Frankfurter: Identity, Ideology and Iconoclasm!

Submitted by dhimmi no more (United States), Aug 31, 2020 at 06:35

You wrote:

>"Palestinians' as a name is not Semitic: so how does that work?

Identity in the ancient as well as late antique Middle East and even today is very fluid but very potent. Milad Hanna or ميلاد حنا (D 2012) he was an Egyptian intellectual and wrote his book: الاعمدة ال٧ للشخصية المصرية or "The 7 Pillars of the Egyptian Identity":

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13445171

Milad Hanna examines the various layers of civilization as well as geography and languages that shaped today's Egypt and its identity. He examines the 4 civilizations that influenced the Egyptian identity of today: Pharaonic, Greco-Roman, Coptic, and Islamic. He also examines the geographical elements influencing the Egyptian identity of today and he includes: Egypt is part of Africa, the Mediterranean world as well as the so called "Arab world"

These pillars of civilizations belong to just about every ethnic/religious/linguistic group/nation in the Middle East back then and now

Take the case of the Yazidis: They live mostly in Syria and Iraq. Their primary language is Kurdish but they are not Kurds, as well as Arabic but they are not Arabs. They follow a very ancient pre-Islamic religion. It is not Islam or Christianity or Judaism. They are not Asiatics or Arabs. However, they very much belong to the Middle Eastern mosaic

Last, the Druze leader Walid Jumblat said: There is a place for everyone in the Middle East but not for all ambitions (echoes of Bernard Lewis' The Middle Eastern mosaic)

Who are we to tell others what they really are!

PS: Frankfurter: Identity, Ideology and Iconoclasm see "Religion in Roman Egypt"

BTW: I found a translation of Milad Hanna's book available at Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/seven-pillars-Egyptian-identity/dp/9770139971/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&qid=1598867696&refinements=p_27%3AMILAD+Hanna&s=books&sr=1-2&text=MILAD+Hanna

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