Al Jazeerah on The Gulf

When researching some facts for my previous posts I stumbled upon an article written by Al Jazeerah (in English) that I thought deserved a bit of thought. The article is about the naming dispute between the Arabs and Iranians on the Arabian/Persian Gulf.

Title:The Dispute About the Persian/Arabian Gulf Name: How Should it Be Resolved?

By Hassan El-Najjar and Nader Habibi

Al-Jazeerah, February 11, 2005



I really liked how both writers, although Arabs, had a very impartial views and wrote in a very fair and academic way about the topic. Such writing is rarely seen these days. Either the Iranians would very aggressively argue that it's always been the Persian Gulf (why not Iranian gulf?) or the Arabs would continue using Arabian Gulf just to piss off Iran.

Either way, it's not a simple topic and there are many historical factors behind this conflict. In addition the current geo-political situation in the Gulf is such that it makes such a naming contest much more important than it really is. So we should try to find a solution to it that agrees to both sides, and that fits in with other problems such as Iranian nuclear ambitions and Iran's occupation of the 3 Emarati islands of Abu Musa, Greater Tunb and Lesser Tunb.

To keep matters brief, I will not paste the whole article, yet I strongly advise you to read it whether you're Persian, Arab, or just curious about the Gulf. The Article:

http://www.aljazeerah.info/Editorials/2005%20Editorials/January-February/The%20Dispute%20About%20the%20Persian%20Arabian%20Gulf%20Name%20How%20Should%20it%20Be%20Resolved%20By%20Hassan%20El-Najjar%20and%20Nader%20Habibi.htm

Personally I never seen much point to highlight one's differences as opposed to one's similarities. We have a lot of things that bind us with our Iranian neighbours up North. We should be proud of these links and work to make them stronger. I really do not mind calling it the Persian Gulf or even the Islamic Gulf (as proposed by the Ayatollah) if we get some of our rights back as Arabs. After all, there are 22 Arabic countries in the world but just one Persian country. Looking at things with a global view mean it would make sense to call it Persian because it would pinpoint the location better. Imagine having a similar Gulf in between some Latin American countries, and they called it the Latino Gulf, that would really confuse me as an outsider as to where its position is.

Usually the smaller nation wins in these areas. Also look at the Sea of Japan. Japan is much smaller than China, and yet I believe it's called after Japan because it pinpoints it better on the map. The Irish sea is another example. As Arabs we should be realistic and flexible without letting go of our rights of sovereignty and security in our seas. Resolving this issue would benefit both the Arab and Persian peoples greatly.

Cartoon of the Day

Right of Return versus Israeli evil Bibi. Mother Palestine!

(Sorry I cannot even remember the source of this picture, if you're the owner let me know and I'll remove it)

UNuclear Israel?

I recently read an article that made my day:

Gulf News 18 Sept 2009

Vienna: Arab states in the UN nuclear assembly on Friday won narrow approval of a resolution urging Israel to put all its atomic sites under UN inspection and join the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

The Jewish state deplored the measure for singling it out while many of its neighbours remained hostile to its existence, and said it would not cooperate with it. The non-binding resolution, which passed for the first time in 18 years of attempts thanks to more developing nation votes, voiced concern about "Israeli nuclear capabilities" and urged the International Atomic Energy Agency to tackle the issue.

So, fanatic racist Israel can have nuclear weapons (and not much nuclear power) and (equally?) fanatic Iran is not allowed to have any of the above? Perhaps it's worth noting that Israel is Jewish and Iran is Muslim. Moreover, Iran is generally anti-American.

Before the vote, US Ambassador Glyn Davies said the resolution was "redundant ... Such an approach is highly politicized and does not address the complexities at play regarding crucial nuclear-related issues in the Middle East."

Redundant or crucial to peace Mr Ambassador? Let's not forget that the US uses its veto powers (only 5 countries in the world have that power) very frequently to protect Israel:

"Washington used its veto 32 times to shield Israel from critical draft resolutions between 1972 and 1997. This constituted nearly half of the total of 69 U.S. vetoes cast since the founding of the U.N."

(Source: By Donald Neff, Former Time Magazine Bureau Chief, Israel, link)

Typical hypocrisy from America in favour of Israel. However, this is a good day for justice and a good day for Palestine.

Sears Tower Glass Boxes

The Sears Tower in Chicago, USA has recently added a lovely assortment of glass boxes for visitors to marvel at this engineering feat from the 103rd floor!

Here are some pictures for your viewing pleasure.

Website Review - http://www.palestinefacts.org/ - Propaganda Alert

http://www.palestinefacts.org/

The website displayed above is a farce. It's a thinly disguised attempt to colour the Arab-Israeli conflict in the blue colours of Zionism and making it appear like this is the truth, at least from a Palestinian standpoint. The target audience for this website is people who are not very knowledgeable about the conflict and who don't know who to ask for information. However, even with zero facts, you will quickly discover the bias, as I will demonstrate below:

1-It's Anonymous

No one seems to want to claim responsibility for this website, as this paragraph quoted from the FAQ section demonstrates:

"There is no one individual editor. The site has been prepared by a team of writers and editors who are knowledgable of the history, politics, economics and military situation in the Middle East, based on information compiled from the best available sources. They have developed Palestine Facts to provide much-needed factual information to everyone who may be interested in the current situation in Israel, how it evolved to today's status, and what might be reasonable policies for the future."

I wonder how many of those "team of writers" are Zionist? or Arab?
Would you trust the opinion of someone without a name?

2- The nomenclature used is exclusively zionist:

For example, the Occupied West Bank is called Judea and Samaria which is a biblical name fanatic Zionists like to call Arab land that they believe belongs to them. No one (even the UN) uses such names except Israel. This is the same area where some Israeli soldiers refuse to serve on ethical grounds. The UN has issued numerous resolutions deeming Israeli settlements in that area illegal, and yet Israel continues to build on land that is not theirs.

3- Biased Maps:

"Invalid Palestinian Arab Maps.Anti-Israel forces have made an industry out of producing invalid maps that either deny the existence of Israel altogether or distort the history and modern situation."

Basically according to this "unbiased" website, any map that is pro-Palestinian is automatically anti-Israeli. What biased logic. The aim of this website is to delete Palestine from the world vocabulary. Interestingly, they do not mention anything about the Israeli Apartheid Wall which was unilaterally drawn by the Israelis and which clearly illegally annexes Arab land that does not belong to Israel.

Even Wikipedia acknowledges that: "Parts of the barrier are built on land seized from Palestinians", although their maps show a clear bias against the Palestinians by naming Arab land with Jewish names. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_West_Bank_barrier

Unbiased websites such as this: http://www.stopthewall.org/maps/150.shtml show the land grab graphically on accurate maps.

4- Biased Sources:

Any academic knows that the quality of your thesis is underpinned by the quality of your sources. This website uses exclusively Israeli sources to describe their supposed Palestinian viewpoint. It's like asking the KKK to abolish slavery. Their map references include:

The Department for Jewish Zionist Education, The Jewish Agency for Israel
State of Israel, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Maps of Israeli Interests in Judea and Samaria, Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies
etc..

5- Denial of any Palestinian history or rights:

The site blatantly tries to argue everything for Israel's benifit, it even claims that the Occupied Territories are not such but they are "occupied territories" very much in the same way that Arabs try to deny Israel's existence by calling it "Israel".

There is a section called Arabian Fables that is as logical as a drunken alcoholic abusive rapist. For example:

"The "Palestinians". That is the fundamental myth.

Again, the use of the quotations to indicate that the Palestinians don't exist. Weird, because the word Palestine has been there since even before the Arabs came to Palestine, and is a Greek name in fact, more than 2000 years old. Another gaping hole in their logic especially since their website's name is Palestine Facts!

What about this:

"Josef Goebbels, the infamous propaganda minister of the Nazis, had it right. Just tell people big lies often enough and they will believe them."

Let's get it clear. This is a website full of anti-Palestinian propaganda. What is very ironic is that they use Nazi propaganda to claim that their propaganda is correct. Well two wrongs never made a right.

Let's never forget that it's Nazi Germany that killed the Jews and not Arab Palestinians. The holocaust is not an Arab problem but the Arabs have had to pay for it. Wouldn't it be fairer if we founded Israel inside Germany?



Here is an example of the daily realities in the Occupied Territories controlled by Israel. This young Jewish extremist man is shown throwing wine at a Palestinian Muslim woman in Hebron. This is wrong because:

1- Alcohol is considered un-Islamic, and thus it is rude to do this to a Muslim.
2- The woman has clearly done nothing to provoke the man, would he accept this to be done to his mother?
3- Since Hebron is a city with an Arab majority (166,000 Arabs, and 500 Jews), isn't it rude for visitors to behave in such a manner?
4- This kind of behaviour would be treated as antisocial racist behaviour in any civilised country, and yet in Israel it's considered normal for Jews. Palestinians don't really have a say even though they completely outnumber the Jew, who of course are heavily armed, and protected by the Middle East's only nuclear power. Obviously the western media doesn't report these things either. (Imagine source: Palestine Think Tank).