'Kashmir, Palestine subjected to obliteration'

By Ahmed Asmar

ANKARA (AA) - An online seminar on Thursday highlighted the Israeli and Indian attempts at obliterating the culture and heritage of the Palestinian and Kashmiri peoples.

The seminar, titled Kashmir & Palestine: The destruction of Indigenous Cultural Heritage was hosted by the Centre for Middle East and Africa (CMEA) and the Middle East Monitor.

A number of Palestinian and Kashmiri politicians and activists joined the seminar, including President of Azad Kashmir Sardar Masood Khan, Founder and President of Palestine Land Society and historian Salman Abu Sitta, wife of detained Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) Chairman Mushaal Hussein Mullick and archaeologist and former Director of The Palestinian Museum Mahmoud Hawari.

Highlighting the struggle by Palestinians and Kashmiris in his talk, Sardar Masood Khan said the UN in both situations did not fulfill its responsibility to honor the voices and rights of both the peoples who are subjected to genocides, discrimination and denied their political right to self-determination.

Amina Khan, director of CMEA, said both Palestinians and Kashmiris are living and experiencing the most protracted and deadliest conflicts where their occupiers seek to dehumanize their struggle by accusing them of terrorism.

Salman Abu Sitta said the Palestinian people are subjected to 10 colonial wars being waged against them: military operations to conquer and seize land, crushing dissent, using political tactics to further their agenda, geographical war by modifying maps, historical war involving obliteration of Palestinian history, archaeological war to destroy cultural sites, religious war to expel Palestinians from sacred sites, defamation of Palestinian fighters, the war against international law and economic war.

Mahmoud Hawari said Israel and India try to destroy the indigenous cultural heritages and misuse archaeology in their obliteration attempts, targeting all aspects of the cultural life.