I hear that they had a problem the last week or so putting up posters announcing their events that quickly disappeared.
They can be found at the Student Center patio area this week 12-1 pm. Friday evening, they are having a dinner event.
Here is a recent link from Europe News (DK) on Coptic issues in Egypt.
http://europenews.dk/en/node/43379
Update: Coptic Christians demonstrating in New York (5-19-11).
(Atlas Shrugs)
Charlie,
ReplyDeleteMaybe they have made peace since 1948.
I know of no Jewish teaching which suggests that it was the Jews who constructed the marvels of ancient Egypt. I do know of school of thought which claims that the Exodus occured at the end of the Middle Kingdom, the only time when the Pharoahnic monarchy was left prostrate, and that this opened the opportunity for the Hyksos invasion, primarily the Amelelites, not Hittites or Greeks. However, by the time of the Seleucid dynasty in Syria, there were thriving Jewish communities in Egypt, and may have been even before the Babylonia exile.
ReplyDeleteI would second the claim that this is not a real event. I rented a room for a couple of years from a Coptic immigrant (later became a citizen); the choice of dress in the photo is a bit sloppy, and no Copt would dress up in fuzzy pink like that.
Siarlys,
ReplyDeleteI never claimed that the one in pink was a Copt.
Anonymous,
ReplyDeleteReally, you have to improve your history. I suggest history lessons from unbiased instructors.
First, Jews do not claim the pyramids.
Second, Jewish presence in the land of Israel goes back 3000 years. Islam goes back to 650 AD. The name Palestine was given to Israel by the Romans around 80 AD, before the advent of Islam. As far as stealing land, it was the Jews who were driven from Muslim lands in the Middle East in 1948. The Jews lost land they purchased and their possessions.
Three, Judaism is not an anti-Egyptian religion. Jews wanted out of Egypt because of oppression. They did not like the Pharaoh.
Anonymous, you really need to get your history straight!
Squid
I love it when Anonymous Muslims state with such conviction what "Judaism teaches." They may not be born with it but they get their anti-Semitism first with their mother's milk, and then through their teachers and peers and reinforced over and over.
ReplyDeleteI never heard anything about Jews building the marvels of ancient Egypt and I am reasonably well informed about mainstream Jewish beliefs.
Next, they believe that land was "stolen" from them, which another falsehood Muslims assert endlessly. They don't realize that in order for something to be "stolen" from them they have to own it first. They NEVER owned the land. They NEVER had sovereignty over that disputed land. They, many of them, LIVED there... that does not give them SOVEREIGNTY over the land. Most of them were tenant farmers on land owned by absentee Turkish owners. Turkey lost their sovereignty over that area after WWI. Many Jews lived there as well and lived there long before most of the "Palestinians" immigrated from surrounding Arab countries. Many of them immigrated as a consequence of the opportunities in the thriving country the Jews were building.
Sovereignty over an area has been gained historically a number of ways; by treaty, by purchase, by conquest, but NEVER, by international law, because they were ubiquitous. Incidentally, they are also typically required to have enough shared identity by language, beliefs, and ability to protect themselves and prevail over all others who claim sovereignty over the land (think of the American revolution). Palestinians have none of these indicia and Israel has every one of them.
Practically every country country in the world, with the possible exception of Japan, China, Korea, and perhaps a few others, exist on land that other people lived on before them. That includes the U.S., Britain, France, etc.
I can't think of a single instance where sovereignty was given to anyone because of their whining and claims of victimhood. The Palestinians are no different in language, religion, identity than the people who live in Jordan or Egypt. They are indistinguishable from them yet they are quite a bit different from the Israelis that have legitimate claims on the disputed land they are trying to usurp.
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Anonymous,
ReplyDeleteThe Squid will help you with your history.
Are you aware that Palestine was never a country?
Are you aware that the word Palestine is Roman, not Arabic?
Are you aware that Jerusalem was never the capital of any Arab nation?
Are you aware that before 1920, the area known as Palestine included much or all of what is now Jordan?
Are you aware that practically every written history of the Palestinian Arabs starts after Jews started returning to the area in the late 1800s?
Are you aware that practically no Arabs called themselves “Palestinian” before 1964?
Are you aware the Palestinian Arabs have never accepted any peace plan that included a Jewish state?
Are you aware that modern terrorism was created by Palestinian Arabs?
Are you aware that Palestinian Arabs never demanded their own West Bank or Gaza state when they were under Jordanian and Egyptian control?
Are you aware that Yasir Arafat embezzled as much as $3 billion from his people, yet he is still regarded as a hero and no Palestinian Arab leader is trying to find his stolen money?
Are you aware that the constitution of Palestine states that Sharia law would be the main source of legislation?
Are you aware that Mahmoud Abbas bankrolled the 1972 Olympic massacre of Israeli athletes, and that he praised the ringleader of that attack as recently as 2010?
Are you aware that Mahmoud Abbas’ doctoral dissertation denied the Holocaust?
Are you aware that Hamas does not want a Palestinian Arab state but instead a pan-Islamic caliphate that spans the world?
Are you aware that the Palestinian Authority still officially states that there was no Jewish Temple in Jerusalem?
Are you aware that the PLO wants to build a state with no Jews in it?
Are you aware that the elected Hamas government has laws discriminating against women?
Are you aware that Yasir Arafat was born in Egypt, but Ariel Sharon was born in Palestine?
Are you aware that the biggest heroes to ordinary Palestinian Arabs are terrorists like Dalal Mughrabi and Samir Kuntar?
Are you aware that the original 1964 PLO charter specifically excluded the West Bank and Gaza from the land they wanted, and their only desire was to destroy Israel within the Green Line?
Are you aware that not a single refugee camp has been dismantled in the territories governed by the Palestinian Authority and Hamas?
Are you aware that even after signing the Oslo Accords, Yasir Arafat publicly said that a Palestinian state is simply a stage on the way to destroying Israel altogether?
Squid
Squid and Miggie are a little bit off... for example, while Islam is only 650 years old, the inhabitants of the area who became Muslim at some point have claims going back much further. Its not like the entire non-Jewish population, or even most of it, are descended from people who erupted from the Arabian peninsula in the 7th century. That was only a veneer, the new ruling class.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous takes the cake however. Historians can pontificate that there is no evidence the Exodus ever happened only by studiously looking at a time when it did not happen, and saying, "See, its not there or then." No, dummies, its about four centuries earlier.
The reason I previously pointed to the end of the Middle Kingdom is that there was a large Asiatic population, which retained a distinct identity from the native Egyptians, sometimes wealthy and powerful, sometimes subordinate or even enslaved, for some centuries previous. Also, the Middle Kingdom ended catastrophically, with the exit of a large Asiatic population, while the Hyksos-Amelekites rushed in to fill the vacuum. There are even indirect mentions by an early New Kingdom Pharaoh of "one" who had helped vanquish these invaders, probably Saul or David.
Anyone who examined the matter could see at a glance that Ramesses II could not be the Pharaoh of the Exodus. He had armies all over the territories of Canaan, Judah, Israel, etc. Think he couldn't have rounded up a bunch of runaway slaves? The only time when the Twelve Tribes would have had breathing space to establish themelves is the interregnum between the Middle and New kingdoms.
As a matter of the justice of the dispute, I favor Ari ben-Canaan's uncle in the movie "Exodus," the fictitious Irgun leader, who tells his Hagganah nephew "If you speak of justice, there is as much justice in the Arabs' case as in that of the Jews. All I'm saying is, we've been on the receiving end of injustice for centuries. Let someone else suffer injustice for a change."
That approach doesn't work forever. The dispute over the territory of the former British Mandate of Palestine is a classic case of "two rights make a wrong." Sooner or later, everyone has to split the difference and get on with their lives. Or, as Miggie points out, it COULD be settled by conquest. In that case, Israel is automatically right as long as it wins, but if it should eventually lose, then, too bad, now its wrong.
We can do better than that.
"The Mohammedans have as much right to Palestine as a dog has to the manger."
ReplyDelete-Winston Churchill
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@Anonymous
ReplyDeleteExcept that the French invaded and conquered England in 1066 and it has never been the same since, which is surely what Ghandi was referring to with respect to the Palestinians and their proper governance by the Jews in Israel.
Anonymous, your "There are no historical records of a large Jewish slave population in Egypt, much less the Exodus happening." is, once again, your anti-Semitism overwhelming your self awareness.
ReplyDeleteThere is no historical record of Mohammed ascending to heaven on a magical horse either.
These are matters of faith. If it were subject to historical proof you wouldn't need faith. You can believe it as a historical event or not as you choose.
If, overall, faith in a religion benefits society by asserting there is a higher power to be reckoned with and there are consequences after doing evil, and that certain rules and principles are all positive
it is a good thing ... even without scientific evidence.
Incidentally, Islam, as a faith has yet to demonstrate this.
Besides that, your Gandi reference to England being conquered is off point. What have the Palestinians ever conquered? It further proves they have no rights of sovereignty there, having never conquered anything, having no treaty with any sovereign owner, purchase from some other legitimate sovereign, no common identity, or anything at all that distinguishes them from the Jordanians, the Egyptians, or the Syrians.
And Siarlys, your "Squid and Miggie are a little bit off... for example, while Islam is only 650 years old, the inhabitants of the area who became Muslim at some point have claims going back much further."
seems to be off by a factor of about 100%. "In 632, a few months after returning to Medina from his Farewell pilgrimage, Muhammad fell ill and died. By the time of his death, most of the Arabian Peninsula had converted to Islam, and he had united the tribes of Arabia into a single Muslim religious polity." By my calculation that is about 1379 years ago, not 650 years.
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Miggie, your arithmetic is correct, although my incorrect figures favored your argument more than your own correct figures do. You were arguing that Muslims haven't been around very long, remember?
ReplyDeleteThe fact remains, most Palestinians are descended from people who have been around for millenia BEFORE the Islamic Caliphate became the latest empire du jour of the region.
The Muslims have been around for as long as Mohammed's lifetime and not a instant before.
ReplyDeleteThe Jewish people had a sovereign nation there before there was any Islam and they ARE the people who were there from about 1300 BCE. Mohammed lived around 650 CE. You do the math.
As a matter of fact though, most of the Palestinians immigrated in the 20th century from surrounding Arab countries and not from having lived on the land forever. This was during the time Israel was becoming a thriving country, before and after the establishment of the state. In any case, whether newly arrived or before, they have no rights to sovereignty according to recognized international law. Don't confuse sovereignty with "living there."
Just as Americans were indistinguishable from Europeans at the time of the American Revolution so the Palestinians are indistinguishable from the people in the surrounding Arab countries. The crucial difference though is that we distinguished ourselves, we won a war of independence, and we were able to defend it against all others who would seek to take it from us. Palestinians expect to accomplish the same thing by appealing to their supposed victim status and appealing to kind hearted, soft headed, liberals.
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Miggie, sovereignty, if it belongs to anyone, resides in the Ottoman Turkish Empire, which is the authority that gave the first Zionists permission to settle there. If not, it rests with the British Mandate granted by the League of Nations. If not then, it is up to "the people who live there" to figure it out "in order to form a more perfect union."
ReplyDeleteThe land was not "empty" before Zionists settlers showed up. There were unused and unwanted acreages that were foisted off on them by local feudal lords. There were plenty of people already there, and some can trace their heritage back to pre=Roman times, whether accurately or inaccurately there is no way to tell. Shall we sort out which Jews are descended from the Twelve Tribes and which from the Khazars? Yeah, I know, the Aryan Nations claims ALL modern Jews are Khazars, but I know a very sober rabbi who cheerfully accepts that SOME component of today's Jews are Khazars, even as he proudly claims direct descent from the Pharisees.
Siarlys, regarding your "Miggie, sovereignty, if it belongs to anyone, resides in the Ottoman Turkish Empire, which is the authority that gave the first Zionists permission to settle there."
ReplyDeleteIt seems that your history is as bad as your math.
Apparently you never heard of the Treaty of Sèvres. It was the peace treaty between the Ottoman Empire and the Allies at the end of WWl. Article 95 is below for your easy reference. (I didn't bother reading the rest of your selective and weird sense of history because it is not worth the trouble of figuring out your points and then trying to set you straight).
British Mandate for Palestine
The three principles of the British Balfour Declaration regarding Palestine were adopted in the Treaty of Sèvres:
ARTICLE 95.
The High Contracting Parties agree to entrust, by application of the provisions of Article 22, the administration of Palestine, within such boundaries as may be determined by the Principal Allied Powers, to a Mandatory to be selected by the said Powers. The Mandatory will be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on November 2, 1917, by the British Government, and adopted by the other Allied Powers, in favour of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.
Palestine officially fell under the British Mandate.
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Apparently Miggie, you stopped reading before the words "If not..." Perhaps you were afraid I would say something about the British Mandate, and that would leave you nothing to expostulate about.
ReplyDeleteThis debate is not about anyone's claim to unassailable sovereignty. It is about finding space for everyone to settle down in some modicum of security. Israel doesn't get to keep ALL the marbles. It is entitled to hold the ones it have without them being stolen. But if it keeps playing marbles for keeps, it could lose them all.