Posted by panchmaster from pool0520.cvx24-bradley.dialup.earthlink.net (209.179.212.10) on Thursday, October 17, 2002 at 0:45AM :
You guys know that Khalil Gibran was Assyrian?? Yet the Arab American Discrimination thingy or whatever there called is claiming he was Arab. In his biography it say's he was "the little Assyrian boy", and never refers to him being Arab!!! Talk about stealing an identity. This great man who was of our blood wrote the book "The Prophet" and also inspired the late American President John F. Kennedy's speech "ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country". This really burns my blood!!!
Another Assyrian from Lebanon William Blatty who wrote the book "The Exorcist" is being claimed as an Arab!! Us Assyrians need to open up our mouths were good at that!!
Susu
+++This is interesting. I read that biography by Khalil's cousin...there is indeed a letter from an American social worker introducing Gibran as an "Assyrian bouy". I figured it must be right cause his cousin, who ought to know, would have corrected it if the woman had been mistaken.
+++The day I hear an Assyrian in America insist that he or she is NOT an American...I'll condemn all Assyrians refered to as Arabs...or Italians...or Dutch.
+++Seems our boys are more than happy...eager even to be called American...they never correct anyone and say..."I am Assyrian...NOT American". Especially in the next few years I doubt any of our boys...as heroic as they are...will rush forward to correct people who mistake them for "Americans".
+++Now see...this kind of simple exchange can't be allowed at beth, or aina...because it is the essence of a free and open society. These guys were put together in dictatorships...to them a Democracy is a place where they finally get the chance to be tyrants.
+++Sure Khalil was Assyrian...but he was "Arab"...even he sees himself as one with the Arab world and its aspirations, he edited an ARAB newspaper...not an Assyrian one..."Arab" in the sense that this was the umbrella they saw themselves under...like you Christians see yourselves emanating from Israel...the home of "your" lord.
+++They can call him what they want...he was Assyrian. It isn't what you think it is...what you hope to make of it. No one is denying Assyrian ethnicity...you just aren't a Nation is all...way too late for that...especially since you insist ONLY Christians can be Assyrian...that makes you not even an ethnic group...just a religious cult.
-- panchmaster
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