 ™ |
– precursor to many cruelties –
| Afrikaner Nationalist | German Nazi | Israeli Zionist |
survive can unleash strong forces that have in the past helped to build our civilization. However, the same struggle may also produce seriously damaging attitudes which in turn replicate the oppressions and threats against which the struggle had originated.
| See: A Modern Menace |
“victims-replicating-the-oppression-of-the-oppressor against third parties...” |
|
Examples in history may be used to illustrate this, although each situation is to some degree unique and summary overviews in any case do tend to distort. Nevertheless, the principle of victims-replicating-the-oppression-of-the-oppressor against third parties is sufficiently visible in the flow of history to warrant these examples.
1902 Britain conquered the twin Afrikaner republics in Southern Africa – the Oranje Vrystaat and the Zuid Afrikaanse Republiek. This occurred against a long background of resistance to British domination, from the days of the Groot Trek of 1835 (an Afrikaner migration to escape British rule that became a political rallying call for following generations). The 1902 defeat cost the Afrikaner more than political independence. Their language and culture lost its recognition in courts and schools. The atrocities of Britain's burnt-earth policy toward the end of that war, the inadequate and often cruel concentration camps for non-combatants, and the cultural humiliation after the war, followed later by the rinderpest plague that impoverished the Afrikaner farming community, provided more than enough motivation to following generations of Afrikaners to struggle again for their independence and dignity.
Unfortunately the princpal Afrikaner church, the Dutch Reformed Church, had already in 1857 introduced racially separated 'mission' churches in the Cape, setting the stage 91-years earlier for this ungodly reaction. |
In this process the resurgence of Afrikaner nationalism (from 1948) constructed a socio-political system (Apartheid) which effectively relegated the black peoples within the British created Union of South Africa to a second class status in all respects. As this process continued black resistance was met with growing cruelty. The rise of black nationalism in response became allied with the cold war animosities of the time and the enmity increased. The Afrikaner now felt threatened by world communism and more serious measures to suppress dissent became the norm. Having regained political independence, cultural dignity and economic strength, the previously Oppressed had now become the Oppressor.
Since the end of white domination in South Africa, although the human-rights restraint on an opposite reaction has been a great achievement, the early signs of a black pan-africanist elitism is showing the same reactive signs of pre nazi Germany.
defeat of Germany in 1918, with the humiliating terms of the Treaty of Versailles, followed by grinding poverty in the Great Depression, set the stage for the rise of an intolerant nationalism that chose a Darwinian philosophy as applied by Adolf Hitler, fed by Teutonic romanticism/myth, in its struggle to re-establish German national dignity.
The German Jewish community was one of the most wealthy and highly educated in Europe. Jealousy toward the affluent, fuelled by the need for a scapegoat to blame for past failures, accelerated the Nazi program to eliminate the Jew from Europe. The special personal resentment of Hitler must not be underestimated, but that animosity could not have resulted in the degree of Jew-hate that it did without the strong tide of deep resentment that had been built up over previous years. (See: the rise of anti-Semitism in Germany and Hitler's revelation)
The level of cruelty that was eventually perpetrated against civilian populations is incomparable in recent history. The 'herenvolk' concept desensitised German civilian population to much of the atrocities occurring among them. This had its roots in the 19th century when the German intellectuals' glorification of German culture became Germanism. In the words of Meinecke (1862-1954) –
"the national idea was raised to the sphere of religion and the eternal" |
– a climate of mind that led unquestioningly into two destructive World Wars.
| As with many in Israel today, with serious implications for the future of the Middle East. |
viciously cruel uprooting and destruction of Jewish communities across Europe by German forces and their surrogates turned the Alijah dream of return into a necessity.
Jewish immigration to Palestine had already put pressure on the local Arab population, increasing tensions before the horrors of the Third Reich drove the homeland ideal from a dream to a desperate necessity.
The population of Jerusalem had grown between 1800 and 1900 from 8,750 to 55,000; with the bulk of that increase being Jewish – an increase from 22.86% to 63.64%. Although in 1922, 54.95% of Jerusalem was Jewish, only 11% of the population of the whole region were Jewish. So, by 1930 the British Shaw Report warned that Jewish immigration to Palestine was creating a "landless and discontented" class of Arabs.
After the 1948 declaration of independence of the State of Israel, in the military conflicts that followed, Israeli Arabs, even though full citizens of the State of Israel became increasingly treated as second class citizens. The very Jewishness of the State of Israel has made reconciliation with its indigenous Arab population a continuing fundamental problem.
The Zionist ideology in its extreme form, further fed by Jewish religious claims to all land from central Sinai to the Syrian coast, has promoted a group superiority concept similar to the 'herenvolk' myth of Nazi ideology. This has helped desensitise Israel to the injustices perpetrated by the evil 'collective punishment' policy of destroying the homes of whole families of whom a member is suspected of violence against Israel.
Probably the
only hope of peace!
The racist nature of the State of Israel in its discrimination against the nationality of non-Jews may mean that, for there ever to be peace in the Middle East, the racist Jewish State of Israel must be destroyed and a non-racial secular State be established which accommodates all the residents of the Holy Land/Palestine/Israel/Canaan – EQUALLY. The hypocrisy of settling for less than this in a world that affirms equality of human rights is unacceptable. The alarmist rhetoric concerning Jewish need for protection in a Jewish State is disturbingly similar to Hitler's rhetoric concerning the persecution of Germans in pre-war Poland and Hungary.
Zionist Fascism
US President GW Bush's statement at the close of his presidential term, that the US has done nothing to deserve this conflict (the Al-Qa'eda world terrorist attacks, etc.), betrays US total ignorance of the effect of their unconditional support for Israel and its vicious Zionist oppression of the Palestinian people which has alienated the Islamic world and those whose morality is impartial.
IF AMERICANS KNEW
Jewish discrimination
not discriminatory 1977
Unfortunately, this lesson of the Victim-Mentality Cycle is ignored and its lessons neutralized by the propagated myth in modern Israel that it is the 2,000 years of Christianity which produced the Nazi Holocaust. Laced with half-truths that mislead, this not only misrepresents history it also closes the mind to the only remedy which stops this evil victim-mentality cycle.
no answer to this damaging cycle of Oppressed-becoming-Oppressor, outside of right living. Bitter trees will always bear poisonous fruit!
The fundamental of right living is the 'gratitude' attitude. What the Bible calls – 'thanksgiving' – which is so fully represented in Israel's Psalms.
Self-congratulation for national heroes of the past simply stokes the fires of pride that will burn in bitterness against scapegoat groups.
really does not matter what 'thanksgiving' is for, as long as the 'thanksgiving' is not directed to one's own group, or one's own god, but to – God, the Creator of ALL.
It is not how one expresses thanksgiving that is important; at what level, or in what form. But, it is critically important how one reacts to oppression! Resentment sprouts bitterness, and bitterness poisons any society to find justification for its own crimes against others, rather than finding solutions that benefit both protagonists.
In a conflict, questions of which side is guilty, or has the most guilt, is often a distraction from finding a solution. The greater guilt is whatever or whoever blocks reconciliation and healing. Diagnosis of the conflict has no value whatsoever unless it is a direct aid to reconciliation.
crimes against the persons and property of others are ultimately against the Creator of all.
He therefore is the ultimate judge and the only one who can give complete forgiveness. He does not do this because history forgets or compensation is made. He only forgives if the attitude that bore the bitter fruit is totally turned around to appreciate the good in gratitude and thanksgiving. Remorse for wrong doing may be the path to this, but it is not a substitute for it.
Orthodox Jews burn the Israeli flag in protest against the State's Zionism.
A regular Purim event in many Orthodox Jewish communities
– Two Peoples : ONE Future