Rudyard Kipling"
“When you're left wounded on Afganistan's plains and
the women come out to cut up what remains, Just roll to your rifle
and blow out your brains,
And go to your God like a soldier”
General Douglas MacArthur"
“We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.”
“It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.” “Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.
“The soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.”
“May God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .” “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
“Nobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
“It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
The Soldier stood and faced God
Which must always come to pass
He hoped his shoes were shining
Just as bright as his brass
"Step forward you Soldier,
How shall I deal with you?
Have you always turned the other cheek?
To My Church have you been true?"
"No, Lord, I guess I ain't
Because those of us who carry guns
Can't always be a saint."
I've had to work on Sundays
And at times my talk was tough,
And sometimes I've been violent,
Because the world is awfully rough.
But, I never took a penny
That wasn't mine to keep.
Though I worked a lot of overtime
When the bills got just too steep,
The Soldier squared his shoulders and said
And I never passed a cry for help
Though at times I shook with fear,
And sometimes, God forgive me,
I've wept unmanly tears.
I know I don't deserve a place
Among the people here.
They never wanted me around
Except to calm their fears.
If you've a place for me here,
Lord, It needn't be so grand,
I never expected or had too much,
But if you don't, I'll understand."
There was silence all around the throne
Where the saints had often trod
As the Soldier waited quietly,
For the judgment of his God.
"Step forward now, you Soldier,
You've borne your burden well.
Walk peacefully on Heaven's streets,
You've done your time in Hell."
Let me be very clear.
PAS and their ilk have always claimed that the urban centres are the
domains of non-Muslims and, thus, anathema to Islamic values. They have
made it very clear in their strategies and propaganda that DAP is a
stand-in for the non-Muslim community.
They have accused DAP of interfering in Islam, most recently in Perak, and secretly controlling the Madani government.
Hence,
this supposed displacement of urban, especially Malay poor, is said to
be through the secret manoeuvres of DAP because they are the supposed
puppet masters of the Madani regime.
Mind you, they do not have to
say this openly because they do not have to. This is exactly the kind
of anti-Jewish rhetoric that has been around for decades and not only in
Malaysia. This is the kind of dog whistle politics that the Malay
political establishment has been enabling for decades.
Remember,
blaming the Jews for the problems of Muslims is exactly like blaming the
Chinese for the social, economic, and political problems of the Malay
community.
PAS has played this card before. Just last year, PAS
had a very vocal and overt campaign comparing Malay ownership in Penang
to the Palestinian issue.
As reported
in the press, “The party claims that Penang has carried out a
‘systematic seizure’ by taking over ownership and control of areas that
were originally predominantly Malay-Muslim. They allege that this was
done by changing the status of rural land to urban land and implementing
mega projects and luxury developments.
“If this matter is not stopped, it is possible that in 50 years, the Malays will disappear from their own homeland.”
Hate speech
Everything
most Malays are taught about the Palestinian conflict, they get from
National Civics Bureau courses and state-sponsored sermons in mosques.
This
is why PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang gets to say something like this:
“When Umno and PAS unite, they are accused of wishing to go to war with
other races. (Our accusers are) like the Jews who did not want Muslims
to be united during the Prophet’s time. This is a disease we must fight.
Let’s join forces and send the enemy to hell.”
PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang
Consider
the hate speech of Muslim convert Ridhuan Tee Abdullah, a preacher, who
took anti-Semitism to a new level by comparing his Chinese brothers and
sisters to the most obscene stereotype of Jews, pleading special
knowledge about their community since he was a kafir (infidel) like them before embracing Islam.
Former
prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad claimed that the Jews are “crooks”:
“(So) what is the reason we don’t allow Israelites to come here? We say
they are crooks (penyangak), and we just got rid of one crook.”
And this was when he was stumping for a non-Muslim Pakatan Harapan candidate.
This idea that spreading hate for the “Jews” makes good capital is what every Islamic political party in this country does.
No subtlety
Except,
of course, when the real world intrudes and Islamists are made to
understand that you cannot expect to be part of the international
community and think you are exempt from certain rules.
This is a
competition about who defends the Palestinian cause better for a local
audience. And in case the prime minister hasn’t noticed, he is playing a
rigged game that the state (and him) created decades ago.
Remember in 2017 when convicted felon and then-prime minister Najib Abdul Razak, in propping up the Palestinian cause, claimed
that he will not back down from the Jerusalem issue even if his body is
cut into pieces, did anyone else think of the “It’s just a flesh wound”
scene from “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”? Maybe it is just me.
Of
course, the non-Muslim component of Harapan will keep their mouths shut
because by opposing anti-Semitism, they suddenly become anti-Muslim,
except of course when they need the help of Malay political operatives
on the campaign trail.
Ultimately, it’s hard to blame PAS for
following this rancid playbook because everyone else does it, too. It is
just that PAS is not subtle about it.
If the Malays are the Palestinians in this narrative, who do you think the Jews are?
