Skip to main content

The Catastrophe (النكبة)

These days, in the second half of the month of May, you will continue to hear the word "Nakba" being pronounced on Arab media channels and commemorations of the Catastrophe that was the forced flight of the Palestinians from their homes for the sake of the illegitimate State of Israel. It is a day that the millions of the descendents of the 750,000 - 800,000 refugees will remember for years, and hopefully, none of us will forget this tragedy.


Salaam, from
Saracen

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Politics as an "Outflow of Culture": Unmasking Racism in today's Socioeconomic Scene

A common yet grave fallacy is to assume that (the actions of) (part of) the infrastructure of a particular country at a particular time and place is derived from a singular cause, of which a metaphysical nature attributed to said cause would be even more so. That said, attributing (a perception of) (failed) politics as an "outflow" of a country's culture is in my honest opinion a crock of bull. I'm not denying that culture and politics are related: there clearly is a relationship between the two in the broader historical context. However, this reductionist outlook panders to more than your garden variety racism, itself being built on misinterpretations and misunderstandings. Why is that? First of all, consider that politics and culture are mutually exclusive concepts, although their definitions may not appear to be so on the surface. Politics (according to the pseudo-omniscient Wikipedia [1] ) is a process by which groups of people make collective decisions. The...

Book Review: "The Third Chimpanzee" by Jared Diamond

Jared Diamond is sort of a rock star in the sphere of biogeography (and science in general depending on your perspective). He is more a doom-sayer than a soothe-sayer, a prophet warning of the destruction of society and mankind as a whole. His magnum opus and prophetic text " Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" has received accolades from a variety of sources, the least of which was the Pulitzer Prize in 1998. Having read that book myself, I came into his lesser-known essay " The Third Chimpanzee " with the expectation that it would be entertaining and enlightening at the same time. Gladly, I was not disappointed, but a glaring issue exists that I will address later. The first book published by Jared Diamond, " The Third Chimpanzee " explores the progression of human evolution in four parts. In the first, he explores the biological premises of our relationship to two other primate species, the common and pygmy chimpanzees (now c...

What Needs to be Said about the Gaza Massacre

It has been a tumultuous week that has passed. Ever since seeing the soul-crushing news of 61 (SIXTY ONE) Palestinians murdered as they were protesting their rights to be free from the open-air prison of Gaza, I've been sick to my stomach and heartbroken. The blood of my brothers and sisters spilt over the sands of the Gaza Strip ran aplenty as if it were cheap. Men, women, children, journalists, and medical personnel were slaughtered in cold blood with live ammunition from guns fired by Israeli terrorist soldiers hundreds of yards away overlooking the "border". What did the shameful Western media do about it? CNN claims "dozens die at the border". The NYT published multiple sham propaganda attempts disguised as "opinion pieces" blaming the Palestinians for their deaths, even going as far as to dehumanize them and negate their suffering. Even the BBC had the gall to call them "clashes". "Clashes"?! It was a massacre! Murde...