Wat is beter: een excuus waarin je tegelijkertijd wel erg duidelijk maakt wat de ander allemaal verkeerd heeft gedaan, of geen excuus? Allebei je fouten toegeven is een mooi concept, maar dat werkt alleen als het ook oprecht overkomt. Toch vind ik de verklaring van de Arabische leiders waardevol, en beter dan niets. Meer nog dan de Arabische automobilist, is degene die kort daarna via de geluidsinstallatie van een moskee beweerde dat de man was gedood en opriep tot wraak, schuldig aan de escalatie en de rellen die het gevolg waren.
RP
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The Jerusalem Post
Oct 12, 2008 22:22 | Updated Oct 12, 2008 23:06
Acre's Arab leaders condemn driver
Oct 12, 2008 22:22 | Updated Oct 12, 2008 23:06
Acre's Arab leaders condemn driver
By DAN IZENBERG
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1222017521503&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Acre Arab leaders released a proclamation on Sunday apologizing for the fact that an Arab resident, Jamal Taufik, drove through an overwhelmingly Jewish neighborhood on the evening of Yom Kippur, triggering fierce riots in the city.
Acre was quiet on Sunday night, as hundreds of policemen patrolled the downtown area where Jews and Arabs live, shop and own stores side by side.
The proclamation was signed by 11 local Arab leaders including MK Abbas Zakour (United Arab List-Ta'al), Acre Deputy Mayor Gazawi Osama, three municipal councilmen - Sliman Wishakhi, Adham Jamal and Salim Nijmi - Sheikh Muhammad Madi and IBA newsman Zoheir Bahlul.
"On Yom Kippur and all the Yom Kippurs, we respected, out of our own free will and sensitivity, the holiness of the day for Jews and refrained, almost every one of us, from violating its sanctity by declining to hold events and by not driving our cars," the proclamation stated.
"We regret that a tiny minority of us did not take such care and chose to drive their cars in a Jewish neighborhood and hurt the feelings of their Jewish neighbors."
The Arab leaders also wrote, "We condemn the harm done to the [driver]. This behavior is fundamentally unacceptable."
The leaders also condemned the "acts of vandalism of a handful of irresponsible and wild members of our people who broke the law and sewed destruction by breaking show windows in downtown Acre."
However, they also condemned "those who thought it was correct to take revenge on innocent Arab residents living in Jewish neighborhoods in the eastern part of the city. They also endured injustice, suffering and pain, not to mention material damages.
"We all suffered," the proclamation continued. "After all, the evil harms everyone."
But Acre's chief rabbi, Yoseph Yashar, did not like the balance struck by the authors of the proclamation between the actions of the Jews and Arabs and the suffering of both sides.
In an interview with the Internet news site Ynet, Yashar said, "As long as they link in the same breath the riots of the Arabs on Yom Kippur eve with the acts of vengeance carried out by Jews in response, it will be very hard to calm matters down."
Zakour told The Jerusalem Post that he had hoped Jewish leaders would reciprocate with a statement of their own regarding the events in Acre, but nothing had been forthcoming. "We felt there was no Jewish leadership that was trying to calm their side," he said.
Zakour said that Arab leaders had met with Public Security Minister Avi Dichter after the Yom Kippur events and had promised to make an effort to calm the Arab side. "We went to the mosques, we talked to the residents, we walked through the market," he said.
On Saturday, "after sensing that there was no similar effort by the Jewish leadership," the Arab leaders decided to draft the proclamation. "I am proud of it and I hope the Jewish side will also publish a similar one," said Zakour. "With good will on both sides, we will rebuild Acre."
But Eli Ben-Shoshan, a shopkeeper and former head of the committee of storeowners on Rehov Ben-Ami, the city's main shopping street, told the Post he was not surprised by the violence that erupted on Yom Kippur.
"I told an Arab neighbor of mine on Yom Kippur eve that I was going home with a bad feeling," he said.
According to Ben-Shoshan, there had been a tradition in Acre that Jews gathered after prayers on Yom Kippur eve in the plaza in front of City Hall and mingled until the early hours of the morning. Starting three or four years ago, however, groups of Arab youths had started causing trouble.
"They rode horses through the plaza and threw plastic bags filled with water or firecrackers at the crowd," he said.
Ben-Shoshan charged that the city did nothing to stop the troublemakers and that each year the youths became bolder.
He was skeptical about the claim that Jewish-Arab coexistence in the city had been shattered. "It was an artificial coexistence," he said. "There are gangs of Arab youths who frequently attack Jews. Jews don't go out at night in the downtown area."
While the Arab population of Acre once lived entirely in the old city, today thousands have moved into the downtown commercial-residential area north of the old city walls. The riots on Yom Kippur eve began in a mainly Jewish neighborhood almost two kilometers east of the center of town and even further from the old city.
After false rumors spread that Taufik, the Arab driver, had been killed by Jews, a large mob of Arabs marched to towards the eastern neighborhood and smashed shop and car windows on Rehov Ben-Ami.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1222017521503&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Acre Arab leaders released a proclamation on Sunday apologizing for the fact that an Arab resident, Jamal Taufik, drove through an overwhelmingly Jewish neighborhood on the evening of Yom Kippur, triggering fierce riots in the city.
Acre was quiet on Sunday night, as hundreds of policemen patrolled the downtown area where Jews and Arabs live, shop and own stores side by side.
The proclamation was signed by 11 local Arab leaders including MK Abbas Zakour (United Arab List-Ta'al), Acre Deputy Mayor Gazawi Osama, three municipal councilmen - Sliman Wishakhi, Adham Jamal and Salim Nijmi - Sheikh Muhammad Madi and IBA newsman Zoheir Bahlul.
"On Yom Kippur and all the Yom Kippurs, we respected, out of our own free will and sensitivity, the holiness of the day for Jews and refrained, almost every one of us, from violating its sanctity by declining to hold events and by not driving our cars," the proclamation stated.
"We regret that a tiny minority of us did not take such care and chose to drive their cars in a Jewish neighborhood and hurt the feelings of their Jewish neighbors."
The Arab leaders also wrote, "We condemn the harm done to the [driver]. This behavior is fundamentally unacceptable."
The leaders also condemned the "acts of vandalism of a handful of irresponsible and wild members of our people who broke the law and sewed destruction by breaking show windows in downtown Acre."
However, they also condemned "those who thought it was correct to take revenge on innocent Arab residents living in Jewish neighborhoods in the eastern part of the city. They also endured injustice, suffering and pain, not to mention material damages.
"We all suffered," the proclamation continued. "After all, the evil harms everyone."
But Acre's chief rabbi, Yoseph Yashar, did not like the balance struck by the authors of the proclamation between the actions of the Jews and Arabs and the suffering of both sides.
In an interview with the Internet news site Ynet, Yashar said, "As long as they link in the same breath the riots of the Arabs on Yom Kippur eve with the acts of vengeance carried out by Jews in response, it will be very hard to calm matters down."
Zakour told The Jerusalem Post that he had hoped Jewish leaders would reciprocate with a statement of their own regarding the events in Acre, but nothing had been forthcoming. "We felt there was no Jewish leadership that was trying to calm their side," he said.
Zakour said that Arab leaders had met with Public Security Minister Avi Dichter after the Yom Kippur events and had promised to make an effort to calm the Arab side. "We went to the mosques, we talked to the residents, we walked through the market," he said.
On Saturday, "after sensing that there was no similar effort by the Jewish leadership," the Arab leaders decided to draft the proclamation. "I am proud of it and I hope the Jewish side will also publish a similar one," said Zakour. "With good will on both sides, we will rebuild Acre."
But Eli Ben-Shoshan, a shopkeeper and former head of the committee of storeowners on Rehov Ben-Ami, the city's main shopping street, told the Post he was not surprised by the violence that erupted on Yom Kippur.
"I told an Arab neighbor of mine on Yom Kippur eve that I was going home with a bad feeling," he said.
According to Ben-Shoshan, there had been a tradition in Acre that Jews gathered after prayers on Yom Kippur eve in the plaza in front of City Hall and mingled until the early hours of the morning. Starting three or four years ago, however, groups of Arab youths had started causing trouble.
"They rode horses through the plaza and threw plastic bags filled with water or firecrackers at the crowd," he said.
Ben-Shoshan charged that the city did nothing to stop the troublemakers and that each year the youths became bolder.
He was skeptical about the claim that Jewish-Arab coexistence in the city had been shattered. "It was an artificial coexistence," he said. "There are gangs of Arab youths who frequently attack Jews. Jews don't go out at night in the downtown area."
While the Arab population of Acre once lived entirely in the old city, today thousands have moved into the downtown commercial-residential area north of the old city walls. The riots on Yom Kippur eve began in a mainly Jewish neighborhood almost two kilometers east of the center of town and even further from the old city.
After false rumors spread that Taufik, the Arab driver, had been killed by Jews, a large mob of Arabs marched to towards the eastern neighborhood and smashed shop and car windows on Rehov Ben-Ami.
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