sister...

From there the bandits went on to the house of Joshua Ben Arieh, where they stabbed and burned to death Joshua, his wife and one son, and then shot dead his infant son. In the same house three children of Shlomo Leimer, aged 8, 10, and 12, were stabbed and burned to death. Proceeding farther, the Arabs broke into the house of Shimon Mizrahi, where they killed his wife and five children, ranging in ages from 1 to 12 years, and then set fire to the house.... [New York Times, Oct. 4, 1938]

Three weeks later (Oct. 27th) Tiberian Arabs murdered the Jewish mayor, Isaac Zaki Alhadif.

The Tiberias massacre was part of three years of terrorism conducted by the Arabs living in or near the holy land. There was no Israel, no disputed territories, just some communities of Jews, many of which housed people who had been living in the land for generations. Rather than put down the violence, the British Government decided to appease the terrorists with a British White Paper limiting Jewish immigration into Palestine just as Hitler was beginning his final solution. As a result, the British Government sentenced many Jews to death at the hands of the Nazis. The attitude of the British and indeed most of the western world toward Arab terror hasn't changed in the intervening 73 years, it is still all about sacrificing Jewish blood to appease the Arabs involved in terror.

May the memories of those slain in Tiberias 73 years ago always be for a blessing.

Muslim mob torches another church in Egypt

2011-10-02T22:15:00.000-07:00

From AINA:

After Friday prayers, a mob of several thousand Muslims from the village of Elmarinab in Edfu, Aswan province, demolished and torched St. George's church, which was being renovated. The mob demolished the dome, walls and columns, then went to the church depot where the lumber to be used for construction was stored and torched it. The fire lasted 2 hours but the attack continued until 7 PM.

In an interview on Coptic TV channel, Father Salib of St. George's Church said "the Imam of one of the village mosques called on the people to take matter in their own hands, he added. Other witnesses named the Imam as Sheikh Sabry.

According to eyewitnesses the Muslims also torched a large depot of electrical goods owned by a Copt, a supermarket and four Coptic homes. Muslims prevented the fire brigade from entering the village. Security forces, which were present, "stood there watching," said Mr.Michael Ramzy, a social worker at the church.

Dr. Naguib Gabriel, head of the Egyptian Union of Human rights Organizations send an urgent message to field Marchall Tantawi to save the Copts in Egypt. "The Copts, their lives and their churches are in danger," he said.

Attorney Mamdouh Nakhla, head of Al-Kalema human rights organization condemned Muslims taking the law in their own hands. He said "if the Egyptian Government is unable to protect its citizens, then the civilized international society should step in immediately to stop this human tragedy."

The only English-language Egyptian media to cover the incident was Bikya Masr:

Aswan’s governor denied the burning of a church in Edfu, in southern Egypt, on Friday and said there was no attack on the church since there is no church “but a Christian guest house,” adding that the situation has calmed and the clashes stopped.

Governor Mostafa el-Said told Channel One, Egypt’s national TV channel, late on Friday that reports stating violence against a church in the city were “wrong.”

Eyewitnesses, however, have reported that a number of Muslim men surrounded church and set fire to parts of it, then moved to Coptic houses in the area, where they set fire to buildings and vandalized a grocery store.

They added that violence continued into the night, with the men using gas containers to set a residential home on fire, while another reported that one of the Muslims said “we don’t want Copts in our town.”

Eyewitnesses have confirmed that some men tried to stop the fire trucks from reaching the burning buildings, which contributed to financial damages for the city.

El-Said said that the clashes erupted after construction was taking place at the guest house with “the intention of turning it into a church which provoked the Muslims.”

He added that the Copts had permission to build on the guest house for 9 meters only, but they exceeded that and increased the building by 13 meters.

He said the Muslims “got angry” and the Copts admitted to the wrongdoing and promised to remove the extra floors, but there was a delay in the removal “which made a local Islamic clerk mobilize young men and head there to remove it themselves.”

That burning smell in the air? That's the fragrance of Arab Spring!

Is Fatah Moderate?

2011-09-28T09:17:00.000-07:00

Fatah Central Committee Member Abbas Zaki Calls Netanyahu and Obama "Scumbags" and Says: "The Greater Goal Cannot Be Accomplished in One Go"
Al-Jazeera TV (Qatar) - September 23, 2011 - 01:49

Maior parte dos "palestinos" prefere ser israelense

2011-09-21T14:35:00.000-07:00

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/story/2011-09-19/east-jerusalem-palestinian-state-arab-israel/50470736/1?csp=34news

Há dois dias o jornal americano USA Today publicou uma pesquisa feita pelo 'Palestinian Center for Public Opinion' que mostra que 35% dos 288.000 árabes que vivem em Jerusalém oriental preferem ser cidadãos de Israel, enquanto só 30% querem ser cidadãos de um estado palestino.

Ou seja: a maioria dos árabes que vivem em Israel querem ser israelenses, e não palestinos. O duro é explicar isso pra imprensa e governantes que não acreditam que esses árabes devam ter opinião ou que Israel deva existir…

Os outros 35% dos entrevistados preferiram não responder a pergunta. O motivo é fácil de entender, já que por lei qualquer palestino que venda terras a um judeu ou seja considerado um "colaborador" de Israel é condenado a morte depois de um julgamente que deixaria Cuba parecendo um paraíso democrático...

Selling Land to Jews 'Punishable by Death'

Por “proteção”, minorias na Síria defendem o regime

2011-09-19T14:59:00.000-07:00

Natural de Homs, cidade que virou o centro dos protestos contra o regime sírio, o cristão Shaher Meida explica em bom português por que apoia incondicionalmente o ditador Bashar Assad. “Com ele temos proteção”, diz ele, que morou um ano em Belo Horizonte. “Sem Assad, o risco é a Síria virar um novo Iraque”. O temor de Meida é uma das explicações por trás do apoio que as minorias do país devotam ao regime, ainda que muitos critiquem o Estado policial e anseiem por mais liberdade. Formado por cristãos, muçulmanos, alauítas, drusos, ismaelitas e uma microscópica comunidade judaica, a Síria é o único país do Oriente Médio em que diferentes grupos religiosos e sectários coexistem, afora o Líbano.

Mas essa aparente harmonia começou a sofrer rachaduras com os protestos iniciados em março, despertando fantasmas de uma guerra sectária. Esse risco é ressaltado pelo regime. A alternativa a Assad, adverte, é o caos. Real ou exagerado, o perigo colocou as minorias em pânico, sobretudo a cristã, que constitui 10% da população de 23 milhões. O temor é que se repitam as perseguições ocorridas no Egito e no Iraque ou um cenário de guerra civil, como no Líbano.

________________________________________________

Setenta e cinco anos atrás um grupo de seis notáveis alauítas (grupo religioso do qual faz parte o ditador Bashar el-Assad e a elite política da Síria) enviaram uma carta aos franceses, na época em que eles e os britãnicos dividiam arbitrariamente o Oriente Médio, destruindo comunidades milenares para apaziguar os muçulmanos. Na carta eles explicavam o motivo de se recusarem a fazer parte da Síria muçulmana e dominada por sunitas [que os consideram infiéis]. Como exemplo eles apontam o tratamento dispensado aos judeus pelos muçulmanos na Palestina:

“The condition of the Jews in Palestine is the strongest and most explicit evidence of the militancy of the Islamic issue vis-à-vis those who do not belong to Islam. These good Jews contributed to the Arabs with civilization and peace, scattered gold, and established prosperity in Palestine without harming anyone or taking anything by force, yet the Muslims declare holy war against them and never hesitated in slaughtering their women and children, despite the presence of England in Palestine and France in Syria.
Therefore, a dark fate awaits the Jews and other minorities in case the Mandate is abolished and Muslim Syria is united with Muslim Palestine… the ultimate goal of the Muslim Arabs.”

Entre os signatários estava Suleiman (Sulayman) el-Assad, avô de Bashar el-Assad.

Syria's crackdown
The Lost Cause of Alawite Zionism

The Other Tsunami

2011-09-17T21:08:00.000-07:00

There is no parallel on earth to what “Jew” means to millions of Muslims.

It is very difficult to hate babies.

It takes a special person.

As morally wrong as it is to murder innocent adults, mankind seems to have a built-in revulsion against killing babies. If a baby does not evoke any tenderness, if a baby is regarded as worthy of being deliberately hurt or murdered, we know that we have encountered a degree of evil that few humans — even among murderers — can relate to.

That is why what Palestinian terrorists did to a Jewish family on the West Bank this past weekend deserves far more attention than it received. Normally Palestinian atrocities get little attention — certainly far less attention than an Israeli apartment building on the West Bank receives. But this particular atrocity got even less attention than usual because the world was focused on the terrible tsunami that hit Japan.

On Friday night, Palestinian terrorists slipped into a Jewish settlement, entered a home, and stabbed the father, the mother, and three of their children to death: an eleven-year-old, a four-year old, and a three-month-old baby.

In order to understand what those actions mean, a seemingly separate incident needs to be recalled: the prolonged sexual attack by up to 200 Egyptian men on Lara Logan, chief foreign-affairs correspondent for CBS News, in Tahrir Square, Cairo, a few weeks ago. It was reported that after stripping her naked and then molesting and beating her, the men kept shouting “Jew, Jew!”

The two incidents tell the same tale. In much of the Arab Muslim world, and some of the non-Arab Muslim world (such as Iran) today, “Jew” is not a person. “Jew” is not even merely the enemy. In fact, there is no parallel on earth to what “Jew” means to a hundred million, perhaps hundreds of millions of Muslims.

Think of any conflict in the world — Pakistan–India, China–Tibet, North Korea–South Korea, Tamil–Sinhalese. There are some deep hatreds there, and atrocities have been committed on one or both sides of each of those conflicts. But in none of those conflicts nor anywhere else is there something equivalent to what “Jew” means to millions of Muslims.

There really is only one historical parallel, and it, too, involved the word “Jew.” The Nazis also succeeded in fully dehumanizing the word “Jew.” Thus, for Nazism, it was as important (if not more so) to murder Jewish babies and children — often through as cruel a means as possible (being burned alive, buried alive, or thrown up in the air and impaled on bayonets) — as it was to murder Jewish adults.

The human being does not have to learn to hate. It seems to come pretty naturally. Nor does the human being have to learn to murder, steal, or rape. These, too, seem to be in the natural human repertoire of evils.

But the human being does have to learn to hate children and babies, and to regard the torture and murder of them as morally desirable acts. It takes years of work to undo normal protective human attitudes toward children.

That is precisely what the Nazis did and what significant parts of the Muslim world have done to the word “Jew.” To them, the Jew is not just sub-human, the Jew — and his or her children — is sub-animal.

Palestinian and other Muslim spokesmen and their supporters on the left argue that this unique hatred is the fruit of Israeli policies, not decades of Nazi-like Jew-hatred saturating Islamic education, Islamic television and radio, and the mosque. But for this to be true, unique hatred would have to be matched by unique evil on the Israelis’ part. Yet, among the injustices of the world, what the Israelis have done to the Palestinians would not even register on a moral Richter scale. The creation of Israel engendered about 750,000 Palestinian refugees (and an equal number of Jewish refugees from Arab countries) and the death of perhaps 10,000 Palestinian Arabs. And all of that came about solely because Arab armies invaded Israel in order to destroy it at birth. Yet, when Pakistan was yanked from India and established as a Muslim state at the very same time Israel was established, that act engendered 12.5 million Muslim refugees, and about a million dead Muslims (and similar numbers of Hindu refugees and deaths). Why then doesn’t “Hindu” equal “Jew” in the Muslim lexicon of hate?

Israel Palestinian Conflict: The Truth About the Peace Process

2011-09-17T11:22:00.000-07:00

Israel's Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Danny Ayalon explains the historical facts relating to the Israeli Palestinian conflict. The video explains that the reason there is no successful peace process is because of decades of Palestinian and Arab recalcitrance and the main reason for the conflict is not Israel's presence in the West Bank, but successive Palestinian leaders resistance to Jewish sovereignty.

Note to Erdogan: Nobody Likes the Turks

2011-09-16T17:49:00.000-07:00

In 1822, the Ottomans dispatched 40,000 Turkish troops to the Greek island of Chios with orders to kill all infants under three-years-old, all males over 12-years-old, and all females over 40-years-old, except those willing to convert to Islam. Some 20,000 Greeks were killed and the island was depopulated, eradicating a 2,000 year culture. Two years later, Ottoman soldiers burned the island of Kasos to the ground and killed 7,000 of its inhabitants. Eventually, Europeans navies dispatched by Britain and France, and a navy dispatched by Russia, intervened to stop the atrocities.

In 1876, 8,000 Turkish troops were dispatched to the Bulgarian town of Batak where, after promising to withdraw in exchange for the Bulgarians disarming, they beheaded or burned alive 5,000 of the city’s now-unprotected civilians. The massacre was part of a broader Turkish campaign in which 15,000 Bulgarians were eventually murdered, and which a British investigator described as “perhaps the most heinous crime” of the 1800s. Eventually, the Russians intervened to stop the atrocities.

I only bring these up because Israel and Greece just signed a military cooperation pact, and Israel and Bulgaria just signed a military cooperation pact, and European Union officials are slamming Turkey for sabre-rattling, and the Russians today committed to patrolling Eastern Mediterranean waters in response to borderline explicit Turkish military threats against Cyprus’s gas drilling.

Erdogan and his neo-Ottoman ilk seem to have forgotten a fairly straightforward regional reality: nobody likes them.

Per JE Dyer’s trenchant analysis, the collapse of Pax Americana has caused the region to revert to somewhere in between 18th century Ottoman naval hegemony and the 19th century Pax Britannica. There are a lot of reasons for everyone to be worried about that dynamic – you’ll recall that this book ended badly – but it has predictable consequences for Turkey’s current resurgence. The AKP’s years of trying to repair regional relations with “good neighbor” and “zero problems” policies — which as recently as last year involved removing historical rivals like Russia, Bulgaria and Greece from Ankara’s “threats list” and replacing them with Israel – have been reversed in a few months.

Presumably, the Turks intend to compensate for alienating Europe by expanding their influence into the Arab and Muslim world, an “eastern turn” that fits their neo-Ottoman pretensions nicely. They’ve opened up border crossings and boosted trade with Iran. They’ve conducted unprecedented joint military drills and emphasized cultural exchanges with Syria, resulting in New York Times articles with fawning lines like – quote unquote – “people in Syria love Turkey because the country supports the Arab world, and they are fellow Muslims.” Erdogan became a Palestinian champion, valorizing Hamas while hosting confabs to hammer out strategies for the Palestinians’ Fatah-driven UN gambit. He even offered the Taliban an office in Istanbul, because why shouldn’t they have an outpost in the revived center of all Muslim life?

And of course most recently, Ankara immodestly declared it was shaping the Arab Spring via its Islamist engagement.

Except the AKP is screwing all of that up, too. Egypt’s Islamists are in a row with Erdogan, which is a little ungrateful on their part given how he empowered them by calling for Mubarak’s ouster early and often (albeit in the context of anti-Israel bluster, naturally). Even worse, having invested so much in now-impossible Iranian and Syrian alliances – to such an extent that Ankara’s efforts strained relations with the 2010 Obama White House – Turkey’s foreign policy is now in shambles:

The bottom line is that from aspiring to having zero problems with neighbors, Turkey has today surrounded itself with problems with all of its key neighbors, and other countries in the region. Ties with Israel are all but broken, dialogue with Syria is all but non-existent, and the extremely warm atmosphere between Tehran and Ankara of only a year ago has all but dissipated due to serious differences over Syria, as well as Turkey’s decision to participate in NATO’s missile defense shield… As for ties with Armenia, they are not going anywhere.

There’s also a limit on how long Turkey can keep boosting Hamas while routinely killing hundreds of Kurds. Something’s going to give and, as Michael Rubin explained not too long ago, it might already be giving.

Meanwhile the Israelis – much to the chagrin of Turkey and the Arab world – cooperated closely with the Europeans to shut down Flotilla II. Israel’s military, economic, and cultural ties with Greece are blossoming, in contrast to the physical wall Greece is building on its Turkish border. The Bulgarian foreign minister recently chastized his Turkish counterpart over Turkey’s anti-Israel diplomacy.

No one is under any illusions that there’s love lost between the Jewish state and many European countries and publics (witness the ongoing hand-wringing over Palestinian UDI and Durban 3). But in between the smug “analysis” declaring that Israel is isolated — a literal Erdogan talking point that’s been gleefully parroted by the likes of Robert Malley and Roger Cohen – it might be worth noting that, at least versus Turkey, the Jewish state is actually slightly up on allies gained during the last few months.

Judenrein: PLO Ambassador Says Jews NOT Allowed in Palestinian State

2011-09-15T08:08:00.000-07:00

So this is what they mean by a "two state solution:"

"After the experience of the last 44 years of military occupation and all the conflict and friction, I think it would be in the best interest of the two people to be separated," Maen Areikat, the PLO ambassador, said during a meeting with reporters sponsored by The Christian Science Monitor. He was responding to a question about the rights of minorities in a Palestine of the future.

Such a state would be the first to officially prohibit Jews or any other faith since Nazi Germany, which sought a country that was judenrein, or cleansed of Jews, said Elliott Abrams, a former U.S. National Security Council official.

Israel has 1.3 million Muslims who are Israeli citizens. Jews have lived in "Judea and Samaria," the biblical name for the West Bank, for thousands of years. Areikat said the PLO seeks a secular state, but that Palestinians need separation to work on their own national identity.

The Palestinian demand is unacceptable and "a despicable form of anti-Semitism," Abrams said. A small Jewish presence in a future Palestine, up to 1% of the population, would not hurt the Palestinian identity, he said.

"No civilized country would act this way," Abrams said.

Abrams should know that using the terms "Palestinian" and "civilized" in the same sentence can't be reconciled.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, os muçulmanos americanos e a Veja

2011-09-12T12:11:00.000-07:00

Ao contar a história da somali que abandonou o Islã após os ataques terroristas de 11 de setembro, a jornalista Nana Queiroz omite números da pesquisa que ela própria cita para desqualificar as opiniões da entrevistada.

http://veja.abril.com.br/noticia/internacional/a-historia-da-muculmana-que-abandonou-o-isla-apos-o-11-9

"A escritora diz ainda que não acredita que o islamismo esteja aberto a "modernizações". Contudo, pesquisas mostram que muçulmanos americanos, mesmo sem deixar a religião, estão mais abertos à assimilação dos princípios ocidentais do que a história sofrida de Ayaan lhe permite acreditar. Entre os muçulmanos questionados em um levantamento feito recentemente, 56% afirmam querer adotar os costumes americanos e 90% defendem até que as mulheres deveriam trabalhar fora de casa (confira os números no quadro ao lado). Em média, eles são também mais felizes que os demais cidadãos americanos: 56% dizem estar satisfeitos com a forma como as coisas transcorrem nos Estados Unidos."

O que não é mencionado em momento algum pela jornalista é que, de acordo com a mesma pesquisa:

19% dos muçulmanos americanos acreditam que o terrorismo suicida é aceitável. Na faixa dos 18-29 o número sobe para 31% (um em cada três)

30% têm uma visão positiva/pouco negativa da Al-Qaeda

28% dizem ser contra a adoção de costumes americanos. Se somados aos que dizem que é preferível adotar alguns costumes, mas mantendo-se distintos do resto dos americanos o número sobe para 44%

60% dos muçulmanos americanos dizem não acreditar que os responsáveis pelo 11/9 foram muçulmanos. Entre os imigrantes muçulmanos vivendo nos EUA o número sobe para 78%.

35% dizem não se preocupar com o extremismo islãmico

31% dizem que há conflito entre ser um muçulmano e viver numa sociedade moderna.

Pew Research Center survey on Muslims in America

The Economist: Palestinos estão entre os mais obesos do mundo

2011-09-10T13:04:00.000-07:00

De acordo com o jornal britânico The Economist os palestinos então entre as populações mais obesas do mundo - as mulheres estão em terceiro lugar (42.5% das palestinas são consideradas obesas) e os homens palestinos estão em oitavo lugar (23.9%).

http://www.economist.com/node/8846631

9/11 in "Palestine"

2011-09-10T11:05:00.000-07:00

Fox News:

CNN:

Fox News reported that in Ein el-Hilweh, Lebanon's largest Palestinian refugee camp, revelers fired weapons in the air, with similar celebratory gunfire heard at the Rashidiyeh camp near the southern city of Tyre as well.

Reports and images of Palestinians from East Jerusalem, Nablus, and Lebanon taking the streets in celebration, were broadcast around the world with many newspapers, magazines, web sites and wire services running photographs. The PNA claimed such celebrations were not representative of the sentiments of the Palestinian people, and the Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo said the PNA would not allow "a few kids" to "smear the real face of the Palestinians".

In an attempt to quash further reporting, Ahmed Abdel Rahman, Arafat's Cabinet secretary, said the Palestinian Authority could not "guarantee the life" of an Associated Press (AP) cameraman if footage he filmed of post-9/11 celebrations in Nablus was broadcast. Rahman's statement prompted a formal protest from the AP bureau chief, Dan Perry.

Pew Report: 1/3 of US Muslims Support Al Qaeda, Suicide Bombs; 25% Came to US Under Bush, Obama

UN: Israel's Gaza blockade is legal; Turkey fumes

2011-09-10T08:45:00.000-07:00

The United Nations on Friday officially approved Israel's maritime blockade of the Gaza Strip as a legal and legitimate measure. The result was the start of a Middle East "cold war" between Israel and former ally Turkey.

For more than a year Turkey has been demanding that Israel publicly apologize for intercepting a so-called "humanitarian aid" flotilla that tried to break the Gaza blockade in May 2010. That operation ended in the deaths of nine Turkish nationals who attacked the Israeli boarding party aboard the flotilla's largest ship, the Mavi Marmara.

Turkey insisted that the entire affair had been an act of piracy by Israel, and openly sided with Gaza's Hamas rulers.

But the Palmer Commission report into the incident that was submitted to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon acknowledged that Israel is facing "a real threat to its security from militant groups in Gaza."

Israel set up a limited blockade of Gaza, including a naval blockade, to ensure that local terrorists do not smuggle advanced weapons into the territory, which they have repeatedly tried to do.

The Palmer Report confirmed that Israel's naval blockade "was imposed as a legitimate security measure...and its implementation complied with the requirements of international law."

The report justified Israel's ongoing refusal to apologize to Turkey over the Mavi Marmara raid further enflaming the Turkish government, which responded by expelling the Israeli ambassador in Ankara.

"Turkey-Israel diplomatic relations have been reduced to a second secretary level. All personnel above the second secretary level will return to their countries," said Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu.

Turkey also suspended all military agreements with Israel, and threatened to file charges against individual Israeli soldiers who took part in the raid at the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

Perhaps most worryingly, Turkey also reportedly decided to bolster its own naval forces in the eastern Mediterranean.

A Turkish diplomatic source told Hurriyet Daily News that a "more aggressive strategy will be pursued. Israel will no longer be able to exercise its bullying practices freely."

Meanwhile, a vindicated Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a statement that Israel had adopted the Palmer Report and was pleased with its findings, even though it was also critical of Israel.

The Palmer Report found fault with Israel for sending so many commandoes to board the Mavi Marmara, and for doing so at such a distance from Gazan waters.

But Israeli officials, who are disputing those particular findings, noted that there were five other ships in the flotilla, and none of them were subjected to violence. The fighting aboard the Mavi Marmara was instigated by terrorist-linked activists, and not the Israeli soldiers, who only resorted to deadly force when several of their number were taken hostage below deck.

"Israel believes that the committee did not sufficiently consider the operational limitations," said Joseph Ciechanover, the Israeli representative to the Palmer Commission.

The Obama Administration voiced increasing concern over the situation, which threatens American interests in the region. Last month, the White House tried to strong-arm Israel into apologizing on Turkish terms, or risk losing American support at the UN when the Palestinians motion for independence.

But at least a few members of Congress said that it was Turkey who was in the wrong, and lashed out over Ankara's hypocrisy in expelling the Israeli ambassador, but allowing the Syrian ambassador, whose government is massacring its own people, to remain.

"Turkey should be ashamed of itself," said US Congressman Eliot Engel (D-NY). "In an almost unbelievable act of hypocrisy, the Syrian ambassador sits comfortably in Ankara, while the Assad regime kills more than 2000 of its own people, but Turkey has expelled the Israeli Ambassador for Israel’s proper enforcement of a legally-established blockade. Rather than bashing the only real democracy in the Middle East, Turkey should focus on its own problems, such as ending its occupation of Cyprus once and for all."

Not a few people have also pointed out that while Turkey is busy demonizing Israel for defending itself, the Turkish air force has been killing hundreds in northern Iraq in raids on suspected Kurdish militants. Both Ankara and the mainstream media have been silent on that comparison.

At the end of the day, Israelis fear Turkey is looking to increase its power in the Muslim world, and there is no better or quicker way to do that than become an outspoken enemy of Israel. Whether or not the belligerent rhetoric and behavior results in open violence remains to be seen, but clearly Israel and Turkey are on a collision course.

Televisão árabe: pronunciamentos de líderes políticos e religiosos e programação infantil

2011-08-31T16:44:00.000-07:00

Trechos de discursos de líderes políticos e religiosos, e programação da TV 'estatal' palestina e de canais do Egito, Irã e Catar:

Políticos palestinos (entre eles Ismail Haniyeh, líder do Hamas) ameaçam países europeus, Israel e EUA.

Sheikh Ibrahim Mudeiris, num sermão de sexta-feira transmitido pela tv "estatal" palestina, falando sobre a religião islãmica e ensinando aos fiéis valores nobres como "os judeus são como o vírus da AIDS e fazem o mundo todo sofrer".

TV do Hamas entrevista dois ófãos de mãe - que se explodiu matando isralenses inocentes - enquanto afirma que a mullher é uma "shahida" (mártir) que foi para o paraíso.

No fim o entrevistador pergunta "Ela matou judeus, não é? Quantos ela matou?" e uma das crianças responde mostrando cinco dedos.

TV al-Rahma (Egito) . Crianças apresentam programas com propaganda islãmica e pan-arabista. Uma delas, repetindo ensinamento corânicos, afirma que "o Dia do Julgmento não chegará até que os muçulmanos lutem contra os judeus... e os muçulmanos os matarão e os judeus se esconderão atrás de árvores e pedras, e as árvores e pedras dirão: Oh muçulmano!, oh servo de Allah!, há um judeu atrás de mim. Venha e mate-o".

Coletânea de programas infantis feitos em países árabes e islãmicos.

Desenho animado iraniano. Programação infantil.

Abd al-Hamid al-Ansari (universidade do Catar) na TV do Bahrein: "Nossos canais merecem ser chamados de "mídia do terrorismo". Eles disseminam entre as crianças coisas que até podem não ser consideradas abertamente terroristas, mas que disseminam o extremismo... e esse extremismo é o início da violência e do fanatismo que levam ao terrorismo".

"Ensinando os palestinos a odiar"

Criança de 'três anos e meio' sendo "entrevistada" num canal egípcio - a menina é filha da artista Wagdi al-Arabi.

"entrevistadora": Basmallah, você conhece os judeus? Gosta deles?

"entrevistada": Sim. Não.

Por quê?

Porque...

Porque eles são...

...eles são porcos e macacos.

Eles são porcos e macacos? Quem disse isso?

Deus.

E onde ele disse isso?

No Corão.

Certo, ele falou sobre eles no Corão.

Intolerância religiosa nos países islãmicos

2011-08-31T01:40:00.000-07:00

Placas: "Judeus e armênios não são permitidos por este portão.
Cães são livres para entrar"

Colunista iraquiano afirma: "É difícil lembrar um período em que os árabes cristãos estiveram em maior perigo do que hoje".

Num artigo no jornal iraquiano Al-Zaman, publicado simultaneamente em Londres e Bagdá, cuja linha editorial é independente e liberal desde a década de 1940, o colunista Majid Aziza dá destaque à situação da população árabe cristã no mundo muçulmano. A seguir, alguns trechos do artigo:[1]

Na Palestina, os cristãos estão quase extintos em conseqüência do controle que os extremistas muçulmanos têm sobre a questão palestina e da marginalização dos cristãos, sem mencionar o impacto negativo da intifada [revolta dos palestinos contra Israel] – que é dirigida pelas organizações islâmicas – sobre os cristãos da Palestina.

"Os cristãos nascidos em países árabes estão fugindo das suas regiões de origem. Hoje em dia, essa informação é divulgada em todo o mundo e é cem por cento verdadeira. As estatísticas mostram que um grande número de cristãos árabes está emigrando para lugares menos perigosos para eles e seus filhos, como Estados Unidos, Canadá, Austrália e Europa. Os motivos são, por um lado, a perseguição que os órgãos governamentais movem contra eles e, por outro lado, os grupos extremistas...

Os cristãos têm vivido há séculos nas regiões conhecidas atualmente como países árabes, juntamente com outros grupos religiosos e, principalmente, com os muçulmanos que participaram com eles das aflições da vida. Mas os cristãos perderam o apoio de seus concidadãos islâmicos por muitas razões, inclusive pelo extremismo religioso entre alguns muçulmanos, pelo aumento da população [islâmica] por motivos religiosos, pelos atos de discriminação, coerção e expulsões individuais e coletivas de cristãos e pelas pressões que os cristãos vinham sofrendo até mesmo quando estavam servindo a seus países. Há muitos exemplos disso na Palestina, no Iraque, no Sudão, no Líbano, no Egito e em outras nações.

Aproximadamente 4 milhões de cristãos libaneses emigraram de seu país em conseqüência das pressões impostas pelos [muçulmanos]. Mais ou menos meio milhão de cristãos iraquianos deixaram seu país pelos mesmos motivos... Hoje a situação está ficando pior por causa da discriminação por parte dos extremistas muçulmanos salafitas. Na Palestina, os cristãos estão quase extintos em conseqüência do controle que os extremistas muçulmanos têm sobre a questão palestina e da marginalização dos cristãos, sem mencionar o impacto negativo da intifada [revolta dos palestinos contra Israel] – que é dirigida pelas organizações islâmicas – sobre os cristãos da Palestina. Com relação aos cristãos coptas do Egito, o que o governo e os muçulmanos fizeram e estão fazendo com eles daria para encher páginas e páginas de livros e jornais, explicando os atos de coerção, discriminação e perseguição. O que está acontecendo também com os cristãos na Argélia, Mauritânia, Somália e outros países é um problema que ocuparia espaço demais para ser explicado.

Essa situação ocorre igualmente nos países muçulmanos não-árabes. Em nações islâmicas como o Paquistão, a Indonésia e a Nigéria, os cristãos também sofrem perseguição. No Paquistão, os líderes muçulmanos decretaram uma fatwa [decisão religiosa] permitindo a matança de dois cristãos para cada muçulmano morto pelos ataques americanos no Afeganistão, como se os americanos representassem o Cristianismo no mundo. Em outros países os cristãos vivem com medo, sob a sombra de ameaças, e enfrentam uma crescente série de agressões toda vez que os Estados Unidos e seus aliados executam uma operação militar contra qualquer país [muçulmano].

Os cristãos têm medo do que lhes poderia acontecer nesses países. A situação é muito grave e requer atenção urgente. É difícil imaginarmos qualquer outro tempo em que os cristãos enfrentaram maior perigo do que atualmente nesses países..." (extraído de www.memri.org)

Nota:

Al-Zaman (Iraque & Londres), 14 de setembro de 2004.

- Perseguição aos cristãos nos países muçulmanos

- Perseguição a cristãos no Egito “democrático” faz 12 mortos e deixa 220 feridos

- Cristãos no Iraque fogem de Natal sangrento

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- The Persecution of Palestinian Christians

- BAHÁ’ÍS: PERSEGUIÇÃO RELIGIOSA NO IRÃ

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- Judeus nos países árabes

- O Tratamento aos Judeus nos Países Árabes/Islâmicos

- O Tratamento aos Judeus nos Países Árabes/Islâmicos - Situação atual

Judeus nos países árabes

2011-08-31T01:26:00.000-07:00

http://www.judeusdospaisesarabes.com.br/

MITO
“Os judeus que viviam nos países islâmicos eram bem tratados pelos árabes”.

O historiador da Universidade de Princeton Bernard Lewis escreve: “A Idade de Ouro dos direitos iguais foi um mito e a crença nisso foi resultado, e não causa, da simpatia dos judeus [europeus] pelo Islã”.
Spanish idyll myth spread by 19th c. British Jews

Maomé, o fundador do Islã, viajou para Medina no ano 622 d.e.c. para atrair seguidores á sua nova fé. Quando os judeus de Medina se recusaram a reconhecê-lo como seu profeta, duas das principais tribos judaicas foram expulsas; em 627, os seguidores de Maomé mataram entre 600 e 900 homens e dividiram as mulheres e crianças judias sobreviventes entre eles.

A atitude dos muçulmanos com relação aos judeus se reflete em diversos versículos do Corão, o livro sagrado da fé islâmica. “Eles (os judeus) foram condenados à humilhação e à desgraça. Eles atraíram para si a ira de Deus por negarem constantemente os sinais de Deus e matarem injustamente seus profetas, bem como por desobedecerem e transgredirem” (Sura 2:61).

De acordo com o Corão, os judeus buscam trazer a corrupção (5:64), sempre são desobedientes (5:78) e inimigos de Alá, do Profeta e dos anjos (2:97-98). Os judeus sempre foram vistos com desdém por seus vizinhos muçulmanos; a coexistência pacífica entre os dois grupos envolvia a subordinação e degradação dos judeus.

No século IX, o califa de Bagdá, Al-Mutawakil, criou um distintivo amarelo para os judeus. Séculos mais tarde, isso foi imitado pela Alemanha nazista.
____________________________________________________

A seguir, um pouco da história das comunidades judaicas nos países árabes, desde suas origens até a quase extinção nos dias atuais.

INTRODUÇÃO

Os judeus vivem no Oriente Médio, Norte da África e na região do Golfo há vários séculos. Houve uma presença ininterrupta de grandes comunidades judaicas no Oriente Médio desde os tempos remotos, mais de 2.500 anos antes do nascimento dos estados árabes modernos. Veja a época em que algumas delas surgiram:

Iraque - século 6 a .C.
Líbia - século 3 a .C.
Iêmen - século 3 a .C.
Líbano - século 1 a .C.
Síria - século 1 a .C.
Marrocos - século 1 d.C.
Argélia - séculos 1 e 2 d.C.
Tunísia – século 2 d.C.

Após a conquista da região pelos muçulmanos, sob o domínio islâmico os judeus passaram a ser considerados cidadãos de segunda classe, mas a eles eram permitidas, durante um determinado período, oportunidades religiosas, educacionais, profissionais e empresariais limitadas.

Isso mudou no século 20, quando ocorreu um padrão de perseguição consistente e difundido e violações em massa dos direitos humanos das minorias judaicas em países árabes. Decretos e legislações oficiais aprovados pelos regimes árabes negaram direitos humanos e civis aos judeus e às outras minorias; suas propriedades foram desapropriadas; eles foram privados de sua cidadania e de seu sustento. Os judeus eram frequentemente vítimas de assassinato, prisões e detenções arbitrárias, tortura e expulsões.

Com a declaração do Estado de Israel em 1948, o status dos judeus nos países árabes piorou drasticamente à medida que muitos países árabes declararam ou apoiaram guerra contra Israel. Os judeus foram, então, expulsos dos países onde residiam há anos e tornaram-se reféns políticos dominados do conflito árabe-israelense.

Os direitos e a segurança dos judeus residentes em países árabes passaram a ser atacados física e legalmente pelos governos e pela população de um modo geral. Na Síria, por causa das perseguições anti-judaicas em Alepo, em 1947, dos 10 mil judeus da cidade, 7 mil fugiram do terror. No Iraque, o “sionismo” tornou-se um crime capital. Mais de 70 judeus foram assassinados por bombas na região judaica do Cairo, no Egito. Após os franceses terem desocupado a Argélia, as autoridades emitiram uma variedade de decretos anti-judeus que induziram os quase 160 mil judeus a fugirem prontamente do país. Após a Resolução da Assembléia Geral das Nações Unidas sobre o Plano de Partilha, em 1947, amotinadores muçulmanos deram início a perseguições sanguinárias em Áden e Iêmen que acabaram causando a morte de 82 judeus. Em diversos países os judeus foram expulsos ou tiveram sua cidadania revogada (como, por exemplo, na Líbia). Inúmeros judeus fugiram de 10 países árabes. Eles se tornaram refugiados em uma região predominantemente hostil aos judeus.

As restrições sancionadas pelo estado, freqüentemente associadas à violência e repressão, forçaram um deslocamento em massa dos judeus. Resultado: mais de 850 mil judeus foram expulsos das terras que eles e seus ancestrais viviam há várias gerações. Saiba mais sobre estas comunidades:

EGITO

Bar Mitzvah de gêmeos, Cairo, Egito, 1930.

Histórico

Os judeus vivem no Egito desde os tempos bíblicos. As tribos israelitas mudaram-se inicialmente para a terra de Goshen (extremo nordeste do delta do Nilo) durante o reinado do faraó egípcio Amenhotep IV (1375-1358 b.C.).

Ao longo dos anos, os judeus buscaram abrigo e habitaram o Egito. Em 1897, havia mais de 25 mil judeus no Egito, a maior parte deles concentrada nas cidades do Cairo e Alexandria. Em 1937, a população alcançou 63.500 judeus.

Na década de 1940, com o crescimento do nacionalismo egípcio e os esforços do movimento sionista para criar uma terra natal judaica adjunta a Israel, as atividades anti-judaicas começaram a surgir com mais intensidade. Em 1945, as agitações começaram – dez judeus foram mortos, 350 ficaram feridos e uma sinagoga, um hospital judeu e um lar para idosos foram incendiados. Após o sucesso do movimento sionista em estabelecer o Estado de Israel, medidas violentas e repressoras vindas do governo e dos cidadãos egípcios tiveram início entre junho e novembro de 1948. Bombas foram postas no quartel judeu, matando mais de 70 judeus e ferindo cerca de 200. As agitações nos meses que se seguiram resultaram em muitas outras mortes. Dois mil judeus foram presos e muitos tiveram suas propriedades confiscadas.

Em 1956, o governo egípcio usou a Campanha do Sinai como pretexto para expulsar aproximadamente 25 mil judeus egípcios do país e confiscar suas propriedades. A eles foi permitido levar do país apenas uma mala e uma pequena quantidade de dinheiro, e todos foram obrigados a assinar documentos “doando” suas propriedades ao governo egípcio. Aproximadamente mil outros judeus foram presos ou mandados para campos de concentração. Em 23 de novembro de 1956, um manifesto, assinado pelo Ministro de Assuntos Religiosos e lido em voz alta pelas mesquitas de todo o Egito, declarava que “todos os judeus são sionistas e inimigos do Estado”, e prometeu que todos seriam, em breve, expulsos (AP, 26 e 29 de novembro de 1956; New York World Telegram).

Em 1957, a população judaica no Egito ja tinha caído para 15 mil. Em 1967, depois da Guerra dos Seis Dias, houve uma nova onda de perseguições, e a comunidade judaica caiu para 2.500. Na década de 1970, após ser dada aos judeus remanescentes a permissão de deixar o país, a comunidade reduziu-se a algumas poucas famílias.

Os direitos dos judeus foram finalmente recuperados em 1979, depois que o presidente Anwar Sadat assinou o Acordo de Camp David com Israel. Somente então foi permitido à comunidade estabelecer laços com Israel e com a coletividade judaica no mundo. Os quase 200 judeus deixados no Egito são agora idosos, e a comunidade judaica do país, outrora orgulhosa e crescente, está agora praticamente extinta.

Decretos discriminatórios e violações dos direitos humanos (apenas alguns exemplos)

O primeiro Código de Nacionalidade foi promulgado pelo Egito em 26 de maio de 1926. Somente tinham direito à nacionalidade egípcia aqueles “pertencesse racialmente à maioria da população de um país cuja língua seja o árabe ou cuja religião seja a islâmica”. 2 Esta cláusula serviu como pretexto oficial para expulsar muitos judeus do Egito.

Em 9 de julho de 1947, uma emenda foi introduzida à Lei das Empresas Egípcias, tornando obrigatório a uma empresa que 75% dos empregados de setores administrativos e 90% dos empregados em geral fossem cidadãos egípcios. Isto resultou na demissão e na impossibilidade de conseguir novos empregos para muitos judeus, pois apenas 15% da população judaica possuía a cidadania egípcia. 3

Os judeus partiram em massa do Egito quando foi criada uma nova emenda, em 1956, retificando a Lei de Nacionalidade Egípcia de 1926. O Artigo 1 da lei de 22 de novembro de 1956 estipulava que os “sionistas” fossem proibidos de receber a cidadania egípcia. 4 O Artigo 18 da lei de 1956 reforçava ainda que “a nacionalidade egípcia poderia ser retirada, por ordem do Ministério de Relações Interiores, em caso de pessoas classificadas como sionistas”. Além disso, o termo "sionista” nunca foi definido, deixando então que as autoridades egípcias o interpretassem como bem entendessem.

As cláusulas nas leis de 1956 e 1958 permitiram que o governo retirasse a cidadania de qualquer judeu egípcio que estivesse ausente do território da RAU (República Árabe Unida) por mais de seis meses consecutivos. O que prova que estas cláusulas foram feitas para atingir exclusivamente os judeus é o fato de que as listas de pessoas desnaturalizadas, publicadas de tempos em tempos pelo Diário Oficial, continham apenas nomes judeus, apesar de muitos outros egípcios não-judeus terem se ausentado por mais de seis meses do território egípcio. 5

Discriminação econômica e estrangulamento (apenas alguns exemplos)

A lei nº 26 de 1952 obrigava todas as empresas a empregar percentagens pré-determinadas de “egípcios”. Um grande número de empregados judeus assalariados perdeu seus empregos, e não conseguiram outros, porque não pertenciam à categoria de judeus que possuía nacionalidade egípcia.

Entre 1 e 20 de novembro de 1956, registros oficiais revelam que, por uma série de ordens de confisco dadas pela Proclamação Militar nº 4, as propriedades de muitas centenas de judeus no Egito foi retirada de seus donos e entregue a administradores egípcios. A Proclamação nº 4 foi posta em prática quase que exclusivamente em judeus; e ainda que um pequeno número de coptas e muçulmanos tenham sido também prisioneiros de guerra, seus pertences nunca foram tomados. 7

Das listas publicadas contendo 486 pessoas e empresas cujas propriedades foram retiradas pela Proclamação Militar nº 4, pelo menos 95% dos nomes eram judeus. Os nomes de pessoas e empresas afetadas por esta medida representa o volume econômico substancial representado pelos judeus no Egito, as maiores e mais importantes empresas e seu sustento principal, por meio de contribuições voluntárias, de instituições judaicas religiosas, educacionais, sociais e de bem-estar social no Egito. 8

Além do confisco de propriedade e outros tratamentos discriminatórios, a Diretiva nº 189 criada sob a autoridade da Proclamação Militar nº 4, autorizava que o Diretor Geral da Agência de Confisco deduzisse, dos pertences de pessoas presas na guerra, 10% do valor total das propriedades confiscadas, alegando ser este para cobrir custos administrativos. A partir disso, sem nenhuma preocupação em relação à legalidade do confisco de propriedades, os judeus do Egito passaram a pagar taxas pela maquinaria ou por confisco e retenção impróprios. 9

Os judeus que deixavam o Egito eram sujeitos a privações e inconveniências adicionais. Uma regra foi estabelecida autorizando judeus que deixassem o Egito a levar com eles cheques de viagem ou outros documentos de troca no valor máximo de 100 libras esterlinas por pessoa. O Banco do Egito fornecia aos judeus que saíam do país instrumentos criados especificamente para contas egípcias na Inglaterra e França, quando as autoridades egípcias sabiam muito bem que tais contas eram bloqueadas em reciprocidade ao bloqueio egípcio de pertences ingleses e franceses, e que não eram livremente negociados fora do país. 10

IRAQUE

Cerimonial de memória para Menahem Salah Daniel, líder da comunidade judaica de Bagdá.

Histórico

O Iraque é a designação moderna para um país estabelecido com a antiga Babilônia, a Assíria e a parte sul da Turquia após a Primeira Guerra Mundial.

O Iraque é também o lugar da mais antiga diáspora judaica, a de história contínua mais longa, de 721 b.C. a 1949 a .C., uma faixa de tempo de 2670 anos.

Comerciantes judeus de Bagdá

No século III, a Babilônia tornou-se o centro do conhecimento judaico, como é confirmado pela contribuição mais influente do conhecimento judaico à comunidade, o Talmude babilônico. Os judeus prosperaram no que era então a Babilônia por 1200 anos antes da Conquista Muçulmana em 634 d.C. Sob controle dos muçulmanos, a situação da comunidade judaica tornou-se instável. Alguns judeus possuíam altos cargos de governo ou prosperavam com o comércio e as trocas. Ao mesmo tempo, outros judeus eram submetidos a taxas especiais e restrições em suas atividades profissionais. Sob o controle britânico, que começou em 1927, os judeus iam bem economicamente, mas todo este progresso cessou quando o Iraque conquistou sua independência em 1932.

Em junho de 1941, o golpe de Rashid Ali, de apoio aos nazistas e inspirado pelo Mufti, iniciou uma série de manifestações e perseguições em Bagdá. Multidões de iraquianos armados assassinaram 180 judeus e feriram outros mil.

Insurreições adicionais de manifestações anti-judaicas ocorreram entre 1946 e 1949. Após o estabelecimento de Israel em 1948, o sionismo tornou-se um crime capital.

Judia iraquiana foge com seu filho

Em 1950, foi permitido que os judeus iraquianos deixassem o país em um ano caso desistissem de suas cidadanias. Um ano mais tarde, no entanto, as propriedades dos judeus que emigraram foram congeladas e restrições econômicas foram dadas aos judeus que permaneceram no país. De 1949 a 1951, 104 mil judeus foram expulsos do Iraque na Operação Ezra e Nehemiah, outros 20 mil foram retirados clandestinamente pelo Irã. Assim, uma comunidade que chegou a 150 mil pessoas em 1947 rapidamente se reduziu a seis mil depois de 1951.

Em 1952, o governo do Iraque barrou os judeus de imigrarem. Com a ascensão de facções rivais Ba’ath em 1963, restrições adicionais foram impostas aos judeus iraquianos remanescentes. A venda de propriedades foi proibida e todos os judeus foram forçados a carregar cartões de idntidade amarelos. As perseguições continuaram, especialmente após a Guerra dos Seis Dias em 1967, quando muitos dos três mil judeus restantes foram presos e demitidos de seus empregos. Por volta desta época, medidas mais repressoras foram tomadas: as propriedades dos judeus foram tomadas; as contas bancárias, congeladas; os judeus foram despedidos de cargos públicos; lojas foram fechadas; licenças comerciais foram canceladas; telefones foram desligados. Os judeus foram colocados em prisão domiciliar por longos períodos de tempo, ou ficavam restritos a suas próprias cidades.

As perseguições chegaram ao seu limite máximo no final de 1968. Grupos de judeus eram presos sob alegação de descobertas de “grupos de espiões” compostos por empresários judeus. Quatorze homens – sendo onze deles judeus – foram sentenciados à morte em julgamentos encenados e, em 27 de Janeiro de 1969, foram enforcados em praças públicas de Bagdá; outros morreram sob tortura (Judith Miller e Laurie Mylroie, “Saddam Hussein and the Crisis in the Gulf”, p. 34).

Em resposta à pressões internacionais, o governo de Bagdá silenciosamente permitiu que a maior parte dos judeus que restavam emigrassem no início da década de 1970, mesmo enquanto outras restrições eram mantidas. Em 1973, a maior parte dos judeus iraquianos restantes estavam velhos demais para saírem do país e foram pressionados pelo governo a entregar títulos, sem compensações, de propriedades judaicas no valor de mais de 200 milhões (New York Times, 18 de fevereiro de 1973).

Hoje, aproximadamente 61 judeus permanecem ainda em Bagdá. O que fora um dia uma comunidade crescente de judeus no Iraque encontra-se hoje extinta (Associated Press, 28 de março de 1998).

Decretos discriminatórios e violações dos direitos humanos (apenas alguns exemplos)

A primeira fração de legislação posta em prática que violou os direitos dos judeus foi a emenda 12 de 1948 para o suplemento 13 de 1938 ao Código Penal de Bagdá. O Código Penal de Bagdá reforçava a cláusula relacionada ao comunismo, anarquia e imoralidade da seção 89A(1). A seção geralmente proíbe a publicação de qualquer coisa que incite a difusão do ódio, abusos de governo ou a integridade da população. Esta emenda, criada em 1948, adicionou o termo “sionismo” ao comunismo, anarquismo e imoralidade, cuja propagação constituía uma ofensa com pena de sete anos de prisão e/ou uma multa.

Em um artigo do jornal New York Times em 16 de maio de 1948, foi registrado que “No Iraque, não é permitido que nenhum judeu deixe o país a não ser que deixe £5,000 (cerca de 10 mil dólares) com o governo para garantir o seu retorno. Nenhum judeu estrangeiro pode entrar no Iraque, nem mesmo de passagem”.

A lei nº 1 de 1950, intitulada “Suplemento ao decreto cancelando a nacionalidade iraquiana”, privava de fato os judeus da nacionalidade iraquiana. A seção 1 estipulava que “o Conselho de Ministros pode cancelar a nacionalidade iraquiana dos judeus iraquianos que desejem por vontade própria deixar o Iraque...”. 14

A lei nº 5 de 1951, intitulada “Lei de supervisão e administração de propriedades de judeus que negligenciaram a nacionalidade iraquiana”, também os privava de suas propriedades. A seção 2(a) “congelou” as propriedades dos judeus. 15

Houve uma série de leis que subseqüentemente expandiram o confisco de pertences e propriedades de judeus que “negligenciaram a nacionalidade iraquiana”. Entre elas está a lei nº 12 de 1951 16 e a lei anexa nº 64 de 1967 (em relação à posse de ações em empresas comerciais), além da lei nº 10 de 1968 (em relação a restrições bancárias).

LÍBIA

Bairro dos judeus em Trípoli

Histórico

A comunidade judaica da Líbia remete suas origens ao século 3 a .C.

Na época da ocupação italiana na Líbia em 1911, havia apenas 21 mil judeus no país, a maior parte em Tripoli.

No final da década de 1930, leis anti-judaicas foram gradualmente reforçadas, e os judeus foram sujeitos a repressões terríveis. Ainda assim, em 1941, os judeus respondiam por um quarto da população de Trípoli e mantinham 44 sinagogas.

Em 1942, os alemães ocuparam o quarto judeu e tornou tudo muito difícil para os judeus na Líbia, ainda que as condições não melhorassem após a liberação. Durante a ocupação britânica, o crescimento do nacionalismo árabe e do fervor anti-judaico foram as principais razões por trás de uma série de perseguições, a pior das quais, em novembro de 1945, resultou no massacre de 140 judeus em Tripoli e regiões próximas, e na destruição de cinco sinagogas (Howard Sachar, A History of Israel).

O estabelecimento do Estado de Israel levou muitos judeus a deixarem o país. Em junho de 1948, em protesto à descoberta do Estado judeu, manifestantes assassinaram outros 12 judeus e destruíram cerca de 280 lares judeus. Ainda que a emigração fosse ilegal, mais de 3 mil judeus conseguiram fugir para Israel. Quando os ingleses legalizaram a emigração em 1949, e nos anos que precederam a independência do Líbano em 1951, demonstrações hostis e manifestações contra os judeus causaram a partida de cerca de 30 mil judeus para o norte do país, e após a Líbia ter conquistado a independência e tornar-se membro da Liga Árabe em 1951 (Norman Stillman, The Jews of Arab Lands in Modern Times).

Decretos discriminatórios e violações dos direitos humanos
(apenas alguns exemplos)

* O Artigo 1 da Lei nº. 62 de março de 1957, decretava, entre outras coisas, que pessoas ou empresas foram proibidas de entrar direta ou indiretamente em contratos de qualquer natureza com organizações ou pessoas domiciliadas em Israel, com cidadãos israelenses ou seus representantes. A provisão desse artigo também permitiu que o Conselho de Ministros registrasse residentes na Líbia que fossem parentes de pessoas residentes em Israel. 17

Família judia da Líbia

·* A Lei de 31 de dezembro de 1958 foi um decreto emitido pelo Presidente do Conselho Executivo de Tripolitania, que ordenava a dissolução do Conselho da Comunidade Judaica e a designação de um comissário Muçulmano nomeado pelo Governo. 18

* Em 24 de maio de 1961, uma lei foi promulgada decretando que apenas cidadãos líbios poderiam possuir ou transferir propriedade real. Uma prova conclusiva da posse de cidadãos líbios era requerida para ser evidenciada por uma licença especial, confiantemente relatado de ter sido emitida para apenas seis Judeus em sua totalidade. 19

Estudantes de escola judaica de Trípoli

* O Decreto Real de 8 de agosto de 1962 decretou, entre outras coisas, que um líbio perdia sua nacionalidade se tivesse tido qualquer contato com Sionismo. A perda da nacionalidade Líbia, de acordo com essa provisão, se estendia para qualquer pessoa que tivesse visitado Israel depois da proclamação da independência líbia, e qualquer pessoa julgada por ter agido moral ou materialmente em favor dos interesses israelenses. O efeito retroativo dessa provisão permitiu que as autoridades privassem Judeus da nacionalidade Líbia à vontade. 20

* Com a primeira lei nº 14, de 7 de fevereiro de 1970, o Governo líbio estabeleceu que todas as propriedades pertencentes a "Israelitas" que deixaram o território líbio "para se estabelecer definitivamente no exterior" teriam que passar pela Custódia Geral. Apesar do preciso fraseio da lei ("Israelitas que deixaram o território líbio para se estabelecer definitivamente no exterior"), o Governo líbio começou a tomar posse de propriedades pertencentes a "judeus" sem se preocupar com o fato de que esses Judeus não poderiam ser considerados "israelitas" e não tinham "se estabelecido definitivamente no exterior". 21

* O governo decretou a lei de 21 de julho de 1970, que afirmava que queria "a restituição de certos recursos para o Estado". A "lei relativa à definição de certos recursos para o Estado" afirmou que a Custódia Geral administraria o valor líquido das propriedades de Judeus, bem como suas empresas e ações pertencentes a judeus. 22

ARGÉLIA

Família celebrando o Seder de Pessach - Oran, 1930.

Histórico

O assentamento judeu na Argélia dos dias de hoje pode ser traçado muito distante no passado. No século XIV, com a deterioração das condições na Espanha, muitos judeus espanhóis mudaram-se para a Argélia. Após a ocupação francesa do país em 1830, os judeus gradualmente receberam a cidadania francesa.

Decretos discriminatórios e violações dos direitos humanos (apenas alguns exemplos)

Em 1934, os muçulmanos, incitados por eventos ocorridos na Alemanha nazista, se agitaram em Constantina matando 25 judeus e ferindo muitos outros. Antes de 1962, havia 60 comunidades judaicas, cada uma mantendo seus próprios rabinos, sinagogas e instituições educacionais. Após a independência da Argélia em 1962, o governo argelino atormentou a comunidade judaica e privou os judeus de seus direitos econômicos. Como resultado, quase 130 mil judeus argelinos imigraram para a França e, desde 1948, 25.681 judeus argelinos imigraram para Israel.

A independência da Argélia com a França foi o evento-chave na expulsão da comunidade judaica. Como resultado do desejo da Argélia e dos argelinos de juntarem-se à onda de nacionalismo e pan-arabismo que varria o Norte da África, os judeus não mais se sentiam bem-vindos após a partida francesa. O Código de Nacionalidade Argelino de 1963 deixou isso bem claro, dando a cidadania argelina como direito apenas àqueles cujos pais e avôs paternos possuíssem algum status pessoal muçulmano na Argélia. 24 Em outras palavras, ainda que a Frente Libertadora Nacional na Argélia fosse conhecida por seu slogan “Um Estado secular democrático”, ela seguia critérios religiosos rígidos ao dar a cidadania, por isso fortificando sentimentos anti-judeus e anti-Israel no país.

Professores e Rabinos da Escola Etz Haim - Oran, 1927

TUNÍSIA

Histórico

As primeiras evidências documentadas de judeus vivendo onde é hoje a Tunísia vêm de antes do ano 200.

Após a conquista árabe da Tunísia no século 7, os judeus viviam em condições satisfatórias apesar de algumas medidas discriminatórias como algumas taxas.

Em 1948, a comunidade de judeus tunísios chegava a 105 mil pessoas, com 65 mil vivendo somente em Tunis.

Decretos discriminatórios e violações dos direitos humanos (apenas alguns exemplos)

Depois que a Tunísia conquistou sua independência em 1956, uma série de decretos anti-judaicos do governo foram promulgados. Em 1958, o Conselho da comunidade judaica na Tunísia foi abolido pelo governo, e sinagogas, cemitérios e quartos judeus antigos foram destruídos sob alegação de “renovação urbana”.

Em condições similares a dos judeus na Argélia, a ascensão do nacionalismo tunísio levou a legislações anti-judaicas e, em 1961, fez com que um grande número de judeus deixasse o país. A situação de instabilidade crescente fez com que mais de 40 mil judeus tunísios imigrassem para Israel. Em1967, a população judaica no para 20 mil.

Durante a Guerra dos Seis Dias, os judeus foram atacados em agitações árabes, e várias sinagogas e lojas foram queimadas. O governo denunciou a violência e apelou à população judaica para que ficassem, mas, no entanto, não os proibiu de deixar o país. Logo depois, sete mil judeus emigraram para a França.

Mesmo em 1982 houve ataques a judeus em cidades como Zarzis e Ben Guardane. Hoje, cerca de 2 mil judeus permanecem na Tunísia.

SÍRIA

Histórico

Os judeus vivem na Síria desde os tempos bíblicos, e a história da comunidade é mesclada à história dos judeus na terra de Israel. A população judaica aumentou significativamente após a expulsão dos judeus da Espanha em 1942. Através das gerações, as principais comunidades judaicas foram encontradas em Damascus e Alepo.

Em 1943, a comunidade judaica na Síria tinha 30 mil membros. Esta população era em sua maioria distribuída entre Alepo, onde viviam 17 mil judeus, e Damasco, onde viviam 11 mil.

Decretos discriminatórios e violações dos direitos humanos (apenas alguns exemplos)

Em 1945, em uma tentativa de impedir esforços para estabelecer uma terra natal judaica, o governo restringiu a emigração para Israel, e propriedades judaicas foram queimadas e saqueadas. Perseguições anti-judaicas começaram a acontecer em Alepo em 1947, fazendo com que 7 dos 10 mil judeus que ali viviam fugirem por medo. O governo então congelou as contas bancárias judaicas e confiscou suas propriedades.

Logo após a descoberta de Israel, como registrado no jornal New York Times em 16 de maio de 1948: “Uma política de discriminação econômica na Síria está sendo posta em prática contra os judeus. ‘Virtualmente, todos’ os cidadãos judeus civis empregados pelo governo sírio foram demitidos. A liberdade de movimentos foi ‘praticamente abolida’. Postos especiais de fronteira foram estabelecidos para controlar o movimento dos judeus.”

Em 1949, os bancos foram instruídos a congelar as contas dos judeus e confiscar todos os seus pertences. Ao longo dos anos que se seguiram, o padrão contínuo de estrangulamento político e econômico fez com que um total de 15 mil judeus deixassem a Síria, 10 mil dos quais emigraram para os EUA e outros 5 mil para Israel.

IÊMEN e ÁDEN

Família iemenita estudando hebraico

Histórico

Os judeus do Iêmen têm várias lendas relacionadas com a sua chegada ao país, sendo a mais conhecida aquela que diz que eles chegaram antes da destruição do Primeiro Templo ( 587 a .C). A primeira evidência histórica da presença de judeus no Iêmen data do século III.

Os judeus começaram a deixar o Iêmen por volta de 1880, quando aproximadamente 2.500 rumaram para Jerusalém e Jafa. Mas foi após a Primeira Guerra Mundial, quando o Iêmen se tornou independente, que o sentimento anti-Judeu no país tornou a imigração uma necessidade. Leis anti-semitas, que tinham ficado esquecidas por anos foram trazidas à tona (por exemplo, os judeus não podiam mais andar nas calçadas ou andar a cavalo). Em um tribunal, as evidências de um judeu não eram aceitas diante das evidências de um muçulmano.

Decretos discriminatórios e violações dos direitos humanos (apenas alguns exemplos)

Em 1922, o governo do Iêmen re-introduziu uma antiga lei Islâmica que exigia que órfãos judeus menores do que 12 anos fossem convertidos ao Islamismo. Quando um Judeu decidia emigrar, ele deveria deixar todas as suas posses. Apesar disso, entre 1923 e 1945, um total de 17 mil Judeus Iemenitas deixaram o país e foram para a Palestina.

Após a Segunda Guerra Mundial, milhares de outros judeus iemenitas queriam migrar para a Palestina, mas o Livro Branco dos britânicos ainda estava em vigor e aqueles que deixassem o Iêmen acabariam em morros abarrotados de gente em Áden, onde revoltas graves aconteceram em 1947 depois que as Nações Unidas decidiram pela partição. Muitos Judeus foram mortos e o bairro Judeu foi completamente incendiado. Apenas em Setembro de 1948 que as autoridades britânicas em Áden permitiram que os refugiados fossem para Israel.

Em 1947, após a decisão pela partição, revoltosos Muçulmanos deram início a uma sangrenta perseguição em Áden que matou 82 Judeus e destruiu centenas de casas Judias. A comunidade Judaica em Áden, que contava com 8 mil Judeus em 1948, foi forçada a fugir. Até 1959 mais de 3 mil já haviam chegado em Israel. Muitos fugiram para os Estados Unidos e Inglaterra. Atualmente não há Judeus remanescentes em Áden.

Na mesma época da fundação de Israel, a comunidade Judaica no Iêmen estava economicamente paralisada, já que a maioria das lojas e negócios judaicos foi destruída. Essa situação cada vez mais perigosa levou a emigração de toda a comunidade Judaica Iemenita – quase 50 mil Judeus – entre Junho de 1949 e Setembro de 1950, na chamada operação "tapete mágico". Uma emigração em menor escala foi permitida até 1962, quando uma Guerra civil trouxe um final abrupto ao êxodo Judaico.

Esse é mais um exemplo do deslocamento de toda uma comunidade Judaica de suas raízes ancestrais em países árabes. É estimado que aproximadamente mil Judeus vivam atualmente no Iêmen. Eles são mantidos como reféns, em péssimas condições e não lhes é permitido deixar o país.

Judeus do Iêmen fogem do país

MARROCOS

Menino celebrando seu Bar Mitzva à caminho da sinagoga com seus
familiares e amigos, Fez, 1940.

Histórico

Os judeus apareceram pela primeira vez em Marrocos há mais de dois milênios, viajando em parceria com negociantes fenícios. A primeira colonização dos judeus ocorreu em 568 a .C. quando Nabucodonosor destruiu Jerusalém.

Decretos discriminatórios e violações dos direitos humanos
(apenas alguns exemplos)

Por volta de 1948, essa antiga comunidade judaica, a maior na África do Norte, contava 265 mil. Em junho de 1948, após a constituição do Estado de Israel, manifestações sanguinárias em Oujda e Djerada mataram 44 judeus e deixaram outros feridos.Naquele mesmo ano, um boicote econômico não oficial foi incitado contra os judeus marroquinos.

A imigração para Israel iniciou com a iniciativa de pequenos grupos que chegaram na época da Independência de Israel. Entretanto, a maior imigração, que trouxe mais de 250 mil judeus marroquinos para Israel, foi induzida por medidas anti-judaicas executadas em resposta a constituição do Estado de Israel. Em 4 de junho de 1949, manifestações apareceram ao norte de Marrocos matando e ferindo dezenas de judeus.Logo após, os judeus começaram a deixar Marrocos.

Durante os dois anos entre 1955 e 1957, mais de 70 mil judeus marroquinos chegaram em Israel. Em 1956, Marrocos declarou sua independência, e a imigração de judeus para Israel foi suspensa. Em 1959, atividades sionistas tornaram-se ilegais em Marrocos Durante esses anos, mais de 30 mil judeus fugiram para a França e para as Américas. Em 1963, a proibição na emigração para Israel foi revogada trazendo mais 100 mil para a costa.

Hoje, a comunidade judaica de Marrocos diminuiu em menos de 10% do seu tamanho original. Dos 17 mil judeus que restam, 2/3 vivem em Casablanca.

Mulheres judias em festa com músicos
Fez, Maroccos, 1950.

LÍBANO

Histórico

Os judeus vivem no Líbano desde os tempos antigos. O Rei Herodes, O Grande, no século I, manteve a comunidade judaica em Beirute.

Durante a primeira metade do século XX, a comunidade judaica desenvolveu-se amplamente devido à imigração da Grécia, Turquia e depois da Síria e do Iraque.

Decretos discriminatórios e violações dos direitos humanos (apenas alguns exemplos)

Houve momentos de manifestação e incitamento durante a constituição do estado de Israel como foi comunicado no New York Times em 16 de maio de 1948:

“No Líbano, judeus têm sido forçados a contribuir financeiramente para a luta contra a resolução da partição das Nações Unidas na Palestina. Atos de violência contra judeus são revelados abertamente pela imprensa, que acusam judeus de ‘envenenarem poços’ etc.”

Em meados dos anos 1950, aproximadamente sete mil judeus viviam em Beirute. Comparada aos países islâmicos, as regras árabe-cristãs que caracterizam a estrutura política do país conduziam uma política de relativa tolerância em relação à população judaica. Todavia, por estarem tão próximos do “estado inimigo” Israel, os judeus libaneses se sentiram inseguros e decidiram emigrar em 1967, fugindo para a França, Israel, Itália, Inglaterra e América do Sul.

Em 1974, 1.800 judeus permaneciam no Líbano, a maioria concentrada em Beirute. A guerra civil muçulmano-cristã destruiu o quarto judeu em danificando muitos lares, negócios e sinagogas judaicas. A maior parte dos judeus libaneses restantes emigrou em 1976, temendo que a presença da Síria no Líbano impedisse sua liberdade de emigrar. Hoje, um número estimado de 150 judeus permanecem no Líbano.

Fatalidades no conflito árabe-israelense

2011-08-25T00:31:00.001-07:00

O conflito árabe-israelense ocupa apenas o 49º Lugar em número de vítimas entre todos os conflitos desde 1950

Diz-se frequentemente - e não só por extremistas - que o conflito árabe-israelense é o mais mortal e, de acordo com isso, Israel é tido como o país mais agressivo e perigoso do mundo (a frente até de países como Irã, China, Coréia do Norte e Venezuela).

Um exemplo disso foi o discurso do então primeiro-ministro britânico Tony Blair no Congresso norte-americano, em julho de 2003: "O terrorismo não será derrotado sem a paz no Oriente Médio entre Israel e a Palestina. É aqui que o veneno é incubado. É aqui que o extremista pode confundir na mente de um número assustadoramente grande de pessoas o argumento para a criação de um estado palestino e a destruição de Israel". Este ponto de vista tolo e simplista leva muitos europeus a ver Israel como o país mais ameaçador do planeta.

Mas será isso verdade?

A fim de colocar as fatalidades árabe-israelenses no seu próprio contexto, Gunnar Heinsohn compilou estatísticas para classificar todos conflitos ocorridos desde 1950, de acordo com o número de mortes ocorridas. Note como bem abaixo na lista encontra-se o lançamento das letras em negrito.

Conflitos desde 1950 com mais de 10.000 Fatalidades *

1	40.000.000	China Comunista, 1949-76 (matança total, escassez causada pelo homem, Gulag)
2	10.000.000	Bloco Soviético: final do Estalinismo, 1950-53; pós-Stalinismo, até 1987 (principalmente o Gulag)
3	4.000.000	000 Etiópia, 1962-92,: Comunistas, fome artificial, genocídios
4	3.800.000	Zaire (Congo-Quinshasa): 1967-68; 1977-78; 1992-95; 1998-até o presente
5	2.800.000	Guerra da Coréia, 1950-53
6	1.900.000	Sudão, 1955-72,; 1983-2006 (guerras civis, genocídios)
7	1.870.000	Camboja: Khmer Rouge 1975-79; guerra civil 1978-91
8	1.800.000	Guerra do Vietnã, 1954-75
9	1.800.000	Afganistão: Matanças Soviéticas mutuamente destrutivas e do Taliban 1980-2001
10	1.250.000	Massacres do Paquistão ocidental no Paquistão Oriental (Bangladesh 1971)
11	1.100.000	Nigéria, 1966-79 (Biafra); 1993até o presente
12	1.100.000	Moçambique, 1964-70 (30,000) + depois da retirada de Portugal 1976-92
13	1.000.000	Guerra Irã-Iraque 1980-88
14	900.000	Genocídio em Ruanda, 1994
15	875.000	Argélia: contra a França 1954-62 (675.000); entre islâmicos e o governo 1991-2006 (200.000)
16	850.000	Uganda, 1971-79; 1981-85; 1994 até o presente
17	650.000	Indonésia: Marxistas 1965-66 (450.000); Timor Oriental, Papua, Aceh etc, 1969 até o presente (200.000)
18	580.000	Angola: guerra contra Portugal 1961-72 (80.000); depois da retirada de Portugal (1972-2002)
19	500.000	Brasil contra os seus índios, até 1999
20	430.000	Vietnã, depois que a guerra terminou em 1975 (seu próprio povo; refugiados dos barcos)
21	400.000	Indochina: contra a França, 1945-54
22	400.000	Burundi, 1959-present (Tutsi/Hutu)
23	400.000	Somália, 1991 até o presente
24	400.000	Coréia do Norte até 2006 (seu próprio povo)
25	300.000	Curdos no Iraque, Irã, Turquia, anos 80 à 90
26	300.000	Iraque, 1970-2003 (Saddam contra as minorias)
27	240.000	Colômbia, 1946-58,; 1964 até o presente
28	200.000	Iugoslávia, regime de Tito, 1944-80
29	200.000	Guatemala, 1960-96
30	190.000	Laos, 1975-90
31	175.000	Serbia contra a Croácia, Bósnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, 1991-1999
32	150.000	Romênia, 1949-99 (seu próprio povo)
33	150.000	Libéria, 1989-97
34	140.000	Rússia contra a Chechênia, 1994 até o presente
35	150.000	Guerra civil do Líbano, 1975-90
36	140.000	Guerra do Kuwait, 1990-91
37	130.000	Filipinas: 1946-54 (10.000); 1972 até o presente (120.000)
38	130.000	Burma/Mianmar, 1948 até o presente
39	100.000	Iêmen do Norte, 1962-70
40	100.000	Serra Leoa, 1991 até o presente
41	100.000	Albânia, 1945-91 (próprio povo)
42	80.000	Irã, 1978-79 (revolução)
43	75.000	Iraque, 2003 até o presente (doméstico)
44	75.000	El Salvador, 1975-92
45	70.000	Eritréa contra a Etiópia, 1998-2000
46	68.000	Sri Lanka, 1997 até o presente
47	60.000	Zimbábue, 1966-79; 1980 até o presente
48	60.000	Nicarágua, 1972-91 (Marxistas/nativos etc...)
49	51.000	Conflito Árabe-Israelense 1950 até o presente
50	50.000	Vietnã do Norte, 1954-75 (próprio povo)
51	50.000	Tagiquistão, 1992-96 (secularistas contra Islâmicos)
52	50.000	Guiné equatorial, 1969-79
53	50.000	Peru, 1980-2000
54	50.000	Guiné, 1958-84
55	40.000	Chad, 1982-90
56	30.000	Bulgária, 1948-89 (próprio povo)
57	30.000	Rodésia, 1972-79
58	30.000	Argentina, 1976-83 (próprio povo)
59	27.000	Hungria, 1948-89 (seu próprio povo)
60	26.000	Independência da Cachemira, 1989 até o presente
61	25.000	Governo Jordaniano x Palestinos, 1970-71 (Setembro Negro)
62	22.000	Polônia, 1948-89 (seu próprio povo)
63	20.000	Síria, 1982 (contra islâmicos em Hama)
64	20.000	Guerra chinesa-vietnamita, 1979
65	19.000	Marrocos: Guerra contra a França, 1953-56 (3.000) e no Saara Ocidental, 1975 até o presente (16.000)
66	18.000	República do Congo, 1997-99
67	10.000	Iêmen Sul, 1986 (guerra civil)

*Todos os números foram arredondados.
Fontes: Z. Brzezinski, Out of Control: Global Turmoil on the Eve of the Twenty-first Century, 1993; S. Courtois, Le Livre Noir du Communism, 1997; G. Heinsohn, Lexikon der Völkermorde, 1999, 2^nd ed.; G. Heinsohn, Söhne und Weltmacht, 2006, 8th ed.; R. Rummel, Death by Government, 1994; M. Small and J.D. Singer, Resort to Arms: International and Civil Wars 1816-1980, 1982; M. White, "Death Tolls for the Major Wars and Atrocities of the Twentieth Century," 2003.

Este terrível inventário mostra que o número total de mortes em conflitos desde 1950 é de aproximadamente 85.000.000. Dessa soma, as mortes no conflito árabe-israelense desde 1950 incluem 32.000 mortes devido a ataques de estados árabes e 19.000 devido a ataques palestinos, ou seja: 51.000 ao todo. O número de árabes mortos é de aproximadamente 35.000, e os judeus israelenses 16.000.

Esses números mostram que, desde 1950, as mortes no conflito árabe-israelense representam apenas 0,06% do total de mortes em todos os conflitos no mesmo período, ou seja: só 1 a cada 1,700 mortos em conflitos desde 1950 morreram devido ao conflito árabe-israelense.

(Adicionando os 11.000 mortos na guerra da independência israelense, 1947-49, compostos de 5.000 árabes e de 6.000 israelenses, não se alteram estes números significativamente).

Numa perspectiva diferente, uns 11.000.000 de muçulmanos foram mortos violentamente desde 1948, dos quais 35.000 (ou 0,3 por cento) morreram durante os sessenta anos de lutas com Israel, ou seja: 1 a cada 315 fatalidades muçulmanas. Em contraste, mais de 90 por cento dos 11 milhões dos que pereceram foram mortos pelos próprios muçulmanos.

Comentários: (1) Apesar da relativa não-letalidade do conflito árabe-israelense, seu renome, notoriedade, complexidade, e centralidade diplomática provavelmente continuarão a lhe dar importância desproporcional na imaginação global. E a reputação de Israel continuará a pagar o preço. (2) Mesmo assim, isso ajuda a mostrar a estatística 1-em-1.700 como um corretivo, na esperança de que um dia, esta realidade exposta, permita ao conflito árabe-israelense tomar seu legítimo lugar, menos importante nas políticas mundiais.

Professor Heinsohn é o diretor do für de Raphael-Lemkin-Institut Xenophobie - und Genozidforschung da Universidade de Bremen.

Deir Yassin

2011-08-25T00:30:00.001-07:00

Um dos versículos do missal anti-semita, exemplo prático de como uma mentira muitas vezes repetida acaba por se transformar em verdade oficial, é o “massacre” de Deir Yassin, episódio da guerra que os árabes moveram aos judeus logo após a aprovação do Plano de Partilha pela ONU.

Os anti-semitas, disfarçados de “anti-sionistas” e “apoiantes da causa palestiniana”, largam a designação “Deir Yassin”, com ar profundo e indignado e, embora não tenham uma ideia clara do que realmente aconteceu, fazem conta que sim e avançam alegremente pelo velhíssimo caminho da demonização do judeu.

Deir Yassin era uma aldeola árabe perto de Jerusalém, na estrada para Telaviv. Na primavera de 1948 os árabes tinham lançado a chamada “Guerra das Estradas” e a parte judaica de Jerusalém estava cercada excepto por essa estrada.

A 13 de Março de 1948, uma companhia árabe, constituída predominantemente por iraquianos tinha entrado na aldeia, com a intenção de fechar o garrote sobre Jerusalém.

Em 09 de Abril de 1948, uma companhia mista do Irgun e do Lehi atacou a aldeia a fim de a capturar e neutralizar os iraquianos.
Foram feitos avisos prévios à população de que devia abandonar a zona, agora transformada em objectivo militar, de facto a maioria da população saiu da aldeia.

Quando os paramilitares judaicos chegaram foram recebidos a tiro pelos iraquianos, muitos dos quais se tinham vestido de mulheres e se protegiam no meio delas, ardil que, como sabemos, continua a ser usado tanto no Líbano como em Gaza.
Os judeus responderam, e nos combates que se seguiram, a unidade do Irgun sofreu pesadas baixas (50 homens) mas conseguiu finalmente neutralizar os iraquianos, capturando alguns ainda vestidos de mulher.
Quando já se tinham rendido, um grupo deles voltou a fazer fogo com armas que mantinham escondidas debaixo das vestes. Muitos paramilitares do Irgun morreram e os restantes ripostaram, matando todos os prisioneiros.
Reacção normal… sem ir mais longe, em Aljubarrota os portugueses executaram centenas de prisioneiros gascões que se tinham rendido, quando a área dos trens foi atacada pelo Mestre de Alcântara.

Quando o Haganah chegou à aldeia encontrou os civis mortos e passou a ideia de que tinha havido um massacre. Alguns investigadores entendem que esta posição da Haganah foi pensada, uma vez que por um lado tinha interesse em fazer fugir os árabes de certas aldeias, espalhando rumores sobre a ferocidade dos judeus, e por outro, convinha-lhe isolar o Irgun, numa luta interna de ordem ideológica, já que a Haganah era de esquerda e o Irgun de direita.

A Cruz Vermelha foi chamada ao local e não encontrou prova de qualquer massacre, conclusão corroborada por um estudo feito em Julho de 1999, por investigadores árabes da Universidade de Birzeit, de Ramalah, segundo o qual não houve qualquer massacre mas sim um confronto militar no qual morreram 107 árabes (incluindo os iraquianos) em consequência do fogo cruzado. Ou sejam, o número de mortos é até inferior ao número de combatentes da companhia árabe que ocupou a aldeia.

De onde vem então a ideia do “massacre”?

Do mesmo local de onde vieram as ideias dos “massacres” de Jenin, e das manobras propagandísticas da ultima guerra com o Hezbolah: empolamento e distorção deliberadas para gerar indignação e estimular o ódio e a mobilização dos países árabes, neste caso a cargo da Rádio “Voz da Palestina”, cujo director, o Dr Hussein Khalidi afirmou que “nós temos o dever de capitalizar esta grande oportunidade”.

Na verdade foi com base na versão distorcida do Dr Hussein Khalidi que saiu um artigo no New York Times a divulgar ao mundo o “massacre” de Deir Yassin, suscitando várias declarações condenatórias das mais diversas personalidades, e basta recordar o que aconteceu no Verão passado com o “massacre” de Canaa, para se ter uma ideia das asneiras que as pessoas proferem, quando enfunadas pela ignorância convencida e pelas visões estrábicas do mundo.

Neste caso o tiro saiu aos árabes pela culatra porque a distorção dos factos lançou o pânico nos felas, contribuindo para engrossar o número de refugiados.
Isto foi confirmado num documentário da PBS (Os 50 anos de Guerra, 1993) que registou depoimentos de aldeões e protagonistas de Deir Yassin.

“Não houve violações. É tudo mentira. Não foram esventradas mulheres grávidas. Era propaganda, para que os árabes fugissem e os exércitos árabes pudessem invadir e expulsar os judeus”
(Mohammed Radwan, combatente árabe de Deir Yassin, , Middle East Times, 20 de Abril de 1998)

“A rádio árabe falou de mulheres a serem mortas e violadas, mas não é verdade…eu creio que a maior parte dos que morreram eram combatentes e mulheres e crianças que os ajudaram. Os lideres árabes cometeram um grande erro. Exagerando as atrocidades eles pretendiam encorajar as pessoas a lutar, mas acabaram por criar o pânico e as pessoas fugiram”
(Ayish Zeidan, aldeão de Deir Yassin,Daily Telegraph, 8Abril1998 )

Aliás Arafat, na sua biografia autorizada, refere expressamente que os exageros das histórias sobre Deir Yassin acabaram por provocar um efeito contrário aquele que se pretendia.

Deir Yassin não foi um massacre, tal como Jenin não foi um massacre, mas sim construções propagandísticas tendo em vista objectivos de guerra psicológica. Os muçulmanos fazem isto constantemente, procurando manipular as receptivas opiniões públicas ocidentais, jogando com os nossos interditos e tabus.
Os exemplos são vastos: usar escudos humanos, fazer explodir crianças, atacar deliberadamente alvos civis, transformar locais de culto, escolas e hospitais em posições de combate, louvar o culto da morte, etc.

Dias depois de Deir Yassin, deu-se um verdadeiro massacre que todavia está dentro do vasto recipiente de amnésia localizada ao dispor dos “apoiantes da causa palestiniana” (ódio a Israel, em português).Uma coluna médica do Hospital de Hadassah, foi atacada e metodicamente executados 77 médicos, enfermeiros e estudantes.
Mas destes não reza a história... eram meros "porcos judeus".

Jenin, o massacre que não houve

2011-08-25T00:27:00.000-07:00

Foto aérea mostrando que apenas alguns prédios do campo de refugiados de Jenin foram destruídos na luta.

Jenin foi um dos 26 campos de refugiados nos territórios da Autoridade Palestina (18 na Judéia/Samaria e 8 na Faixa de Gaza) transformados nos últimos anos em fortalezas do terrorismo palestino. Desde o início da intifada de Al-Aksa, uma das células terroristas mais perigosas dos muçulmanos fanáticos funcionava em Jenin. Não foi por acaso que Jenin tornou-se conhecida como "fábrica do terror". "De todos os combatentes, nós éramos os mais bem preparados", disse o terrorista palestino Omar ao jornal egípcio Al-Ahram pouco após o término da luta em Jenin. "Nosso plano era criar uma armadilha para os soldados israelenses em Jenin, detonando cada um que entrasse no campo de refugiados".

Apesar das acusações contra Israel veiculadas em toda a mídia mundial, em que se chegou a falar de milhares de mortos entre a população civil, logo ficou claro que se tratava apenas de propaganda palestina. Israel evitou bombardear o campo de refugiados justamente para preservar a vida dos civis. Desse modo, os soldados israelenses tiveram que enfrentar uma dificílima luta no solo, o que resultou na morte de 23 deles. Dos 50 palestinos encontrados mortos nas ruínas, 45 estavam uniformizados e armados e apenas 5 eram civis.

Israel está sempre "na mira" da ONU
Muitos jornalistas divulgaram as alegações palestinas sobre centenas de cadáveres enterrados em valas comuns e sob os escombros das casas que teriam sido destruídas indiscriminadamente. O oficial israelense Joni Wolf, que combateu em Jenin, explica: "Os buldozeres eram chamados apenas quando víamos que um prédio estava ocupado por terroristas ou impedia o aceso a alguma posição importante. Além disso, duas vezes por dia havia um cessar-fogo e apelos eram feitos por alto-falantes para que os terroristas se entregassem, o que muitos fizeram. Mesmo depois disso, ainda esperávamos por algum tempo para ver se alguém mais sairia do prédio. Somente depois disso os buldozeres o demoliam".

"Mortos vivos" e "mortos mortos"
Para dar a impressão de que havia um maior número de vítimas em Jenin, os palestinos também encenaram sepultamentos para a mídia ocidental e para as organizações de defesa dos direitos humanos. Por exemplo, o exército israelense divulgou um filme mostrando que um palestino "morto" caiu da padiola em que estava sendo transportado e saiu correndo. Jornalistas israelenses também constataram que funcionários da AP tinham "abastecido" a vala comum dos "massacrados" com cadáveres retirados do cemitério de Jenin. Além disso, os habitantes foram ameaçados para não contarem aos investigadores nada a respeito da realidade da luta e das ações dos terroristas.

No escritório da UNWRA em Jenin um colete à prova de balas da ONU pendurado junto a quadros de "mártires" palestinos

A ONU administra os campos de refugiados
Antes que a ONU possa condenar Israel por um massacre que nunca aconteceu, ela deveria examinar a si mesma, procurando explicar como os campos de refugiados palestinos puderam se transformar em centros de terrorismo. No fogo cruzado das acusações contra Israel, esqueceu-se que os campos são administrados pela UNWRA (Agência de Socorro Para os Refugiados Palestinos), um organismo da ONU responsável pelos refugiados. "Aliás, há muitos anos perdura o escândalo da submissão da ONU à estratégia árabe de manter os campos de refugiados como abrigos temporários", diz o especialista israelense Dr. Shlomo Avineri. Ele explica a razão: "Apenas assim os palestinos e a UNWRA podem exigir a manutenção do status de refugiados. Dessa forma eles também podem continuar insistindo no direito de retorno dos refugiados a Israel". Por isso, a AP de Yasser Arafat nunca investiu no melhoramento da situação nos campos de refugiados, apesar de ter recebido apoio financeiro dos EUA e dos países da União Européia para essa finalidade. "Qualquer tentativa de reabilitação ou melhoramento das condições dos refugiados tem sido rejeitada pelos políticos árabes. Desse modo eles conservam conscientemente a miséria dos palestinos para não enfraquecerem suas exigências com relação a Israel", explica o Dr. Avineri.

12.500 palestinos são funcionários da ONU
O número elevado de palestinos que são funcionários da ONU (4.500 na Judéia/Samaria e 8.000 na Faixa de Gaza) causa estranheza. Os palestinos trabalham nas mais variadas atividades da ONU nos territórios (escolas, serviço social, escritórios) e são pagos por ela. Isso explica porque a ONU não fez nada contra a criação de centros de terrorismo nos campos de refugiados. Em outras palavras: os funcionários da ONU deixaram de observar conscientemente as atividades terroristas e até participaram delas.

A AP de Yasser Arafat nunca investiu na melhora da situação nos campos de refugiados, apesar de ter recebido apoio financeiro dos EUA e dos países da União Européia para essa finalidade.

A ONU sempre mostra compreensão pelo lado palestino, mas não pelo israelense. No mês de março (2002), terroristas palestinos assassinaram 130 israelenses e não se ouviu nenhuma crítica por parte da ONU. Na véspera da páscoa, 28 judeus perderam suas vidas no atentado contra o Hotel Park em Netania. A ONU condenou os palestinos por isso? "O derramamento de sangue de ambos os lados deve ser interrompido", disse, como sempre, o Secretário-Geral Kofi Annan. Mas, o que Israel pode esperar da ONU, se dos seus 189 países-membros 52 são nações muçulmanas e inúmeras outras são alinhadas com elas.

IDF investigation: Egyptians took part in attack near Eilat

2011-08-24T13:43:00.000-07:00

Three of the Islamic terrorists who perpetrated the attack are not Palestinians but Egyptians. And they were aided not only by Bedouin Arabs in the Sinai, but also by Egyptian Army soldiers

The IDF did everything in its power to prevent Egyptian troops from getting hurt in last Thursday's multiple terror attacks near Eilat, inquiries conducted by both the IDF and the Egyptian army showed. The IDF also found that at least three of the terrorists were Egyptian citizens.

Head of the General Staff's Planning Branch Amir Eshel, who traveled to Cairo early this week to present to Egyptian officials the findings of the IDF's initial investigation, even brought photographic evidence to the fact.

Egyptian ignored terrorists at first

Also according to the IDF investigation, the Egyptian troops noticed the presence of the terrorists even before the attack was launched, but did nothing about it. Only later that evening did an officer and a few soldiers leave their post, evidently to stop the ongoing sniper fire. The terrorists, who were wearing uniforms similar to those of the Egyptian army, resisted.

Possibly at this moment, when the troops and the operatives merged together, the Egyptian soldiers were shot. It remains unclear who fired the deadly shots, as the soldiers' bodies have yet to be autopsied by the Egyptian authorities.

Protesters in front of Israeli embassy in Cairo (Photo: AFP)

Israel has photographic evidence that GOC Southern Command Maj.Gen. Tal Russo personally ordered the forces fighting on the ground and in the air to be careful not to hit the Egyptian military post and its soldiers.

Israel was aware of these facts last week, but decided against releasing them in order to avoid embarrassing the Egyptian army and to dodge a media dispute over the versions of the events.

However, the information was submitted to Egypt's Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, which in turn invited an IDF representative, Maj.-Gen. Eshel, to present the findings in Cairo. Some of the findings were published in an Egyptian newspaper on Wednesday.

The Big Pharaoh and the average Egyptian

2011-08-23T11:13:00.000-07:00

-- Mirror? What mirror?

-- Welcome suicide bombers!

Big Pharaoh (hat tip PJMedia) lives up to his reputation for straight shooting in his analysis of an Egyptian website poll showing that 49% of those who voted believe that the Mossad blew up Dahab — twice as many people as any other possibility. He discusses the response of a well educated friend:

“Israeli tourists don’t go to Eilat (a southern Israeli resort) anymore. Dahab and Sinai is much more cheaper and so they come to Egypt instead of spending their holidays in Israel” she explained.

“So you’re telling me Israel targeted a resort that is frequented by its own people and could have killed Israelis just to stop them from sunbathing in Sinai???” I asked.

“Yes. They could kill a few of their citizens to save the tourism industry there” she shot back.

Now this logic is particularly interesting since it concerns purely internal Israeli financial calculations. By this logic, Egyptians do not even figure in the calculus, it’s all about Israeli economic interests.

As students of conspiracy theory regularly point out, the way that people imagine the conspirators represents a projection that tells you about the way they think. Here a member of the Egyptian elite (on top of the prime divider) contemplates a government strategy that, for a minor economic advantage, kills a couple of dozen people (including “their own”) without a second thought. That’s not Islamic fanaticism, that’s classic aristocratic contempt for the rest of mankind.

Moreover, the sheer casualness of the analysis — of course Israelis would kill a few of their own civilians for an uptick in the Eilat tourist trade — gives a stark insight into one half of the Moebius strip of cognitive egocentrism. The Israelis are capable of any disgusting deed, including knocking off their own people for temporary economic gain to the owning class. Never mind that they will sacrifice their own soldiers’ lives to avoid casualties to the enemy’s civilians. No wonder Jenin must be a “massacre.” If it were seen for what it was, how could people go on with this kind of analysis. No wonder there can’t be peace between these people, when one side cannot begin to imagine what’s going on on the other side — and the two sides are not! the same.

I wanted to bang my head against a wall!

I have said countless times before that the root cause of the darkness we’re living in is our unwillingness to look in the mirror and start criticizing ourselves and the cult of death we allowed to infect our society. We don’t want to admit that many of our children are willing to kill themselves in order to massacre others. We don’t want to admit that religion needs renewal and reform to suit the year 2006 and not 1006. We don’t want to admit anything of that. Do you know why ladies and gentlemen we don’t want to do that? We’re just busy and in a constant state of denial. We’re busy hating America. We’re busy blaming Israel.

We are also living in a disgusting state of narcissism. We think we are the best nation handpicked by God. Our nations have the best religion approved by heaven. Nothing wrong can be in us, nothing wrong can be in our culture, and nothing wrong can be in our religious beliefs. It must be the evil “outsiders.”

This is a good example of “chosenness as privilege” rather than as “responsibility.” It gives an excellent view of the “normative” view of chosenness that historically has informed both Muslim and Christian supersessionist thinking — we are the new chosen people who replace the old (for Christians, Jews; for Muslims, Jews and Christians). When one then projects that envious and imperialist notion of chosenness back onto the Jews, one gets the widespread dislike of Jews for being so arrogant as to think of themselves as the chosen people.

There is no doubt whatsoever that all Egyptians condemned this terrorist attack and were shocked when it happened. Yet I am not really talking about this specific attack. I am referring to our general condition that gave birth to murderers from Bali to New York. Many are to blame here. Our repressive governments, the economic disaster they created, the humiliation millions of youth are feeling, and above all the deadly religious rhetoric that wants to draw us hundreds of years backward.

Allow me to add to your list, a media (both Arab and Western) so eager to believe the worst about the Israelis, so ready to forgive any excess from the Palestinians (chosen people of the left), that when the bombings first started many people — even good-hearted people — they found it relatively easy to say, “what choice do they have?” So in addition to your own cultural problems, Big Pharaoh, you have a supposedly enlightened West eagerly (if unconsciously) feeding your people’s own worst instincts. It’s hard to fight that.

I thought we’ll finally start looking in the mirror once we ourselves get bombed by terrorists. I thought that once we get torn into pieces by suicide bombers we’ll realize that the Palestinian suicide bomber will not end up in paradise but in the lowest pit of hell. Unfortunately, I was wrong. We’re still so busy to look in the mirror and see the ugly face there.

One could restate this in terms of a European lament: “Once the suicide terrorism has hit us, then we’ll rethink our championing of the Palestinians.” But Madrid and London, like 9-11, had mixed results. Many rushed to appease and self-criticize (really to blame the West), and only some people began to rethink the situation rather than to continue to slide into moral disorientation. Apparently there are too many psychological factors lying behind the demonization of Israel and the “chosenness” of the Palestinians for a mere suicide bombing or two of one’s own people to cause such a massive paradigm shift.

My condolences to you, your people, and your painful predicament, and my apologies for the unconscionable ways in which my culture’s supposed progressives contribute so irresponsibly to all our suffering, yours, ours, the Muslims who must live through this wave of fascist theocracy, and, perhaps in first place, the suffering of the Palestinian people.

Uh-Oh, A Foretaste of The New Democratic Egypt: Radical Nationalists and “Liberal Islamists”

2011-08-21T16:24:00.000-07:00

by Barry Rubin

young child, posed by his father, stands amidst the crowds [Tahrir Square, Egypt] wearing a mock suicide vest and holding a mock 'katyusha' rocket

There is still confusion regarding some details of the terrorist assault by Gaza Palestinians affiliated with al-Qaida, from Egypt, into Israel, and then back into Egypt. Israeli survivors of the attack say the terrorists were wearing Egyptian army uniforms.

At one point, either confused or after the terrorists hid among a group of Egyptian soldiers dressed the same way, Israeli soldiers fired and reportedly killed three real Egyptian soldiers. Israel has apologized in line with international norms.

Amr Moussa, the man most likely to be Egypt’s next president and known for his hatred of Israel and strong dislike of the United States (a radical nationalist who opposes Islamism but might make a deal with the Brotherhood to get into power and to govern thereafter) gives a foretaste of his demagagic tendencies if elected. He tweeted:

“Israel has to realize that the days in which our sons are killed without an appropriate and strong reaction are forever gone.”

That sounds rather like a threat of war. Oh, he’ll be just fine running Egypt, right? For the record, let’s note that Egypt failed to guard its border, the shortcoming that made the whole shoot-out happen in the first place. Presumably Egypt won’t be apologizing to Israel. In fact, it has withdrawn its ambassador.

(A personal note. A couple of year ago, an Egyptian diplomat invited me to lunch in Tel Aviv. One of the things he said was that he had advised Israeli Arab citizens to reverse their policy of refusing to join Israel’ army. Then, he explained, they could get military training and have guns to use against Israel some day. They rejected the idea, he concluded. I’m not joking. That’s the way people really talk in the Middle East when they think it isn’t going to be reported. I should add that I never agreed on any confidentiality in that conversation.)

Nor will anyone in Egypt–not a single group, writer, or intellectual–publicly condemn the attack on Israel even though it was carried out by an al-Qaida affiliate that also wants an Islamist revolution in Egypt. Of course, the Egyptian military is attacking local al-Qaida revolutionaries within the country. But we are back to the pre-Sadat standard: Anything that kills Israelis is good.

What will happen when Hamas attacks Israel with rockets, mortars, and attempted cross-border attacks? Israel retaliates. President Moussa will again threaten war and while he probably would not go so far (“probably” does not make one feel secure), he would suspend the Egypt-Israel peace treaty or suspend the Israeli ambassador. Wouldn’t that make him a hero? And certainly Egypt would let money, Egyptian volunteers, and weapons flow freely into the Gaza Strip to help the “brothers” there confront “Zionist aggression.” The Arab world would cheer.

Here’s a good summary to remember this change: Hamas is to Egypt as to Hizballah is to Syria, a client and proxy terrorist group with which to hit Israel while avoiding direct confrontation. There are unconfirmed reports that Iran is cutting back on funding for Hamas–since Hamas wants Iran’s ally, the Syrian regime, to be overthrown. If that story is true, Egypt will be all the more important as Hamas’s new patron.

And what would President Obama do? One shudders to think but it might have something to do with playing golf.

Perhaps, though, Moussa won’t be president. Perhaps someone else will win the election. Either way, though, the president will have to deal with a strengthened parliament that will be around 40 percent radical Islamist, 10 percent far left, and much of the rest radical nationalist.

The New York Times has offered us, however, a definitional solution to the problem by creating a new political ideology. And I predict that we will be hearing a great deal about this new “movement” : the “liberal Islamist.”

“Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh, a liberal Islamist and former member of the Muslim Brotherhood, released a statement asking the ruling military council to deal with the incident as a matter of national security and demanded the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador as well as a halt of Egyptian gas shipments to Israel.”

Actually, though, Fotouh’s political role is not quite clear. He poses as a centrist nice guy who has split away from the Brotherhood. I rather suspect he is still a Brotherhood leader under cover. The Brotherhood promised not to run a candidate for president and Fotouh’s “split” give it a plausible deniability. But after all won’t the Brotherhood leaders and supporters be voting for Fotouh and reconcile with him immediately thereafter? Is there any real difference between Fotouh and the Brotherhood on substantive issues? Presumably “moderation” means going a bit slower in transforming Egypt into an Islamist state.

Of course Amr Moussa is more a representative of the old Egypt than anyone else in Egyptian politics today. But he is popular and demagoguery will make him more popular. Of course there are genuinely moderate people and parties that want to improve living standards, clean up corruption, and do other good things. The problem is, however, who will end up being in power.

If Amr Moussa is elected and the Brotherhood becomes the single biggest party in parliament we could well say “The revolution has been betrayed.” That would not be the first time in history that has happened. Others would say “The revolution has been fulfilled.” This is precisely what happened in Iran. Every day I hear from friends in Egypt how frightened or angry or upset or worried they are. I hope things will turn out well; as an analyst I must report what I see.

Incientally, even for a Middle East cynic like me the outpouring of Arab media support for the attack on Israel is surprising. After all, it is an al-Qaida operation and it would have been easy to pretend moderation, winning some brownie points in the West, by going tsk-tsk at the evil al-Qaida as opposed to the “wonderful” Hamas and Fatah.

Nope, even the official Palestinian Authority newspaper–rather than lay low to promote a nice image on the eve of the UN independence debate–praised the attack and cold-blooded murder of Israeli civilians. Presumably they don’t feel any need to pretend to be moderate since they know much of the Western media, academics, and even governments will give them a free pass no matter what they do or say.

Incidentally, NowLebanon, an excellent moderate source of news, estimates that almost 20,000 people have been killed in the “Arab Spring” (or as the Washington Post calls it, “Arab Transition,” disorders, mostly in Libya. The “Arab Spring” is not being followed by an Arab Summer, and next to come is the fall.