Convivencia interview #1: Zaragoza, Spain.

We are traveling the length of historic al-Andalus, from Barcelona to Zaragoza to today’s Andalusia (southern Spain) asking ordinary people about convivencia. What is convivencia? It’s a friendlier term for “coexistence” that was originally used to describe the strikingly positive relationship between Muslim, Christian, and Jewish communities in Islamic Spain a.k.a. Al-Andalus. Today’s interviewee is Hamid from Ghana.

Do you think that convivencia is possible in today’s world?

Yeah, I think so. But it just depends on the people. Depends on their background, the type of education they have, and what they were taught about Islam and all that. Because some guys, as soon as they hear the word Islam, all they think of is terrorists, bad people, wicked people, people that have been brainwashed, people that only think of killing and doing bad things. And in the first place, there’s no religion that will send people to go and kill and do bad stuff.

The only problem is sometimes when you poke somebody, definitely the person will poke you back. To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. So people act, then they don’t see the cause of the reaction. All they see is “they are bad people.” But some of them are also good. Those who like to read, those who are educated, then they know it’s possible. Because in the first place, you can’t be a foreigner in someone’s land and begin imposing things. You can’t do that. As a foreigner, what you have to do is to adapt to what you have around you. You see, but more or less they think the Muslims are brainwashed, but I would say it’s the opposite. They are the brainwashed. Because they have been told that the Muslims are bad people.

All this stuff started in Iraq. What happened in Iraq? They said they have weapons of mass destruction and there was nothing there. So what do you expect? To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. When they react, now they are bad people. Look at what Trump just did.

Yeah, crazy.

Yeah, with a B2 bomb base and all that, definitely they will react back. But when they react back, they are the bad people, you see?

Right, right.

After doing the shit, now he wants to do settlement, you see? He wants to do peace talk. How can you do peace talk after poking someone?

Yeah, he wants them to surrender.

Yeah, no, no, no, they won’t surrender. They will retaliate, then we’ll talk about peace. Because you can be smart. No one is stupid nowadays. Everybody is wise. Just with your phone, you can find out everything. Gone are the days where they go to Africa, buy gold at a cheap price. Now even someone from the countryside will just take his phone, he can Google it and he’ll see the price of everything. So social media has made it so open that it’s not so easy to manipulate people nowadays.

But as for convivencia, it’s possible because there are a lot of people, when you talk to them, you see that they are open-minded. But the old ones: Oh, my God. 90% of the old ones, they don’t understand. They are rather brainwashed.

Yeah, in America, it’s even worse. So how about Palestine? Is convivencia possible in Palestine?

Yeah, it’s possible, like in the past it was possible. When these Jews were sacked from all over the world, where did they go? The only people who accepted them were the Palestinians. They co-existed for so long, until they started doing—it’s like me coming to your house and saying, let me sleep on your couch. From sleeping on your couch, I am now the landlord of your house. We can never have peace by so doing.

If they steal the whole house, that’s the worst.

Yeah. Just look at what Israel was doing to the Palestinian people. Even food, they don’t allow food to get in. But now Iran is doing the same thing to them, they are giving them their own medicine. And look at what Trump just did.

Well, inshallah, it will work out. Inshallah, we’ll see some justice eventually.

You know, I like America, but one thing that I don’t like about the U.S. is when your principles change depending on whom you’re dealing with. Then you are not fit to be a leader, because your principles should be your principles. But when your principles change depending on whom you’re dealing with then absolutely you are not trustworthy.