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Sentinel & Enterprise (Fitchburg, Massachusetts)
August 17, 2011 Wednesday
Ethnic cleansing by any name is immoral
by Don Long is pastor of Faith Christian Church in Fitchburg.
This summer, as 22 of us from the Fitchburg area traveled in Israel,
we were struck by the fact that throughout Israel there are "Arab"
towns and "Jewish" towns existing side by side. No talk in Israel
about "removing the Arabs." Full citizenship rights and opportunities
are given to all Arabs living in Israel. And then we traveled to what
the world calls the "West Bank" -- it is biblically and historically
"Judea and Samaria." We visited many Jewish communities there,
numbering anywhere from hundreds to thousands of residents. And we
wondered why Jews and Arabs cannot likewise live together here? That's
not a question to the Jew -- it's a question to the Arab -- and a
question to the world. The answer is unfortunately quite clear: They
want a nation of their own -- and they want it free from all Jews!
Ethnic cleansing is the removal of an entire ethnic population,
forcing them to leave one territory and move to another. From the
International War Crimes Tribunal, The Hague, in the case against
Slobodan Milosevic, ethnic cleansing was said to be a criminal act and
its executors criminals. In the 1990s this term was widely used in the
press to describe what was taking place in Yugoslavia, where Croatians
were being driven out by Serbians, and likewise Serbians by Croatians.
Ethnic cleansing typically uses intimidation, forced expulsion and/or
killing of an undesired ethnic group, as well as the destruction or
removal of key physical and cultural elements, including places of
worship, cemeteries, works of art and historic buildings. In 1992, the
U.N. General Assembly condemned ethnic cleansing as a crime against
humanity.
So why would the U.N. even consider granting nationhood status to the
Palestinian Authority when that same entity has made it clear that all
the Jewish communities, some 300,000 people, must be removed from
Judea and Samaria? Can you imagine the reaction in the world if the
government of Israel said that in order for a two-state solution to
take place, all of the more than 1 million Arab Muslims living in
Israel must be forced to move to the new Palestinian state? Protests
would erupt around the world; our college campuses would be sites of
protest gatherings; our State Department and president would
immediately condemn such a statement. Yet when Abbas and the
Palestinian Authority very clearly say that all Jews must be removed
-- not a word of condemnation. Where is the moral outrage?
Unfortunately, ethnic cleansing has all too frequently been a part of
human history. The Romans expelled all the Jews from Palestine in A.D.
70. In 1290, King Edward I expelled all Jews from England. In 1492,
King Ferdinand expelled all Jews from Spain. During World War I,
Turkey was responsible for the ethnic cleansing -- some would say
genocide -- of the Armenians. In World War II the Nazi government
began with ethnic cleansing, and ended with genocide in the Holocaust
and the extermination of more than 6 million Jews. During the
partition of India, 5 million Hindus and Sikhs fled from what became
Pakistan into India, and more than 6 million Muslims fled from what
became India into Pakistan. Our own nation was guilty of ethnic
cleansing when in 1830 President Andrew Jackson signed the Indian
Removal Act -- forcing all the Cherokee Indians in the South to be
marched off to tribal lands in the Midwest.
In the years after the nation of Israel was established, more than 1
million Jews were forced to leave their homes in Arab states, so that
most Arab nations are now "Judenrein" -- a reference to Hitler's
attempt to remove all Jews from the population. And now many in the
world want to establish yet another Arab nation that will be free of
Jews! Gaza is now free of all Jews -- all 9,000 of them removed. The
result -- a terrorist camp raining rockets into the sovereign nation
of Israel on a regular basis. Remove all the Jews from Judea and
Samaria? The very mention of that by the Palestinian Authority should
cause a swift and clear response from the civilized nations of the
world. If that is your world view, you are disqualified from being a
member of the civilized nations of the world.
And this is quite apart from the discussion as to whether the
Palestinians have a "right" to the land to begin with. Despite what
Peter Tocci and others believe, history is not on their side. True,
the British did promise land to the Arabs -- but they already gave it.
Three-fourths of the British Mandate was given by the British, without
any international approval, to form the nation of Jordan. Jordan is
the homeland for the Palestinians. People should read "From Time
Immemorial" -- research by Joan Peters, who began with one point of
view but whose research shows that the so-called Palestinians have no
claim to the land. That might open the door for a great public debate.
But to the point of this letter: Ethnic cleansing was, is, and always
will be immoral. If we as a people -- and our government leaders, no
matter what their political persuasion is -- cannot be clear on that,
then we have no moral right to think we can be a nation leading the
world. You want to be a nation free of one ethnic group? Then you
cannot be a nation!
From: A. Papazian
August 17, 2011 Wednesday
Ethnic cleansing by any name is immoral
by Don Long is pastor of Faith Christian Church in Fitchburg.
This summer, as 22 of us from the Fitchburg area traveled in Israel,
we were struck by the fact that throughout Israel there are "Arab"
towns and "Jewish" towns existing side by side. No talk in Israel
about "removing the Arabs." Full citizenship rights and opportunities
are given to all Arabs living in Israel. And then we traveled to what
the world calls the "West Bank" -- it is biblically and historically
"Judea and Samaria." We visited many Jewish communities there,
numbering anywhere from hundreds to thousands of residents. And we
wondered why Jews and Arabs cannot likewise live together here? That's
not a question to the Jew -- it's a question to the Arab -- and a
question to the world. The answer is unfortunately quite clear: They
want a nation of their own -- and they want it free from all Jews!
Ethnic cleansing is the removal of an entire ethnic population,
forcing them to leave one territory and move to another. From the
International War Crimes Tribunal, The Hague, in the case against
Slobodan Milosevic, ethnic cleansing was said to be a criminal act and
its executors criminals. In the 1990s this term was widely used in the
press to describe what was taking place in Yugoslavia, where Croatians
were being driven out by Serbians, and likewise Serbians by Croatians.
Ethnic cleansing typically uses intimidation, forced expulsion and/or
killing of an undesired ethnic group, as well as the destruction or
removal of key physical and cultural elements, including places of
worship, cemeteries, works of art and historic buildings. In 1992, the
U.N. General Assembly condemned ethnic cleansing as a crime against
humanity.
So why would the U.N. even consider granting nationhood status to the
Palestinian Authority when that same entity has made it clear that all
the Jewish communities, some 300,000 people, must be removed from
Judea and Samaria? Can you imagine the reaction in the world if the
government of Israel said that in order for a two-state solution to
take place, all of the more than 1 million Arab Muslims living in
Israel must be forced to move to the new Palestinian state? Protests
would erupt around the world; our college campuses would be sites of
protest gatherings; our State Department and president would
immediately condemn such a statement. Yet when Abbas and the
Palestinian Authority very clearly say that all Jews must be removed
-- not a word of condemnation. Where is the moral outrage?
Unfortunately, ethnic cleansing has all too frequently been a part of
human history. The Romans expelled all the Jews from Palestine in A.D.
70. In 1290, King Edward I expelled all Jews from England. In 1492,
King Ferdinand expelled all Jews from Spain. During World War I,
Turkey was responsible for the ethnic cleansing -- some would say
genocide -- of the Armenians. In World War II the Nazi government
began with ethnic cleansing, and ended with genocide in the Holocaust
and the extermination of more than 6 million Jews. During the
partition of India, 5 million Hindus and Sikhs fled from what became
Pakistan into India, and more than 6 million Muslims fled from what
became India into Pakistan. Our own nation was guilty of ethnic
cleansing when in 1830 President Andrew Jackson signed the Indian
Removal Act -- forcing all the Cherokee Indians in the South to be
marched off to tribal lands in the Midwest.
In the years after the nation of Israel was established, more than 1
million Jews were forced to leave their homes in Arab states, so that
most Arab nations are now "Judenrein" -- a reference to Hitler's
attempt to remove all Jews from the population. And now many in the
world want to establish yet another Arab nation that will be free of
Jews! Gaza is now free of all Jews -- all 9,000 of them removed. The
result -- a terrorist camp raining rockets into the sovereign nation
of Israel on a regular basis. Remove all the Jews from Judea and
Samaria? The very mention of that by the Palestinian Authority should
cause a swift and clear response from the civilized nations of the
world. If that is your world view, you are disqualified from being a
member of the civilized nations of the world.
And this is quite apart from the discussion as to whether the
Palestinians have a "right" to the land to begin with. Despite what
Peter Tocci and others believe, history is not on their side. True,
the British did promise land to the Arabs -- but they already gave it.
Three-fourths of the British Mandate was given by the British, without
any international approval, to form the nation of Jordan. Jordan is
the homeland for the Palestinians. People should read "From Time
Immemorial" -- research by Joan Peters, who began with one point of
view but whose research shows that the so-called Palestinians have no
claim to the land. That might open the door for a great public debate.
But to the point of this letter: Ethnic cleansing was, is, and always
will be immoral. If we as a people -- and our government leaders, no
matter what their political persuasion is -- cannot be clear on that,
then we have no moral right to think we can be a nation leading the
world. You want to be a nation free of one ethnic group? Then you
cannot be a nation!
From: A. Papazian