Dari Cermin Diri, Terpancarlah Luahan Hati...

In 1516 Palestinians began four centuries of life under Ottoman rule. The vast walls towering above the inhabitants of Jerusalem’s Old City today are a lasting monument to Ottoman rule, built in the realm of Suleiman the Magnificent (1520-66).

As with earlier Muslim empires, the Ottomans practiced a certain tolerance of Christians and Jews. In the 16th century for example, the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in Jerusalem was acknowledged as the custodian of the Christian Holy Places. Although the vast majority of world Jews chose to live elsewhere than Palestine, hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees fleeing Spanish and other Christian persecution were given asylum within the Ottoman empire (Khalidi, 1984, p. 31).

Independence Within Limits

Recent academic research has provided a detailed picture of the indigenous Palestinian population during Ottoman times. In his study of Ottoman Nablus over a 200-year period, Beshara Doumani deconstructs the dominant image of a small peasant people dominated by Turkish overlords. His work demonstrates the power and active economic development by local citizen merchants and officials, and an active role taken by peasants in defining their identity and relationship to the land (Doumani, 1995).

While the Land Code of 1858 and the Civil Code of 1869 continued to centralize power to the regime, individual land rights were acknowledged, stabilizing patterns of possession and giving greater protection to the peasant population. “But even where Palestinians did not have formal legal title, the state’s title to much land was already considered merely nominal and the land actually belonged to Palestinians through long use and possession, or was communal land held in trust for the inhabitants of the Arab villages and used by them for generations” (Abu Hussein and McKay, 2003, p.105).


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Despite centralization of power, individual land rights were acknowledged, giving greater protection to the peasant population.


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By 1878, Palestine had been divided into three administrative units: the two northern districts of Nablus and Acre ruled by the administrative vilayet of Beirut, and the sanjak of Jerusalem, ruled directly from Constantinople. Although without doubt the people of Palestine were under foreign rule, Ottoman occupation was a very different experience from modern Israeli occupation.

Population: 1878

Ottoman Palestine in 1878 was home to a population of 440,850, of whom 88 percent were Muslim (including a small minority of Druze), 9 percent Christian, and 3 percent Jews. Palestinian Jews were predominantly living in existing towns with religious significance, such as Tiberias, Safed, Hebron, and Jerusalem, and had not been establishing new Jewish settlements. In addition to the main population, there were around 200 Samaritans living on the edge of Nablus and also a small number of Gypsies (Passia, 2002, p. 2).

Early Opposition to Zionism from Palestinian Jews


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Most Palestinian Jews did not welcome the impact of Zionism on their peaceful life with Christians and Muslims.

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Judaism, just like Christianity, is a religion and not a unified ideological political movement. Jews worldwide were not united in one political goal or as an equal social movement. Zionism began as a secular European Jewish movement and was opposed early on by religious Jews. The majority of the Jewish community in Palestine at that time were religious Orthodox Jews, living on financial support from outside Palestine. While the financial dependence of this religious group was viewed with some disgust by many secular Zionists in Europe, the majority of Palestinian Jews did not welcome the ideological invasion of foreign Jewry on the peaceful life that they had lived for generations with Muslims and Christians of the same land.

European Funding

The end of the nineteenth century marked the beginning of Jewish settlement of the land, as well as influx of immigrants. Between 1882 and 1903, at least 25,000 Jews arrived in Palestine on what is called the first aliyah. By 1914 over 60,000 Jews had arrived in the first and second aliyahs. In the first aliyah only about 5 percent of immigrants were involved in building new settlements. However, slowly the idea of establishing a Jewish state began to gain support.

AND IT BEGAN...

In 1878, 26 Jerusalem Jewish families purchased a piece of land 9 km (5.6 mi.) outside of Jaffa, which was part of the grazing land of the Arab village of Al-Abbasiya. The Jewish site was named Petah Tikva (meaning the “Gate of Hope”). From the beginning the new Jewish rural community came into conflict with local Arab farmers.

In 1882 the Jewish settlement of Rishon L’Zion (meaning “First to Zion”) was established. The settlement was founded on land belonging to Arab villagers from `Eyun Qara.

Early colonial activity had lacked funding and organization, but this was soon to change as Zionism gained wider support. European Jewish philanthropists, such as Moses Montefiore and Edmond de Rothschild, started to discreetly negotiate with Ottoman officials to bypass bureaucracy and purchase large areas of land to establish Jewish settlements. The aim was to try to establish a Jewish community which could be financially dependent on the land in order to develop, rather than merely being a small number of poverty-stricken religious Jews living from charity handouts.

BIRTHS OF ZIONIST LAND ORGANIZATIONS


Edmond de Rothschild 1835 – 1934—Financial backer of Zionist settlement project
© Jewish Virtual Library

In 1896 Maurice de Hirsch established a branch of his Jewish Colonization Agency in Palestine. Four years later, by the time the World Zionist Organization (WZO) was established, Edmond de Rothschild had invested in plantation development and training to nurture 22 plantation colonies. A year later in 1901, the Jewish National Fund (JNF) was established in London. The JNF’s explicit mandate was to acquire land in Palestine that would remain inalienably Jewish (illegal to sell on to non-Jews) and only employ Jewish labor.

By 1914 some 30 Zionist settler colonies had been founded. The majority of the new Jewish settlers kept European nationality, which gave privileges under the Ottoman system. The second wave of immigrants had produced leaders of the kibbutz movement, whose plans for demographic domination and Jewish labor plantations stirred a great rift between the previously peaceful mixed Palestinian community.

THINGS BECAME OUT OF CONTROL...

For their part, the Ottomans tried to limit mass land acquisition and immigration, but had their hands tied by European pressure and also corruption and greed of officials and large landowners. Vast estates were thus purchased by Zionists from absentee landlords in Beirut above the heads of Palestinian tenants and sharecroppers. The sale of the land by the Sursock family in Marj ibn Amer is a noted case. Contrary to Zionist propaganda, over 90 percent of these sales were made by foreign Turkish Ottoman notables rather than by the Palestinian occupants themselves.

So as Europe marched on to destroy the crumbling Ottoman Empire, the Palestinians (as with the rest of the Ottoman Arab world) feared an uncertain future. Palestinian fellahin (peasants) faced increasing problems finding work, as new immigrants dispossessed them of their land and livelihoods. Some 11,000 Jewish immigrants were working on 47 rural plantations and cooperatives across the land, supervised and subsidized by the WZO. Zionists in Europe, most notably Britain, were pushing for validation of their colonialist project in Palestine.

http://www.islamonline.net/English/In_Depth/PalestineInFocus/Ottoman/01.shtml

EARLY HISTORY
Zionism claims that history and divine will justify Israeli domination of the land of Palestine as the exclusive home of the Jewish people. The Zionist project has attempted to put archaeology at its service, but even certain Israeli historians have contradicted a simplistic Zionist view of history. Yet, despite this evidence to the contrary, the Zionist myth continues to dominate the Western popular historical imagination.

A key pillar of Zionism is that the land of Palestine belongs to the Jews owing to the existence of a glorious Israelite kingdom in days gone by, a kingdom ended by mass forcible exile. Yet, even within Israel there are scholars who question this basic Zionist historical pillar.

Zeev Hertzog, a professor of archaeology and ancient studies at Tel Aviv University, reported that decades of intensive investigations in the area led to his conclusion that Israelites did not sojourn in Egypt or wander in the desert. In summary, he concluded that an Israelite kingdom did not entirely conquer the land of Canaan in a military campaign and then divide it between twelve tribes. Based on his archaeological findings, Hertzog believes that the famed empire of David and Solomon was at most “a small tribal kingdom” (reported in Israeli Ha’aretz, October 29, 1999, cited in Masalha, 2000, p. 2).


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Historical evidence fails to justify claims to one specific expulsion of the Jewish people.

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An ironic fact is that the large majority of the Palestinian population cast out in 1948, whether Muslim or Christian, are descended from the ancient peoples of the land (Prior, 2001, p. 20). Indigenous peoples, Jewish or otherwise, would have been converted to Christianity and Islam in the waves of empire sweeping across the region in various historical periods. The fact that a Palestinian family is Muslim does not mean that its origins are not indigenous or are based in foreign Arabian or Turkish empires, a common Zionist claim.

Palestinian land has always been peopled by many different ethnic and cultural groups. Historical evidence fails to justify claims to one specific expulsion of the entire Jewish people from the holy land two millennia ago. While some population transfer occurred in the Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian periods, the majority of the indigenous population of the land today covered by the state of Israel and Palestine remain “in situ” (Prior, 2001, p. 29). Academic research suggests a gradual integration of various peoples until final unification under Assyrian rule. Iron Age settlements excavated on the central hills of Palestine, from which the later kingdom of Israel developed, show no signs of the arrival of an incoming conquering ethnic group that dispelled all people indigenous to the land to build its own kingdom. The continuity over time with Canaanite culture repudiates an ethnic distinction between “Canaanites” and “Israelites” (Prior, 2001, p. 22).

After Jerusalem was destroyed under the Romans in the year 70, and again after the suppression of the Jewish leader Bar Kochba’s revolution in 135, Jews were, indeed, expelled from the Jerusalem area. However, it was only from this specific area, and the Jewish people were not driven entirely from the lands of Palestine. Some Jewish migration was also voluntary, a natural process of change in demographics over time that would be expected in any country across the globe.

Physical Return: A Relatively New Goal

A central tenet of Zionism is that divine Scripture justifies confiscation of Palestinian Arab land and expulsion of the non-Jewish native population. Zionism states that far from dispossession, such an act should be seen as claiming an ancestral right. Successful Zionist propaganda has resulted in general ignorance of the fact that the desire for a physical return using military means is actually only a relatively recently accepted idea within the Jewish community.

Twentieth century Zionism has its roots in secular European nationalism (see section on the Land Under the Ottomans). Traditionally, while the Jewish community has always considered Jerusalem and “Israel” as part of the “promised land,” in religious terms, this was a spiritual concept. Neither Jews living in the historical land of Palestine nor Jews in other parts of the world united in large numbers to try to form a movement to bring all Jews together in Palestine. While at times some Jewish communities, like other minority groups across the world, did face persecution, many Jews lived in comfortable and respected positions as citizens of nations and cities across the world, from Alexandria to Babylon to Rome. Seeking to create a Jewish state in Palestine, or anywhere else, was not an idea that was on the Jewish agenda.

As late as the 1880s for example, when secular political Zionism was developing in Europe, American Reformist Jews (the majority of the US Jewish community) considered the concept of an independent Jewish state as counter to the objectives of Jewish worldwide mission. The first American Reformist prayer book removed all references to the Jews as living in exile, specific hopes of the return to the homeland, and rebuilding the temple in Jerusalem.

Throughout the history of Judaism, even in the early years of the Israeli state, it was believed that only with the coming of the Messiah at the end of the world would the Jewish nation be gathered together in Jerusalem. It was seen as sacrilegious for any political Jewish movement to try and hasten this moment through human means, military or otherwise. There are still Jewish religious groups today, such as Naturei Karta, that categorically reject Zionism and the creation of a Jewish state as the claiming of a God-given right (see Web Sites). It is only since 1967 and the Israeli capture of the Old City of Jerusalem (only a fraction of time in the long and ancient history of the Jewish faith) that religious groups have adopted and promoted the Zionist cause so fervently.

Dan aku tidak menjadikan jin dan manusia melainkan supaya mereka menyembahKu (51:56)

Jelas di sini, bahawa dalam apa sahaja yg kita lakukan, Allah adalah matlamat kita. Oleh itu, marilah kita menjadi manusia 'abid iaitu manusia yg beribadah kpd Allah dlm setiap gerak-geri, perkataan dan perbuatan.

Dengan menyedari hakikat ini, bahawa tujuan kita diciptakan adalah utk beribadah kepadaNya, barulah kita dpt memamtuhi segala perintahNya dan menjauhi segala laranganNya.

"Katakanlah:Sesungguhnya solatku (sembahyangku), ibadatku, hidupku, dan matiku hanya untuk Allah, Tuhan Semesta Alam" (Al-An'am:162)

Inila ciri keimanan yang perlu ada pada seorang mukmin.

"Sesungguhnya jawaban orang-orang Mu'min bila mereka dipanggil kpd Allah dan RasulNya agar Rasul menghukum (mengadili) di antara mereka ialah ucapan; "Kami mendengar dan kami patuh." Dan mereka itulah orang-orang yang beruntung." (Al-Nur:51)

Oleh sebab itu, segala perbuatan kita hendaklah Islam dan menepati syariah Islamiyyah. Ini juga bererti, hubungan sesama kita dan juga sesama makhluk Allah yg lain hendaklah menepati syariat Islamiyyah. Segala-galanya....

Kerja, Belajar, berjalan...

Assalammualaikum wbt

Salah satu ciri-ciri keimanan,
1.Al-Taibun (orang yang senantisa bertaubat)

"Dan berlumba-lumbalah kamu kepada keampunan dari Tuhan kalian dan berlumba-lumbalah mencari syurga yang luasnya seluas langit dan bumi yang disediakan utk org2 yang bertakwa" (3:133)

"Orang-orang yang apabila mengerjakan perbuatan keji atau menganiyai diri sendiri lantas mereka ingat akan Allah lalu memohon keampunan terhadap dosa-dosa mereka - dan siapakah pula yang berkuasa mengampuni dosa selain daripada Allah? Dan mereka tidak meneruskan perbuatan kejinya itu sedangkan mereka mengetahui" 3:135

Hadis diriwayatkan oleh al-Bukhari, baginda bersabda, "Demi Allah, sesungguhnya aku beristighfar dan bertaubat kepadaNya dalam sehari lebih drpd 70 kali"

Sabda Rasulullah SAW, "Jauhilah dosa-dosa kecil kerana apabila ia terkumpul pd diri seseorg lambat-laun akhirnya ia akan membinasakannya"

Erm... dosa-dosa kecil ni sbnarnya bahaya sbb kalau dibuat dosa-dosa kecil byk kali boleh jadi dosa besar seolah dikumpul butiran pasir kecil yang lama-lama jadi bukit.

Sayidina Umar al-Khattab, "Hitungilah diri kamu sebelum kamu dihitung, timbangkanlah amalan kamu sebelum ianya ditimbang dan bersedialah kamu menghadapi hari qiamat (hari perhitungan)."

3 Syarat Taubat:
1.Tinggalkan dosa-dosa itu- tak lagi kerjakan
2.Menyesali perbuatan yang lalu
3.Berazam tidak lakukan

Dosa sesama manusia, sama seperti yang tiga ni, tapi, ditambah lagi satu, which is,
memohon kerelaan orang yang ada hak menuntut kesalahan

Assalammualaikum wbt
Satu hari....
Ada satu buku ni yang saya jumpa di '.....'
Buku yang berharga yang ditempatkan di bilik yang sebenarnya bukan muzium tetapi jauh lebih tinggi nilai fungsinya. Tetapi, memandangkan, terdapat byk skali buku-buku berharga seperti ini di dalam bilik itu yang kelihatan seolah tidak dibaca...
Aku terasa seolah bilik itu muzium dan buku-buku itu hanyalah bahan-bahan pameran. Sedangkan bilik itu adalah sgt istimewa, ...

bukan bilik berdating,
bukan bilik wayang,
bukan juga bilik dlm restoran mewah, seperti restoran Jepun,
bukan juga bilik arcade/games,
bukan bilik karaoke,
bukan bilik menagih dadah,
....

tetapi bilik mengerjakan solat.

Namun, the fact yang terdapat byk khazanah-khazanah ilmu berharga yang ditinggalkan oleh generasi dulu di dalam bilik itu semacam menimbulkan perasaan gembira di hati ini...

Bahawa jalan yang dilalui bukanlah jalan yang baru,
Bukan juga jalan yang sunyi,
tetapi, merupakan sambungan jalan-jalan.....

Comel kan?

Bukan ni jer yang comel sebenarnya....

Ada lagi perkara yang comel dan indah, tetapi, ade terselit perasaan sayu...

Buku-buku berharga tinggalan generasi dulu yang tersusun di rak-rak itu semacam menjadi suatu bukti....

Bukti kasih sayang mereka....
Yang memancarkan sinar harapan kepada generasi seterusnya....
Agar bangun dan terjaga dari buai dan mimpi,
Dan mara ke hadapan, berani mendapatkan keredhaanNya, keredhaan Allah yang Esa....
Dan tinggalkan parit yang kotor, dan salurkan air yang bersih... melalui parit yang lurus dan tidak bersimpang siur....

Agar... putus asa dan sambil lewa digantikan dengan semangat gigih berusaha...

...

Kemudian, perasaan sayu tidakkan terasa lagi,

Wahai saudaraku semua,

Tidakkah engkau menyedari?

"Maha Suci Allah yang telah menurunkan al-Furqan (al-Qur'an) kepada hambaNya, agar dia menjadi pemberi peringatan kepada seluruh alam" (Al-Furqan:1)

"Dan ingatlah suatu hari (ketika) Allah menghimpunkan mereka berserta apa yang mereka sembah selain drpd Allah, lalu Allah berkata (kepada yang disembah):"Apakah kamu yang menyesatkan hamba-hambaKu itu, atau mereka sendirikah yang sesat dari jalan (yang benar)? Mereka (yang disembah itu) menjawab:"Maha Suci Engkau, tidaklah patut bagi kami mengambil pelindung selain Engkau (untuk jadi) pelindung, akan tetapi Engkau telah memberi mereka dan datuk nenek mereka kenimatan hidup, sampai mereka lupa mengingati (Engkau): dan mereka adalah kaum yang binasa." (Al-Furqan:17-18)

John Ashcroft, the US attorney general said, "Islam is a religion in which God requires you to send your son to die for him", while "Christian is a faith in which God sends his son to die for you".


When I read this statement, I was really dissapointed and I couldnt stop myself from not being angry and I don't even try to stop it.

People might not understand why such emotional feelings exist.

Some may say, "We should be open-minded. I understand why he thinks that way"

But, to let such false statement echoes into the air is like letting a poisonous gas polluting the clean air.

It has be said and it has happened, I know. But, having acknowledged this false accusation, what do we as Muslims should do about it?

I personally feel that the reason why Muslims do not bother to care so much about such statement is because of "thinking that it is a dead end road and that there is nothing Muslims can do about it".

But,who is he as compared to "Allah, the Almighty".

There is actually a lot of things one can do. The first step is to strengthen our 'Akidah, our Faith towards Allah, our tawheed". Although, it seemed to be an individual effort but No.....

As it gradually turns out that our belief in Allah and in our Prophet Muhammad unites the Muslims, forming a strong tie between Muslims across the world wherever they are, whichever skin color they have, which ever race or tribe they come from.

That is one of the unlimited miracles and beauties of Islam that I wish everybody can see, feel and touch with their heart.....