APEL·LES MESTRES, BÈLGICA I LA REPÚBLICA

     Durant la Primera Guerra Mundial, Alemanya va envair Bèlgica, lloc de pas gairebé obligat per tal de fer una ofensiva efectiva sobre França. En aquestes circumstàncies, Apel·les Mestres, poeta català aliadòfil va compondre aquest poema, per tal d'animar els belgues, històricament sempre rebregats pel pas de nombrosos exèrcits pel seu territori:

No passareu

No passareu, i si passeu
serà damunt d’un clap de cendres;
les nostres vides les prendreu;
nostre esperit no l’heu de prendre.
Mes no serà per més que feu,
no passareu.

No passareu, i si passeu,
quan tots haurem deixat de viure,
sabreu de sobres a quin preu
s’abat un poble digne i lliure.
Mes no serà per més que feu,
no passareu.

No passareu, i si passeu,
decidirà més tard la història,
entre el saió que clava en creu
i el just que hi mor, de qui és la glòria.
Mes no serà per més que feu,
no passareu.

A sang i foc avançareu
de fortalesa en fortalesa;
però, què hi fa! si queda en peu
quelcom més fort: nostra fermesa.
Per ço cantem: per més que feu,
no passareu.

    Us sona, oi, això de no passareu? Aquest no passareu, en tercera persona, no passaran, serà el lema de la resistència a l'Exèrcit Nacional durant la Guerra Civil Espanyola. Tothom coneix la història. Van acabar passant i, enfument-se'n, en una cançó de Celia Gámez. Com a Bèlgica, sempre acaben passant, imposant-se la llei del més fort. I d'això va el poema d'Apel·les Mestres. No passareu, diu, però després afegeix, i si passeu... És a dir, té un pla de contingència, dit en paraules que avui estan de moda. Un pla de contingència que consisteix en no deixar-se vèncer per la por i resistir, i si la resistència sucumbeix a la força de l'enemic, preservar la dignitat i deixar que sigui la Història qui finalment jutgi i digui qui va vèncer i convèncer finalment.
     Quina casualitat que aquest poema sigui dedicat al poble belga, no? 

LETTER TO THE HEBREWS

     On October 27, 2017,  catalan Parliament declared his support to the independence of the country. It was the result of a long story. Someone will say you that this story, called El procés in catalan, begins on September 2012, with a demonstration of about two million people asking the rulers for Catalonia become a new country in the European Union. This comes from much earlier...

     As you know, Spain History (as said by President Aznar in a conference in the Hudson Institute) is the History of Christian people fighting against Muslims for his land. It supposed the expulsion of Jews on 1492 and Muslims on 1609. So, it is the History of Christian people being intolerant with people that did not have the same religion. 

     Absolutism of the seventeenth century and later nationalism of the nineteenth century advocated a single state united by features such as religion, customs, laws ... and languages. Spain History became the History of people that speaked Castilian persecuting all the other languages in the land. On 1715, Philip the Fifth (fifth in the castilian numeration of kings) forbade the use of Catalan in the administration of the kingdom. His son, Charles the Third, on 1768, forbade the use of Catalan in the education and menaced with severe fines teachers that spoke Catalan in the school . On 1801, Charles the Fourth's Prime Minister, Manuel Godoy, wrote a law forbidding Catalan in theatrical works. 1881's criminal prosecution law prevented to use Catalan in the Courts. 
     Administration, education, culture, courts ...: the construction of the Spanish State was made on the basis of only one religion and only one language: Castilian. Nowadays, Castilian and Spanish are the same language. It has not  been always like this ...
     Fortunately, Catalan people resisted this attacks and go on speaking their own language. On the first half of the twentieth century, Spain gave certain degree of autonomy to Catalonia. Catalan governments (La Mancomunitat at first, and La Generalitat during the Second Spanish Republic) made an effort to promove and make an official use of catalan language. The winner of Spanish Civil War, the dictator Francisco Franco, Hitler's allied, forbade again all uses of Catalan. 
      With the return of democracy in Spain, Catalonia recovered his political autonomy and the ability of having his own education sistem. Until 1993 no one discussed in Spain catalans' right to educate their children in the  language of the country. During 50's economic development, people from another spanish regions came to Catalonia. If Catalan should survive and if this people's descendants wanted to find easily a job in Catalonia, a linguistic immersion system in school was necessary. In many catalan suburbs, the only opportunity to hear (and in consequence, to learn) Catalan is in the school. It is a similar case to the Hebrew in Israel.
      On 1993 there was an election in Spain. There was a great economic crisis after Olympic Games and Felipe González's government suffered many cases of corruption. Aznar's victory seemed safe. There was a surprise when Felipe González was again elected. But González had to pact with the party that ruled in Catalonia, CiU. Aznar was very angry... If he wanted to overthrow González, he had to attack Catalonia. And he start to argue against linguistic immersion.
       On 1996, Aznar must pact with CiU to rule Spain. But in 2000 he got an absolute majority in spanish Parliament. He started to apply his centralist program. Catalan self-government tried to survive by the writing of a new statute. José Luis Zapatero was elected in 2004 with the promise to the catalans that his government would support the new statute. It was not easy. Catalan new statute needed a majority in spanish Parliament. Zapatero and the leader of Catalan opposition (in that moment) Artur Mas, pacted an statute with less competences. It disgusted to the independentists of ERC, but catalan people (with a short 30% cause of ERC boycott to the referendum) approved this new statute.
       But during Aznar's governement (1996-2004), his party, PP, took control of Justice. In Spain there is not a real Third Power, cause judges' bosses are appointed by the Goverment. Despite Zapatero had the Government, PP don't wanted to change the judges of his confidence. They submitted to the Constitutional Court an appeal against the Catalan statute. They win and Constitutional Court suppressed certain articles of this law in 2010. Especially those that concerned the right of Catalans to be considered a nation and have mechanisms to preserve their own culture. July the 10, 2010 a great demonstrations claimed against this sentence; there were many people calling for the independence.
On April 2011 CNA(Catalan National Assembly) was founded, a group of people of all the ideologies with the only purpose of pressing government to ask the catalans if they wanted to be independent in a referendum. The rest of story is well known.

• 9/11, 2012: A demonstration of two milion people claims for the independence of Catalonia.
• 11/25, 2012: Elections in Catalonia. 83 of the 135 elected deputies are for an independence agreed referendum. Representatives of three parties (CiU, ERC, ICV) go to Madrid in order to convince spanish parliament of doing a referendum. Spanish parlamentaries say no.
• 11/9, 2014: Self-determination query (not referendum) organized by La Generalitat (Catalan autonomous government). Two milion catalans go to vote. Before this, Spanish Government try to discredit it saying it is only a query. After the success of the participation, they accuse Catalan president Artur Mas of spending public money in this query. Artur Mas is condemned and disabled. Spanish Prime Minister, Rajoy, invents a new concept: Spanish Prime Minister, Rajoy, invents a new concept: silent majority, he refers to people that has no voted and, in his opinion, is for Spain's unity, he refers to people that has no voted and, in his opinion, are for Spain's unity. This exposes his thinking about democracy: people must be silent, they cannot express their opinions.
• 9/27, 2015: New elections in Catalonia. CDC (conservative catalanist party) and ERC (leftist independists) go together in a list called Junts pel Sí (Together for Yes) , because they consider that this election is a legal way to do a referendum. So think another list, CUP. Together they achieve the majority in Catalan Parliament. Spanishists say that independentists have lost the election because they have only 48% of the votes. Both add to his side CSQP, that are for an agreed referendum and are not spanishists.
• 10/1, 2017: La Generalitat organizes an independence referendum in Catalonia. They have no permission of the Spanish Government. That sunday Spanish Police assaults electoral colleges and injure mamny civil people. They hack the computers with the electoral census: some spanish journalists say that they can vote four o five times. Due to this, this election cannot be a normal referendum: it can be compared with the first election in Iraq after Saddam Hussein.
• 10/16, 2017: Two independentist leaders, Jordi Cuixart and Jordi Sánchez are quickly processed and send to jail for a demonstration on 9/20. Remember: judges in Spain owe his job to the Governement. It can be clearly readed as a threat against Catalan Government if they declare independence.
• 10/27, 2017: After making efforts to negotiate with Spanish Government an agree and basing on the results of 10/1, President Puigdemont declares Catalonia's independence. Seeing waht has happened with Cuixart and Sánchez, he has to go away from Spain. He's right: on November 3, eight ministers of his government are prisoned.

      The same day on that Puigdemont declared the independence, spanish Government, with the agree of the two main opposition parties (PSOE and C's) , took control of La Generalitat. They do this basing in an article of spanish Constitution, 155, that has a deliberately ambiguous writing.

       They have already declared his intention of making changes in Catalan system of education, firing those that not agree with 155: two teachers in La Seu d'Urgell are today processed for organizing a debate in his classes about policial violence on October, 1. Spanishist say that we are indoctrinating children like we were integrists and they pretend to implant his point of view about Spain's History: they deny that Catalonia has had ever an autogovermment before XXth Century, they deny Bourbon's repression of the Catalan language (as said by the previous king Juan Carlos), they deny even that Franco was a dictator (as said by the spanish Royal Academy Of History in his printed dicitonary)... And,  obviously, they deny our right to educate children in our language. Denying our own culture and our own history they are denying our right of being: unfortunately, you know what i'm referring... The shadow of a short guy with moustache is today already very long...

       So, independence has been our last try to survive as a culture. We have reached the same conclusion as that reached Theodor Herzl: we need a state to protect us as a culture. Please, Hebrews of the world, help catalan people, support catalan autogovernment and our rigth of being. We need you!!!