Countercurrent – November 4, 2023
Israeli military bombs hospitals, ambulance convoys and schools
By Kevin Reed
The Israeli military, with the backing of the Biden administration, has targeted hospitals and medical staff for missile strikes in Gaza over the past 24 hours. On Friday, Israel carried out an airstrike on an ambulance at the gate of Al Shifa hospital, killing 15 people and injuring 60 others, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. The strike near the hospital, located in the neighborhood of North Rimal in Gaza City, was confirmed by the Israeli government, which claimed the ambulance was being “used by a Hamas terrorist cell.” The Israeli allegation was “rejected by Health Ministry spokesmen.”
The Palestine Red Crescent Society issued a statement condemning the bombing of the ambulance convoy. The statement said, “Upon the arrival of Palestine Red Crescent society’s ambulance (Mercedes 3-1242-55) at the hospital gate to unload the injured (Najwa Toutah, 35 years old, shrapnel in the chest and leg, in an ICU condition), who was destined for Rafah Crossing to receive the required medical treatment in Egyptian hospitals, the vehicle was struck by a missile fired by the Israeli forces, only at a distance of about two meters from the hospital gate.”
The New York Times reported that “an explosion” occurred near the hospital at 4:30 p.m. local time on Friday. The Israeli strike was carried out after a spokesman from the Palestinian Health Ministry announced at a news conference that a convoy carrying “a large number of injured people” would be heading south on the coastal road of Al Rasheed near the Rafah border crossing with Egypt.
A graphic video at the scene at the gate of the Al Shifa hospital was posted on Twitter/X showing the death and destruction from the airstrike.
https://twitter.com/muhammadshehad2/status/1720454684031283647
The post by Al Jazeera journalist Muhammad Shehada included the following description: “Israeli just bombed the main gate of al-Shifa medical compound where over 30,000 refugees are sheltering. Dozens killed & wounded; literal pools of blood everywhere! Multiple ambulances were damaged as they attempted to transport the critically wounded to Rafah.”
Speaking after the attack, Ashraf al-Qudra told the press that the convoy had left the hospital and made its way to a nearby roundabout when it was hit by an airstrike. The Times reported that al-Qudra said, “The convoy turned back, and when it got back to the entrance of Al Shifa, it was hit again.”
The Health Ministry and international aid groups say Al Shifa hospital is running out of fuel and has curtailed services amid the cutoff of electricity and fuel by Israel. Doctors have reported that large numbers of people have been wounded in airstrikes and are being treated without enough medicine and supplies.
In addition to the strike on the Al Shifa medical facility, Al Jazeera reported that Israel also struck the Indonesian Hospital in Bait Lahia located in the North Gaza Governorate. The report said people in the area were combing through the rubble using their cell phones as torches. The report also said, “Large plumes of smoke could be seen in the evening sky as small fires had broken out amid the mounds of debris.”
Al Jazeera also reported an air raid in the vicinity of the al-Quds hospital in the Tel al-Hawa area of Gaza City. A post on Twitter/X said that Israeli jets targeted the hospital and that there were “several casualties.” The al-Quds facility is providing shelter and basic needs for 14,000 people, mainly women and children.
The Palestine Chronicle reported on Friday that Israel struck the Osama Ben Zaid school on Friday afternoon, killing 20 people and injuring dozens of others. The school was being used to house displaced people whose homes have been destroyed by the war.
Numerous media outlets are reporting that Israeli forces have surrounded Gaza City on three sides and are operating within the city, fighting in close combat. In a televised statement, Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi, the Israel Defence Forces chief of staff, said Israeli forces “are in the heart of northern Gaza, operating in Gaza City, surrounding it.”
The siege of Gaza City is the latest in the ethnic cleansing operation of the Zionist state against Palestinians which has so far killed more than 9,200 people, mostly women and children, and injured at least 32,000 others. The death toll in Gaza is horrific and is without precedent in the history of Israeli violence against Palestinians, recalling the crimes of the Nazis in World War II.
Well aware that the Palestinian death toll will climb dramatically in the coming days, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was dispatched to Israel on Friday for the purpose of backing the genocide and covering up the scale of the crimes being committed.
The global charity Oxfam issued a statement on Friday saying it was “gravely concerned for the lives of around 500,000 Palestinians, alongside any of the more than 200 Israeli and other hostages, currently trapped in a ‘siege within a siege’ in northern Gaza.”
The Oxfam statement also said, “Israel’s decision to deprive civilians in Gaza of items essential to their survival such as food, water, fuel, medicines, and other aid amounts to collective punishment and a violation of international humanitarian law.”
On Friday, the World Health Organization (WHO) also released a statement saying that women, children and newborn infants are “bearing the burden of the escalation of hostilities in the occupied Palestinian territory.”
The WHO statement went on to say, “As of 3 November, according to Ministry of Health data, 2,326 women and 3,760 children have been killed in the Gaza Strip, representing 67% of all casualties, while thousands more have been injured. This means that 420 children are killed or injured every day, some of them only a few months old.”
The WHO said that there are an estimated 50,000 pregnant women in Gaza with more than 180 giving birth every day. The statement goes on, “These women are unable to access the emergency obstetric services they need to give birth safely and care for their newborns. With 14 hospitals and 45 primary health care centers closed, some women are having to give birth in shelters, in their homes, in the streets amid rubble, or in overwhelmed healthcare facilities, where sanitation is worsening, and the risk of infection and medical complications is on the rise.”
The WHO statement reports that over half of the population of Gaza is being sheltered at UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) facilities “in dire conditions, with inadequate water and food supplies, which is causing hunger and malnutrition, dehydration and the spread of waterborne diseases.”
https://countercurrents.org/2023/11/israeli-military-bombs-hospitals-ambulance-convoys-and-schools/
Daily Sabah - November 3, 2023
Israel hit 4 Gaza schools-turned-shelters run by UN, killing 23
At least 23 people were killed under 24 hours as Israel targeted four schools being used as shelters in the Gaza Strip, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said late Thursday.
The four "schools-turned-shelters" have served as temporary homes for some 20,000 people, who have been displaced by the nearly four weeks of relentless attacks by Israeli forces on the densely populated Palestinian enclave.
At least 20 people were killed and five were wounded at a shelter school at the Jabalia refugee camp, the largest in the Gaza Strip, two days after massive bombardments in the area, UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini said in a news release.
At least 195 people were killed in Jabalia on Tuesday and Wednesday, according to the Gazan media office.
Earlier Thursday, another shelter school in the north of the Gaza Strip was also damaged. One child was reportedly killed.
Further south, two schools-turned-shelters in the al Bureij Refugee Camp were also hit, the UNRWA said. Two people were reportedly killed and 31 were wounded.
"Since the start of the war on Oct. 7, nearly 50 UNRWA buildings and assets have been impacted, with some being directly hit," Lazzarini said.
Those buildings are being used as shelters and currently hosting around 700,000 people.
One of the victims was a young Palestinian refugee, who was also a UNRWA staff member, named Mai Ibaid.
She was "a bright software developer in her mid-20s with physical disabilities," Lazzarini said. "She was displaced from her home and killed in the Jabalia Refugee Camp with members of her family."
Ibaid was one of 72 UNRWA staffers killed since Oct. 7, marking the highest number of U.N. aid workers killed in a conflict in such a short time, the agency said.
"How many more?" Lazzarini wrote. "How much more grief and suffering? A humanitarian cease-fire is overdue for the sake of humanity."
https://www.dailysabah.com/world/mid-east/israel-hit-4-gaza-schools-turned-shelters-run-by-un-killing-23
Daily Sabah - November 4, 2023
Erdogan: Türkiye will bring Israel’s war crimes to ICC
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he "crossed out" Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and that Türkiye will file a complaint with the International Criminal Court (ICC) over the country's war crimes and human rights violations in Gaza.
The embattled premier "is no longer someone we can talk to; we have crossed him out," Erdoğan told reporters on Friday aboard the presidential plane returning from Kazakhstan, where he attended the Organization of Turkic States summit.
"I said something in my speech at the Palestine Rally. I announced that we would support initiatives that would bring Israel's human rights violations and war crimes to the ICC. Our relevant authorities, especially our Foreign Ministry, will carry out this work," the president added.
He said that Netanyahu has lost the support of Israeli citizens and he wants to garner support for massacres through religious rhetoric.
"What the Torah is he talking about?" Erdoğan said about Netanyahu's recent remarks on Amalek, the ancient nation described in the sacred book as a staunch enemy of the Israelites.
"Don't the Ten Commandments include 'Thou shalt not kill' as an order?" he questioned.
What Netanyahu is doing is "purely public relations, a populist approach," Erdoğan further said.
"The Israeli administration systematically usurps Palestinians' homes, streets, workplaces and living spaces," he said, adding that Israel does not "grant them the right to live."
"The occupation has become widespread after invaders who they call 'settlers' were placed into the homes of Palestinians. They want to justify the war crimes committed by the Israeli army with religious rhetoric," Erdoğan said.
Erdoğan also said Ankara "is ready to act as a guarantor country for Gaza" after clashes, reiterating Türkiye's support for the Gazan people amid Israel's ongoing aggression.
Erdoğan criticizes the EU and the global community for turning a blind eye to Israel's attacks
The global community and the EU have turned a blind eye to Israel's attacks to destroy Gaza's health infrastructure, leaving infants and civilians for dead, Erdoğan said.
Accusing the EU of displaying a "very strange and inconsistent role," Erdoğan said that the EU "did not and could not put forward a fair approach."
"Pay attention to who is currently on Israel's side and who is also left out of the diplomatic processes in the Russia-Ukraine war. (It is) the European Union."
"Our trust in the EU has been shattered," he added.
"The EU administration must first think carefully about the issue of trust in international law and the universal values they mention at every opportunity. While hospitals are being hit, civilians are being killed in refugee camps and Israel is spewing death into places of worship, schools and marketplaces, they have to explain where they stand," Erdoğan said.
"What does the EU administration propose?" he asked. "To pave the way for the complete occupation of Palestinian lands by Israel and to end the existence of Palestine?"
The president also emphasized that "it is the time to defend human life and the right to live."
The Israeli army has widened its air and ground attacks on the Gaza Strip, which has been under relentless airstrikes since the surprise offensive by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7.
Ankara has floated a guarantorship model for the ongoing conflict where both Israel and Palestine would have guarantor countries, namely Saudi Arabia or Türkiye, as well as Western nations experienced in mediation.
Türkiye has also sent 10 planeloads of humanitarian aid to Gaza, which Erdoğan assured would continue “so long as conditions allow.”
Humanitarian aid has only been trickling into the blockaded city through Egypt’s Rafah border crossing, which the U.N. and human rights organizations have warned would “be nowhere nearly enough.”
At least 9,488 Palestinians, including 3,900 children, have been killed in Israeli attacks since then, while the Israeli death toll has topped 1,500, according to official figures.
Basic supplies are running low for Gaza's 2.3 million residents due to the Israeli siege, in addition to the large number of casualties and displacements.
https://www.dailysabah.com/politics/diplomacy/turkiye-erased-netanyahu-will-bring-israels-war-crimes-to-icc
Countercurrent – November 4, 2023
The Gaza genocide: 75 years in brief
By Tom Suarez
For 75 years, Israel has been terrorizing Gaza, attacking and bombing the very people it ethnically cleansed from their homes in 1948. When finally on 7 October the Gaza concentration camp blew wide open, the ‘West’ feigned outrage — and blamed Gaza. Herewith a crash-course for the media and US presidents…
What is Gaza?
● Gaza is an ancient region of Palestine. But the world now knows it as the Gaza strip, a specific area severed from the rest of Palestine by Israel’s acquisition of territory by force.
Who are its people?
● Although Gaza has been home to Palestinians since ancient times, most of Gaza’s people today are originally from land now under Israeli control, ethnically cleansed by Israel because they are not Jewish. Israel continues to block them from returning home for that singular reason, sealing the “strip” as a ghetto for non-Jews.
Certainly they can at least get to the West Bank to escape the carnage?
● No. Already in 1948, Israel began shooting Palestinians attempting to cross from Gaza to the West Bank. In 1967 Israel created bantustans out of the Palestinian land it seized in the Six Day War, and assigned all non-Jews ID cards for one bantustan or another.
But today this has to do with Hamas, a terrorist organization
● The word ‘terrorist’ has lost all meaning in political parlance. Terrorism is deliberate violence against civilians to achieve a political end — precisely the tactic Israel was born by, and continues to exist by. Palestinian violence, terror or not, justifiable in means or not, is in self-defense against Israeli terror.
● Israel uses terror to achieve its goals because those very goals constitute crimes against humanity. Palestinian goals are those of human rights, equality, and freedom, but we, the ‘international community’, have for 75 years denied them any conventional means of defense, while empowering their tormentors.
● Hamas’ breach of the Gaza ‘fence’ on October 7 was not in itself an act of terror — as the elected government responsible for the Palestinians’ security, it had the very obligation to breach the concentration camp walls.
But Hamas killed 1400 Israelis, took 200 hostages, and committed atrocities
● Hamas’ capturing or killing of Israeli soldiers enforcing the concentration camp is legitimate self-defense. Hamas’ killing of civilians is not. But if we are to be reduced to argument by body count, even just a single Israeli massacre against Gaza (2014) killed twice as many civilians, and the US Congress applauded it.
● The “1400” figure is repeated despite substantial evidence that the IDF, not Hamas, was responsible for many of those deaths, whether through indiscriminate fire or because of the so-called ‘Hannibal Directive’ in which Israel deliberately eliminates captives to avoid hostages.
● Hamas did indeed take civilian hostages. Yet Israel holds at any time five-to-ten thousand Palestinian kidnapped civilians, many of them children; but instead of calling them hostages, calls them ‘prisoners’, and we go along with it.
● As regards Hamas atrocities, surely Israel would have documented them? Forty beheaded babies and not even a photograph for war crimes trials? We have instead only words parroted by the media and US president. This is not to say that atrocities could not have occurred; yet the few survivors whose accounts have been made public speak instead of being well-treated, even respectfully treated, despite the inherently terrifying situation.
Antisemitism is through the roof
● It is an offense against common decency — and indeed against Jewish identity — that the cloud of antisemitism is raised to smokescreen genocide. Contrary to the spin of US politicians, Hamas did not attack Israel because it hated Jews. This exploitation of antisemitism to cover Israel’s ongoing crimes should be condemned, not obeyed.
● Ironically, those bigots who indeed blame ‘the Jews’ for the carnage against Gaza are merely taking Israel at its word — that Israel acts in the name of Jews, as Jews.
● The organizations supplying the ever-rising antisemitism figures repeated by the media use a fictitious definition of antisemitism (IHRA) that was specifically engineered to smear voices critical of Israel as antisemitic. Even my pointing this out adds another tick to their tally.
There is no answer to this ‘conflict’
● There has always been an answer: the end of apartheid, equal rights for everyone river-to-sea in a secular state. Israel blocked this in 1947, and continues to block it today, because the end of apartheid means the end of Israel. That is and always has been the cause of these decades of misery.
● Thus the end to this 75-year catastrophe lies entirely in the hands of Israel and its benefactors. There are no ‘two sides’ to this. No Palestinian has ever occupied Israeli land, placed Israelis under apartheid, ethnically cleansed Israelis, or blocked Israelis from going home or getting medical treatment or going to school or pursuing their dreams. The present horror is not the result of evolutionary events, but of the singular goal of the Zionist movement for well over a century: a messianic state based on racial supremacy and ‘purity’, achievable only through the dehumanization and elimination of another people.
Tom Suárez is a London-based historical researcher as well as a professional Juilliard-trained violinist and composer. A former West Bank resident, his books include three works on the history of cartography, and four on Palestine, most recently “Palestine Hijacked ﾖ how Zionism forged an apartheid state from river to sea”.
https://countercurrents.org/2023/11/the-gaza-genocide-75-years-in-brief/
An Open Letter to President Biden
By Dr. Habib Siddiqui
Mr. President,
More than 20 years ago, Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old American peace activist, was killed in Rafah by an American-made, Israeli-owned Caterpillar bulldozer. Her crime: she protested a demolition campaign by the occupying Israeli government that destroyed over a thousand in the Gaza Strip.
In a letter sent to her family from Gaza, Corrie described the Palestinian suffering she had witnessed. "No amount of reading, attendance at conferences, documentary viewing and word-of-mouth could have prepared me for the reality of the situation here," she wrote. "You just can't imagine it unless you see it."
In another letter she wrote, "I'm witnessing this chronic, insidious genocide and I'm really scared, and questioning my fundamental belief in the goodness of human nature."
Poor Corrie, she did not realize that she herself would soon be a martyr – marked for extermination by the apartheid, colonial-settler statecraft. As expected, the ensuing internal Israeli military investigation cleared the bulldozer driver of any fault, and the ruling judge decided that Israel could not be held liable because the bulldozer was engaged in a “combat operation.”
The next twenty years have witnessed not only the demolition of tens of thousands of homes, but also major genocidal crimes against the Palestinian people over and over again (what is termed ‘mowing the grass’ operation by the apartheid regime), by the same murderous and barbaric statecraft that has no respect for human lives. Thanks to the moral bankruptcy of the West, in general, and the US and the UK, in particular, Israel behaves like a rogue state that is above the international law.
The latest genocidal orgy in the Occupied Palestine, esp. in Gaza, has once again shown the utter savagery and evil side of the Netanyahu government and the western complicity for such horrific crimes against humanity. In Israeli calculus, every Palestinian is a terrorist who does not deserve living alive. And the sad story is, it is our hard-earned US dollars that are paying the bills for those arms and ammunitions used by the IDF to commit war crimes.
The death toll of the Palestinian civilians inside Gaza in less than a month has already surpassed those who died in Ukraine in its 18-month-long war with Russia. They are pulverized, shattered, and blown into pieces. By the way, a stark 70% of the victims are women and children. As of Friday, November 3, 2023, some 40,000 residential units have been destroyed by the IDF. Even the churches, mosques, schools, colleges, universities, utility centers, hospitals, clinics, ambulances and refugee shelters and camps are not off-limits. Nor are the UN-run offices, schools, and hospitals safe from Israel’s barbarism. As a result, more than 70 UN employees (highest ever in a conflict zone) have been killed by the IDF. There is not a single place, including the southern Gaza and Rafah border that is safe from Israel’s brutal attack from land, sea, and air.
Rather than stopping the funding for Israel, your administration has bolstered its coffer. Do the Palestinian lives matter to you? How much blood must the Palestinians shed before you stop rewarding a murderous regime?
What Netanyahu’s government is doing is pure evil. Israel cannot abuse the international laws regarding the ‘right of self-defense’ against people in occupied territories. Only a delusional mind can afford to see ‘no evil’ and ignore such obvious heinous crimes of our ‘reliable ally’ in the Middle East! It is high time to change the course and say enough is enough. Do not let the tail wag the dog.
The entire world is crying out for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. It is the USA, excuse my bluntness, which is behaving like a bully that is allowing the mass slaughter of the Palestinians to continue with no end in sight. They are seeing firsthand your administration’s regrettable double-standards vis-à-vis the Ukraine Crisis, which is contributing to a serious erosion of public trust in you. You cannot preach about human rights, dignity and democracy around the globe while giving a carte blanche to an apartheid regime that treats Palestinians as children of a lesser god. Apartheid system is the worst crime known to humankind. Please, do not reward it.
Whether you like it or not, Mr. President, your naked approval of Israeli war crimes inside Gaza has made you a partner-in-crime of genocide. You have lost credibility not only in the Global South and within the broader UN, but also within the progressives and swing voters here inside America. Please, visit any major university campus to see how most young Americans feel about Israel’s genocidal crimes against the Palestinians. Listen to the voices of the protesters who have been rallying in all the major US cities. Do not be surprised to find that many of the vocal critics of your pro-Israeli policies are Jewish Americans. AIPAC does not speak on their behalf anymore. Please, consider talking to Jewish American academics like Norman Finkelstein and Noam Chomsky to get an objective and more balanced perspective on the Palestinian question.
I am not surprised that Secretary Blinken’s latest trip to Israel has failed. Thanks to the ‘Amen Corner’ in the Capitol Hill, and decades of pampering plus protective shielding offered by our US government in the UN, the ‘little’ rascal Israel has graduated to becoming an obscenely arrogant, purely evil, savage, monster that has the now the audacity to say 'no' to your plea for a ‘humanitarian pause’, let alone a ceasefire that is badly needed now in Gaza.
Mr. President, do you recall, what late Secretary James Baker III, had said in June 1990 in comments directed to the Israeli government? “The phone number (for the White House switchboard) is 202-456-1414. When you’re serious about this, call us,” Baker said. If the new government, led by Yitzhak Shamir, which included some of Israel’s most hawkish politicians, were to put unacceptable conditions for Palestinian participation in the talks, “there won’t be any dialogue, there won’t be any peace,” Baker said bluntly. The United States could not get the talks going unless Israel showed willingness.
Mr. President, Tony Blinken is no Jim Baker. Please, find a Jim Baker in your administration to demand an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. If diplomacy will not do the tricks, cut down all the supports that Israel now enjoys. Israel has been an ill-conceived investment anyway that has made the USA isolated in our globe. Do not waste the veto power in the UNSC to justify and sanitize Israeli war crimes.
It is said that an uncouth hog needs whipping and not carrots! Such tough measures will help revive your credibility and spare you from being called to the Hague. Otherwise, even if you manage to dodge such a verdict in the ICC, please, be assured that history will judge you very harshly as one who financed mass murder and aided genocidal crimes of the apartheid state of Israel. And you can say, Sayonara to the next election.
The Pathology of Crisis in Palestine and the Recipe of Relentless War
By Firoz Mahboob Kamal
The British colonialism: the father of the crisis
British imperialism is the father of the current crisis in Palestine. The colonial British occupiers fathered the crisis with the Balfour Declaration on Nov. 2, 1917. On that day, Arthur James Balfour, the British foreign secretary, wrote the following letter to Baron Lionel Walter Rothschild detailing the government’s support for a Jewish nation in Palestine.
“Dear Lord Rothschild,
I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet. ‘His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.’
I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.
Yours sincerely,
Arthur James Balfour”
In later days, Winston Churchill, who was the colonial administrator of Britain in 1922, also explained Britain’s colonial aims as follows: “I insist upon loyalty and the good faith of England to the Jews, to which I attach the most enormous importance, because we gained great advantages in the war. We did not adopt Zionism entirely out of altruistic love for starting a Zionist colony: it was a matter of great importance to this country. It was a potent factor on public opinion in America, and we are bound by honor, and I think upon the merits, to push this thing as far as we can.” (Source: Rick Richman’s book, “And None Shall Make Them Afraid: Eight Stories of the Modern State of Israel.”
While giving testimony to Peel Commission in 1937on the Arab revolt against British rule, Churchill said: “I do not agree that the dog in a manger has the final right to the manger even though he may have lain there for a very long time. I do not admit that right. I do not admit, for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America or the black people of Australia. I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher-grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place.”
What could be the more exact expression of extreme white supremacism than this above piece of Churchill’s view? He compared the Arabs as the dog lying in a manger. A wolf never condemns another wolf for its brutality. So the current British Government cherishes the same old colonial legacy; hence give full support to the Israeli colonisers and warcrimininals.
The USA: the foster father of the illicit British child
After the demise of the British colonial rule in Palestine, the USA appeared in the scene as the foster father of Israel -the illicit child of British colonialism. Edward Said – a Palestinian American scholar, rightly blamed the US for reproducing Europe’s old colonial habits in the arena of world politics. The British colonial legacy survives in its unconditional support for Israel. Israel and the USA now stand together against the rest of the world. As a result, the world looks de facto divided into two axises: the US-led axis of evil that wants the genocidal war to continue against the Palestinians and the axis of peace loving countries that voted for an immediate ceasefire in the recent US General Council resolution. Because of the USA’s persistent opposition, the peace looks far distant.
The USA claims to be the leader of the democratic world. But it has denied the survival rights of millions, let alone democratic rights. The USA has committed the worst genocidal war crimes plus massive destruction of physical infrastructures in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria during its illegal occupation. In recent history, no other country in the world has been so genocidal as the USA. It is the only country that could even drop nuclear bombs on two Japanese cities. Now it sponsors and supports economically, militarily and politically the most genocidal war criminals against the defenceless Palestinians.
Since democracy brings electoral victory for the Islamists, the USA and its allies stand as the worst enemy of democracy in Muslims countries -especially in the Arab world. So the US supported a military coup in Egypt to remove Islamist Dr. Mohammad Morsi - the first democratically elected President of that country. The US committed the same crime in Pakistan. The US government instigated the Pakistan Army to deseat Imran Khan -the democratically elected Prime Minister. Moreover, all the murderous tyrant rulers of the Middle East could sustain and snatch the democratic rights of the people only because of US protection.
Transshipment of a European problem to Palestine
The Jewish people were considered incompatible with the Christians since their arrival to this Christian continent of Europe. In almost all European countries, the Jews are not allowed to live in the midst of the Christian people. They were allowed only to live in concentration camps like ghettoes completely secluded from the common people. Along with ghettoisation, anti-Jew genocide was enedemic in almost all European countries. The countries like Russia, Ukraine, Germany, England, France, Spain are notorious for such anti-Jew genocides. The German Nazi leader Adolf Hitler exacerbated the genocidal cleansing of the Jews to an industrial scale by establishing scores of gas chambers.
History gives the testimony that the Jews enjoyed full security and liberty only in Muslim countries. Unlike Europe, the USA and Canada, the word anti-semitism is unheard in the Muslim World. Jews never lived in any ghetto in any of the Muslim countries. Mutual respect and trust were so great that when the Muslims and Jews in Spain faced genocidal cleansing, the Jews,too, wished to leave Spain along with the Muslim to Muslim lands. This is why a huge Jewish settlement is found in countries like Morocco, Tunisia and Egypt.
But the British were much more clever than the Germans and other Europeans. Instead of putting the Jews into gas chambers, they planned for a full transshipment of them to another continent. Firstly, they thought to put them in a secluded area in Uganda, the Caribbean Islands or Madagascar. But the plan didn’t work. The Jews didn’t find any religious inspiration in it. Later on, Palestine was selected for the ultimate homeland for the Jews. The British occupied Palestine in 1917; the Jews were less than 8 percent prior to the occupation. Then a massive migration of Jews from all over the world was engineered; in 1948, they became 36 percent of the population. The club of imperialists called the League of Nations gave 56 percent of the land to the Jews. But Israel never ceased to expand; now it occupies 78 percent of Palestine. In the remaining 22 percent, Israel has established more than 100 colonies for half a million Jewish settlers. Now, Israel is very close to capturing the whole West Bank. The Israeli Army is now very busy driving the Palestinians out of Gaza for its full annexation.
James Baldwin rightly understoods the pathology of the Middle East crisis. He wrote about the colonial underpinnings of the crisis: “The state of Israel was not created for the salvation of the Jews; it was created for the salvation of the Western interests. … The Palestinians have been paying for the British colonial policy of ‘divide and rule’ and for Europe’s guilty Christian conscience for more than thirty years.”
A recipe for more more wars
One can’t make peace with robbers and killers. The Israelis have proven to be persistent robbers of Palestinian lands and killers of innocent civilians. As per a report of Gaza’s Health Ministry, Israel has already killed 9, 488 people; of them 3, 900 are children. By relentless bombing Israel has displaced half of the Gaz’s population. Israel continues its policy of killing and destruction.
For peace, it also needs to undo the past crimes. Otherwise crimes will breed further crimes. In 1948, Israel forced about 700, 000 people to leave their homes. About 500 villages were destroyed. These are huge war crimes by international law. The international law also gives the solemn right to the evicted Palestinians to return to their homes. But Israel refuses to abide by international law. Rather, it has framed laws to obstruct their return.
International law does not allow settlement colonies in the occupied lands. But Israel continues to build more settlement colonies and increase the number of the implanted Jewish population in the occupied West Bank. Israel thus shows total disregard of international law. And Israel has powerful sponsors like the USA, the EU and UK to commit further war crimes and further violation of the international laws. With such persistent war crimes and such violation of law, how can one expect peace in Palestine? It can only work as a perfect recipe for more wars and more war crimes.
How peace flourished in Ottoman Palestine: A story of coexistence?
Palestine, which yearns for peace and stability for over a century, saw its longest period of peace during the 401 years of Ottoman rule, from the conquest of Jerusalem in 1516 to the dawn of the British Mandate in 1917. But how was that possible?
By AYSE BETUL AYTEKIN
As Israel relentlessly pounds Gaza with high explosives, while continuing to impose a brutal occupation in the West Bank and legislating more divisive laws in Israel proper people across the world can be heard asking — why is the history of the region so very soaked in blood? Perhaps, this is because of a general lack of historical knowledge, or because of a long-running campaign in the Western media, in which aspects of history are deliberately elided.
In hindsight, the troubles for Palestine began when, in 1918, the Ottoman Empire was forced to cede the territory to the League of Nations, who handed it over for the British to administer as a Mandate. As it was later revealed, the British and the French had other ideas, having already secretly signed the Sykes-Picot Agreement in 1916 and publicly announced the Balfour Declaration in 1917.
What unfolded afterwards is well-known. Less known is what existed before. In other words, a continuous, 401-year-long rule of the Ottoman Empire — a period marked by peace, harmonious coexistence and flourishing of local culture.
For the Ottomans, Palestine’s importance stemmed from its historical capital Jerusalem, which is regarded as Islam’s third holiest city after Mecca and Medina. For the Ottoman dynasty, which already held the Islamic Caliphate, the stewardship of these lands was viewed as a sacred duty.
And yet, given Jerusalem’s position as sacred to the two other Abrahamic religions, it never tried to disturb the harmony that existed between believers of different religions who lived in the Holy Lands.
Raja Shehadeh, a Ramallah-based Palestinian lawyer, writer and co-founder of the award-winning Palestinian human rights organisation Al-Haq, reiterated this understanding to TRT World.
He has decided to trace his Ottoman uncle's footsteps and delve into the historical landscape of Ottoman Palestine, perhaps with the hope of embalming pain with memory. Through his literary work, A Rift in Time, published in 1997, he captures the once-desirable Ottoman identity, offering readers a profound insight into life during the era.
“Ottoman Palestine holds great significance towards understanding Palestinian history and identity. It was a time when the three monotheistic religions coexisted without conflict,” he says.
Ottoman arrival in Palestine
When the Ottoman ruler Selim I, famously known as Selim the Resolute, conquered the regions that now make up modern-day Syria and Palestine in the 16th century, the Levant had already endured multiple turmoils.
Before their defeat by the legendary Ayyubid Sultan Salahuddin al Ayyubi in 1187, Crusaders from Europe had repeatedly invaded Palestine and massacred a significant portion of the Muslim population.
After the Battle of Marj Dabiq, during which Sultan Selim conquered Jerusalem and the surrounding Palestinian territories from the Mamluks, a reconstruction process unfolded in this historic region. Palestine, divided into multiple administrative provinces, experienced a remarkable 401-year-long period of stability, enabled by the unity and harmony of its diverse society.
Travels with ‘Ottoman uncle’
Najib Nassar, Raja Shehadeh’s great-uncle, was a Christian Palestinian who lived in the late 19th and early 20th century Palestine, just before the British Mandate started. He had rejected all other identities and insisted on defining himself as “Ottoman”.
Over a century later, Najib’s journey enables us to escape the Occupation through our imagination “into a better, more peaceful time of open borders that has all become so distant from the present confining reality,” Shehadeh says.
Uncle Najib was a persistent advocate of the Ottoman presence in his homeland, even during the three years or more he spent evading Ottoman soldiers due to his vocal opposition to the Empire's involvement in World War I. Through it all, he never wavered in his commitment to his "Ottomanness".
What motivated Najib's strong attachment to the Ottoman identity? Understanding this can shed light on why diverse communities in Ottoman Palestine shared similar feelings.
A fatherly state
Preserving harmony for Palestine's multi-religious population resulted from the Ottoman Empire's determination not to pursue colonisation in the region.
“The Ottomans may have needed reforms, of course, but ultimately, it was a multi-ethnic regime that never attempted to colonise the region,” Shehadeh says in A Rift in Time, voicing his uncle.
The coexistence stemmed from the Ottoman administrative mechanism known as the "millet system", aptly described as the "talisman" of societal harmony by Mim Kemal Oke, historian and professor of International Relations at Istanbul Ticaret University.
The term "millet", commonly defined as a "religious community", was employed by the Ottomans to represent non-Muslim religious communities.
The central authority didn’t categorise the minority groups based on their ethnic backgrounds. Rather, they were organised according to their religious affiliations. Through a structured series of negotiations with the leaders of these religious communities, the millet system emerged as a successful example of non-territorial autonomy.
The Empire governed various religious minority groups under a single rule and played a reconciliatory role among them, as Professor Oke tells TRT World. This was an inherent result of the State's paternalistic governance approach, overseeing and coordinating interactions among different groups.
The central authority recognised various religious groups, such as the Greek Orthodox, Armenian, Catholic and Protestant denominations among Christians, granting them the autonomy to appoint their leaders, manage their internal affairs, preserve their language, maintain independent courts and practise religious beliefs. Members of these communities often occupied prominent roles in government and pursued various economic and professional endeavours.
As historian Beshara B. Doumani also notes, up until the late 19th century, the people of Palestine experienced a significant level of self-governance. By the time the sun set on the Ottoman era, the 1917 Balfour Declaration was offering Jews exclusive political rights to establish a "national home". In contrast, non-Jews, who comprised 90% of the population then, were assured only of civil and religious rights.
The mosaic
The historical impact of the self-governance of the minority communities in Ottoman Palestine could potentially change the way we interpret the region's history, emphasising diversity rather than uniformity.
The centuries-long Ottoman rule provided Palestinian lands "a distinct cultural flavour, mythology and historical memory to each village, town and city, and, at a larger level, to clusters of villages and entire regions,” Prof Doumani says.
Just like Najib Nassar, the vast mosaic of the Empire's subjects were holding tight to their cultural heritages, which seems to have made it easier for them to maintain their loyalty to the State.
What Raja, the author of more than a dozen books on Palestinian heritage, found during his research into Najib’s memory, was that the Christian identity was strong among his uncle’s contemporaries too. “They found no contradiction between being Christian and Ottoman and felt that their rights and freedom to practise their religion were protected. They also felt they could participate as Christians in political life without restraints,” he says.
A fatherly state
Preserving harmony for Palestine's multi-religious population resulted from the Ottoman Empire's determination not to pursue colonisation in the region.
“The Ottomans may have needed reforms, of course, but ultimately, it was a multi-ethnic regime that never attempted to colonise the region,” Shehadeh says in A Rift in Time, voicing his uncle.
The coexistence stemmed from the Ottoman administrative mechanism known as the "millet system", aptly described as the "talisman" of societal harmony by Mim Kemal Oke, historian and professor of International Relations at Istanbul Ticaret University.
The term "millet", commonly defined as a "religious community", was employed by the Ottomans to represent non-Muslim religious communities.
The central authority didn’t categorise the minority groups based on their ethnic backgrounds. Rather, they were organised according to their religious affiliations. Through a structured series of negotiations with the leaders of these religious communities, the millet system emerged as a successful example of non-territorial autonomy.
The Empire governed various religious minority groups under a single rule and played a reconciliatory role among them, as Professor Oke tells TRT World. This was an inherent result of the State's paternalistic governance approach, overseeing and coordinating interactions among different groups.
The central authority recognised various religious groups, such as the Greek Orthodox, Armenian, Catholic and Protestant denominations among Christians, granting them the autonomy to appoint their leaders, manage their internal affairs, preserve their language, maintain independent courts and practise religious beliefs. Members of these communities often occupied prominent roles in government and pursued various economic and professional endeavours.
As historian Beshara B. Doumani also notes, up until the late 19th century, the people of Palestine experienced a significant level of self-governance. By the time the sun set on the Ottoman era, the 1917 Balfour Declaration was offering Jews exclusive political rights to establish a "national home". In contrast, non-Jews, who comprised 90% of the population then, were assured only of civil and religious rights.
The mosaic
The historical impact of the self-governance of the minority communities in Ottoman Palestine could potentially change the way we interpret the region's history, emphasising diversity rather than uniformity.
The centuries-long Ottoman rule provided Palestinian lands "a distinct cultural flavour, mythology and historical memory to each village, town and city, and, at a larger level, to clusters of villages and entire regions,” Prof Doumani says.
Just like Najib Nassar, the vast mosaic of the Empire's subjects were holding tight to their cultural heritages, which seems to have made it easier for them to maintain their loyalty to the State.
What Raja, the author of more than a dozen books on Palestinian heritage, found during his research into Najib’s memory, was that the Christian identity was strong among his uncle’s contemporaries too. “They found no contradiction between being Christian and Ottoman and felt that their rights and freedom to practise their religion were protected. They also felt they could participate as Christians in political life without restraints,” he says.
Abraham's unity
The Muslim population of Palestine, on the other hand, primarily owed their loyalty to the central authority in Istanbul, given that the Ottoman Sultan held the role of the Caliph, the head of the Muslim community worldwide. They perceived themselves as citizens rather than mere subjects of the Empire, and this overarching Ottoman identity took precedence over narrower ethnic affiliations, according to Prof Oke.
Similar to various characteristics in the region, this too was destined to evolve, influenced by the rise of nationalism in the 19th century in other parts of the world. It was followed by the emergence of Arab nationalism across Ottoman territories in the 20th century.
Today, the Ottoman practice of giving unique laws applicable to each religious group is still followed by most countries in the Middle East, the Ramallah-based author explains.
“Yet the kind and extent of coexistence prevalent in the Ottoman era is no longer possible, mainly because of the politicisation of religion, which had not been the case then,” he adds.
The enduring harmonious spirit still resonates to this day through an inscription at the Jaffa gate of Jerusalem's old city, placed there by Suleiman I, famously known as "Suleiman the Magnificent". It reads, "There is no God but Allah, and Abraham is His friend." This statement serves to unite believers of all three Abrahamic religions, as they all revere Abraham as a prominent figure.
The historical realities that contrast with today’s occupied Palestine mean, for Shehadeh, that “Ottoman times are looked back upon with nostalgia and yearning for the time when there were no borders between the states created by Western imperialists after World War I.”
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The Journal of America Team:
Editor in chief:
Abdus Sattar Ghazali
Senior Editor:
Prof. Arthur Scott
Special Correspondent
Maryam Turab
