“Where should we go after the last frontiers?
Where should the birds fly after the last sky?
Where should the plants sleep after the last breath of
air?
The earth is closing on us, pushing us through the
last passage,
and we tear off our limbs to pass through.”
-
Mahmoud Darwish
These few lines by Mahmoud Darwish, who was regarded as the
Palestinian National Poet in Exile, aptly give an idea about the tragedy of the
Palestinian nation. While as for Muslims in rest of the World the Hijri New
Year Day heralded hope for a peaceful year ahead, these people were greeted
with rockets and missiles (manufactured from the American tax-payer’s money!)
on the very first day of the New Year. While as people in most parts of the
world are voicing their concern in unison and criticising the offensive (read
Massacre), the oppressor seems unfazed whosoever the critic be.
The present continual massacre of
civilians in the Gaza strip traces back its root to the cold-blooded killing of
a young Palestinian boy while he was playing football by the Israeli defence
forces. After this, three more boys were killed in not much different
circumstances. Hamas Military fired crude rockets (which hardly make a hole
through concrete) in protest/retaliation. Then Israel assassinated Ahmed al-Jaabari
(the Hamas military head) who was also the chief broker in negotiations for a
lasting ceasefire. Being involved in such negotiations, he was under protection
of a no-assassination pact with Israel at the time of assassination. And Hamas
had to retaliate (any sane organisation would do that!) giving Israel a pretext
for full scale offensive (read Massacre)!
In the midst of all this, one may
have expected the much revered world body, the UN, to take effective measures
to stop bloodshed. But this time as well, as on all previous occassions, the
all-weather friend US ensured that even a weak UN doesn’t harm Israel’s
interests. The US has so far vetoed not less than 42 UNSC resolutions (upto
2011) related to Palestine alone! This means, while all other members
(non-Permanent ones included) of the UNSC favoured a resolution against Israel,
US with its Veto Power ensured that the resolution wasn’t passed. With Russia
openly accusing the US of filibustering the issue during UN Security Council
deliberations, any immediate action against Israel seems a distant dream. Move
over to Syria where Genocide is underway under the Assad regime, Russia and
China leave no stone unturned to thwart any UNSC measure against Syria!
This reduces the role of UN to that
of just a soap which cleanses dirt from one’s hands, in this case it absolves
(cleanses) Israel of all the crimes by not taking any decisive action apart
from issuing ‘warnings’! And even if the UNSC does pass any resolutions Israel
has had an eventful history of ignoring these, having so far violated most of
the 102 resolutions passed by different US bodies like UN Security Council, UN
General Assembly and UNRWA. While as the war on Iraq was based on the moral
high ground that it had breached a UNSC resolution, and talks about war on Iran
are being revolved around the same thing, Israel still has the distinction of
being the country which has violated the highest number of UN Security Council
Resolutions!
While
condemning the Israeli massacre of the Palestinian people in Gaza without
mincing any words, one should keep in mind that we can’t blame the entire
Jewish community of the world for the sins committed by Zionists in Israel.
There is a pretty sizeable fraction of genuinely humane people among the Jews
who unequivocally condemn Israel’s Fascist and Supremacist actions. I have seen
on social networks that, in the process of condemnation, we go on to the extent
of praising (and thanking) Hitler for exterminating the Jews of Europe during
the Holocaust. By doing so, We, Muslims lose a large constituency of people all
around the world who would, otherwise, support the Palestinian cause. I have
myself seen people (on social networks, of course!) arguing that Muslims have
no moral ground to condemn the Israeli onslaught as long as they are happy with
the Jewish Holocaust! We are not a legacy-orphan nation, we have inherited the
legacy of great Humans & Statesmen like Tariq bin Ziyad, Omar bin Abdul
Azeez & Salahudeen Ayyubi among others in addition to the Prophetic legacy
of the Noble Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) and His companions. Where
does the need to patronise Hitler arise?
Another interesting fact here is that
Bal Thackeray, the recently dead Ideologue of the Shiv Sena was a big fan of
Hitler himself and patronised him. While Muslims take Thackeray as a sworn
enemy for his tacit role in the anti-Muslim riots and all, the patronising of
Hitler by Muslims seems by any means short-sightedness and narrow-mindedness.
After all the friend of an ‘enemy’ doesn’t make a friend at all! And by any
means, an oppressed nation fits better empathising or sympathising with another
oppressed nation and not in being sadistic in other nations’ sufferings.
"…it was painful to listen to people who have suffered so much
themselves, mock others who suffer, in different ways, but no less intensely
under the same oppressor. In that slogan I saw the seeds of how easily victims
can become perpetrators", writes Arundhati Roy in her book ‘Listening To Grasshoppers’
commenting on the action of Kashmiri protestors taunting the India’s poor with
slogans like “Bhooka Nanga Hindustaan”!
In the present case, maybe the
oppressor is not the same but their (Hitler's & Israel's) ideology is same
- Fascist & Supremacist!
