Under pressure from Zionists, and following its own racist discrimination against Jews, European powers had been challenged to find a way out to address the issue of Jews in Europe. Thus in 1917 the British created a ‘homeland’ for Jews in Palestine in what they call the Balfour Declaration (Google search and educate yourself). By then the First World War was raging in Europe during which Jews were severely persecuted, arrested, detained, looted, raped and killed in various European capitals.
If you do your research you will come to find that over the past 1000 years until 1948, various Europe governments and cities had created numerous laws to either expel Jews out of their cities or countries or restricted them to identified quarters in their cities. From Moscow, Kyiv or Warsaw to Paris or Brussels or Berlin or Rome or London or Lisbon etc.
Knowing the racism and violence they faced from fellow Europeans, a Zionist movement emerged in the 1890s comprising hardcore Jewish radicals who were hellbent on taking Palestine as the home of Jews. Led by an Austrian Jew, Theodor Herzl the movement managed to gain British support in what became the Balfour Declaration.
Fast forward to 1948 when the United Nations, pushed by the United States and the UK passed Resolution 181 in 1947 to create the State of Israel in Palestine. The Resolution states that a portion of Palestine will be taken out to be the new State of Israel. By then Palestine was under control of the British. This was just after the Second World War when millions of Jews were once again subjected to the most gruesome atrocities by Germany and other European countries including France, UK, Netherlands, Italy or Poland, etc. (Do your own research)
When the UK or the UN created the Israeli state at different times on their own, that is in 1917 and 1948 respectively, they never consulted the existing Arab populations who were already living in Palestine or the neighboring Arab countries to determine the nature of the new reality. Indeed that region called Palestine is indigenous to both Arabs and Hebrews who are generally Muslims and Jews respectively. But some Arabs and Hebrews are also Christian or belong to other religions. Therefore these Arab and Hebrew tribes both have a right to live in Palestine and Israel.
What is not right is to bring European citizens or other nationalities to come to settle in Palestine by forcefully removing the indigenous Arab people. Just because a person is a Hebrew or a Jew but is an Argentine citizen or a French or German cannot just appear in Palestine to be given land by removing the Arab indigene from his house or land! This is exactly what the Israeli Zionist government is doing for these foreigners who are called Jewish settlers!
In that light, it is also a misnomer to perceive this conflict as purely religious. The Israeli Zionists and their apartheid government wish to impose their version of the interpretation of the Scriptures to claim that the entire Palestine belongs to only Israel. They wish to claim that there was a dispersion that caused Jews to leave that land and scattered around the world and now they are just coming back. But that land has been occupied by many other tribes and races since the beginning of history including Black People who many historical accounts claim to be the original Hebrews and Jews, hence the original settlers! For example the Prophet Moses was indisputably a Black man.
The trouble in Palestine is caused squarely by European governments and primarily the UK and backed by the US. Western powers, who colonized that entire region for decades, never consulted with the Arabs when they took those heavy, life-changing decisions. They never provided any support to the Palestinians to also build their own viable state alongside the Israeli state. Rather from 1917 to date the West totally ignored and suppressed Palestine while providing full military, political and economic support to Israel to build, sustain and strengthen an apartheid regime at the detriment of the Palestinians.
Consequently the Israeli government which is always led and occupied by anti Palestinian racist bigots feels encouraged to do whatever they want to expand their state at the detriment of the Palestinians. Thus, the Israeli state took it upon itself to grab the lands of Palestinians and hand them over to new Jewish arrivals from anywhere in the world!
This was why immediately after Israel was created in 1948, a war broke out between the Arabs and the new settlers otherwise called Israel. Again, the West came back to support Israel. Then another war broke out in 1967, and once again the West came in defense of Israel. In that war, the UN drew maps to determine the respective territories of both Israel and Palestine.
But ever since, Israel refused to accept these internationally recognized borders but continues to encroach on them as it continues to take Palestinian lands everyday until today. (Do your own research). This is why the official UN name for Palestine is Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) because of Israeli occupation.
Today, Israel has succeeded to pack Palestinians in two tiny spaces in their own land and still encroach on them. These are Gaza and West Bank! (Find out about them). Even though since the 1993 Oslo Talks a two state solution was trumpeted, it still remains a pipe dream. Why? Because the entire Western world, and especially the US and UK are not interested in its implementation because Israeli leaders and people generally do not accept the idea of a Palestinian state. To them, Palestine is non-existent because to them that entire land belongs to the Israelis only and alone.
Gaza is about the size between Banjul and Sukuta to Brikama, and it has a population of 2 million people. It’s like putting the entire population of The Gambia within Brikama to Banjul and this does not even include Brusubi and the rest. Gaza is therefore the most densely populated urban area in the world!
West Bank is a bit bigger with a population of 3 million and already more than 30% of it is also occupied by Israel. Israel has built a very high wall round it. Thus, it means that both Gaza and West Bank are prisons, more so Gaza. Despite the fact that there is no resistance in the West Bank like Hamas in Gaza, still Israeli soldiers constantly kill unarmed civilians in West Bank as they protest. So why should one condemn the armed resistance in Gaza if non-violent resistance in the West Bank could face the same killings by the Israeli Zionist forces?
Yet it is inside the West Bank that Al Aqsa Mosque is located which is the 3rd holiest place for Muslims, more so the Palestinians! Israel illegally controls access to this holy mosque and so it is up to them to decide who enters or not. Any Palestinian who wishes to travel between Gaza and West Bank or outside should get an Israeli permit first.
For even a foreigner like me to enter Gaza or a Palestinian to leave her own Gaza home, one would need a very arduous paperwork over a long period of time! I had occasion once to be in a program with fellow Palestinian activists from Gaza. It took more than 3 months for the activist lady to obtain a permit such that half of the program was finished by the time she got the permit.
Thus, what all this shows is that Israel is running a hardcore apartheid regime in Palestine thanks to the complicity of its Western backers. For example the US Government gives more aid to Israel than to any other nation on earth. It has equipped the Israeli military with the most modern and most sophisticated weapons on earth such as the anti missile iron dome or jet fighters, including nuclear weapons.
Not just that, but western countries, under pressure from Israel seek to even control and deny any open discussion of this conflict, more so any condemnation of Israel. They classify any attempt to hold Israel accountable to be anti Semitic. By their strategy, my this post itself would be classified as anti Semitic because I am criticizing the apartheid system being perpetrated by Israel.
Consequently even western intellectuals, scholars, and politicians are afraid to condemn Israeli occupation and atrocities lest they are accused of anti Semitism which could mean losing business or other opportunities, etc. They stifle freedom of expression about Israel as they seek to impose their own narrative as the only acceptable speech and opinion! Nonsense.
Furthermore, Israel and its western backers decided to classify the entire Palestinian resistance as terrorism. This means that Palestinian groups such as PLO, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Qassam Brigades, etc are all terror groups together with their leaders including the late Yassir Arafat, of blessed memory!
Because of this false anti Semitism propaganda, the Israelis have succeeded to keep everyone not in support of them to stay silent about their crimes and stay away from supporting Palestine! But surely where there’s oppression and occupation there shall by resistance. Do not let them silence you! Never.
We saw how ANC picked up arms to fight apartheid in South Africa yet the West had called Mandela and ANC terrorists. We saw how various resistance groups emerged all over Africa to fight colonialism. We saw how the Vietcong emerged in Vietnam in the 1950s to 70s to fight both French and American occupation forces.
Even in Europe we saw how resistance movements emerged in France or the Netherlands or Belgium and even in UK to fight the German Nazi regime that occupied their lands in the Second World War! Currently there are armed resistance groups in Ukraine fighting Russian invasion and occupation of their lands, and rightly so.
Therefore why wouldn’t Palestinians organize to resist another occupation perpetrated by Israel? Because Israel is empowered by the West we see how even their human rights organizations, scholars, CSOs and media jump into that same dishonest and ignorant narrative that the Palestinian resistance is terrorism. This is false.
Hamas and similar groups are fighting against apartheid and a brutal colonialism in the 21st century! That’s all. They are freedom fighters and not terrorists. The terrorist is Israel and its western backers in their governments, universities, CSOs, media and politics. If Israel remained with the 1967 borders and together with the West accepted the two-state solution proposed in the Oslo Accords, by now there would not have been any violence in Israel or Palestine. Hence the current crisis is the fault of no one but the West and Israel who are perpetrating terrorism in Palestine and Israel. They must be stopped.
As a citizen of the world, do not let oppressors and their backers to overwhelm you with their propaganda by making you believe a lie! Israel and its allies are sophisticated in every sense of the word. They are well equipped with high class media, academia and military with lot of resources such that they can do anything and still make you believe their propaganda.
They use so-called peace talks only to divert, confuse and delay any meaningful attempt to address this tragedy so they can continue to occupy and oppress. Israel is not ready and willing to recognize the rights and dignity of Palestinians. But they hide behind the false claims of anti Semitism and terrorism to demonize Palestinians and to claim that Palestinians don’t want peace!
Do your own research from multiple sources to get to understand what is happening in the world. Don’t be a zombie for anyone. Even if you cannot research, you do have common sense to look and think. So use your common sense.
Ask yourself why would Palestinians challenge a first class military force which can kill them as it likes when they could have just let Israel be so they can also have peace? Are Palestinians stupid or foolish or so dumb that they would just want to have the Israelis kill them like flies?
Remember, apartheid, colonialism and occupation are facts of history in which one foreign power jumps on a people to oppress and exploit them. It has happened all over the world in the past hence it must not be difficult for a sensible person to realise that the same story is unfolding right before our eyes in Palestine today perpetrated by none other than Israel and its western backers, US, UK and the EU.
For this reason the current international system must be dismantled. The United Nations has been rendered useless and outdated by the US, UK, France, Russia and China as the permanent members of the Security Council. These 5 countries together with the EU have demonstrated that they pose the greatest threat to global peace, democracy and human rights. The time is now for the global south and nations with conscience in the West and East to reject the United Nations as it is and demand the creation of a new international system for global peace, justice and equality.
Stop Israel. Now.
Palestine shall be free!
