This year marks the 59th anniversary of the Nakba (Palestinian catastrophe) in which the Zionist Jewish militias committed a horrendous number of massacres and crimes which led to the displacement of half of the Palestinian nation (around 750,000) from their villages and towns and the occupation of most of Palestine. In the memory of the Palestinian holocaust I have five messages that I would like to send to different people who have a lot to do with this continuing catastrophe: Palestinians living in Palestine, Palestinians living outside Palestine, Palestine solidarity movement activists, the international community and Jews worldwide.

To Palestinians living in Palestine

My first message is to the Palestinians living in Palestine. Your struggle and resistance of the Zionist Israeli occupation and apartheid made you the role model for all freedom fighters and all those who seek justice around the world. We outside Palestine have always been proud of being Palestinians, not because of what we have done for our cause, but rather because of your steadfastness in the face of the Zionist terror that has been imposed on you for the last 59 years. We would love to stand side-by-side with you and face the Zionist occupation together in Palestine, but unfortunately this is out of our hands. The majority of Palestinians outside Palestine are refugees who are denied the right to return and, for those who are not, there is always a need for Palestinians to be all over the world in order to spread the message about the Palestinian struggle and to defend the Palestinian cause and rights wherever the Zionist propaganda twists facts and delivers a distorted picture about the history of the Palestinian struggle and the ongoing Israeli crimes against the Palestinians.

It took other nations hundreds of years to get rid of colonisation and gain their freedom. It took India four centuries to get its freedom and independence, and it took the Algerians 130 years to end the French colonisation. Palestine is no less than any of these and therefore we should not expect to pay a cheaper price for our freedom. Always bear in mind that life without dignity is worse than death, and life without freedom loses all its dignity. If you think that compromising parts of the nation's rights, fought for by three generations, will do you any good you are very much mistaken. There will always come a day when a new generation starts seeking their dignity and, once again, they will realise it is found in their freedom and their return to their home land. Neither the Israeli occupation nor its collaborators should let you down or drive you to give up your rights.

It is fate that every coloniser and occupier recruits collaborators from within the colonised nation to pave their way in. We heard about many examples in the past and the modern history, with Iraq probably being the most recent example. We also have them in Palestine, but this should never make you ashamed of being Palestinian because the moment a collaborator helps the enemy they lose their Palestinian identity. I have no doubt that the recent clashes in Palestine have been ignited and directed by the Zionists and their collaborators. But how are we going to identify them? It is not that difficult. I'll be very frank and reveal to you my simple approach to point them out. Question the loyalty of everyone who hugs a Zionist, whose hand is full of Palestinian blood. Question the loyalty of everyone who accepts military and logistic aid from the same countries starving the Palestinians. Question the loyalty of everyone whose militias are freely allowed in and out of Palestine while the Palestinians have to wait for days or even weeks on border points –and in several cases die from illness while waiting. Question the loyalty of everyone who says no to a temporary state but welcomes the road map, and says yes to the right of return but is willing to negotiate it and make compromises. To conclude my message to the Palestinians inside I shall say again: you made us proud of you for 59 years and this shall continue until we all declare a Palestinian state over the whole of Palestine.

To Palestinians living out of Palestine

My second message is for the Palestinians living outside Palestine. I shall remind myself and you that what makes someone a Palestinian is the Palestine deeply rooted in their heart. So a true Palestinian should live as a Palestinian no matter where they are, and will raise their family to appreciate the Palestinian culture, traditions and lifestyle because this is part of our struggle to preserve the Palestinian identity which the Zionists have been striving to erase ever since they took our land.

It is not a luxury, but rather an obligation, to educate people whom we live with about our cause, our rights, our history and our culture. No one is capable of speaking on behalf of the Palestinians better than the Palestinians themselves. This is conditional on having Palestinians who understand, and are able to communicate with, the communities they live amongst. Never assume others are going to be the ones to take on such a role; Let it be you. Educate yourself about your cause and don't be shy to speak out about the Palestinian struggle wherever you are. We always blame the world for not standing with us but we never asked ourselves if we have ever made an effort to tell the world what they should know about our just cause. Someone may keep saying something for ages but that will be useless if he speaks a language his audience do not understand!

Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza strip are the ones involved in deciding on the best strategies and methods to physically resist the Israeli occupation on one hand, and to run the Palestinian community on the other hand. Palestinians may differ in their approaches to these issues and therefore it is legitimate and understandable that they form different parties and groups representing and promoting those approaches. Palestinians living outside Palestine have no reason or justification however, to split themselves into different camps. We should be an example of unity and harmony for we have one goal we all long to achieve: our freedom and return. A Palestinian living outside should always live and present themselves not as a member of Fatah, Hamas or any other party but only as a proud Palestinian.

To the Palestine Solidarity movement activists

My third message goes to the Palestine solidarity movement activists around the world. The Palestinian nation salutes you for defending their rights, increasing the awareness of your people about the Palestinian cause and exposing the Israeli brutality and the evil face of Zionism. I can tell from my experience that there are non-Palestinians who are more Palestinian than some Palestinians. We are grateful for every single moment you spend for us and we will never forget your struggle with us.

I would just like to remind myself and you that the role of a solidarity movement is to defend the rights of a nation and mobilise people to support those rights. It is worrying though to notice a few examples where this red line is crossed by making compromises on behalf of the Palestinians and proposing "solutions" that drop some of the Palestinian rights. So that we don't lose the plot, we should always remind ourselves of our primary aim and that is to support all the Palestinians' rights (and not picking some and neglecting others). It is only the Palestinian nation -as a whole- that has the authority to decide for its future. We stood by the Black South Africans until the apartheid regime was dismantled. We did not impose solutions on them but supported the end of apartheid. Likewise, we should support all rights of the Palestinian nation including their right in their independent sovereign state and the right of all refugees to return to their original villages and towns and their right to compensation.

To the International community

My fourth message is for the international community. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood." It is ironic that this statement is also 59 years old and it's yet to see the light in this wild world. If you think you have no hand in the suffering of the Palestinians for 59 years -or even more- then you have to rethink about it.

Palestine was granted to the Zionist Jews through the Balfour declaration 90 years ago which was then followed by mass immigration of the Jews from Europe and USA to Palestine where their camps were secured by British forces. Although Britain had no right in the first place to offer the land of the Palestinians to someone else they still issued a white paper clarifying that the Jews had no right to form their own state in Palestine, and that is when Zionist terror escalated against both the Palestinians and the British -with the King David Hotel bombing in Jerusalem being one example of that terror-. When the British lost control of the Zionist Jewish terrorist groups they simply decided to leave the Palestinians to their fate and leave the country! By that time the Americans were the main source of aids and funds to the Zionist terror militias and supplied them with all their military needs including air fighters.

It was in that decade when the Holocaust was committed against the Jews and other ethnicities. The sympathy with the Jews led 33 states -of which the most were either European countries or controlled by major powers- to vote for the UN partition plan of Palestine in 1947. But hold on, what do the Palestinians have to do with all of this?! There is only one answer; European states recognised the suffering of the Jews but still didn't want to host them. This brings to my mind the Aliens Act of 1905 which was enacted by the then-prime minister Arthur Balfour -Yes the same Balfour!- to restrict the immigration of Jews to the UK.

We didn't vote for Balfour, the British people did. We didn't vote for any foreign government that supported the Zionists before or after the declaration of their illegal state in 1948, the western nations did. Unfortunately, most of us only care about what the governments would do for us and ignore their support to the Zionists and their crimes. You have been paying taxes for ages; you probably received good health and social services in return, but how many times did you question the tax money redirected by your government to fund the killing of the Palestinians by the Israeli army? You enjoyed your freedom to vote for your representative in your Parliament, but only very few were caring enough to blame their governments for starving the Palestinians for practising their right to vote for a party other than what the Zionists prefer. Palestinians do not ask for anyone's apology; All what they ask for is to help them end their catastrophe, which they had no hand in creating, and to support their freedom and their return to the land Zionists wouldn't have taken without getting empowered by the US and many European governments.

Is it bliss to be ignorant? Not when it makes you involved in the crime. Your favourite shop is Marks & Spenser because it offers you good value for money, but then it is also your money that helps M&S to support Israel with hundreds of millions of US dollars every year. You open your bank account with Barclays, a bank which shamelessly sponsored the celebrations of "Israel's birthday", and you still justify it for yourself believing that closing your account won't make even a tiny difference. You will still insist to buy your makeup from Estee Lauder even when you are told that its Chairman, Ronald Lauder, is a Zionist working with the land-grabbing Jewish National Fund (JNF), opposing the right of return for Palestinians. What is worse is that you may be donating to the JNF charity in your country to help them erase any remaining signs of the Arab villages flattened by the Zionists since 1948. If you want to be passive and do nothing to help the Palestinians and pressure your government, the minimum I can ask you for is not to take part in their killing and daily suffering with your money… BOYCOTT!

To all Jews worldwide

My fifth and final message is dedicated to the Jews worldwide. Our problem is not with you; it's with Zionism. We lived in Palestine hundreds of years in peace and harmony as one Palestinian nation: Muslims, Christians, Jews, Druze and others. We understand the suffering many of you had to undergo in Europe and the US but this should never give the Zionists the justification to cause another nation even worse suffering in your name. Muslims, Christians and Jews believe in the same God, a just and merciful God, a God who will never give one nation the right to expel another nation from their land and replace them, a God who will never allow a Jew to kill an Arab to secure a "Jewish state", a God whose wrath is sure to be provoked by the racist Zionist ideology and its adopters and implementers, specially when they claim to speak in the name of God.

As a Jew you may be thirsty to speak against Zionism, and I do understand the risks you will have to undertake considering the Zionist attempts to silence you, but believe me it's worth the risk. You won't be alone; the majority of silent Jews are non-Zionists, and all what you need to do is to break your silence and add your name to the honour list of Jewish heroes who dare to speak out for Judaism and against Zionism. It may sound a bit pragmatic for a Palestinian to encourage non-Zionist Jews to speak out the truth about their faith to unveil the lies of the Zionists who pretend to represent the Jews, but I'm sure even the non-Zionist Jew dreams of the day when, for people all over the world, the word "Judaism" becomes attached to peace, justice and equality instead of Zionism, racism, occupation, war and "Nakba".

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May 21, 2007 By Akram Awad, PhD Researcher University of Leeds Leeds LS2 9JT United Kingdom http://www.akramawad.com