Now Can We Believe Them? A Palestinian Commentator Affirms What Zionist Jews Have been Saying All Along
The refusal of Christian peace activists in the U.S. to take Jewish and Israeli testimony about the Muslim mistreatment of Christians in the Middle East seriously is truly a thing to behold. The testimony of American and Israeli Jews about the suffering of Christians in the Middle East is discounted because it is interpreted as an attempt to affirm the legitimacy of a Jewish state in the Middle East and undermine the legitimacy of the cause of Palestinian nationalism. As written previously on this blog, “Apparently, when a Zionist Jew hears a tree fall in the forest, it doesn’t make a sound peace and human rights activists in the West want to hear.”
Maybe, they’ll listen to ‘Abd Al-Nasser Al-Najjar, columnist for the Palestinian daily, Al-Ayyam. According to a MEMRI translation of his Oct. 25, 2008 column, Al-Najjar has addressed the issue in a much more forthright manner than Sabeel or its supporters in the West. Here is part of what he wrote:
Christians are being persecuted not only in Iraq, but in most Arab countries, regardless of their numbers there. They are subjected to every possible kind of discrimination, as well as expulsion. The problem is that it is not only Arab officials who are remaining silent [in the face of these crimes] – [they do so] because their primitive mentality is centered on the cult of the ruler – but, alarmingly, so are Arab intellectuals, the elites, non-government organizations, and leaders of the private sector. All these groups look on at these unprecedented [acts of] folly without apprehending the danger with which these crimes are fraught.
…
“Furthermore, there has been an attempt to marginalize Christian culture in Palestine, even though it is rich and deeply rooted [there]. This began with [accusations] of unbelief [against Christians] – a move that ultimately harmed Palestinian society as a whole…
“Despite all the injustices [against the Christians], no one has seen or heard of any constructive action to curb it and to [defend] the Christians’ rights – whether by the elites, by any of the three branches (executive, legislative, and judiciary), by non-government organizations, or even by the political factions themselves. [Such action should have been forthcoming] not out of kindness and compassion, but [due to] regarding Palestinian Christians as indigenous to this land, and [therefore] no different from us, with the same rights and obligations [as Muslims].
If Arab Muslims can speak honestly these issues, then why can’t Christians in the West speak in the same forthright manner about these issues?
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