Sunday, June 5, 2011

زهرة المدائن



لأجلك يا مدينة الصلاة أصلي
لأجلك يا بهية المساكن يا زهرة المدائن
يا قدس يا قدس يا مدينة الصلاة
عيوننا إليك ترحل كل يوم
تدور في أروقة المعابد
تعانق الكنائس القديمة
و تمسح الحزن عن المساجد
يا ليلة الأسراء يا درب من مروا إلى السماء
عيوننا إليك ترحل كل يوم و انني أصلي
الطفل في المغارة و أمه مريم وجهان يبكيان
لأجل من تشردوا
لأجل أطفال بلا منازل
لأجل من دافع و أستشهد في المداخل
و أستشهد السلام في وطن السلام
و سقط الحق على المداخل
حين هوت مدينة القدس
تراجع الحب و في قلوب الدنيا أستوطنت الحرب
الطفل في المغارة و أمه مريم وجهان يبكيان و أنني أصلي
الغضب الساطع آتٍ و أنا كلي ايمان
الغضب الساطع آتٍ سأمر على الأحزان
من كل طريق آتٍ بجياد الرهبة آتٍ
و كوجه الله الغامر آتٍ آتٍ آتٍ
لن يقفل باب مدينتنا فأنا ذاهبة لأصلي
سأدق غلى الأبواب و سأفتحها الأبواب
و ستغسل يا نهر الأردن وجهي بمياه قدسية
و ستمحو يا نهر الأردن أثار القدم الهمجية
الغضب الساطع آتٍ بجياد الرهبة آتٍ
و سيهزم وجه القوة
البيت لنا و القدس لنا
و بأيدينا سنعيد بهاء القدس
بايدينا للقدس سلام آتٍ

Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Never Forget: Gaza Flotilla




Exactly a year from today on 31st May 2010, while in international waters and en route to Gaza, Israeli Naval Forces communicated that a naval blockade over the Gaza area was in force and ordered the ships to follow them to Ashdod Port or to be boarded, the ships declined and were boarded in international waters.The boarding started at 2 a.m. on 31 May 2010 and was completed by 8.

Never Forget:

Where? International waters of the Mediterranean Sea
Target? Gaza-bound flotilla in international waters
Date? 31 May 2010
Executed by? Israeli Navy
Outcome? Seizing control of the ships and detaining the passengers
Casualties? 9 passengers killed and several dozen passengers and seven commandos injured.

AlJazeera's report on board of the Mavi Marmara before commuications were cut:



The aftermath of Israel's attack on Gaza Flotilla in pictures:



Protesters outside Downing Street in London.



Protesters in Amman, Jordan


Protesters in Nablus



To follow second-by-second tweets from all over the world about Gaza Flotilla, follow the hashtag #Marmara and #Flotilla on Twitter. My favourite tweets were these of Haya Al Shatti, a Kuwaiti activist who was on board of Gaza Flotilla last year:



في مثل هذا الوقت كبلونا وفتشونا وصعدونا لسطح السفينة في الشمس الحارقة..في مثل هذه الثواني استوعبت وقاحتهم وحقارتهم
وجوههم مغطاة بالكامل وصرختهم الرئيسية "سييت" اي اجلس و"واخد واخد" اي واحد واحد..وقبل ان يكلمونا يضعوا الرشاش وجهنا

Sources: AlJazeera's Blog and Wiki.

Monday, May 9, 2011

May, the 13th 2011

جمعة النفير إلى غزة
في يوم الجمعة 13 مايو 2011 سيؤيد الشباب الواعي من جميع أنحاء العالم و بمختلف الديانات القضية الفلسطينية بمختلف الأشكال، كل بما يستطيع، تأكيدا منهم ان القضية الفلسطينية لم ولن تنسى. وأن الحصار على غزة باطل والكل شريك في التغيير.
ففي مصر، سيقوم عدد هائل من الشباب المصري الأقباط منهم والمسلمين بالصلاة والدعاء لغزة أو ما أسمونه بالـ "صلاة المليونية" ومن ثم سيتوجه البعض منهم إلى معبر رفح الذي فتح قريبا بعد سقوط نظام مبارك، وذلك في تمام الساعة التاسعة صباحا من يوم الجمعة القادم، ومنه إلى غزة لتوصيل المؤن والأدوية وغيرها من المساعدات إلى قطاع غزة المحاصر. وقد أمر وزير الخارجية المصري بعد تشاور مع قادة القوات المسلحة بفتح معبر رفح لتسهيل عملية عبور الأدوية والمساعدات في خطوة إيجابية كبيرة.
أما في كندا، فستقوم حملات كبيرة لدعم تسيير بواخر كندية لتوصيل المساعدات والمعونات المادية والمعنية لسكان قطاع غزة في نهاية هذا العام. من هذه الحملات على سبيل المثال، حملة "ساعد في تسيير السفينة" التي يقودها كيفين نيش أحد أعضاء قافلة الحرية وممن كانوا على متن السفينة مرمرة التي توجهت إلى غزة في مايو 2010 والتي قتل فيها 9 من الأتراك العزل المنظمين للقافلة على أيدي الصهاينة في هجوم بربري على المياه الدولية.

فكيف ستكون مشاركتك؟

On May, the 13th, young people from all over the world, and from different religions and beliefs are going to support the Palestinian issue. Each one them is going to participate in their own way to stress on the fact that they did not, and they will not forget Palestine, and more, to prove to the world that the siege on Gaza is invalid and illegal.
In Egypt, a big number of people, both Copts & Muslims are planning to gather on Friday the 13th of May in the morning to perform prayers together for Gaza.  And at 9 AM on the same day some of them will head to Rafah border crossing, and from there to Gaza to accomplish a mission of delivering supplies of medicines and other aids to the besieged Gaza Strip. Worthy to mention that Rafah crossing was recently opened, after the fall of the Mubarak regime. And the after consultation with the leaders of the armed forces, the Egyptian Foreign Minister ordered the opening of the Rafah border crossing to facilitate the crossing of drugs and aid in remarkable positive step.
  
[Rafah Crossing | معبر رفح]

As for Canada, many major campaigns are going to start on May the 13th to support the Canadian ships  heading to Gaza by the end of the year to deliver aid for the residents of the Gaza Strip. One of these campaigns, for example, is the campaign called "helped in the conduct of the ship" led by Kevin Nish who is one of members of the freedom flotilla, and who was on board the ship of Marmara in May 2010.
So how are you going to help?

Update: An interseting views by a young Kuwaiti guy on the 13th of May & Gaza (in Arabic)
تحديث: فيديو جميل ومعبر يستعرض فيه شاب كويتي اراءه حول القضية الفلسطينية، غزة ويوم 13 مايو 2011

Sunday, December 26, 2010

Gaza: Two Years The Massacre

ستنصرون..لا مِراء
ستنصرون..في الأرضِ والسماء
لأنكم مشاعلُ الحياة
في العالمِ الخــــواء

Saturday, December 25, 2010

The 2% Theory



Since the very beginning of this blog, it's been always fascinating to read about Herzl and how he managed to form the main beliefs of the so called “Jewish State”.
In this blog entry I’m going to talk about the 2% theory and use Theodor Herzl as an example.
The 2% theory implies that those who make a difference and create victory are only 2% of any nation. Only 2% believers in a definite and specific idea can make it real!
Using Theodor Herzl as an example: he was only one person, and only few people supported him - way after he wrote his book. They were in total much lesser than 2% of the Jews from all over the world back in 1890’s. He failed to convince the Ottoman Sultan, Abdulhamid to allow the Jewish migrations to Palestine in return of massive financial assistance “knowing that The Ottoman Empire was bankrupt, after the Ottoman-Greek war”..he didn’t give up, and instead decided to hold and chair the first Zionist Conference in the Swiss city of Basel.
The main two recommendations/outcomes of the conference were:
1.       The Jews will have no home but in Palestine, and Argentina is no more what they aim for if their plans went wrong.
2.       If the Ottoman Sultan Abdulhamid insisted in refusing the Jews’ claims and demands, they wouldn’t hesitate to destroy the The Ottoman Empire

Three more summits were more than enough to attract the attention of the entire world, and specially the European countries to the Zionists’ dream to establish their own independent estate in the Palestinian land. The British government put so much pressure on Sultan Abdulhamid to amend all the laws that used to prohibit the Jews migrations to Jerusalem.

An idea that turned into a book and later to global summits was created by less than 2% of the Jews. We need another 2% to bring justice to the oppressed Christian and Muslim Palestinians & to unite against those who forgot what humanity means.

End of blog entry…



قاعدة ال 2 بالمائة
منذ بداية هذه المدونة، ما زالت القراءة عن هيرتزل وتمكنه من بناء المعتقدات المهمة للدولة اليهودية المزعومة من أكثر الأمور تشويقا. في هذه التدوينة سأتحدث عن ما يسمى بقاعدة الـ 2 بالمائة، وسأستخدم "ثيودور هريتزل" كمثال
تنص هذه القاعدة على أن من يستطيع إحداث فرق وتحقيق النصر هم فقط اثنان بالمائة من أي أمة. اثنان بالمائة من المؤمنين بفكرة معينة ومحدده هم من يستطيعون أن ينقلوا الفكرة إلى عالم الحقيقة والتطبيق
عودة إلى مثال ثيودور هيرتزل: كان هيرتزل شخصا واحدا حظى بتشجيع ودعم قلة من الناس بعد فترة طويلة نسبيا من نشر كتابه. كان عددهم اجمالا لا يتجاوز ال 2% من اليهود في جميع أنحاء العالم في التسعينيات من قرنين. رغم فشله في إقناع السلطان العثماني عبدالحميد بأن يسمح للهجرات اليهودية مقابل معونة مالية عظيمة "في زمن كانت الدولة العثمانية مفلسة بعد الحرب العثمانية-الأغريقية"، لم يفقد الأمل، وإنما أصر على الاستمرار في طريق تحقيق الحلم وترأس أول مؤتمر صهيوني في سويسرا.
أهم التوصيات التي خرج بها المؤتمر كانت:
لن يقبل اليهود بغير فلسطين وطنا، والأرجنتين ليست خطة بديلة بعد الآن
إذا أصر السلطان عبد الحميد العثماني في رفض مطالبهم، فلن يترددوا أبدا في تدمير الدولة العثمانية والقضاء عليها

ثلاث مؤتمرات\قمم إضافية كانت أكثر من كافية لجذب اهتمام العالم، وخصوصا الدول الأوروبية للحلم الصهيوني ببناء كيانهم المستقل على الأراضي الفلسطينية. قامت الحكومة البريطانية بوضع ضغوطات كبيرة على السلطان العثماني عبد الحميد ليقوم بتعديل كل القوانين التي كانت تمنع الهجرات اليهودية للقدس

فكرة واحدة تحولت إلى كتاب، ومن ثم إلى قمم عالمية مصدرها أقل من 2% من اليهود في العالم. نحن بحاجة إلى 2% أخرى لتحقيق العدل للمسيحيين والمسلمين المستضعفين في فلسطين، وللتوحد في وجه كل من نسى معنى الإنسانية.

نهاية التدوينة

Sources:




3. The Jewish State - Herzl
2. فلسطين التاريخ المصور - د. طارق السويدان
1. علمتني الحياة - حلقة القدس

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Are Palestinians Inversely Propotional to Distance?


I’d like to apologize for my inactive presence. And seldom do I remember being joyful about it, but, as a full time student as well as counting down graduation, I’m being occupied by my work and plans. Pray for me the best, I have a decent break, I hope I put up thoughts I’ve been carving for this space. This post is biased in Palestinian’s perspective, i.e. not extremely related to politics.


In my studies, while transmitting power wirelessly via antennas, the power dissipates in terms of distance where the further the receiver is, the weaker the power becomes which is logical and scientifically proven. Does this also apply to an individual’s character with respect to identity without taking into account outer effects in which complexity of a behavior increases? Every Palestinian, whether old or young, experiences the consequences of not being in their homeland in a variety of categories such as social standards where some cannot work or may not travel. In a search of freedom, where none can return to his homeland because either he needs a visa or because the middle-eastern part of the world would treat him differently by suspecting him working with Israel or Groups of Palestine or even terrorism. In search for his lost identity, a regular person would search where the sunrise is unquestionable, a stable place for living and quenching the human’s needs. Palestinians immigrate to many parts of the world out of the Middle East in order to survive, however, one may think that a Palestinian soul may be blended and gradually lost within the process of living, just like the case of power and distance…right? In fact, whether they become leaders, rich, famous, not having Arabic reflection or no proof of their Palestinian roots. NONE deny that he is originally Palestinian, but may not be obvious not proud to mention, but some of Palestinians who reside in the middle east tend to fake their identity by painting their lifestyle intentionally by others to lose their identity, those are labeled scum and hypocrite in my hometown. If you have neither respect nor honesty to your homeland, then you don’t respect yourself and if you don’t respect yourself… who will respect you?



Bottom line, the relationship between those Palestinians who are away from hometown and hometown are linearly stable and non linearly increasing, for a person will search for his identity and end up being a moving mirror of his hometown. May God bless us all; wherever we are we are one. I also am proud of this… and I will provide this post some examples I know.

Dr.Adnan Mjalli, 07/08 Entrepreneur of the year

Anas Sharbini (born 21 February 1987 in Rijeka[1]) is a Croatian football midfielder playing for HNK Hajduk Split in the Croatian first division.
He is the brother of striker Ahmad Sharbini of Hajduk Split. His father, Jamal Sharbini, is a Palestinian born in Damascus, Syria.[

Elías Antonio Saca González (born in Usulután, 9 March 1965) is a Salvadoran politician and was the President of El Salvador. He was elected President in 2004 to serve a five-year term that ended in 2009.
Saca is descended from Palestinian (Catholic Christian) immigrants who arrived in El Salvador in the early 20th century from the West Bank town of Bethlehem.

Hazem "Haz" Ali[1][5][6] (born December 20, 1978)[1][2] is an American former professional wrestler and manager of Palestinian descent.[5] He is best known by his ring name Armando Estrada and for his work with World Wrestling Entertainment on its ECW brand.[3]



Zainab Al Khatib, Female Danish Team's Goalkeeper



Nicolás Alejandro Massú Fried (born October 10, 1979, in Viña del Mar, Chile), nicknamed Vampiro (Spanish: "vampire"), is a Chilean tennis player, a former world number nine in singles, and a two-time Olympic gold medalist. He is the only male player to have won both the singles and doubles gold medals in the same Olympic Games in modern (1988 ff.) Olympic tennis.[1]

His father, Manuel Massú, is of Palestinian Ancestry

Edward Wadie Saïd (Arabic pronunciation: [wædiːʕ sæʕiːd] Arabic: إدوارد وديع سعيد‎, Idwārd Wadīʿ Saʿīd; 1 November 1935 – 25 September 2003) was a Palestinian-American literary theorist and advocate for Palestinian rights. He was University Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University and a founding figure in postcolonialism.[1] Robert Fisk described him as the Palestinians' "most powerful political voice."[2]

Le Trio Joubran (Arabic: الثلاثي جبران‎) is a Palestinian oud band, consisting of the three brothers Samir, Wissam and Adnan Joubran from the city Nazareth. The Joubran brothers come from a well-known family with a rich artistic heritage. Their mother, Ibtisam Hanna Joubran, sang the Muwachahats (poems that originated in Arab Spain) while their father is among the most renowned stringed-instrument makers in Palestine and in the Arab world

Melechesh is an black metal band that originated in Jerusalem. The band started their career in Jerusalem (and Bethlehem) and operated from there between 1993–1998; however, they have resided mainly in Amsterdam since 1998 for several personal, professional and demographic reasons.


Dr.Ali Ghrayeb,

Associate Professor

Concordia Research Chair in High Speed Wireless Communications

Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering Concordia University

I pe
rsonally took a course under him and he influenced my life big time.

I have 30 more examples, I can go forever on this... but I picked those to be the highlight of this post. and Happy Eid for my fellow Muslim readers.

Accept my kindest regards,

Fathi Albatie