Azmi Bishara on 61st Anniversary of the Naqba

Azmi Bishara

The Palestinian Cultural Club warmly welcomed Azmi Bishara to AUB this month to share his perspective on Palestine on the 61st anniversary of the “Naqba,” a day that recognizes the creation of Israel and the displacement of the Palestinians. A Palestinian Christian born in Israel, who served in the Knesset and founded the National Democratic Assembly party (Balad), Bishara opted for exile following Israeli allegations that he was assisting “the enemy” in the July 2006 war with Lebanon.

Bishara voiced his desire to see “an end to institutional inequality between Palestinians and Israelis” and a “one-state solution” that will end racist policies towards Palestinians, envisaging “a country of all its citizens” that will recognize a universal right of return. To open the talk, he sharply criticized the Arab world for not forming a unified front on the issue of Palestine and for categorizing it as “a Palestinian issue,” when the issue lies not only in the Palestinians’ separation from their land, but “their separation from the Arab world.”

“The media casts Palestinians and Israelis as two separate extremes, two separate sides on an issue . . . instead of presenting the actual power dynamic,” Bishara continued, turning his attention to global perception of the issue. He argued that terminology plays a strong role in tainting the picture, as in using the word “conflict” instead of “occupation” to twist the struggle into one between Judaism and Islam instead of an ethnic-national conflict over land rights.

Citing the forced creation of Israel, Bishara implied that certain foreign powers have the responsibility to rectify their mistakes. “The issue of Palestine is something the world cannot allow to continue, and that the world had a hand in,” he asserted.

Addressing the problem of the refugees, Bishara revisited his argument for the right of return. “How are we going to solve the problem of the refugees without the right of return?” he asked, insisting that any other solution would end in destruction and bloodshed. “There needs to be a resistance,” he said, urging commitment and confidence from the Palestinian people. “The most important thing for Palestinians to believe in is a future.”