By Ayesha Ahmad, IOL Washington correspondent 

WASHINGTON, March 14 (IslamOnline) - A group of panelists at Howard University in Washington denounced Israeli flaunting of international laws and the support it receives from the United States. 

Speaking Wednesday, March 13, at a forum planned to educate students, panelist El-Hajj Mauri Saalakhan explained each Israeli violation of international laws, including the annexation of East Jerusalem by force, the use of internationally provided military aid to kill civilians and the creation of segregated settlements on Palestinian land.

"The [Jewish-only] settlements [are] built with taxes from a country where housing discrimination is illegal," said Saalakhan, a poet and civil activist with the Washington-based Peace and Justice Foundation. 

"With all of this international law in favor of Palestinians, why is it … this has been able to go on for so long?" he asked. "Because of the protection that this apartheid state receives from the United States of America." 

He also noted "the blatant role of the U.S. media in perpetuating this cancer." 

Another speaker, Reverend Graylan Hagler of Washington's Plymouth Congregational Church, said that this support existed because the U.S. "sees Israel as its beachhead in the Middle East." 

Hagler, a long-time peace activist, said that the problem would not be resolved until true justice for the Palestinian people had been addressed. 

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere," he said, emphasizing that simply the killing of Osama bin Laden, Washington's prime suspect in the September 11 attacks, would not produce the results the U.S. wanted. "As long as issues of justice are not addressed, America will never be safe." 

The Reverend stressed that without the enormous support of the United States, Israel would be forced to find a peaceful resolution. 

"If you cut off that pipeline of funding tomorrow, Israel would have to deal with coexistence with the Palestinians," he said. "The only thing that keeps it afloat is the blood dollars coming from here." 

Echoing Saalakhan's concern, Hagler emphasized the role of the media which "always dresses things up for us to their advantage… we allow ourselves to be educated by a 30-second sound bite." 

He said that even the right-wing Christian movement in the U.S. creates an "eschatological framework" in which it is made to seem that "Christ cannot come again until [Israel] is established… as a Jewish homeland." 

Hagler said that Zionists hijacked the faith of Judaism, reflecting the remarks of a third panelist, Rabbi Yisroel Weiss of the orthodox Jewish group Neturei Karta. 

Zionism began only 100 years ago - as opposed to the ancient Jewish faith - as "a movement started by irreligious Jews… [who] had left the folds of believing in God," Weiss said. 

It is the belief of Neturei Karta that the state of Israel should not exist - "metaphysically, they will never succeed," Weiss said - because the Jews are meant to be in a state of exile until God Himself ends their exile, and to end that exile themselves is "inciting God".

"When God tells us the time is proper, He will end the exile… without any military actions from the Jewish people, God will reveal Himself," Weiss said. 

He called the Zionist movement "false representatives of Judaism," saying that they have committed sins against the Palestinian people - stealing their land, killing civilians, creating a situation in which Jews are also killed - in the name of Judaism when they are actually going against the laws of their faith. 

Saalakhan emphasized the importance of Weiss's presence. "All Jews are not down with what Israeli is doing," he said. 

Hagler also pushed Weiss's point, saying that Zionists are "not talking about 'justice,' they're talking about 'just us.'" 

Both stressed, along with Weiss, that their denunciation of Zionism had nothing to do with Judaism or Jews as a people. 

"If you get up and you speak against Zionists, you're not an anti-Semite," Weiss said. "The problem between Jews and Muslims is false." 

A fourth panelist, Howard University political science professor Dr. Mervat Hatem, initiated the event with a history of the current conflict and "what went terribly wrong" with the 1993 Oslo accords. 

The forum was sponsored by Howard University's Muslim Student Association, its Amnesty International chapter, and the Peace and Justice Foundation.

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