Opinion

Thank you to Haaretz’s David B. Green for forcing me to research the Arabs in Andalusia

I owe the veteran Haaretz journalist, David B. Green, thanks for forcing me to search the internet for some quick and simple information about the Arabs in Andalusia.

I am not a historian and, for decades, my medical and public health education and practice had limited my intellectual forays to related scientific fields. With that narrowed vision, I had forgotten what little relevant historical information I had learned in elementary school under the British Mandate. And anything I learned after that was filtered clean either through the Zionist sieve or through my professional focus. I now recall reading some of Maimonides’s original writings in the Arabic Language at the Harvard Medical School Countway Library. I recall reading about the First Aid approach to cases of snakebite and being amazed how, in fact, such approach hadn’t changed in near a millennium. Or was it Avicenna’s treatise that I read on the subject of snake bite? At least to me, the two are equidistant culturally, emotionally and as sources of pride. Wouldn’t you know it, some uppity modern-day Emergency Medicine physician had gone and changed that. You no longer put a tourniquet proximal to the bite.

But I digress. Not only that there was little in our school curriculum after the Nakba about Arabs as a whole, what with our Old Testament and Jewish History studies and needing to convert all relevant dates to different eras of the first or second temple, but also that there was an undeclared ban on applause when teachers spoke of Arab history. I know of at least one teacher in my village in Galilee, who was fired for singing the praises of the Arabs in Andalusia to his students. A student ratted on him. He had such a difficult time finding another job that he up and left to Norway where he got a PhD in anthropology and commenced, among other things, to document life in erased Palestinian villages in Israel on the eve of their destruction. Go figure! What can you do to stop those Palestinians from muddying your pure springs of knowledge?!

David B. Green (Photo: Twitter/@davidbeegreen)

But I digress again. Nearly ten years ago, I corresponded with Mr. David B. Green who, at the time, was in charge of the English-language editorial page in Haaretz. He assured me then that he intended to give my voice the chance to be heard. After I had submitted one article about the ongoing Israeli war on Gaza and exchanged a few emails with him, I realized that he wanted my voice to be heard saying what he thought. Our correspondence ended.

Today I read his article about congresswoman elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez discovering her Jewish roots. When I saw the heading I thought to myself: What a great opportunity for my wise friend of old to butter me up by mentioning the congenial relations between Muslims and Jews that prevailed in Andalusia and the great strides in science and philosophy that their combined peaceful efforts had achieved.

“Please, Mr. Green,” I reflected, “just try and milk this one a little for a positive gesture toward the twenty percent of your co-citizens and potential readership. After all, Muslims and Jews coexisted with a modicum of harmony for near eight centuries. And when it all ended, both Muslims and Jews were driven out together. In fact, many more Muslims than Jews were expelled or forced to convert to Christianity.”

Not a chance! I read the article again and repeated my mental appeal to Mr. Green: “Since you allude to genetics and family trees in your article, let me challenge you to a wager: I bet you my last keffiyeh that Ms. Ocasio-Cortez and I have more genes in common than she does with your prime minister. Please, if not for me, then just for the context, please, in the future, do mention those darn Muslims. Just for the record!”

Not once this time around! The whole issue was the sole concern of Jews and Christians. And would you believe it, when I googled it in various forms, the scores of different references I found give the same general impression: The history of Andalusia seems to revolve around its Jews versus its Christians. I wonder if the Department of Arab Education in Israel is in contract with Google?

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“Ms. Ocasio-Cortez and I have more genes in common than she does with your prime minister.”

and of course not forgetting the Berbers, the Almoravid, Almohad and personal favorite dynasty the Awlad Ziri, Zirids of Grenada, and the Zayyanid, Hafsid, Marinid, Wattasid etc berber dynasties that ruled in the Maghreb and sometimes Spanish kingdoms, often allying with both Grenada and the Iberian, Kings of Castille, kind of like America pre 1861, when it all went to the hell from which we are yet to be delivered. Mostly Sanhaja and Zennata Berbers, other than when they are neither,

have you seen the Arabic and neo-Aramaic speaker comparing notes

https://youtu.be/IOBLy9_8pe0

a Christian scholar once told his class, I was sitting in, “while one can not state that Jesus spoke Arabic he certainly did if he ever bought anything in a Palestinian market.”

anyway just made me recall.

AOC is a fast learner. Those Sephardic/Jewish roots she has suddenly uncovered should come in handy.

I just hope she won’t make the mistake Elizabeth warren did and try for that little DNA test. I fear that if she did, those “Sephardic” roots will turn out to be Berber in origin. May be we should buy her Shlomo Sand’s book? (the first one)?

Also, this article reminded me – unfortunately – the utter boredom I had to suffer through my entire schooling, having to go through that old testament scrolls. In detail. Every day. By the time i was in high school I discovered the trick of reading more interesting manuscripts under the table. I recall being quite partial to the history of the English, the Vikings and the Russ. Fascinating stuff as compared to the duldrums and the endless droning of my bible teachers, who could not breath life into a page if their lives depended on it. mercifully, I forgot them all.

Oh and that jewish history stuff (another mandatory daily class)? Oh my, the less is said the better – what without queens and mistresses and heroic tales of exploits, it could all be fitted in a couple of years, or so I thought (as I read my own self-selected infinitely more exciting and thought-provoking histories under the table).

Luckily, having been blessed (cursed) with uncanny memory I always managed to study just enough the night before the tests. Mercifully, this style of learning also begets much forgetfulness, which came soon and lasts to this day.

But yes, I might as well confess – I just hated school in Israel. With the same passion I loved sports, and sometimes science (our literature courses were also singularly unmemorable. Can’t recall a single teacher who was worth listening to, except for the young substitute who once showed up only to be shown the door in record time. Too entertaining probably). Not that I minded going to school per se, as a place to socialize, but its the content I had serious issues with, which left a lot to be desired. Sometimes I think I should sue the israel Education department for criminally wasting my time, when time was the single most precious gift a young person can have.

OTOH I did learn a valuable skill – I could fall asleep at a drop of a hat. In fact, even to this day I keep a Tenach book on the night stand in case of sleeplessness. merely opening it seems to cure the problem. No sleeping pills needed.

It is a myth that Muslims, Jews and Christians lived a peaceful life in Andalusia. There were constant conflict and war even among Muslims themselves.

The fact is that Christians won – and the same queen who sent Columbus to discover new routes to India also sent first Jews, then Muslims packing.

The fact is also that Spain now is trying to milk its former Jewish presence to the fullest. In every city now there are signs for “Jewish quarter” with obligatory Jewish museum. I think it has something to do with Spanish ingrained antisemitism – they believe that Jews control money and they want the money.

Thank you Dr. Hatim Kanaaneh and Mondowiess for this article on al-Andalus!! If they ever invent a time machine my first choice for a journey into the past would be Al-Andalus (Andalusia) during the 8th century.

One of my pet peeves is that for whatever reason, its magnificent history and enormous contribution to civilization is virtually ignored in the western world’s high schools.

From my notes:
Perhaps the most outstanding example of the harmony that existed in the past between Muslims, Christians and Jews was the legendary kingdom known as al-Andalus (Andalusia) established in the southern two-thirds of the Iberian Peninsula (part of present day Spain) by Arab Muslims following their defeat of the Visigoths and conquest of the city of Cordova (which became their capital) in circa 711. They treated the defeated Christians with clemency and were welcomed as liberators by the Jews of Spain. Although the Muslims made no concerted effort to convert Christians and Jews, by the tenth century Islam had become the dominant faith.

The Golden Age of this province of the Islamic Empire (established in 756 by the exiled Syrian Prince Abd al-Rahman) lasted for well over 400 years. During these centuries under Muslim rule the three Abrahamic faiths lived in friendship and developed the world’s most advanced centre of learning and the arts, challenged only by Baghdad.

“In principle, all Islamic polities were (and are) required by Quaranic injunction not to harm the dhimmi [religious minorities in a Muslim state], to tolerate the Christians and Jews living in their midst. But beyond that fundamental prescribed posture, al-Andalus was, from these beginnings, the site of memorable and distinctive interfaith relations. Here the Jewish community rose from the ashes of an abysmal existence under the Visigoths to the point that the emir who proclaimed himself caliph in the tenth century had a Jew as his foreign minister. Fruitful intermarriage among the various cultures and the quality of cultural relations with the dhimmi were vital aspects of Andalusian identity as it was cultivated over these first centuries.” (Maria Rosa Menocal, Ornament of the World; Little, Brown and Company, 2002, pp. 11 and 30)

“[By] laying the foundations of their power in a system of wise and equitable laws, diligently cultivating the arts and sciences, and promoting agriculture, manufactures and commerce, [the Muslim Arabs] gradually formed an empire unrivalled for its prosperity by any of the empires of Christendom…. The cities of Arabian Spain became the resort of Christian artisans, to instruct themselves in the useful art. The Universities of Toledo, Cordova, Seville, and Granada, were sought by the pale student from other lands to acquaint himself with the sciences of the Arabs and the treasure lore of antiquity.” (Washington Irving, Tales of the Alhambra, GREFOL,SA, La fuensanta, Mostoles, Madrid, 1990. pp. 52-53)

Andalusia’s first caliph, Abd al-Rahman III, who ruled Andalusia from 912-961, appointed Hasdai ibn Shabrut, leader of the kingdom’s Jewish community and one of history’s most outstanding Jews as his foreign secretary, chief advisor, and closest confidant. In this tradition Samuel Hanagid, a Jew, who later commanded a great army in the mid-eleventh century, was made a prince under the Arab caliphate.

Jewish business people, artists and intellectuals thrived in Andalusia. Among them were the poet Judah Halevi, the influential philosopher Moses Maimonides and writers Rebi Isaac Hacohen and Sayed Alfassi who was published under the nom de plume Harif.

It was in Andalusia (known in Hebrew as Sefarad) “that the profoundly Arabized Jews rediscovered and reinvented Hebrew; there that Christians embraced nearly every aspect of Arabic style – from the intellectual of philosophy to the architectural styles of mosques….” (Maria Rosa Menocal, Ornament of the World)

I urge those who are of the Jewish faith to watch this recent video:

Young Jews visit Spain and connect with al-Andalus:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxxtzNuL7AM

thankyou dr. kanaaneh for sharing your curiosity and learning process.