Israeli Christmas and New Year fireworks over Gaza

Gaza Dead May Rise and Join the Resistance

Lecture at Northeastern University, Chicago

By Ali Baghdadi

January 15, 2009

Before talking about the Israeli fireworks that have lighted the skies of Gaza for the last twenty days, I must remind you of some brief history.

In 1948, through a series of ugly and brutal massacres, European Jewish settlers, aided by the British who colonized Palestine after the First World War, succeeded in emptying out more than 500 Palestinian towns and villages of their indigenous Christian and Muslim inhabitants. As a result of the violent illegitimate birth of Israel, the overwhelming majority of Palestinians were thrown into the desert. Theodor Hertzel, known as the father of modern Zionism, years earlier, spoke of the need to cleanse the land from its snakes. He is referring to us, the Palestinian Arabs.

I witnessed and experienced the whole tragedy. I am one of its survivors. Perhaps the most famous of these “cleansed” villages was Deir Yassin, 5 miles west of Jerusalem. Though the village had good relations with its Jewish neighbors, on April 9, 1948, the Stern and Irgun paramilitary gangs invaded Deir Yassin at dawn. Two hundred fifty four men, women and children, including unborn babies, were slaughtered. Twenty five Palestinian males were taken alive and shot dead nearby. Fifty three orphaned children were dumped along the old city wall. My school, next to the American Colony Hotel, became their shelter. The remaining village residents, mostly women, were paraded naked in trucks, with loud speakers, warning the Palestinian population, if they don’t flee their homes, they will face the same destiny. Menachem Begin, who led the Irgun so-called Jewish freedom fighters, stated, loud and clear, that Israel could not have been born without the Deir Yassin massacre.

This terrifying scene cannot escape my memory until this day. The screams of women and children continue to ring in my ears. What is most ironic is the fact that the Polish born terrorist leader, Begin, was later elected as president of Israel, and the so-called Israeli “holocaust” museum was erected on the ruins of that unfortunate Arab village.

My mother, three sisters, 6, 4, and 2 year old, and I answered the Jewish call. With only the clothes on our backs, and with my youngest sister on my shoulder, and under a shower of mortar bombs, we climbed Mount of Olive and fled east on foot to Bethany. We were most definitely fortunate. We survived. A family, who was huddled in a truck at Herod’s gate of the Old City wall, a couple of minutes before we arrived, did not. A few days later, we ran further east to Jericho. Finally we fled south to Hebron. Life in exile was unbearable.

To provide for my family, I returned home alone. In East Jerusalem, despite the bullets and bombs flying over head, and with a wooden tray of candies and tobacco, I stationed a block away from the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Jordanian soldiers were my only customers. Arab Jerusalem was a ghost town, empty of its unarmed and helpless inhabitants, with only stray dogs and cats. I was 11 year old. A month or two later, when rumors spread of the fall of East Jerusalem to Israeli soldiers, my mother and sisters travelled on foot up the rugged mountains and down the steep valleys to insure my safety as their only man and provider.

I do apologize. I didn’t come here to talk to you about my life story in the Holy Land. It may be boring. Certainly, it could take a huge volume to cover. I am here to speak of the Palestine tragedy that the U.S. corporate media, which is controlled by Zionist Jews, distorts or shies away from. If only the Americans knew, things would have been different. Unfortunately, they are left in the dark.
In 1948 Israel over took 72% of Palestine. In the war of 1967, the Zionist settler state occupied the remaining 22%, the West Bank and Gaza.

Six million of us have been living in refugee camps in Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon for over sixty years. Though the United Nations recognized our right of return, and ordered the Israeli government to honor and implement this right, in accordance with 1948 UN resolution 194, Israel continues to defy the U.N. and the international community. As a matter of fact, Israel’s acceptance into the United Nations was conditional on its implementation of this resolution.

The West Bank with a population of over 2 million Palestinians has been converted into ghettoes. Over 650 Israeli military checkpoints block the roads. More than 120 Jewish settlements, an apartheid wall, and highways for the exclusive use of Jews, violate international law and make life of Palestinians unbearable. A trip from a village to another that used to take 15 minutes in a car, may now take 7 hours. Many pregnant Arab women, on the way to hospitals, have lost their babies while waiting to pass at checkpoints. Israel’s objective has nothing to do with the security of Jews. The humiliation and harassment of Palestinians are designed to force them to abandon what little remains of their occupied lands.

One and a half million Palestinians, mostly refugees, who were evicted from their lands in 1948, are crowded into Gaza, a 150 square mile strip, approximately 25 miles long and 6 miles wide, the most densely populated area in the world. Israeli leaders, including President Shimon Perez, often publicly wished to see Gaza sink into the Mediterranean. Former Republican presidential candidate, U.S. representative Ron Paul, described Gaza as a “concentration camp”. Prior to the present Israeli military aggression, over two thousand Gazans were killed in the last two years alone. In seven years, Israeli dead were three.

Gaza has been under siege, by land, sea, and air, for a long long time. No food, no drinking water, no medicine, no electricity, and no fuel.

Though Israeli leaders insist that Israel as a state is Jewish; though Jews don’t believe in Jesus and label his mother as a whore; though Israeli Jews continue to desecrate Muslim and Christian sacred places including the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and the Church of the Nativity, and often spit at Christian clergy; Israel has been celebrating Christmas and the New Year. I have been pinned down to satellite TV for the last 20 days. I have been watching Israel’s fireworks lighting the skies of Gaza, day and night. Unfortunately, you won’t see what I have been seeing. The U.S. news media don’t want you to “enjoy” the celebration.

I have been watching live the bloodbath and the holocaust being inflicted on the helpless people of Gaza. I have been watching American weapons of mass destruction in action. I have been watching the F16’s, the Apache helicopters, and gun boats dropping the most destructive bombs on people who have no means to match them. I have been watching new terrifying American arms being tested, and white phosphorus bombs and other illegal weapons being used. Palestinians possess not a single military or civilian plane, not a single surface to air missile, not a single tank, not a single canon, not a single missile guided by laser from high in the sky. I have been watching body parts of men, women and children scattered in the streets and pulled from underneath the rubble. The count today has exceeded 1,100 martyred and 5,000 injured; the majority is children and women. I have been watching Israeli missiles and “precision smart” bombs targeting police centers, prisons, apartment buildings, homes, schools, universities, mosques, hospitals, clinics, and even ambulances. In the first 12 day of Israeli, 19 mosques were leveled to the ground. The Islamic University, the oldest and largest scientific complex in Gaza, was hit and destroyed on the third day of the fireworks “carnival”. On the fifth day, among many other sites, Dar al-Arqam, a highly respected private school, received the same fate. Sixty seven schools were destroyed. A school that belongs to the UNRWA in which Palestinian women and children took refugee was hit. At least 50 victims were killed in cold blood. The school is well marked. Israeli spy planes fly daily over Gaza. Everything in Gaza, according to American and Israeli leaders, is a legitimate target. Educational institutions produce “terrorists”.

Even a chicken farm was subjected to Israeli air raids. The scene of the injured birds screaming and flying in every direction was alarming and shocking. Palestinian animals may carry explosive belts. They may be trained to kill Israeli soldiers.

Not only do living Palestinians terrify Israelis, but also the dead. Israeli airstrikes on a Gaza graveyard killed Palestinian martyrs for the second time. The Israelis are not willing to take a chance. The Quranic verse that says “Think not that those who die in the cause of God (and in defense of one’s lands) are dead, but alive” might be literally true!

One of the most moving experiences that made me cry was a “speech” delivered by a 5 year old Palestinian girl standing in her destroyed bedroom in the midst of her shattered dolls. She picked her torn and burned clothes from the floor and brought them to her nose. “Come and smell the smoke of explosives,” she asked. Like a young woman, she was heartbroken for the loss of her bracelet and ring her parents gave her. “Where are we going to sleep?”, she wondered. “EVEN I was terrified,” she added. The word, EVEN, coming from an innocent pretty little girl, who thinks of herself to be strong and brave, is making my heart traumatized with pain. I am certain, this girl, if she survives the massacre carried out by the “fourth-military-power” in the world, will, in a few years, become a “terrorist” leader. Seriously, her speech, her logic, her tone of voice, and her hand gestures, were more effective than those of Barak Obama. Of course, unlike the U.S. President-elect, who inspired millions of people worldwide, it is doubtful that Westerners will ever hear this little angel. Her only crime is the fact that she was born a Palestinian, an Arab and a Muslim. What a curse!

What hurts me the most is the fact that I can only watch the bloodbath, the genocide and the holocaust the helpless and defenseless Palestinians are subjected to. Almost since he ascended to the throne of the American Empire, George W. Bush designated Palestinian charitable institutions which assist orphans and widows as terrorist organizations. Some of my friends have received long term jail sentences for aiding clinics and orphanages.

Ironically, while the holocaust was going on in Gaza, President-elect Obama was having a good time in Hawaii. I voted for him. More than 90% of Arab and Muslim Americans voted for him. We voted for change. We voted for an America that does not kill and destroy. We voted for an America that is truly kind, gentle, and committed to real democracy and peace. We voted for an America that is pro life, the life of millions of born people in every corner of the globe. We hope that we won’t be disappointed. Unless he speaks out, and take positive and courageous steps against occupation, oppression and genocide, Obama will soon be next to Bush, a mass murderer and war criminal, in history books. Silence is not acceptable. Silence is complicity.

Twenty days have passed and none of Israel’s military or political objectives have been realized. Palestinian will to resist has not been broken. The bond between the Palestinian masses and the resistance forces has not weakened. Hamas which came to power through a free and democratic election as testified by former President Jimmy Carter, continues to insist, no negotiations will be considered until aggression is completely stopped; unless the siege of Gaza is fully lifted; unless all crossing-points are immediately opened; and unless the people of Gaza can exercise their birth given right to move, travel and trade freely with the outside world.

In a letter to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert that advocated carpet bombing of Gaza civilians, Israel’s former Sephardi chief rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu ruled that there was absolutely no moral prohibition against the indiscriminate killing of civilians. An entire city holds collective responsibility for the immoral behavior of individuals.

Avigdor Lieberman, a member in the Knesset and a former minister in the Israeli government, does not believe that “carpet bombing” alone will be enough. Speaking at Bar-IIan University, Lieberman called on his government to implement the same technique used by the United States in its war against Japan. According to Israeli media, he reminded his audience that the two atom bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki had rendered the occupation of Japan “unnecessary”. In the 1973 Arab Israeli war, former Prime Minister of Israel, Golda Meir, was prepared to use this technique against Egypt. Israel possesses 200 to 300 atom bombs.

The world is responding to Israeli war crimes and crimes against humanity in an unprecedented manner. Demonstrations against the holocaust carried out by the Israeli military against Gaza have spread to every major city in the world. In Los Angeles, Jews protesting the Israeli crimes shut down the Israeli consulate. Cambridge, Massachusetts, home to Harvard University and the Massachusetts School of Technology, voted to become the first American city to officially condemn Israel’s assault on Gaza.

What amazes me the most is the fact that Afghanistan, a poor country, which is subjected to daily death and destruction by the United States and its NATO allies, is sending humanitarian aid to Gaza and has pledged to send volunteers to fight the Israelis.

Yesterday, Venezuela and Bolivia broke relations with the Zionist settler state due to the inhumane persecution of the Palestinian people. Viva Hugo Hussein Chaveze. Viva Evo Hussein Morales. The two Latin American presidents will seek to charge top Israel officials with genocide in the International Criminal Court. Malaysia is calling upon the United Nations to immediately set up a tribunal to investigate and prosecute Israelis for committing war crimes. Similar demands to bring the Israeli perpetrators to justice are being voiced on every continent, including Europe.

Here are some recent statements made by some Hollywood stars in relationships to the Palestinian Israeli conflict:

“Israel is a Nazi state,” Jewish comedian Roseanne Barr.

“Take a look at Israel’s history, and you would know who the terrorist is”, Al Pacino.

“Humanity ceased to exist when Israel was established”, Dustin Hoffman, a Jew.

“Israel means war and destruction and we Americans are behind this war and I am ashamed of being American”, Anthony Hopkins.

“Bush, Sharon, Blair and Rice are names that history will damn”, George Clooney.

“Arabs and Muslims are not terrorists. The world should unite against Israel”, Angelina Jolie.

“Zionists are the source of destruction. I wish I could fight against them”, Mel Gibson.

Of course, there are probably many others who stand on the side of the forces of oppression and occupation.

“Arabs are dirtier creatures than animals and we Jews are the Chosen People. There is no comparison”, Harrison Ford.

In conclusion, all-out-starvation of Gaza has not worked. All-out-war will also fail. Palestinians are fighting back. Their homemade rockets, though small and primitive, have forced almost one million Jewish settlers to hide in shelters. Remember that the settlements Palestinians have been targeting in retaliation, are towns and villages from which they were forcefully evicted by Jewish gangs, robbers and bandits when Israel was illegitimately born.

Israel was defeated in Southern Lebanon in July of 2006. The U.S. government has been defeated in Iraq and Afghanistan. Certainly, Israel will be defeated in Gaza. Victory of the oppressed will prevail. Israel will eventually face the same fate received by the supremacist apartheid state of South Africa. Undoubtedly, sooner than later, the Jewish Zionist identity on stolen Palestinian lands will disappear.


Photo courtesy: BBC