I came across this post on Drima's blog. It wasn't the content of the topic that intrigued me but the subsequent discussion between the Israeli commentors.To many of us, the Israelis, each & every single one of them, have been portrayed as cold-blooded monsters, who are not human & who solely live on destroying the others & conquering the world(No offense to the Israeli readers).
I never saw them as more than that & never imagined that they lead normal lives like the rest of us, let alone fall in love & get married.However, this insightful post & the fact that they have cultural differences & internal racism just like the rest of us is fascinating.
We don't recieve much news about their social lives or the difficulties some of them face within the country. Hence,I'm grateful that Drima started such a post & yes, the Zionist govt is insane but just like there are good Muslims & bad ones, the same applies to the Israelis.
I truly & genuinely enjoyed reading their comments & personal stories.I'm astounded by how blinding my misconceptions were & feel ashamed at the unnecessary hate I harboured for all of them.
Some of the IDF's actions make it no less of a criminal than that of the NCP & whoever murders, be it a Muslim, Afghani, Israeli, Chinese, Christian, is immoral.From now on, I won't blame one party & ignore the other.My anger shall be distributed equally:)
Update: You know what the best part is: Something my 15 year old sis said to me.Mind you, she is the queen of our family * mashallah* but being a teen, her priorities revolve around malls & cute guys,lool.Anyway, when I told her about this post, I was surprised at her reaction.She asked me to print it out because she wants to know more about the Jews & feels really bad when she hears prayers targeted against them.I was ecstatic since my sis rarely showed an explicit interest in such issues & given how our schools & the media distort news,I'd happily say that this is one step forward:)
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
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35 comments:
I see your sister is going on your footsteps.. Thats really good..
She's lucky she has a great sister like you..
And bout my side job.. so far so good!! didnt hand it over to my sis yet,, probably next week enshala!
Much love sis!
What Precious said...
Buy your sis a fluffy Raccoon toy and call it Moishe :)
PS
Yes! Hunams are terrible - long live Equal Opportunity Misanthropy! :)
Hipster-
I hope you will catch my post on in response to you on Mideast Youth.
Mashalla about ur sis.. God bless her :)
Thnx to both u & Drima for the eye opener, I -like you- am also very ashamed of my upbringing to view all Israeli's as cold-blooded killers with no compassion or humanity.
There's a few rotten apples in every tree I guess.
It is really larger than I imagined I think: this phenomenon that Israeli's are like cold-blooded killing machines....
It's those stigma's that used to keep people separated and Israel had their fair share in it (clear line between 'us' and 'the enemy' = almost every arabic country) - but luckily enough this virtual encounters and 'travelling all over the world' opens our eyes...
Last summer there was a commercial on israeli tv for a communication company that i thought beautiful and so much reflecting what's going on now in our virtual world without borders, until.............. I saw the clip on youtube and read the comments underneath it, HaHaHaHa - never knew stigma's are also created when they try to suggest positive things.
Anyway this is the clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eyy4vD7Aiew
:D
Tsedek, I agree about that commercial. I loved it at the time, and it also surprised me, because mostly our commercials (like all commercials) tend to be shallow and purely mo'-money oriented.
Anyways, Hipster, live long and prosper, girl. ;)
Precious,sis, Allah ikhaleek.That's all I desire:To have a positive influence on whoever crosses my path.Bless your heart& love ya too:)
Good luck with the job.
lool@ Equal Opportunity Misanthropy & fluffy raccoon.
Thankx bro & if I do buy her one, I'll let her call it by your real name:P
Howie, thankx & will read it asap.
Mahoya, thankx & yea, there's a lot of de-brainwashing & reforming we need to do.
RK, amen & bless you.
Tse, awwwwwwww the commercial is touching irrespective of the comments.At least someone thought about it in such a way.
The discussion was revolutionary-it was as if someone poured cold water over me & put out the fire inside.My doubts & dislike alleviated since I joined the blogosphere but the post erased it completely & left me riddled with immense guilt & shame:)
Speaking of the phenomenon,in Harry Potter movies, Voldemort's name is taboo & they say " He who must be named" when referring to him.That is the impact the word " Israel" has.When the name is put in any context or sentence, it generates a feeling of repugnance. It is the epitome of "evil",looool.
tsk,tsk, & that is only the name:)
"Buy your sis a fluffy Raccoon toy and call it Moishe :)"
Don't! I use the name "Moshe" for the non-existing author of the words of wisdom on my home page:
http://web.mac.com/ajbrehm/iWeb/Home/Wisdom.html
I'm confused.Are you the same German Andrew Brehm?
& don't worry, I shall have it named in Raccoon's real name;)
"I'm confused.Are you the same German Andrew Brehm?"
Yes.
But Raccoon is somebody else, an Israeli, I think.
I am the German Andrew Brehm, living in Ireland. I was in Israel during the last war.
Everything cleared up? :-)
Yea, I know Raccoon but I was confused because you used a different nickname(Leauki)instead of your oft-used full name.
Thankx & your impressive " nationalism" essay still sticks to memory.
Yes, "Leauki" is a name I often use. Incidentally, the nationalism essay is located on my "Citizen Leauki" blog.
The URL I gave above leads to my personal home page and personal blog. There is almost no politics there, although I will move the nationalism essay series there (and clean it up a bit too).
I think you might enjoy my personal blog... :-)
Precious is right of course. Your little sister is lucky.
Hipster,
The average Palestinian and Israeli wants to live peacefully and coexist and move on. The second and third generations are unfortunately suffering due to the huge mistake the world has done by planting Israel on the lands of the Palestinians.
Unless there is justice there will be no peace between the two parties . I have to admit though that the Palestinians daily life and social situation is not to be compared to the Palestinian conditions. It will be very unfair to compare people who live in concentration camp to those who are playing with water guns in Tel Aviv.
I'm only sympathetic to the innocents on both sides that are killed due to violence.
Since Israel claims democracy. It is the role of every Israeli citizen to not vote for war if they don't want war, not to vote to violence if they don't want violence. To vote for the rights of the Palestinians and co-existance otherwise they will never live in Peace.
No nation has given up their land.
"Since Israel claims democracy. It is the role of every Israeli citizen to not vote for war if they don't want war, not to vote to violence if they don't want violence."
And Israelis have consistently done this.
No Israeli politician ever won an election by announcing that he would attack neighbouring countries and destroy them. But Arab politicians score points with such "plans".
Israelis don't want war. But that doesn't mean that Israel will allow its neighbours to invade or throw rockets at Israel whenever they feel like it.
Israel doesn't want violence. But Israelis DO INDEED regard violence AGAINST ISRAEL as VIOLENCE. That might be hard to understand for some, but it is true.
Israel doesn't want violence. But Israel prefers using violence if that works against anti-Israel violence.
Better them than us is what Israel thinks about victims. Better them and us than nobody is what the terrorists think about victims.
If Israel stops the violence the result will simply be dead Jews and a destroyed Israel. That will only change when the Arab nationalists give up trying to kill Jews and destroying Israel.
Andrew,
Denial is a big problem
It will be very unfair to compare people who live in concentration camp to those who are playing with water guns in Tel Aviv.
What is unfair is using unreasonable comparisons. Concentration camps were used to systematically murder people.
There is no such thing in Israel.
Israel left Gaza and what happened. Was there a cessation of violence? We all know the answer. The rockets kept falling and in spite of the ceasefire they keep falling.
Hamas refuses to recognize Israel. They continue to support terrorist attacks. It would be one thing if they could say that they only attacked Israeli soldiers, but they do not. They attack without regard for anyone.
This is a link
to a very powerful video that shows the results of terror.
Watch that and tell me that you would not beg for a very strong response to terror.
It is a terrible situation. Israel is not always right, Israel has made mistakes. But so has every nation.
Lose the double standard. If you truly cry for justice you have to hold Hamas and company accountable for their actions too.
Twosret,Andrew & Jack, thankx for your feedback.
Twosret, the reason I wrote this post is to show how judgemental I was towards the Israeli citizens.There is no reason for me to hate a whole nation for what it's govt is doing.However,like you, I condemn what is being carried out in Palestine & there is no way I can compare the life of an average Palestinian to an average Israeli.
I still want to research the genesis of the conflict & till then, I won't take sides,though I'm more sympathetic towards the Palestinians, till I find the truth on my own.
As Drima said, it is a deadly deadlock.
"As Drima said, it is a deadly deadlock."
That's the point. It is not. Or at least it doesn't have to be.
It's only a deadlock as long as there are Arabs who want to destroy Israel (and kill its inhabitants). There is no "crompromise" that can be found if one side wants to destroy the other.
The so-called "deadlock" would disappear if only the Arab Palestinians would simply stop the attacks. It is that simple.
Israel does NOT profit from this war. Israel has no reason to fight the war except that Israel must defend herself. Israelis do not want to kill Arabs and you will never see demonstrations in Israel where such is demanded and nobody in Israel will ever be punished for not hating Arabs enough.
You will have to realise that there simply isn't a deadlock. It's not two sides hating each other. Israelis and Jews are fairly indifferent towards Arabs and Muslims.
You can try it out. In fact I have proposed this bet to people in the past and nobody, not even those convinced that Jews hate Muslims and that that is the problem, would take me up on it. (Apparently they don't really believe what they themselves say anyway. In fact, I would bet that Twosret would happily choose an Israeli prison over being a prisoner of Arab Palestinians. The ridiculous claim about "Israeli torture prisons" is anti-Semitic nonsense, and Twosret knows that.)
The bet was this:
Walk through an Arab city wearing a T-shirt with an Israeli flag pictured (or any other really obvious Jewish symbol). Tell random people you meet that you support Israel and Judaism and believe that Arab side is to blame for the conflict.
I would, in exchange, walk through a Jewish city in Israel wearing a t-shirt with an Arab nationalist flag pictured, perhaps the "Palestinian" flag. I would tell random people that I support the Arab countries, specifically Syria and "Palestine", and Islam and and believe that the Jewish side is to blame for the conflict.
If Twosret and people like him/her are right, I will land in an Israeli torture prison while my bet opponent would have little trouble.
I am willing to take the risk. I am in fact so confident that I am right with my theory that I have no fear at all; I would only feel uncomfortable for wearing a T-shirt with a flag of people who want to kill me.
Or consider this: Hizbullah hid their weapons in villages and attacked from these villages, drawing fire there. It's obvious that Hizbullah thought that attacking from these civilian villages would help them in their war against Israel. If even Hizbullah believe that civilians are a good defence against Israel, if even Israel's deadliest enemy believes that human shields work against Israel, how bad can Israel be?
You can compare Arabs and Israelis easily. In Palestine both were in the same position in 1947. They just developed differently.
If in 1947 the Arabs in the new state of Israel would have helped defending the country against the immediate invasions (like the Druze and bedouins have!), I don't know what would have happened. But I can blame them for betraying their new country in the hope that they would get a better one (which none of their neighbours managed to do).
hmmm, if I implement your dare in the UAE or Sudan,I might land in prison,loooool, unless, of course, I add the words " Palestine" & " coexistence".
Hipster, walai I disagree. Even if you added the words coexistance together with the Israeli flag, there will still be a significant portion of Sudanese who will probably smack you. To many Israel is evil and is destined to be destroyed.
Andrew, I disagree. It is a deadly deadlock and I'm afraid it will get deadlier as Iran continues on with its agenda. I think we're still far from seeing the day in which Arabs chill out. What the situation is and how you put doesn't matter. What matters is how Arabs perceive the situation to be. As long as the current perception persists, it will remain a deadly deadlock. Like I said before, we need more Sadats and Begins.
BTW I think your dare is an excellent example to describe the reality. In Israel, things like freedom of speech are upheld, even if not completely. People can express their opinions and the society is more matured than in much of the Arab world. If I carry an Israeli flag and wave it in the middle of Khartoum, I'll get beaten up like hell or maybe even killed.
"If Twosret and people like him/her are right, I will land in an Israeli torture prison while my bet opponent would have little trouble."
Hi Andrew, it's been a while :). I suppose I fall into the "people like him/her" category but I actually agree with you that one would have more of a problem walking through an Arab country with an Israeli flag.
I would assume that there are Israelis who do blindly hate and generalize Arabs as a whole...it happens everywhere sadly...but certainly not just Israel.
After 9/11 there was definitely some anger and blind hatred toward the Arab world as a whole by many in the US but the truth is that Americans had the ability to cope. Of course we have more security measures in place these days to try to prevent future terrorist attacks but in the end, we still have our dignity and our freedom (as do Israelis, no?).
You cannot tell me that this is the case in Palestine. Imagine being stripped of your own freedom and dignity. Now how would you feel about those who consciously support the policy that has taken away these basic human rights? So yes I would definitely feel much better about sporting a Palestinian flag in Israel!
"BTW I think your dare is an excellent example to describe the reality. In Israel, things like freedom of speech are upheld, even if not completely. People can express their opinions and the society is more matured than in much of the Arab world. If I carry an Israeli flag and wave it in the middle of Khartoum, I'll get beaten up like hell or maybe even killed."
Drima,
You are very wrong and you don't know anything about Israel. I dare you to walk in the streets of Tel Aviv and wave a Palestinian flag and express your point of view in public that Palestinians deserve Justice and peace.
Good luck you man. This is one of the most simplistic points you ever made. It goes to show that you know nothing about the hate of Isrealis to Arabs.
Hipster,
I agree with you totally. I have to caution you though that learning the truth won't be through some zionist crowd on the internet.
Learning the truth will be by reading a well researched academic opinions from both sides.
Edward Said is one of the leaders from the Palestinian side. Middle Eastern Studies in Berkely issues a great magazine that is very good to read.
Good luck to you althought I think history and the truth won't solve the current problem. Unless the two nations of Israel and Palestine live equally there will be no peace.
Awww, Twosret, how nice of you to spread your brainwashing hate propaganda everywhere.
"
You are very wrong and you don't know anything about Israel. I dare you to walk in the streets of Tel Aviv and wave a Palestinian flag and express your point of view in public that Palestinians deserve Justice and peace."
People do that all the time, you bigoted psychopath. Practically everybody in Israel wants peace for everybody - Israelis and Palestinians alike.
And your brand of "justice" is illegal in Israel. Genocide is not nice.
It's one thing to be mentally ill, Twosret, dear... it's completely another to try and inflict others with your vile disease.
This is the Raccoon, anonymous because I have some sort of Blogger problem.
You don't just have a blogger problem Raccoon don't worry. LOL!
Yea, Drima, true.At best, imprisonment & at worst, decapitated.
Twosret, thankx for the recommendations.Concerning the Zionist crowd, I really did learn some things from them:)
Yes, reading the history won't solve anything but learning the truth is crucial & critical in filtering the lies, assessing the situation & fighting for the right side.This is how the current situation is manifested: Palestinians blaming the Israelis & Israelis blaming the Palestinians.Paradoxically, both sides put up persuasive & reasonable arguments.As my sweet mama says, " the Israelis & Palestinians are cousins, I don't know why they are fighting?"
Raccoon, c'mon, don't you think that " bigoted psycopath & mentally ill" is too much? It's her opinion afterall:)
Amy, thankx for your feedback.
Hipster -
Me and Twos have a long-standing argument, I am afraid. Sorry, it was unfair to bring this fight to your blog.
Please accept my apologies.
*bows*
Hey,bro,no problem:)
Hipster,
Don't worry about The Raccoon he is my little pet :) cute and naughty sometimes :)
Good to hear that:)
"I don't know why they are fighting?"
I know why the Israelis are fighting. But what exactly do the Arabs want?
If they want Israel to leave the occupied territories, all they have to do is WAIT and NOT START FIGHTING when Israel withdraws. It's very easy.
Israel withdrew from southern Lebanon and Gaza. All the respective populations had to do next was live, but they decided to attack Israel instead.
Where is the convincing argument for their actions? What has it brought them? Was there ever a chance that the outcome of their attacks could be better than peace?
I don't know why the Arabs are fighting. Israel leaves those alone who leave Israel alone.
But I know why Israel is fighting. Israel is fighting because there are people who want to destroy her. How can anybody not understand that that would make Israel fight?
The people of Israel have gone through being destroyed once. And they didn't fight back.
But as the Quran predicted, interestingly enough, there won't be a third exile and the people of Israel stand together and do not turn back.
I never understood why Muslims of all people don't understand that.
Does the Quran not say
"And when Moses said to his people: 'O my people, call in remembrance the favour of God unto you, when he produced prophets among you, made you kings, and gave to you what He had not given to any other among the peoples. O my people, enter the Holy Land which God has assigned unto you, and turn not back ignominiously, for then will ye be overthrown, to your own ruin.'"
Does Islam not dictate that Jews must not turn back?
Common sense would imply that Israel fights back when attacked, specifically when attacked by people who want to destroy her.
And the Quran reminds Muslims that G-d commanded the Jews to live in the holy land and not turn back.
What is unclear?
Just visiting for a re-read, but Twosret's following comment kinda made me want to post a reply:
"You are very wrong and you don't know anything about Israel. I dare you to walk in the streets of Tel Aviv and wave a Palestinian flag and express your point of view in public that Palestinians deserve Justice and peace."
People have done this. Many times. Many, many times. More times that I can count. Israeli Arabs and Jews alike. The fact that you are biased to the point of blindness will not make these protests go away. I've seen them many times on various news outlets (and in a couple of cases walked by them).
By the way, I threw as much as a tomato at said Palestinian-flag-waving protesters, I'd most likely get myself arrested.
Please... Twosret... There's a nice person in you, which tends to be covered in a shell of hatred whenever someone mentions the Evil Zionist Regime. You know, the democratic one. The one that has free speech. The one that is accountable. Unlike the various terrorist gangs that vie for who gets to destroy the Palestinians for the next few years.
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