Opinion Editorials, September 2007
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Demonstrations Should be Only Against Occupiers, Not Against their Victims
By Hassan El-Najjar
ccun.org, September 15, 2007
Any effort for peace between Israelis and Palestinians, or between any parties in conflict anywhere, is worthwhile and deserves encouragement. However, in this case (read below), the organization arranging this event, "One Voice," is creating a symmetry between the Palestinian victims and their Israeli oppressors.
It is the Israeli occupiers and Israeli illegal settlers who are usurping Palestinians, stealing their property, and imposing the longest military occupation on them.
It is the Israeli occupation government and its Zionist supporters who are the extremists, not the Palestinians who resist the Israeli occupation and the Israeli oppression.
These demonstrations should have been declared only against the Israeli occupation government, its oppressive occupation forces, and its illegal settlers.
To say that it is against Palestinian and Israeli extremists is misleading and does not contribute to ending the conflict, which will end only when Israelis and their Zionist supporters acknowledge the Palestinian inalienable rights mentioned in UN resolutions, starting with ending the brutal Israeli occupation and allowing Palestinians to establish their own state.*
You can't equate the starved population in Gaza Strip and besieged Palestinians in the West Bank with the Israeli occupation forces and their government, who have been continuously imposing a regime of severe embargo and sanctions on the Palestinian people since January 2006, in addition to the daily killing, injuring, kidnapping of Palestinians, and damaging of their property.
Real world peace will come after ending wars and foreign occupations. To treat the occupiers and the occupied as if both of them are offenders is nothing but appeasement to the extremist occupation forces and their supporters.
There's no peace without justice, and no peace efforts are worthwhile without honesty.
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One Voice plans international anti-extremism demonstrations
Date: 15 / 09 / 2007 Time: 11:53
Bethlehem – Ma'an –
Arab, Israeli and international supporters of the One Voice organisation are planning worldwide demonstrations on the 18th of October in protest against all forms of violence.
The demonstrations are expected to be held in Israel, Palestine and other nations throughout the world. One million Israelis and Palestinians are expected to participate in the protests.
Israeli millionaire and president of One Voice, Daniel Lobsky, said "one reason for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is that the only voice listened to is that of extremists on both sides. It is time we listened to the voice of the moderates who represent the silent majority.
"We, the overwhelming majority of both peoples, believe in peace and love life and prefer that it triumph."
The two major demonstrations will take place simultaneously in Palestine and Israel, one in a large park in Tel Aviv and the other in a football stadium in Jericho.
In tandem with the two demonstrations, other activities will take place in New York, London and Ottawa. The rallies have been given the title 'moderates want peace'.
One Voice is a non-profit organisation operating in Israel and Palestine, established to counter extremism.
The One Voice movement, which has offices in both the West Bank city of Ramallah and in Tel Aviv, as well as London, New York and Ottawa, aims to empower Palestinian and Israeli civil society to take a more assertive role in ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The movement also seeks to establish the largest international network of 'friends'. Through this, the movement hopes to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and establish a state of Palestine.
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Note to Readers:
The Israeli settlements as well as the Land-Grab, Apartheid Wall in the Palestinian occupied territories have been built illegally on confiscated Palestinian lands. These represent a major violation of international law, Geneva Conventions, and they obstruct reaching a peaceful resolution for the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
The Israeli occupation forces abduct and kidnap Palestinians from their homes and at checkpoints, on daily basis. Most media refer to these abductions and kidnappings as arrests, which is inaccurate and not true as the Israeli occupation government has no jurisdiction over Palestinian citizens inside their own territories.
Further, when Israeli occupation forces kill Palestinian civilians, particularly when the victims are women and children, this should be referred to as an act of terrorism, and perpetrators should be described as terrorists.
Since the end of the second intifadha in 2005, not a single Israeli civilian was killed by Palestinian resistance organizations. However, Palestinian civilians have been killed by Israeli occupation forces, almost on daily basis.
Note to Journalists:
Any journalist who does not describe this as terrorism is biased, unfair, not objective, and a participant in terrorizing the Palestinian people, so the Israeli occupation of Palestine can continue endlessly.
Note to Translators:
The Arabic definite article, Al (or its variant, El) should be written with a hyphen separating it from the noun it is associated with, for example Al-Aqsa. If a hyphen is not used, as in Al Aqsa, it confuses non-Arabic readers. They may think that it is an abbreviation of the name Albert, as many Americans do.
The Arabic definite article Al (or El) should be written as such, whether it is Shamsiyah or Qamariyah in pronunciation, simply because we are dealing with the written form of the language, not the spoken one. Using the Shamsiyah so many forms in writing is inaccurate and confusing to non-Arabic readers, to say the least.
Only standard (fasih) pronunciation of Arabic names should be used. Non-standard ('ammi) should be avoided avoided. Example: Names like Abu Sunainah, Abu Rudainah, and Abu Shebak are written by some translators in the non-standard forms of Abu Snainah, Abu Rdainah, and Abu Shbak.
The standard pronunciation of the vowel at the end of names is (a), not (e), particularly if it is followed by (h), like in the cases of Haniyah and Rudainah, not Haniyeh and Rudaineh.
The standard pronunciation of vowels in the following names is (ai), not (ei) as written by some translators: Hussain, not Hussein and Hassanain, not Hassanein. This is the same long vowel pronounced in the English words "rain" and "brain."
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