The following article comes as Over 1,962 Palestinians, including 470 children, have lost their lives and more than 10,100 have been wounded since the Israeli military unleashed fatal assaults on the Gaza Strip more than a month ago.This comes as Israeli authorities are systematically acting to change East al-Quds' identity and character.
A report published by the al-Aqsa Foundation in October, said the Israeli regime is planning to build a synagogue in the al-Aqsa Mosque compound as part of its efforts to further Judaize the occupied Palestinian territories.
Over the past decades, Israel has tried to change the demographic makeup of al-Quds by constructing illegal settlements, destroying historical sites, and expelling the local Palestinian population.
Over half a million Israelis live in over 120 settlements built since the 1967 Israeli occupation of the West Bank and East al-Quds. The international community considers the settlements as illegal.
Imam Khomeini was the first marja'-i taqlid (source of religious guidance) and great religious leader to authorise the use of monies received for charitable disbursement to support the Palestinian combatants. When the Quds-occupying regime perpetrated yet another crime in its long list of crimes and set fire to the al-Aqsa mosque, Imam Khomeini, with complete foresight and in stark contrast to the policy adopted by others on the matter, which was to endeavor to have the mosque rebuilt, stressed the need to preserve the vestiges of Israel's crimes as a symbolic factor to incite and encourage the Muslims to rise up against the existence of the main reason for the crime, that is the occupying regime. He said, "They set fire to the Masjid al-Aqsa. We cry out: 'Leave the Masjid al-Aqsa half-burned to the ground; do not erase all traces of the crime!' But the Shah's regime opens an account, sets up a fund, and starts collecting money from the people supposedly to rebuild the Masjid al-Aqsa, but really to fill the pockets of our rulers while also covering up the crime committed by Israel."
From the very beginning, he introduced the Islamic aspect and the ideological dimension of the struggle with Israel as the most effective factor in the movement for mobilising the oppressed Palestinian nation and attracting support for them from the Islamic umma. He considered other methods of struggle, such as reliance on Arab nationalism and nationalist views along with other imported and non-Islamic ideologies, as a departure from the path of struggle for the freedom of Quds. He had a clear insight into the internal problems besetting the Islamic world, amongst them the weakness, inability or subordinate nature of some of the heads of Islamic states. Consequently, he emphasised the importance of public knowledge and awareness in the Islamic world stemming from the principles of belief and the umma's common faith and culture, and of avoiding sectarian differences. He called on the heads of the Muslim governments to accept this approach too, and believed that as long as the governments were of the same mind as their people and went along with Muslim public opinion and demand, they were to be entrusted with the authority of leadership and with the responsibility for guiding the struggle, otherwise the Muslim nations should do to them what the Muslim nation of Iran did to the Shah.
Now briefly some of the aspects of Imam Khomeini's views relating to the Palestinian problem and confrontation with the Zionist enemy will be discussed. With a quick look through the present anthology, one can briefly summarise the different aspects of Imam Khomeini's views on Palestine and other concomitant issues under the following headings:
The necessary requirements for being able to adopt a basic stance on Israel and pursue a serious struggle against it are that the people, while being aware of the facts, should at the same time not be stricken with consumption fever and should trust their leaders to the extent that they go along and co-operate with them. However, the suppression and despotism prevalent in most Islamic countries at the time was such that the people did not support their governments. Imam knew this and realized that the main buttress of the struggle would be the people's Islamic faith, he said: "Until the time that we return to Islam, the Islam of the Prophet of God, our problems will remain. Until that happens, we can solve neither the Palestinian problem nor the problems besetting Afghanistan and other places. The nations must turn to the earliest age of Islam, if their governments do so with them there is no problem, otherwise the nations should detach themselves from their governments and do to them what the nation of Iran did to its government so that the problems can be solved."