Of Israel's cowardly attack on Gaza Aids Flotilla - By Seema Mustafa

South Africa's President Zouma is visiting India. The fact remains that the meeting of a liberated South Africa's President and Indian President and Prime Minister is taking place in the backdrop of another Apartheid regime being created in the Middle East, and Indian Government has no comparable role to play when comparing with the enormous moral support extended by India towards the breakdown of apartheid regime in South Africa. 

Indian government should stand up and be counted and not remain a stooge of the zionist forces.

Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Seema Mustafa <seemamustafa@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, Jun 5, 2010 at 5:12 PM
Subject: column
To: Ghulam Muhammed <ghulammuhammed3@gmail.com>

By Seema Mustafa

Israel has demonstrated not just its intolerance but also its cowardice. Nine peace activists aboard the Flotilla carrying humanitarian aid for the people trapped in Gaza by the Israeli military, were shot not once but several times at close range. And of these five were shot in the back. And the Israeli defence: they were al Qaeda, they were terrorists, they came at us with sticks and knives.

Shame! Brutal murder following an act of aggression has evoked condemnation across the globe, but a lot more needs to be done. Turkey that had established diplomatic relations with Israel giving it legitimacy in that part of the world, has now withdrawn its Ambassador and taken up the matter in the United Nations. Other governments have also condemned the killing, but stopped short at that. India has also added a feeble voice to the criticism, and took an entire day to frame the statement which talks of the ‘use of force’ but does not carry the word ‘Israel.” Almost as if by stating this, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his government are afraid of inviting Israeli and American ire. Not a word that the blockage against the Palestinians should be lifted immediately, and all supplies of medicines and food and other essential commodities resumed forthwith. Not a word.

Shame! Shame on Israel for occupation and murder. Shame on the world, including India, for maintaining complete silence. Shame on the Arab countries for cowering under US pressure, and refusing to unite to get the Palestinians back their land and Israel contained to agreed on territory. The courage of armies has been taken over by the peace activists across the world who are defying Israel’s threats and have refused to back off after the brutal attack. Ship after ship will arrive at the Palestinian waters seeking to break the blockade, and whether the aid material they are carrying is unloaded or not, this war has already been won. Israel has been defeated morally by a group of ordinary people who worked over the months to get the ships together and break the blockade. They have done so, and have actually challenged Israel’s claims to the waters, even though the countries across the world have failed to do so.

The four ‘terrorist’ groups of West Asia have been those who challenged Israel and Washington’s writ in the region. One of them is dead, and his country destroyed, namely Iraq President Saddam Hussein who had, in his final years, tried to right some of the wrongs he had committed  through a new agenda that included taking up the cause of the Palestinians. Iraq was invaded as then US President George W.Bush was convinced that it was harbouring weapons of mass destruction, and when these were not found, the ugly invasion was justified as an attack on a “terrorist.”

The other three continue to exist, and are the demons that the West and now even the East raises and whips every time it wants to consolidate votes and polarize people. There is the Hamas that is now controlling Gaza, that won the elections through a process that was certified as free and fair by the US, and that has been rigid in its anti-Israel and anti-US positions. It is therefore, terrorist and targeted by Israel in a continuing war that has been sanctioned by the world, including India. Needless to say innocent Palestinians are paying the price, with the blockade of Gaza just a small example of the terror that the Palestinians are living with on a daily basis. The terrorist is the Israeli state for them.

There is Hezbollah, a strong voice that has challenged the might of Israel not just verbally but in deed by inflicting a severe defeat on the army a few years ago. It is a defeat that Israel has not recovered from till now, and of course Hezbollah is a ‘terrorist’ outfit as it has refused to accept Zionism as an ideology, and is one of the few organizations in West Asia that is also represented in the government. Hezbollah leader Nasrullah has refused to compromise and has filled the sizeable anti-Israel space in Lebanon, and in fact in the region itself where he is seen as a hero of the Arab street.

And then there is Iran, the ‘rogue nation’ despite its ancient civilization and its sophisticated brain. For the new definition now brands any one---individual, group, state---who questions the right of Israel and the US to push their writ across the globe as a “terrorist” or at best a “terrorist sympathizer.” A description being used by governments to restrain other nations, or their own people. It is being used to justify and perpetrate state terror, establish and reinforce the will of the militarily powerful over the poor, and to kill and maim at will. Iraqis were killed and imprisoned, and the proud people of ancient Mesopotamia were treated like dogs by the ugly ‘conquering’ army. Palestinians have been humiliated, tortured, killed with their land having become a playing field for the Israeli state. And people resisting the might of autocratic states across the world are under attack by their own governments.

India, after attaining freedom, had declared her support for the struggle of the world. Her leaders at the time were part of the anti-apartheid struggle and the Palestinians efforts to get back their land. Jawaharlal Nehru, and even Indira Gandhi, realized that foreign policy and domestic policy were totally interlinked, and Indian independence could only draw strength from these struggles in Africa and West Asia. There was nothing Hindu or Muslim about the decision. It was a decision taken by a fledgling democracy that had dreams of a future.

Unfortunately the pygmies who have come to power over the last years have no sense of history, or justice, or even a basic understanding of the rule of law. Important global issues are reduced to the Hindu-Muslim, Shia-Sunni discourse by petty politicians who are scrambling to be recognized as leaders by Washington. The tenets of democracy are  reduced to petty politics, as India moves away from the strength of the non aligned to the weakness of a nation captured by the glitz of globalization and militarization.

One wonders, if today India would have had a voice loud enough to make a difference for the anti-apartheid forces if the movement was still alive. Or whether hers would have been a feeble croak, unheard and ignored by not just the world powers but even the smaller nations.

--
Seema Mustafa