We have all been watching from the past few days how Israel is leading a plan of ethnic cleansing of innocent Palestinians, which is making it impossible for the people of Palestine to survive let alone lead a peaceful life in the terrorising environment that Israel has created for them. On the other hand, with no political manifesto, new Palestinian generation is now making its voice heard, sending an unmistakable, resounding message to Israel, that the Palestinian people are not passive victims.
The present-day situation may appear hopeless. “The fact of the matter,” wrote Edward Said in 1979, “is that today Palestine does not exist, except as a memory, or, more importantly, as an idea, a political and human experience, and an act of sustained popular will.” However, this was not a pessimistic averment. As Said himself remarked 19 years later, “There is no getting away from the fact that, as an idea, a memory, and as an often buried or invisible reality, Palestine and its people have simply not disappeared. No matter the sustained and unbroken hostility of the Israeli establishment to anything that Palestine represents, the sheer fact of our existence has foiled, where it has not defeated, the Israeli effort to be rid of us completely.”
The truth be told none of us cared until we saw videos of influencers and activists from Palestine going viral on social media, but here is something you should know about the ongoing situation.
When the first world war ended in 1918 the British took control of Palestine and proposed a mandate which provisioned jews with establishing a “ Jewish national homeland” in Palestine, The Jews were thrown out from every country in Europe and it was Palestinians who came to their rescue. The images recently started to circulate among media where the Jewish refugees are coming in with banners saying “The Germans destroyed our families and homes, please, don’t you destroy our hopes” so we discern, with no disrespect intended, that they came begging for shelter when they had just been through genocide and we can all see where that led the world especially the Palestinians. This mandate to establish the state of Israel came into effect in 1923.
That is from where the Israeli Apartheid came into existence, We may call it the conflict now but it never was one and never will be one. Because there is no sharing of power between the two parties, clearly Israel has control over both Palestinian lands and their lives now.
Later on, the united nations proposed a plan of partitioning The land into two sections one of which became an independent Jewish state and the other an independent Arab state with Jerusalem being the capital to both as an international territory with a special status, But here If I may ask a question was it the place and right of UN to do what they did? Despite knowing that the situation was already that of a civil war between the Palestinians and Israelites.
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Even though the apartheid of Palestinians and the preparations and immigration of Jews had already started but officially
In May 1948 the Jews declared the independence of the Israeli state and started a Nakba (catastrophe) against Palestinians where they were driven away from their homes, and they were not even allowed to return. Statistics show that 80% of all Palestinians were driven out and Israel illegally occupied land more than which was envisioned in the UN proposition and the world watched just as we are watching right now whilst Gaza is being bombed, children are being slaughtered, women and men are being harassed, victimised, Persecuted, oppressed by Israeli forces ever since then. It is clear that the people who welcomed the oppressed became their oppressor in time, They opened their hearts and homes to Israelites only for them to take it all away one day. It might very well be said that the Nakba never really stopped. Statistics also say that 850,000 Jewish settlers immigrated to Palestine and took over the families and homes of Palestinians who had once welcomed them with warm embraces who now became their most dreaded oppressors. Despite the outrage of the neighbouring countries like Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and other Arab countries which led to an Arab-Israel war, Zionists with the support and funding of America managed to illegally occupy and control the west bank as well as the Gaza strip and as we can see they are trying to do the same with east Jerusalem now starting from the neighbourhood of sheikh jarrah. The west bank and the Gaza strip as well as East Jerusalem was supposed to be under the control of Palestinians However Zionists never let that happen, Ever since that day they have been illegally driving Palestinians out of their homes, And letting Israeli colonists settle in by the use of violence and other monstrous acts, think of any monstrous act that you can and Israel has committed that against the people of Palestine, Killing innocent children, Leaving the old and needy people shelterless by dragging them out of their own homes where they have spent the rest of their lives and we’re planning to spend the remaining rest. Zionists want nothing but to establish a Zion state and ethnically cleanse the land they consider was gifted to them of any Muslim and their remnants.
The present cycle of violence between Israel and Palestine began during the early days of Ramadan and gradually escalated in and around Jerusalem. Some poorly thought-out strategic decisions by Jerusalem’s police, combined with instances of unnecessary heavy-handedness towards Muslim worshippers celebrating the holy month, led to the escalation of tensions. Another exacerbating factor as per the experts was a court case involving home-evictions of Palestinian families in the East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah. Cast by Israel’s government as an ordinary dispute over ownership of real estate, the story had opened for many Palestinians — inside and outside Israel — festering wounds of dispossession, confiscated lands, and reviled discriminatory property laws designed to provide preferential treatment for Jews.
Recent videos show Israeli settlers chanting “Death to Arabs” and settlers opening fire upon kids who refuse to give up their homes, Their homes are their basic rights, Israel has kept the Gaza strip, people of the west bank and east Jerusalem deprived of their basic rights like clean drinking water and other necessities. Going into detail about how, when and what grave crimes these Zionists committed against the innocent Palestinians would take a lifetime and still the stories of their atrocities will not end.
Talking about the recent uprising and apartheid that Israel never actually stopped and seemed to start again is when the Israeli settlers were let free like the pack of blood-hungry wolves to go and prey upon innocent targets, The zionist colonists are planning to occupy east Jerusalem just as they did with the west bank, They started to drive out Palestinians from their homes in the neighbourhood of sheikh jarrah, and when the Palestinians decided to not give up their homes these brutal monstrous forces came barging in Masjid Al Aqsa with stun grenades and rubberised steel bullets and other lethal weapons simply because Al Aqsa mosque has always been a soft spot for Palestinians and Zionists have always been using it to oppress and suppress their voice of freedom, Where else in the world would you see some oppressive forces throwing grenades, Shooting people and harassing the women by dragging them through their hijabs when all they are doing is simply observing their prayers peacefully in their mosque? Where else do you see such things happening and the world’s so-called superpower funding them to do so, They were funded $38 billion military aid to bomb children, women, men and to destroy homes, Demolish buildings and suppress the voices of people fighting for their rights. Israeli soldiers arrest youth, Activists, even children simply for standing their ground and not letting the oppressor dictate their lives and yet Israel claims to be the only democracy in that continent. We all have seen recent bombings on the Al Jala tower which housed media houses like Al-Jazeera and BBC as well as had residential apartments, we see tweets coming in of parents burying their children, some parents putting their kids to sleep in the same room only so they could die together. If you go on Twitter and see the tweets under hashtags #SaveSheikhJarrah or #FreePalestine the stories we read and the conditions we get to know about are heart wrenching and any sane human’s heart would shred into a million pieces with the pictures coming in. They bombed a building and killed 10 people of the same family which included 8 children and 2 women, They wiped an entire family of 22 members clean, With doing all that America announced more aid in billions of dollars to israel, as if their Annual military aid was not enough to support the ongoing apartheid and ethnic cleansing of Muslims.
The reports show that more than 1400 Palestinians are wounded, 217 innocent Palestinians are killed which included 63 children, Now you tell me what threat are the children to israel and how do they even justify the killings?
They are taking down news pages that report their atrocities, stalk activists and get them arrested harass their families and whatnot, solely for the reason that they refused to give up on their homes, their lives, their Holy Mosque. and at this point where we all are sitting in the luxury of our homes, tweeting, commenting, sharing the posts and proving our solidarity with the Palestinians, they are the ones on the ground, in the courtyard of the third holiest site in Islam protecting it from the evil that has its sight set on it. The leaders of the Muslim nation are watching for some crooked reason abstaining from speaking on it or giving out a clear warning to Israel for the apartheid, whilst real believing Jews and Christians and other people are out on the roads raising their voices for the innocent Palestinians and against Zionists. Are we as a Muslim nation so spineless that we are watching our brothers and sisters be killed, shot at, being Bombed and harassed and yet we dare to stay silent and watch them crumbling under oppression? Apart from a few neighbouring countries opposing them, where are the other muslim nations? Why aren’t our so called powerful muslim leaders talking about the atrocities and the sufferings of Palestinians?
There are no easy solutions to the current round of violence. As the strongest actor in an asymmetrical battle, Israel should accept the ceasefire allegedly offered by Hamas to prevent further bloodshed. With mounting casualties on both sides, including women and children, such a step has become urgent.
Notably, Israel is already in hot water over a recently published report by Human Rights Watch, which accuses Israeli officials of committing the crimes of apartheid and persecution — two categories of crimes against humanity. And with an ongoing investigation by the International Criminal Court involving both Israel and Hamas over allegations of war crimes in Gaza during 2014, both parties would do well to take such warnings under consideration.
Author is a regular Columnist of Good Morning Kashmir. She can be contacted at jansaiqa7@gmail.com
