SCHOLARS UPSET ABOUT BAMIYAN BUDDHAS ARE SILENT ABOUT THE NEAR COMPLETE DESTRUCTION OF GAZA'S CULTURAL AND HISTORICAL SITES

1

Apartheid Israel has destroyed all mosques in Gaza,

destroyed or damaged most archaeological sites,

most secular historical buildings,

all universities and museums

with their archives of historical documents,

but archaeologists, art historians, cultural historians,

historians, museum curators etc are almost all

completely silent. Of the prominent people

who were vocal about the destruction

of the Bamiyan Buddhas, I've seen one
(1) to speak against the destruction

of Gaza's cultural, historical and religious sites.

One(1). All the high and noble words

about protecting shared cultural heritage,

all the laments about loss

of irreplaceable works of religious art

was apparently just pointless rhetoric

to be used on some occasions

and ignored on others.

2

When the Taliban and the Islamic State

destroyed Gandharan and Assyrian art,

when Islamists destroyed shrines in Mali

the rhetoric flowed, an abundant flood,

but now, near silence, and everyone

with a spine who tries

to speak is attacked, blacklisted, fired

so that the destruction can go on,

all these scholarly professions now

fighting on the side of destruction

of everything they claim to hold dear,

everything of whose torch bearers

they have appointed themselves.

Because Israel is now the vandal

and Israel can do nothing wrong

because it's Israel. The circular logic

of idiots embraced by the best

educated and most learned,

reduced to gibbering fellow travelers

of Apartheid genocidaires

as our shared cultural heritage

is destroyed. But it's all-right -

it's Israel doing it,

and Israel can do nothing wrong

because it's Israel.

 

15.05.2025

Verse Poetry Poems Poem

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse