DOHA, Qatar -- No other national struggle in the world has assimilated itself, or has been inadvertently assimilated, to symbolize so many things to different people as has the Palestinian struggle. And yet, despite the intricate layers of sense and understanding that have sought to encapsulate the Palestinian struggle, Palestine itself lingers in the world's consciousness merely as a symbol.

Palestine is the last domicile for those seeking deliverance, and the ultimate place next to heaven for those in quest of salvation. There, it has been written that the tireless hunt for spiritual quintessence shall come to an end; the armies shall meet there, once more; they shall fight in the name of God, an Armageddon not like any other, of which victory has already been promised to the righteous.

Palestine has also been a rally cry for the dispossessed and for the aspiring underdog. Its letters have been inscribed in blood on prison walls throughout Israel and the Arab world as a promise of victory or as a lamentation of defeat. When anti-globalization activists take on neoimperialist institutions, they raise a Palestinian flag, and when Venezuela's poor brought Hugo Chavez back to power on April 14, 2002, a Palestinian flag also swayed.