We Are All Palestinians

http://mantiqaltayr.wordpress.com/2010/06/20/we-are-all-palestinians/
http://www.arabist.net/blog/2010/6/14/the-murder-of-khaled-said.html

We Are All Palestinians
June 20, 2010 · 20 Comments

1. Hi FBI guys who read this blog. How about a little multiple choice test? It’s a pretty easy test, so easy in fact that Shas Party members don’t even get a hint at the correct answer.Now here’s the question:

Let’s say you have a person whom you suspect may be guilty of a crime, any crime really, but one that is serious enough that you will want to send someone out to arrest the person. Let’s say the person is suspected of doing any one or more of the following: dealing drugs, using drugs, exploiting child labor laws, murdering innocent people on the high seas, exposing fraud in the police department by uploading videos of policemen engaged in criminal behavior, selling nuclear weapons to South Africa, or maybe something really awful, like hitting Israeli commandos over the head with a stick. Anyway, whatever the reason, you all out there in the FBI have a warrant and need to go arrest this guy. The guy is 28, you have his name, you know who he is, so you:

A. Enter his home early one morning with a professional and capable team of agents, surprise him and his family, scare the hell out of them, and arrest him and bring him in for questioning.

B. You put him under surveillance and determine that he is unarmed. When he goes into a public place in the evening you send in a couple of well-trained agents who surprise him, verify his identity, arrest him, and bring him in for questioning.

C. As he leaves his home for work in the morning, you follow him in an unmarked car, then you turn on your police lights, pull him over, rough him up a bit, steal anything in his car or in his wallet of value, arrest him, and take him in for questioning.

D. Either A, B, or C except that just before arresting him you ask for a huge bribe. If he agrees to pay, you go easy on him and eventually let him escape.

E. You follow him late a night into an internet café. You ask for his money and then, when he acts scared, you begin to beat the shit out of him in front of all the customers and the manager and make sure to smash his head against a marble table. Then as he screams begging for mercy you stick illegal drugs in his mouth, drag him out of the café, take him to a building nearby making sure to smash his head against the metal door of the building since suspects make good battering rams. There you continue to beat him to death even as two doctors try to revive him and then when he is dead you still continue to beat him. Then you lie like the Israeli government about everything even as human rights groups around the world condemn you and call for a real investigation.

Okay, so which is the correct answer? Now I am sure that Shas Party members would have no problem picking the correct answer. Likewise with Likud party members, Kadima and whatever. In addition, the Egyptian government and police – and I use the term police loosely here – would also pick the very same answer. That answer is E and that is just what happened to a young Egyptian man named Khaled Said on June 6th, 2010 in Alexandria, Egypt. It is all over the internet in certain places. It even made it in the Jerusalem Washington New York Times Post – a newspaper that really cares for the rights of all Arabs, as we know. Here’s a nice quote from another article about this disgusting and all too-typical event:

“The victim’s brother, Ahmed Said, maintained that the beating was revenge for his possession of a video showing the policemen dividing the spoils of a drug bust among themselves and so they confronted him at the cafe. He said he saw his brother’s body a day after his death. His jaw was twisted, his rib cage mangled and his skull cracked, he said. Similar images were posted on bloggers’ websites and he confirmed their authenticity.”

What’s going on here and has been going in Egypt for basically ever, is that the Egyptian government is treating its own citizens the exact same way that Israel treats the Palestinians. Actually, let me revise that a bit. Egypt is treating its own people not just the way Israel treats the Palestinians, Egypt treats its own people just like Egypt and Israel treat the Palestinians.

Many governments are treating their own citizens the way Israel and Egypt treat the Palestinians – most Arab governments do this, for example, but the situation seems to be getting worse, not better, even in the US of A.

FBI guys, it is your job to make sure that the government here does not treat Americans the way Egypt, Israel and the US treat Palestinians. Same for all of you out there in law enforcement.

Now, if you can find a way to treat BP officials like Palestinians, on that issue maybe I can be flexible.

2. Before and after photos of Khaled Said are all over the net. You can see them here. I am not posting them below because it is just so gross. Be warned. But if you think you can handle it take a look. Then let the Egyptian embassy know what you think. Here’s their contact info:

3521 International Ct. Nw
Washington DC 20008
USA
Phone:
+1-202-895-5400
Fax:
+1-202-224-4319
+1-202-224-45131
Email:
Embassy@egyptembassy.net
Website URL:
www.egyptembassy.net

Ladies and gentlemen, no one should be treated like a Palestinian.

3. It would probably surprise no one to learn that all of the tuyuur here at Mantiq al-Tayr are huge fans of Deek Jackson. But right now, thanks to Deek Jackson, I can’t go anywhere now without hearing the tuyuur singing his latest song. It is so bad that I can’t even drive alone in my car without the words “Fuck off”, sung so beautifully at a key part of the song, running through my head. So I close this post with the link to his song below.

To all of you in authority who abuse your power at the expense of common men and women, “fuck off.”

(Music starts at 33 seconds into the video. It’s worth the wait. And if you aren’t patient, I’ll notify the Egyptian police.)