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Newspaper Solidaridad Socialista
Buenos Aires – January 19th of 1988

“We are struggling against a nazi state" (view)

Interview to Suhail Akel from the Palestinian People Information Office in Argentina (This is read as Palestine Information Office in Argentina)

- How were Palestinians expelled from their land?

- I will tell you my experience. I was born in Palestine, East Jerusalem. In 1948, when the pseudo State of Israel was created on Palestinian soil, my people and my family had practically no choice: a ship towards displacement or a truck to the desert. My family chose America... so here I am, while others are living in our homes. The massacre of Deir Yasin is an example of Zionists carried out this despoilment. Of 400 inhabitants of this town, 250 were sang-froid killed on the 04/09/48 (including old people, pregnant women and children) by the paramilitary groups Irgun and Stern, leaded by former Israeli prime minister Menahem Begin and present prime minister Yitzhak Shamir. This is only one of the killings perpetrated by the Zionists. This was the way in which my people were expelled from their country. Today repression is just a continuation of Deir Yasin. After that we could never return to our land.

- How do the two million Palestinians living under the State of Israel’ s government live?

- Israel is, like South Africa, a state based on an “Apartheid”. A racist State whose legislation divides society according to race. A part of the population is considered superior, it dominates the State and possesses all privileges. The other one is oppressed and it has no rights, its people are not even considered citizens. It is the same basis that Hitler and Nazis –who believed that Germans were a superior race- applied in the countries they dominated during the Second World War against Jews. Today Zionism does the same in Israel. Those who most suffer are the Palestinians in the territories occupied after the 1967 war, that is, Gaza Strip and the West Bank (the so-called Cisjordan). There my people live in refugee camps, in inhuman conditions. There are Palestinians families consisting of 10 or 12 members that are living in a 4-by-4-meter room sharing a hole they use as bathroom. Then it is covered with soil. They have no rights. They cannot lift their voice, their flag, nor can they sing their hymn. Nor are they allowed to have a decent work, since they are continuously exploited by the Israeli oligarchy. Most people who live there work for poor salaries in comparison with the salary of the Israeli workers. They carry out the worst jobs and they have no right to protest or form trade unions to defend themselves. Furthermore, the best lands have been taken by the Zionist colonialist settlers and those who protest about this situation are considered “terrorists” and put under arrest, o sent to concentration camps resembling those of the nazis.

- This insurrection is an answer to this situation...

- This popular insurrection has been maturing for many decades and there have been some antecedents, but now the conditions are such that it has exploded with much more force. This shows us that we are not talking about the people who will give in, these people do not want to be subdued or oppressed by those who occupied their territory and stole all their rights. Israel, Zionism, Yankee imperialism have not been able to –in 40 years’ time- to destroy my people. And young Palestinians are the ones who are on the streets, facing Israeli bullets with sticks and stones. They are struggling for a conviction: for their land, for their national self-determination and for their legitimate rights next to their national identity, the PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization). This is why I have no doubt about the fact I will return to a liberated Palestine freed from Zionist aggression and racism.

Interview by Alejandro Iturbe

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