The Fear of US!
August 4, 2009
The fear of us.
The fear.
Instill fear and they can be controlled,
ruled upon and
will become submissive,
weak.
They shall beg for our mercy;
to their knees they will fall,
look up — eyes glazed with frailty
(hysteric) –
and beseech our forgiveness.
We will tame the savage —
By any means necessary!
We will crash via iron rhinos,
soar via steel eagles,
and endless slugs shall sting, pierce and
flay soft miserable flesh.
We shall wipe them off the map;
from the page of existence.
Their villages that house them;
their homes that shelter;
their schools that teach and remind them,
and, especially,
their Houses of soulful soothe.
Caged these birds will molt;
unable to flee, nowhere to hide.
We shall taunt, poke and pluck.
They shall bathe in the blood of their abject Martyred.
We shall rule.
We will be obeyed.
They tell me that I am to fear.
To fear what could be if I stand for justice.
Haunts of Al-Nakbah, Sabra, Shatilia, and Dahiya,
still fresh and sore, remind me of the reprieve in truth.
The salvation of standing.
They wish to bring me to my knees.
I still persist and shall forever resist,
fear: For my divine right to,
EXIST!
With my rocks,
I resist.
With my pen,
I persist.
My soul, will and patience,
Declare my right to exist.
Not fearful, but comforted with death.
Death for my Mother,
and land.
Oh, I shall not fear.
I shall persist.
Even with your bombs,
Caterpillars and
massacres.
I will resist.
(Evermore!)
May I be honored with Martyrdom,
My cavalry of brothers and noble sisters –
Wombed from calvary of generations past –
shall replace me in honor
and defend my Mother, land.
(Forevermore!)
Now, we see the panic.
Where the fear of us, becomes the fear of WE:
The lowly spirit’d, meek and righteous.
Until My Mother’s Appeased Henceforth:
I — Nay!
We shall resist,
persist
and
be free.
They claim they’re an “Army of Steel”.
I say, yes, they are. Draped in American steel,
American can weaponry of holocaust and demolition.
LO! For I’m not finished; I also say,
“that under that steel, cowering beneath it’s false comfort,
is Flesh!
Soft, shivering meat.”
And we are starved!
“The fear of us”, has morphed my brothers,
my noble sisters;
“The Fear of us” is now, and has always been,
the fear of he, she, me, they…of We!
“Deterrence capability…our main weapon—the fear of us.” — Ariel Sharon ’67
For over 60 years that tactical motto has been unchanged…and completely ineffective.
May Peace and Blessing be Upon all of you whether my brothers and sisters here in the States or halfway across the world in Palestine, Lebanon or Iraq or Africa or Europe or my brothers/sisters in Pakistan and Asia; to my Jewish, Christian and Muslim brethren: As-Salaam Alaikum wa Rahmatuallah wa Barakatu. We WILL win. We shall persist, resist and be free.
With all my love, prayers and hopes — Ammar
Orientalism: A Short History
August 4, 2009
A recent post on the condition of Muslims in the western media got me thinking. Not of the obvious bias the media or the West has had against Islam and Muslims recently, but of the historical nature of that hostility. To further my annoyance, yesterday, I began reading “The Arabian Nights” translated by Husain Haddawy and nearly instantly I recognized a difference in the tone of the literary masterpiece when compared with other translations from western sources such as Richard Burton.
In reality the West has never really known Islam. Since, it took spot light in the West, Christians and non-practicing Christians alike have never spoiled an opportunity to slander it in order to, just as today, justify waging war against it. Islam has been subjugated to grotesque distortions which still endure today in the minds of many Europeans and, of course, Americans. Minus the very few-and-between to most westerners Islam can be broken down into three categories: Fanaticism, fatalism and polygamy. Very few understand the basic root understanding of the word “Islam” itself as simply the “Submission to the will of God”. Even if that simple fact is acknowledged the twisting of the faith’s tenants and teachings, curses submission to oppression and fear of an evil entity through a corrupt false Prophet (Astagfurallah, “I ask forgiveness of Allah”). One is then forced to concede the fact that oriental studies in the west have had less to do with academic impartiality and more with a clear intention of belittling the Islamic faith and it’s adherents.
Asiatic faiths, such as Hinduism and Buddhism, especially within the past century, have garnered much more sympathy and interest than Islam, even though it has close roots with Christianity and Judaism with all three springing from the same Abrahamic source. This indoctrination through misinformation and demonization is not a recent phenomena.
With regard to Islam and the Islamic territories,
for example, Britain felt that it had legitimate
interests, as a Christian power, to safeguard. A
complex apparatus for tending these interests
developed. Such early organizations as the
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge (1698)
and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel
in Foreign Parts (1701) were succeeded and later
abetted by the Baptist Missionary Society (1792),
the Church Missionary Society (1799), the British
and Foreign Bible Society (1804), the London
Society for Promoting Christianity Among the Jews
(1808). These missions “openly” joined the
expansion of Europe.(Said, Edward. “Orientalism” pg.100)
Far from the Christian teaching, “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.” (Exodous 20:16) Christian missionaries were eager to take part in European imperialism. In fact several prominent European Orientalists were Christian missionaries, like Sir William Muir, who wrote several heavily biased books on Islam and the Prophet Muhammad, and are some of the same sources used to this very day be those wishing to attack Islam.
Islam, then, and evidently so, today, is seen as a competitor on the worldly stage of adherent count. From the writings of John of Damascus that falsely labeled Muslims as poly-idol worshipers — a clear distortion against Islam’s staunch monotheistic teachings of “There is no God but God…”; to the likes of Peter the Venerable who through distortion and manipulation of language and text, “translated” the Qur’an, even including nine extra chapters. The Koran, Commonly Called the Alcoran of Mohammed, translated by George Sale, is another infamously distorted “translation” of the Qur’an. JM Rodwell, Muir and a myriad of other conspirators attacked the faith, it’s text and assailed the character of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), seeking to manipulate public thought and perception. Often employing invented stories or exaggerating facts within what Muslims consider “weak Hadiths” or simply by distorted facts of Islamic belief and passing them off as academic truth.
“The use of false evidence to attack Islam was all but
universal . . . ” (Daniel, Norman. Islam and the West. p. 267)
Roman Catholic Church, also had a devil’s hand in fabricating, propagating and embracing any attacks against Muslims and Islam.
At a certain period in history, hostility to
Islam, in whatever shape or form, even coming
from declared enemies of the church, was received
with the most heartfelt approbation by high
dignitaries of the Catholic Church. Thus Pope
Benedict XIV, who is reputed to have been the
greatest Pontiff of the Eighteenth century,
unhesitatingly sent his blessing to Voltaire.
This was in thanks for the dedication to him of
the tragedy Mohammed or Fanaticism (Mahomet ou le
Fanatisme) 1741, a coarse satire that any clever
scribbler of bad faith could have written on any
subject. In spite of a bad start, the play
gained sufficient prestige to be included in the
repertoire of the Comédie-Française.”(Bucaille, Maurice. “The Bible, Qur’an and Science” pg.118)
Take into account from above that even a dedicated enemy of the Church, Voltaire, was embraced when discovering they had a common enemy in Muhammad and Islam. Throughout Europe Islamic bashing was not concentrated to the limited oriental “scholars” or clergy, it was popular culture:
The European imagination was nourished
extensively from this repertoire [of Oriental
images]: between the Middle Ages and the
eighteenth century such major authors as Ariosto,
Milton, Marlowe, Tasso, Shakespeare, Cervantes,
and the authors of the Chanson de Roland and the
Poema del Cid drew on the Orient’s riches for
their productions, in ways that sharpened that
outlines of imagery, ideas, and figures
populating it. In addition, a great deal of what
was considered learned Orientalist scholarship in
Europe pressed ideological myths into service,
even as knowledge seemed genuinely to be
advancing.”(Said, Edward. “Orientalism” pg.63)
The invariable tendency to neglect what the
Qur’an meant, or what Muslims thought it meant,
or what Muslims thought or did in any given
circumstances, necessarily implies that Qur’anic
and other Islamic doctrine was presented in a
form that would convince Christians; and more and
more extravagant forms would stand a chance of
acceptance as the distance of the writers and
public from the Islamic border increased. It was
with very great reluctance that what Muslims said
Muslims believed was accepted as what they did
believe. There was a Christian picture in which
the details (even under the pressure of facts)
were abandoned as little as possible, and in
which the general outline was never abandoned.
There were shades of difference, but only with a
common framework. All the corrections that were
made in the interests of an increasing accuracy
were only a defence of hat what had newly
realised to be vulnerable, a shoring up of a
weakened structure. Christian opinion was an
erection which could not be demolished, even to
be rebuilt.(Daniel, Norman. Islam and the West. pg. 33)
Of the above quote Edward Said expands:
This rigorous Christian picture of Islam was
intensified in innumerable ways, including during
the Middle Ages and early Renaissance a large
variety of poetry, learned controversy, and
popular superstition. By this time the Near
Orient had been all but incorporated in the
common world-picture of Latin Christianity as in
the Chanson de Roland the worship of Saracens is
portrayed as embracing Mahomet and Apollo. By
the middle of the fifteenth century, as R. W.
Southern has brilliantly shown, it became
apparent to serious European thinkers “that
something would have to be done about Islam,”
which had turned the situation around somewhat by
itself arriving militarily in Eastern Europe.(Orientalism Pg. 61.)
“Of all the great men of the world no one has had as many detractors as Muhammad.” Roger Du Pasquier
There is no doubt that for over a millennium people in the West have been indoctrinated, almost since birth, that Islam is a religion of a radical rebellious thugs bent on taking over the world. And while Islamic history is not wholly innocent nor should be exiled from debate and scholastic investigation, it is quite literally appalling and, at times, infuriating that even fourteen hundred years after the death of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and the establishment of Islam, Muslims are still categorized as violent extremists via perversion of an “evil” religion.
–HG Wells
Alhamdulillah!
July 31, 2009
Not that anyone’s reading this damn thing, but just as a way to alleviate the stress that’s been building within me for the past couple of weeks. It has been a rough two weeks for me personally, but thankfully, all that is coming to a close as, Henry Louis Gates and that police officer that arrested him (we’ll call him “Whoshisface”) are going to meet, again.
Thank goodness Obama was able to intervene and calm this building national crisis. Man, that guy is like Superman. Economy? Check! Health care? Double check! War? “We rocked them Babels!” Totally rad! It was pretty crazy here for a while, but Obama, like the Olympian god he is, swept in, carried the nation’s biggest burden, since, like, the Civil war, on his shoulders, sat these two idiots down, roofied them up and did his thang!
Gates-gate is finally over. For now…mostly! Now, we can finally hear about the Zionist extremists storming al-Aqsa Mosque or the 27 people killed, this morning, in Iraq…or not. But, that swine flu sure is making a comeback, I wonder if it has anything to do with…Nah!
Jewish Fundamentalists storm Al-Aqsa!
July 30, 2009
More than 200 Jewish extremists have reportedly entered al-Aqsa Mosque, positioning themselves inside the holy site, allegedly to perform religious rituals.
According to a statement released by the Al-Aqsa Foundation for Endowment and Heritage, the incursion was “significant”. The foundation has called on Muslims, Arabs and all Palestinians to take action in support of the mosque.
The attack comes amidst Tisha B’Av, also known as “The Ninth of Av” — a Jewish fasting day in commemoration of the destruction of the two Temples. The occasion falls on the ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av, which usually coincides with late July or mid-August.
The First Temple was built by King Solomon and was considered the most sacred site in ancient Judaism. It was destroyed when the Babylonians pillaged Jerusalem (al-Quds) in 586 BCE.
According to Jewish accounts, the construction of the Second Temple was completed in 516 BCE on the site of the First Temple but was destroyed during the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE.
The destruction of the two Temples allegedly took place on the same day — the ninth of Av — but about 656 years apart.
The storming of al-Aqsa Mosque — a holy site in the eyes of many Muslims — has drawn anti-Israeli condemnation.
Former Palestinian minister for al-Quds affairs, Hatem Abdel Qader, has warned that the Israeli government is “playing with fire” by allowing far-right Jewish groups to put the mosque in harm’s way.
Abdel Qader resigned from his post last month after he censured the acting Palestinian Authority for neglecting al-Quds. He says the Salam Fayyad government refuses to uphold its commitments to the city, which is undergoing a difficult period.
According to Abdel Qader, the Palestinian Finance Ministry “contributes nothing to the effort to keep the residents on their land.”
