Who are you against Israel or Palestine?
First off, I want to start by addressing Shaherbano’s comment on Muslims being the oppressors for 1500 years. Although there are a lot of examples of “Muslim” kings doing genocide against their own people, it doesn’t mean that all Muslims behave this way.
Second, she claims that all Palestinian leaders are terrorists. Even if this is her opinion, I don’t think that the innocent civilian women and children that are being slaughtered by the IDF are terrorists. However, I am against Israels’ slaughtering of women and children does not mean that I am pro Hamas. I am also against the fact that Hamas fires rockets on Israeli territory. Additionally, I am against the unjust Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands as well as the treatment of the Palestinians by the Israeli government. Israel does not treat these people like humans. They make Palestinians walk through scanners to enter any decent part of Israel. They brand them like cattle and dehumanize them. Many innocent Palestinians belong to no country and can exercise absolutely no voting rights in Israel. http://www.ifamericansknew.org/
In this Telegraph story it is very clear that I would stand with the Israelis who are protesting against their own government and against the fascists who are celebrating the murder of Gazan children, clearly it is hate that we should stand against:
“There is no school tomorrow; there are no children left in Gaza,” chanted the right-wing extremists gathered opposite Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square on Saturday night, waving Israeli flags and shaking their fingers in the air.
As the the cries of “I hate all the Arabs” and “Gaza is a cemetery” intensified, some of the protesters tried to accost the participants in one of the country’s biggest anti-war demonstrations this year.
“Go protest in Gaza!” they shouted at the thousands spread all over Tel Aviv’s main protest square, in a demonstration that dwarfed the extremists’ riot.
In one corner of the square, just meters away from those calling for the continuation of the war, dozens of tea light candles were set up as a border around the youths crouched inside. Quietly, they lit and placed candles around photographs of both Palestinians and Israelis killed in the war so far.
Another one of Shaherbano’s points is we have enough of our own problems and there are bigger problems out there so we should not focus on Palestine. I am against any and all oppression. No oppression is too insignificant to stand against. It only takes one’s voice to stand up against oppression, and I think that we can say enough words to stand up against the oppression in Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, and Palestine all in the time span of 10 minutes. She is implying that our resources are limited and the fact is that they are not. All Mateen Haider was doing was using his voice to stand up for the oppressed Palestinians and he claimed that he is doing so because of someone he admires. This is perfectly okay and I don’t see why he is being so severely criticized for it.
The fact that Shias survived throughout history through silence or “Taqiyya” is true. However, many Shia’s today don’t have a fear of death. For example, I’m currently writing this in the United States, where I have the freedom to speak through my first amendment right. It doesn’t make sense to continue my silence if I can speak out against oppression without a threat. On top of that, it should be the decision of the individual if he wants to speak out against oppression, not the strategy backed by Shaherbano.