Saeb Erekat dead at age 65 - He mattered, as do his people

     If you never heard of him, if you did not know that there was a such a person, or even such a name, then I am here to tell you that he and his name mattered, that he counted profoundly as a person and a man, a person and representative of his people. This is in the season of the global pandemic (2020), and the post months of the George Floyd-provoked Black Lives Matter.

This man was Palestinian. In Arabic, Filisteen. A woman or girl is a filisteeniya. Plural of them is filisteeneeyun. There are millions of them, and many are poor. But this story is worse than only poverty of these millions and those that Erekat lived for.

What, pray tell, is a Palestinian? Isn't Philistine an ancient enemy of Israel in the Old Testament, or in the more modern Webster's dictionary a person of rude and backward notions? Yes, the Palestinians derive from these characterizations. Look up the word in a book or some Google search.

The definition of such people, to many around the world, is either controversial or ignored. Both of these connotations is too bad for them, and us, (shame upon us) because we as human beings of consciences in the 21st century-- like recognizing that some American law enforcement officers can learn how not to shoot a suspect too fast or lean on his neck while he is in cardiac distress-- we as citizens of a world that does not really feel or pay enough attention to the human needs and rights of those around the planet should know about the peoples of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. They are Arabs, which makes it difficult. They have been there a long time, and many were kicked out.

 

The Palestinians, becoming more of their own sanctioned sovereign state decade by decade, since the UN mandate of 1946, but painfully slow, and torturously torpid in modern circles of power, and infringed upon by extremist eretz Israelis, are the last denizens of the Holy Land to enjoy the freedoms of living as they should. Although, granted, the majority of the people of Syria and even Lebanon seem to be suffering more at present than the average Palestinian, per se.

But, most of them, the Arabs to the direct north, have political rights, at least in Lebanon, while Syria is retching in its own turmoil and violence. Autocracy was supposed to be thwarted by the Arab Spring, but other powers prevailed.

Arabs are passing a dark winter of progress or digression, as perhaps is their cross and crescent to bear, from the religious to the socio-political. The Russians have inserted themselves to pick up some of the slack of the Levantine oppressor and bully, Bashar al-Assad in Damascus. No pity lost on the people of that divided and forlorn land. Or Iraq to its east on the horizon of the rising sun.

Then there are the Palestinians, keepers of the Temple Mount of Jerusalem, co-owners of the land of milk and honey, places of holy import like Hebron (Khaleel, burial place of Abraham), Al-Aksa Mosque and Haram as-Sharif in el-Qodz, the third holiest site of Islam.

My college roommate grew up there, his father was the main key administrator of the Holy Mosque and the the disputed holy grounds of the great religions that claim it. His son, with PHD in tow, now resides comfortably in the wealthy and peaceful Emirates. Farther from the call to prayer that can be threatened by crowds of stone throwers or machine gun toters, or worse.

But, according to the interpretation of the Gazan friend who acquired his doctorate in history at UCLA, Shawqi, my former roomie's heart is not with "the people", as I said in my stunted Arabic to him in the halls of graduates at the Westwood campus, before alighting an elevator at Bunche Hall, a building full of brains and book makers and analysts, but as Shawqi said, the engineer's heart is with "the poor".

 

Shawqi is from Gaza. Ghaleb, the son of the Mosque caretaker, is from wealthy central Palestine, the West Bank.

 

Back to Saeb Erekat. Whether left or right, intransigent as a hawk or docile as a dove, Saeb had some points to make.

 

And so do I.

 

His life meant a lot, and so do his people. They are part of the justice and claims of an unfair world.

 

I look forward to the day that I can visit his grave in solemn peace, and smile with my Israeli and Palestinian brothers and sisters in this incredible land and the riches that they share, and share with us, the rest of the world that hardly ever knew them, but should.

 

Mr. Erekat, I salute you. COVID-19 has struck down a hero and a champion.

 

His memory will not be forgotten, nor his cause for freedom and honor for his people.