This article was sent to Debbie Ducro, an American-Jewish journalist with the Kansas City Jewish Chronicle. She published it, and was fired the next day.
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I am a Jew. I was a participant in the Rally for the Right of Return to Palestine. It was the right thing to do.
I've heard about the European holocaust against the Jews since I was a small child. I've visited the memorials in Washington, DC and Jerusalem dedicated to Jewish lives lost and I've cried at the recognition to what level of atrocity mankind is capable of sinking. Where are the Jews of conscience? No righteous malice can be held against the survivors of Hitler's holocaust. These fragments of humanity were in no position to make choices beyond that of personal survival. We must not forget that being a survivor or a co-religionist of the victims of the European Holocaust does not grant dispensation from abiding by the rules of humanity.
"Never again" as a motto, rings hollow when it means "never again to us alone." My generation was raised being led to believe that the biblical land was a vast desert inhabited by a handful of impoverished Palestinians living with their camels and eking out a living in the sand. The arrival of the Jews was touted as a tremendous benefit to these desert dwellers. Golda Meir even assured us that there "is no Palestinian problem".
We know now this picture wasn't as it was painted. Palestine was a land filled with people who called it home. There were thriving towns and villages, schools and hospitals. There were Jews, Christians and Muslims.
In fact, prior to the occupation, Jews represented a mere seven per cent of the population and owned three per cent of the land.
Taking the blinders off for a moment, I see a second atrocity perpetuated by the very people who should be exquisitely sensitive to the suffering of others. These people knew what it felt like to be ordered out of your home at gun point and forced to march into the night to unknown destinations or face execution on the spot. The people who displaced the Palestinians knew first hand what it means to watch your home in flames, to surrender everything dear to your heart at a moment's notice. Bulldozers levelled hundreds of villages, along with the remains of the village inhabitants, the old and the young. This was nothing new to the world.
Poland is a vast graveyard of the Jews of Europe. Israel is the final resting place of the massacred Palestinian people. A short distance from the memorial to the Jewish children lost to the holocaust in Europe there is a levelled parking lot. Under this parking lot is what's left of a once flourishing village and the bodies of men, women and children whose only crime was taking up needed space and not leaving graciously. This particular burial marker reads: "Public Parking".
I've talked with Palestinians. I have yet to meet a Palestinian who hasn't lost a member of their family to the Israeli Shoah, nor a Palestinian who cannot name a relative or friend languishing under inhumane conditions in an Israeli prison. Time and time again, Israel is cited for human rights violations to no avail. On a recent trip to Israel, I visited the refugee camps inhabited by a people who have waited 52 years in these 'temporary' camps to go home. Every Palestinian grandparent can tell you the name of their village, their street, and where the olive trees were planted. Their grandchildren may never have been home, but they can tell you where their great-grandfather lies buried and where the village well stood. The press has fostered the portrait of the Palestinian terrorist. But the victims who rose up against human indignity in the Warsaw Ghetto are called heroes. Those who lost their lives are called martyrs. The Palestinian who tosses a rock in desperation is a terrorist.
Two years ago I drove through Palestine and watched intricate sprinkler systems watering lush green lawns of Zionist settlers in their new condominium complexes, surrounded by armed guards and barbed wire in the midst of a Palestinian community where there was not adequate water to drink and the surrounding fields were sandy and dry. University professor Moshe Zimmerman reported in the Jerusalem Post (30 April, 1995), "The [Jewish] children of Hebron are just like Hitler's youth."
We Jews are suing for restitution, lost wages, compensation for homes, land, slave labour and back wages in Europe. Am I a traitor of a Jew for supporting the right of return of the Palestinian refugees to their birthplace and compensation for what was taken that cannot be returned?
The Jewish dead cannot be brought back to life and neither can the Palestinian massacred be resurrected. David Ben Gurion said, "Let us not ignore the truth among ourselves...politically, we are the aggressors and they defend themselves...The country is theirs, because they inhabit it, whereas we want to come here and settle down, and in their view we want to take away from them their country...".
Palestine is a land that has been occupied and emptied of its people. Its cultural and physical landmarks have been obliterated and replaced by tidy Hebrew signs. The history of a people was the first thing eradicated by the occupiers. The history of the indigenous people has been all but eradicated as though they never existed. And all this has been hailed by the world as a miraculous act of God. We must recognise that Israel's existence is not even a question of legality so much as it is an illegal fait accompli realised through the use of force while supported by the Western powers. The UN missions directed at Israel in attempting to correct its violations of have thus far been futile.
In Hertzl's 'The Jewish State' the father of Zionism said: "We must investigate and take possession of the new Jewish country by means of every modern expedient." I guess I agree with Ehud Barak (3 June 1998) when he said, "If I were a Palestinian, I'd also join a terror group." I'd go a step further perhaps. Rather than throwing little stones in desperation, I'd hurtle a boulder.
Hopefully, somewhere deep inside, every Jew of conscience knows that this was no war; that this was not G-d's restitution of the holy land to it's rightful owners. We know that a human atrocity was and continues to be perpetuated against an innocent people who couldn't come up with the arms and money to defend themselves against the western powers bent upon their demise as a people.
We cannot continue to say, "But what were we to do?" Zionism is not synonymous with Judaism. I wholly support the rally of the right of return of the Palestinian people. here.
Jewish Editor sacked for publishing article.
secebis sajak ..
assalamualaikum...
disini penulis ingin berkongsi sajak yang dikarang oleh psychedelic mundo yang ketika ini sedang melanjutkan pelajaran di jordan.. teruskan perjuangan mu di bumi anbiya' sahabat!
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Buat sahabat-sahabat jauh dan dekat
Jangan kau fikir ini sahaja dunia mu
Berpaling arah membuka lembar
Sambil terkepit Goald Coast di hujung bibir
Atau Nusantara hijaumu ditepi mulut
Berpusing kepala mencari makna
Tersangkut tekak ditinggal kekasih
Jangan,jangan kau ingat ini sahaja duniamu
Legakan dengan secangkir kopi atau teh
Melabonlah sampai tingggi mentari asal jgn kau sedih
Biar dunia tahu kau bukan bangsat mencuri harta
Rakyat tak berdosa satu apa pon jangan kau seksa
Kerna bumi ini Tuhan cipta bukan untuk menyebar noda
Di hasut syaitan tertegak batang dan tanduknya
Nafsu dan serakah menjadi tuhan manusia gila
Biarkan setan dengan kerjanya
Sekupang dua kunun ditadah sangat di bumi tua ini
Haram mengenang nasib orang di bawah
Menganggok sahaja walau betol-betol tuannya salah
Jangan kau ingat ini sahaja duniamu
Kelak tiba masa kau merayu membabi buta
Pekong ditelanjang di khalayak mata
Mampus dikejar rasa malu dan berdosa
Jangan kau ingat ini sahaja dunia mu
Tonggang lah air apa pun yang kau suka
Mabuklah dengan apa cara pun yang ko suka
Tugas mu bukan mencari seluar dan baju mu sahaja
Ramai lagi yang bogel hidop derita
Entah bila nasibnya akan dibela
Ini kerja kau kawan,kerja ku jua
Maaf buat mu kasih
Aku pergi jauh dari mu
Bukan mencari betina bogel buat pelepas nafsuku
Bukan mencari kencing syaitan hingga kembung perutku
Bukan mencari seluar baju buat membalut tubuh telanjangku
Bukan,bukan itu sahaja duniaku
Mencari erti hidop walau digamit rindu
Teman dan taulan jangan kau lupa perjuangan mu
Suatu hari aku pulang aku datang mencari mu
R.A.D.H.A a.k.a RELEVANKAH AUKU DI HATI ANDA?
Assalamualaikum...dan salam perjuangan..
Insan anti-AUkUisme,
Ibn Qadir
Assamualaikum w.b.t diucapkan kepada semua, salam tinta dari seorang penulis mentah yang sedang meniti tikar kehidupan. Sebagai seorang penuntut, saya tidak dapat menolak soalan soalan yang bangkit di minda. Ini disebabkan oleh senario yang berlaku di sekeliling saya sendiri. Apa yang berlaku saban hari, membuatkan saya berfikir dan terus berfikir. Sebut sahaja tentang AUKU, tiada lain yang dapat saya fikirkan selain kesannya terhadap belia terutama pelajar universiti selaku penyambung warisan negara. Tidak dapat dinafikan, ramai lagi penuntut di luar
Situasi 1: (keliru)
Saya: Kebanyakannya golongan educated lebih banyak berfikir
Mangsa 1: Aah…memang pun…
Saya: Untunglah diorang yang belajar jurusan undang- undang. Lagi banyak tau pasal constitution..and diorang patutnya lagi bijaklah decide mana baik mana buruk
Mangsa 1: Itulah..memang banyak yang kitorang belajar…( dengan nada bosan)
Saya: Seronoknya…celik hati..celik minda..habis, awak pelajar undang-undang tapi still pangkah pihak yang tidak sepatutnya? Camne tu?
Mangsa 1: Memangla aku belajar…tapi malaslah aku nak fikir…ni assignment banyak lagi..takyahla fikir..bukan tanggungjawab kita pun..
Saya: ( terdiam sambil ternganga)
Komen penulis: Malas nak berfikir? Bukan tanggungjawab kita? Inilah kesannya apabila hanya golongan veteran sahaja yang dibenarkan berfikir dan melibatkan diri dengan politik…
Situasi 2: (takut tak tentu pasal)
Saya: pernah dengar AUKU tak?
Mangsa 2: apa benda tu? Pelik je…
Saya: akta universiti dan kolej universiti…
Mangsa 2: owh…untuk apa?
Saya: sekat kebebasan pelajar universiti dan macam-macam lagi…
Mangsa 2: aku taknak fikir..yang aku tau time election, aku pangkah je..
Saya: kenapa camtu?
Mangsa 2: aku bukannya apa…aku ‘takut orang cina jadi pemerintah and melayu dipinggirkan’…
Saya: (terdiam tak percaya)
Komen penulis: jelaslah, fikiran mahasiswa dan mahasiswi sudah digodam oleh AUKU. Dengan adanya AUKU, graduan graduan yang membawa perkataan ‘takut’ kemana mana sahaja akan lahir…
Akhir kata, apa tujuan menuntut ilmu itu jika tidak digunakan sebaiknya? Apa gunanya mengadap buku berjam jam tetapi berfikir tentang ini barang seminit dua pun tidak mahu? Buka minda anda para penuntut, kamu bukan alat mainan kawalan jauh yang menggunakan bateri…bila diperlukan, dipasang baterinya..bila tidak mahu,di cabut pula bateri itu..
p/s: maaf di atas penggunaan bahasa rojak di dalam perbualan dan terima kasih kepada Ibn Qadr kerana banyak memberikan input kepada saya
wassalam, Ummi Umairah
Jebat Pahlawan Rakyat
Taming sarinya memutuskan adat larangan
