Why the Right of Return Matters to Palestinians
Posted by saifedean on July 16, 2007
I have started writing a column for the 3QuarksDaily website. It’s a really great site and I’m real glad to be writing there. Make sure you check out the site and see the About Us section.
Here is my first article published yesterday, about the Right of Return means to me, with relevance to my grandfather’s land that was usurped by Zionists in 1948; drawing a contrast between demanding that I give it up, and demanding that blacks give up the right to front seats in a bus.
Excerpt:
The way to end racial conflict in the American South was not for Rosa Parks and blacks to give up their rights to the front of the bus and ‘let everyone live in peace’, but by ending the system that denies someone the right to sit in a certain part of a bus depending on their skin color. Similarly, peace in Palestine will not come when Palestinians give up their right to own a piece of land because of the religion to which they were born; but rather, when we abolish the system that assigns plots of lands, houses and villages to people based on what version of god they believe in.
I will never consider there to be peace in Palestine so long as I can visit my grandfather’s house in Atteel and look a few kilometers west to see my land that I can not visit, own, or sell. The day I can reclaim that land, I will visit it once, savor the feeling, and the very next day, I’ll sell my share of it to the highest bidder regardless of their religion, race or ethnicity, and donate the money to an educational institute that will teach the children of Palestine, regardless of their religion, race or ethnicity about the importance of equality and justice, about Rosa Parks, and about how peace could never be achieved on the basis of racist exclusion, whether it be from the front of a bus or from an orange grove.
Read the rest of the article here and make sure to check out the comments section, which has a lively debate developing.
4 Responses to “Why the Right of Return Matters to Palestinians”
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July 16, 2007 at 10:10 pm
Very nice Blog! I couldn’t tell if this is posted here. If not, please help spread the word.
http://attendingtheworld.wordpress.com/not-so-cool-facts-about-israel/
July 18, 2007 at 7:13 am
Great piece, Saif, I read it at 3 Quarks where I’ve just left a comment.
August 9, 2007 at 3:33 pm
Dear Saifedean: In your article on Electronic Intifada you left out one point about European thinking. That is, that supporting the so-called State of Israel is their contribution to compensating the Jewish People for what is called the HOLOCAUST. No European leader would dare risk being called an anti-semite by questioning the legitimacy of the Zionist ethnocracy and conquest. And this results in their accepting the idea that Palestinians should pay for whatever did or did not happen in Poland in World War II. As long as the Zionist heretics hold the sword of Damocles-Holocaustims over the heads of Europeans, they will continue on this insane policy. There is no practical alternative to the Palestinians taking things into their own hands. And God will do the rest! Playing politics with Oslo, even by Hamas, is a total waste of time.
August 9, 2007 at 3:35 pm
And I pray to God that you retake the land of your grandfather! Zionism is not Judaism! The Zionist regime is a heretical outlaw regime that occupies the mind of most people through Holocaustism. Its days are numbered. The Palestinian People must hold on. But playing the Oslo political game is a useless effort!