1 August 2011, Palestine Chronicle http://palestinechronicle.com (USA)
By Lillian Rosengarten*
We are by now too familiar with the label anti-Semite aimed towards all who dissent from the deplorable policies of Netanyahu's right-wing disaster. It does not matter if the resistance to Israeli occupation and ongoing collective punishment arises from the actions of Jews, Muslims, atheists, socialists or any human rights activists. In addition, Jew against Jew has created a deeply disturbing divide that pits Jews against one another and seriously questions what it means to be Jewish within a context of compassion or as a fear response to having once been dehumanized and thoroughly victimized. How can this justify the continuous role of Israel as victimizer in the form of an obscene collective punishment, an entire population marginalized, hated, left war torn and homeless without freedom. What is the message to the world after decades of this occupied prison?
I personally have been called an anti-Semite and nothing could be farther from the truth. My motives are not anti Jewish but rather antiwar I see as fascism in the form of an extreme nationalistic Zionism. This behavior cannot help but destroys the soul of Judaism a spiritual religion that ascribes to tolerance, compassion, does not kill and has the courage to reflect on its way of life. It is by now known that the Knesset, the core of Israeli government has thrown out a female Arab-Israeli member, Hanin Zuabi, who had the audacity to participate in protest against her country's actions. She witnessed the brutal murder of 9 unarmed activists on the ill fated Mavi Marmara that attempted to break the Gaza siege. She is now threatened with the loss of her Israeli citizenship.
Yes it is me again, Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany shouting to the world, never again, not in my name." Every day I am bombarded with news of some other atrocity in the name of protecting the "democratic state of Israel." I want to awaken from this nightmare. I no longer can tolerate to hear, “Palestinians do not recognize Israel and wish to destroy us." How much longer can we hear Netanyahu's mantra (US complicit here) "we will never recognize the terrorists Hamas” (legally elected by a majority of Palestinians.) I want to reiterate again, those who call others terrorists must reflect on the terrorism within themselves. The US is grossly guilty of similar careless projections of the label "terrorist" while refusing to acknowledge their own use of terrorism. Tragically Israel and the US both suffer from inordinate forms of extreme denial on the nature of their own violent behavior to keep wars and human suffering going and cannot self reflect on their ego maniacal political agendas. Other countries aid violence by selling arms and contribute powerfully as destroyers of human life in exchange for exorbitant payments.
Recent news has induced a cringe response. Germany sold a torpedo submarine to Israel, capable of deploying nuclear missiles and firing nuclear holocaust. How is this possible? Can it be a form of German restitution to assuage unconscious (or conscious) guilt by association with their infamous history when Nazi insanity and rabid anti-Semitism coupled with Aryan delusions of grandeur ruled Germany? I do not claim to know yet recognize the sheer lunacy to send weapons to Israel. Do we need more killings and endless suffering? Where is the resistance, the outrage? I need to hear more, louder, stronger. Does the Israeli agenda now include a nuclear war with Iran? Has Israel completely lost all reality? I can say much the same for the US that would engage mindlessly with Israel for we are Israel's strongest ally for an exorbitant corrupt price. Is the agenda of Netanyahu's right wing hoodlums to blow up all their neighbors to become the only country in the Middle East and the “only democracy?" Let Israel not become victim to its own self-fulfilling prophesy by their own hand. Such a nightmare, calling for the destruction of Israel cannot happen. Israel along with their Palestinian neighbors MUST change political direction. As of now, Israel is drowning in a sea of paranoia and fear. How can a democracy and brutal occupation exist together? How is it so many remain blind? It has happened before in the 30's but this time it occurs with a twist of fate. Racism lives in a different form yet is equally virulent. I am afraid. Left undisturbed, this myth of democracy will support a continuous unending tragedy for both Palestine and Israel. They must, in order to survive face each other with honest dialogue and sincere attempts at mutual understanding and compromise.
Now I end with some comments on Israel's harsh decision to build museum over a century old Muslim graveyard. For years Muslims struggled unsuccessfully to prevent this construction. The irony is the "museum of tolerance" is being built to promote coexistence and is a project of the Simon Wiesenthal (Nazi hunter) center. Ultra orthodox Jews claim ancient Jewish graves were once located there. Instead of tolerance, one sees arrogance, racism, infantilism, and utter righteousness in action. Can it be this provocative and destructive decision serves to reinforce the tragic rise once again of worldwide anti-Semitism?
*Lillian Rosengarten, a refugee from Nazi Germany is a Buddhist practitioner, poet, writer and a pacifist. She contributed this article to
PalestineChronicle.com. Contact her at: truthpoem@gmail.com.
Mostrando postagens com marcador Hanin Zoabi. Mostrar todas as postagens
Mostrando postagens com marcador Hanin Zoabi. Mostrar todas as postagens
quarta-feira, 3 de agosto de 2011
MK Zoabi: “Racism is Part of the Ruling Consensus in Israel”
31 July 2011, Alternative Information Center המרכז לאינפורמציה אלטרנטיבית
http://www.alternativenews.org (Israel)
Nikki Hodgson and Mikaela Levin for the Alternative Information Center (AIC)
“When it comes to the rights of Palestinians in Israel, there is no difference between opposition and coalition.” The AIC interviews MK Hanin Zoabi, who is concerned that racism has become part of Israeli national consensus, and everything outside of this must now be criminalized.
Since she was sanctioned for her participation in the first Freedom Flotilla to Gaza, Knesset Member Hanin Zoabi (National Democratic Assembly) spends most days inside her office in the Knesset. Her desk is overflowing with papers, the small coffee table on the side is occupied with used tea mugs and some treats; in one corner, facing her desk, a television is broadcasting live the debate on the Knesset floor.
As of Monday 18 July, MK Zoabi is unable to participate in Knesset general debates or even speak in parliamentary committees until the end of this year’s parliamentary sessions, at the end of July. “I can just vote”, explains the Palestinian politician, with a half smile of open resignation. Throughout the entire interview with the Alternative Information Center (AIC), Zoabi will not take her eyes off the screen for more than a minute; she doesn’t want to miss the chance to exercise her last remaining right as a democratic elected MK: expressing her minority vote.
- Do you think you can still promote change from within the Knesset?
Promote change...mmmm, yeah! (She laughs). Definitely. The event of the Flotilla proved how crucial our presence in the Knesset is. It is ironic. The fact that they restrict our movements and incite against us indicates that we are really challenging their policies. Because if you don't challenge their policies, if you don't make a difference, if our existence as the National Democratic Assembly was insignificant to them, they could simply marginalise us, let us do whatever we want. The fact that they are so racist against us, the fact that they are doing everything in order to incite against, is proof that we are bothering them; we are not making their life easy.
Zoabi refuses to yield to pessimism. It’s been more than a year since she gained global fame with her participation in the Freedom Flotilla on board the Mavi Marmara, the Turkish ship on which nine activists died and dozens were injured after it was attacked by an elite Israeli naval force. Since then Zoabi has become accustomed to the insults and aggressive comebacks of her fellow MKs, both from the right and the centre. As she said, “when it comes to the rights of Palestinians in Israel, there is no difference between opposition and coalition”. “When I could still participate in Knesset committees, every time I used to speak, someone would say ‘yeah, you are in the Flotilla so go to the Flotilla and go to Gaza’. I talked about kindergartens and about children and they would say ‘you can go to Gaza’. I spoke of the confiscation of lands and they would say ‘it is better to go to Gaza’, she recalled, laughing carelessly.
A month after the first Flotilla was attacked and their passengers detained and deported, MK Zoabi received the first sanction from her colleagues. She was stripped of three of her parliamentary privileges: her diplomatic passport, funds for any legal counseling and the right to visit countries with which Israel doesn’t have diplomatic relations. “It's just hatred,” Zoabi explained. In this Knesset irrational racism exists. Maybe in the previous Knesset there was a more rational racism, a more sophisticated racism; but now it's very basic, very direct”.
This “irrational racism” is part of the new ruling consensus in Israel, Zoabi continues. “A lot of people now think that Jewish values are more important than democratic values. This obsession with judaising everything...the children in schools have no idea what democracy means, or equality. When you obsessively teach them Zionist values, they will grow up with the conclusion that there are no Palestinians citizens here. It's a psychological ethnic cleansing. They teach them to recognize the Palestinian as an enemy, but not to recognize him in daily life, as a citizen, as a partner in this home land,” warns Zoabi, losing her relaxed manner for a moment.
For Zoabi, the sole Palestinian woman in the Knesset, the main difference between the current government and the previous ones is not racism (“Israel has been a Jewish state since 1948, that is not something new”), but the criminalisation of everything outside of this consensus. The recently approved anti-boycott law if proof of that. “The settlements are part of Israel and that is not negotiable. This way of thinking is delegitimising politics as such, because now everything is part of a consensus and whatever is outside this consensus is criminalised. This is the dramatic effect of this government”, Zoabi asserts, before turning her eyes for a last time to the TV. The last speech is about to finish; she can finally take her seat on the floor of the Knesset and vote against the creation of an investigative committee on the funding sources of Israeli human rights organizations.
http://www.alternativenews.org (Israel)
Nikki Hodgson and Mikaela Levin for the Alternative Information Center (AIC)
“When it comes to the rights of Palestinians in Israel, there is no difference between opposition and coalition.” The AIC interviews MK Hanin Zoabi, who is concerned that racism has become part of Israeli national consensus, and everything outside of this must now be criminalized.
Since she was sanctioned for her participation in the first Freedom Flotilla to Gaza, Knesset Member Hanin Zoabi (National Democratic Assembly) spends most days inside her office in the Knesset. Her desk is overflowing with papers, the small coffee table on the side is occupied with used tea mugs and some treats; in one corner, facing her desk, a television is broadcasting live the debate on the Knesset floor.
As of Monday 18 July, MK Zoabi is unable to participate in Knesset general debates or even speak in parliamentary committees until the end of this year’s parliamentary sessions, at the end of July. “I can just vote”, explains the Palestinian politician, with a half smile of open resignation. Throughout the entire interview with the Alternative Information Center (AIC), Zoabi will not take her eyes off the screen for more than a minute; she doesn’t want to miss the chance to exercise her last remaining right as a democratic elected MK: expressing her minority vote.
- Do you think you can still promote change from within the Knesset?
Promote change...mmmm, yeah! (She laughs). Definitely. The event of the Flotilla proved how crucial our presence in the Knesset is. It is ironic. The fact that they restrict our movements and incite against us indicates that we are really challenging their policies. Because if you don't challenge their policies, if you don't make a difference, if our existence as the National Democratic Assembly was insignificant to them, they could simply marginalise us, let us do whatever we want. The fact that they are so racist against us, the fact that they are doing everything in order to incite against, is proof that we are bothering them; we are not making their life easy.
Zoabi refuses to yield to pessimism. It’s been more than a year since she gained global fame with her participation in the Freedom Flotilla on board the Mavi Marmara, the Turkish ship on which nine activists died and dozens were injured after it was attacked by an elite Israeli naval force. Since then Zoabi has become accustomed to the insults and aggressive comebacks of her fellow MKs, both from the right and the centre. As she said, “when it comes to the rights of Palestinians in Israel, there is no difference between opposition and coalition”. “When I could still participate in Knesset committees, every time I used to speak, someone would say ‘yeah, you are in the Flotilla so go to the Flotilla and go to Gaza’. I talked about kindergartens and about children and they would say ‘you can go to Gaza’. I spoke of the confiscation of lands and they would say ‘it is better to go to Gaza’, she recalled, laughing carelessly.
A month after the first Flotilla was attacked and their passengers detained and deported, MK Zoabi received the first sanction from her colleagues. She was stripped of three of her parliamentary privileges: her diplomatic passport, funds for any legal counseling and the right to visit countries with which Israel doesn’t have diplomatic relations. “It's just hatred,” Zoabi explained. In this Knesset irrational racism exists. Maybe in the previous Knesset there was a more rational racism, a more sophisticated racism; but now it's very basic, very direct”.
This “irrational racism” is part of the new ruling consensus in Israel, Zoabi continues. “A lot of people now think that Jewish values are more important than democratic values. This obsession with judaising everything...the children in schools have no idea what democracy means, or equality. When you obsessively teach them Zionist values, they will grow up with the conclusion that there are no Palestinians citizens here. It's a psychological ethnic cleansing. They teach them to recognize the Palestinian as an enemy, but not to recognize him in daily life, as a citizen, as a partner in this home land,” warns Zoabi, losing her relaxed manner for a moment.
For Zoabi, the sole Palestinian woman in the Knesset, the main difference between the current government and the previous ones is not racism (“Israel has been a Jewish state since 1948, that is not something new”), but the criminalisation of everything outside of this consensus. The recently approved anti-boycott law if proof of that. “The settlements are part of Israel and that is not negotiable. This way of thinking is delegitimising politics as such, because now everything is part of a consensus and whatever is outside this consensus is criminalised. This is the dramatic effect of this government”, Zoabi asserts, before turning her eyes for a last time to the TV. The last speech is about to finish; she can finally take her seat on the floor of the Knesset and vote against the creation of an investigative committee on the funding sources of Israeli human rights organizations.
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