Late last year, I posted about Fursan al-Aqsa: The Knights of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, a video game developed by Nidal Nijm, a Brazilian resident who claims he is of palestinian Arab origin. Nijm claimed to be against the killing of innocent civilians, even though his video game depicted a terrorist fighting while wearing a baby on his back! The game was removed from Steam (for copyright infringement) temporarily, but soon reinstated.
Following my posts on his vile game, Nijm has been trolling me on social media. And I just received an email from him announcing its availability in Hebrew:
Finally, after many years of dedication and hard work, and also many sleepless nights, Fursan al-Aqsa, the full game, is available now!
Resisting the Zionist Occupation is NOT Terrorism!
Fursan al-Aqsa® is an Action Game which addresses the Israel x Palestine conflict from a Palestinian perspective, breaking the cliché of portraying Arabs as Terrorists. You will play in missions across Palestine with many objectives to accomplish, epic battles, powerful guns, vehicles to drive and more.
The mail includes a link to the new trailer
which indicates just how deranged and bloodthirsty Nijm is. For even though he has claimed he is just promoting “resistance” against soldiers, his game includes gratuitous, sadistic scenes – like that of an IDF soldier being hung from a crane, before being fed to a shark:
and a terrorist using a chainsaw on a soldier:
This is the creation of someone who enjoys the idea of murdering and inflicting horrendous pain.
Disturbingly, besides being available on Steam, the game is also available on the PS3 and XBox 360.
It is also scoring well on Metacritic (so far based on 17 reviews)
but clearly, those who gave it a good score have taken the palestinian Arab side:
Wow, the Steam reviews are not lying, the game is really freaking good! The shooting feels satisfyingly fantastic, the way you can dodge in slow motion effortlessly makes the game way easier than the first level makes it seem.
Make no mistake, this is a pretty challenging game, but if you use the dodge mechanic, and play more attentively than you normally would, you’ll feel like a total BAMF.
The first level is not a great representation of the main game, it does throw you in the deep end, and it may take some time to get your bearings, so far, I have only finished the first of nine levels, and I am pretty decent at shooters.
This plays like a mix of Max Payne and GoldenEye, yea, it really does. A mix of objective-based slightly nonlinear levels and slow motion precision shooting makes for a very unique experience, that is even more fun to play than it looks.
You have the choice to play in first or third person, I would say First Person feels just right, third is a nice option, but given the intensity of the game, the first-person mode will allow better aiming and reaction timing, making things a whole lot easier.
Now for the fun bits, this is a very political game, regardless of intention. The intentions do seem to be political in part, although the passion to create an outstanding game was clearly a major, if not the major driving force behind this immensely enjoyable game.
Does this game endorse Terrorism? No!
Do you play a Terrorist? Well, that depends on your point of view.
If anything, the game enables the player to see another point of view, one that is incredibly unique to gaming as a whole at this point.
For a bit of history…
The Israel/Palestine conflict has sort of turned both parties into terrorists at times, but given how the conflict started, it is very difficult to see Palestinians as terrorists. Has there been terroristic action taken by Palestinians against Israelis, yes, but when the Israelis started things, it kinda muddies the whole thing.
This conflict is not what you think, the truth is that during and after WWII, Israelis returned to their so-called promised land, you know, after the whole Nazi Genocide thing, so it makes sense to seek a home and to return to biblical traditions.
What does not make sense, is to become nearly as, and this may get this review yanked, but to become as bad as those who harmed you. Whew, might have worded that correctly.
Israelis may have a biblical claim to Palestine, but what happened was basically a modern-day version of America’s land-grabbing the Native’s home through terrorism and genocide. There were people already calling that land home, you could have shared it, you could have gone like, right next door, it was just as nice and been neighborly, but you started bombing mosques…
This is a proven historical fact, Israelis committed terrorism first, they bombed mosques and used guerrilla warfare to take Palestine by force, then the United Nations was all like, cool bros, we got a Country that did something similar, all cool homies.
So, is it Terrorism to fight an occupying oppressive force? Wait hold on, I think Palestine is like living a total Red Dawn situation, so in that case, Wolverines!!!!
This game’s existence and availability on gaming platforms, as well as the positive reactions to it, are just another example as to how this generation is becoming increasingly lost – and evil.
