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Hussam has been a lifelong human rights activist who is passionate about promoting democratic societies, in the US and worldwide, in which all people, including immigrants, workers, minorities, and the poor enjoy freedom, justice, economic justice, respect, and equality. Mr. Ayloush frequently lectures on Islam, media relations, civil rights, hate crimes and international affairs. He has consistently appeared in local, national, and international media. Full biography at: http://hussamayloush.blogspot.com/2006/08/biography-of-hussam-ayloush.html

Friday, May 16, 2008

The Nakba (Catastrophe) lives on, after 60 years

This week, Israel and its supporters celebrated the 60-year anniversary of the establishment of the Apartheid state of Israel on historic Palestine.

Few remembered the heavy price paid by the Palestinians, the indigenous people of that land.

Few mentioned the over 500 Palestinian villages and towns destroyed by Israel in 1948.

None talked about the 750,000 Palestinians who were forcefully ethinically cleansed by Israel in 1948 from their land and homes and never allowed to return.

When will we celebrate the return of today's over 7 million Palestinian refugees to their homes and towns? Isn't it time for their suffering to end too?

60 years of dispossesion are enough. Time to end this ongoing Nakba.







2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Demanding that refugees be allowed to return to their homes and towns does not promote hatred. This is what the UN Resolutions and international law demand too.

It is ironic and hypocritical to demand that Palestinian refugees "move on" with their lives after being forced out 60 years ago while you advocate for Jews to have the right to settle in Palestine because their ancestors were forced out of it by Romans over 2000 years ago! If many of the Jews could not "move on" after 2000 years, what makes you think that Palestinians would move on after merely 60 years, with all their links to their land still so fresh.

We all aspire for peace in the region. But that will certainly not happen until justice is established in the form of an end to the Israeli occupation and the return of refugees to their homes.

Anonymous said...

Demand that the Arabs 'refugees' cease terror and barbaric culture before you justify a state for just another terrorists organization called PLO.
No refugees in the world were given such luxury and help from the international community.
The Arabs now called "Palestinians" are their own worse enemy. No matter what the world does for them, they still resort to more horror and terror using their children as human shield.

So, do demand civility first before anyone is qualified for a sovereignty. And certainly the Arab World who acquired/conquest the lion share of the land after the fall of the Ottoman Empire can chop off a piece of land to build another Arab state for their own brethren, Arab Palestinians, if they do not wish to absorb them, just as the Jews absorb their own. The Jewish people were birthed in Judea and Samaria, why do you expect Israel to create another state in her heartland which can never be viable for the two people? 90% of the Arab Palestinians are Sunnis. How many Sunni state there are? Saudi Arabia can create a state near Qatar, where most Arab came from anyway.

Most of the Arabs who fled were squatters who encroached the land of Palestine in 1948. No matter what concession Israel makes, it will never be enough. The Arab world only wish is to destroy Israel and until then the Arab Palestinians are going to remain tin the same, condition, sadly. They have had ample opportunitis to create a state for themselves, but tthey repeatedly chose terror and each time it was only worse for all and them.

It is only by miracle that Israel exists despite the vicious several attempts by the Arab World to destroy her using the Arab Palestinians with their consent as pawn, how pathetic.

Could it be that Allah so chose?