Randa Abdel-Fattah, Palestine Human Rights Campaign, speech to 2004 Palm Sunday
The imperialist invasion and occupation of Iraq and Palestine continues because our world has no such thing as an ‘international community’. There is only American global hegemony, which is allowed to pursue a reprehensible imperial agenda because countries like Australia and Britain insist on validating all US and Israeli actions and simultaneously devaluing and effacing Iraqi and Palestinian resistance.
Randa Abdel-Fattah, Palestine Human Rights Campaign
|
Any action by the West, no matter how draconian, illegal, inhumane and hypocritical, can now be placated if it is done in the name of the war on terrorism, not in the name of truth. This is the ugly reality.
And what terrifies me is that in our democracies there is a stifling of voices of resistance. The war on terror is turning us into a censored society, into a totalitarian propaganda machine which is eating away at the integrity of our democracy. We only have to scour the headlines and editorials of our leading newspapers. Or reflect upon Howard's ridiculous public brawl with Mick Keelty. Or listen to Downer and Howard fumble and mumble every time one of their endless lies is exposed.
As John Pilger analysed, "Of all the western democracies, Australia is the most derivative and the most silent. Those who hold up a mirror are not welcome in the media."
Those in the Australian, American and British public who protest against the imperialist invasion of an oil-rich Arab country in a region already tainted by a colonial war in Palestine are accused of supporting terrorism.
We stand here today because we are opposed to terrorism, whether in Bali, Spain, New York, or the terrorism of the American, Australian and British governments, who have more blood on their hands and are the most dangerous threat to world peace.
There is nothing so vile, so despicable, as state sponsored terrorism which is elegantly discussed in parliaments and dressed up as benign and heroic; as morally superior and justified. The worst terrorism is Western hypocrisy because it attacks the very foundations of our nation's conscience, accountability, morals and above all our humanity.
What do we tell our children who watch our elected Parliamentarians support a war based on exposed lies and deceit?
What do we tell our children when they want to study international law? Do we tell them that it disappears into thin air once they leave their classrooms?
What do we tell our children when Howard and his cronies place American self-interest before our nation's interests and welfare?
What do we tell our children about the Orwellian vocabulary of our media when it comes to Israel? How occupation becomes disputed territories. Illegal Jewish settlements become neighbourhoods. Palestinian suicide attacks are reported in an isolated context. Not only is Israel's 35-year illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories deemed irrelevant, to suggest it as a cause is deemed tantamount to supporting suicide bombs. The aggressor is presented as victim, cause as effect, 'wall' as 'fence'.
What do we tell our children who ask why the Palestinians and Iraqis attract the label of terrorists whenever they resolve to die on their feet, rather than live on their knees?
I ask all this because Bush, Howard, Blair, Sharon and the subservient Arab puppets in the Middle East- they are suffocating reason, truth and humanity and leaving our children with no answers.
Where there is injustice there is a right to resist and there is a right to be heard without being demonised. That is why we owe it those whose voices are being silenced, to cry out loudly on their behalf, doing what we can, with what we have, wherever we are.
And so I want to throw out some questions that an Iraqi civilian would ask of Bush, Howard and Blair. I want to tell a story of a Palestinian.
Why is it that I would be allowed to live,
If my veins flowed with oil instead of blood?
Why does your stock exchange prosper?
According to how many of my people's bodies you throw dead in the mud?
Why do world leaders bow and worship you
Even when their citizens are loathe to join your war?
What immense power do you wield,
When being your ally means having no choice but to encourage your weapons to roar?
Why do you define evil?
When it is you who holds a press conference to announce how you will kill those not on your side?
What world do I bring my child in?
A world that pats you on the back when you seek civilians as victims of your genocide?
Why is it said that there is a United Nations
Supposedly concerned for the destruction and death you will,
Why do we have a United Nations?
I think I understand, perhaps because nations must unite in order to kill?
Why was Iraq once your friend?
Given weapons to fight your battles- its peace-time borrowed.
Why do your western partners not realise,
That you will never fail to make your friend of today, your enemy of tomorrow?
Where do I go for protection?
When the dictators of the East and West are accomplices to your crimes
What do the defenseless and weak do?
When even the rich and free are helpless against a few men forging such despicable times?
I am Palestinian
Palestinian air my ancestors and I did first breathe.
I am considered to have no identity
One of the lies you seek to weave.
I am citizenless
Shunned from my rightful place in my country's demography.
I am considered dispensable,
Forced to disappear into geography.
I am exiled
The world's perpetual guest.
I am considered a burden
On the conscience of the West .
I am homeless
Thrown a backpack of memories for a home.
I am considered a nothing amongst millions
And so I feel bitterly alone.
I am bereft of my ancestor's land
Even though I still carry my house's front door key.
I am considered the criminal
When it was you who stole from me.
I am denied return to my birthplace
Apparently undeserving of this human right.
I am considered an instigator of violence
Even when there is every evidence that you started the fight.
I am robbed the right to live
Upon the homeland that bears the deep roots of my family tree.
I am considered unfitting to live
On the soil of my first touch, the land in which I did first see.
I am a prisoner
Of a warden who superimposed itself on my state.
I am considered a terrorist
Whenever I challenge the terror of a nation dictating a people's fate.
I am running
As you target me with your bullet from an overhead plane
I am considered to be numb of any feeling
Even though the theme in my life's narrative is pain.
I am a parent
Of a child harassed at checkpoints with the soldier's barrel of a gun
I am considered to be unworthy of life
My death is explained by 'what's done is done'.
I am all this
Yet you ask me to suppress my tone
I am angry
For all I have is a life without hope and a simple stone.
|
