Asbarez: When the World Burns and Silence Prevails

BY MARIE ROSE ABOUSEFIAN, PHD

For many years now, the world has been watching sometimes with partial protests, but mostly with indifferent silence the genocides and wars unleashed by Israel with the support of America: in Gaza, Lebanon, Yemen, Iran, Syria, and across the Middle East.

The all-powerful Israeli fist has paralyzed the world’s senses, and the terror is so overwhelming and immediate that it seems each country, by remaining neutral, is trying to avoid meeting the same destruction.

Lately, the whole world witnessed the brutality with which Israel once again subjected the peaceful population of Lebanon to massacre, in the same manner as in Gaza, sparing neither children, nor women, nor the elderly, nor the young. As if that were not enough, it reduced the country’s infrastructure to dust and, still unsatisfied, declares its intention to level it completely to the ground.

Lebanon is bleeding dry, like Gaza, while Israel celebrates its victory and prepares for even greater blows. And America, as always, remains silent, concealing its participation and its similar crimes committed in Iran and elsewhere.

Is this truly the greatest achievement of humanity in the 21st century? On the one hand, humansreach the moon and return, on the other, under that very same moon, an entire human life is annihilated.

After looting vast lands and the wealth of nations, displacing peoples, distorting their human and national identity, and erasing their image, are they still not satisfied? Do they now seek to destroy entirely both their past and present, the whole of civilization, as declared by the President of the United States, who has proclaimed himself the master of this planet?

But why does all this affect me so deeply? Why does it surprise me, when for eight long years our own country has been held hostage by a nonentity who does not serve its nation but the enemy, an enemy whose primary aim is likewise to erase us as a nation entirely from the face of the earth?

Living in this reality, I should not be surprised by the world’s silence, because we too, with bowed heads, continue to watch the dismantling of our country while preparing for elections. We allow the current anti-national authorities to impose their candidates, to alter electoral laws for their own benefit, to roam from village to village, district to district, church to church, house to house, intimidating people, making false promises to secure their votes, and force themselves upon the nation.

Amid this global turmoil, observing the heroic resistance of our neighboring country Iran against the self-proclaimed “invincible” America in a war imposed upon it, does our people reflect on how it surrendered its own country with such indifference? 

Does it think about its fragile survival and the preservation of its territorial integrity? Or does it still believe the false justifications and promises of the current incapable authorities?

With both admiration and envy, I watch how in neighboring Iran, amid internal unrest stirred by foreign forces, in the heat of war, under a rain of bombs, not only all political forces, but also the state leadership, military, and diplomatic corps, defend every inch of their vast, multiethnic country with unwavering devotion. Not one of their “commanders” says that snow-covered Mount Damavand is unnecessary, or that the Zagros Mountains are not theirs. On the contrary, they are ready to die for those mountains and deserts. United, they defend their country. No one says, “Give up Hormuz so we can live in peace”, as our people once said about Artsakh. It is a painful reminder, isn’t it? It is a reality, testified by Yerablur, where our 5,000 heroes who fought alone now rest.

Not only politicians, but also intellectuals, play their part in explaining to the Iranian people whom they are defending their country against. Among them, the most prominent is Professor Mohammad Marandi, whom I had the opportunity to meet years ago at a conference in Paris. I was impressed by his knowledge, his balanced thinking, and his familiarity with Armenian literature.

Professor Marandi, though Iranian by nationality, was born, educated, and received his professorship in English Literature in the United States. He has taught at renowned universities, yet he left that path to lecture at Tehran University, dedicating his time and energy to revealing to his people the true purpose of the American Israeli war imposed upon their country. Through his interviews, he exposes the essence of American expansionist ideology and its long-standing efforts to destabilize Iran.

For years, as his country has remained a target of war, he has worked tirelessly to inform his people especially those easily swayed by foreign, particularly American, propaganda about the true intentions of those seeking to destroy their nation, and the consequences of believing such propaganda, joining internal traitors, and surrendering the country to genocidal forces.

It pains me that despite having many professors, doctors, and intellectuals, we have not had our own Marandi, someone who would reveal to our foreign influenced society the dangers of American-Turkish policies that have gradually brought our country to the brink of collapse.

I appeal to my colleagues, to those in the arts, literature, history, and to our intellectuals who have remained silent for far too long, who still tolerate the current ruler, a clownish tyrant who wears our mutilated map as a badge and distributes it everywhere like a peddler. They must emerge from their shells, first reject that badge an open humiliation for our country, and make it clear that no one should accept it. They must explain how the dangerous the so-called “TRIPP”is for our national interests, and how self-sacrifice for foreign agendas leads only to ruin.

They must unite with other candidates, go among the people, speak with them, reveal what has happened in our country, and make them understand that the coming elections are not ordinary elections about pensions or prices, or about living comfortably. This is a matter of the country’s very existence, of having a homeland at all, of survival itself.

They must ensure that people neither accept bribes nor give in to fear of losing income or employment, for all of that can be restored under new leadership if only the country is saved.

I am also certain that American, Turkish, and European intermediaries will use every means to re-elect this obedient servant of their interests. That is why unity is essential. The people must feel they are not alone, and that these elections cannot be falsified as before.

We have a great mission: to save our collapsing country from the current authorities, to secure the release of our captives, and not to sign a single document with the enemy. This obliges us all, to reject them, to refuse to follow their herd, whether in churches or on the streets.

Our endangered region compels us to unite and struggle at any costs to save our country.

When there are death and destruction in the world, we cannot entrust our fate to those who create that destruction, or those who serve them.

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