By Sylvia Schwarz* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz
Israeli Destruction of the Mamilla Cemetery
Less than fifteen years later, in the 1960s a park was built in part of the cemetery and a parking lot covered another part. These were followed by a school, football field, underground parking garage, and road. Electrical wires were laid in other sections.
The final few acres were dug up just before the beginning of Ramadan, in the middle of the night (as can be seen on the CNN video) so that Israel can build the 'Museum of Tolerance' in conjunction with the Simon Wiesenthal Center in the United States.
An enormous amount of knowledge was lost with the destruction of the Mamilla Cemetery, according to St. Paul based archaeologist, John E. Landgraf, Ph.D., because the era since the end of the Byzantine period and the beginning of the Islamic conquest (around 638 CE) up to the present day is the least known period of history in the Middle East generally. There is much to be learned by examining skeletal remains, headstones, and tombs. However, the Israeli Department of Antiquities, which has recently been taken over by the Orthodox Rabbinate, does not allow any human skeletal remains to be examined; Jewish remains must be re-interred as quickly as possible out of respect, whereas non-Jewish remains at the Mamilla Cemetery were disposed of along with tombstones and other debris in construction dumpsters.
Dr. Landgraf, who participated in a number of archaeological digs in Israel and the West Bank between 1965 and 1980, said that the Israeli Department of Antiquities was seldom interested in the preservation of remains or artifacts from the Islamic period. In the late 1960s the discovery of Muslim graves at Tell Gezer did not interest the American head archaeologist at the time, and so bulldozers were used to push remains, artifacts, and debris back into the graves.
Archaeological excavations are a way of learning about the past in an orderly fashion. One exposes history a layer at a time, and by careful examination knowledge can be gained of the various eras and cultures. When Israel occupied East Jerusalem in 1967 Israeli archaeologists used bulldozers to excavate the Western (Wailing) Wall area down to the late Roman period, destroying the homes of Palestinians living there at the time, and along with them the 1500-year history of the people who had lived there since the Byzantine period. "Thus there is a loss of continuity in our understanding of the past," said Dr. Landgraf.
It is ironic that in the midst of mass hysteria over an Islamic center to be built in lower Manhattan, because some people feel that this would be disrespectful to the dead, that a genuine desecration of a sacred place occurs, unreported in most mainstream media. "The unfortunate reality is that Indigenous populations live in a world in which we are never safe from colonizer assaults even when we are dead," says Wazayatawin, Ph.D., Indigenous Peoples Research Chair and Associate Professor, Indigenous Governance Program, University of Victoria, someone who has worked on behalf of Indigenous peoples in this hemisphere for many years, and sees many parallels with the experience of Palestinians. "The ongoing desecration of Indigenous burial sites, including the Mamilla Cemetery in West Jerusalem, reflects a deeply embedded colonizer mentality that views subjugated peoples as fundamentally inferior and unworthy of even the most basic dignities afforded other human beings," she says.
Dr. Wazayatawin continues, "The act of erasing a people's memory from the landscape is a necessary element in the colonization process. In order for the colonizers to legitimize their occupation of another's land, they must eradicate all memories of the colonized, including even the human remains that demonstrate a deep and powerful connection to the land itself."
Everywhere in Israel are the eradicated memories of the dispossessed Indigenous people. Old mosques are transformed into bars and nightclubs, so that patrons drink alcohol where Muslims used to pray. The history museum in Jaffa (more of a tourist site than an educational institution) is inexplicably silent about the existence of people in the city between the Roman times and Napoleon's invasion. Street names are changed from their ancient Arabic names to new Hebrew ones. Golda Meir's famous comment "there is no such thing as a Palestinian people" reflected her desire, not a reality, but it has been repeated so often that many Israelis believe it. The destruction of a cemetery shows starkly how little regard Israel holds for the humanity of the Palestinians. As Dr. Wazayatawin says, "There is something terribly wrong with a culture that digs up the dead of others. The societal justification for such a crime reveals its own sickness."
Video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kq_M6pOarQU
and here is the Promotion for the "Museum of Tolerance"
Video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEKui5CX7sk
PLEASE ACT NOW TO STOP THIS CRIME!!
http://sabbah.in/9Salqz
read the entire document and then SIGN THE PETITION! ( http://www.mamillacampaign.org/ )
ALSO READ: http://sabbah.in/a4B89M where you can see the CNN video embedded.
* Sylvia Schwarz is an American Jew who began to question Zionism in 1982 after the Sabra and Shatila massacres in Lebanon. She is actively involved in the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN), in a state-wide campaign to get US to divest from State of Israel bonds, and in other Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaigns.
(OpEdNews)
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Desecrating graves is just a primitive way of showing contempt. Personally, I wouldn’t worry about it if they were my ancestors’ graves. My ancestors don’t need their bones anymore. Contempt only hurts if you care.
Ironically, the best show of contempt I ever saw was by a Frenchman against Israel. France had caught a terrorist wanted by Israel but let him go. Israelis were demonstrating outside the French embassy. A Frenchman came out on the balcony and the crowd fell silent, assuming he was there to address them on behalf of the French government. Instead he raised a camera to his eye and started taking pictures. The demonstrators became so angry many of them literally tore out their hair and frothed at the mouth. The Frenchman finished shooting pictures, then went back inside. FRANCE: point, game, set, and match in a very graceful victory. ISRAEL: disqualified.
Clearly, no one over there saw poltergiest! “ahem”
Desecration of the dead is globally considered one ofmhe gravest forms of disrespect. Hence saying “I will piss on your grave” or stories of mutilation of dead bodies of an enemy. It tells you not only what they truly think of muslims, but the building of ammuseum of tolerance is a message tied up in a joke. The only tolerace sought is for themselves.
A sad, bitter, and angry world we live in.
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