http://www.kurdmedia.com/articles.asp?id=12955
Some advice to fanatics
Saturday, August 05, 2006
KurdishMedia.com - By Kamal H. Artin
Recent escalation of violence in the Middle East initiated by frustrated
weak militarists against angry more powerful ones might have caused some
ambivalence where to stand! The simple answer for many of us, as pacifists who
enjoy peace at home and are currently not affected directly by war, is to
reject both sides for their violent behavior. For those who are suffering or
have suffered because of war, the answer might be different. Apparently
Israelis, whose ancestors' right to live freely was taken away by the most
brutal fanatic of the 20th century, take any threat to their existence
seriously and are afraid of the rise of a 21st century fanatic who opposes
their people. Some of them as fanatic Jews might compete with their fanatic
Muslim cousins and become so revengeful that they take an eye for an eye in the
name of their religious pride. It is time that these cousins compete for
forgiveness and independent peaceful co-existence to show that their faith is
worth being proud of! If they freely choose violence instead, they should be
aware that a natural outcome of such a choice might be death or self
destruction.
It might be very difficult for fanatics to truly accept the existence of
others and denounce any form of violence; however, they have no other choice
but to behave like the Kurds in Southern Kurdistan, if they plan to be part of
a democratic process and help Palestinians to become independent. Since
creation of various artificial nation-states in the Middle East by major
powers, the Kurdish movement has tried to create a real nation state for its
people. The idea of uniting separated parts of Kurdistan has been pejoratively
described as separatism and brutally suppressed, while violence of separating
governments of Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria has been considered as stabilizing
and unifying measures to preserve the territorial integrity of a few members of
the United Nations. Reactive aggression, revolts, or guerrilla fights have been
among the methods used by a faction of the Kurdish movement to achieve its long
term objective. Such a method has been the most inappropriate and inefficient
method and not only legitimized the bombing of Kurdish cities and villages in
the mind of the masses of their opponents, but also has caused loss of many
valuable lives on both sides. Even many naïve Kurds have been manipulated to
turn against their own people and support the central governments in the name
of unity and protecting the territorial integrity of the nation state they have
been assigned to.
Regardless of which side of the conflict they might have been, until
recently the Kurds had been the main losers of all national and international
treaties related to their destiny. To name a few examples, they had stayed
second class citizens without an identity of their own, their land had remained
underdeveloped, and their children had been denied access to public schools in
their own language. Only within the past decade some Kurds have been treated as
equal partners in world politics, although not in the name of their own nation
but as the unifying servants of their assigned country, Iraq. Despite sabotage
and corruption of some untrustworthy elements, Kurds there have been making
progress, Iraq even now has a Kurdish president, Kurdish children are learning
their mother tongue freely, Kurdish culture is being revitalized, and there is
a construction site in every corner of Southern Kurdistan. These achievements
would not have been possible without trust, mutual respect, belief in peaceful
co-existence, denouncing violence, and participation in a democratic process by
the Southern Kurdistani people. It seems that this method has brought them much
closer to their dream of an independent Kurdistan.
For those who see violence as the answer to challenges in life, I can
only wish a change of mind so they can join the peaceful majority of their
society. This wish might still take hundreds of years to fully come through,
since natural selection is a lengthy process and not every aggressive
individual becomes the victim of his or her choices before mating and
reproduction! For those who make non-aggressive choices in life and still
become the victims of war and violence I have the same wish that I have had for
the people of my origin, the Kurds, whom I believe have suffered for decades
because of the violence of their opponents. I wish them success, patience,
endurance, peace of mind, and the ability to forgive, once their mighty violent
opponents become weak and ask for forgiveness!
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