While the creation of Israel has been a blessing for the Jewish people, it has created turmoil and bloodshed for the Muslim world. Israel has been built on the face of a false religious right, going back to a vague interpretation of the Old Testament.
The Zionist movement started as a political, secular entity, not a religious objective. It evolved from a yearning among Jews who felt rejected and persecuted by the Christian world. They yearned for a homeland in order to free themselves of this treatment. It is this same treatment that Muslims now are undergoing under Israeli leadership, which to Muslims, is the ultimate hypocrisy behind the creation of Israel.
Muslims and Jews, before the creation of Israel, lived in relative peace and harmony. Although Jews lived under Muslim rule, they were free to participate in politics and guaranteed full protection of religious freedom. In contrast, today’s Israeli government has purposely provoked mass fatal riots by offending the Muslim world through the horrendous invasion of Muslim holy sites (i.e. the recent excavation of a tunnel underneath the Dome of the Rock), despite virulent objections by Muslims through protest.
Additionally, Palestinian Christians and Muslims alike are forbidden access to the Holy City of Jerusalem without a prior pass from the government, which is extremely difficult to obtain.
From the beginning of the illegal immigration of Jews in Palestine in the early part of this century, the Middle East has been torn in half by war. The creation of the Israeli state has resulted in four wars and has come extremely close to the systematic destruction of a nation.
While Israel claims it is threatened by so called “Muslim Fundamentalists,” it was in fact Zionist groups that used terror and extremism to threaten and expel the indigenous people. The most atrocious of these events was the massacre that occurred in 1948 at Deir Yaseen in which an Israeli killed hundreds of innocent Palestinians. This was a cause of 750,000 Palestinians, Muslims and Christians being forced from their homeland in the worst, inhumane way known to mankind.
Muslims would like to revert back to the golden age in which Muslims and Jews lived in peace and harmony. The creation of Israel is nothing to celebrate, but is an event that will forever tear Muslims and Jews apart.
-Tarek Elgawhary is a freshman majoring in philosophy and religion, and Ali Hussein is a sophomore majoring in computer science.
