(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - We have interviewed Dr. Mohsen Saleh, from the Zaytuna Center for Studies, about the success of Israel’s occupation and its process of Judaization of Palestine in opposition to a disunited and non-resistant Muslim world.
The program also includes interviews with Ahmad Mousalli, professor at the American University of Beirut and Dr. Tahsin Halabi, political Analyst, Damascus. What follows is an approximate transcript of the interview.
Q: Who do you think bears responsibility here? I mean Israel seems to have succeeded in taking over many parts of Palestine including trying to Judaize and take over Jerusalem al-Quds itself.
Saleh: Well, generally speaking yes the Israelis succeeded in the process of Judaization of Beitul Moqaddas and most of Palestine. The process of Judaization of al-Quds is going on, quietly but excessively. Nowadays we have in al-Quds more than 480,000 Jews who are living in East and West Jerusalem (al-Quds).
Besides the very active work of the process of Judaization - I will not go into details because your question is about responsibility - but generally speaking, it is the responsibility in the beginning for Palestinians, then the Arab world and the entire Muslim world also is responsible for that.
But also besides that it is an international responsibility because it is a matter of a cause of justice, which should be supported by everyone who believes in justice and freedom.
Q: We heard Professor Mousalli [the other guest of the program] say that we are deadlocked in this issue. Now with the fact that the Palestinians themselves, at home they are not quite seeing eye to eye when it comes to how to deal with this issue, do you think that we are really deadlocked?
Saleh: Yes to a very big extent we are having such a deadlock because nowadays the Israelis who are ruling there are having their program of very active Judaization not only for Jerusalem, but for the whole Palestine even the West Bank.
Palestine or occupied Palestine is now under an extreme rightist Israeli rule(rs) who are working day and night in such process of Judaization. They don’t have any vision for this or any kind of solution to the Middle East matters or whatever, the settlements there, and so their vision is growing more and more for the process of Judaization.
At the same time we have such a disunity; weak Arab and Muslim world who are not active in supporting the Palestinian resistance movement and also even in supporting the steadfastness of the people who are living in Jerusalem (al-Quds) in facing such brutal occupation by the Israelis.
Q: Let me ask you a little bit professor Saleh about the importance of this day specifically since it was designated in the holy month of Ramadan. Do you think there is any connection in this spirituality of Ramadan and how the entire Muslim world and even non-Muslims actually are celebrating it and remember it with a lot of fervor it seems?
Saleh: Yes this day has a very high importance, but let me first add some little information of what’s going on in al-Quds.
For the last year unfortunately, we have more than 35 violations against Masjid al-Aqsa (al-Aqsa Mosque) just in the last year, whereas these violations against al-Aqsa, between 1967 until 1993 were not more than 40 or 50.... So within one year it has been doubled and is becoming much more dangerous.
Besides, we have more than 38 tunnels underneath Masjid al-Aqsa and almost we have kind of new excavations - I’m talking about such excavations which the Israelis are trying to bring in one way or another, a new city under Masjid al-Aqsa, a Jewish one. We have more than 10 synagogues around Masjid al-Aqsa. So things are changing in a very dangerous way.
Now the importance of such a day is that it is recalling all the Muslims, the Arabs, the Palestinians and the world of the importance of this holy city, which in its very origin was a holy place for all religions. So it should be a center for peace and tranquility. Nowadays with such Jewish Israel occupation it has become a place of bloodshed, the sufferance of people. So it is not reflecting any message of religions at all.
Now, also with this call of Imam Khomeini, it’s becoming like a call of unity of Muslims directing the Muslims to overcome their differences, whatever and to concentrate on their mutual relations and challenges which they are facing, all of them.
So they [have] something in common: the challenge of the Judaization of al-Quds; and the challenge of the Israeli occupation and changing the very structure of al-Quds.
So, it is a call also for unity and also a call for their common cause, for their common mission to overcome their differences and to unite to do it in a very objective way in which this could help the Muslims to do something….
Q: This is the point here. Do you think that if the Palestinians have the true support among 1.5 billion Muslims only without the humanitarian support, which they’re getting all over the globe, things would have been different?
Saleh: Sure. I’ll give you one example - Last year we had unfortunately from the so-called Muslim Conference, or the OIC - the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, only the Committee of Jerusalem (al-Quds) contributed almost USD 12 million in the whole year to Jerusalem (al-Quds). While one of the Israeli billionaires, Moscovitch contributed more than USD 100 million.
So, one Israeli Zionist contributed that much - almost ten times of what was contributed by all Muslim countries in such a committee - it reflects the very weak [and] feeble position of this OIC.
The most important thing is that if the Muslims were really serious about Jerusalem because the very existence of this movement, of this organization was because of the arson of Masjid al-Aqsa in 1969. So if they were serious then I think they would go more practical in supporting the Palestinians and their steadfastness under this Israeli brutal occupation.
Q: The fact that for Arabs, especially some Muslim leaders, they are so much dependent on the Western states that Palestine has not become the priority, but don’t you feel that they might fear that they would have a lot of revolutions with their own states as a result of this negligence of the Palestinian issue?
Saleh: Israel itself is very much dependent on its very existence, on the weakness and division in the Arab world especially in the area around it.
Nowadays the strategic environment around occupied Palestine or Israel is changing - especially in Egypt. And such a change in the strategic environment to be more warm in supporting the Palestinian issue and supporting resistance will mean a kind of starting point for changing the equation or the formula of the weakness and disunity of the Muslim world around this occupied Palestine to a kind of establishing new governments, new regimes based on the very will of their own people.
And the people in the area are very much connected (whole-)heartedly and in their minds with Palestine, Beitul Moqaddas.
So, yes, we have a very strong potential in the region to growing support of the Palestinian issue by such a change in the environment if we want to talk about a positive change, hopefully although yes we are still having many challenges - of the Western intervention, of the uprisings in the Arab world to redirect these changes to a negative one or to their own ends.
But still we have very strong hopes that the change will happen. Otherwise, whether sooner or later, the people of the region will change and we are sure that the Muslim cooperation and unity will come and Jerusalem will continue to be the heart of the Arab world and the heart of the Muslim Ummah and a sign and a symbol of unity for all Muslims.
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