What’s wrong with the world mama?
People living like ain’t got no mamas
I think the whole worlds addicted to the drama
Only attracted to the things that bring you trauma
...
People killing people dying
Children hurting, you hear them crying
Can you practise what you preach
Would you turn the other cheek?
...
It just ain’t the same all ways have changed
New days are strange is the world the insane?
If love and peace so strong
Why are there pieces of love that don’t belong
Nations dropping bombs
Chemical gases filling lungs of little ones
With ongoing suffering
As the youth die young
So ask yourself is the loving really strong?
So I can ask myself really what is going wrong
With this world that we living in
People keep on giving in
Making wrong decisions
Only visions of them living and
Not respecting each other
Deny thy brother
The wars going on but the reasons undercover
The truth is kept secret
Swept under the rug
If you never know truth
Then you never know love
Where’s the love y’all? (I don’t know)
Where’s the truth y’all? (I don’t know)
Where’s the love y’all?
People living like ain’t got no mamas
I think the whole worlds addicted to the drama
Only attracted to the things that bring you trauma
...
People killing people dying
Children hurting, you hear them crying
Can you practise what you preach
Would you turn the other cheek?
...
It just ain’t the same all ways have changed
New days are strange is the world the insane?
If love and peace so strong
Why are there pieces of love that don’t belong
Nations dropping bombs
Chemical gases filling lungs of little ones
With ongoing suffering
As the youth die young
So ask yourself is the loving really strong?
So I can ask myself really what is going wrong
With this world that we living in
People keep on giving in
Making wrong decisions
Only visions of them living and
Not respecting each other
Deny thy brother
The wars going on but the reasons undercover
The truth is kept secret
Swept under the rug
If you never know truth
Then you never know love
Where’s the love y’all? (I don’t know)
Where’s the truth y’all? (I don’t know)
Where’s the love y’all?
Since Israel has refuse journalists and reporters entry into Gaza, these are the stories and pictures from inside Gaza itself.
The following is a piece that my mate wrote (not sure if it’ll be published) – am reproducing it here with her permission. I hope you’ll take the time to read it.
~~~~~~~~
FACTS AND A GOOD STORY
Ida Bakar
It must be heartening for the letter writer ‘Hamas to blame for Israeli raids’ that his thoughts are echoed by none other than President Bush himself. Such is the insight on the affair that I am compelled to let the facts get in the way of a good ‘Israeli defence’ story.
This war did not start on the 27th December 2008.
Despite the unilateral Israeli ‘disengagement’ from Gaza in September 2005, according to an Israeli Human Rights group B’Tselem, Israel continued to control the air and sea space, movement between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank (also via neighbouring countries), the population registry, family unification, and the crossing of goods to and from Gaza. On 28 June, Israel bombed the electric-power station. Since then, residents of the Gaza Strip have relied completely on Israel for their electricity.
In addition to direct killing of civilians since the disengagement, IDF soldiers taking pot-shots at unarmed Gazans, children included, the population is further traumatised by sonic booms from low flying military planes; so much so Physicians for Human Rights Israel has petitioned against this extreme violation of human rights.
Following a free and fair election in which Hamas was elected to power, the people of Gaza were collectively punished by Israeli siege which, in the last 18 months have starved the population of food and denied access to medical care.
The Israeli military occupation denies the Palestinians the very basic of human dignity as reported by the International Committee of the Red Cross way back in 2007. Israel blockade of Gaza has resulted in malnutrition amongst the 1.5 million population of the occupied land.
The Israeli army has continued to deny ICRC emergency medical team into Gaza despite the dire humanitarian situation.
So, for the letter writer to compare the Gaza-Israeli situation with relationship between Malaysia and Thailand or Singapore is missing the point all together. Malaysia’s army is not occupying those countries.
The letter writer stated that Hamas has refused to sign cease-fire agreement. This, again, is a fib as Hamas and Israel signed up to an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire on 19th June 2008.
Unfortunately, while the world was in euphoria after Obama’s election to the American presidency, on the 5th November 2008 Israel launched an incursion into Gaza killing seven Palestinians. This effectively ended the ceasefire and Hamas rockets flew in retaliation.
The letter also called for Hamas to stop attacking Israel. What about the Israeli stranglehold on Gaza? When the rockets stop and Gaza infrastructure further destroyed, not to mention the five thousand already dead (as opposed to four Israeli civilians), will Israel allow some dignity for the Palestinians? Will Israeli talk with Hamas? Efraim Halevy, former Mossad chief certainly thinks so.
After all, Hamas was elected into office by the Palestinians of Gaza. Gaza and the West Bank are under illegal Israeli military occupation. These Palestinians are denied their basic human rights to dignified lives.
History has shown time and again that occupation and oppression will be resisted. Think of the wars of independence from colonial rule. Think of East Timor and Tibet. As Malaysians we fought the Japanese occupation, we aimed to be free of British colonial rule however benign and benevolent it was.
The Palestinians of Gaza do not have sophisticated weaponry to fight the Israeli military might. The Israelis do not want a viable Palestinian state and continues to trample on their dignity. Read the testimonies from Gaza via B’Tselem here.
Gaza is akin to a prison camp, what choice these Palestinians have?
The 500 or so who protested at the US embassy recently are joined by hundreds of thousands more in the capitals around the world, European capitals included.
I humbly urged the letter writer to read beyond the up-the-minute news bulletin. All the links above are from Israeli and Western organisations websites. I have chosen them so as not be accused of being a one-sided affair to discredit anything related to the US and Israel as stated in the letter.
List of on-line references
B’Tselem Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in Occupied Territories
http://www.btselem.org/english/About_BTselem/Index.asp
http://www.btselem.org/english/Gaza_Strip/Index.asp
http://www.btselem.org/english/Testimonies/index.asp?TF=30&image.x=11&image.y=11
Physician for Human Right Israel
http://www.phr.org.il/phr/article.asp?articleid=270&catid=55&pcat=-1&lang=ENG
International Committee of the Red Cross
http://www.icrc.org/web/eng/siteeng0.nsf/html/palestine-report-131207
http://www.icrc.org/web/eng/siteeng0.nsf/html/palestine-update-030109?opendocument
BBC news
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7809289.stm
CBS news
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/06/19/world/main4193410.shtml
Wall Street Journal
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118593144036684212.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
The Independent Newspaper
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/chronic-malnutrition-in-gaza-blamed-on-israel-1019521.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/massive-rocket-attack-launched-on-israel-992978.html
Ida Bakar
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