ARA Ends Divestment Campaign

It is with some regret that ARA announces that we have officially decided to end our Palestine solidarity campaign at Wayne State University’s campus. We have militantly pursued divestment for almost two years now. We have had many successes, met many inspiring individuals and groups, made all the necessary enemies, and, hopefully, set an example for the future. This blog will continue as a way for us to comment on events pertaining to Palestine solidarity in the US and around the world.

This announcement comes on the heels of an approximately six-month period of relative inactivity at Wayne State. Our proudest moment was perhaps our confrontation of Daniel Pipes in October of last year, but since then, we have had little success meeting interested and committed Palestine solidarity activists.

Already in the activist community, our commitment and courage has been called into question, as word of this announcement has circulated. We would like to stress that ARA was always an expression of an important strand of militancy both in the Arab and Muslim community and in the anti-imperialist and anti-racist social justice community. If our campaign ends today, it is not because that strand has vanished from our own hearts, but because it has not met with a similar strand in the hearts and minds of others.

The reality is that too many people looked to us to lead the struggle, and saw in our activity a validation for their own inactivity. As long as ARA was around, “fighting the good fight,” it seemed others could simply go about their lives, not really worrying about Palestine. As a result, the ranks of ARA have depleted over time, and continuing our campaign has no longer become tenable. But we are not ending our campaign because we are tired or bored or afraid. We are ending it because we simply have not met enough people with the courage to confront Israeli apartheid, US imperialism, and popular opinion in the United States. In spite of this, we hold out hope and confidence that at a future time, we will meet courageous people willing to say, “enough is enough,” and who will join us in the struggle for Palestine.

In solidarity,

ARA

Where Walt and Mearsheimer Fear to Tread

While the entire nation seems gripped in the euphoria of hope lately, Palestine solidarity and anti-war activists found little to be hopeful about in Walt and Mearsheimer's talk in Ann Arbor last Friday. Far from a principled stand against Israeli apartheid or US imperialism, Walt and Mearsheimer argued for a reformed occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, stripped of its excesses. While they admitted that a "Jewish state" was fundamentally at odds with democratic principles (such as those the US preaches but rarely practices), they argued that any solution to the conflict that does not leave the Jewish apartheid state intact was unacceptable. We ask how a "Jewish state" will be created without ethnically cleansing the Palestinians living within Israel? What kind of sovereignty will two open-air prisons connected by some kind of "monorail" and under Israeli lock and key have? What vision, what hope do Walt and Mearsheimer offer to Palestinians and Palestine solidarity activists? The answer is simple, they offer none.

Walt and Mearsheimer's fatal flaw is their inability to see support for Israel as part and parcel of white supremacy and imperialism in the United States. They argue that the Israel lobby has led US interests around by the nose for the last forty years, as if the Zionist project of colonizing Palestine is not in the interest of Western imperialism. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, Theodor Herzl, spiritual and ideological father of the modern-day Zionist movement, stated explicitly in his founding text of the Zionist movement, "The Jewish State," that his goal in creating a Jewish state in Palestine was to create "a wall of defense for Europe in Asia, an outpost of civilization against barbarism." Here, Herzl concisely summarizes the racist assumptions underlying the Zionist colonial project. Europeans, Herzl argues, have a right to the land that supersedes that of the indigenous people. Further, the colonial project is part and parcel of the historical “burden” that has fallen upon Europeans to bring “lower cultures” up to the level of civilization Europe has achieved.

In spite of such clear statements, Walt and Mearsheimer argue that US support for the Zionist project is an aberration. To do so is to ignore the entire colonial history of the United States from its very inception! And lest we forget, the US was founded on the basis of ethnic cleansing and genocide against the indigenous people of the Americas in ways that strikingly parallel the founding of the state of Israel and its practices against the indigenous people of Palestine, using much the same racist logic. Far from an aberration, support for Israel is part and parcel of the long white supremacist history of the United States, and lines up nicely with the interests of US imperialism. One important service Israel provides in the region is its attempts to disrupt and destroy grassroots movements throughout the region that threaten to overthrow client states of the US, or disturb business as usual in the region.

This is what is perhaps most disturbing about Walt and Mearsheimer and the argument they make. Far from a principled stand against US imperialism in the Middle East, their opposition to the "special relationship" Israel enjoys with the US represents their belief that supporting Israel is harming the ability of US imperialism to achieve its objectives in the region. For example, they imply that the occupation of Iraq could be better achieved with the help of Syria and Iran, and that the Israel lobby's opposition to both states makes it far more difficult than it otherwise would be to work with both states to crush the resistance in Iraq. Sincere anti-war activists must surely cringe at the suggestion that Iran and Syria be recruited to assist the US in continuing, and better managing, the occupation of Iraq.

In short, Walt and Mearsheimer are imperialists who do not fundamentally oppose the white supremacist basis of American foreign policy. They seek to lead sincere Palestine solidarity activists down a road of ruin that criticizes the excesses of Israeli apartheid, but does not fundamentally challenge its premises.

So where do we go from here? Walt and Mearsheimer, in spite of their best intentions, showed us the way forward when they quoted Ehud Olmert, speaking at the Annapolis "peace" talks a couple months ago. At that time, Olmert noted that "if the two-state solution collapses, and [Israel] faces a South African-style struggle for equal voting rights, then the state of Israel is finished." ARA agrees and welcomes the development of such a struggle whole-heartedly. We must do our part to develop such a movement in the United States. Wherever two or three of us are gathered, we have tremendous strength. We must exercise that strength by demanding divestment in our city councils, universities, and workplaces. We must oppose imperialism and white supremacy in their entirety, and not just their excesses. We should begin where Walt and Mearsheimer fear to tread, by challenging the right of Israel to exist, by objecting not only to current ethnic cleansing operations in the West Bank and Gaza, but also to the ethnic cleansing that led to the foundation of Israel, by demanding the return of all refugees to their historic homelands, by demanding democratic rights to all people living within historic Palestine. These are not utopian demands, but basic, simple rights that all people should enjoy, and many have fought and died to achieve.

Walt and Mearsheimer to Speak at U of M

Students Allied for Freedom and Equality is hosting a discussion on the Israel lobby this Friday. Anyone who needs a ride should contact ARA at struggle@wsuara.org. Further information follows.

The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy

with Professor John J. Mearsheimer
Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago

and Professor Stephen Walt
former Academic Dean, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University

When: Friday, March 14th @ 7:30pm

Where: Natural Science Auditorium, Rm. 2140
830 N. University, Ann Arbor, MI

Professors John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt will discuss the impact of The Israel Lobby on US Foreign Policy. Their presentation will focus on their widely-renowned book "The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy", a New York Times bestseller. There will be a question and answer session and a book-signing immediately following the event.

This event is hosted by Students Allied for Freedom and Equality (SAFE).

Our Black Shining Prince

43 years ago, Malcolm X, the "greatest Muslim of American birth" as some have referred to him, was struck down by an assassin's bullets. Today, in remembrance of his important contributions to our struggle, we recall the words Ossie Davis spoke at his funeral.

Here—at this final hour, in this quiet place—Harlem has come to bid farewell to one of its brightest hopes—extinguished now, and gone from us forever. For Harlem is where he worked and where he struggled and fought—his home of homes, where his heart was, and where his people are—and it is, therefore, most fitting that we meet once again—in Harlem—to share these last moments with him.

For Harlem has ever been gracious to those who have loved her, have fought for her and have defended her honor even to the death. It is not in the memory of man that this beleaguered, unfortunate, but nonetheless proud community has found a braver, more gallant young champion than this Afro-American who lies before us—unconquered still.

I say the word again, as he would want me to: Afro-American—Afro-American Malcolm, who was a master, was most meticulous in his use of words. Nobody knew better than he the power words have over minds of men.

Malcolm had stopped being a Negro years ago. It had become too small, too puny, too weak a word for him. Malcolm was bigger than that. Malcolm had become an Afro-American, and he wanted—so desperately—that we, that all his people, would become Afro-Americans, too.

There are those who will consider it their duty, as friends of the Negro people, to tell us to revile him, to flee, even from the presence of his memory, to save ourselves by writing him out of the history of our turbulent times.

Many will ask what Harlem finds to honor in this stormy, controversial and bold young captain—and we will smile. Many will say turn away—away from this man; for he is not a man but a demon, a monster, a subverter and an enemy of the black man—and we will smile. They will say that he is of hate—a fanatic, a racist—who can only bring evil to the cause for which you struggle! And we will answer and say to them:

Did you ever talk to Brother Malcolm? Did you ever touch him or have him smile at you? Did you ever really listen to him? Did he ever do a mean thing? Was he ever himself associated with violence or any public disturbance? For if you did, you would know him. And if you knew him, you would know why we must honor him: Malcolm was our manhood, our living, black manhood!

This was his meaning to his people. And, in honoring him, we honor the best in ourselves. Last year, from Africa, he wrote these words to a friend: My journey, he says, is almost ended, and I have a much broader scope than when I started out, which I believe will add new life and dimension to our struggle for freedom and honor and dignity in the States.

I am writing these things so that you will know for a fact the tremendous sympathy and support we have among the African States for our human rights struggle. The main thing is that we keep a united front wherein our most valuable time and energy will not be wasted fighting each other.

However we may have differed with him—or with each other about him and his value as a man—let his going from us serve only to bring us together, now.

Consigning these mortal remains to earth, the common mother of all, secure in the knowledge that what we place in the ground is no more now a man—but a seed—which, after the winter of our discontent, will come forth again to meet us.

And we will know him then for what he was and is—a prince—our own black shining prince!—who didn’t hesitate to die, because he loved us so.

A Sober Assessment of the Palestine Solidarity Movement

Anti-Racist Action (ARA) called a rally for last Wednesday in the center of campus. We intended to commemorate and celebrate the recent breakout from Gaza, where Palestinians, in an instant, overturned and forever changed the status quo in the region. Make no mistake. The breakout from Gaza is an innovation in the struggle for Palestine the like of which we have not seen for quite some time. This innovation reflects a string of creative breakthroughs by the Palestinian people in the struggle for their freedom. Let us briefly review.

In November 2006, hundreds of women marched on a mosque where Israeli Defense Forces had trapped Palestinian militants[i]. They dressed the militants in women’s clothes and snuck them out hidden within their numbers. IDF forces fired on these women, and two paid the ultimate price for their resistance. And yet, these women defied all odds, and all consequences, in defense of their brothers and in defense of each other.

Weeks later, Gazans prevented air strikes against the homes of two Palestinian militants when, organized through local mosques[ii]. Within minutes, hundreds of people had gathered in the house and on the roof, Israel called off the attacks, and Israel’s promised “death from above” was averted.

And now, just over a week ago, Palestinians have defied, indeed destroyed, an international border, and resisted both the “slow death” promised by Israel and the hollow promises of the bankrupt leadership of the Arab world. This incident demonstrates the international vision of the struggle for Palestine and its ability to transcend all borders. Witness the sticky position it has put the corrupt US lapdog Mubarak in: he has been forced to choose between shutting down the border to appease the US and Israel (what he would like to do) and keeping it open in solidarity with the Palestinians (what the vast majority of Egyptians would like him to do). Throughout the Middle East, Arab leadership has made similar compromises with Israel and the US. Syria, while currently a member of the “axis of evil,” was intimately involved in expelling the PLO from Lebanon in the ‘70s. Jordan struck a deal with Israel as Israel launched its “War of Independence” (read: war of terror against Palestinians aimed at expelling enough to create a Jewish majority). This deal entailed Israel promising Jordan control over much of the West Bank if Jordan kept its army (at the time arguably the strongest in the Middle East) out of any incursions between Arab forces and Haganah forces. The list goes on. In case after case, the vast majority of everyday people side with Palestine, while their governments collude with the US and Israel against Palestinians and, in Egypt and elsewhere, even against pro-democracy movements within their own borders. The current incident creates a unique opening for struggle throughout the Arab world where solidarity with Palestine is a decisive issue.

In spite of these innovations on an international scale, in the US, ARA experienced more of the same. We were disappointed last Wednesday that no one showed up to celebrate and commemorate this proud moment in Palestine’s history. However, rather than dwell on this incident, we seek to draw the necessary conclusions, and in doing so move forward with renewed energy. What does this incident mean for solidarity work in the United States? What can we who seek to do our part in the struggle for Palestine do here? First, we must soberly assess the strength of the current movement. From there, we can assess both the prospects for success today, as well as in the future.

The Palestine solidarity movement currently stands at perhaps an all-time low. This may seem a peculiar sentiment at a time when events are even today taking place across the country for “Israeli Apartheid Week,” and are being coordinated with groups around the world. This is a fine beginning, and in many countries around the world, these events are part of a growing Palestine solidarity movement. However, in much of this country, there exists no movement at all. In the limited places where such a movement does exist, it is torn by factionalism. Various groups quibble about strategy, tactics, even procedural questions.

ARA’s approach to these questions has been quite controversial. ARA has never turned away from a fight. We have confronted the Wayne State University administration and exposed its moral bankruptcy on many occasions. We have confronted and defeated our Zionist enemies as well. One particularly proud moment was at our rally last October, when we led our march right through our Zionist opposition, forcing them to get out of our way as we marched on the office of the university’s president demanding divestment.

Both among Zionists and among so-called Palestine solidarity groups, these tactics and our militancy have been vilified. We have had heated arguments with Zionists on the campus of Wayne State, and we have had heated arguments with the social workers and pallbearers of the movement many times. We remain undeterred. We take inspiration from the example of Malcolm X, who was much reviled in his own time for his uncompromising militancy. Today, he is remembered and beloved because of that militancy, which redeemed black humanity in the face of attacks by white supremacy. His uncompromising militancy was a key element in that redemption. Our own militancy is a tribute to Malcolm, one of the true heroes of American history. We remain convinced that in the current climate of racist attacks on Arab and Muslim people, as well as all Palestine solidarity activists, uncompromising militancy is the only response that allows us to maintain our own humanity. Any other response accepts the dehumanization these racist assaults attempt. Finally, while our militancy may not resonate today, we believe we are building a legacy for the future. Time will tell.

In short, the Palestine solidarity movement is currently very weak. It is torn by factionalism and divisions based on strategy, tactics, and similar issues. In reality, it is hardly a movement at all. It is a story of small groups of five, ten, sometimes fifteen people holding aloft the banner of Palestine at a time when few are interested in its cause. In the absence of mass participation, these small groups quibble over petty differences and concentrate more on what divides than what unites them. However, when a renewed and vibrant Palestine solidarity movement emerges, it will sweep away and submerge these differences. It will draw on the legacies of those groups whose politics resonate with its own, and it will resign the rest to the dustbin. It is therefore necessary to briefly survey the reasons why people are not moving in great numbers on the issue of Palestine. Several factors contribute to the lack of a sustained movement.

First, it is impossible to overlook the racist climate of the United States with regard to Arab and Muslim people since 9/11. This climate has been produced by the active engagement of both the United States government and racist Zionists. The government has rounded up thousands of Arab and Muslim men on the flimsiest of pretexts, and in some cases even placed agents provocateur[iii] to entrap them, and sent them to prison and Guantanamo, all so it can trumpet victories in the so-called war on terror. The fact that many of these convictions have been overturned[iv] and thrown out due to shady dealings on the part of cops, prosecutors and federal agents illustrates the flimsiness of many of these charges. In addition, Zionist advocates for Israel such as Alan Dershowitz, the plagiarizing and disgraced Harvard lawyer, Daniel Pipes and his Campus Watch organization and Abe Foxman and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), have ensured that support for Palestine is criminalized and Palestine’s advocates are run out of the academic community[v] and in some cases the country[vi]. All these actions have been met by the notable inaction of most of the left, which, plagued by its own conservatism and anti-Muslim racism[vii], has also failed to intervene on behalf of Palestine. The left has consistently refused to take up the cause of persecuted Palestine solidarity activists and everyday Arab and Muslim racism. In addition, where the left is perhaps most active, in anti-war activities, Palestine is either ignored, or debate about including it is stifled by Zionists within the anti-war movement.

Second, and perhaps most decisively, the Arab and Muslim community is a house divided against itself. Take for example an upcoming event in metro-Detroit. The event, entitled, “Weaving Our Community: Dispelling Myths and Stereotypes of the Muslim Community,” is hosted by none other than the ADL![viii] The same ADL is rumored to have encouraged the FBI to begin the investigation of the Los Angeles 8 that resulted in a twenty-year fight to remain in the United States for eight innocent Palestinians whose only crime was support for the cause of Palestinian liberation[ix]. The event features prominent members of the Arab-American community speaking about the affinities between Jewish and Muslim folks, but considering who is hosting the event, one can guess what affinities the event will highlight. Far from an alliance based on a firm opposition to Israeli colonialism and apartheid, the event will feature Muslim sell-outs trying to convince the rest of the community to accept Israeli apartheid and colonialism. They will even be trying to convince us that we should join the military, the FBI, and the CIA, alleging that our presence within such institutions will end the racism they practice against us. Fat chance. The same lie was preached during the ‘60s to black folks following the civil rights movement, and here we are, black folks occupying the highest positions of power in the country, and black folks still living in squalor in the inner cities, the victims of racism throughout the country. And to top it off, even with the addition of black folks, these institutions continue to practice the same racist policies from a generation ago against Arabs and Muslims today.

This event highlights the key tension within the Arab and Muslim communities, simmering just below the surface. This is a tension between the conservative middle-class leadership in our mosques and community centers, and the youth growing up increasingly disenfranchised, subject to more and more vicious attacks, and increasingly unwilling to compromise with racism. Much of this leadership stresses the compatibility of Arab and Muslim civilization with the imperialist project in the Middle East. This leadership posits itself as “good Muslims” as opposed to those barbarian hordes who oppose Israeli colonialism and apartheid. It seeks to teach their communities the benefits of an alliance with the white supremacist politics of the United States throughout the world. However, racist attacks on Arab and Muslim communities teach a different lesson, and young folks are beginning to realize that they must choose between an alliance with white supremacy or rejecting it in favor of multiracial solidarity with all people.

At Wayne State, this tension plays out with the dual aspirations of students. Many see what is going on in Palestine, in Iraq, and even in Guantanamo and sense that the American Dream they are promised is a fraud. And yet, there is a great deal of pressure within the community to aspire to become a doctor, a lawyer, a dentist, or anything else that ensures status under capitalism. We need only consider the story of any of our cousins, brothers, or sisters that have chosen not to follow this path to know the truth. While those that reject this dream wholesale may be considered outcasts and freaks within the family, they are often the most consistent anti-racists, and the most principled in rejecting the evils of imperialism throughout the world.

In short, what is required is a wholesale reckoning within these communities. This reckoning is happening on the lower frequencies. Aunties are beginning to speak out against patriarchy. Sisters are getting jobs and moving out on their own or with other sisters who reject these values and seek to form their own communities based on their own values. Both brothers and sisters, in ones and twos, are rejecting this lifestyle altogether. These folks are laying the basis for this future reckoning, and speeding it along its course.

Given the active attacks by the government and Zionists; given the tacit support through inaction of much of the left; given these unresolved tensions within decisive communities, it is clear that the prospects for victory are limited. What, then, are the prospects for the future? Where do we begin?

When examining the prospects for the future, we do well to consider the remarks of two people, Ehud Olmert and, once again, Malcolm X. Let us begin with Malcolm X’s speech, given over forty years ago in Detroit, “The Ballot or the Bullet.” Such a landmark speech deserves far more commentary than we can currently include, especially given its relationship to the current electoral charade, but that is fodder for another day. For now, we must simply consider the advice Malcolm gave to his audience regarding what each of them could do to further the black liberation struggle. “Join any organization,” he said, “that has a gospel that’s for the uplift of the black man.” “If the NAACP is preaching black nationalism,” Malcolm said, “join the NAACP. If a church is, join that church. If a civic group is, join that civic group.” We in ARA believe that the struggle for Palestine should begin with that first step: join any group committed to the full decolonization of all of historic Palestine. Join any group that demands an end to military rule in the West Bank and Gaza. Join any group that calls for an end to Israeli apartheid practiced against all Palestinians. Join any group that demands equal citizenship for all Palestinians and the return of all refugees. Join any group that actively and courageously pursues these ends.

If we were to end our lesson there, however, we would be poorly served, for Malcolm continued. He continued by saying that “when you get into that organization, and you see it pussyfooting or compromising, pull out of it because that’s not black nationalism. We’ll find another one.” The same goes for the struggle for Palestine solidarity. If you get into a Palestine solidarity group, and it is not doing all those things, pull out of it, because that is not Palestine solidarity. It might be bake sales, endless meetings, a bunch of people united in wearing keffiyehs but divided on everything else, but it is not Palestine solidarity. Again, if people are lighting candles and mourning like a funeral when one of the Palestinian people’s proudest moments has occurred, leave that organization. Join another.

In this way, we will begin to build toward a future where the Palestine solidarity movement is truly a force to be reckoned with. We will begin to build a powerful grassroots movement for our freedom. I say our freedom because if you are in solidarity with Palestine, if you are vocal about justice in Palestine, and if you actively pursue divestment from universities, companies, churches and other organizations, you will quickly find that you have as much freedom as you are willing to fight for. Or as little.

Malcolm X offers much for those of us involved in this struggle. But what might Olmert offer those of us seeking the liberation of Palestine? Hasn’t he committed himself in every action and word to the very opposite? Of course he has. But as we know, occasionally a nugget of truth slips past the mental censor of the Israeli mind, such as the occasional reference to Israeli nuclear weapons that aren’t supposed to exist. At the recent Annapolis “peace” conference, Olmert let slip one of those insightful nuggets, which explains both the recent histrionic attempts to settle the situation in Palestine in favor of a “two-state” solution as well as pointing our own way forward. “If the two-state solution collapses,” Olmert said, “and we face a South African-style struggle for equal voting rights, then the state of Israel is finished.” This comment reflects the knowledge that there is an entity called Greater Israel that governs 5 million Palestinians with some or no political rights. It reflects the anxiety within Israeli society caused by the continued failure of all initiatives to resolve the conflict within the strictures of an apartheid solution. Finally, it shows that a unified political movement of all Palestinians is a powerful vision for the future of the movement.

Olmert has given us our task: rather than wringing our hands about ’48 Palestinians vs ’67 Palestinians; rather than worrying about which parts of Palestine are occupied and which are not, or which are colonized and which are not; rather than splitting hairs about to what extent apartheid Israel resembles apartheid South Africa, we must state our case boldly and simply. All walls must be dismantled, all people must return, all of Palestine must be free.

We shall leave the details to the future reconciliation campaign following the demise of Israel.

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[i] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6112386.stm

[ii] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6164666.stm

[iii] http://www.democracynow.org/2007/1/10/police_entrapment_in_terror_case_nyc

[iv] http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2004-09-01-terror-doj_x.htm

[v] Perhaps the most notorious of these cases was the recent denial of tenure to Norman Finkelstein at DePaul University in Chicago. Other academics targeted by the Zionist thought police include Nadia Abu El Haj at Barnard College, and Joseph Massad at the Columbia Univesity.

[vi] http://www.campus-watch.org/article/id/2980

[vii] http://www.leftturn.org/?q=node/124

[viii] http://regions.adl.org/michigan/events/

[ix] This allegation was reported in the article, “Constitution Trumps All for ‘House Bolshevik’ Einhorn,” appearing in the Los Angeles Jewish Journal in December 2007. In the wake of the dismissal of all charges against the L.A. 8 by judge Bruce Einhorn, the article has been pulled from the website at jewishjournal.com.

Greensboro, SNCC, and the Fight against Racism

Today is February 1st. For many of us, this marks the beginning of Black History Month, a time when we remember and seek to renew the struggles of the past. While we certainly celebrate our past, ARA maintains that every month should be black history month. Attacks on our communities persist, whether through outrageous rent and utility bills, sub-par schools in our communities, racial profiling in Detroit and particularly in the suburbs, where "Driving While Black" is a serious offense, or the stares and looks that constantly remind us that we are far from a colorblind society. In spite of the current state of affairs, we remain proud and assured of our ability to change the world through our committed actions. Every day is a chance to reflect on the proud political tradition of our people. From the Deep South to the intersection of Cass and Warren to Africa, the Middle East and Asia, we are one people struggling for justice. There is much that remains to fight for.

One key moment in the history of our struggle happened on this day 48 years ago, in Greensboro, North Carolina. Four young black men walked into a Woolworth's store, sat down at the lunch counter, and demanded service. When the waitress told them they couldn't sit at the counter, they refused to move. When the manager, red-faced and full of arrogance, told them they had to leave, they refused to move. When the police came, and an officer slowly beat out a rhythm in the palm of his hand with his nightstick, they refused to move. One of the young men, Franklin McCain, remarked that he felt relieved when he sat down, as if a weight had been lifted, as if we was alive for the first time. An elderly white woman walked up to them and patted one of them on the arm. "I'm disappointed in you," she said, and continued, "I'm disappointed that it took you so long!"

Many others had been waiting on the spark that emerged in Greensboro. The next day, instead of four, there were almost thirty students. The next, students filled sixty-three of the sixty-six stools at the counter. By the fourth day, hundreds of black students were taking part in the demonstration. Soon, the sit-ins spread throughout North Carolina, first reaching Winston-Salem and Durham, then spreading to Charlotte and Raleigh. By February 10th, the movement had reached most of the state, and by the next week, the spark the Greensboro four lit had spread throughout the South. All around them, young black folks and some anti-racist whites joined the sit-in movement, inspired by their newly-discovered power: their ability to challenge and defeat racism through collective action.

On July 26th, 1960, Woolworth's lunch counter was desegregated, but at this point, the challenge to Jim Crow had expanded well beyond Greensboro, and had even institutionalized itself with the forming, in April, 1960, of one of the most important organizations in the history of the Civil Rights movement, the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC, pronounced "snick"). SNCC would dominate the Civil Rights movement for much of the next decade, and its uncompromising militancy and bravery in the face of racist attacks made the young people who formed SNCC (many were in their late teens and early twenties) the stuff of legend. We remember their names today: Stokely Carmichael, H. Rap Brown, Bob Moses, Jim Forman, Cleveland Sellers, and even John Lewis.

SNCC established a reputation as the most uncompromising of Civil Rights organizations, and this had much to do with the youth of its members, their idealism, and their total rejection of racist American society. One of the original Greensboro Four once remarked that at the time, their attitude was, "Don't trust anyone over eighteen." Their rejection of racism was an attack on every previous generation that had accommodated and accepted it. All who refused to oppose it stood condemned in these young people's eyes.

So today we honor the legacy of the Greensboro Four, the sit-in movement it sparked, the organization and leaders that arose from that movement, and the lessons their legacy teaches us. Tomorrow, we continue their struggle.

For more information about SNCC and its history, check out Clayborne Carson's, In Struggle, as well as Howard Zinn's SNCC: The New Abolitionists.

NAKBA CONTINUES AS HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS FLEE GAZA

Back in October, Anti-Racist Action, together with almost 100 Wayne State students, confronted racist Israel supporter Daniel Pipes when he visited our university. We let Pipes know he wasn’t welcome on our campus, and it is a lesson he won’t soon forget.

One reason we opposed Pipes was his support for cutting off basic necessities to the Gaza Strip. He has expressed support for such proposals at least twice, once over six years ago and again in September 2007. In the past week, Israel has implemented just such a policy. Electronic Intifada summarized these measures and their implications in an article today: “That means no movement in or out of the Gaza Strip for people, or any kind of shipments in of vital food, fuel supplies and medicines. It is more than a miserable existence: it is a slow death.”

While Pipes and Israel assert that these measures have been taken as punishment for rocket attacks on Israel, their true purpose was revealed today, as 350,000 Gazans fled into Egypt following the bombing of the separation wall in southern Gaza. The purpose of this collective punishment is to make the Gaza Strip unlivable, to bring about the “slow death” of Gazans or force them off the land. WITH THE RECENT LOSS OF ALMOST 25% OF THE ENTIRE POPULATION OF THE GAZA STRIP, THE ZIONIST DREAM OF A JEWISH STATE IN ALL HISTORIC PALESTINE HAS COME CLOSER TO REALITY.

Today must be remembered as yet another Nakba in the series of Nakbas that constitute the story of the indigenous people of Palestine since the arrival at the turn of the 20^th century of Zionists bent on establishing their state.

These newest refugees of Israeli terrorism must be allowed to return to Gaza, as all Palestinian refugees of this conflict must be allowed to return to Palestine. The Jewish nature of Israel must be opposed, and apartheid must be destroyed so that peace may finally come to the region.

Free at Last, Free at Last

The following article continues our series documenting the harassment and intimidation faced by Palestine solidarity activists in the U.S. Michel Shehadeh highlights many of the key lessons for those of us involved in similar struggles, including the importance of building grassroots support networks and the meaning that comes from shared experiences of struggle where we create our own values and reject those of our racist and capitalist society. While once again a documentation of the lengths to which Zionists will go to destroy the lives of our people, at the same time it is a story of courage. Shehadeh fought against enormous odds, and all the tricks and connivances of the most powerful government in the world, and emerged unbowed and free. An interview with Shehadeh about his 20 year struggle for freedom is available here.

Twenty years of government harassment comes to an end

For the last 20 years, the U.S. government has accused me of being a terrorist. Along with six other Palestinians and a Kenyan, we were dubbed the "Los Angeles Eight" by the media. Our case even made it to the U.S. Supreme Court.

On Oct. 30, 2007 — 20 grueling years after the early morning raid in which armed federal agents barged into my apartment, brutally arrested me before my 3-year-old son's eyes, incarcerated me in maximum security cells in San Pedro State Prison for 23 days without bond, and attempted to deport me — the government dropped all charges fabricated against me. The charges involved accusations of aiding a member group of the Palestine Liberation Organization that the government alleged aided terrorism.

But Los Angeles immigration Judge Bruce J. Einhorn had ordered an end to the deportation proceedings against us last January because the government failed to comply with his order to disclose evidence that supported our innocence. He called their behavior "an embarrassment to the rule of law."

Why did the U.S. government spend 20 years trying to ban us from this country? Because we tried to educate Americans about the situation facing millions of Palestinians living in apartheid-like conditions under Israeli military occupation. Because we organized fundraisers to provide Palestinians with humanitarian support. And because we attended demonstrations to urge a shift in U.S. policy away from unconditional financial and diplomatic support of Israel.

The government robbed us and our families of the best and most productive years of our lives. For more than 20 years, they vilified us in public without recourse. We'll never be able to entirely erase the negative words and images they manufactured about us. Our case is a stark example, and is different only in degree, from what routinely befalls those who call for equal rights for Palestinians and who press for a fair Middle East U.S. policy consistent with international law. In February of this year, two others who advocated equal rights for Palestinians — Mohammed Salah and Abdelhaleem Ashqar — were found not guilty of terrorism charges based in part on evidence provided by Israel and obtained through the use of torture.

President Carter, university professors John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt and Nobel laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu face charges of anti-Semitism and shoddy scholarship meant to intimidate, discredit and silence them.

And it may be surprising, but I don't hold a grudge. Throughout this 20-year plus ordeal, we never lost faith that we would win against this political and legal oppression. Not only because of our innocence, but because of the tremendous, unfaltering support that we enjoyed all these years across religious, ethnic and civic communities, and a legal team that did not waver once in its commitment to justice. This incredible support has taught us more about America than we could have learned in two lifetimes; the support of such people who are a living example and a role model for immigrants — to positively engage with the issues facing the country on a daily basis. Struggling to make the place a bit better than when we arrived is what made America home to us. We made that choice, and we're the better for it.

My two American-born sons learned though this experience the meaning of establishing a strong grassroots connection and of getting involved with their community. The words justice, freedom, equality and civil liberties are not words they learned in school that will become empty clichés as they grow older. They are concepts that have real meaning to them, that affect their family and community. They know these rights must be vigilantly protected, especially when the issues they advocate are not popular, or at times of war and conflict, when the first causalities are our basic freedoms — free speech, the right to dissent and to disagree with the government — the very basis of democracy.

From the beginning, we said that our case was a political one and that the government made us victims of a political witch-hunt. We persevered all these years and defeated the attempt to uproot us from our communities, break our families apart, and deport us, because we were innocent. Free at last, we are finally exonerated and it tastes sweet. We will savor the sweetness. And we will use it to fuel our determination to defend the same issues that our supporters defended through us: justice, civil liberties, freedom and immigrant rights. We believe that this is the America for which we continually aspire, the America that is just, here at home and in faraway places — with policies based on fairness, equality, and a shared humanity.

Michel Shehadeh is a research associate in the Arab and Muslim Ethnicities and Diasporas Initiative in the College of Ethnic Studies at San Francisco State University. Reprinted from arabamericannews.com

Planning the Terror that Created Israel

2008 is the 60^th anniversary (if such a sweet-sounding term can reasonably applied in the circumstances) of the explusion of 800,000 Palestinians from historic Palestine by Zionist militias. This massive effort followed the passage of UN resolution 181, and aimed at achieving a vast Jewish majority in the areas that would become Israel. With such a majority, the so-called democratic character of Israel was thought to be secured.

Thankfully, brave anti-Zionist Israelis exist, alongside all the courageous anti-Zionists of all stripes. One invaluable asset to our ranks is Ilan Pappe, and his book, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, is a weapon in the struggle for Palestine.

As the anniversary of Nakba approaches, an important review of this book has recently been published by the International Socialist Review. You can find it below and at this link. Ilan Pappe’s book is available online or, of course, at your local, Palestine-friendly bookstore.

Planning the terror that created Israel

The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine
Ilan Pappé
OneWorld Publications, 2006 (paper 2007)
320 pages • $15 (paper)

Review by MOSTAFA OMAR

ISRAELI HISTORIAN Ilan Pappe, whose parents fled persecution in Nazi Germany in the 1930s, minces no words in telling the real story of Zionism’s crimes against the Palestinians:

It is the horrific story of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, a crime against humanity that Israel has wanted to deny and cause the world to forget. Retrieving it from oblivion is incumbent upon us; it is the very first step we must take if we ever want reconciliation to take a chance, and peace to take root, in the torn land of Palestine and Israel.

In The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, Pappé explains and documents that the true goal of the founders of Zionism had always been to create a majority Jewish state, emptied as much as possible of the native Palestinian population. He meticulously (and painfully) reconstructs the story of how Zionist leaders, over many decades, carefully laid the groundwork for this expulsion and how they intiated their plan in 1948 when the British finally decided to leave.

The same Western governments that have been quick to denounce ethnic cleansing in Darfur or Bosnia and Kosovo, writes Pappé, have failed to recognize that the same awful crime also happened to the Palestinians sixty years ago and continues today.

Myth and reality

Israel’s official version of the story of 1948 claims that Jewish settlers in Palestine never intended to expel their Palestinian Arab neighbors; that Zionist leaders were willing to accept UN resolution 181 of November 1947, which called for the partition of Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state, but that it was the Palestinians who rejected that plan; and that the Palestinians became refugees when they “voluntarily” fled their homes to make room for the Arab armies that invaded Palestine in May 1948 to carry out what they called a “second Holocaust” against Jews.

Palestinian historians such as Walid Khalidi and Salim Tamari have repeatedly documented the crimes Israel committed in 1948 and afterwards, using historic records as well as the testimonies of Palestinian refugees. For his own research, Pappé decided to debunk the Israeli myths by relying almost exclusively on declassified Israeli military archives and the memoirs of Israel’s “founding fathers.”

These sources leave no doubt that, in the decades before 1948, the leaders of Zionism concocted a premeditated plan to expel the native Palestinian population. Pappé details how these Israeli “heroes” executed the plan in the period from December 1947 to March 1949 through the use of massacres, rapes, demolition of villages, and forced expulsion of the native population. In doing so, he manages to vindicate and corroborate the story that the Palestinians have been trying to get out to the Western world for the past sixty years.

Pappé has belonged to the school of historical revisionists pioneered by the Israeli historian Benny Morris in the late 1980s with The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem 1947–1949. In that book, Morris also researched declassified Israeli military archives and found that the Zionist leadership and militias committed certain crimes during the war of 1948 that led to Palestinian expulsion and flight. Morris maintained that these crimes were not the result of any advance plan of expulsion, but rather the result of the dynamics of the conflict—much the same as other bad things that happen in all wars.

The “transfer” plan

Looking at the same documents Morris used, however, Pappé concluded that Morris selectively used data and ignored many events that point starkly to a conscious plan of expulsion. He goes on to argue that the founders of Zionism—from Theodore Herzl to David Ben-Gurion—had always planned to expel the native Palestinian population as a prerequisite for creating an exclusive Jewish state in Palestine.

For example, in 1937 Ben-Gurion told the Jewish Agency Executive, the organization charged with procuring land for Jewish settlements in Palestine, “I am for compulsory transfer; I don’t see anything immoral in it.” Ten years later, Ben Gurion maintained his opposition to sharing Palestine with the Arabs by rejecting the UN partition plan because he believed it didn’t allocate at least the majority of Palestine to the Jewish state.

Pappé argues that the partition plan was, from the beginning, unfair to the Palestinians because they still made up two-thirds of the population in 1947, while the UN allocated only 42 percent of the land to them. Meanwhile, the UN allocated 56 percent of Palestine to foreign Jewish colonizers who only made up a third of the population. Despite this injustice to the native population, the founding father of Israel actually insisted on getting more and more land. In a speech delivered to his own Mapai Party on December 3, 1947, Ben-Gurion made his aims clear:

There are 40 percent non-Jews in the areas allocated to the Jewish state. This composition is not a solid basis for a Jewish state.… Only a state with 80 percent Jews is a viable state.

Zionist leaders believed that it was not possible to achieve a Jewish majority in the country simply through immigration, since most Jews fleeing Nazi Germany’s Holocaust wanted to head West, not to Palestine. Therefore, Pappé writes, they concluded that there was only one way to achieve this goal of a majority Jewish state on the majority of the land of historic Palestine—the ethnic cleansing of the natives.

Preparing for ethnic cleansing

Since the early 1930s, these founding fathers worked hard to prepare for a majority Jewish state with very few or no Arabs. First, they successfully strengthened Jewish economic, social, military, and political institutions that could become the basis of the new state. They also took advantage of British openness to Jewish immigration during the British colonial mandate period of 1917–48. In addition, they worked to weaken the Arab political leadership by fighting alongside British forces to crush most of the Palestinian political and military infrastructure during the Arab revolt of 1936–39. At the end of the Second World War, they launched a relentless campaign of terrorist attacks against British interests in Palestine to drive the British out.
They also authorized a committee of Jewish historians and Arabists (a term that refers to specialists in Arabic culture) to compile a detailed, secret map of every Arab town and village in Palestine. They recorded the location and topography of the villages, the degree of land fertility, and availability of water, the number of inhabitants and the names of all adult males, the number of guards and weapons, the names of individuals who took part in or sympathized with the 1936 revolt, and even recorded a description of the Mukhtar’s (mayor’s) living quarters.

Leaders such as Ben-Gurion, Golda Meir, and Moshe Allon met for years on a biweekly basis in the “Red House” in Tel Aviv as a group called The Consultancy. They drew and revised a sophisticated plan to carry out the “transfer” of the Palestinians at an opportune time in order to secure a Jewish majority in Palestine. In the third updated version of that plan (compiled at the end of the 1930s and referred to as Plan C or gimel in Hebrew), these leaders agreed on the necessity of carrying out the following steps:

• Killing the Palestinian political leadership;
• Killing Palestinian inciters and financial supporters;
• Damaging Palestinian transportation;
• Damaging Palestinian water wells, mills, etc.;
• Attacking Palestinian clubs, coffee houses, meeting places, etc.

Within a few months, the same “founding fathers” drew up the final version of the plan, now named Plan D, or dalet in Hebrew. These leaders ordered their militias and gangs to start implementing Plan D only hours after the UN issued resolution 181 in November 1947. The long nightmare for the Palestinians would only get worse. Zionist militias began to attack and expel villagers with or without provocation inside lands allocated to either the Jewish or Arab state.

Qisarya was the first village to be expelled in its entirety, on 15 February 1948. The expulsion took only a few hours and was carried out so systematically that the Jewish troops were able to evacuate and destroy another four villages on the same day, all under the watchful eyes of British troops stationed in police stations nearby.

The people of the village of Sa’sa were among the early victims. On the night of February 15, 1948, troops from Palmach (which had the largest Zionist militias) “took the main street of the village and systematically blew up one house after another while families were still sleeping inside.” Moshe Kalman, the Jewish officer in charge of the operation later recalled, rather poetically, “In the end, the sky prised open. We left behind 35 demolished houses (a third of the village) and 60–80 dead bodies (quite a few of them were children).”

Declassified Israeli military archives confirm that the Zionist militias carried out at least thirty-seven large-scale massacres in that period. Some of the worst massacres and rape cases took place in villages such as Deir Yassin on April 9, 1948, where one survivor, Fahim Zaydan, described what Jewish troops did:

They took us one after the other; shot an old man and when one of his daughters cried, she was shot too. Then they called my brother Muhammad, and shot him in front of us, and when my mother yelled, bending over him—carrying my little sister Hudra in her hands, still breastfeeding her, they shot her too.

The news about the fate of the villagers in Deir Yassin spread like wildfire across Palestine, with Jewish troops cruising through other villages promising the villagers the same fate if they didn’t leave. And though more recent accurate accounts of the number of those killed in Deir Yassin suggest a figure of 170 men, women, and children, Zionist propaganda broadcast over loudspeakers in the weeks that followed the massacre claimed that they actually killed over 300, in order to elevate the panic among Arabs.

On October 28, 1948, Palmach troops committed another massacre in the village of Dawaymah, described by Pappé as more brutal than the massacre in Deir Yassin. In just a few hours, all houses were blown up and 455 people were executed, including 170 women and children. The remaining 6,000 inhabitants—who included 4,000 refugees expelled earlier that year from other villages—were forcibly expelled. According to Israeli archives, “The Jewish troops who took part in the massacre also reported horrific scenes: babies whose skulls were cracked open, women raped or burned alive in houses, and men stabbed to death.”

In all those villages that were attacked, the map compiled earlier by the Arabists proved to be extremely useful. It gave the Jewish troops complete understanding of the best way to attack those villages. And with the help of paid informants, it allowed them to pick out and immediately execute all potential resisters.

By the end of the war, Zionist troops had destroyed more than 420 Palestinian villages and turned their inhabitants into refugees. The same ill fate that befell the Palestinian countryside also befell the Arab population in cities—both Arab or mixed. The campaign against the Palestinian cities was also as relentless and brutal as that against the villages.

On the first day of Passover, April 21, 1948, Jewish troops began Operation Scissors (later renamed Operation Cleansing the Leaven or Bi’ur Hametz in Hebrew) to cleanse the mixed sea-port city of Haifa in the north of its fifty thousand Arab inhabitants. The troops attacked by rolling barrel bombs from the hills onto Arab streets and using heavy artillery while loudspeakers threatened the Palestinians to leave or else. Thousands of Palestinians fled to the port, attempting to get on boats to leave, but even there, Jewish troops continued to shoot, leading to more panic with parents trampling their own children. Many drowned when overloaded fishing boats capsized. This all happened under the nose of the British forces who were still stationed in the city and didn’t fulfill an earlier promise to protect the city’s Palestinian inhabitants.

Another example of what Pappé calls the urbicide, (killing of cities) of Arab Palestine is the attacks on the two cities of Acre and Baysan. On May 6, 1948, Jewish troops laid siege with intensive bombardment. Loudspeakers shouted everywhere: “Surrender or commit suicide. We will destroy to the last man.”

According to British doctors in the city’s Lebanese Red Cross hospital, the troops also caused an outbreak of typhoid and dysentery among Arabs and even British soldiers by poisoning the water supply with germs. These germs were developed by the Biological Warfare Science Corps program, set up by Ben-Gurion himself in the 1940s and ironically known by its acronym HEMED, which means “sweetness” in Hebrew.
Exhausted, starved, and fearing more death and destruction, the Palestinian inhabitants of Acre and Baysan finally surrendered in a matter of days only to be loaded by Jewish soldiers at gunpoint onto trucks that drove them to their future refugee camps. By the end of the war most major Palestinian cities had become totally or almost totally empty of their Arab inhabitants.

By the spring of 1949, Israel had conquered up to 80 percent of historic Palestine. It expelled 800,000 Palestinians, or 75 percent of the native Arab population, from their homeland, turning them into refugees and preventing them from coming back at the end of the war. The founding fathers had finally succeeded in securing a Jewish state with a Jewish majority. Some 660,000 Jews imposed military rule on 150,000 Arabs who dug in and didn’t flee. The rest of the Palestinians were dispersed as refugees in the remaining 20 percent of their own country or in neighboring Arab states—made to live as refugees for the following sixty years. Today, they number over six million.

Setting the record straight

Pappé makes a couple of critical points. First, he explains that the Arab resistance to the Zionist efforts of ethnic cleansing was actually quite weak. While Ben-Gurion, in public speeches, delivered fiery public warnings against a “second Holocaust,” he expressed utter confidence in private meetings that the nascent state of Israel would crush all Arab armies and resisters.

This confidence was based on his knowledge that Jewish troops outnumbered and out-gunned all the Arab armies combined. In addition, the Soviet Union allowed Czechoslovakia to supply the Jewish side with new tanks and air power while Britain formed an embargo on arms sales to the Arabs.

Pappé shows that the majority of the Palestinians, especially villagers, never fully comprehended the gravity of the Zionist threat in 1948. They had no idea that the Zionist project meant not to exploit them but to expel them. Indeed, in the early months of 1948, many were going on with their lives, even planning future harvests.

Second, Pappé demonstrated that Benny Morris was wrong to claim that the expulsion started after the Arab armies entered Palestine on May 15, 1948. He uses the same archives that Morris looked at to show massacres and expulsions beginning and spreading as early as December 1947.

The price: The future

Like all Israelis who dare to tell the true story of what happened, Pappé was ostracized. He received death threats and was forced out of his job as a distinguished senior lecturer at the University of Haifa last summer. Citing an atmosphere of hate and bigotry, he decided to accept a job at Exeter University in England.

There, he continues to argue that Israel must admit its historic crime in order to begin the process of reconciliation. He also argues that the state of Israel is racist to the core and must be democratized and purged of hate. The first step towards democratization is eliminating the Jewish character of the state, allowing all Palestinian refugees to return, and establishing total equality between Arabs and Jews in Palestine.

He is full of hope that this future is possible through the Palestinian struggle for national liberation. Pappé likens the resistance to Palestine’s olive trees, a national symbol of pride. Israelis keep trying to destroy them by planting pine trees over them, but the olive trees keep growing back.

BOLE SO NIHAL! SAT SRI AKAL!

Today, Sikhs around the world gather at their local Gurdwara to celebrate Guru Gobind Singh Ji's Janam Din. Guru Gobind Singh is perhaps the most well-known of the 10 Sikh Gurus, possibly because his life was filled with incredible struggles and trials and for ultimately institutionalising Sikhism through creation of the Khalsa.

Guru Gobind Singh became the 10^th Guru when he was nine years old upon receiving the head of his father, the 9^th Guru, in a box. His father, Guru Tegh Bahadur, had been beheaded by the Emperor in India at the time for refusing to convert from Sikhism. The period in which the Guru lived was one of conflict between local landowners endlessly trying to oppress the people in their undying quests for power and the Emperor at the time trying to suppress all those who politically and religiously differed from him in his own attempts to maintain power. The Guru followed his father's example as well as the example of the eight Gurus before them, refusing to capitulate to those in power and fighting to maintain freedom for not only Sikhs but other oppressed people as well. After all, Guru Tegh Bahadur had been beheaded not only for refusing to convert himself but for refusing to convince others to convert as well.

Guru Gobind Singh Ji is perhaps most well-known for creating the Khalsa within Sikhism. The Khalsa is the collective of baptised Sikhs. Ultimately the Khalsa is the brother/sisterhood of Saint-Soldiers of Sikhs. The idea behind it is simple; one must not only be involved in spiritual affairs but also in temporal affairs. The soldier has two swords as symbolised in the Khanda, the symbol of Sikhs- one to fight the oppressors of people and the second with which to defend the innocent. This is reiterated in the uniform of the Khalsa given to Sikhs by the 10 ^th Guru. The 5 K's, which make up the uniform, include the kesh (uncut hair), kept because all of God's creation is perfect so to cut it is a dishonour to God, the kanga (wooden comb), to maintain cleanliness of the kesh, kara (steel bracelet), a reminder that a Sikh is bound to God, kachhera (long undershorts), symbolising modesty and high moral character, and the kirpan (strapped sword), worn to not only remind one of her duty as a Khalsa but also worn as symbol to defend one's faith and to defend those who cannot defend themselves.

No one embodied the idea of a Saint-Soldier more than Guru Gobind Singh Ji. He lost not only his father, but his mother and his four sons, the two elder were killed in battle, and the two younger were bricked alive (all of whom died for refusing to convert from Sikhism). Despite these tragedies which would have crushed the spirit of any man, the Guru continued to be a beacon of hope and light for all people. He himself fought in many battles mostly in defense of people increasingly subject to religious persecution from the rulers of India at the time as well as to defend his own religious freedom and that of his followers. The Guru found no reason to be tied to any Empire or local ruler; rather he believed that people should be allowed to live their own lives as they see fit. This obviously led to clashes between him and the Emperor at the time as well as with local landlords who cherished the feudal system, under which they lived and prospered. Ultimately he was assassinated for refusing to bow down to those in power, for recognizing no power but that of God. He was the last of the living Gurus for the Sikh people passing on his succession to the eternal Guru, the Guru Granth Sahib which is the holy scriptures of the Sikh people.

Gobind Singh Ji was an amazing man and his birthday is a time to not only celebrate and remember his legacy as something of the past but to honour it by embodying these ideals within our own lives in the present and future. BOLE SO NIHAL! SAT SRI AKAL!