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Afghan flag flown over Marjah |
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The Afghan flag has been flown over the Helmand city of Marjah. The event today is to signify the capture of the area from Taliban control. The Taliban resistance has faded away from direct combat, a characteristic of guerilla warfare. However newly planted improvised explosive devices were uncovered showing that the Taliban are very much still present.
Attending the flag-raising ceremony was Mohammad Gulab Mangal, the governor of Helmand province, and Brigadier General Larry Nicholson, who heads the US marines in southern Afghanistan. |
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Israeli mother Addresses European Parliament |
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Dear Friends,
Dr. Nurit Peled-Elhanan is the mother of Smadar Elhanan, 13 years old
when killed by a suicide bomber in Jerusalem in September 1997. Below
is Nurit's speech made on International Women's Day in Strasbourg
earlier this month. Please listen to the words of a bereaved mother,
whose daughter fell victim to a vicious, indiscriminating terrorist
attack. I wish her words will enter the hearts of all peace seekers in
our troubled and divided world.
For better days,
Professor Avraham Oz
Department of Hebrew and Comparative Literature
University of Haifa
avitaloz @ research.haifa.ac.il
WOMEN
by Nurit Peled-Elhanan
Thank you for inviting me to this today. It is always an honour and a
pleasure to be here, among you (at the European Parliament).
However, I must admit I believe you should have invited a Palestinian
woman at my stead, because the women who suffer most from violence in
my county are the Palestinian women. And I would like to dedicate my
speech to Miriam R`aban and her husband Kamal, from Bet Lahiya in the
Gaza strip, whose five small children were killed by Israeli soldiers
while picking strawberries at the family`s strawberry field. No one
will ever stand trial for this murder.
When I asked the people who invited me here why didn't they invite a
Palestinian woman, the answer was that it would make the discussion
too localized.
I don't know what is non-localized violence. Racism and discrimination
may be theoretical concepts and universal phenomena but their impact
is always local, and real. Pain is local, humiliation, sexual abuse,
torture and death, are all very local, and so are the scars.
It is true, unfortunately, that the local violence inflicted on
Palestinian women by the government of Israel and the Israeli army,
has expanded around the globe, In fact, state violence and army
violence, individual and collective violence, are the lot of Muslim
women today, not only in Palestine but wherever the enlightened
western world is setting its big imperialistic foot. It is violence
which is hardly ever addressed and which is halfheartedly condoned by
most people in Europe and in the USA .
This is because the so-called free world is afraid of the Muslim womb.
Great France of "la liberte égalite et la fraternite" is scared of
little girls with head scarves. Great Jewish Israel is afraid of the
Muslim womb which its ministers call a demographic threat.
Almighty America and Great Britain are infecting their respective
citizens with blind fear of the Muslims, who are depicted as vile,
primitive and blood-thirsty, apart from their being non-democratic,
chauvinistic and mass producers of future terrorists. This in spite of
the fact that the people who are destroying the world today are not
Muslim. One of them is a devout Christian, one is Anglican and one is
a non-devout Jew.
I have never experienced the suffering Palestinian women undergo every
day, every hour, I don't know the kind of violence that turns a
woman's life into constant hell. This daily physical and mental
torture of women who are deprived of their basic human rights and
needs of privacy and dignity, women whose homes are broken into at any
moment of day and night, who are ordered at a gun-point to strip naked
in front of strangers and their own children, whose houses are
demolished , who are deprived of their livelihood and of any normal
family life. This is not part of my personal ordeal.
But I am a victim of violence against women insofar as violence
against children is actually violence against mothers. Palestinian,
Iraqi, Afghan women are my sisters because we are all at the grip of
the same unscrupulous criminals who call themselves leaders of the
free enlightened world and in the name of this freedom and
enlightenment rob us of our children.
Furthermore, Israeli, American, Italian and British mothers have been
for the most part violently blinded and brainwashed to such a degree
that they cannot realize their only sisters, their only allies in the
world are the Muslim Palestinian, Iraqi or Afghani mothers, whose
children are killed by our children or who blow themselves to pieces
with our sons and daughters. They are all mind-infected by the same
viruses engendered by politicians. And the viruses , though they may
have various illustrious names--such as Democracy, Patriotism, God,
Homeland--are all the same. They are all part of false and fake
ideologies that are meant to enrich the rich and to empower the powerful.
We are all the victims of mental, psychological and cultural violence
that turn us to one homogenic group of bereaved or potentially
bereaved mothers. Western mothers who are taught to believe their
uterus is a national asset just like they are taught to believe that
the Muslim uterus is an international threat. They are educated not to
cry out: `I gave him birth, I breast fed him, he is mine, and I will
not let him be the one whose life is cheaper than oil, whose future is
less worth than a piece of land.`
All of us are terrorized by mind-infecting education to believe all we
can do is either pray for our sons to come back home or be proud of
their dead bodies.
And all of us were brought up to bear all this silently, to contain
our fear and frustration, to take Prozac for anxiety, but never hail
Mama Courage in public. Never be real Jewish or Italian or Irish mothers.
I am a victim of state violence. My natural and civil rights as a
mother have been violated and are violated because I have to fear the
day my son would reach his 18th birthday and be taken away from me to
be the game tool of criminals such as Sharon, Bush, Blair and their
clan of blood-thirsty, oil-thirsty, land thirsty generals.
Living in the world I live in, in the state I live in, in the regime I
live in, I don't dare to offer Muslim women any ideas how to change
their lives. I don't want them to take off their scarves, or educate
their children differently, and I will not urge them to constitute
Democracies in the image of Western democracies that despise them and
their kind. I just want to ask them humbly to be my sisters, to
express my admiration for their perseverance and for their courage to
carry on, to have children and to maintain a dignified family life in
spite of the impossible conditions my world in putting them in. I want
to tell them we are all bonded by the same pain, we all the victims of
the same sort of violence even though they suffer much more, for they
are the ones who are mistreated by my government and its army,
sponsored by my taxes.
Islam in itself, like Judaism in itself and Christianity in itself, is
not a threat to me or to anyone. American imperialism is, European
indifference and co-operation is and Israeli racism and its cruel
regime of occupation is. It is racism, educational propaganda and
inculcated xenophobia that convince Israeli soldiers to order
Palestinian women at gun-point, to strip in front of their children
for security reasons, it is the deepest disrespect for the other that
allow American soldiers to rape Iraqi women, that give license to
Israeli jailers to keep young women in inhuman conditions, without
necessary hygienic aids, without electricity in the winter, without
clean water or clean mattresses and to separate them from their
breast-fed babies and toddlers. To bar their way to hospitals, to
block their way to education, to confiscate their lands, to uproot
their trees and prevent them from cultivating their fields.
I cannot completely understand Palestinian women or their suffering. I
don't know how I would have survived such humiliation, such disrespect
from the whole world. All I know is that the voice of mothers has been
suffocated for too long in this war-stricken planet. Mothers` cry is
not heard because mothers are not invited to international forums such
as this one. This I know and it is very little. But it is enough for
me to remember these women are my sisters, and that they deserve that
I should cry for them, and fight for them. And when they lose their
children in strawberry fields or on filthy roads by the checkpoints,
when their children are shot on their way to school by Israeli
children who were educated to believe that love and compassion are
race and religion dependent, the only thing I can do is stand by them
and their betrayed babies, and ask what Anna Akhmatova--another mother
who lived in a regime of violence against women and children--asked:
Why does that streak o blood, rip the petal of your cheek?
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Suiss Antagonist of minaret embraces Islam |
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The news about Switzerland's ban on the construction of minarets has made the headlines, providing shocking evidence of the strength of increasing intolerance in Europe. I shall be writing more about the minaret ban and its implications later, God willing, but right now I wanted to share an interesting side note.
Daniel Streich was a member of the Swiss People's party (SVP), the political party that pushed the minaret ban initiative.
Streich is a military instructor in the Swiss Army and a local politician in the commune of Bulle. Formerly a devout Christian, he converted to Islam??"and kept it a secret for two years.
Streich has left the SVP, made his conversion to Islam public, and has denounced the SVP's anti-Muslim campaign as a witch hunt. As far as I can tell, this story has not broken in the English language press. So, I translated a news article on Streich from German to English, published at the Swiss news site Twenty Minutes Online. Here it is:
Daniel Streich, military instructor and, until recently, a Swiss People's Party (SVP) politician in the city of Bulle, has left the party.
The reason: He converted to Islam. For two years he kept this secret from his ex-party. Now, with the "witch hunt against Islam," this situation has become unbearable for him.
He was a true SVPer and Christian. He read the Bible and regularly went to church. Now Daniel Streich, military instructor and community council member, reads the Qur'an, prays five times a day and goes to a mosque. "Islam offers me logical answers to important life questions, which, in the end, I never found in Christianity," says Streich.
Because he could no longer stand the "SVP's witch hunt against Islam" Streich left the part two weeks ago (around November 10, 2009) and has made his conversion to Islam become publicly known two years after his conversion. Now he's participating in the building of the new Civil Conservative Democratic Party in the canton of Freiburg. The former churchgoer is vehemently against the minaret initiative: "If the initiative passes, it will be an absolute deep blow for me. I would have to ask myself, why I applied myself professionally and politically for over 30 years for this political system." In contrast, Switzerland urgently needs more mosques. "It is not worthy of Switzerland to force Muslims to practice their faith in back alleys."
Reactions in the SVP were mixed. "Everyone can believe what he wants to," says General Secretary Martin Baltisser. SVP-National Council member Alfred Heer had a less friendly reaction. Politcal scientist Georg Lutz: "The SVP and Islam stand closer to each other than people suppose. Both advance a conservative worldview."
With all due respect, I disagree with Lutz' position. Muslims tend to have political attitudes that are similar to the social teaching of the Catholic Church: "progressive" on economic, environmental, and foreign policy issues, while being "conservative" on sexual ethics. But, a more accurate approach would be to say that Catholics and Muslims frequently do not fit within the stereotypical left/right divide.
If anything, I would say that both Catholicism and Islam are more to the Left. The Right emphasizes particularity (whether the micro-particularity of capitalist individualism or the macro-particularity of nationalism). The Left, on the other hand, tends to stress universality. A balanced political position will address both universality (we're all members of the same species living on the same planet) and particularity (we are shaped and live in particular communities that have their own traditions, political needs, and strengths and weaknesses). How one falls on the left/right spectrum (assuming such a spectrum exists) would be a function of his or her relative stress on universality vs particularity. Since both Catholicism and Islam (along with other great world religions) say that what unites human beings is more important than what divides them, their fundamental tendency is somewhat to the Left (IMHO).
Anyway, there's a sidebar item about an SVP politician trying to frame Streich's conversion as a national security risk, implying that all Muslims in Western militaries are like the lone nut gunman at Fort Hood. (Ironically, in doing so he confirms Streich's allegation that the SVP's minaret ban is a "witch hunt" against Muslims). Here's the piece:
Alfred Heer: Anxiety over the convert Daniel Streich?
Because Daniel Streich converted to Islam when he was an active professional member of the armed forces leads certain politicians to think: "That could be a security risk for the country. We've just seen what happened in the USA," says SVP-National Council member Alfred Heer, referring to the shooting spree of a Muslim military psychiatrist at Fort Hood. Army spokesperson Christopher Brunner responded, "That is an absurd accusation." The Swiss military is neutral on religious affiliations. Brunner: "it is totally irrelevant which religions our personnel belong to." Performance, not belief, is what matters.
Whether Switzerland remains true to its democratic heritage, or follows the paranoia that feeds the extremism that devastated Europe in the 30's and 40's, depends on whether its citizens, in the long run, will think like Brunner or Heer. As for myself, I hope that some day I can see the Swiss Alps again without being harassed for my Islamic faith. Man denkt, Gott lenkt.
Jason Hamza van Boom |
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Dad .. what's a terrorist? |
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by David Campbell
Surely even a child can understand the difference between good and evil.
Dad ... what's a terrorist?
Well, according to the Oxford dictionary a terrorist is "a person who uses violence
and intimidation in the pursuit of political aims". Which means that terrorists are
very bad men and women who frighten ordinary people like us, and sometimes even kill
them.
Why do they kill them?
Because they hate them or their country. It's hard to explain ... it's just the way
things are. For many different reasons a lot of people in our world are full of
hate.
Like the ones in Iraq who are capturing people and saying that they'll kill them if
all the soldiers don't leave?
Exactly! That's an evil thing called "blackmail". Those innocent people are
hostages, and the terrorists are saying that if governments don't do what they want
the hostages will be killed.
So was it blackmail when we said we'd attack Iraq and kill innocent people unless
they told us where all their weapons were?
No! Well ... yes, I suppose. In a way. But that was an "ultimatum" ... call it "good
blackmail.
Good blackmail? What's that?
That's when it's done for good reasons. Those weapons were very dangerous and could
have hurt a lot of people all over the world. It was very important to find them and
destroy them.
But Dad ... there weren't any weapons.
True. We know that now. But we didn't at the time. We thought there were.
So was killing all those innocent people in Iraq a mistake?
No. It was a tragedy, but we also saved a lot of lives. You see, we had to stop a
very cruel man called Saddam Hussein from killing a great many ordinary Iraqi
people. Saddam Hussein stayed in power by giving orders that meant thousands of
people died or were horribly injured. Mothers and fathers. Even children.
Like that boy I saw on TV? The one who had his arms blown off by a bomb?
Yes ... just like him.
But we did that. Does that mean our leaders are terrorists?
Good heavens, no! Whatever gave you that idea? That was just an accident.
Unfortunately, innocent people get hurt in a war. You can't expect anything else
when you drop bombs on cities. Nobody wants it to happen ... it's just the way
things are.
So in a war only soldiers are supposed to get killed?
Well, soldiers are trained to fight for their country. It's their job, and they're
very brave. They know that war is dangerous and that they might be killed. As soon
as they put on a uniform they become a target.
What uniforms do terrorists wear?
That's just the problem ... they don't! We can't tell them apart from the civilians.
We don't know who we're fighting. And that's why so many innocent people are getting
killed ... the terrorists don't follow the rules of war.
War has rules?
Oh, yes. Soldiers must wear uniforms. And you can't just suddenly attack someone
unless they do something to you first. Then you can defend yourself.
So that's why we attacked Iraq? Because Iraq attacked us first and we were just
defending ourselves?
Not exactly. Iraq didn't attack us ... but it might have. We decided to get in
first. Just in case Iraq used those weapons we were talking about.
The ones they didn't have? So we broke the rules of war?
Technically speaking, yes. But ...
So if we broke the rules first, why isn't it OK for those people in Iraq who aren't
wearing uniforms to break the rules?
Well, that's different. We were doing the right thing when we broke the rules.
But Dad ... how do we know we were doing the right thing?
Our leaders ... Bush and Blair and Howard ... they told us it was the right thing.
And if they don't know, who does? They say that something had to be done to make
Iraq a better place.
Is it a better place?
I suppose so, but I don't know for sure. Innocent people are still being killed and
these kidnappings are terrible things. I feel very sorry for the families of those
poor hostages, but we simply can't give in to terrorists. We must stand firm.
Would you say that if I was captured by terrorists?
Uh ... yes ... no ... I mean, it's very difficult ...
So you'd let me be killed? Don't you love me?
Of course! I love you very much. It's just that it's a very complicated issue and I
don't know what I'd do ...
Well, if somebody attacked us and bombed our house and killed you and Mum and Jamie
I know what I'd do.
What?
I'd find out who did it and kill them. Any way I could. I'd hate them for ever and
ever. And then I'd get in a plane and bomb their cities.
But ... but ... you'd kill a lot of innocent people.
I know. But it's war, Dad. And that's just the way things are. Remember?
David Campbell is a Melbourne writer. |
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Cii / Unity FM launches Hajj 1430 programme |
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By: Nina Sambo
Channel Islam International’s Hajj broadcast team arrived in Jeddah today. The 4 hujjaj, Inayat Wadee, Ebrahim Moosa, Ahmed Moolla and Mohammed Lambat traveled on Interlink Airlines via Maputo and landed safely at the King Abdul Aziz Airport in Jeddah this morning. In Maputo they were joined by 95 eager hujjaj who were sent off by hundreds of local people. “It was an amazing experience to witness the scene in Mozambique,” said Inayet Wadee. “It was good to see people from around Southern Africa going to perform the Hajj.”
Cii has also set up a Hajj nerve centre at their offices in Johannesburg. The team will document the experience of their colleagues in the holy lands. Live reports, accompanied by statistics, analysis and interactive interviews will form just part of the programming that will run 24 hours during the actual days of Hajj.
The exclusive broadcast is also set to be the first on the South African FM frequency via Unity FM on 98.9 FM in Gauteng and 103 FM in Durban. The team in Saudi has described the weather in the Kingdom as stifling. Inayet Wadee said, “It is very hot and humid as usual. We will be staying in Madinah for 3 days and will then move on to Makkah.” According to Wadee one of the biggest talking points so far at this year’s Hajj is the H1N1 virus. “There were scanners, doctors and people in masks at the airport,” he added.
The central theme of this year’s broadcast is entitled: In the Foosteps of Ebrahim (AS). Cii Crossroads presenter, Ebrahim Moosa, will this year lead listeners through the Hajj, detailing the experiences of Ebrahim (AS). He said the flight on Interlink was pleasant. “People on board were reciting the labaik and performed salaah at the relevant times.”
Moosa added that he will be telling the stories of ordinary people during this year’s pilgrimage as well as focusing on the health of pilgrims and how they manage to cope during the strenuous activities.
“During the flight yesterday, one passenger experienced a slight heart attack but he is up and moving again and will be continuing his Hajj and did not allow this condition to dishearten him,” said Moosa. So for more exciting news views and reviews on hajj 1420 listen to Cii and Unity FM. or follow us online via facebook and twitter.com/channelislam. |
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An Open letter to Mr. Jacob Zuma, President of South Africa |
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By Dr. Haidar Eid - Gaza
Dear Mr. President,
I am writing to express my dismay and disappointment with both your attendance at the national conference of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies - a racist organization by any standards - as well as the content of your speech at that forum.
I am a naturalised South African of Palestinian origin. I spent more than five years in Johannesburg, during which I earned a PhD from the University of Johannesburg and lectured at the-then Vista University in Soweto and Rand Afrikaans University in Johannesburg.
I would like to take issue with the manner in which you express your support for the two-state solution: "It is a solution that fulfils the aspirations of both parties for independent homelands through two states for two peoples, Israel and an independent, adjoining, and viable state of Palestine" (emphasis mine). Allow me, Mr. President, as a resident of Gaza, to express my shock with the fact that - only 8 months after the Gaza massacre, in which 1500 civilians, including 434 children, were brutally murdered - you still believe that there are two symmetrical sides. You even call it the "Israeli-Palestinian conflict!" Was that your belief in the 1970's and 80's; that there were "two-sides" to the South African "conflict"? Were there two equal parties, namely White and Black, with equal claim to the land and equal historical responsibility for the-then status quo? No doubt, this sounds like a bizarre interpretation of South African history and one which we Palestinians find equally astounding when applied to our history and our reality today.
Mr. President, these words of yours are even more disturbing, given your own involvement in the commendable struggle against the brutal, anti-human apartheid system and the notion of "independent homelands" which were based on the separation of human beings. Your struggle as Black South Africans, was morally superior to apartheid because it was inclusive where apartheid focused on separation; it was embracing where apartheid focused on division; it was life-affirming where apartheid was violent and murderous.
The South African anti-apartheid goal, adopted by anti-apartheid activists all around the world was unequivocal: the end of the racist system and ideology of apartheid. There could be no toenadering (rapprochement)with apartheid ideologues; no creation of homelands and puppet leaders: the system had to be dismantled in its entirety. Many South Africans supported by a sustained global anti-apartheid campaign, sacrificed their lives to bring down the Bantustansan euphemistically, called independent homelands by the apartheid regime. Mr. President, Steve Biko, Oliver Tambo, Chris Hani, the Mxenges, the Slovosac to mention but a few anti-apartheid heroes must have listened to the speech to the JBD and wondered what happened to the universal values and human rights espoused by the ANC.
Comrade Jacob (if I may),
I would like to brief you on the nature of the powerful party, i.e. Israel - with whom your post-apartheid government still, amazingly, maintains exceptional diplomatic and economic ties.
Unlike the new post-apartheid South Africa, which you helped to create, in the State of Israel all human beings are NOT equal. There are fundamental artificially created and selectively rewarded a level of of citizens in the state. Israel defines itself as a Jewish State. It, therefore, creates a bizarre distinction between "nationality" and "citizenship." Almost 22% of the citizens of Israel are Palestinians who are excluded from such a definition. Israel thus, by definition is NOT the state of its citizens, but rather that of "The Jewish People", most of whom, like the members of JBD whom you were addressing, have no birthright connection to it. The question which begs an answer is what the status of those Palestinian citizens in a Jewish state is? The answer is, as every single - to use a word you must abhor "non-white" South African knows: Racism.
The delegates at the national conference of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies, Jewish, but at the same time, South African citizens "enjoy full rights" in Israel, rights that apartheid Israel denies to us, the indigenous people of this land. They also call us "Israeli Arabs", "Jerusalem residents", "Arabs of the territories", not to mention the refugees living in the Diaspora, whose mere mention always spoils any party, and whose right to return and compensation is sanctioned by International Law (UNGA resolution 194).
Israeli nationality, therefore, is non-existent. Instead, there is "Jewish Nationality". To make such a bizarre term comprehensible, think of "White Nationality" as opposed to South African. In your speech before the JBD, you state very eloquently that "(m)uch as we are conscious of who we are culturally and otherwise, it must not take away the national identity, as we should be South Africans first".
The International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crimes of Apartheid, Article 2, Part 3, clearly defines apartheid as:
"[a]ny legislative measures and other measures calculated to prevent a racial group or groups from participation in the political, social, economic and cultural life of the country and the deliberate creation of conditions preventing the full development of such a group or groups, in particular by denying to members of a racial group or groups basic human rights and freedoms, including the right to work... the right to education, the right to leave and return to their country the right to a nationality, the right to freedom of movement and residence."
This definition, in its entirety, clearly applies not only to the Palestinian people residing in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, but also those living in Israel itself. This is precisely the reason that the UN Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights Situation in the Occupied Territories, a fellow South African, John Dugard, concluded that "the 1973 International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid appears to be violated by many practices".
If you were born to Palestinian parents living in Israel - a fate you have been spared, Mr. President - you too would be denied the rights of "Jewish Nationality" and been forced to submit to institutionalized inferiority or choose to resist it.
Furthermore, ICSPCA (quoted above), Article 2, Part 4, makes it crystal clear that:
"[t]he term 'the crime of apartheid',' shall apply to "any measures including legislative measure, designed to divide the population along racial lines by the creation of separate measures and ghettos for the members of a racial group or groups The expropriation of landed property belonging to a racial group or groups or to members thereof.."
Comrade Jacob, the word apartheid never appears once in your speech before the JBD! A listener would never know that you were speaking to an audience who actively support apartheid in another country.
Did you know that racist laws used to forbid Black property ownership in white areas in apartheid South Africa are in force in apartheid Israel? Indigenous Palestinian citizens of Israel are not only prohibited from living on land owned by "Jewish institutions", but are also not allowed by force of "law" to reside in any areas designated "Jewish" either.
I, myself, Mr. President, a resident of Gaza, like so many Palestinians, have legal title to my parents' land in Israel, but have no "legal" right to it because my parents' property, like that of millions of other Palestinians', was taken away from us and given over to Jewish ownership. The facts are that Jews owned only 7% of Palestine before 1948; today 93% is considered "state land" and can only be owned by Jews or Israel.
This is only one example, Comrade Jacob, of the nature of the state your government deems "democratic"and "friendly" despite its past strategic ties with apartheid SA. In your presidential campaign, you were quoted singing "kill the Boer!" And yet, in your speech, you "unequivocally" condemn "all forms of violence from whatever quarter", particularly where civilians are targeted!
I fail to understand this contradiction. Is this a reflection of the difference between comrade Jacob and President Zuma? Do you, as president, think that Palestinians have no right to resist their occupation and dispossession? You even equate our resistance with the War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity committed by the Israeli Occupation forces in the West Bank and, in particular, in Gaza.
Is it too much, comrade Jacob, for us, representatives of Palestinian Civil Society organizations to ask your government to sever all diplomatic ties with apartheid Israel, and endorses not to say lead the growing global Boycott Divestment and Sanctions campaign against Israel? Is that really too much to ask a democratic post-apartheid South Africa for?
Is this the embodiment of Fanon's prophecy about the "Pitfalls of National (Racial?) Consciousness?" Is it because the Black Middle class which your government represents and which has taken power from the White Middle class is underdeveloped? Fanon, whom you must have read while on the run from the apartheid police, says that this national middle class "has practically no economic power, and in any case it is in no way commensurate with the bourgeoisie of the mother country which it hopes to replace." Is this why you are prepared to kowtow to the South African Jewish community which "has been called one of the most tightly-knit in the world, overwhelmingly united in its support for Israel?"
Your government, Mr. President, turns a blind eye to the war crimes of its own citizens against Palestinians. The South African war criminal David Benjamin was allowed to freely move around South Africa and share his tactics of support and defence for the Israeli Occupation Forces in its recent onslaught against the Gaza Strip with impunity. There are seventy other South Africans that are known to have links with the destruction of the Israeli Occupation Forces who enjoy the same impunity. It is left to individuals and civil society organizations in South Africa to take action against these criminals that should rightly be the task of the government.
Your post-apartheid government, Mr. President, unashamedly, supports the two-state solution: one for Palestinians (Muslim and Christians), and one for Jews. In other words, you support the re-birth of Bantustans, albeit in the Middle East this time. The two-state solution is a racist solution, comrade Jacob. If you did not accept it for yourselves in South Africa, why force it on Palestinians instead of supporting us as we demand the right to our homeland every single inch of it?
Mr. President,
A politics based on narrow-minded, selfish pragmatism was rejected by all anti-apartheid forces, locally and internationally during the years of the anti-apartheid struggle. What was promoted, instead, was adherence to universal principles of equality and dignity.
I truly hope you will reconsider. I know that it is my constitutional right as a citizen of the New South Africa - which I am proud of - to address you directly. I do so to express my deep disagreement and dissatisfaction with your government's Middle East policy and its continued support for the apartheid policies of the Israeli government, given that this support undermines and actively harms the Palestinian struggle for liberation and self-determination.
Sincerely,
Professor Haidar Eid
Gaza, Palestine
- Dr. Haidar Eid is Associate Professor in the Department of English Literature, Al-Aqsa University, Gaza Strip, Palestine. Dr. Eid is a founding member of the One Democratic State Group (ODSG) and a member of Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI). He contributed this article to PalestineChronicle.com. |
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