Can you hear us?

 

Pray for Gaza

 

Palistine music

 

سيكون ماضيك

 

Palestinian irony

 Palestinian charged with attempted murder for stabbing of another Palestinian man in Jaffa (TA) who he thought was Jewish.....

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Prosecutors filed an indictment today against Mohammed Haroub for the stabbing in Tel Aviv on the eve of Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, during which a man was seriously hurt.

Mohammed Haroub was charged with “a terrorist act of attempted murder, a terrorist act of aggravated assault,” and illegally entering Israel from the West Bank. Prosecutors said he stabbed the Arab victim with a screwdriver, assuming he was Jewish.

“The defendant, who believed that the plaintiff was a person of Jewish descent, approached him without being noticed, shouting at him in Arabic ‘Jew, Jew,’ hit him over the head with a bottle of water next to him, and stabbed him with the screwdriver in his upper body, with the intention of causing his death,” a statement from the Justice Ministry said.

The victim, from East Jerusalem, shouted back at the assailant in Arabic during the attack that he was not Jewish, but the stabber ignored his calls, the indictment read. Mohammed Haroub only fled the scene after he thought the injuries he had caused the victim would lead to his death, prosecutors charged. Police arrested him nearby shortly after the stabbing.

This stabbing was part of spate of stabbing attacks last month, apparently in solidarity with the Palestinian security prisoners who escaped from Gilboa Prison and were all later rearrested.

Hunger Strike Poem by Adnan Farhan Abdul Latif

 They are artists of torture,

They are artists of pain and fatigue,
They are artists of insults
and humiliation.
Where is the world to save us
from torture?
Where is the world to save us
from the fire and sadness?
Where is the world to save
the hunger strikers?

Who Is an Arab? By John Tvedtnes

 

Who Is an Arab?

By John Tvedtnes

Who is an Arab? The answer varies according to the person giving the reply. One who considers himself an Arab would say that an Arab is someone who speaks Arabic, but he probably would not mention his historical background. Most Westerners would think of a Muslim as an Arab. Yet the Iranians, Turks, Pakistanis, Indonesians, and many others are Muslims—but don’t speak Arabic. Moreover, some Arabic-speaking peoples are Christian, while others are Druze (an offshoot of Islam).

Perhaps the most historically accurate answer is that most often given by Christians and Jews: the Arabs are descendants of Ishmael, the firstborn son of Abraham. This highly oversimplified definition no doubt stems from the fact that Muhammed was of the Ishmaelite tribe of Quraish. But not all Arabs are Ishmaelites.

The earliest Arabians, according to the Bible, were the descendants of Joktan, who lived five generations after the flood.¹ The Joktanites lived in the fertile regions of southern Arabia, and were the “Arabians that were near the Ethiopians.”² They were traders, some of whom in later years actually crossed the Red Sea to settle in Ethiopia. One of the sons of Joktan was Sheba, ancestor of the Queen of Sheba who visited Solomon.³

The northern Arabian tribes were, for the most part, descended from Abraham through Ishmael, son of his Egyptian wife, Hagar. His descendants inhabited the coastal area of western Arabia.⁴

By his third wife, Keturah, Abraham had six sons, whom he sent to dwell in the east so that Isaac could inherit Canaan.⁵ Because they lived in an essentially desert land, they were nomads, and hence we read of the “travelling companies of Dedanim,”⁶ and of “the Arabian in the wilderness.”⁷ Some of them pitched their tents as far away as Babylon, it would seem.⁸

Perhaps the best-known tribe was the Midianite tribe. Moses’ father-in-law Jethro was a Midianite, and his descendants, the Kenites, settled in Palestine with the Israelites under Joshua.⁹

The Edomites, located in the mountainous region southeast of the Dead Sea, were descendants of Abraham and Isaac through Esau or Edom.¹⁰ They mingled with the Horites or children of Seir,¹¹ but acknowledged their close relationship to Israel as descendants of Jacob’s brother.¹² They often warred with Israel,¹³ and were never included within the Israelite borders.¹⁴ In Maccabean times, their land was called Idumea, and hence, King Herod the Great, an Idumean convert to Judaism, was a descendant of Esau.

The trans-Jordanian Arabs of today are all related to Abraham as well. The Aramaeans, or Syrians, are perhaps descendants of Aram, the great-nephew of Abraham.¹⁵ Or they may be descended from Aram, son of Shem.¹⁶ It was to Syria that the patriarchs traveled to find wives in their own families.¹⁷ Though the early seat of the Aramaeans was beyond the Euphrates, by the time of David they had moved south to Damascus and Beth-Rehob.¹⁸ They became subject to David, but gained independence in Solomon’s time.

The Moabites and Ammonites are descendants of Lot, Abraham’s nephew. When Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed, Lot’s two daughters, believing that the world had come to an end, intoxicated their father and deceived him into fathering children by them.¹⁹ The Ammonites lived east of Mount Gilead, from the Jabbok southwards.²⁰ They were subject to King David²¹ and although they later became independent, they nevertheless presented gifts to King Uzziah.²² Their brethren, the Moabites, lived along the eastern bank of the Jordan River and east of the Dead Sea. They warred constantly with Israel.²³ Their language, known from the Moabite Stela, erected by King Mesha in honor of his victories over Israel,²⁴ was almost identical to Hebrew.

Except for those living in the Arabian peninsula, however, none of these peoples spoke Arabic prior to the seventh century A.D., and only those living in Arabia would have termed themselves Arabs. When Muhammed made his famous journey to Medina in 621 as the first step in the establishment of a Muslim Arab state, even the Arabs were far from united. Broken into many factions throughout the peninsula, most were idolators, while those in the north tended to be Christians; there were even numerous Arabic-speaking Jewish tribes.

From Arabia, the Arabs moved outward to conquer most of the Middle East (Asia Minor remained Greek until the Turkish invasion some 850 years later), all of North Africa, and the Iberian Peninsula. Arabic became the new language for all of the conquered lands; and over the years, the natives came to consider themselves Arabs. Thus, the Egyptians, Libyans, and Phoenicians, all descendants of Ham,²⁵ were assimilated with the invading Arabs. So were the Assyrians, Babylonians, and Berbers of North Africa. We can also say that the Arabs of the Gaza Strip are, to a great extent, descendants of the Philistines, after whom the land of Palestine was named. Palestine has perhaps seen more mixing of peoples than most areas of the world, due to its strategic position on trade and military routes. The Israelites took control of the land under Joshua, but were unable to completely destroy the Canaanites.²⁶ Then, subsequent invasions brought the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Medes and Persians, the Greeks, and the Romans, some of whom, in each case, remained and intermarried with the local population. Byzantium inherited the scepter from Rome, and it was against Byzantine Palestine that the Arabs moved in 638. Later invasions by the Crusaders, Mongols, Turks, etc., brought about further mixtures.

Incongruous as it may seem in the light of the modern conflict in the Holy Land, many of the Palestinian Arabs of today are descendants of the Jews who inhabited the land some 2,000 years ago. Many important Palestinian families can trace their genealogy back to Judah or another of the tribes of Israel. Christian communities of Palestinian Arabs are mostly descended from the original Jewish inhabitants who were converted to Christianity soon after Christ. Those who are still Christian are not usually converts of the Crusaders, but rather descendants of Christians who resisted conversion to Islam in the seventh century. An example is the Maronite Christian community. They speak Arabic but use Aramaic—the language spoken by the Jews of Jesus’ time—in their liturgy.²⁷

The historical answer to the question, “Who is an Arab?” is therefore very complex. It is easy to see why the Arab himself generally takes a linguistic sidestep to: “An Arab is someone who speaks Arabic.”

genesis 21

 

The Birth of Isaac

21 Now the Lord was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised. 2 Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had promised him. 3 Abraham gave the name Isaac[a] to the son Sarah bore him. 4 When his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham circumcised him, as God commanded him. 5 Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.

6 Sarah said, “God has brought me laughter, and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me.” 7 And she added, “Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”

Hagar and Ishmael Sent Away

8 The child grew and was weaned, and on the day Isaac was weaned Abraham held a great feast. 9 But Sarah saw that the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham was mocking, 10 and she said to Abraham, “Get rid of that slave woman and her son, for that woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac.”

11 The matter distressed Abraham greatly because it concerned his son. 12 But God said to him, “Do not be so distressed about the boy and your slave woman. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it is through Isaac that your offspring[b] will be reckoned. 13 I will make the son of the slave into a nation also, because he is your offspring.”

14 Early the next morning Abraham took some food and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. He set them on her shoulders and then sent her off with the boy. She went on her way and wandered in the Desert of Beersheba.

15 When the water in the skin was gone, she put the boy under one of the bushes. 16 Then she went off and sat down about a bowshot away, for she thought, “I cannot watch the boy die.” And as she sat there, she[c] began to sob.

17 God heard the boy crying, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven and said to her, “What is the matter, Hagar? Do not be afraid; God has heard the boy crying as he lies there. 18 Lift the boy up and take him by the hand, for I will make him into a great nation.”

19 Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. So she went and filled the skin with water and gave the boy a drink.

20 God was with the boy as he grew up. He lived in the desert and became an archer. 21 While he was living in the Desert of Paran, his mother got a wife for him from Egypt.

The Treaty at Beersheba

22 At that time Abimelek and Phicol the commander of his forces said to Abraham, “God is with you in everything you do. 23 Now swear to me here before God that you will not deal falsely with me or my children or my descendants. Show to me and the country where you now reside as a foreigner the same kindness I have shown to you.”

24 Abraham said, “I swear it.”

25 Then Abraham complained to Abimelek about a well of water that Abimelek’s servants had seized. 26 But Abimelek said, “I don’t know who has done this. You did not tell me, and I heard about it only today.”

27 So Abraham brought sheep and cattle and gave them to Abimelek, and the two men made a treaty. 28 Abraham set apart seven ewe lambs from the flock, 29 and Abimelek asked Abraham, “What is the meaning of these seven ewe lambs you have set apart by themselves?”

30 He replied, “Accept these seven lambs from my hand as a witness that I dug this well.”

31 So that place was called Beersheba,[d] because the two men swore an oath there.

32 After the treaty had been made at Beersheba, Abimelek and Phicol the commander of his forces returned to the land of the Philistines. 33 Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba, and there he called on the name of the Lord, the Eternal God. 34 And Abraham stayed in the land of the Philistines for a long time.

Footnotes

1. Genesis 21:3 Isaac means he laughs.
2. Genesis 21:12 Or seed
3. Genesis 21:16 Hebrew; Septuagint the child
4. Genesis 21:31 Beersheba can mean well of seven and well of the oath.
   
   
   

We need to rethink how we think

We need to rethink how we think! Western logic is not every thing! Greeks and Romans are not the only humans on earth. They are not the only people in earth who thought deep thoughts! So did the Jews and Arabs! So did the Chinese and Japanese! So did the nodics! So did the Russians! So did the celts! So do the Americans! So free your mind! Rethink your thinking!

Pakistan vs india

أحبك

Koran the opening

The Opening

In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful.
[1.1] All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds.
[1.2] The Beneficent, the Merciful.
[1.3] Master of the Day of Judgment.
[1.4] Thee do we serve and Thee do we beseech for help.
[1.5] Keep us on the right path.
[1.6] The path of those upon whom Thou hast bestowed favors. Not (the path) of those upon whom Thy wrath is brought down, nor of those who go astray.

arabian music

arabic alphabet

AL AARAAF. by poe