Lod residents protest Arab neighbors

Hundreds of demonstrators gather in front of home sold to Arab family in attempt to change owner’s mind; plan to protest all week

Eli Senyor

Hundreds of Jews protested against an Arab family moving into the Naveh Zayit neighborhood in Lod on Saturday, and two demonstrators were taken in for questioning.Preparations for the protest began after residents of the neighborhood discovered that one of their neighbors had signed a contract to sell his home to an Arab family.

Immediately upon hearing this, tenant representatives went door-to-door, distributing fliers calling to “save the neighborhood”. Some 200 residents responded to the call and gathered in front of the seller’s home to protest the deal. [source]…”

As upsetting as it may sound, I was shocked to read this but wasn’t exactly surprised! Reports of steep rise in racism among the Israeli community are all over the place; lately, a survey showed that 75% of the Israeli community don’t approve on living in the same building with Arabs, another 50% consider marriage to an Arab a national treason, and over than 60% of Jewish Israelis will not allow an Arab to enter their house! [source]

On the other hand, I think one won’t need a documented survey to understand the amount of racism against the Jews and the Israelis amongst the Arab communities, I think that if such a survey is to be conducted the results would be something like: “99% of Arabs don’t accept living anywhere near a Jew”, or something like: “99% of Arabs are proud to hate all Jews!”. The way Jews are perceived in local Arab media had often infuriated me, the scuffle with Zionism is never an excuse for such an outrageous racism to disseminate.

In my personal perspective, humanity fades once racism is on the rise, and in the case of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, once racism is unleashed this way, more crimes will find more justifications, and more miseries will find their way to more people. Something must be done to stop this madness.

In a short period after the war ended in favor of the Jewish militias, the new-born Israelis destroyed more than 400 villages in which those refugees were living for thousands of years in an attempt to erase any non-Jewish appearance inside Palestine. Many of those villages and towns were rebuilt and resettled by Jews and the names of those villages and towns were changed from Arabic to Hebrew. It is worthy to quote Moshe Dyan describing the situation before and after that:

“Jewish villages were built in the place of Arab villages. You do not even know the names of these Arab villages, and I don’t blame you because geography books no longer exist, not only do the boooks not exist, the Arab villages are not there either. Nahlal arose in the place of Mahlul; Kibbutz Gvat in the place of Jibta; Kibbutz Sarid in the place of Huneifis; and Kefar Yehushu’a in the place of Tal al-Shuman. There is not one single place built in this country that did not have a former Arab population.”

[ Moshe Dyan, in Haifa, quoted by Ha'aretz, April, 4 1969. Reproduced by Ed Walid Khalidi in the book "All That Remains"]

 In 1950, the UNRWA was able to register 914,000 Palestinian as refugees from the same conflict. Today, the estimated number of the Palestinian refugees is around 4.4 millions registered in UNRWA with roughly 1.5 millions unregistered for multiple reasons, and another 770,000 displaced refugees after the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza in 1967. Most of the refugees today live in what can easily be described as inhumane lifestyles inside refugee camps that are located mainly inside Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the occupied Gaza Strip and The West Bank, and around the world.

The International community, represented by the United Nations, directly recognized the catastrophe and issued the famous 194 resolution in 11 December 1948 and kept reaffirming it every year ever since, the resolution stated on the following:

“..the [Palestinian] refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbors should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return and for loss of or damage to property which, under principles of international law or in equity, should be made good by the Governments or authorities responsible.” [source]

Israel, and since the day of its establishment, refused to abide by the International Law and refused to allow a single refugee to return to his home, every now and then, an Israeli official reassures to all the Palestinian refugees around the world that their right to return to their original homes will never be accepted by the Jewish state.

It remains unquestionable that for any Palestinian leadership the issue of the refugees lay on top of their priorities at any negotiations to take place; according to most Palestinians, the real Palestinian cause is the cause of the refugees, and judging by the everlasting Israeli stance from this cause, any negotiations that will not embrace a total just solution to the issue of the refugees will never see the light.

[Hat tip: KABOBfest]

When I reached them they looked excessively exhausted, no doubt the trip (that technically should take an hour and a half!) is physically draining, not to mention humiliation, but they looked overly exhausted and I thought something’s wrong. When I asked my father about it and he answered very furiously: “Well, you can say I’ve been up for the last 48 hours! The Israelis thought Nablus citizens should watch some fireworks last night, and so they amused the inhabitants with some!” He was really pissed, and obviously loaded with much more to say. I waited until we reach home and they get some rest to set down and listen to what they got.

Later at night, they started telling me about the things they did, the people they met, and the places they went to, mostly people I already know and places I already had been to but I kept listening until my father started talking about the trip back to Amman, and to say the least, I never saw my father that disgusted and fed up in my entire life, he was about to blow up of anger while talking, he started talking about his last night in Nablus and how they spent it terrified counting the number of explosions caused by the Israeli Occupation Forces while trying to catch some 25-year-old suspect around the neighborhood, he said the Israeli army pounded a few houses with missiles and heavy weapons, not to mention a lot of gun fires all night long, it was a war zone he said, the only difference is that it was a one-sided war! They couldn’t sleep that night at all, they left very early in the next morning to avoid any unexpected traffic, of course, to those who don’t already know, the process of leaving any city in the occupied West Bank is very complicated, and may very easily fail! It all depends on the mood of the Israeli officer at each checkpoint, that is, every 10 to 20 kilometers! The first checkpoint you encounter when you leave Nablus is Huwara checkpoint, the infamous center of humiliation.

As I said, my parents reached there early inside a cab, they waited behind the long line of cars in front, after some time people are forced to leave the cars and walk on foot to take another cab waiting on the other side, that’s in case the Israeli officer said it’s ok to do so! People lining up were mostly women and old men, with a decent number of college and school students and teachers; my father was close to the office/barrack and could see the soldiers inside, and by soldiers I mean around 16-year-old kids holding M16′s taller than they are on their backs, the queue was stopped for a long time without one of the soldiers coming out to do some work as usual, my father had been there for around 2 hours now standing beside lots of older men only when they heard the soldiers kids laughing out loud inside their barrack and then started getting out of it playing in front of 300 people waiting for them to finish, one of the soldiers kids jumped on her soldier kid boyfriend’s back and started laughing and giggling while whispering to him and licking his ears and cheeks, my father describes the situation with genuine pain in his voice, he was furious to a point I cannot describe by words, after all, he was a man standing in line like a prisoner, right outside the city his family belonged to for thousands of years, waiting for a little girl, who he’s three times her age, to give him the permission to start searching through his stuff and then decides if he’s qualified enough to pass to the next checkpoint were he could be treated the same way. He then describes how the girl disgustingly orders old men to open their bags with the head of her machine gun, and then flips through their stuff with the same gun. I was pretty sure he intentionally cut some parts because if he didn’t he would’ve had a heart attack while repeating!

My mother took the story into another level, she bought me some very nice shirts and pullovers from there, they looked really expensive, and because I know that cloths are usually expensive in the West Bank, I asked her how much did all this cost? She said they were around $5 each! I couldn’t believe my ears; those shirts would have cost a small fortune in a normal situation, but that’s not even the point, she told me that she actually bought them out of pity! She entered a shop trying to find me a shirt or something, and the salesman literally begged her to buy anything! He was selling at 90% off the original prices; his family needs bread he said to my mother.

The situation inside the occupied West Bank is by all means miserable; the occupation is turning life there into a living hell; poverty, unemployment, lack of security, and desperation haunt the place, it’s unacceptable for human beings to continue living like this.

A searing interview with Avichai Sharon and Noam Chayut, both veterans of the Israeli Defense Forces and members of Breaking the Silence. Sharon and Chayut served during the second intifada, an on-going bloodbath that has claimed the lives of over three thousand Palestinians and nine-hundred-fifty Israelis. After thorough introspection, these young men have chosen to speak out about their experiences as self-described “brutal occupiers of a disputed land.”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37MFa7ZKQWo[/youtube]

P.S. The situation in the occupied Palestinian territories is actually a lot worse than this brief break out of reality shows.

from Alternate Focus

[Hat tip: Sabbah]Â

An average Arab will never comprehend neither justify anything Israel does, just the same as an average Israeli will never understand what Arabs do, simply because arrogance motivates both sides’ actions. This is why if the current situation lasts another million years, nothing will change, Arabs will never accept the existence of Israel, and Israel will stay as offensive as it is now.

When the Israelis come to any negotiations they don’t come with Ben Gurion’s words, they come with arrogance instead, and when Arabs come, they come with one thought in their heads; “we have the right, no matter what we do.” The Israelis say they want peace, but they’re not willing to pay what it takes for a peace with the Arabs, Arabs on the other hand tend to dream and swim in fantasies a lot, and they cannot comprehend the idea behind the word “status quo”. Therefore, this kind of negotiations will never work out, and by work I mean work for ever!

As an Arab, I see a chance today; I see a possibility for a way out, and I know that this time it might work out just fine, but also as an Arab, I think it’s Israel now that has the answer; the conflict today is more clear than ever, even for an outsider who doesn’t have the slightest idea about the conflict, it’s clear that the coming peace negotiations are ultra crucial, and it’s clear that there’s a possibility this time, only if Israel give up on their arrogance for once. Hamas, the alleged main obstacle to peace achievement, made a lot of gestures but the Israelis weren’t listening, it’s not a joke when Mishal say that Hamas will consider recognizing Israel if a Palestinian independent state is founded, and when Hamas offers a major truce agreement with Israel, Israel must understand that this is an opportunity and ridiculing it is not the wise thing to do only because this tiny militia refuses to call Israel a legitimate state like everyone else does!

The Israeli leaders must step out of their arrogance-led mentalities, today there’s an opportunity, and take it from an Arab, if a Palestinian independent state is founded on the lands of 1967, A LOT of things will change, but if the wall, the settlements, the checkpoints, and the humiliation are all too valuable to Israel than a real sustainable peace as apparent from Livni’s words, then I think there’s no opportunity at all.

Recently, the government of Jordan pushed a new legislation to the parliament vote; the new legislation enables the government to force certain punishments on journalists convicted with “press crimes” that could reach jailing and high fines, the questionable new law is considered a high threat on the already-threatened freedoms of press in Jordan, and is being widely rejected by almost every Jordanian, well, excluding the parliament members of course who recently voted in favor of the new law which is now only waiting the senates approval to be placed in action.

Prior to this move, Abdulhadi Al Majali, a famous billionaire and the head of the Jordanian parliament, threatened journalists openly of “legislating new laws to minimize their freedoms in case they kept criticizing the parliament!” Abdulhadi, who once ordered policemen to shoot at students protesting at Yarmouk University when he headed the security forces, participated in a physical attack on journalists recently right inside the house of representatives during a session; some journalists tried to record a physical fight taking place between two representatives which led other representatives to beat up those journalists and then thieve their cameras!

 
During the short period of parliamentary life in Jordan, which was reinitiated in 1989 after more than a 30-year period of halt, this one seems to be the worse; the current MP’s broke the record of unexplained absence to the sessions, they were the first to demand personal cars (BMW 530i to be specific!) for their Excellencies’ personal use, they were the first also to break the record of traveling expenses after traveling to almost every spot in the universe, and the list just keep going. The most optimistic (paid!) observer would describe their performance as humble.

It is worth noting that one of the causes of this lame performance is the process by which those representatives get their way to the house of the people in the first place; in Jordan, and in an exposed behavior from the regime, the voting process can be described as a single-vote process, where each citizen above 18 can only vote once for one single person, this way the regime guarantees that the winning representatives are nothing but a bunch of tribe and family leaders, stripping out any ideological background from the parliament, and minimizing the threat Islamists and Leftists might oppose on the regime, the results until now seem pretty satisfying to the regime as one can conclude.

The next election is supposed to take place in the near future, Jordanians in general don’t expect much to change, how could anyone expect any change if all the causes of lameness are still there anyway?

p.s. some of the links lead to Arabic scripts for lack of English resources, if you can’t read Arabic, you’ll have to unfortunately rely on my words!

At the time when most Arabs criticize Westerners (Americans in specific) because they swallow everything presented to them without questioning, they seem to follow the same route! A single news clip, a show, or a bunch of photos are enough for millions to start demonstrating without questioning, and until this day, a thrilling speech can drive millions of Arab Middle Easterners blindly. Over a night, the media turned the sympathetic feelings toward Iran and the Shiites among Arabs 180 degrees with a 2-minute low-quality clip showing Saddam’s execution, and yet most Arabs feel that they cannot be driven easily, not by the media for sure!

A similar thought can be reflected on some of the conceptions on the west; for instance, there has been a cliche catching on for a while of that all Americans are guilty because they failed in creating a coalition against their pro-war leaders to cause a coup against them, while at the same time forgetting all about Arab states and kingdoms that helped directly in the invasion of Iraq but yet almost no protests took place in the Arab world, therefore neglecting the fact that if it’s anyone’s guilt for not acting then it’s theirs!

It’s easy for many people to whine and complain about the western double-standard policy, which is a fact, and blame them for not interfering when it matters, while at the same time rejecting everything coming from the west under the excuse of that it’s not “original” or that it has to be some sort of a conspiracy against us. Moreover, the western media bias is harshly criticized by the same people who don’t see any biasing in the Arab media and take any word coming from it to be sacred and unquestionable.

It’s my deep conviction that we need to introduce objectivity heavily in our lives in order for us to stand up and face the perils ahead, because as I see it from here, hypocrisy never prevails.

[this article was also published at my personal blog]

I’m a 21-year-old Jordanian engineering student living in Amman, passionate about all Middle Eastern issues from smoking habits to oppression and dictatorship, realistic enough to believe in the day things turns out just fine, while going through constant struggle with my numbness to see that day coming. In what matter politics, the Palestinian case labels the core of it all to me, a cornerstone to neutralize this region of flames, and in what matters Arabs, their current enslavers are my biggest enemies, whether they’re other fellow Arabs, traditional gold diggers, or even dark ideas and myths.

If I’m to write, I might be sarcastic or acting professional, but most of the times I’ll be boring. It’s very unlikely that I get offended, sometimes I shock my self with the level of tolerance I show, but then again I realize it’s not tolerance but rather indifference. I’m a huge defender of personal and public freedoms, that leads to a deep resentment to all Arab regimes inside my mind, and to a conviction of that things will definitely become better. Public awareness is always the first step in my perspective.

Hopefully, I’ll add something and learn a lot, I started blogging more than a year ago, and here’s my proof I’m currently Enjoying My Space and hoping for others to do the same.

Omar Fahd