To Palestine, with love

The Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud

Abbas, asked at the United Nations in September

the end to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian

territories, from where many inhabitants have had

to flee to Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Egypt.

After 63 years of suffering, of submission to the

interests of the State of Israel, the Palestinian people

is still awaiting to be truly free and independent as the

people of Angola, Mozambique or South Africa

Tears and sighs have marked the daily lives of the

Palestinians over six long decades because the Israelites

have hoisted the right to have the last word on

the true proclamation and recognition of a Palestinian

state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Persecuted by the Jewish cause in 1948 and 1967,

the Palestinians are a people that only managed to

have an Authority, fragile, but not a true Republic, so

proud of itself as Algeria or India.

Native of the lands lying between the Sinai Peninsula

and the River Jordan, the Palestinians have more

than 2000 years of existence, for already in the fifth

century BC the Greek historian Herodotus referred

to them, but yet they do not have as much right for a

seat on the UN General Assembly as East Timor or

South Sudan, which recently proclaimed its independency

from the north.

The West Bank has about 2.4 million inhabitants

and the Gaza Strip, which is the other part of Palestine,

1.4 million, so as a whole they are expected to

total as close to four million, not counting the three

million Palestinians refugees in Jordan for a long time.

If this is not enough people to have their own

state, as a full member of the United Nations, then

what it is? Any set of four to seven million people have

the right to establish their own identity without being

subject to the dictates of others.

Much less populous areas, such as Guinea-Bissau,

Gambia, Cape Verde and Sao Tome and Principe have

the right to an unquestionable place in the international

community. So, why Palestine doesn’t have?

There are other such cases in the world, of people

relegated to the second plan, as is the case of the

Kurdish people, but for now, let’s start by demanding

the recognition of the rights of the Palestinians to a

state of full sovereignty, a Republic that can coexist

peacefully with Israel.

Palestinians or Philistines are awaiting their time in

the concert of nations. Jorge Heitor
* Na revista Prestígio, de Maputo