Friday, August 13, 2010
Elder of Ziyon
The lyrics are filled with what can only be called outright lies, but lies that are accepted as truth by a huge percentage of the world. Here is how it starts:
In 1948 they were driven out at the point of a machine gun
Families fled in fear to Jordan, Syria and Lebanon
They fled around the globe, firmly held in terror's grip
And about a million refugees ended up in the tiny Gaza Strip
In 1967 the IDF moved in
And the refugees in Gaza became refugees again
Settlers took their farmland, soldiers took the ports
And the people were surrounded by military forts
In 2007 they cut it off completely
No access to the borders, no access to the sea
The world began to see this unavoidable stamp
The most crowded place on Earth was now a concentration camp
Israeli jet fighters bombed Gaza from the air
And they kept out the supplies needed to rebuild and repair
They kept out the convoys of humanitarian aid
Anemic children going hungry, crushed and burned in bombing raids
Now, people listening to this in a concert have next to zero ability to think critically about these sincere-sounding libels. They get caught up in the moment - a purely emotional moment that has no bearing on logic or reality - and the hate that underlies these lyrics become, subconsciously, a part of them.
So yesterday I decided that it is time to write a folk song that actually tells the truth about Palestinian Arabs. Unfortunately, I cannot play guitar nor can I sing very well, so I cannot upload it to YouTube and cause countless clueless leftist heads to explode at the confluence of folk singing about an oppressed people and the truth about who is oppressing them.
But maybe one of my readers can.
So, without further ado, here is my song:
The pawns of the Middle East
In 1948 their leaders abandoned them
The rich Arabs packed up and went to Lebanon
Their confident leaders told them to get out of the way
So the Jews could be slaughtered and then they'll be back to stay
But that's not what happened. Their fighters didn't fight.
Wild rumors scared them, and most then joined the flight
They ended up in Egypt, Syria, Jordan
The Palestinian Arabs thought they'd start over again
They thought that they'd be welcomed by the Arabs who said that they loved them
But they were placed in giant camps, and had to stay in tents
They thought that they were all Arabs, but they were only that in name
The other Arabs didn't want them to remind them of their shame
Chorus:
Decade after decade, the Arabs let them down
They treated them like animals, and just used them as pawns
They thought that their problem was that they didn't have a state
But the real problem was that they were taught only to hate.
They wanted jobs, they wanted land, they wanted to fit in
Their hosts only wanted the millions given by the UN
They kept them stuck in camps, in disgusting misery
They did everything possible to ensure they'd never be free.
The Arab states passed laws to let them know where they stand
They couldn't work in certain jobs, couldn't own any land
They had no choice, no rights, no control over their fate
And they raised a generation who was taught nothing but hate.
Chorus
Jordan never gave them an inch of "historic Palestine"
The entire world had no problem. They thought that this was fine.
The only land that Arabs would allow them to receive
Was the land that would be left over when they forced the Jews to leave.
Their new leaders taught terror, for them not to be so meek
Jordan slaughtered thousands of them in a matter of just weeks
And so it went, year after year, kept in dire straits
400,000 of them got kicked out of Kuwait
Decade after decade, the Arabs let them down
They treated them like animals, and just used them as pawns
They thought that their problem was that they didn't have a state
But the real problem was that they were taught only to hate.
It didn't take long to write - maybe 45 minutes. I could write an entire album in a couple of days. Political folk-singers are overrated.
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