No Shortcuts to Liberating Palestine
Now that everyone cries for and over what is happening in Gaza and Palestine, it ought to be said that Muslim governments must lead the way in envisioning and orchestrating responses.
This is their chance to redeem themselves for all the past shortcomings. Palestine belongs to all of us, yet to the whole (normal) world.
Palestine has been repeatedly betrayed, and we are all guilty of inaction. Come the Day of Judgement, there will certainly be questions that will require answers. Not everyone will be exempt from the repercussion.
There are no shortcuts to solve the Palestinian issue and ultimately liberate the country and its people. To begin with, reason must rule over emotions, organization over chaos, quality over quantity, and the ideals of a higher order over shallow personal and clannish ones.
Actions must be sensible and well-thought-out. Islamic unity, brotherhood, and cooperation are the key, rooted in the fundamentals of the Islamic faith and propagated through Islamic education (enlightenment).
Moving from Mere Words to Action
The age of mere talking, complaining, condemning, and begging someone else to do something should be over. A new age of systematic and organized Muslim action should be on the horizon.
It is high time that the words of Almighty Allah are heeded: “O you who have believed, upon you is (responsibility for) yourselves. Those who have gone astray will not harm you when you have been guided” (al-Ma’idah, 105).
It is also high time that Muslims get their acts together and start saving not only themselves but also the rest of the world.
As the custodians of the final revealed message to mankind, and as Allah’s vicegerents on earth, such is Muslims’ duty. Indeed, with great authority comes great responsibility.
As such, Muslims are supposed to lead (guide) the world and be its saviors. Nowadays, since the world is led by the agents of evil as a result of which there is so much power concentrated in the wrong hands, the world is a dangerous place, threatening existence as a whole.
Again, if we only listened to the counsel of the Almighty: “And those who disbelieved are allies of one another. If you do not do so (cooperate and protect each other), there will be fitnah on earth and great corruption” (al-Anfal, 73).
Evil appears strong only because righteousness is absent. In the case of Palestine, Israel appears great and fearsome only because Muslims are weak; there is no competition.
However, no sooner does righteousness come into being and start to operate, than evil starts waning. The rule is that the more righteous one is, the less evil there is in and around him.
The two cannot coexist. It is either righteousness or evil. However, while the existence of righteousness is real, the existence of evil is imaginary.
There is no evil as such. There is only the absence of righteousness. It follows that one should not worry about evil per se; rather, he should worry about how to bring about righteousness which is bound to nullify evil.
In the Palestinian context, Muslims should be concerned more about themselves than about Israel; their religious and civilizational excellence is a countermeasure to Israel.
This insight, too, is derived from the Qur’anic message: “And say: ‘The truth has come and the falsehood has vanished; surely falsehood is a vanishing (thing)’” (al-Isra’, 81).
Also: “He should establish the truth and abolish falsehood, even if the criminals disliked it” (al-Anfal, 8).
Without a doubt, the most effective way to abolish falsehood (evil) is to establish the truth (righteousness).
We often wonder what exactly we can do for Palestine and its noble cause. The answer is “a lot.”
In addition to the conventional means, such as praying, donating, protesting, educating ourselves about the issue at hand, and spreading the truth, there is something else more delicate and more demanding that is needed not only for Palestine today but also for all other present and future “Palestines.” That something is also the most powerful of means.
Almighty Allah is clear that His help is near (al-Baqarah, 214), there is neither help nor victory except from Allah (Alu ‘Imran, 126), Allah is competent to give them (and anybody) victory (al-Hajj, 39), Allah gives victory to whom He wills (al-Rum, 5), and that helping the believers is ever incumbent on Allah (al-Rum, 47).
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As inspiring and attractive as the above decrees are, there are nevertheless serious prerequisites that must be fulfilled before the former can be put into action. As if beneath those a disclaimer “terms and conditions apply” gleams.
Those prerequisites either stand side by side with the mentioned decrees or are subtly woven into their profound messages. For that reason, when deliberating upon the topic of Allah’s help and victory, one should take into consideration the entire context.
Accordingly, the Qur’an is explicit that Allah inevitably helps the (true) believers, that surely Allah will help the one who helps Him (His cause) (al-Hajj, 40), and that if the believers help Allah (His cause), He will help them and plant firmly their feet (Muhammad, 7).
If Allah says that His help is near, that His help is the exclusive and supreme help, that He can help under any circumstances if He so wills, and that He helps whomever He wills – this does not mean that Allah’s help is guaranteed and unconditional.
Rather, it means that the Divine help is ever available and accessible. The avenues leading to it are always open and the needed resources (prerequisites) are fairly straightforward.
Though the All-powerful and All-Wise Allah can do whatever He wants, the time-honored rule is that a person (a nation) is helped only if he (it) helps, and is destroyed only if he (it) destroys. It is a reciprocal arrangement.
In retrospect, even the Prophet and his companions – the most exceptional people to have ever graced this planet – lost the battle of Uhud because the conditions of the heavenly help and victory had not been met.
The battle of Hunayn was almost lost too, on account of its participants feeling overly elated due to their great number. That is, they were almost ruined by the afflictions of overconfidence, underestimating the enemy, and prioritizing quantity to the detriment of quality (al-Tawbah, 25).
The importance of human
resources as the most valued assets
What is needed therefore for procuring Divine interventions is to have people (human resources or assets) who will act both individually and collectively as embodiments of the Islamic message.
Those people (new generations of the Muslim ummah) will betoken the outcome of the implementation of comprehensively clever and well-planned strategies.
They will not be disoriented, confused, torn between East and West (Orient and Occident), artificially cultured and one-dimensionally civilized. They will be real, not fake; built (created), not veneered; and made to be in front, not to follow or ape.
Such people’s strengths will be faith, knowledge, confidence, courage, tenacity, willingness to take initiative and sacrifice. Worthy of every promise Allah made in the Qur’an for the true believers, they will be able to move mountains.
Satans from the ranks of both the jinn and mankind will dread them. They will be filled with trepidation at the prospect of encountering them either on the actual or ideological battlefields.
Let’s remember that before building a civilization in Madinah, the Prophet built people first, and before taking control of the physical Ka’bah in Makkah, he moved away from it first to build spiritual “ka’bahs” in the hearts of people.
The Prophet knew all too well if he was surrounded by real people as the most valued assets, no civilizational obstacle or challenge would prove insurmountable; and if he managed to plant spiritual “ka’bahs” inside the hearts of such extraordinary people, the physical Ka’bah in Makkah was destined to be his sooner rather than later, even though he resided about 450 kilometers away from the latter.
Clearly, the Prophet diligently attended to the root causes which unsurprisingly culminated in the anticipated outcomes.
Needless to say, to liberate Palestine the same set of conditions are required. Without people as epitomes of a vision, without action as a rendition of ideas or plan as an acme of a cooperative thought, nothing will be possible.
SOURCE: https://aboutislam.net/muslim-issues/opinion-analysis/no-shortcuts-to-liberating-palestine/