Teaching for Peace and Change in the World’s Biggest War Zones

Republished from the New Indian Express   By Blessy Mathew Prasad Published: 30th May 2016 06:00 AM Last Updated: 28th May 2016 01:51 PM Gun shots, bloodshed, refugee camps, hatred, basically …

Source: Teaching for Peace and Change in the World’s Biggest War Zones

Teaching for Peace and Change in the World’s Biggest War Zones

Republished from the New Indian Express

http://www.newindianexpress.com/education/edex/Teaching-for-Peace-and-Change-in-the-Worlds-Biggest-War-Zones/2016/05/30/article3454921.ece

 

By Blessy Mathew Prasad

Published: 30th May 2016 06:00 AM

Last Updated: 28th May 2016 01:51 PM

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Gun shots, bloodshed, refugee camps, hatred, basically anything that says ‘war’ – would probably scare away millions of us who have never seen that side of life. Except maybe for a few like Siraj Davis. An American citizen of Japanese origin, Siraj made one of the biggest decisions of his life six years ago, when he entered Syria, determined to do everything he could to remove refugees from their misery. It would come at a huge price, of course. And he was ready for it.

Six years without departure, witnessing war first hand, and even being deported for his pursuit of refugee rights, Siraj has seen it all. Syria to Jordan and Jordan to Erbil, Kurdistan, Siraj has spent the last six years researching, documenting and helping Iraqi, Palestinian and Syrian refugees in the Middle East.

He has taught at numerous international private schools and language institutes and now teaches at the American International School in Erbil, Kurdistan apart from teaching Permerga fighters and fighting for the rights of Yezidi refugees.

Ask him why he loves teaching so much and he emphatically replies, “because that’s the only way out”. For Siraj, education is the door to peace in the Middle East. “It is absolutely necessary to employ and uplift education to deter a trajectory of violent struggle derived from alternative ideologies  surrounding our youth outside of the schools, as opposed to non-violent resistance and tolerant meaningful dialogue,” he says.

He believes that it is the responsibility of teachers to introduce students to the acceptable  rhetoric, to be more forthcoming in the dialogue with the ‘other’ society that teaches them to repel, and to do away with the negative intolerant impediments.

When injustice and violence have become the cultural norm, when you’re constantly told to flee your home to avoid being mistakenly bombed as a terrorist, when you’re separated from loving families for prolonged periods of duration, endure second to third class citizenship, experience languishing penury and cruel abuse and merciless exploitation in your own region and specific nation of refuge, and desperately await a visa to a developed nation which is the only pathway to a real life for them, so often, the young are led to believe that it’s hopeless to even attempt to change things.  That, according to Siraj, is the worst form of submission in any human, to attempt nothing and feel content at such hypnosis. “I have taught students that simple things such as viewing or liking a video about humanity can improve the world. Sending a thank you letter to those who fight for our rights is a step. Making a blog can make a difference. But the first and most exigent step is getting the students to believe in themselves. If it takes an entire school year to convince them of this,  it is absolutely worth it,” he says with conviction.

Deeply inspired by his mother’s compassion for the downtrodden, Siraj has made it his life’s mission too. Little wonder then that the legend Noam Chomsky penned a note of appreciation for Siraj, something that will remain safe in his treasure box.

The Davis Docu

His first book was Religious Fanaticism and Abolition: Early 19th Century Marginalization of David Walker and Nat Turner. In it, he researched the application of religion by the abolitionist movement to justify violence at slave rebellions

He did something never done before in the historiography of the abolition movement by taking prolific author Herbert Aptheker’s record of slave rebellions in America and analyzing it statistically, which demonstrated the phenomena that every 20 years, the level and frequency of violence of rebellious groups tends to increase in a struggle, as it did in abolitionism

Reach out: https://www.facebook.com/siraj.davis

Cheers for a Palestine by Name, Forget the Rights

Cheers for a Palestine by Name, Forget the Rights.

Cheers for a Palestine by Name, Forget the Rights

Cheers for a Palestine by Name, Forget the Rights.

Cheers for a Palestine by Name, Forget the Rights

Let me disabuse some further clear fallacies I have been reading about this event on Facebook.One Facebook user stated in support of a second Palestinian state,“A bird in the hand is better than another 64 years of nothing. America Indians can’t eliminate USA just as Israel is not going to disappear… the “real” revenge is to thrive and develop a working Palestinian economy despite the hardships.”Sacrificing for an inclusive and Democratic state is very possible and it doesn’t necessarily entail hate, as some assume (some perceive that a one state solution translates into the destruction of the Jewish culture and rights). Similar enigmas of conflict have existed in many situations across the globe within the pages of history and it is very possible to apply in the Palestine conundrum. Although there are Palestinian voices that emphasize angry rhetoric in regards to the formation of one state, there are just as many voices that desire cultivation of peaceful coexistence, whose vernacular does not entail this. furthermore, what one says and does are two different things.Moreover, we should expect that Israel and the US will make the economy for Palestinians scream (as Nixon said about Salvador Allende in Chile) after their embarrassment in the UN.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nE3E2cbAy3YAnother Facebook user stated about the one state solution,“It’s unachievable. If Palestine can get most of the pre-67 borders and the right to return, it should be taken. I know it’s all Palestine, yet, it’s unachievable.If I have an illness and years are lost, will I except a cure at 50 or lose it all? The answer is rhetorical. Take the 67′ borders and shun Israel in perpetuity.Remember Star Wars…’Don’t give into hate, Luke.’ “As we see in the two prior posts, the error in reasoning is that a one state solution coalesces with the idea that violence is an intractable condition of that aspiration, that it is unattainable, and that there will be economic stability with a second Palestinian state.To ignore the pre-conditions of peaceful coexistence before this nightmare all began, is to be so exhausted from injustice and the pursuit of its anathema, that one is willing to capitulate for the sake of trading justice, even the tiniest fabrication of it, for temporary peace. That is in fact what one will ascertain with two states.http://azizabusarah.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/two-state_solution_king_queen_254395.jpg?w=300

via Cheers for a Palestine by Name, Forget the Rights.

The World Declares to Israel “Hands Off Gaza!”

 

The World Declares to Israel “Hands Off Gaza!”.

Collective Consciousness and TJP: Why We Refuse to Surrender

These are not perfect people by far. They have tough skin and like many great minds in history, they have flaws, sometimes huge ones. Sometimes those who have above normal passion and resilience against injustice by the powerful over the weak are misconstrued as insane, incorrigible, anti-authority, or/and misanthropes. The fact is the experiences they have endured and fights they have stood strong against have created a turtle’s shell on the outside to protect their fragile inner parts, which could be used against them to diminish their will to be resilient or to loosen the grip of their clinch on their own humanity, honor, and integrity. To protect themselves from the harsh cruelty and despicable natures of those brainwashed by years of national and zealous religious indoctrination who call themselves citizens of the very same governments that create the injustices that make people like them squint in horror as they cry on the inside while trying to control their rage at such disgusting, barefaced, and shameless injustice. Sometimes our hearts are pure and honest, too honest as some say. People hate others who are too honest or speak truth to power as Ray Luv, the late 2 Pac’s friend, explained was a reason why people hated and wanted 2 Pac Shakur dead.2 Pac: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUoyBNmMHgMThese people or leathernecks for humanity are human rights activists. And yes. We all are eccentric! Some may have peculiar habits such as wearing the same suit everyday of the week or failed in high school as Albert Einstein, some may have been former criminals who turned their lives around like Malcolm X, some may have a high libido as Franklin Roosevelt and Dr. King Jr, some may have huge debts like Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln and Mark Twain who all filed for bankruptcy, and more flaws. We are human.

via Collective Consciousness and TJP: Why We Refuse to Surrender.

Cheers for a Palestine by Name, Forget the Rights

 

Cheers for a Palestine by Name, Forget the Rights.

Cheers for a Palestine by Name, Forget the Rights

 

Cheers for a Palestine by Name, Forget the Rights.

Collective Consciousness and TJP: Why We Refuse to Surrender

Collective Consciousness and TJP: Why We Refuse to Surrender.

 

Exerpt from Siraj’s blog:

“Therefore, US civilians and other citizens of the Axis of Israel at home and abroad are in danger because of the US and the West’s devotion to the injustices done by Israel against the Palestinians. Worse, the US and the Western proselytizing machine have echoed and magnified the voice of Israel’s versions of Nazi propaganda. Today we can see books and newspapers in Israel such as the Jerusalem post calling Palestinians crocodiles, copying the Nazi style of Der ewige Jude (The Eternal Jew) and Rasse und Seele (Race and Soul) and magazines such as Neues Volk in support of the chosen racial/religious identity of Israelis.  One only needs to read the aforementioned list of Nazi material and read Israeli propaganda outlets to see the striking similarities. These media outlets’ voices are epitomized by comments such as former Prime Minister Golda Meir’s comment that the Palestinians simply do not exist or former Israeli president Moshe Katsav when he said Arabs have a different culture and morality and conscience than Israelis, or  Menahim Begin’s statement that Palestinians are beasts, or Rabbi Yaacov Perrin’s declaration that all Arabs are not worth one Jewish fingernail, and much more. All of the above and more would make a living Joseph Goebbels and Heinrich Himmler momentarily tear from the shock of who in fact is the conclusive superior species of human, later throwing their hands up in glee of success as to the honor bestowed upon their beliefs of Darwinistic superiority. A celebration not only of Nazi methods, but of the Israeli stupidity of self-proclaimed hubris funded by American and Western blank checks in reclusive solitude from international criticism. An applause is overdue, Israel has become the modern Nazi state and the Axis of Israel has successfully demonstrated that only small circumstances, perhaps of race, separated Western support of such barbarous regimes as Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan during WWII with that of Israel.

If the danger to lives is not imminent enough a threat to citizens of nations that support Israel or the Axis of Israel, then the very trust in the Western principles of which we espouse and hold up to the world is in danger of being rebuked. All of our founding fathers in America such as Benjamin Franklin who declared sacrificing freedom for security will lead to neither has been spit on by the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). Many innocent Muslims have been falsely charged and imprisoned such as Ziyad Yaghi, Affia Siddiqui, and much more. Violent acts and discrimination against Muslim Americans and other Muslims in Europe have been proliferating since 9-11 according to many different human rights organizations.  And what of wise words of entangling alliances abroad? John Quincy Adams, a man who discreetly helped terminate slavery and whose cousin, Samuel Adams, is credited with sparking the American Revolution, would hold his head in his hands in disgust if he knew his advice that America should not go abroad in search of monsters was not heeded. Truly! Americans and other westerners have been tested in these times not in regards to the danger to them, but in violating the very same principles of which their own countries have been founded on, and upon that heuristic, it is a failing grade.

All of the above hypocrisy leads to a country where they consistently demand the surrounding neighbors and indigenous of Palestine to recognize their Right to Exist, while simultaneously never acknowledging the Palestinian’s Right to Exist.”

Collective Consciousness and TJP: Why We Refuse to Surrender