More on the Centennial of the Palestino Soccer Club in Chile.
Some Israelis try to deny the existence of a Palestinian identity/nationality.
How do they explain that this club was started in 1920 by immigrants and the sons of immigrants to Chile?
I am actually in favor of Israel, but to deny the existence of a Palestinian people is not helpful. The reason the conflict is so vicious is precisely because a Palestinian people do exist.
Posted on YouTube: April 2, 2019
Note: The team, CD Palestino was founded in 1920. The reference to 1948 refers to what the Palestinians call the Naqbe.
Chile has been taking in Palestinians since the 19th century. The vast majority were Christians from Beit Jala, Beit Sahour, Bethlehem, and Beit Safafa.
Many were fleeing the anti-Christian persecutions of the Ottoman Turks (before 1917), and later some fled the Muslim-Jewish fighting during the Mandate. A few came after the Six Day War in 1967.
However, there were a few Muslims among them: some either converted to Christianity or married Christian women who raised the kids to be Christian. Roughly 99% of the Palestinians in Chile, Chilestinians, are Christian.
These Palestinians have often become elites in Chile, and they wield political power above their numbers.
Chile has a major league soccer (futbol) team called CD (Sports Club) Palestino, which represents the Palestinian community to the world. It is followed not only in Chile, but in Palestine.
There are some who claim that Palestinian identity did not exist until 1967, however …
1920 – CD (Sports Club) Palestino was formed 1938 – Club Palestino (a social club) was opened. This is no minor local club, but is a major cultural force.
Posted on YouTube: February 23, 2017
At the time of this writing, Gaza is brimming over with about 1.8 million people. Gaza is under an Israel blockade, and the situation has become unliveable.
Israel has even offered to pay the flight fare for those Gazan Arabs willing to emigrate from Gaza, but Israel can find no willing countries to take them.
Israeli authorities are willing to allow Gaza Strip residents who want to emigrate to fly out via Israel if a country is found to accept them, a senior government official said on Monday. According to the official, Israel would even pay for the flight. The official added that the government had asked a few countries, including some in the Middle East, whether they would be willing to accept Palestinians from Gaza, and was turned down.
Well, Israel should know better.
It will take more than a free flight to get countries to accept the Arabs.
But if Israel is willing to give the Gazans some money – say $100,000 US per person – then Chile might be willing to take in some Gazans, or some Palestinians from Judea and Samaria (the West Bank).
The general idea is good; but it will cost more than paying the fare of a few Palestinians willing to leave Gaza.
Chile could easily absorb 100,000 Palestinians – whether from Gaza, or Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), does not matter.
But it will cost more than a free airline ticket.
Now, Chile could not possibly take in all the Palestinians. But 100,000 would be doable, and it would be a good start. At $100,000 US per person, it would be $10 Billion. It would not be cheap.
Argentina joined the growing list of nations which have blacklisted Hezbollah.
Argentina can do this relatively easily. Most of Argentina’s Arab population is Christian with little or no sympathy for Hezbollah. While Argentina’s Arabs are roughly 10% Muslim, most of them are non-practicing.
Hezbollah has been caught running money laundering and drug smuggling operation in Latin America, and frankly most of Latin America’s countries consider them destablizing.
Source:Reuters – July 18, 2019
Argentina brands Hezbollah terrorist organization, freezes assets
Argentinian authorities designated Hezbollah, which it blames for two attacks on its soil, a terrorist organization on Thursday and ordered the freezing of the Lebanese Islamist group’s assets in the country.
[TeleSUR] is a pan–Latin American terrestrial and satellite television network headquartered in Caracas, Venezuela. TeleSUR was launched with the objective of providing information to promote the integration of Latin America.
Venezuela, thanks to Hugo Chavez, is an ally of Iran; and allows Iran’s HispanTV.
HispanTV’s programming has been distributed in Venezuela, Spain, Argentina, Cuba and other countries worldwide and is intended to reinforce ties between Iran and Latin American states such as Venezuela, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, Colombia, and Mexico as well as to counter what the Iranian government sees as unfair coverage in Western media. The channel is similar to Press TV, an English language news channel and Al-Alam an Arabic satellite TV station also owned by the Iranian state, which claim to provide “accurate and unbiased coverage of the world and the Middle East events as they unfold.”
In July 2013, HispanTV and other Iranian channels have been removed from several European and American satellites, allegedly because of the Iran sanctions, even though an EU spokesman said that these sanctions do not apply to media
England and Spain have pulled Iran’s propaganda (English language Press TV and Spanish language HispanTV) off from their European Satellites.
Yet, Iran’s networks both survive on the internet.
However, Iran’s propaganda is distributed, with Latin governments’ approval, thoughout Latin America.
There are several voices that condemn international silence toward Israel’s military offensive against the Gaza Strip that has killed, by far, more than 2,000 Palestinians. To Susana Khalil, Palestinian resident in Venezuela, only the progressive governments of Latin America have spoken out against the horror and barbarism caused by the Israeli army. teleSUR. (Used Google to translate)
Note: teleSUR is Spanish for Tele South, as in South of the USA.
A lot of this is uncontested by the USA or Israel in South America.
