Essay from Santiago Burdon

Showing Support to Palestinians Does Not Make You Anti-Jew, Anti-Semitic, or Anti-Anything. It Makes You Human. Go ahead, be human.

In Support of the Palestinian People 

I have been receiving some rather vexatious comments from people I know casually through Social Media. I have been unfriended by many due to my position concerning the Palestinian and the Israeli Zionist conflict that has recently culminated into an atrocious and horrific war. Once again exemplifying the inhumane treatment humans are capable of inflicting upon their fellow man. It seems my position supporting the Palestinian people and detesting the persecution they have been subjected to since the illegal occupation of Arab and Palestinian homes, farms and businesses by Jews, has angered them. Israel has inflicted horrendous acts against the Palestinian people for over 70 years. 

Appears the United Nations appropriated Real Estate they didn’t own. The British Mandate supported by the United Nations and advocated by the United States allocated land area to Zionist leaders for settlement 1917. Later amended to accommodate WWII Jewish refugees. 

This Mandate granting property to the Jewish people extended rights of land ownership despite the property being owned and lived upon in some instances for generations of Arab and Palestinian families . They never took into consideration the legal rights of the Palestinian land owners. Prior to the British annexation of the territory it was part of the Ottoman Empire. An astonishing fact is the people were treated humanely and were extended all the rights of every other Ottoman citizen. Not so under Israeli occupation. 

In 1948 Israel declared independence demanding to be recognized as an independent nation by the United Nations. 30 countries voted against the declaration but it passed anyway. No longer would Israel recognize the conditions of the British Mandate. 

Soon after the new government implemented laws discriminating against Palestinians. The land allocated by the United Nations wasn’t large enough to support the immigration of millions of Jewish refugees. Israel determined it was entitled to areas inhabited by thousands of Arab and Palestinian people. The military quickly attacked Palestinians living in those areas with Israel forcefully confiscating the land. Over 726,000 Palestinians were evicted from their homes and thousands more were massacred. That was the start of Israel’s solution to living in harmony with other people in the region as they had proclaimed. 

Since then Israel has adopted the practice of Apartheid. Their main objective during over 70 years of occupation is the genocide of the Palestinian people. Here’s Amnesty International’s report of their investigation into Israel’s actions. 

Israel’s atrocities and injustice against Palestinians: Cruel system of domination and crime against humanity

Amnesty International has analyzed Israel’s intent to create and maintain a system of oppression and domination over Palestinians and examined its key components: territorial fragmentation; segregation and control; dispossession of land and property; and denial of economic and social rights. It has concluded that this system amounts to apartheid. Israel must dismantle this cruel system and the international community must pressure it to do so. All those with jurisdiction over the crimes committed to maintain the system should investigate them.

February 2020

The Israeli persecution of Palestinians is extensive and too many to list. 

Let me tell you, if my home was taken from me, evicted from my homeland, tortured, my people murdered and every other crime possible was levied against me, I would have no qualms about picking up a weapon and rage against Israel. Maybe I’m the one that should unfriend those of you advocating Israel’s atrocious treatment of Palestinian men, women and innocent children. 

I’m unable to understand and far from accepting anyone’s support of Israel. Either you are an evil and sadistic person or just an uninformed. And if those descriptions aren’t accurate then I deduce that you’re just an ignorant idiot.