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Former MK Ayoob Kara: For Generations, His Druze Family Fights For Israel

“The real Nakba was experienced not by the Palestinians, but by the Jews from Arab countries.”

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Former Israeli Communications Minister Ayoob Kara told TheJ.ca about his family, ardent supporters of Zionism. (Photo: liputanislam.com)

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Today is Israel’s Independence Day. While anti-Israel activists in Canada are commemorating Israel’s Independence Day as Nakba Day, which translates into English as “The Day of the Catastrophe,” it is of pivotal importance to recall that such a narrative does not do justice to the Druze, Bedouin, and other non-Jewish soldiers, who fought alongside the Jewish people in defending the State of Israel. 

Two of these soldiers were Eli and Vagi Kara, the brothers of former Israeli Communication Minister Ayoob Kara, who perished during the First Lebanon War.  It also does not do justice to the former minister, who was wounded in that war and suffers from severe PTSD to date due to his service to the State of Israel.  

As Ayoob Kara recalled, “I was severely injured near Beirut. I was in Rambam Hospital in a caste for a long time. My brother Eli Kara was killed along the Syrian border in East Lebanon. He was the last victim before the withdrawal to what we call South Lebanon. My eldest brother Vagi was severely injured as well in the head in the center of Lebanon. He suffered a lot. My mother and father became depressed from this situation for these two brothers had no family. Every day, every month, became unbelievably horrific. I tried to make them feel better.” Eventually, Vagi would succumb to his injuries and this ultimately caused Kara’s parents to also die from the sorrow of losing two sons.

Yesterday, on Israeli Memorial Day, the former minister visited the cemetery where his brother Eli is buried in Daliyet Al Carmel together with his family. There was a special ceremony in honor of the Druze soldiers who perished during Israel’s various wars. 

In an exclusive interview, Ayoob Kara’s daughter Ameera Kara noted that it is of utmost importance to her to serve the State of Israel, as the country has provided them with a good life and that Kara has sons serving in the IDF. His son Eyal is serving in an intelligence unit and claimed that it was his own decision to do so, not his father’s, as he is an independent thinker. His son Fadi is also serving in the IDF and  stressed that his father did influence him: “I am proud to come from this home. It’s great to have this privilege.”     

“I come from a family where we view living in Israel to be a blessing,” Ameera added. “From coming from a Zionist home to working with Arabs that want to destroy Israel, I had to make them professionally understand why I want to show them the beautiful face of Israel.” 

Ameera is studying medicine in a Jordanian university and believes her presence there as an Israeli can do wonders to advance the peace treaty with the country: “There you can see the peace and not from the government.”

The Kara family has a long history of fighting for the State of Israel. “Many years ago, my ancestors were the leaders of the village and they cooperated with the Jewish community in the area, including with the Rothchild and Weizmann families,” Ayoob Kara explained. “My grandfather, the father of my father, was part of the Jewish National Fund, the fund that established the State of Israel. He was the only Druze at this time that helped the Jewish people to begin to move to establish the Israeli state. For this reason, in 1939, the Arab fundamentalists shot and killed my Uncle Abdullah Kara.”

That grandfather was an especially important figure in the Druze community, as “he influenced them to support the Jewish community before Israel’s independence and he did a lot to advance that. One of the important leaders is from Abu Ghosh. When I was a child, we traveled a lot there. Yosef Abu Ghosh was the same as my grandfather, just in the Jerusalem area. My grandfather helped the Jewish community in the Haifa area till Jerusalem in the cavalry division. He rode a horse from Haifa to Jerusalem. He slept in Abu Ghosh in the house of Yosef Abu Ghosh, a good friend of Yitzhak Shamir, and they were best friends with Yitzhak Shamir.” 

According to Kara, his grandfather’s contributions were recognized by the Zionist leadership and this recognition contributed to making him who he is today: “When I met Yitzhak Shamir, till he died, when he saw me, he asked about my grandfather and Yosef Abu Ghosh, all the time and his brother Musa Abu Ghosh. This convinced me of the importance of helping the Jews and the Jewish people’s alliance with the Druze and other Arab peoples here. This made me want to give back to society.”

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Arab fundamentalist opposition to his family’s support for the Jewish people forced his grandfather to relocate to Caesarea: “In Caesarea, my grandfather’s job was to help the Jewish kibbutzim and moshavim from 1930 till the independence of Israel. They moved back to Daliyat Al Karmel after the independence of Israel. During all this time, my grandfather and my family cooperated with the Lehi, Etzel and all the underground Jewish organizations that needed our cooperation to establish the State of Israel. In 1947, another uncle disappeared due to the cooperation between my family and the Jewish community.”

The fighting spirit of Kara’s grandfather was passed down to his father: “In 1948, my father volunteered to become part of the Israel Defense Forces to fight in the War of Independence. He fought and helped to occupy the Galilee Mountains and got injured in this war. He was severely injured all over his body. They thought that he died but he managed to survive and to get married, and to have three boys and three girls.” 

Nevertheless, although Kara’s father managed to survive the War of Independence, he suffered a lot for this country. In total, he lost two brothers, two sons and two cousins in the service of the State of Israel. This family tragedy is what prompted the former minister to go into politics. After he was disabled and suffered grave loss, he could not be an IDF general like he dreamed to do, so he sought to serve in other ways. 

Even though he is Druze and not Jewish, he sacrificed much for the State of Israel. For this reason, the former minister is greatly disturbed whenever people promote the Nakba narrative because according to him, the term Nakba is nothing more than a public relations ploy utilized by the Palestinian side, which has no basis in the reality.

“The Nakba never happened for there never was a Palestinian state. Prior to the establishment of the State of Israel, the Holy Land was controlled by the Ottoman Empire, of which Syria and Egypt were the main provinces in the area. In contrast, the Jewish people have 4,000 years of history on this land, dating back to the Prophet Moses. The real Nakba was experienced not by the Palestinians, but by the Jews from Arab countries. Close to a million people, from Egypt to Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Morocco, lost their homes.”

Kara maintained that while the State of Israel absorbed these Jewish refugees, the Palestinians in the Arab countries have been denied all civil and other basic human rights. “It is preferable to stay foreign and not to build a new future, not in Lebanon, Syria, or Egypt. They are waiting to occupy back the Holy Land, something which creates a Nakba. If they are Arabs, why do they not become part of the Arab states? This is the problem, he stated, “they do not accept Israel. From before 1967, the PLO and other terror groups were so dominant, fighting Israel before the war in 1967. The problem is not land. It is culture and religion. This is the problem in the Middle East.”  

Rachel Avraham is a political analyst working at the Safadi Center for International Diplomacy, Research, Public Relations and Human Rights.  She is the author of “Women and Jihad: Debating Palestinian Female Suicide Bombings at the American, Israeli and Arab Media.”  

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We revealed the incursion of anti-Israel progressive elements such as IfNotNow into our communities. We have exposed the distorted hateful agenda of the “progressive” left political radicals who brought Linda Sarsour to our cities, and we were first to report on many disturbing incidents of Nazi-based hate towards Jews across Canada.

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Monthly support is a great way to help us sustain our operations. We greatly appreciate any contributions you can make to support Jewish Journalism.

We thank you for your ongoing support.

Happy reading!

Thank you for choosing TheJ.Ca as your source for Canadian Jewish News.

We do news differently!

Our positioning as a Zionist News Media platform sets us apart from the rest. While other Canadian Jewish media are advocating increasingly biased progressive political and social agendas, TheJ.Ca is providing more and more readers with a welcome alternative and an ideological home.

We revealed the incursion of anti-Israel progressive elements such as IfNotNow into our communities. We have exposed the distorted hateful agenda of the “progressive” left political radicals who brought Linda Sarsour to our cities, and we were first to report on many disturbing incidents of Nazi-based hate towards Jews across Canada.

But we can’t do it alone. We need your HELP!

Our ability to thrive and grow in 2020 and beyond depends on the generosity of committed readers and supporters like you.

Monthly support is a great way to help us sustain our operations. We greatly appreciate any contributions you can make to support Jewish Journalism.

We thank you for your ongoing support.

Happy reading!

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