Long before we know ourselves,
Our paths are already set in stone.
Some may never figure out their purpose in life,
And some will.
There are a lot of us who are caught up in this hell we all live in,
Content with being blinded by rules and judgment.
We live in a world where it’s more okay to follow than to lead.
In this world being a leader is trouble for the system we are all accustomed to.
Being a leader in this day and age is being a threat.
Not many people stood up against the system we all call life,
But toward the end of our first ten years into the millennium we heard a voice.
A voice who was speaking to us from the underground for some time.
A voice who spoke of vulnerabilities and other human emotions and issues never before heard so vividly and honest.
This is the story of a young man who not only believed in himself,
But his dreams too.
This is the story of The Man On The Moon.
One of the most amazing pieces of spiritual writings I’ve ever read or heard for Ibn El-Arabi:
Listen, O dearly beloved! I am the reality of the world, the centre of the circumference, I am the parts and the whole. I am the will established between heaven and Earth, I have created perception in you only in order to be the object of my perception. If then you perceive Me, you perceive yourself. But you cannot perceive Me through yourself, It is through my eyes that you see Me and see yourself, Through your eyes you cannot see Me.
Dearly beloved! I have called you so often and you have not heard Me. I have shown myself to you so often and you have not seen Me. I have made myself fragrance so often, and you have not smelled Me, Savorous food, and you have not tasted Me. Why can you not reach Me through the object you touch Or breathe Me through the sweet perfumes? Why do you not see Me? Why do you not hear Me? Why? Why? Why?
For you my delights surpass all other delights, And the pleasure I procure you surpass all other pleasures. For you I am preferable to all other good things, I am Beauty, I am Grace. Love Me, love Me alone. Love yourself in Me, in Me alone. Attach yourself to Me, No one is more inward that I. Others love you for their own sakes, I love you for yourself. And you, you flee from Me.
Dearly beloved! You cannot treat Me fairly, For if you approach Me, It is because I have approached you.
I am nearer to you than yourself, Than your soul, than your breath. Who among creatures Would treat you as I do? I am jealous of you over you, I want you to belong to no other, Not even to yourself. Be mine, be for Me as you are in Me, Though you are not even aware of it.
Dearly beloved! Let us go toward Union And if we find the road That leads to separation, We will destroy separation. Let us go hand in hand. Let us enter the presence of Truth. Let it be our judge And imprint its seal upon our union Forever.
This is a very interesting video posted by a new Muslim sister who reverted to Islam and facing opposition to her decision by her family, I enjoyed watching all her videos so far and has so much respect for her, you can subscribe to her channel on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/justmissmarla
I am my neighbors Quran;
He reads me when we meet.
Today he reads me in my home—
Tomorrow in the street.
He may a relative or friend
Or slight acquaintance be;
He may not even know my name,
Yet he is reading me.
And, pray, who is this neighbor
Who reads me day by day
To learn if I am living right
And walking as I pray?
Oh, he is with me always
To criticize and blame,
So worldy-wise in his own eyes,
And Sinner is his name.
Dear Muslim sister, friends and brothers,
If we could only know
How faithfully the world records
Just what we say and do;
Oh, we would write our record plain
And come in time to see
Our worldly neighbor won to Allah
While reading you and me. ¯Author Unknown
Please note that I did not write this poem but if anyone knows who did I’d be happy to list it. InshAllah.*
I’m currently outing with part of my family in 6 October city club, while having loads of work back home, that got me thinking a bit of our concept and activities while having a family outing! I think a typical family outing since childhood haven’t change much, as you can imagine I do find time while outing for writing a blog post, would that be an indicator that it’s not so much fun for an old 22 years old guy like myself.
The most amazing trip and outings I had lately was to Alex, with only the guys around my age in the family, we all agreed that we had amazing time and we all enjoyed ourselves. So, why don’t we enjoy family outing with the family including older members of the family as much as with the peers. does it have to do with the activities we can involve in, freedom? or is it about selfishness of the young ages who want to just fly or blog?
Is it supposed to be like that all the time, or family outing is something we usually do wrong? We should enjoy our time with the older members of our family, right?
What do you guys think?
P.S. this is not to be understood that I’m not enjoying my time, I’m just having thoughts about how to make outing with the family a better experience for everyone. I’ll get back with my suggestions later on ..
Today reminds us with the Israeli aggression against #Gaza last year, which ended with more than 1300+ kills majority among women and children.
If you’re on Twitter, at the moment, you should participate in a campaign about #Gaza by placing #Gaza in your tweets and keep #Gaza a trending topic as much as you can.
Here is a reminder of some writings I wrote before about Gaza:
Yes, right, choosing which media we expose ourselves to and which friends we hang out with is very important as that will determine who we’re going to be! Guys, pick the right friends and expose yourself to the media that will make you a better person.
I can relate to that in multiple phases in my life and I think in your own life as well. I find some who I thought to be conservative and practicing when they get withing a community that approve a specific negative behavior like flirting for example, they do indulge in that and change themselves by being a part of that community.
Regardless of how hard and may be offensive it might be to trim yourself from a community, it might be the only choice to keep going towards the goals you set for yourself at first place.
Be yourself and don’t be so easy to influence, chose your friends and media, ideas you expose yourself to. You only have the choice to be what you want and you’re deciding that NOW!
In this video I try to present some basis we need to understand while going for online friendships, we shouldn’t be very open to let anyone deceive us or hurt us, right?
Hehe, I had no script whatsoever and was kinda sleepy!
I watched a touching movie lately where the concept the movie going around is simply the definition of Islam and Wayne the wise man in the movie is presenting the concept as the idea way to lead our lives.
So, just like Islam teaches us we’re not supposed to lead our lives with ambitions other than focusing on why we’re here; the meaning of our existence and other than stressing over the results will come out of what we do, we should focus on the intention and as Wayne said surrender to the Will of God.
It comes out very beautiful when some non-Muslim man relate to an Islamic concept without knowing that more than 1.3 billion people on earth are supposed to be living this way!
‘A good friend and a bad friend are like a perfume-seller and a blacksmith: The perfume-seller might give you some perfume as a gift, or you might buy some from him, or at least you might smell its fragrance. As for the blacksmith, he might singe your clothes or at the very least you will breathe in the fumes of the furnace.”
Following up with some of the virtual problems I had from a while, I found that Hadith from ILoveHadith.com touching and expressive to meanings I felt:
Narrated Abu Huraira (Radiyallaahu `anhu) that the Messenger of Allah (Sallallaahu `alayhi wa sallam) said,
“The worst people in the Sight of Allah on the Day of Resurrection will be the double faced people who appear to some people with one face and to other people with another face.”
Sahih Al Bukhari Volume 008, Book 073, Hadith Number 084
What a derogatory quality to be a hypocrite and what an ugly behavior is it? Be yourself and tell the people you dislike that you dislike them, take a solid situation and then be yourself.
I can bring some screen shots of Twitter direct messages expressing ultimate respect to my logic and situation and then public posts mocking me from the same person, who present herself as righteous, freedom and truth fighter!
Understanding that our religion is more about how you behave to people is an essential component of the belief of every Muslim. As I wrote before about the essential and religious ethics and how our religion focused on planting these essential ethics deeply inside every individual, this Hadith comes to confirm that boldly!
Whatever happens, don’t deceive, manipulate or use anyone. Not only that’s wrong, but it’ll put you under a lot of troubles on the Day of Resurrection
I wrote that comment as a reply to an Ecademy blog entitled: “A Question of Faith, Philosophically Speaking” and as keeping my content in one place is what that blog is all about, had to publish it here too.
Link: http://www.ecademy.com/node.php?id=132840
As a Muslim, we do have a reply to that question. Simply, God or Allah or whatever you call it, will never subject people to punishment and reward without giving them a physical evidence to make them believe both in his existence and the way he wants them to lead their lives.
So, for people to follow God’s guidance, prophets had been sent with visual miracles that convince everyone watching it that, this is something extraordinary and the person presenting it and claiming that he’s a messenger of god, had to be right, accordingly. So, in this case as you saw yourself Jesus returning the dead back to life (by god’s will) and telling people what they’re keeping in their homes, without visiting it.
If you or me had been personally in that situation, we’d find it easy to follow Jesus (Peace and Blessings Be Upon Him), or if we attended miracles of Moses (Peace and Blessings Be Upon Him), we’d definitely believe him, because that’s something extraordinary, and we saw it with our eyes.
So, for our situation currently, if there were a God shouldn’t he give us a miracle that should drive us to believe in his existence and guidance?? Is it fair to be judged the same way, the followers of Jesus, Moses and Mohamed attended such VISUAL miracles?? And we didn’t saw it with our own eyes?? So, Is god or Allah fair, to put us in such doubtful situation and others before us attended miracles visually and lived it??
As Muslims we believe that God is fair and he did send an ever remaining miracle to the end of the world with prophet Mohamed, which wasn’t only VISUAL, for the attendees of the miracle to believe and then tell the others what they’ve saw and they believe.
No, God sent via the final messenger PBUH, a miracle that will remain to the end of the world, which is the holy Qur’an. Oh! Ya! So you believe that it’s a miracle so should everyone just believe that is a miracle like you do.
Absolutely not, the Qur’an hold scientific facts that had been revealed 14 centuries by a man who can’t read or write and still till today, scientific research is coming with these facts and finding it in a book from more than 1400 years! So, isn’t that an evidence that make people believe in that book, that the person told these facts is the messenger of God?
Not only scientific facts, while it might be the sharpest for a non-Arabic speaker, the words itself and the combination of verses is a miracle in itself, that no one was ever able to come with a writing that approach it, either in style or content. The concept of miracles is presented here in that video from minute 4:00 to 13:00 after that they continue their talk about how the Qur’an is the miracle of our age.
So, as a simple reply to your question, there is is a miracle that’s not visual and still miraculous, from every angle it’s approached from and sincere study from someone trying to find the truth, will drive to the believe in God and his messengers peace be up on him, including the final messenger Prophet Mohamed PBUH.
Regardless, of all the propaganda from haters and envious to the truth, Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world, especially the USA, where millions of dollars are invested in anti-Islam propaganda.
Feel free to ask about anything ambiguous in my post and the concept itself, these are one of the subjects that interest me.
Hi John, Yes, I understanding what you mean and I’m not personally offended or anything, the point is just, when referring to torture and wrong doing in warfare in the last 100 years, how much of that wrong was coming from those you’re referring to as your people. Taking war on Iraq as an example?
In the video from 6:00 to 8:00 :
“We created a great lie to live with, the lie was, we’re the good ones, we’re the idol, we’re the ones who help others, But that’s not the case. I think we in the west didn’t control the world because of our great way of thinking, or for our great values, or for our great religion. But, because we used merciless violence more than others.
If I can be more serious. Muslims weren’t who slaughtered 4 million people during the crusade. Muslims weren’t the people who slaughtered 50 million people during imperialism. Also, Muslims weren’t the people who killed 70 million people during WWI & WWII. Muslims weren’t the people who killed 6 million Jews either.
But, that had been the result of western invasion, and when we talk about the victims of Al-Qaeda, and here I repeat that Al-Qaeda to me are murderers, then we need to talk about the victims of the western policies in Iraq & Afghanistan”
By the way, I’m pretty open minded and while I proudly belong to Egyptian, Arabs and Muslims. I had been in close personal relationships with westerners, including a Jew, and quite sense that they’re my people too, as long as they don’t do or wish any harm to anyone.
And I’m being religious and following my religious teachings while doing that:
8 Allah does not forbid you respecting those who have not made war against you on account of (your) religion, and have not driven you forth from your homes, that you show them kindness and deal with them justly; surely Allah loves the doers of justice
9 Allah only forbids you respecting those who made war upon you on account of (your) religion, and drove you forth from your homes and backed up (others) in your expulsion, that you make friends with them, and whoever makes friends with them, these are the unjust.
Just to clarify something, Muslims does come from every ethnicity and background so you can’t define someone as Muslim by look, and Arabs make 18% only of the total population of Muslims.
Just stumbled upon this Facebook profile and brought me a laugh. You’re supposed to write something about yourself in the box below your photo in your Facebook profile.
Being subscribed to clevonamerica YouTube channel from a while, I really liked his latest video addressing Nationalism:
It made me remember a movie “Head of State“, in which two individuals were going for presidency. One’s motto was “God bless America … and no place else” the other replied “God bless America .. and everyplace else!“
Human nature will keep inside us a sense of belonging to the people, culture and land where we grew up. And a desire to see it the best, which might be obvious in Football matches for example. But what the heck might be the problem for me, you or anybody else if god also blessed the other countries!!
I still meet some people who are going with the mentality of the first motto! And really don’t know what to say!
Just a Facebook status inspired me to post that blog, while developing the WordPress theme I’ll use for that blog and planning my online activities generally.
A piece from Egyptian popular poetry calling people to keep humble regardless of the position they attained in their temporary life ..
يا طير يا عالي في السما .. طظ فيك
ما تفتكرشي ربنا مصطفيك
برضك بتاكل دود .. وللطين تعود
تمص فيه يا حلو .. ويمص فيك
عجبي
Oh there! you bird, flying high in the sky .. (Tozz) damn you!
Don’t just think that .. god has chosen you …
You still eat worms, and to the mud you’ll return (i.e. when you die) …
You suck it now, sweet .. and it’ll suck you soon (i.e. after your death) …
My Exclamations!
**** ‘Tozz’ is an Egyptian word illustrate being not interest in something and/or induce disrespect to it, don’t know a polite translation to it.
Three weeks ago, I decided to start Vlogging and actually provided an Ice-Breaking video, expressing my intention to start Vlogging starting with the topic of “Unity of Muslims”. Since then I had been thinking of the ideal way to presented the topic and came to some ideas, that I’ll be trying to get clear in that post.
The series’s title will be “Lessons In Unity” and its goal is to explore incidents – usually battles – throughout our Islamic History where we united and show different situations, concepts and analogies related to the unity of Muslims.
Out of brainstorming, I structured the series in 10 lessons that will communicate the meanings we need to understand today, in order to conceive and seek unity between us Muslims the right way, I focus on having a certain logical flow of information so each lesson adds a new concept we’re prepared to understand from the last one and wider our view in a certain way.
The lessons is structured as follows:
1. Unity as a Concept
In this light introduction, I’ll present why unity is important by couple of very famous analogies, then will discuss 3 main concepts that goes against unity of Muslims. The concepts are Racism, Nationalism and Sectarianism.
2. Sahaba’s Perception of Unity:
To form a solid, stable structure; you had to make sure that the units you use in that structure is actually solid and stable at first place. The strength of a wall you’re intending to build, is directly dependent on the strength of every single building block you’ll use in it.
The same concept applies to building communities, to unite people you had to make those people ready for unity before trying to unite them. By changing their mentalities and as a result their behaviors, attitudes and qualities towards the their brothers and sisters who share their religion.
As such concepts had been sharply clear in the way the companions of the prophet (PBUH) united after Hijra. The brotherhood, personal qualities and attitudes between Mohajereen & Ansar would be the subject of the 2nd episode of this series Insha’ Allah (God Willing).
3. Sahaba’s Different Interpretations
Could Muslims have different approaches to a certain Islamic ruling or a in finding a solution to a certain problem, we do have different schools of thoughts, so how those people who started these schools of thoughts conceived unity of Muslims? what’s the red lines that should not be crossed when we talk about different approaches, when a certain approach should be considered excessive and unacceptable in a Muslim community.
The feasibility and flexibility to have different approaches to a problem, had been obvious in a certain situation when Sahaba (RA) interpreted an order gave by the prophet (PBUH) differently and how they dealt with each others upon their difference and how Prophet Mohamed (PBUH) reacted to the issue.
By discussing that, I want to bring to our attention that among us Muslims, we should have the flexibility to accept others’ opinions and interpretations and be mature enough to maintain our brotherhood with those who conceive things differently. And at the same time we should never tolerate those who ruin our Islamic teachings by having unacceptable approaches.
4. Ohod’s Unity Pitfalls
The battle of Ohod is rich with unity lessons, it shows two types of deviations. Among the Muslims one third of the Muslim army left the battlefield because of the heads of hypocrisy within the Muslim community itself. Then those who preferred this life and didn’t obey Prophet’s orders, caused a lot of harm to Muslims.
I’ll present those two deviated groups in the battle of Ohod in order for us to understand ourselves and how practically things get to work. To know that there is among us may be those who can harm us more than our enemies and among us those who’ll go for their own agendas.
Presenting that in the context of Unity will give us the maturity we need, not to be easily fooled or deceived while sincerely seeking unity. As Allah SWT says in the holy Quran:
Had they marched out with you, they would have added to you nothing except disorder, and they would have hurried about in your midst (spreading corruption) and sowing sedition among you – and there are some among you who would have listened to them. And Allah is the All-Knower of the Zalimun (polytheists and wrong-doers). [Quran 09:47].
5. Hussein (RA) & Muslim Unity
We can’t deny that disunity had taken place at some point after prophet Mohamed’s death, and there had been some battles within the Muslim community itself. I’ll present that subject not by getting back to what historically happened, who was right and who was wrong. But how should be conceive it and how what happened should even bring the Muslim community closer and unite us upon righteousness.
A lot of emotional energy from the martyrdom of Imam Hussien (RA) is being manipulated to misguide Muslims, especially new Muslims and those with no access to appropriate Materials. We’ll see how Hussien (RA) in Karbalaa have done everything possible for the unity of Muslims, and the disunity had been actually caused by those who betrayed him.
6. Saladin’s Leadership Model
Had the Muslim unity been just something of the past when prophet Mohamed (PBUH) and the righteous companion been there, we’ll explore how in medieval Islam, Muslims united against crusades under the leadership of Saladin.
I’ll focus on exploring the issue of Leadership, taking Saladin as a leadership model and focusing on couple of incidents that shows how strong, wise and righteous he was and the Muslim leader should be. And also, how the Muslim community united under his leadership.
7. Unity Against Mongols
Mongols is considered one of the greatest dangers faced the Muslim community since its existence, politically Muslims had been totally and completely disunited during the beginning of the attacks from the Mongols, even some was helping the Mongols killing Muslims and occupying Muslim lands.
But how Muslims united at such circumstances, even inside the single country there had been fights between different groups. How Kotoz the Muslim leader was able to unite all Muslims against their enemy and win the battle of Ain Jalot.
I’ll be focusing on Kotoz as an excellent politician dealing with different groups seeking power, and then as a fighter by shouting Wa Islamah (O! My Islam) in the battlefield.
8. 1973 War’s Unity
No one can deny that in our Modern history the limited victory in 1973 war was a result of a limited unity, In a trail to bring hope and show that unity isn’t something dates back to centuries. I’ll show some signals of unity between Egypt, Syria, Libya and Saudi Arabia and different Muslim countries in this war against the Zionist occupation.
9. Muslim Resources
Who are we? This is going to be statistics and representation to the ability of us Muslims and how powerful the Muslim world could grow if we really united.
10. Personal Roles
Finally, how could me and you participate in the Unity of the Muslim community, what’s the values and qualities should we live with. Out of the ideas we’ll discuss, we’ll get to a certain points that we should all keep in mind to achieve unity on the long run. And work for unity between even the local Muslim communities.
Just adding general points about the publishing of the series.
Publishing Format:
The nature of videos is being quick, light and persuasive and It won’t be practical to cover every lessons in a 5 ~ 10 minutes video! and make all points clear enough for the audience; thus, I’ll be considering the videos as the conclusion and will use it for what It should be eye-opening, persuasive and light, while the technical points and the detailed description of the incidents will be published as articles on this blog Insha’ Allah (God Willing), while the videos will be published on YouTube and Muxlim mainly.
By the end of the series, I’ll collect my writings and the ideas generated out of research and interaction and produce a PDF document including all the ideas discussed and all the lessons learned.
The main publishing framework though, is going to be my personal blog here, so If you’re interested in the series the ideal way to keep yourself updated is to subscript to the blog feeds, or you can connect with me on different social networking sites.
Qualification & References:
What makes me qualified to talk about this subject, I was grown up in a religious family and had a considerable amount of religious education, so all these incidents I studied before, plus the series is “Practical Lessons” all what I do is having access to authentic information and use my logic in communicating with the audience taking the context and our current status as Muslims into account, and highlighting the points that will be beneficial.
I’m from the mainstream Muslims and don’t associate myself with any Muslim group or school of thought, except following the authentic teachings of Islam from the Holy Quran & Sunnah, that’s why I won’t be using that series to Market for a certain group or a school of thought.
Of course, I prepare from references that I’m adding in this post, The majority of my preparations if not all of it is from Arabic sources, which include mainly the following books and taps:
* الرحيق المختوم. بحث في السيرة النبوية – فضيلة الشيخ صفي الدين المباركفوري
* دروس وعبر من سيرة خير البشر – دروس في غزوة أحد – الدكتور محمد المختار محمد المهدي
* أباطيل يجب أن تمحي من التاريخ – الدكتور إبراهيم شعوط
* سيرة صلاح الدين الأيوبي – القاضي بهاء الدين المعروف بإبن شداد
* و اإسلاماه – علي أحمد باكثير
* التتار – دكتور راغب السرجاني
May Allah SWT accept our work, and hope that would be beneficial in somehow Insha’ Allah (God Willing)
I started working with Adobe Premiere Pro producing some videos for YouTube. As I’m starting to talk about unity, picked up that scene from Braveheart, showing how could calling for unity might be deceptive.
Calling for unity against a common enemy among people that share a religious belief, country or even a business is very logical and a sign of maturity of whom calling for unity.
But that’s not always the case, some people will sharply betray when it’s the real time. some for a piece of land, some money and others for their own political agenda.
In this clip from Braveheart, I try to communicate that meaning, Wallace won the first battle by himself and the people loved him and followed him as they saw his goal is freedom for all of them.
When it came to the critical preparation for a battle in which he’ll need the help of the other group, he called for unity and actually been promised.
At the hardest time when he sent the sign for the other group to attack, he discovered that he had been betrayed, look into his eyes to realize how it feels when discover that you had been betrayed and learn the lesson and make sure who are you uniting with.
This is a lesson to learn when calling for unity, is that person or group of people actually want to unite for the best of the community, or they’re doing that for their own agenda!
Sorry for the incorrect dimensions and low quality, I’ll fix it in the upcoming videos. Hit the HQ button for now for better preview.
Unite yes, but keep your eyes open for whom you’re uniting with.
We won’t get the truth, until we demand it — Founder of If Americans Knew
While clouds of incomplete information, and propagandized reports and news coverage flooding to the western media, which not only hindering western’s ability to understand the root causes of the conflict in the middle east, but most times find sick reasons behind killing children, destroying homes, and the use of prohibited chemical weapons against civilians.
Back to 2001, a journalist in a small town in the US, thought something is wrong about the coverage she gets about that conflict, and decided to go to Gaza herself to have a first hand experience on what’s going on. When she came back and read the articles and news coverage in the American media, she didn’t find anything from what she has seen. And realized that she and all of her follow Americans is getting a very one-sided view of the conflict.
Decided to found If Americans Knew, and conduct research and get statistics about the conflict, and started getting her voice to public.
Here is she, telling her story herself, and showing some of the statistics she got from an Israeli organization. In the documentary by Alternate Focus http://www.alternatefocus.org/
Part I, [9:29 Min]
Part II, [9:30 Min]
Part III, [1:02]
That’s their website http://ifamericansknew.com/, Just imagine how the statistics will be after the recent terrorist attacks on Gaza?!
Not sure about your media sources, and how you’re being misinformed. Check; Peace, Propaganda & The Promised Land movie posted earlier: http://www.ecademy.com/node.php?id=120619
We won’t get the truth, until we demand it — Founder of If Americans Knew
That blog had been originally published by myself on Ecademy.
Away from the current situation in Gaza, I’ve tried to give an introduction to the root causes of the conflict, and the distortion in most western media, and as a result in westerner’s views about the conflict.
I’ve posted couple of blogs, and was intentionally presenting westerner’s views who visited the occupied Palestine, conducted research or collected statistics. because as we say here a blue eyed can only believe a blue eyed – that was obvious lately having no formal western media in Gaza during this massacres. It was justified to say we don’t hear, don’t see and don’t believe -.
Today, here is an Interview conducted by Middle East Broadcasting Company on March 14th, 2003, two days before Rachel Corrie was murdered by the Israeli Defense Forces, she talk about water well being destructed – water that people drink -, houses people live in being flattened with the ground .etc May be someone will come-up with the idea that some terrorists was drinking from the water wells, or may be hiding inside, and the house of a physician was, hmmmm , was whatever a sick, silly imagination can bring!
Peace activist Rachel Corrie, 23, is a student at the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington. She died Sunday, March 16, 2003, in the southern Gaza city of Rafah while trying to stop an Israeli bulldozer from tearing down a Palestinian physician’s home. She fell in front of the machine, which ran over her and then backed up, witnesses said. Israeli military spokesman Captain Jacob Dallal called her death an accident. State Department spokesman Lou Fintor said the U.S. government had asked Israeli officials for a full investigation.
1. Protecting a water well in Rafah, Gaza, Rachel Corrie is on the far right.
2. Rachel Corrie, right, and other members of the ‘International Solidarity Movement’ hold up a banner reading ‘Israeli army stop shooting children’ in protest of Israeli military actions at the Rafah refugee camp in southern Gaza in this photo taken Friday March 14, 2003.
3. Rachel Corrie chats with a Palestinian friend, living in a dire situation in Rafah, Gaza.
4. Rachel Corrie stands in front of an Israeli army bulldozer wearing an orange jacket so that she can be easily identified and seen.
5. Rachel Corrie uses a loudspeaker as she stands between an Israeli bulldozer and a Palestinian physician’s house in the southern Gaza town of Rafah.
6. The Israeli bulldozer ran over her and then backed up, crushing her chest and skull.
7. Friends try to aid Rachel Corrie after she was run over by an Israeli army bulldozer.
8. Palestinian doctors try to save the life of Rachel Corrie at the Najar hospital in the southern Gaza town of Rafah.
9. Alice, a friend of Rachel Corrie, holds her friend’s passport as she break down upon hearing the news of Rachel’s death at Najar hospital.
10. Two volunteers of the International Solidarity Campaign to Protect the Palestinian People comfort each other after the killing of U.S. citizen Rachel Corrie.
11. A Palestinian medical worker carries a mock coffin covered by a Palestinian flag for Rachel Corrie, during a memorial service in Gaza city.
12. Palestinian children carry a mock coffin covered by an American Flag commemorating Rachel Corrie.
13. Palestinians put flowers at a mock coffin of Rachel Corrie, a member of the ‘International Solidarity Movement’ during a memorial service at the Unknown Soldier square in Gaza city.
14. Palestinian children light candles for Rachel Corrie.
15. Olympia, Washington, residents stand in silent vigil around a mock casket at a candlelight vigil Sunday evening, March 16, 2003, for Rachel Corrie.
16. Students at the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, gather around a shrine for Rachel Corrie. Friends and college faculty are mourning what they are calling the senseless murder of Corrie.
17. An unidentified man cries next to a shrine in honor of peace activist Rachel Corrie during a protest outside the Israeli consulate in downtown San Francisco on Monday, March 17, 2003.
We’re very acquaint with Palestinian burning the US flag, as a natural result of being killed by a US weapons and the US supporting whatever might happen to them under whatever silly reason. But we see here the Palestinians themselves carrying the American flag. So, in case of Palestine, it’s not the evilness of some people who want to hate others, it’s people’s actions and situations that make them loved or hated by others.
For me as an Arab when I engage with someone in a discussion who’s taking a tough view against the US people, I tell him that they don’t know the reality on the ground and don’t understand what their country is doing on their names and usually find Rachel Corrie a brilliant example of people still alive! far away from others who suffer and can feel their pain. Unfortunately, In today’s world those are few.
As a part of my blog yesterday War On Gaza, Background for Truth Seekers! I meant to provide some documentaries as a reference for whom might be feeling that something isn’t right in his perception of the conflict, or what the western media is presenting to him/her.
For someone who’s watching Aljazeera!, then reading western media articles online, it’s sometimes hard to tell that it’s the same incidents being covered, or the weight given to each incident is somehow close to fair or normal, a certain techniques, including making use of people’s perception to the conflict (which is one-sided and formed by the previous propaganda from the beginning of the conflict) to get the new incident as an evidence to that perception maybe, but when it gets up to 1000 kills, most of which are purely civilians, shooting ambulances, aid workers, and killing journalists. Isn’t it the right time to double check your information? or question your perception?
Of course that’s in case you’re searching for the truth, not someone blindly supporting a certain project and somehow involved in promoting the massacres, and spreading false information to intentionally cover what he/she know is the truth.
Peace, Propaganda & the Promised Land is a 2004 documentary by Sut Jhally and Bathsheba Ratzkoff which—according to the film’s official website—”provides a striking comparison of U.S. and international media coverage of the crisis in the Middle East, zeroing in on how structural distortions in U.S. coverage have reinforced false perceptions of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict” and which “analyzes and explains how–through the use of language, framing and context–the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza remains hidden in the news media” – Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace,_Propaganda_&_the_Promised_Land
Here is a clip as an introduction to the video: [8:33 Min]
As the video is protected by Fair Use Clause, which allows the broadcast of the video for the purposes of commentary, criticism and education. here is the full video [80 Min]
Finally, truth and facts isn’t things that someone – including myself – say it’s the truth and the facts, everybody should form his own opinion after listening to both sides and understanding what they’re trying to communicate, and bypassing the propaganda from both sides.
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