Zahir Mahmood – Is Israel an apartheid state? Comparisons between South African apartheid and Israel
AI: Summary ©
The Israeli conflict is discussed, including the use of the Islamic criteria of oppression of liberation of Huck of birth and the history of the conflict, including the use of the military method of bouncing off the enemy and the military method of bouncing off the enemy. The speaker also discusses the discrimination faced by the Hol-cost and the history of the conflict, including the rise of the new Israeli president and the new Israeli president.
AI: Summary ©
Bismillah R Rahman r Rahim
hamdu Lillahi Rabbil Alameen salatu salam ala Sade in what city Maulana Muhammad while early he was Herbie he woman Serbia hombre Hassan in LA yo Medina by the respective brothers, elders, sisters Somali one after Allah
today I thought I'd speak about
a the Palestinian issue.
But
I wanted to use a criteria because we always speak about the Palestinian issue when we already use the Islamic criteria of oppression of liberation of Huck of birth.
Today I will use the criteria which is used generally by the West.
And I want to assess
would Israel in its current form today be regarded as an apartheid
country.
So, for those who may remember,
we had South Africa
and South Africa was regarded as an apartheid country. And in 1994,
South Africa had its election first and fair elections. And prior to that, it was an apartheid system. And everybody said after South Africa never again, will never allow this to happen again,
where one
community is superior to the other community. So let me define for you what apartheid is. It's a policy of segregation and political, social and economic discrimination of one race over another,
one ethnicity over
another. This is the definition of apartheid. And for those who may not be familiar with the backdrop of how the Palestine situations started, I'll just give you a brief recap briefly. The Foreign Secretary of Britain was the man called Arthur Balfour
in 1917, after the First World War, after they defeated the Ottomans, what they decided to do because they were the victors, they decided now the Ottoman territory will be carved up.
So the foreign secretary, Arthur Balfour, decided now to give Palestine and is known as the famous Balfour Declaration, you know, the Balfour Declaration is, which was mandated that a group, which were less than 10%, were given a land which belong to people who are over 90%.
So imagine this, a third party takes the land of a group of people who are living on that land, who are 90%
and gives it to a group of people who are less than 10%.
Why did he do this? Now he is regarded by the Israelis as a hero, but really, he didn't like Jews. He was an anti Semite.
I rebelled for it. And he said, he said that Jews are alien and they're hostile. He gave many speeches, which are recorded by his biographers that he didn't want the Jews in the UK, the migration to Europe, so he actually wanted them out of Europe. So what did he do? He transported the European problem onto the Middle East.
So he was an anti Semite. He was actually a racist. And that brings me back to the apartheid regime that we're going to speak about today, South Africa. So in 1904, when they were discussing the South African issue in Parliament, Belfour said this.
He said, we have to face the facts. Men are not born equal. The white and black race are not born with equal capacity. They are born with different capacities which education cannot and will not change.
So not only was the anti Semite, he was actually a racist. He says, no matter how much education you give to the black people, blacks are born different to white people, and they will always remain the same.
Color Contrast that
with the Prophet salaallah alayhi wa sallam on his final hook ba the final major could quote ba on his hedge
The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said you are all made from Anthem.
There is no superiority for the white over the black for the black over the white for the Arab over the non Arab for the non Arab over the Arab elaborate Taqwa.
Besides the taqwa 1400 years ago, the Prophet salaallah alayhi wa sallam articulated this. So this founder of Palestine is not only an anti Semite, he's actually a racist.
Now, this is how Palestine, Israel came into being.
So now what about the people of South Africa? What about people who fought for apartheid? What did they say about Israel?
Nelson Mandela,
who is regarded as you know, one of the major figures of the last century,
he said, our liberation, the South African liberation can never be complete.
Without the freedom of the Palestinians.
They regarded intrinsic
Desmond Tutu just passed away recently, Archbishop Desmond Tutu said in his article, apartheid in the Holy Land, he said, after visiting Israeli Palestine, he said, so much of what has happened to black people in South Africa, I see it in
Israel.
So these people who had lived under apartheid, who had fought under apartheid, the likes of Nelson Mandela, the likes of Desmond Tutu, all said that the regime in Palestine resembles the regime in South Africa. The difference was, the regime in South Africa has finished.
The regime in Israel still carries on.
As far back as 1961, the prime minister of South Africa, Hendrik for fault.
He was regarded as the main architect of the apartheid system. So he started what was known as the bantustan. Ban System System is in Africa, and it means homeland. So what they did with the Africans in South Africa was that they removed them from where they lived. And they moved them generally to the outskirts with all the blacks now lived in one area.
And generally how they did it was that we get one entrance and one exit.
So you live far away, and you had one entrance, one exit. The reason for that was if you try to rebel, you only one way out, so they go crush the rebellion.
So this is the main architect, the grand architect of the apartheid system. He said, regarding Israel,
the Jews took Israel from the Arabs after the Arabs have lived there for 1000 years.
Israel is like South Africa, is an apartheid system. So he's saying Israel, like South Africa is apartheid system.
Now, the interesting thing is SubhanAllah. This is where you got delusion. Many of the Israelis actually regard themselves closer to the blacks of South Africa than the whites.
That's what they regard themselves they believe that they are actually closer to the blacks of South Africa. We are an oppressed nation, we were driven, we are the Holocaust, we were driven out of our lands, therefore, we were oppressed nation, not realizing
that you are doing exactly to the Palestinians what was done to you
and more in May, in some form the shape because lasted longer.
So now you have
the Balfour Declaration, you have people of Meltem, Nelson Mandela, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, those who fought against the apartheid system.
And then you have the South Africans who created apartheid system, saying to them,
that Israel and
South Africa are very similar.
Now, let me explain to you how this discrimination takes place and the similarities
As I mentioned,
the Africans and not only the African, even the colors, and many of the Muslims, who had been there for 300 years in South Africa, they were taken out of the areas by the minority white.
And they will take into areas which are generally outside the city, and they made these homelands for them.
And they would have to stay there. They were not prosperous places. No, you know, if you look at the way the whites lived in South Africa,
Pamela's beautiful. I lived in South Africa for a few years, so I lived in a place called Newcastle. So the black township in Newcastle was called mega den.
And it was so far out, it was so far out, that if they decided to walk from there to attack Newcastle Town Centre, they will most likely get exhausted by the time they reach there.
So this was a form a manner in which they control these people.
There will be one entrance, one exit. That's it. And then you will see the lush areas of the whites in all these places.
What does Israel have Israel as exactly the same.
It has the the wall the apartheid wall, which separates the West Bank from Israel.
The UN is regarded as illegal according to international law, they don't care. They take people's lands. They separate families.
And I'm telling you this is no exaggeration when I say separate family cousins, brothers haven't seen each other for decades because they happen to live on the other side of the wall. Or they happen to live in a part of the territory that they've never been able to visit their family members.
They have checkpoints.
New numerous checkpoints. I met people in the West Bank
who lived seven eight miles from Messina AXA, who have never been to Murshida AXA
who have never been to Barcelona AXA.
Imagine this third holiest place, you live a few miles away.
And you can't go to machine AXA.
And then you have the settlements.
You go to the West Bank, all these settlements, by international law are illegal.
And you see them they like cities, no exaggeration. They would they tell you, you know that settlement, there was a few homes. And then it grows and it grows and it grows. And now it's a city
and you serve more and more land.
And this is the gem thing. Imagine this.
When Israel was created the vast majority of the Jews who live there
were
Arab Jews and Messiah who the Jews which are known as Oriente choose, many belong to that part of the world.
That's what they were. But all the presidents ba one, all the prayers of Prime Ministers bar one have all been white Europeans. What's the argument? The argument is this, that we lived here 3000 years ago. And because we lived here 3000 years ago, we have the right to take them to our mother land, if that's established as disputed, as well.
So after 3000 years, you have the right to come back to your country. But the Palestinians that you removed
5.9 million Palestinians live in the Middle East, nearly 2 million still live in refugee camps. So after 3000 years, you have the right to come back. But those who were removed 75 years who still have the keys to their homes, who live in refugee camps. Don't have the right to come back. What's your one argument?
One argument.
It's like saying, going to America, going to Australia going to New Zealand going to Canada and the native walking in the sea. Come on. VK. Okay, this was our land a couple of couple 100 years ago, not 3000 years ago, but Kate
Do you live in refugee camps will take your homes.
So why is it that the West support them so much when they have strategic reasons?
But also you will see that Anglosphere countries, Anglosphere countries are those countries
like our country here, Canada, America, Australia, New Zealand, they are generally the most ardent supporters of Israel. Why?
Because by country, but which was the main source of the problem, every single one of them is created of the back of genocide and the ruins of other individuals, Native Americans, Aborigines, so for them is just an extension of what they do. They think, you know, yeah,
this is exactly what we done. And now this is what's happening with the Palestinians.
You know, let me tell you about the apartheid Let me carry on about the apartheid bed. Salem is a human rights organization, Israeli human rights organization.
It speaks about, you know, because they like to say, no, there is no apartheid in Israel. And we're not even talking about the West Bank, the Gaza, we're not talking about the occupied land we're talking about now we're talking about Israel proper, where Palestinian Israelis live.
So Bensalem mentions that there are 7000 residents, Jewish residents in Jerusalem. They have 1000, public parks, 36 swimming pools, and 26 Libraries.
The estimated Arabs who live in East Jerusalem are about 260,000.
They are 45. They have 1045. public parks, not one swimming pool, only to libraries.
And then they say no.
There is no apartheid there. There is no segregation there.
And you will see every MP, literally every mp
back in Israel.
You will see the anchors and the presenters on TV when it comes to the Israeli issue. You listen to the questions. They never challenge.
Make it Saudi make it Iran make Afghanistan make any of the other issues. Look how harsh they come.
Because see people pick and choose.
And when they pick and choose we you and I begin to pick and choose.
Because we never really study the facts.
We become apologetic. You know every year in the Knesset Knesset Israeli parliament, every year, the Palestinian Israelis present a bill that Israel, not the West Bank, not Gaza, Israel itself should be a country for all its citizens. So 20% of Israel is Arab. Every year, this apartheid regime does not even allow it to reach the floor of the house.
Every single year.
In Israel,
if you're a Jew conscription
to the army is mandatory. But other ethnicities are exempted or Arabs don't have to. And they don't want the Arabs,
the last regime to ever do this. That who excluded
conscription on the basis of ethnicity and race was South Africa.
South Africa,
I want to tell you this story about a guy called
gold rich, Arthur gold rich.
He was an African White,
Afrikaans speaking Jew, who was at school at a time in 1940.
So one day, what happened is that the teacher began to give German books you're gonna have to learn German. Now this is exactly the same time when Hitler is doing his work in Europe,
because many of the white Afrikaners believed that Hitler would win, and it's better that we side with Hitler.
So this young man Arthur
He's a Jew. So he wrote a letter to the Prime Minister, John Smith's that I don't want to learn German, I want to learn Hebrew. So they gave him
he gave him permission to learn Hebrew. So he began to learn Hebrew in 1948.
This was like now in 1947, the British Mandate over
Palestine finished, and this is when you had the Nakba, the 1948, it was established to establish they ethnically cleansed the Palestinians. 1000s of villages were destroyed. cities were depopulated. And the irony of this is, look at this. There was a handful of very few Jews every day ethnically cleanse, and then they asked the Ethiopian Jews to come the Russian Jews to come the European Jews to come the Algerian Jews, the Iraqi Jews to come. Everybody is going to come there. We haven't been there for 3000 years, according to them according to their history.
And you've just ethnically cleansed the country.
So in 1948, now Israel is at war. So this is the gold rich. He decides to join the Jewish army. He stays there. He fight for a few years. And then in 1954, he comes back to South Africa. And he joins the ANC. The ANC is the African National Congress, Mandela's party. And Mennella writes in his autobiography, he goes that very few of us knew guerrilla warfare besides this person, because he spent time in Israel fighting.
So he now is fighting against the white Bora Africana regime in in South Africa, where he's why himself in 1964.
The places raided he's there. 17 people are taken into the tension among amongst them is the leader of the ANC. At that time, Walter Sisulu, Arthur, Sulu, I think if that's his name, Nelson Mandela is already in prison. Out of the five people who were taken to jail, five were white, or five were Jewish.
Before the matter reaches the court, he manages to sneak out and he reaches Israel. And he lives in Israel. So he fought for Israel. And then he fought against the white Ruth apartheid regime
in South Africa.
Now, today, he lives in Israel in a very posh area.
And he says about Israel. So he fought for the the creation of Israel, he wrote writes about Israel. He says that, you know,
it is similar to what the blacks what was done to the blacks in South Africa when they were holed into certain areas. And then he said, The racism in Israel is abhorrent. He says he reaches he said, the Israelis never wanted peace. They just wanted to grab land. He lives in Israel. He fought for Israel.
And he draws the comparisons between what the whites in South Africa and what the Israelis do in
in Israel. And then he says, he said, The brutality and inhumanity of what is imposed on the people of the occupied territories is an unbearable
is unacceptable.
See, the reason I mentioned all these my brothers and sisters, if you come late,
is that Israel
by any parameter by any yardstick is an apartheid regime.
But it gets its full support from the west unflinching support.
While they will speak ill about South Africa, they will do exactly the same thing
in Israel, but they will turn a blind eye to it.
I mentioned his criteria because we live in the west and we see the hypocrisy.
But on top of that, brothers and sisters,
the thing is, this is not just human rights abuses for us in Palestine.
Palestine also has an additional
feature. He has a religious feature.
This is the place where the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam went on Mirage on a Salah and Mirage is the way he led the MBIA salatu salam in Salah.
This is the place where the honorable Barbara the Alana went to get the key only place one time he left in his jaws in his 10 and a half years. As a me. This is the place where sallahu de spent all his life to liberate. Why? Because each one of them knew the virtues of this place.
And this is why
we always remained
vocal about this.
Because not only is it abuse of the human rights of our Palestinian brothers and sisters, and the rights and the URL of the honor the blood of a believer is more holier than the Kaaba. Also it has a religious dimension.
So as you can see, as I mentioned today,
that many of the
characteristics which created which made South African apartheid state
they're in Palestine, and Noam Chomsky says that what changed.
Apartheid was supported by the West. Margaret Thatcher, in her times, declared the ANC Mandela as a terrorist. They wanted to hang him.
The Scandinavian countries supported the ANC by the very same time. Margaret Thatcher was saying this a terrorist organization, and Nelson Mandela should be hunk.
So what changed?
People's minds changed. When America decided no longer to back the apartheid regime in South Africa, that's when things changed. They ultimately at the end of the day,
they defend Palestine they don't defend Palestine.
Our issue is a religious issue. We are not dictated by the we trust in Allah subhanho wa taala. And even within our lifetime, if the Palestinian issue gets worse.
It's still our responsibility to speak about it. Because Allah will ask us Mufti Taqi Usmani have with Allah He was in mushiya kotoba he came out mushy the Cordoba and the driver said to him, he said mercy, quote, The bar was the second biggest large machine in the world once upon a time, if a larger machine Abu Salah Salem, these drivers had to make dua, that one day we retrieve,
go to the machine of the 30s Allah said say Make dua that we keep what we have
machines slipping from our hand on a daily basis.
Use the one line you think subsequent generations pay you and I when they will read in history and they will say that people live in a global village and Masjid Aqsa, you mean you look at history and say how did this happen to the Muslims? How did this happen to the Muslims and happening in front of our eyes
and we do nothing about it. And then when things go out, slip off of our hand and we cry over spilt milk