Saturday, April 2, 2016

Indigenous Terminology (Australia & Palestine)

AUSTRALIA - from the document Indigenous Terminology issued recently by the University of NSW (teaching.unsw.edu.au)

More appropriate

Invasion
Colonisation
Occupation

Australia was not settled peacefully, it was invaded, occupied and colonised. Describing the arrival of the Europeans as a 'settlement' attempts to view Australian history from the shores of England rather than the shores of Australia.

Less appropriate

Settlement

The use of the word 'settlement' ignores the reality of Indigenous Australian peoples' lands being stolen from them on the basis of the legal fiction of terra nullius and negates the resistance of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. The fact that most settlers did not see themselves as invading the country, and that convicts were transported against their will is beside the point. The effects were the same for Indigenous Australian peoples.

PALESTINE - suggested draft for the University of NSW's next Indigenous Terminology guideline

Appropriate

Invasion
Ethnic-cleansing
Colonisation
Occupation

Palestine was not settled peacefully. It was invaded, occupied, colonised, and ethnically-cleansed from 1918 to 1948 by Zionist immigrants under the protection of British bayonets and with the aim of carving out a Jewish state. Those remnants not ethnically cleansed in 1948 - the West Bank and the Gaza Strip - were invaded, ethnically-cleansed, occupied, and colonised from 1967 on.

Not at all appropriate

Return
Redemption
Land of Israel (Eretz Israel)
Terrorism (unless applied to the ethnic-cleansing operations of Zionist forces)

Describing the invasion of Zionist immigrants as a 'return' to, and 'redemption' of, the 'Land of Israel' (Eretz Israel) panders to political Zionist mythology and ignores the settler-colonial reality of the Zionist project in Palestine. Palestine was never, in Zionist terminology, 'a country without a people.' In 1918, 90% of its population were Arabs (Muslims and Christians), and, up to the ethnic cleansing of Palestine by Zionist terrorists in 1948, they were still a two-thirds majority in their own land. The use of the terms 'return' and 'redemption' ignores the massive Zionist theft of Palestinian homes and lands which followed the ethnic cleansing of 1948, and the Zionist label 'terrorism,' used against the Palestinian Arab people, negates their resistance to Zionist colonisation, a resistance which began in earnest in 1920 and continues to this day. The fact that some Zionist immigrants left their European homes and invaded Palestine in response to anti-Semitic persecution in Europe is beside the point. The effects were the same for the Indigenous Palestinian Arab people.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

A point of diference between the standard text-book colonial takeover of Australia compared to the duplicitous and deceitful colonial takeover of Palestine is the extraordinary betrayal of the trust of the Arabs by their 'allies', the British. Never again can an Englishman's word be his bond.

A Treaty between Great Britain and the Arabs, recognising and supporting Arab independence, agreeing to explicit frontiers, including all of Palestine in its entirety, was signed, after much detailed correspondence and discussion between The Shereef of Mecca, Hussein, representing 'the Arab Nation' and the British High Commissioner in Egypt, Sir Henry McMahon.

The British were under great duress, after the failure of the First and Second Gaza Offensives , the debacle at Kut [Iraq] and defeat at Gallipoli. The British desperately needed Arab help fighting Turkey.

Shereef Hussein's son Emir Feisal raised tens of thousands of fighters amid showers of British propaganda leaflets dropped over Palestine by aeroplanes promising Arab freedom and independence.

At the same time the Arab forces were sucsessfully liberating their ancient homeland, the British, the French and the covetous World Zionist Organisation were hard at work concluding secret agreements and treaties to cheat the Arabs of their birthright and hand over their land to the worlds foremost Semitic Impersonators, the Ashkenazi Jews, murderous Zionist crackpots from Russia and Poland with sophisticated 'westernised' helpers like Herzl and Weizmann. Not very Semitic sounding names as we know but when did that impede professinal impersonators from adopting stage names? 'Netanyahu' is a prime example.

World War One has not concluded in the Middle East, but I know who will be the ultimate victor, and it won't be the Semitic Impersonators!

MERC said...

Am in basic agreement with what you say. Just one thing re the matter of Semitism. It wouldn't matter one iota whether Europe's Zionists had rolled-gold certificates from God Itself guaranteeing that they were 100% organic Semites in a direct line from David, Solomon and Joshua, the simple fact of the matter is that Palestine belonged to the people who were living there at the time, 90% of whom were non-Jews, and no one else.