To Br. Raqib about answer to Moshe

Submitted by Plato (United Arab Emirates), Dec 26, 2006 at 04:28

How come Palestine, which was Jewish/Christian to begin with, became largely Muslim. Wasn't it after it was conquered by the Muslim armies. Or is it the case that the Jews/Christians were driven out and occupied by Arabs. You can of course conveniently claim that the original inhabitants saw the light of Islam and eagerly discarded their old religion. What has happened in Palestine is nothing special Brother Raqib. In history there have been worse injustices committed. Stalin did it. Hitler did it. Turkey did it. Ghengiz Khan did it.Gazni did.Ghori did it. Taimur did it. The White man did it in the Americas, in Australia, New Zealand.

And now, Brother Raqib, do you know who is doing it on a bigger scale than what the Israelis are doing it. Perhaps Darfur has not reached your radar screen yet. How many massacred in just three years. Almost 300,000 at last count.Compare that figure with that of the Palestinians over the last 60 years. And who is doing the massacring. Not the Jews. I hope you know it is the Sudanese who are doing it. I need not tell you what religion they follow. Perhaps you do not know, but the Darfurians are also Muslim. The Sudanese have been killing animists and Christians for decades now without any whimper from anywhere in the Muslim world. And when they began massacring Muslim brothers what you hear are a few whispers here and there prompted by the Western press and governments, not by any Arab or Muslim sheikh, government or AlAzhar.

Why is the Muslim world not screaming as loudly as they do about Palestinians when Muslims kill Muslims. The same silence was heard when Saddam gassed the Kurds and massacred the Shias. The Muslim world is one Ummah and so what happens within it should be swept under the carpet. Massacring people (Banu Quraiza), uprooting whole populations (Banu Nadir, Banu Qaynuka), forcibly converting unbelievers (Meccans)is what is done only by Christians, is perhaps your impression.

Having said all that it must be admitted that what happened to the Palestinians is one of the great injustices of the twentieth century. The Western nations arm-twisted the rest of the world into voting for the creation Israel. But now the deed is done and trying to undo it by by blowing up innocent citizens who had no part in it all over the world will only add to the miseries of everyone. Two wrongs never made a right.

You wrote: "Brother Moshe you can see human sufferings in Palestinians in the time of winter and no home."

I do not know much about the weather conditions in Darfur, but they are suffering too. Brother Raqib your heart must open out to all people in distress not just to your brothers in religion, the Palestinians, Bosnians etc.

You say:".... during that time it was the Islamic Ottoman Empire who allowed the Jews to dwell in their cities with honour." It cannot be disputed that the Jews were subject to some terrible times under Christian dispensation. But when you say the Jews were allowed to dwell in Muslim cities with honour, you are mistaken. They had to live as dhimmies, and you know what that meant. If they were allowed to live in honour in Muslim countries where are all those Jews now. Talk to some Egyptian Copts to know what dhimmidom means. The people of the book had to pay the jiziya tax with willing submission as specifically ordered by the Koran. Also read the Pact of Omar, which is supposedly a model for the treatment of non-muslims living in Muslim countries to see the kind of honourable lives the Jews would have lived. Also there is the matter of the masscre of Jews committed in places like Morocco, Spain when the Muslims thought that the Jews were getting a little uppity. A google or wikipedia search will enlighten you.

Warm regards

Plato

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