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What Others Are Saying:
"Gosline and Aldeeb have taken the incomprehensible mindset of Islam and laid it out for us in the most logical fashion. The sources are all in Arabic and other foreign languages revealing scrupulous research. This was a major scholarly undertaking and one of the most timely studies of our age."
Dr. Lester Ness
Prof. of Near Eastern Studies
"[Muslims in the West] is the most thoroughly researched study on this subject ever published. It is as spell binding as it is terrifying! All of a sudden 911 made sense.
I think it should be required reading for every student of comparative religion, international relations or international law."
Dr. Faruk Al-Rawi
Former Director of Antiquities, Iraq
and Assistant to Sadam Hussain
"This balanced and compelling study, based on freshly synthesized scholarship, spotlights the issues tearing our modern Islamic states apart and opens the way for a greater understanding between Muslims and non-Muslims, Palestinians and Jews, east and west."
Mohammud Tiab
Professor of Islamic Studies
Sohag University, Egypt
"If the Palestinians and the Jews paid attention to the wisdom in these pages, the fighting would finally end, and there would be lasting peace in the Middle East. It is not surprising that Dr. Aldeeb initiated this study, in light of his origins (as a Christian Palestinian). By definition, he is not a Muslim, and therefore open to originate dialogue. In this work he calls a cat 'a cat'."
Guy Hennebelle
Director of Panoramiques Magazine
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Backgrounder
Jihad & PC: Religious War Mandate �
Why is a Muslim is in the West always called by faith to be in a perpetual state of war?
Even though a Muslim can accomplish his religious duties, in the Land of Disbelief (the West), it is preferable that he emigrates toward the Land of Islam. But where is this "Land of Islam" in the modern world?
Relying on the authority of Malik (d. 795), Ibn-Rushd (d. 1126), imam of the Great Mosque of Cordoba and grandfather of Averroes, the obligation of migration is maintained until the day of resurrection.
Many contemporary Muslim extremists believe they are quickening the end of this age by what they are doing. Those converted to Islam in the Land of Disbelief must immigrate to the Land of Islam so Islamic norms
may be applied to them.
For a stronger reason, a Muslim cannot travel to the Land of Disbelief for trade or other purposes, since the laws of Disbelief will be applied to him, unless he wants to ransom a Muslim captive.
If he goes to the Land of Disbelief willingly, without constraint, he cannot preside over prayer and his legal testimony is rejected. Ibn-Rushd urges Muslim authorities to establish controls on roads so no Muslim can
travel to the Land of Disbelief, especially if he is transporting forbidden commodities, which could strengthen the enemy against Muslims. In application of this migration doctrine, Muslims traditionally left countries
reconqored by Christians.
So in 1091, the Christian reconquest of Sicily was achieved after an Islamic occupation of more than 270 years. A large number of Muslims left the island and found refuge on the other side of the Mediterranean.
Imam Al-Mazari, from Mazara (in Sicily; d. 1141, in North Africa) called to Muslims living in Sicily not to remain in the Land of Disbelief. The imams of our era are calling all Muslims to leave the West or fight for Islam
in any way they can.
The war rages on, whether or not we will admit it.
PC advocates assert that if we learn to accept Islam and provide a tolerant environment for Islam, the problem will disappear. That is far from the case. Islam, by definition, can not tolerate co-existence with any other
belief structure. This assumption is in error.
There are three ways that a Muslim is permitted to reside in the West, the realm of unbelievers:
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Sojourn in an enemy country for an imperative reason.
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Voluntary sojourn in ignorance of the fact that the sojourn is forbidden.
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Sojourn in an enemy territory hoping to snatch it from the occupying force and return it to Muslims, or hoping to lead the infidels on the straight way, or, at least, to divert them from any heresy.
With the capitulation of Toledo in 1085, most Muslims left the city. Those who remained could safeguard their mode of life and their propriety, their habitual residencies, as well as fiscal regime and religious freedom by paying tribute.
These Muslims were despised by those who emigrated and by those who had not been conquered. They were called ahl al-dajn, or mudajjan, words used to qualify the tamed or domestic animals by opposition with free or wild animals.
They became known in Spanish as mud�jar. However, the tolerance of the Christian kings of Spain toward their subjects, Jews as well as Muslims, did not last. Many Muslims converted to Christianity, but continued to live their faith secretly, exposing themselves to the fury of the Inquisition.
They were called Moriscos. This situation ended when it was decided to expel them, like the Jews before them, in 1492. The expulsion was concluded by 1610.
The Moriscos under the Christian authority hid their religion by resorting to dissimulation (al-taqiyyah) as permitted by the Koran:
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Believers never ally themselves with the disbelievers, instead of the believers. Whoever does this is exiled from GOD. Exempted are those who are forced to do this to avoid persecution (3:28).
Those who disbelieve in God, after having acquired faith, and become fully content with disbelief, have incurred wrath from God. The only ones to be excused are those who are forced to profess disbelief, while their hearts are full of faith (16:106).
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Dissimulation consists in saying or showing the opposite of what one believes in reality to save oneself or others from an eminent danger. It is admitted by both Sunnite and Shiite jurists.
Legitimating such an attitude, a fatwa (religious decision) of mufti Ahmad Ibn-Jumaira, dated December 1504, gave precise regulations to fit their hostile milieu.
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Thus if Christians obliged them to insult the Prophet Muhammad: they should pronounce his name as Hamed, as Christians do, and think not of the messenger of God but of Satan or of a Jew called Muhammad. If they are forced to go to Church at the time of Islamic prayer: they will be dispensed of doing the later, and the worship will be considered as the Koranic prescription of prayer toward Mecca. If they are prevented from doing their prayers during the day: they should do them at night. The ritual ablution could also be replaced according to the circumstances: they can plunge in the sea, or rub the body with a clean substance, soil or wood. If they are obliged to drink wine or to eat pork: they may, but knowing it is an impure act and observe a mental reserve.
If they are forced to renounce their faith: they should try to be evasive; if they are pressed: they should inwardly deny what they were obliged to say.
This permission to lie to save one's faith is still practiced by all Muslims in the West.
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MORE ANSWERS THAN QUESTIONS �
Shel Gosline's and Sami Aldeeb's book, Muslims in the West provides a vivid picture of the Muslim world view and how it is completely at odds with Jeffersonian democracy.
What do you think about the American response to the attack of Sept 11th, 2001, and the onging "War against Terrorism"?
I think that the United States missed a good opportunity to do a conscience examination. They avoided carefully asking why they are now hated in the Muslim world and what they could do to avoid such hate.
They preferred to answer to the attacks with strength. However, the true name of Ben Laden, is "Misery and Injustice".
And the United States must fight against these two factors. If you caught malaria, it does not serve any good to run after the mosquito which pricked you; you should rather know where does it come from, why there are swamps and how one can purify them.
What is the nature of this injustice?
This injustice that reigns is in Middle East, with its center in Palestine, since the presumed guilty comes from there. Oussama Ben Laden himself makes reference to facts that deserve discussion.
I think about the American military presence in many countries of the region, which is a form of colonialism, about the support of the United States, for a long time now, to various dictatorships, and about the drama that is daily unfolding over the Palestinians.
Isn't Oussama Ben Laden a fanatic who should be brought before justice?
He is certainly a fanatic. The Kamikazes themselves were certainly victims of brainwashing.
But the first duty of the United States is to maintain justice on their side. This may not be sufficient, but it is absolutely necessary and thus far they are failing miserably!
As long as they do not accomplish it, they are responsible in the drama that has touched them.
One fact is well known: people are open to be much more easily manipulated in situations without an exit and when they feel desperate. Why else would anyone strap bombs to themself to do off and kill others.
All the leaders in this tragic drama we are witnessing are asking the wrong questions. It is not a war of good defenseless people being destroyed against insane terrorist... rather there is evil and good on both sides.
Why is Muslims in the West an important book?
I saw an issue being studiously ignored in the western press, a topic that no Muslim would be willing to address and one which few non-Muslims understand. We have a real chance here to end this bloodshed, if the perspectives of this book are taken to heart.
It is time for vilification to end on all sides. The world is too small and there are too many weapons of mass destruction available. We have been lulled into a false sense of security since the end of the Cold War. We have forgotten what war can bring about.
We are dealing with political forces of titanic proportion. OUr only hope is to reach the mass of people who make of this and other democracies to awaken them to the realities of what is unfolding. Writing this book is an act of faith in the free press and democracy.
After what happened to the United States isn't it right to ask for justice.
What is 'justice'? Is it "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth?" Then go kill the same number of people as died on September 11th. If justice is about bringing about a lasting peace, with security and prosperity for all, then a counterattack anywhere will fail no matter how successful it may seem to be militarily.
In the case that occupies us, there are two possible ways to bring about justice. The first consists of dragging the guilty before courts as done by the Allied Powers following World War II. (We are approaching the 60th anniversary of that event... there is still much controversy over its success or failure.)
The problem is that it is a biased justice: it judges others by its own standards; losers only are recognized as guilty, whereas winners are always right.
It ensues uneasiness, a confusion of values that can only be harmful.
The second manner to proceed consists in creating reconciliation commissions, as in South Africa. Crimes of apartheid were very serious. When Nelson Mandela obtained power, he had good reason to want to judge persons responsible before the whole world.
And yet, he did not, he attacked the evil at its roots and henceforth he is even appreciated by Whites. The United States should have done the same, to name wise men, to encourage freedom of speech.
Instead, they are condemning all objectors to silence, including journalists that dare criticize their politics. They are condemning anyone who questions the validity of "Homeland Security", or even dares to ask why it has to be so powerful; powerful beyond the limits of constitutional law.
Their attitude is not going to serve morals, or society. It may even be the first step in the move away from democracy to imperial dictatorship. Remember Rome... it was also a democracy once. I would not want to live to see the day when democracy in America collapses like the World Trade Center, but it seems that we are heading in that direction at a fearful pace.
Ten Little Known Facts About Islam
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Contrary to the Shiites, Sunnites admit the marriage of a Muslim with a non-Muslim monotheist (Jewish or Christian). �
If a non-Muslim woman married with a non-Muslim man becomes Muslim, her marriage is dissolved, except if her husband accepts to follow her in her new religion.
A Muslim woman can only marry a Muslim man. The non-Muslim man, whatever is his religion, that wants to marry a Muslim woman, must previously convert to Islam.
The Shiites allow a marriage of a Muslim man only with a Muslim woman.
A person who abandons Islam cannot contract a marriage, being either punished of death or confinement to life, or considered at least as dead. If the apostasy intervenes after the marriage, this one is dissolved. If a Christian converts to Islam to marry a Muslim woman, and comes back to his religion of origin thereafter, he is considered as apostate. Therefore, his marriage is dissolved immediately.
The same happens to a Muslim husband who adopts positions judged contrary to the Islamic religion.
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How do current events in Afghanistan....
No justice, no peace: for a Canaanite Republic
"The worse of miseries is one which causes laughter", says an Arab proverb. I will add that the worse of miseries is not to know laughter in misery. Allow me therefore some overflow of language to relieve my deep sadness while thinking about my homeland of origin. To arrive at wisdom, a man often needs to reach limits of lunacy. I start with being located. From where am I? How is my homeland called? Today, my adopted homeland is called Switzerland. As for my homeland of origin, it is located somewhere between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River. I hesitate to pronounce its name and I want to rename it so much:
- "Israel"? This country is recognized by the United Nations, is not recognized by (all) countries that surround it. The name itself causes hate and contempt among Arabs and Muslims. I do not enter in the motivations.
- "Palestine"? This is the only country recognized by the countries that surround Israel, but not by the United Nations or Israel, also causing hate and contempt among fundamentalist Jews and Christians. Every time I write a reader's letter (signed Christian of Palestinian origin) in the Swiss newspapers, I receive one or several letters of these fundamentalists telling me that Palestine is a myth that has no existence in history and that Palestinians came from an island somewhere in the Mediterranean. Here also I do not enter in the motivations.
It is yet necessary to a name this plot of ground large as a handkerchief. I decide therefore, not to annoy anyone, by using the name of Canaan. It is the name that God, according to the Bible, used to designate this land while speaking to Abraham (mythic or real, carnal or spiritual father of Jews, Christians and Muslims):
I will give to you, and to your offspring after you, the land where you are now an alien, all the land of Canaan, for a perpetual holding (Genesis 17:8).
By using the Canaan name, I wish also to make justice to the ancient inhabitants of this land, of which existed some representatives in the time of Jesus. The Gospel according to Matthew reports that a Canaanite woman came to Jesus asking him humbly to heal her daughter "tormented by a demon". Jesus granted her prayer and praised her faith, "Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish!" Matthew adds, "And her daughter was healed instantly" (Matthew 15:21-28). Sometimes, I start dreaming with those Jews who believe in the arrival of the Messiah, just to ask him a miracle, one alone: to heal all inhabitants of the land of Canaan tormented by the demon of violence these days.
One day or the other, inhabitants of this plot of ground should meet again to speak, to eat, to drink and to rebuild this ravaged country. They should then get along on a name that does not recall them anymore their silliness of the past and should not wake up the demon of the past. I propose them here and now to call their country "Canaan", a neutral name, without spite and without bad memories. They will be called then among nations "the Canaanites".
But how to arrive at this utopian day whereas Jews, Christians and Muslims who populate Canaan tear one another to pieces, threaten themselves with atomic and chemical bombs, delighting in the death of others and glorifying their martyrs that sacrifice their life to kill and wound the greatest number of the other clan?
In the days of the apartheid regime of South African, not a long time ago, some twisted minds proposed as a solution of the problems between Blacks and Whites, to paint the Blacks in white, or the Whites in black. Some cans of paint and that's it! One could propose today a similar solution for Jews, Christians and Muslims in Canaan: two of these groups should convert to the religion of the third. No matter which. All the same.
The solution of painting cans has not been adopted in South Africa. They preferred the solution of the ballot box, the way of democracy. Instead of creating courts to judge criminals of war as Whites did after the Second World War, ex-Yugoslavia war and Rwanda war, the South Africans preferred commissions of conciliation. Blacks, the majority, chose recourse to their ancestral wisdom, i.e. the discussion of their problems under the palaver tree. Mali knows a similar wise system to solve problems: people meet in a hut with a very low roof. They must remain sitting to discuss. If one of them sets up to use his hands against another, he hits his head against the roof. Blacks and Whites discuss in South Africa. All is not rosy, but good will is there. The Whites are always white, and Blacks are always black, but they decided to work elbow to elbow, to construct their future together. Instead of changing the color of their skin with paint, they decided to change their hearts. In spite of years of jail and persecution, President Mandela knew how to inspire fellow citizens with a sense of justice. Today numerous White South-Africans give him homage.
Justice. Changing the heart. Working together elbow to elbow instead of destroying each other. These may be the passwords to solve problems between inhabitants of Canaan: Jews, Muslims and Christians. We are in this respect against the idea of sharing the country of Canaan. All as we are against the apartheid between inhabitants of this country as it reigns today. Unity makes strength. Division provokes hatred and frustration.
About fifteen years ago, I took a tourist bus in Rome to get a general view of it. At one stop, I saw on the portal of a Church engraved in the stone this sentence in Latin: Fructus justitiae pax (Peace will be the fruit of justice). Coming from a country torn by war, this sentence unsettled me. I wanted to know the origin. After researches, I discovered that it is a word from the Prophet-poet Isaiah (32:17) who lived in the country of Canaan 2700 years ago. I wish to give here the whole passage that is exceptionally beautiful:
Justice will dwell in the wilderness,
and righteousness abide in the fruitful field.
Peace will be the fruit of justice,
and the result of justice, quietness and trust forever (Isaiah 32:16-17).
Follow my consideration: a sentence of Isaiah who states, "Peace is the fruit of justice" engraved on the portal of a Church in Rome, capital of the Romans whose strategists said: Si vis pacem, para bellum (If you want peace, prepare for war). What contrast! My emotion was to its roof and today again when I think about it, I have the thrill. Immediately after, I founded in Switzerland with friends an association called the Association for the reconstruction of Emmaus, whose all documents carry the enrolment, "Peace will be the fruit of justice" (Isaiah 32:17). My friends and I wanted to make of this village a symbol of justice and peace in the country of Canaan.
Emmaus is that famous village on the road of which the resurrected Christ met two of his disciples. Invited to spend the night together, they only recognized him after having shared bread with him (Luke 24:13-35). The sharing of bread, gesture of solidarity between humans! And not the sharing of a country, a gesture of hate and silliness. Jews occupied this village in 1967, destroyed it completely with bulldozers and expelled its inhabitants. On the site of this village they established a picnic place called Park Canada. Trees replaced humans. My friends and I wanted to help inhabitants of this village to return, in a gesture of justice and solidarity. But Jews still turn a deaf ear to the demand of its inhabitants1. As with this village, Jews destroyed 384 other villages since the creation of Israel, according to Jewish maps2. Inhabitants of these destroyed villages became refugees of which a good part live in 61 concentration camps:
13 in Lebanon, 10 in Syria, 10 in Jordan, 20 in West-Bank and 8 in Gaza Strip, therefore some kilometers from their lands and their destroyed houses. Jews refuse their return whereas they welcome their coreligionists from the United States, Russia, West Europe, Ethiopia, India and other countries and install them on lands and houses of these refugees whose only crime is not being Jews!
Let us return to the story of painting cans. During the previous centuries, thousands of people converted to Judaism. All these blue-eyed blonds are not the sons and daughters of the Semitic Abraham unless he assiduously frequented whorehouses of Eastern Europe. Today again, one finds conversion to Judaism. One must also add non-Jewish partners in mixed marriages and children of these marriages. This entire beautiful people may claim, according to Israeli law, the "right to return" in the country of Canaan. Once there, they benefit from all social, economic and political advantages of Israeli laws. These advantages are only partially provided for non-Jews who are born in the land of Canaan and have Israeli passport. Their only crime is that they are not Jews, precisely as South African Blacks' crime was not being White. The non-Jews who live in the territories occupied by the Jews in 1967 and the Palestinian refugees living in concentration camps under Jewish occupation or in adjacent countries do not have right to advantages recognized to the "Jewish" Russian, American, Swiss, Polish, Italian, English, Dutch, Ethiopian, French, Germans, Austrian, Australian, Canadian, etc. The only crime of these Palestinians is that they are not Jews, precisely as South African Blacks' crime was not being White. We are therefore confronted with a real racist regime of apartheid, whatever one says. Those who do not consider this regime as racist are either blind or dishonest.
What to do with this racist regime of apartheid based not on skin color, but on religious adherence? There is still the solution of painting cans, which we mentioned above. It is sufficient to find a well-intentioned reformed rabbi to deliver a certificate of Judaism to Christian and Muslim Palestinians. Immediately after, they will join the "Elect People" and have the right to consume "milk and honey" of the country of Canaan with other Jews. Another solution would be to convert all inhabitants of the country to just one faith Judaism, Christianity or Islam, and to make a law that gives them all the same rights.
The solution of conversion, therefore of painting cans, does not seem feasible on a large scale, at present at least, even though some hope may be there. On the Internet one finds a site of Jews converted to Islam called "Jews for Allah." One also finds "Jews for Jesus;" as well as former Christian Russians converted to Judaism, in order to escape Russia. One may recognize them by their uncircumcised penis. Some even get circumcised, exchanging their foreskin for an Israeli passport. Should we pity them?
In the meantime, it is necessary to find another solution. Non-Jewish Palestinians of Canaan, with their Arab brothers or pseudo-brothers had recourse to the United Nations, to Western and other countries to convince the Jews to recognize their rights. They also had recourse to traditional war. Currently, they resort to primitive weapons: stones. Without counting invectives, nothing makes Jews move even one millimeter... whose projects are unknown and fantasy. Ben Gourion said the borders of Israel spread over all lands where an Israeli soldier puts his foot. Some fundamentalist Jews (as well as fundamentalist Christians in the United States and Switzerland) think the borders of the Promised Land should spread from the Euphrates to the Nile. Such would explain the fact that the Israeli embassy in Egypt is located on the other side of the Nile: one cannot put an embassy to a foreign country on ones' own territory! Jews in the country of Canaan can count on their indefectible American and European allies as well as on their atomic weapons to dissuade Arab and Muslim countries and impede them from winning the war. Continual American and British bombing against Iraq aims probably to send a signal to any Arab country that would consider a war against Jews. In a panic, Arab countries are satisfied with sending some money to Palestinians. In the meantime, they provide Jews and their allies the necessary Arab oil to make run their tanks and planes that destroy and sow desolation among non-Jewish inhabitants of Canaan.
But one does not know how long Palestinians will accept to be abused by Jews. The Arab poet Al-Mutanabbi (d. 965) said, "It is necessary to never underestimate a weak one in a quarrel: a mosquito is capable of covering the lion's eye with blood." The Internet edition of the Jerusalem Post of August 14th, 2001 presents information that constitutes a warning in face of the deterioration of the Middle East situation. The information is based on an article of a director of a Palestinian Center in Gaza published by the Palestinian weekly Al-Manar issued in Lebanon. According to this information, Palestinians think seriously about the biologic weapons to counter Jewish military strength. About a hundred experts would be capable of handling and using them. Some bombs toward water resources, beaches, markets and residential centers would do the job, without being easily detected, according to the information in the Jerusalem Post. We are before an apocalyptic script with unpredictable consequences. It will be then Hitler's posthumous victory: the extermination of Jews and non-Jews in the Middle East.
J. S. Schuldhess, an anti-Zionist Jewish Swiss artist, writes that one found hair, bones and shoes of the Jews dead in concentration camps. But their passports, where are they now? He speculates that some Nazi soldiers used these passports to go to Israel under the identity of their Jewish victims, in order to continue Hitler's policy in that region. This would explain, according to him, the presence of an important German community in Israel. Whatever be the fate of the Jewish passports, human foolishness does not limit itself in time or space: one can be a Hitler without being an Aryan, and a Nazi while being Semitic or Pseudo-Semitic. Do you want proofs?
The Bible tells the story of Samson. His enemies, the Philistines, seized him and gouged out his eyes. They brought him down to Gaza, today's famous city manhandled by the Jews, and bound him with bronze shackles; he ground at the mill in the prison. One day, his enemies made a feast in honor of their divinity. They called Samson out of the prison to entertain them. Samson said to the attendant who held him by the hand, "Let me feel the pillars on which the house rests, so that I may lean against them." The house was full of men and women who looked on while Samson performed. Samson grasped the two middle pillars on which the house rested, and he leaned his weight against them. He strained with all his might; and the house fell on all the people who were in it (Judges 16:21-30).
Does this remind you of something? History repeats itself! Is this the prelude of what awaits all the region of the Middle East, if Jews and their allies persist with the present politics? No one in the Middle East is strong enough to insure victory and crush his enemies completely, nor weak enough to be reduced to perpetual slavery. We advance inexorably toward ultimate war and destruction of the entire Middle East. No one will be left unscathed in this next war, all programmed as a delay-action bomb. After the first madman pushes a button, it will be too late to stop him. The country of Canaan, or even the neighboring countries, will become an uninhabitable desert for many centuries. Even lizards will not be able to reside there. Hate on all sides are so strong that dry and green, innocent and guilty, young and old man alike, will end up in smoke and ashes.
The solution of the despair toward which Jews and their allies are pushing Palestinians will bring peace for no one. We need to come quickly out of the gears of war and abandon the Roman strategist principle, "If you want peace, prepare for war", to come back to the principle of the Prophet Isaiah, "Peace will be the fruit of justice" (32:17). Peace requires that one returns most quickly to the table of negotiations and open all files, notably the most delicate, the one concerning refugees and the 385 Palestinian villages destroyed by the Jews. Without a solution to this file, the region will never, never, know peace. It is necessary that Jews stop claiming for themselves the title "Elect People" and accept others as equal human beings, just as Whites of South Africa finally accepted Blacks as human beings. It is necessary to end the present politics of religious apartheid, politics unfortunately sustained by the West, for the same reason as racial apartheid had to end in South Africa. Jews must accept the creation of a new State, regrouping Jews, Christians and Muslims; a State we could call "The Canaan Republic." They must, like the United States or Switzerland, suppress religious borders between the three communities. Separation of 'church' and 'state' must get into effect before there can be peace in the Middle East. In the same time, the three communities must change the legal system concerning family law and create only one law and only one court for all: for Jews, Christians and Muslims, with laws permitting mixed marriages (to mix the bloods) and suppress discrimination against women. Thus one may have a free society. No society can live on two or three levels of law. Again two measures are needed:
- To create mixed schools where Jews, Christians and Muslims study together, the same matters and the two languages: Arabic and Hebrew.
- To suppress religious cemeteries and bury people together, whatever their faith, so that they remember that they are united before life as before death.
In a speech pronounced May 5th, 1991 before the Knesset, the violinist and humanist Yehudi Menuhin said:
Those that live by the sword will perish by the sword, and terror and fear provoke terror and fear. The hate and the contempt are fatally infectious.... One fact is surely abundantly clear, that this devastating way to govern by fear, by contempt of the fundamental dignity of life, this continuous asphyxia of a dependent people should be the last method adopted by those that, themselves, know the horrible significance of it all too well, the unforgettable suffering of such an existence... It is not worthy of my great people, the Jews.
In an interview, Father Elias Chacour, originally of Biram, a village destroyed by the Jews, said:
We are citizens of second zone, yes, if there are zones. I believe in fact there is now only one zone in Israel, the Jewish citizenship zone. There are non-zones, the margin, where non-Jews are tolerated, but not accepted, because Jews do not have a solution to rid themselves of it. Fortunately, there are very few Jews - but they exist - that protest against this segregation. I fear that in a very short time, if Israel does not fundamentally change politics, does not convert to a new political direction, I believe that we will only have the military option to survive here. It cannot make any roots here, because Palestine, since before Abraham, since Melchizedeck, did not accept a conqueror who does not try to make roots. They are not making roots. They are planting hate in the heart of Palestinians. It is necessary to change, if they want to survive with any quality of life in the Middle East.
The authors of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights affirm in the preamble:
It is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law.
This affirmation rejoins the word of the Prophet Isaiah, "Peace will be the fruit of justice" (32:17).
To conclude, if Jews are truly looking for peace in the Middle East, they must conform themselves to the principles of justice instead of persisting in their current policy contrary to human rights. In this regard, they should allow Palestinian refugees to return home and treat non-Jewish Palestinians on an equal footing, irrespective of their religion. Why the fact of being Christian or Muslim makes a Palestinian a candidate for refugee camps, jails, torture, deportation or death? Why?
The day when Christians, Muslims and Jews will be considered by Jews as equal human beings and agree to treat them on equal footing, that day will be the first day of peace in the Middle East. The Middle East has today to choose between justice for all and the extermination of all.
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