Palestinian Al-Jazeera Producer in Qatari Daily: Time For the End of the ‘Great Lie’ Israel
Palestinian columnist and Al-Jazeera newsroom producer Samir Al-Hijjawi recently wrote an op-ed titled “Israel Is Surely Temporary,” which was published in the Qatari daily Al-Sharq, and, in slightly modified form, in the Jordanian government daily Al-Rai. In it, he wrote, “It’s time for Israel to go… It’s time for the end of the great lie… It’s time [for Israel] to go because the regimes protecting [it]… are toppling one by one.” He added that the “Nakba Day” protests on Israel’s borders were proof that the Palestinians and Arabs would never relinquish Palestine, the beloved waqf (religious endowment) of all Muslims.
Following are excerpts from the op-ed:
“The Arab and Palestinian youth who gathered on the borders of Palestine on Nakba Day showed that Palestine resides in the hearts and minds of the Arabs, from the [Atlantic] Ocean to the Gulf, and that the attempts of the Zionist entity and the West, along with the official Arab regimes, to erase Palestine from memory have utterly failed.
“Israel – along with its allies, the official Arab regimes, including Mahmoud ‘Abbas and Salam Fayyad’s [Palestinian] Authority – has taken pains to remove Palestine from the school curricula and the mosques. The Zionist entity has attempted to oppose anything that might evoke Palestine – films, [television] shows, articles, poems, books, and lectures. Israel has raised hell following [the publication of] a [certain] article by a Palestinian intellectual, or poems like Mahmoud Darwish’s ‘Passers between the Passing Words.’ [Israel has also] prevented the documentary about the Dir Yassin massacre from being screened at the U.N., and was enraged at the Turkish [television] series ‘Valley of Wolves,’ responding by brutally [rebuking] the Turkish ambassador [to Israel] to the point of humiliating him.
“Israel is not acting alone in this arena. It has help from institutions, lobbies, and movements, such as the secret Masonic movement [i.e. the Freemasons], as well as the clubs associated with it, and also from research centers, as they are called, and from associations, clubs, ‘peace forums,’ and other sham [organizations] whose only concern is to ensure support and protection for Israel.
…”It’s time for Israel to go, along with its tales and legends. It’s time for the end of the great lie that has destroyed everything and poisoned relations between the Arabs and the West. It’s time [for it] to go because the regimes protecting this entity are going; [indeed,] those that protect the borders of this artificial entity are toppling one by one. It has no choice but to go.
[snip]