Activists should heed facts, not hype

I find it appalling that many students in UCLA call themselves
human rights activists, yet they support those regimes and
societies that violate exactly those rights.

This especially pertains to their support of the Arab regimes
and societies that have been completely violating human and animal
rights, while condemning Israel and the United States ““ two
countries that have sought to preserve these rights. Almost every
human rights activist believes in democracy and free and discrete
elections. Yet, there are 21 Arab countries, and not a single one
of them is a democratic government. In fact, in almost every Arab
state, anyone who opposes the government becomes a political
prisoner and is sometimes tortured to death.

Human rights activists support equality for women. Nevertheless,
in Saudi Arabia, a woman cannot even get hospitalized without her
husband’s presence. In Egypt, female genital mutilation still
occurs, and a majority of women undergo the procedure.

On the contrary, all female Arab citizens of Israel are eligible
to vote and a woman, Golda Meir, even became the prime minister
““ which is more than I can say for any Arab state.

I found it to be a disgrace when black students walked around
campus last year wearing green armbands, symbolizing Palestinian
unity against Israelis. I wonder if they were aware of the fact
that if they were to go to Sudan and Mauritania they would probably
be enslaved. Indeed, these two Arab nations have an apartheid
policy of enslaving their black Christians, even in the year
2002.

On the contrary, in the 1991 Operation Solomon, Israel brought
thousands of black Ethiopian Jews not to be enslaved or used for
cheap labor; but rather to be made full citizens of Israel with
equal rights.

What I find to be most hypocritical is that some proponents of
gay and lesbian rights support the Arabs and the Palestinians. In
almost every Arab country, if a man were to publicly make out with
his boyfriend, he would be buried alive either by the government or
by the society itself.

Israel, however, has been very tolerant of gays. In fact,
recently, an openly gay man became a member of the Israeli
parliament. In addition to that, Israel does not have a
“Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy in its
military. You can ask and you can tell, and practically no one in
the Israeli military will care about your sexual orientation.
Discrimination against gays is prohibited.

Not only that, but in 1998, Israel sent a transsexual, Dana
International, to represent the country in the European Eurovision
Song Contest. She made the country proud by winning first place.
When was the last time you saw a transsexual representing an Arab
state?

The communists at the International Socialist Organization
pathetically support the Arabs. However, are they aware of the fact
that forced labor is not illegal in Lebanon, and many servants,
women and children are compelled to work against their will?

Pro-Palestinian activists are concerned about the Palestinians
who are supposedly being oppressed by the Israelis. I wonder if
those same activists are also concerned about the donkeys whose
ears were amputated by Palestinians. As Henry Chu from the Los
Angeles Times described, the unlucky donkey “deemed to
represent Israel, was paraded among the crowd then punished by the
demonstrators, who sliced off both its ears and its
tail.”

Israel is often referred to by blind and ignorant sympathizers
of the Palestinians, as a fascist state. Perhaps if those same
people were surrounded by strict Arab regimes as Israel is, they
would also become “fascists.”