Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Girl lost in poker game pleads for help
HYDERABAD (Reuters) - A teenage girl in southern Pakistan, whose late father lost her in a poker game when she was 2 years old, has asked authorities to save her from being handed over to a middle-aged relative.
Rasheeda, 17, said she has filed applications with the police and a local councillor asking them to prevent Lal Haider, 45, from taking her to his home.
Her mother, Nooran said her husband racked up a debt of 10,000 rupees ($151) to Haider playing cards.
"My husband didn't have money to pay, and instead he told Lal Haider that he could take Rasheeda when she grows up," she said.
Despite being paid his money last year, she said Haider still insisted the girl should be given to him because of tribal customs.
While both families live in Hyderabad, a city 160 km (100 miles) north of the southern city of Karachi, they belong to the same tribe in Baluchistan province.
The girl's uncle, Dur Mohammad said Haider apparently wanted to marry the girl to his son.
Khalid Rajput, a local councillor dealing with the case, said the decision that Rasheeda should be handed over to Haider was taken late last week at a tribal council meeting.
"We know some tribal elders from Baluchistan came for the meeting in which the girl's family was told to give her as per their customs," he said.
Irfan Bhutto, a police officer in Hyderabad, said Haider had been summoned. "We will ensure the girl does not have to do anything against her will."
Source
Rasheeda, 17, said she has filed applications with the police and a local councillor asking them to prevent Lal Haider, 45, from taking her to his home.
Her mother, Nooran said her husband racked up a debt of 10,000 rupees ($151) to Haider playing cards.
"My husband didn't have money to pay, and instead he told Lal Haider that he could take Rasheeda when she grows up," she said.
Despite being paid his money last year, she said Haider still insisted the girl should be given to him because of tribal customs.
While both families live in Hyderabad, a city 160 km (100 miles) north of the southern city of Karachi, they belong to the same tribe in Baluchistan province.
The girl's uncle, Dur Mohammad said Haider apparently wanted to marry the girl to his son.
Khalid Rajput, a local councillor dealing with the case, said the decision that Rasheeda should be handed over to Haider was taken late last week at a tribal council meeting.
"We know some tribal elders from Baluchistan came for the meeting in which the girl's family was told to give her as per their customs," he said.
Irfan Bhutto, a police officer in Hyderabad, said Haider had been summoned. "We will ensure the girl does not have to do anything against her will."
Source
George Soros and the problem of self-hating Hebrews
What do Karl Marx, Leon Trotsky, Noam Chomsky and George Soros have in common?
They were/are all radicals, born to Jewish parents, had no Jewish identity and hurt Jews (not to mention non-Jews).
The term "non-Jewish Jew" is generally attributed to the Jewish historian Isaac Deutscher, who wrote an essay by that name in 1954. The term describes the individual who, though born a Jew (Judaism consists of a national/peoplehood identity, not only a religious one), identifies solely as a citizen of the world and not as a Jew, either nationally or religiously.
Once the walls of Jewish ghettos broke down and European Jews were allowed to leave Jewish societies, many Jews became non-Jewish Jews. In most cases, either they or their children assimilated into the societies in which they lived. However, a small but significant percentage became radicalized. They came to loathe "bourgeois," i.e., traditional middle class, values and Judeo-Christian society; Western national identities (though they generally supported anti-Western national identities); and they particularly loathed Jewish religious and national identity.
Karl Marx, the grandson of two Orthodox rabbis (and, to be entirely accurate, son of parents who converted to Christianity), wrote one of the most significant anti-Semitic essays of the 19th century, "On the Jewish Question" (1844). In it one finds such statements:
"Money is the jealous god of Israel, beside which no other god may exist. . . . The god of the Jews has been secularized and has become the god of the world. . . . The social emancipation of Jewry is the emancipation of society from Jewry."
Leon Trotsky, born Lev Bronstein, may be regarded as the intellectual father of Russian, later Soviet, Communism. He along with Stalin and three others fought to succeed Lenin as leader of the Communist Party after Lenin's death in 1924. In 1920, when Trotsky was head of the Red Army, Moscow's chief rabbi, Rabbi Jacob Mazeh, asked him to use the army to protect the Jews from pogromist attacks. Trotsky is reported to have responded, "Why do you come to me? I am not a Jew." To which Rabbi Mazeh answered: "That's the tragedy. It's the Trotskys who make revolutions, and it's the Bronsteins who pay the price."
Noam Chomsky has devoted much of his life to working against America and Israel. He is alienated from the very two identities into which he was born. Indeed he has vilified both his whole life. To cite but one example, he traveled to Lebanon to appear with Hizbollah leader Sayyed Nasrallah and lend his support to a group that is committed to the annihilation of Israel and is officially listed as a terrorist organization by the United States.
George Soros is the fourth example of an individual born Jewish who has become a radical world citizen who is alienated from America and from his Jewish origins, and damages both.
As described by Martin Peretz, editor-in-chief of The New Republic, "George Soros is ostentatiously indifferent to his own Jewishness. He is not a believer. He has no Jewish communal ties. He certainly isn't a Zionist. He told Connie Bruck in The New Yorker — testily, she recounted — that 'I don't deny the Jews their right to a national existence — but I don't want to be part of it.'"
Writing in The Wall Street Journal, writer Joshua Muravchik reported that Soros has publicly likened Israel to the Nazis.
Of course, Soros supports Palestinian nationalism, but that is a consistent feature of radicals — anti-Jewish and anti-American nationalisms are good, Jewish and American nationalisms are bad. Thus, as reported in the Jerusalem Post, "Soros and his wealthy Jewish American friends have now decided to aim their fire directly at Israel . . . to form a political lobby that will weaken the influence of the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC."
How to explain such Jews? People with no national or religious roots who become politically active will often seek to undermine the national and religious roots of others, especially those in their own national/religious group. It is akin to the special animosity some ex-Catholics have toward the Church. Non-Jewish Jews are far more likely to work to weaken Christianity in America than Jewish Jews, especially religious Jews. Religious Jews celebrate religious Christians.
Jews with no religious or national identity do not like Jews who have those identities, and Americans who have likewise become world citizens do not much care for Americans who wave the American flag.
Just as chauvinism — excessive and amoral nationalism — can lead to nihilism, so, too, the absence of any national or religious identity can lead to nihilism. The radical non-Jewish Jew loves humanity, but hurts real humans, especially his own.
JWR contributor Dennis Prager hosts a national daily radio show based in Los Angeles. He the author of, most recently, "Happiness is a Serious Problem". Click here to comment on this column.
Source
They were/are all radicals, born to Jewish parents, had no Jewish identity and hurt Jews (not to mention non-Jews).
The term "non-Jewish Jew" is generally attributed to the Jewish historian Isaac Deutscher, who wrote an essay by that name in 1954. The term describes the individual who, though born a Jew (Judaism consists of a national/peoplehood identity, not only a religious one), identifies solely as a citizen of the world and not as a Jew, either nationally or religiously.
Once the walls of Jewish ghettos broke down and European Jews were allowed to leave Jewish societies, many Jews became non-Jewish Jews. In most cases, either they or their children assimilated into the societies in which they lived. However, a small but significant percentage became radicalized. They came to loathe "bourgeois," i.e., traditional middle class, values and Judeo-Christian society; Western national identities (though they generally supported anti-Western national identities); and they particularly loathed Jewish religious and national identity.
Karl Marx, the grandson of two Orthodox rabbis (and, to be entirely accurate, son of parents who converted to Christianity), wrote one of the most significant anti-Semitic essays of the 19th century, "On the Jewish Question" (1844). In it one finds such statements:
"Money is the jealous god of Israel, beside which no other god may exist. . . . The god of the Jews has been secularized and has become the god of the world. . . . The social emancipation of Jewry is the emancipation of society from Jewry."
Leon Trotsky, born Lev Bronstein, may be regarded as the intellectual father of Russian, later Soviet, Communism. He along with Stalin and three others fought to succeed Lenin as leader of the Communist Party after Lenin's death in 1924. In 1920, when Trotsky was head of the Red Army, Moscow's chief rabbi, Rabbi Jacob Mazeh, asked him to use the army to protect the Jews from pogromist attacks. Trotsky is reported to have responded, "Why do you come to me? I am not a Jew." To which Rabbi Mazeh answered: "That's the tragedy. It's the Trotskys who make revolutions, and it's the Bronsteins who pay the price."
Noam Chomsky has devoted much of his life to working against America and Israel. He is alienated from the very two identities into which he was born. Indeed he has vilified both his whole life. To cite but one example, he traveled to Lebanon to appear with Hizbollah leader Sayyed Nasrallah and lend his support to a group that is committed to the annihilation of Israel and is officially listed as a terrorist organization by the United States.
George Soros is the fourth example of an individual born Jewish who has become a radical world citizen who is alienated from America and from his Jewish origins, and damages both.
As described by Martin Peretz, editor-in-chief of The New Republic, "George Soros is ostentatiously indifferent to his own Jewishness. He is not a believer. He has no Jewish communal ties. He certainly isn't a Zionist. He told Connie Bruck in The New Yorker — testily, she recounted — that 'I don't deny the Jews their right to a national existence — but I don't want to be part of it.'"
Writing in The Wall Street Journal, writer Joshua Muravchik reported that Soros has publicly likened Israel to the Nazis.
Of course, Soros supports Palestinian nationalism, but that is a consistent feature of radicals — anti-Jewish and anti-American nationalisms are good, Jewish and American nationalisms are bad. Thus, as reported in the Jerusalem Post, "Soros and his wealthy Jewish American friends have now decided to aim their fire directly at Israel . . . to form a political lobby that will weaken the influence of the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC."
How to explain such Jews? People with no national or religious roots who become politically active will often seek to undermine the national and religious roots of others, especially those in their own national/religious group. It is akin to the special animosity some ex-Catholics have toward the Church. Non-Jewish Jews are far more likely to work to weaken Christianity in America than Jewish Jews, especially religious Jews. Religious Jews celebrate religious Christians.
Jews with no religious or national identity do not like Jews who have those identities, and Americans who have likewise become world citizens do not much care for Americans who wave the American flag.
Just as chauvinism — excessive and amoral nationalism — can lead to nihilism, so, too, the absence of any national or religious identity can lead to nihilism. The radical non-Jewish Jew loves humanity, but hurts real humans, especially his own.
JWR contributor Dennis Prager hosts a national daily radio show based in Los Angeles. He the author of, most recently, "Happiness is a Serious Problem". Click here to comment on this column.
Source
Ruined poppy farmers join ranks with the Taleban
Tim Albone in Panjwayi and Claire Billet in Nad Ali
The tractor roared through the field, the plough tearing through the valuable poppy crop as the farmer looked on. A helicopter searched for insurgents and armed police stood watch, their uniforms replaced by robes and turbans to make them less conspicuous.
“The people are unhappy with this eradication campaign; if it goes on they will all join the Taleban,” Dilbar, a poppy farmer in Helmand province, told The Times.
The prospect of such a surge in Taleban numbers is bad news for the 5,000 British troops based in Helmand and 1,400 more heading there after the announcement by Des Browne, the Defence Secretary. The fiercest fighting since the Taleban were overthrown in 2001 came last year, with more than 4,000 people killed, and intelligence reports predict a new offensive this spring.
Poppy eradication is a double-edged sword. Afghanistan provides nine out of every ten grams of heroin sold on the streets of Britain, and officials are determined to stamp out poppy growth. Yet a successful campaign would leave many unemployed as potential recruits for the Taleban.
Afghans, ever the pragmatists, have devised their own solution. “We leave some fields without destroying the poppy so everyone is happy . . . otherwise they will go and support the Taleban,” said Aminullah, 21, a policeman with the eradication force in Helmand.
Although 90 per cent of Helmand’s arable land is turned over to poppy growth, only 550 hectares (1,400 acres) were destroyed in the first week of the campaign. With three months left until harvest the police know that they are fighting a losing battle.
Farmers take huge risks to grow poppy as the market price is 20 times that of wheat. But without aid they have little choice and when the crop is destroyed they are crippled by debt, often having borrowed heavily from landlords to plant the crop. Landlords make no concessions for eradicated crops and the farmers are still expected to pay off their loans.
Smugglers who take the drug out of Afghanistan are also rewarded handsomely for their trade. Very few, if any, smugglers or landlords have been punished, and in southern Afghanistan operate virtually beyond the law. “It will be impossible for us to eradicate the entire poppy. We will need months and months and the poppy will be ready for harvest in only three,” Aminullah said.
In Babaji, a village of mudwalled houses and winding dirt tracks five miles (8km) from Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand province, eradication was meant to be in full swing.
“We are growing poppy because we don’t have any other options,” said Abdullah, a poppy farmer, as tractors ploughed part of his field. Over sweet green tea Abdullah, 35, had persuaded a member of the local shura, or council, to leave some crops. The shura member then spoke to the eradication agents and Abdullah’s most valuable crops were saved.
In the district of Panjwayi, in neighbouring Kandahar province, where Nato troops fought the largest antiTaleban battle last September, the agents are reluctant to leave poppy fields untouched.
In the village of Haji Habib police apologised to farmers as the tractors destroyed fields of poppy. “We started here because the village is a Taleban village,” Bismallah Jan, 35 a policeman, said. “But we still feel bad we are destroying their livelihoods.”
Source
The tractor roared through the field, the plough tearing through the valuable poppy crop as the farmer looked on. A helicopter searched for insurgents and armed police stood watch, their uniforms replaced by robes and turbans to make them less conspicuous.
“The people are unhappy with this eradication campaign; if it goes on they will all join the Taleban,” Dilbar, a poppy farmer in Helmand province, told The Times.
The prospect of such a surge in Taleban numbers is bad news for the 5,000 British troops based in Helmand and 1,400 more heading there after the announcement by Des Browne, the Defence Secretary. The fiercest fighting since the Taleban were overthrown in 2001 came last year, with more than 4,000 people killed, and intelligence reports predict a new offensive this spring.
Poppy eradication is a double-edged sword. Afghanistan provides nine out of every ten grams of heroin sold on the streets of Britain, and officials are determined to stamp out poppy growth. Yet a successful campaign would leave many unemployed as potential recruits for the Taleban.
Afghans, ever the pragmatists, have devised their own solution. “We leave some fields without destroying the poppy so everyone is happy . . . otherwise they will go and support the Taleban,” said Aminullah, 21, a policeman with the eradication force in Helmand.
Although 90 per cent of Helmand’s arable land is turned over to poppy growth, only 550 hectares (1,400 acres) were destroyed in the first week of the campaign. With three months left until harvest the police know that they are fighting a losing battle.
Farmers take huge risks to grow poppy as the market price is 20 times that of wheat. But without aid they have little choice and when the crop is destroyed they are crippled by debt, often having borrowed heavily from landlords to plant the crop. Landlords make no concessions for eradicated crops and the farmers are still expected to pay off their loans.
Smugglers who take the drug out of Afghanistan are also rewarded handsomely for their trade. Very few, if any, smugglers or landlords have been punished, and in southern Afghanistan operate virtually beyond the law. “It will be impossible for us to eradicate the entire poppy. We will need months and months and the poppy will be ready for harvest in only three,” Aminullah said.
In Babaji, a village of mudwalled houses and winding dirt tracks five miles (8km) from Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand province, eradication was meant to be in full swing.
“We are growing poppy because we don’t have any other options,” said Abdullah, a poppy farmer, as tractors ploughed part of his field. Over sweet green tea Abdullah, 35, had persuaded a member of the local shura, or council, to leave some crops. The shura member then spoke to the eradication agents and Abdullah’s most valuable crops were saved.
In the district of Panjwayi, in neighbouring Kandahar province, where Nato troops fought the largest antiTaleban battle last September, the agents are reluctant to leave poppy fields untouched.
In the village of Haji Habib police apologised to farmers as the tractors destroyed fields of poppy. “We started here because the village is a Taleban village,” Bismallah Jan, 35 a policeman, said. “But we still feel bad we are destroying their livelihoods.”
Source
Monday, February 26, 2007
Zionist Tomatoes of Death (tm)
Ahmadinejad blames enemies for tomato prices
Iranian president says country’s enemies have hatched a range of plots to push Islamic republic to give up its disputed nuclear program, including driving up food prices
Reuters Published: 02.26.07, 16:54 / Israel News
Iran’s president said on Sunday the country’s enemies had hatched a range of plots to push the Islamic Republic to give up its disputed nuclear programme, including driving up the price of tomatoes and other food.
But Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said such tactics would not work, Iran’s ISNA news agency quoted him as saying.
Rising prices, particularly the cost of tomatoes which form an important ingredient in Iranian food, have prompted growing public criticism of Ahmadinejad’s government. The president has often dismissed complaints as media exaggeration.
"In order to harm us, they (enemies) make plots, for instance they come and push tomato prices up in the market. They think we will give up our ideals with their plots," Ahmadinejad said in a speech in which he said Iran would not reverse its atomic plans.
The West accuses Iran of seeking atomic bombs and demands Teheran halt sensitive atomic work, a step Teheran has rejected.
The United Nations has slapped restrictions on aspects of Iran’s nuclear programme and Washington has imposed sanctions on two Iranian banks and three firms. Ahmadinejad’s opponents blame price hikes on government spending policies not sanctions.
'Enemies think they can stop this bulldozer'
The latest official figures show inflation running at about 16 percent but economists say official figures underplay what Iranians pay for basic food in shops because they are based on a broader basket of goods that includes some subsidised items.
"Of course, God willing, the problem of meat, chicken and tomatoes will be solved. One should be aware that our revolution is like a bulldozer ... the enemies think by throwing a few small stones and sand they can stop this bulldozer," Ahmadinejad said.
It is not the first time the president has sought to deflect criticism for the rising price of tomatoes.
In a speech in January presenting the new budget to parliament, he also dismissed comments that tomatoes had risen to 30,000 rials ($3.25) per kg from 12,000 rials, suggesting shoppers should be more discerning about where they bought.
"Come and buy them from the fresh fruit and vegetable market next door to us. Why are you buying them from expensive places?" the president, who won over many voters in the 2005 presidential race with his down-to-earth style, told lawmakers.
Some shopkeepers cite the early onset of cold weather for the particularly sharp rise in the price of tomatoes, a reason Ahmadinejad has also cited in the past.
Ahmadinejad swept to power promising to share out Iran’s oil wealth more fairly, but he has been blamed for fuelling inflation by what critics call his profligate spending policies of the country’s windfall earnings from high crude prices.
Source
Iranian president says country’s enemies have hatched a range of plots to push Islamic republic to give up its disputed nuclear program, including driving up food prices
Reuters Published: 02.26.07, 16:54 / Israel News
Iran’s president said on Sunday the country’s enemies had hatched a range of plots to push the Islamic Republic to give up its disputed nuclear programme, including driving up the price of tomatoes and other food.
But Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said such tactics would not work, Iran’s ISNA news agency quoted him as saying.
Rising prices, particularly the cost of tomatoes which form an important ingredient in Iranian food, have prompted growing public criticism of Ahmadinejad’s government. The president has often dismissed complaints as media exaggeration.
"In order to harm us, they (enemies) make plots, for instance they come and push tomato prices up in the market. They think we will give up our ideals with their plots," Ahmadinejad said in a speech in which he said Iran would not reverse its atomic plans.
The West accuses Iran of seeking atomic bombs and demands Teheran halt sensitive atomic work, a step Teheran has rejected.
The United Nations has slapped restrictions on aspects of Iran’s nuclear programme and Washington has imposed sanctions on two Iranian banks and three firms. Ahmadinejad’s opponents blame price hikes on government spending policies not sanctions.
'Enemies think they can stop this bulldozer'
The latest official figures show inflation running at about 16 percent but economists say official figures underplay what Iranians pay for basic food in shops because they are based on a broader basket of goods that includes some subsidised items.
"Of course, God willing, the problem of meat, chicken and tomatoes will be solved. One should be aware that our revolution is like a bulldozer ... the enemies think by throwing a few small stones and sand they can stop this bulldozer," Ahmadinejad said.
It is not the first time the president has sought to deflect criticism for the rising price of tomatoes.
In a speech in January presenting the new budget to parliament, he also dismissed comments that tomatoes had risen to 30,000 rials ($3.25) per kg from 12,000 rials, suggesting shoppers should be more discerning about where they bought.
"Come and buy them from the fresh fruit and vegetable market next door to us. Why are you buying them from expensive places?" the president, who won over many voters in the 2005 presidential race with his down-to-earth style, told lawmakers.
Some shopkeepers cite the early onset of cold weather for the particularly sharp rise in the price of tomatoes, a reason Ahmadinejad has also cited in the past.
Ahmadinejad swept to power promising to share out Iran’s oil wealth more fairly, but he has been blamed for fuelling inflation by what critics call his profligate spending policies of the country’s windfall earnings from high crude prices.
Source
Here we go again, some more riots
A political party named SIAD (Stop Islamiseringen af Danmark-Stop Islamisation of Denmark) has demanded a censorship for parts of Quran, stating that that certain parts 'encourage violence.'
After caricature crisis and the attack no Muslim graves, Denmark has hit the headlines for the third time again with its anti-Islamist movements. A political party called Stop Islamisation of Denmark has claimed that 67th and 69th verses of Quran are violating the Danish constitution and the mosques across the country should be closed according to the 78th article of the Danish constitution. SABAH Newspaper has talked with the leader Anders Graves of SIAD; a party that has about 400 members. Graves said: "Denmark is our country. Some verses of the Quran are filing me with worries about the lives of my children and grand children." Stating that they have no intention or expectation on banning the Islam religion across the country Gravers said people living in Denmark should obey the constitution of the country no matter what they believe in.
Source
After caricature crisis and the attack no Muslim graves, Denmark has hit the headlines for the third time again with its anti-Islamist movements. A political party called Stop Islamisation of Denmark has claimed that 67th and 69th verses of Quran are violating the Danish constitution and the mosques across the country should be closed according to the 78th article of the Danish constitution. SABAH Newspaper has talked with the leader Anders Graves of SIAD; a party that has about 400 members. Graves said: "Denmark is our country. Some verses of the Quran are filing me with worries about the lives of my children and grand children." Stating that they have no intention or expectation on banning the Islam religion across the country Gravers said people living in Denmark should obey the constitution of the country no matter what they believe in.
Source
Sunday, February 25, 2007
PAKISTAN: POLIO EPIDEMIC VICTIMS 'MARTYRS' SAYS CLERIC
Islamabad, 22 Feb. (AKI/DAWN) - A cleric in a northern Pakistani village has opposed a foreign-funded polio vaccination campaign of the Pakistan government, urging locals not to take any preventive measures against polio "as those killed during an outbreak are martyrs". "I must tell my brothers and sisters that finding a cure (vaccination) for an epidemic before its outbreak is not allowed in Sharia ," said Maulana Fazlullah during a Friday sermon in Mam Dherai village where he is building a madrassa with local funds.
“According to Sharia, one should avoid going to the areas where an epidemic has broken out, but those who do go to such areas and get killed during an outbreak are martyrs,” he said. The provincial government has launched an anti-polio campaign to run between February 20 and 22 in selected parts of the province, but there have been reports of people refusing to get their children vaccinated.
Sermons like this are influencing people into refusing polio vaccination in many parts of the NWFP. Like Nigeria, Pakistan is another country where clergy is blocking efforts aimed at eliminating fatal diseases like polio. Cases of people misbehaving with polio vaccination staff have been reported from several areas. Recently, a surgeon, Dr Ghani Khan, was killed in a bomb blast in remote Bajaur Agency, causing postponement of the anti-polio campaign, official sources said.
Swat is one area where polio staff is facing resistance, said an official, adding that deeply religious people often resisted things involving foreigners.
Maulana Fazlullah suspects the intentions of foreign agencies involved in funding drives against fatal diseases: “I don’t understand why foreigners would think of our well-being when we see that they are killing Muslims in Afghanistan and Iraq.” He cited the example of a companion of the Prophet who, he said, was ‘martyred’ during an epidemic.
Maulana Fazlullah - who is the son-in-law of Maulana Sufi Mohammad, leader of the defunct Tehreek-i-Nifaz-i-Shariat Mohammadi which sought to have Sharia law replace civilian law -- has gained popularity in the villages and hamlets of the Swat province due to his religious teachings transmitted through an illegal FM radio station. His Friday open air sermons attracted large crowds.
The health department also holds clergy responsible for the refusal of the people to get their children immunised against polio in some districts of the NWFP. Last year, 15 polio cases were reported in the NWFP -- seven belonging to the tribal agencies and eight to the settled areas, officials said, adding that in 2007, a 10-month-old was detected with the polio virus in Nowshera.
“The propaganda of the clergy is causing more and more people in Swat, Bajaur, Lakki Marwat and Momand agency to refuse polio drops for their children,” said an official of the Expanded Programme for Immunisation (EPI) run by the NWFP Health Department. In the wake of the killing of surgeon Ghani Khan in Bajaur, the polio staff, mostly comprising locals, had refused to go ahead with the anti-polio campaign in the agency, sources said.
Confirming the postponement of the anti-polio drive, an official said the government was faced with multiple obstacles like staff security, inaccessible areas and presence of large number of Afghan refugees.
“Most of the eight people, detected with the polio virus in the settled areas, were of Afghan origin,” official said.
(Aki/DAWN)
Source
“According to Sharia, one should avoid going to the areas where an epidemic has broken out, but those who do go to such areas and get killed during an outbreak are martyrs,” he said. The provincial government has launched an anti-polio campaign to run between February 20 and 22 in selected parts of the province, but there have been reports of people refusing to get their children vaccinated.
Sermons like this are influencing people into refusing polio vaccination in many parts of the NWFP. Like Nigeria, Pakistan is another country where clergy is blocking efforts aimed at eliminating fatal diseases like polio. Cases of people misbehaving with polio vaccination staff have been reported from several areas. Recently, a surgeon, Dr Ghani Khan, was killed in a bomb blast in remote Bajaur Agency, causing postponement of the anti-polio campaign, official sources said.
Swat is one area where polio staff is facing resistance, said an official, adding that deeply religious people often resisted things involving foreigners.
Maulana Fazlullah suspects the intentions of foreign agencies involved in funding drives against fatal diseases: “I don’t understand why foreigners would think of our well-being when we see that they are killing Muslims in Afghanistan and Iraq.” He cited the example of a companion of the Prophet who, he said, was ‘martyred’ during an epidemic.
Maulana Fazlullah - who is the son-in-law of Maulana Sufi Mohammad, leader of the defunct Tehreek-i-Nifaz-i-Shariat Mohammadi which sought to have Sharia law replace civilian law -- has gained popularity in the villages and hamlets of the Swat province due to his religious teachings transmitted through an illegal FM radio station. His Friday open air sermons attracted large crowds.
The health department also holds clergy responsible for the refusal of the people to get their children immunised against polio in some districts of the NWFP. Last year, 15 polio cases were reported in the NWFP -- seven belonging to the tribal agencies and eight to the settled areas, officials said, adding that in 2007, a 10-month-old was detected with the polio virus in Nowshera.
“The propaganda of the clergy is causing more and more people in Swat, Bajaur, Lakki Marwat and Momand agency to refuse polio drops for their children,” said an official of the Expanded Programme for Immunisation (EPI) run by the NWFP Health Department. In the wake of the killing of surgeon Ghani Khan in Bajaur, the polio staff, mostly comprising locals, had refused to go ahead with the anti-polio campaign in the agency, sources said.
Confirming the postponement of the anti-polio drive, an official said the government was faced with multiple obstacles like staff security, inaccessible areas and presence of large number of Afghan refugees.
“Most of the eight people, detected with the polio virus in the settled areas, were of Afghan origin,” official said.
(Aki/DAWN)
Source
Palestinians are not hungry
Because of the increase of supply and lack of demand : the drop in prices of vegetables in the market to a central Jericho Dennie level
التاريخ : 25 / 02 / 2007 الساعة : 17:10Date : 25 / 02 / 2007 at : 17:10
Jericho-together - prices of vegetables in a market Jericho the central (hisba) to the lowest levels. there was a surplus of agricultural products in the market, the lack of demand from local traders, or those so inclined n to Jericho from inside the Green Line.
The price of the fund Alkosa, tomatoes and Venus to S. Chuakl circulation, while the rate exceeds these items weeks before the 70th shekels.
As the price of the option and eggplant to five p evil shekels.
It demands that farmers in the governorate of Jericho and the Ministry of Agriculture opening new markets in foreign markets to products charges against every year due to losses Baher Ziad e surplus on the local market needs.
Source
Automatic translation from arabic by Google Language Tools
التاريخ : 25 / 02 / 2007 الساعة : 17:10Date : 25 / 02 / 2007 at : 17:10
Jericho-together - prices of vegetables in a market Jericho the central (hisba) to the lowest levels. there was a surplus of agricultural products in the market, the lack of demand from local traders, or those so inclined n to Jericho from inside the Green Line.
The price of the fund Alkosa, tomatoes and Venus to S. Chuakl circulation, while the rate exceeds these items weeks before the 70th shekels.
As the price of the option and eggplant to five p evil shekels.
It demands that farmers in the governorate of Jericho and the Ministry of Agriculture opening new markets in foreign markets to products charges against every year due to losses Baher Ziad e surplus on the local market needs.
Source
Automatic translation from arabic by Google Language Tools
Russian fishermen catch squeaking alien and eat it
Village residents from the Rostov region of Russia caught a weird creature two weeks ago after a strong storm in the Sea of Azov. The shark-looking creature was producing strange squeaky sounds. The fishermen originally believed that they had caught an alien and decided to film the monster with the help of a cell phone camera. The footage clearly shows the creatures’ head, body and long tail. The bizarre catch was weighing almost 100 kilograms, the Komsomolskaya Pravda reports.
However, ufologists and scientists were greatly disappointed when they found out that the fishermen had eaten the monster. They said that they were not scared of the creature so they decided to use it as food. One of the men said that it was the most delicious dish he had ever eaten.
Click here to see the video of the alien sea monster
Chairman of the Anomalous Phenomena Service, Andrei Gorodovoi, stated that the creature, which he could see on the short video, was an anomalous being. However, it could hardly be described as an extraterrestrial form of life, he added. Gorodovoi rejected the version about mermaids too. “There are many legends about mermaids living in the Sea of Azov. Nevertheless, specialists of the Service for Anomalous Phenomena have never confirmed those fairytales. On the other hand, we do not deny the possibility of other forms of life in the Sea of Azov,” the ufologist sad.
A spokesman for the Rostov-based zoo, Alexander Lipkovich, contacted local ichthyologists and asked their opinion about the Azov alien. “They said that the fish bears resemblance to a sturgeon. It was an extremely interesting individual. I have never seen anything like this before in my whole life,” the specialist said.
Translated by Dmitry Sudakov
Pravda.ru
Source
However, ufologists and scientists were greatly disappointed when they found out that the fishermen had eaten the monster. They said that they were not scared of the creature so they decided to use it as food. One of the men said that it was the most delicious dish he had ever eaten.
Click here to see the video of the alien sea monster
Chairman of the Anomalous Phenomena Service, Andrei Gorodovoi, stated that the creature, which he could see on the short video, was an anomalous being. However, it could hardly be described as an extraterrestrial form of life, he added. Gorodovoi rejected the version about mermaids too. “There are many legends about mermaids living in the Sea of Azov. Nevertheless, specialists of the Service for Anomalous Phenomena have never confirmed those fairytales. On the other hand, we do not deny the possibility of other forms of life in the Sea of Azov,” the ufologist sad.
A spokesman for the Rostov-based zoo, Alexander Lipkovich, contacted local ichthyologists and asked their opinion about the Azov alien. “They said that the fish bears resemblance to a sturgeon. It was an extremely interesting individual. I have never seen anything like this before in my whole life,” the specialist said.
Translated by Dmitry Sudakov
Pravda.ru
Source
Stop global warming - Kill all cows!
According to recent reports that spankin', new Yukon adorning your driveway may not be the main culprit in the oft reported global warming phenomenon. More likely, it's the pig on your plate. That's right, the real perpetrators of greenhouse gas emissions are of the bovine variety. A large percentage of the world's total greenhouse gas emissions are actually caused by farting farm animals and stacks of cow poop. Go ahead, you can still take delivery of that custom Prius you ordered, it couldn't hurt, just don't swing through the drive through for a Big Mac on the way home.
According to the U.S. Government's Energy Information Administration (they have administrations for everything) 2005 report “Emissions of Greenhouse Gases in the United States 2004”, the transportation sector in the U.S. produced 2,000 million metric tons CO2 equivalent (MMTCO2e) of greenhouse gas emissions. According to a new report Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, agriculture is responsible for 18% of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions. However, in the U.S. agricultural emissions of methane and nitrous oxide, the two main greenhouse gas components of agriculture, amounted to only about 232 MMTCO2e in 2004. That's only 11.6% of the transportation total, and 3.2% of total emissions. Do we just have cleaner cows than the rest of the world?
Sadly, no, our cows are just as stinky as everyone else's. More likely is that we have more cars than cows, a situation not found in much of the rest of the world. As the rest of the world struggles to emulate our economic success, and pull it's people from the poverty that's enslaved them since the dawn of time, two things occur. One, they want to ride, rather than walk. Second, they want a nice burger. You guessed it, that makes for Chevy dealerships and McDonald's restaurants springing up around the world like 'shrooms after a spring rain.
When people are prosperous, much to the chagrin of the PITA crowd, they acquire a taste for beef. When they're poor, they eat more chicken, a foodstuff that's less greenhouse gas intensive to breed, raise and keep than cattle. According to the FAO report, per capita meat consumption in developing countries has tripled in the last 30 years, although it's still barely a third of that in developed nations. Developed nations however, are increasing their meat consumption at a vastly slower rate. The increase in the same time period only amounted to 18%.
Increasing prosperity is moving the world to increase greenhouse gas emissions. This is occurring at a greater rate in the developing world. Although the U.S. still leads the world in total greenhouse gas emissions, our output of gases as a percentage of our GDP is actually falling as we switch from a manufacturing to an information economy. As manufacturing capacity is increasingly moved from developed nations, such as the U.S., to third world and Asian countries, green house gas emissions move with them. Concurrently, citizens of developing nations have found the joys of zipping down the road in air conditioned comfort and are increasingly able to afford it.
This must be stopped at once! If the poor people in these other nations get a taste of the prosperity we've enjoyed for years, who knows where it will all lead. They too will be driving to Burger King with their A/C on “MAX” to combat the sweltering heat and humidity. We can't allow that to happen, can we, lest their prosperity and subsequent greenhouse gas emissions spell the end for us all. Unless we want a taste of the sweltering heat and humidity they struggle with on a daily basis, we've got to clam down on world wide economic growth. Do we want citizens of other nations to drive Escalades and live in McMansions? I say “NO!”
Source
According to the U.S. Government's Energy Information Administration (they have administrations for everything) 2005 report “Emissions of Greenhouse Gases in the United States 2004”, the transportation sector in the U.S. produced 2,000 million metric tons CO2 equivalent (MMTCO2e) of greenhouse gas emissions. According to a new report Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, agriculture is responsible for 18% of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions. However, in the U.S. agricultural emissions of methane and nitrous oxide, the two main greenhouse gas components of agriculture, amounted to only about 232 MMTCO2e in 2004. That's only 11.6% of the transportation total, and 3.2% of total emissions. Do we just have cleaner cows than the rest of the world?
Sadly, no, our cows are just as stinky as everyone else's. More likely is that we have more cars than cows, a situation not found in much of the rest of the world. As the rest of the world struggles to emulate our economic success, and pull it's people from the poverty that's enslaved them since the dawn of time, two things occur. One, they want to ride, rather than walk. Second, they want a nice burger. You guessed it, that makes for Chevy dealerships and McDonald's restaurants springing up around the world like 'shrooms after a spring rain.
When people are prosperous, much to the chagrin of the PITA crowd, they acquire a taste for beef. When they're poor, they eat more chicken, a foodstuff that's less greenhouse gas intensive to breed, raise and keep than cattle. According to the FAO report, per capita meat consumption in developing countries has tripled in the last 30 years, although it's still barely a third of that in developed nations. Developed nations however, are increasing their meat consumption at a vastly slower rate. The increase in the same time period only amounted to 18%.
Increasing prosperity is moving the world to increase greenhouse gas emissions. This is occurring at a greater rate in the developing world. Although the U.S. still leads the world in total greenhouse gas emissions, our output of gases as a percentage of our GDP is actually falling as we switch from a manufacturing to an information economy. As manufacturing capacity is increasingly moved from developed nations, such as the U.S., to third world and Asian countries, green house gas emissions move with them. Concurrently, citizens of developing nations have found the joys of zipping down the road in air conditioned comfort and are increasingly able to afford it.
This must be stopped at once! If the poor people in these other nations get a taste of the prosperity we've enjoyed for years, who knows where it will all lead. They too will be driving to Burger King with their A/C on “MAX” to combat the sweltering heat and humidity. We can't allow that to happen, can we, lest their prosperity and subsequent greenhouse gas emissions spell the end for us all. Unless we want a taste of the sweltering heat and humidity they struggle with on a daily basis, we've got to clam down on world wide economic growth. Do we want citizens of other nations to drive Escalades and live in McMansions? I say “NO!”
Source
France Urges Diplomacy For Earth-Threatening Asteroid
The news that an asteroid will pass close to Earth in 2036 prompted a group of scientists to recommend Saturday that the United Nations arrange an international space mission to deflect the threatening space rock.
France, however, immediately issued a statement urging restraint against “a seemingly lovely space rock we know nothing about,” and claimed that the United States was behind the call to take agressive action.
“Once again, the United States is rattling sabers when diplomacy hasn’t had a chance to work,” said French spokesman Serge Betain. “We must use the United Nations to convince the world that what we think is a life-threatening boulder hurtling through space may actually be a peaceful mission from a far away planet.”
The French offered an alternative plan that calls for efforts to communicate with the asteroid via 24 hour broadcasting of a radio signal into space. Against a back drop of Enya music, French actor Gerard Depardieu will apologize to the asteroid that the Earth is in its path and ask what the two celestial bodies can do together to avoid a catastrophe.
Betain went on to slam the world for what he called “blatant Earth-centric thinking.”
“When you think about it, exactly who is in whose path? Have we considered the point of view of the asteroid? Perhaps, as we speak, they are scurrying around planning to divert us. How does that feel?”
Source
France, however, immediately issued a statement urging restraint against “a seemingly lovely space rock we know nothing about,” and claimed that the United States was behind the call to take agressive action.
“Once again, the United States is rattling sabers when diplomacy hasn’t had a chance to work,” said French spokesman Serge Betain. “We must use the United Nations to convince the world that what we think is a life-threatening boulder hurtling through space may actually be a peaceful mission from a far away planet.”
The French offered an alternative plan that calls for efforts to communicate with the asteroid via 24 hour broadcasting of a radio signal into space. Against a back drop of Enya music, French actor Gerard Depardieu will apologize to the asteroid that the Earth is in its path and ask what the two celestial bodies can do together to avoid a catastrophe.
Betain went on to slam the world for what he called “blatant Earth-centric thinking.”
“When you think about it, exactly who is in whose path? Have we considered the point of view of the asteroid? Perhaps, as we speak, they are scurrying around planning to divert us. How does that feel?”
Source
College Profs Denounce Western Culture, Move to Caves
Cambridge, MA - Two years ago this month, Alan Lowenstein, associate professor of philosophy at Harvard University, came to a fateful conclusion. "I suddenly realized that the oppression of western technology extended to my own life," he explained. "That's when I got rid of my computer, threw away my Brooks Brothers suits, changed my name to Grok and moved into a cave."
A passionate critic of Euro-American "linear thought," Grok is one of a growing number of college professors around the nation who have relocated to caves, mud huts and makeshift sweat lodges to demonstrate their disdain for western culture and technology. For Grok, 44, the move to a cave was a natural step in his intellectual progression.
"My dissertation at Columbia integrated the seminal works of Jacques Lacan, Derrida, and Michel Foucault," said Grok, referring to the influential French deconstructionist philosophers. "I was able to prove, conclusively, that conclusiveness is not conclusive."
The 1983 dissertation, entitled "Beyond the (Dis)Integration of Post-Modern Post-Toasties Pair 'o Dimes and Paradigms: Look at How Clever I Am," created a stir in academic circles and landed Lowenstein a prestigious teaching position at Harvard. From there, he honed his cutting-edge research.
"I began to deconstruct everything I could get my hands on," said Grok. "The Old Testament, Shakespeare, Dick and Jane, the 1967 Sears catalog, the Boston phone book, you name it. I showed how everything is a lie, that everything could be deconstructed. Except Deconstruction, of course."
When he earned tenure in 1991, Grok decided to broaden his philosophical research. "I realized that deconstructing literature was overly limiting. It was clear that other fields of inquiry could benefit from deconstruction."
It was then that Grok published a series of influential articles in which he deconstructed the sciences. "I initially showed that the so-called 'scientific method,' so treasured by the self-appointed high priests of science, was nothing but a bizarre ritual of the industrialist phallocracy," said Grok. "From there, it was a short intellectual leap to disprove the reality of the periodic tables, gravity and algebra."
The Awakening
Despite being elected chairman of the Philosophy Department in 1995, Grok felt an intellectual void. "I needed some way to explain why literature and science were so bad, so putrid, so incredibly vile," said Grok. "That's when it dawned on me. They were the products of western culture."
The shocking realization lead Grok to a new stream of research that unveiled the oppressive nature of western civilization. He immersed himself in the writings of third world revolutionaries Franz Fanon, Rigoberta Menchu and Maxine Waters. With CUNY professor Leonard Jeffries, he documented NASA's theft of earth-orbiting satellites from the K!ung bushmen of sub-Saharan Africa.
"This stream of research completely obliterated the smiling mask of oppressive western cultural hegemony," said Grok, proudly. "Plus, I got a fat merit raise out of it."
Strangely ill at ease, Grok was about to have an epiphany. "It was at the Modern Language Association meeting in Chicago in '97," he explained. "I was chairing a session on the link between Malibu Barbie dolls and the Guatemalan counterinsurgency movement. Then it occurred to me. Here we were, complaining about western science and culture, using animated Power Point slide presentations. At the Four Seasons, no less. It was just a tad hypocritical."
The scene caused Grok to re-examine his own life. "I realized then that I, too, was a victim of white male Eurocentric western culture. My brainwashing was so complete, so insidious, it took forty-two years to discover it," he said.
"I think it all goes back to that Stingray bike I got in fifth grade," added Grok, who grew up in affluent suburban Winnetka, Illinois. "Like other victims, I became fixated on material things. I shudder to think of that time, before graduate school, when I considered getting a job."
After the conference, Grok vowed to eliminate the trappings of western culture in his own life. First to go were his personal computer, his BMW sedan, his fashionable Back Bay apartment, and his expensive wardrobe. They were replaced by a typewriter, a bicycle, a phone-free studio apartment and secondhand clothes.
To his chagrin, Grok realized that the replacement technologies were also contaminated by western culture. "The wheels on the bicycle, for example," noted Grok. "Only western civilization would be as arrogant to speak of 'perfect' circles."
Grok said that each of his attempts to replace western technology brought more frustration. "Last year, when I was hunkered over the heating grate in my cardboard box, I realized I was merely a pawn of western industrialists. They're trying to seduce and entrap the developing world with their addictive steam and cardboard technology."
A Simple Plan
Over the last year, Grok continued to cleanse his personal life of western culture and technology. While he is "not quite there yet," he said he is finally happy in his 8' by 4' by 4' dirt cave along the banks of the Charles River.
"Finally, I have broken the cycle of oppression," he said, violently hacking up a thick clot of blood-streaked mucus. He refused an offer to contact medical assistance. Noting that "western medicine is merely a front for the hegemonic pharmaceutical industry," Grok applied another leech to his chest.
"Like the indigenous peoples, I have everything I need here," said Grok. "Especially stray dogs."
Like the prairie bison to the Lakota Sioux, stray dogs are an important source of hides, meat and milk for Grok. A committed animal rights activist, he does not skin or eat the dogs until they have died of natural causes.
Grok said his simplified, non-western lifestyle has made him a more spiritual man. "Each day, I pray to the dog god for more stray dogs," he said. He has even sculpted a totem of the dog god, made entirely of dried dog excrement. He considered cave paintings of the dog god, but rejected the idea as "too European."
Paradigm Shift
Grok's dramatic commitment to western technology-free living has inspired others in the academic community. One convert is Eegah, chairperson of the department of gender studies at the University of Michigan, who now lives in a creek bed outside Ann Arbor.
"There is something very liberating, very empowering about abandoning phallocentric culture," said Eegah, who was until recently known as Katherine Robinson. "Cave dwelling authenticates our visceral experience, releasing us from the bond of western patriarchal oppression."
As an example, Eegah noted that she is no longer dependent on money. "I have adopted the traditional barter system of non-western, matriarchal societies. I get all the furs and meat I need by having sex with hobos."
Eegah said that non-western living has other advantages. "I am liberated from western notions of female beauty. No longer do I have to shave my armpits, bathe, or see the dentist," said Eegah, noting that she has lost fewer than ten teeth since 'going non-western' in 1996.
Duke University english professor Mognuk, formerly known as Phillip Turner, tried to bring his own commitment to non-western thought directly into the classroom - or in his case, classcave. Instead of using the department Xerox machine to print syllabi and exams, Mognuk painstakingly copied each, by hand, onto tree bark using frog blood for ink. The process is made more difficult by the lack of daylight before spring semester.
"The Xerox machine is an avatar of the sterility and conformity of European-based civilization," explained Mognuk, stroking his mud-encrusted beard. "And it is full of evil spirits."
Kristin Hawley, Duke sophomore and a student in Mognuk's popular class, E2605 - Fire Bad, said the unconventional course has opened her eyes to the evils of western hegemony. "Before this course, I had always assumed that Fire Good," said Hawley. "It wasn't really my fault, I was simply parroting the western culture propaganda. You know, 'Fire Good, Fire Good.'"
"Because of Professor Mognuk, I now know that Fire Bad - Fire Very Bad," added Hawley. "I finally feel my parents are getting something out of that $30,000 of tuition money."
More Research Needed
Back in his Cambridge cave, Grok was stirred from his sleep by the blaring horns of taxis on Massachusetts Avenue. It was a bitterly cold January morning, and he insulated himself by slathering his skin with a thick slab of dog lard and wrapping himself in extra dogskins. Struggling to clear the snow blocking the cave entrance, Grok emerged squinting against the bright sunlight as it reflected off the snow and the Boston skyscrapers.
"What a beautiful morning," said Grok. "A tragedy it's spoiled by all the hateful western technology." He will spend the next hour foraging for a breakfast of nuts and tree bark in the shadows of Boston's skyline, with little success.
Hungry and discouraged, Grok attempts to mug a passing jogger by jumping on his back. However, at 5'6", 123 pounds and weakened by spasmodic coughing, he posed little threat. Taking pity, the jogger offered Grok a granola bar, which he hungrily accepted.
"I know it's processed food," said Grok apologetically. "But I used force to take it from my oppressor. My research shows that this is a legitimate, non-western method of wealth redistribution."
Clearing the snow from his makeshift twig sundial, Grok noted the time. "Damn," he exclaimed. "I'm late for my lecture." He hobbled off to class wearing Wonderbread wrappers on his feet, one of his few remaining concessions to western technology.
While it has been tough at times, Grok said he has no regrets. "Western culture is a cancer, and I'm committed to wiping it out. Plus, the whole cave-dwelling thing should help with my promotion case and journal articles."
Meanwhile, Grok said he plans one more fling with western technology.
"I'm taking a plane to Washington next week," said Grok. "I'm getting some sort of award for my deconstructing of the word 'is.'"
Source
A passionate critic of Euro-American "linear thought," Grok is one of a growing number of college professors around the nation who have relocated to caves, mud huts and makeshift sweat lodges to demonstrate their disdain for western culture and technology. For Grok, 44, the move to a cave was a natural step in his intellectual progression.
"My dissertation at Columbia integrated the seminal works of Jacques Lacan, Derrida, and Michel Foucault," said Grok, referring to the influential French deconstructionist philosophers. "I was able to prove, conclusively, that conclusiveness is not conclusive."
The 1983 dissertation, entitled "Beyond the (Dis)Integration of Post-Modern Post-Toasties Pair 'o Dimes and Paradigms: Look at How Clever I Am," created a stir in academic circles and landed Lowenstein a prestigious teaching position at Harvard. From there, he honed his cutting-edge research.
"I began to deconstruct everything I could get my hands on," said Grok. "The Old Testament, Shakespeare, Dick and Jane, the 1967 Sears catalog, the Boston phone book, you name it. I showed how everything is a lie, that everything could be deconstructed. Except Deconstruction, of course."
When he earned tenure in 1991, Grok decided to broaden his philosophical research. "I realized that deconstructing literature was overly limiting. It was clear that other fields of inquiry could benefit from deconstruction."
It was then that Grok published a series of influential articles in which he deconstructed the sciences. "I initially showed that the so-called 'scientific method,' so treasured by the self-appointed high priests of science, was nothing but a bizarre ritual of the industrialist phallocracy," said Grok. "From there, it was a short intellectual leap to disprove the reality of the periodic tables, gravity and algebra."
The Awakening
Despite being elected chairman of the Philosophy Department in 1995, Grok felt an intellectual void. "I needed some way to explain why literature and science were so bad, so putrid, so incredibly vile," said Grok. "That's when it dawned on me. They were the products of western culture."
The shocking realization lead Grok to a new stream of research that unveiled the oppressive nature of western civilization. He immersed himself in the writings of third world revolutionaries Franz Fanon, Rigoberta Menchu and Maxine Waters. With CUNY professor Leonard Jeffries, he documented NASA's theft of earth-orbiting satellites from the K!ung bushmen of sub-Saharan Africa.
"This stream of research completely obliterated the smiling mask of oppressive western cultural hegemony," said Grok, proudly. "Plus, I got a fat merit raise out of it."
Strangely ill at ease, Grok was about to have an epiphany. "It was at the Modern Language Association meeting in Chicago in '97," he explained. "I was chairing a session on the link between Malibu Barbie dolls and the Guatemalan counterinsurgency movement. Then it occurred to me. Here we were, complaining about western science and culture, using animated Power Point slide presentations. At the Four Seasons, no less. It was just a tad hypocritical."
The scene caused Grok to re-examine his own life. "I realized then that I, too, was a victim of white male Eurocentric western culture. My brainwashing was so complete, so insidious, it took forty-two years to discover it," he said.
"I think it all goes back to that Stingray bike I got in fifth grade," added Grok, who grew up in affluent suburban Winnetka, Illinois. "Like other victims, I became fixated on material things. I shudder to think of that time, before graduate school, when I considered getting a job."
After the conference, Grok vowed to eliminate the trappings of western culture in his own life. First to go were his personal computer, his BMW sedan, his fashionable Back Bay apartment, and his expensive wardrobe. They were replaced by a typewriter, a bicycle, a phone-free studio apartment and secondhand clothes.
To his chagrin, Grok realized that the replacement technologies were also contaminated by western culture. "The wheels on the bicycle, for example," noted Grok. "Only western civilization would be as arrogant to speak of 'perfect' circles."
Grok said that each of his attempts to replace western technology brought more frustration. "Last year, when I was hunkered over the heating grate in my cardboard box, I realized I was merely a pawn of western industrialists. They're trying to seduce and entrap the developing world with their addictive steam and cardboard technology."
A Simple Plan
Over the last year, Grok continued to cleanse his personal life of western culture and technology. While he is "not quite there yet," he said he is finally happy in his 8' by 4' by 4' dirt cave along the banks of the Charles River.
"Finally, I have broken the cycle of oppression," he said, violently hacking up a thick clot of blood-streaked mucus. He refused an offer to contact medical assistance. Noting that "western medicine is merely a front for the hegemonic pharmaceutical industry," Grok applied another leech to his chest.
"Like the indigenous peoples, I have everything I need here," said Grok. "Especially stray dogs."
Like the prairie bison to the Lakota Sioux, stray dogs are an important source of hides, meat and milk for Grok. A committed animal rights activist, he does not skin or eat the dogs until they have died of natural causes.
Grok said his simplified, non-western lifestyle has made him a more spiritual man. "Each day, I pray to the dog god for more stray dogs," he said. He has even sculpted a totem of the dog god, made entirely of dried dog excrement. He considered cave paintings of the dog god, but rejected the idea as "too European."
Paradigm Shift
Grok's dramatic commitment to western technology-free living has inspired others in the academic community. One convert is Eegah, chairperson of the department of gender studies at the University of Michigan, who now lives in a creek bed outside Ann Arbor.
"There is something very liberating, very empowering about abandoning phallocentric culture," said Eegah, who was until recently known as Katherine Robinson. "Cave dwelling authenticates our visceral experience, releasing us from the bond of western patriarchal oppression."
As an example, Eegah noted that she is no longer dependent on money. "I have adopted the traditional barter system of non-western, matriarchal societies. I get all the furs and meat I need by having sex with hobos."
Eegah said that non-western living has other advantages. "I am liberated from western notions of female beauty. No longer do I have to shave my armpits, bathe, or see the dentist," said Eegah, noting that she has lost fewer than ten teeth since 'going non-western' in 1996.
Duke University english professor Mognuk, formerly known as Phillip Turner, tried to bring his own commitment to non-western thought directly into the classroom - or in his case, classcave. Instead of using the department Xerox machine to print syllabi and exams, Mognuk painstakingly copied each, by hand, onto tree bark using frog blood for ink. The process is made more difficult by the lack of daylight before spring semester.
"The Xerox machine is an avatar of the sterility and conformity of European-based civilization," explained Mognuk, stroking his mud-encrusted beard. "And it is full of evil spirits."
Kristin Hawley, Duke sophomore and a student in Mognuk's popular class, E2605 - Fire Bad, said the unconventional course has opened her eyes to the evils of western hegemony. "Before this course, I had always assumed that Fire Good," said Hawley. "It wasn't really my fault, I was simply parroting the western culture propaganda. You know, 'Fire Good, Fire Good.'"
"Because of Professor Mognuk, I now know that Fire Bad - Fire Very Bad," added Hawley. "I finally feel my parents are getting something out of that $30,000 of tuition money."
More Research Needed
Back in his Cambridge cave, Grok was stirred from his sleep by the blaring horns of taxis on Massachusetts Avenue. It was a bitterly cold January morning, and he insulated himself by slathering his skin with a thick slab of dog lard and wrapping himself in extra dogskins. Struggling to clear the snow blocking the cave entrance, Grok emerged squinting against the bright sunlight as it reflected off the snow and the Boston skyscrapers.
"What a beautiful morning," said Grok. "A tragedy it's spoiled by all the hateful western technology." He will spend the next hour foraging for a breakfast of nuts and tree bark in the shadows of Boston's skyline, with little success.
Hungry and discouraged, Grok attempts to mug a passing jogger by jumping on his back. However, at 5'6", 123 pounds and weakened by spasmodic coughing, he posed little threat. Taking pity, the jogger offered Grok a granola bar, which he hungrily accepted.
"I know it's processed food," said Grok apologetically. "But I used force to take it from my oppressor. My research shows that this is a legitimate, non-western method of wealth redistribution."
Clearing the snow from his makeshift twig sundial, Grok noted the time. "Damn," he exclaimed. "I'm late for my lecture." He hobbled off to class wearing Wonderbread wrappers on his feet, one of his few remaining concessions to western technology.
While it has been tough at times, Grok said he has no regrets. "Western culture is a cancer, and I'm committed to wiping it out. Plus, the whole cave-dwelling thing should help with my promotion case and journal articles."
Meanwhile, Grok said he plans one more fling with western technology.
"I'm taking a plane to Washington next week," said Grok. "I'm getting some sort of award for my deconstructing of the word 'is.'"
Source
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Former ACLU Chapter President Arrested for Child Pornography
Feb. 23, 2007— Federal agents arrested Charles Rust-Tierney, the former president of the Virginia chapter of the ACLU, Friday in Arlington for allegedly possessing child pornography.
According to a criminal complaint obtained by ABC News, Rust-Tierney allegedly used his e-mail address and credit card to subscribe to and access a child pornography website.
The complaint states that federal investigations into child pornography websites revealed that "Charles Rust-Tierney has subscribed to multiple child pornography website over a period of years."
As recently as last October, the complaint alleges, "Rust-Tierney purchased access to a group of hardcore commercial child pornography websites."
Complaint Alleges Access to Graphic Material
Rust-Tierney admitted to investigators that he had downloaded videos and images from child pornography websites onto CD-ROMs, according to the complaint.
The videos described in the complaint depict graphic forcible intercourse with prepubescent females. One if the girls is described in court documents as being "seen and heard crying", another is described as being "bound by rope."
The investigation is being conducted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and the Arlington County Police as part of the Northern Virginia and District of Columbia Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force.
Rust-Tierney made an initial appearance in a federal court in Alexandria, VA, Friday. He is being detained pending a preliminary hearing scheduled for Wednesday, February 28.
Youth Coach, Argued Against Restricting Public Internet
Rust Tierney coaches various youth sports teams in and around Arlington, Virginia, according to court documents.
In the past, Rust-Tierney had argued against restricting Internet access in public libraries in Virginia, writing, "Recognizing that individuals will continue to behave responsibly and appropriately while in the library, the default should be maximum, unrestricted access to the valuable resources of the Internet."
Source
According to a criminal complaint obtained by ABC News, Rust-Tierney allegedly used his e-mail address and credit card to subscribe to and access a child pornography website.
The complaint states that federal investigations into child pornography websites revealed that "Charles Rust-Tierney has subscribed to multiple child pornography website over a period of years."
As recently as last October, the complaint alleges, "Rust-Tierney purchased access to a group of hardcore commercial child pornography websites."
Complaint Alleges Access to Graphic Material
Rust-Tierney admitted to investigators that he had downloaded videos and images from child pornography websites onto CD-ROMs, according to the complaint.
The videos described in the complaint depict graphic forcible intercourse with prepubescent females. One if the girls is described in court documents as being "seen and heard crying", another is described as being "bound by rope."
The investigation is being conducted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and the Arlington County Police as part of the Northern Virginia and District of Columbia Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force.
Rust-Tierney made an initial appearance in a federal court in Alexandria, VA, Friday. He is being detained pending a preliminary hearing scheduled for Wednesday, February 28.
Youth Coach, Argued Against Restricting Public Internet
Rust Tierney coaches various youth sports teams in and around Arlington, Virginia, according to court documents.
In the past, Rust-Tierney had argued against restricting Internet access in public libraries in Virginia, writing, "Recognizing that individuals will continue to behave responsibly and appropriately while in the library, the default should be maximum, unrestricted access to the valuable resources of the Internet."
Source
Police protect girls forced to convert to Islam
Extremist Muslims who force vulnerable teenage girls to convert to Islam are being targeted by police, Met chief Sir Ian Blair has revealed.
Police are working with universities to clamp down on "aggressive conversions" during which girls are beaten up and forced to abandon university courses.
• Muslim pupils 'need their own showers'
The Hindu Forum of Britain claims hundreds of mostly Sikh and Hindu girls have been intimidated by Muslim men who take them out on dates before terrorising them until they convert.
Sir Ian spoke about the problem at a conference organised by the forum.
A Met spokesman said: "Neighbourhood officers work with university authorities in London and we would encourage anyone targeted in this way to seek help and support and where necessary use third party reporting facilities if they do not want to contact police directly."
Ramesh Kallidai, of the Hindu Forum of Britain, said: "Some girls are petrified because they are constantly being phoned up, having their door knocked.
"One girl was beaten up on the street and others have been forced to leave university."
• Met police chiefs are to review a controversial stop-and-search power used in the fight against terrorism. Assistant commissioner Andy Hayman, the overall head of Britain's anti-terrorist operations, said he had concerns about the number of stops carried out in London using Section 44 legislation.
Source
Police are working with universities to clamp down on "aggressive conversions" during which girls are beaten up and forced to abandon university courses.
• Muslim pupils 'need their own showers'
The Hindu Forum of Britain claims hundreds of mostly Sikh and Hindu girls have been intimidated by Muslim men who take them out on dates before terrorising them until they convert.
Sir Ian spoke about the problem at a conference organised by the forum.
A Met spokesman said: "Neighbourhood officers work with university authorities in London and we would encourage anyone targeted in this way to seek help and support and where necessary use third party reporting facilities if they do not want to contact police directly."
Ramesh Kallidai, of the Hindu Forum of Britain, said: "Some girls are petrified because they are constantly being phoned up, having their door knocked.
"One girl was beaten up on the street and others have been forced to leave university."
• Met police chiefs are to review a controversial stop-and-search power used in the fight against terrorism. Assistant commissioner Andy Hayman, the overall head of Britain's anti-terrorist operations, said he had concerns about the number of stops carried out in London using Section 44 legislation.
Source
Friday, February 23, 2007
Jerusalem Post interview with Michael Totten
Hizbullah has now regained its strength after last summer's war, with the aid of Syria and Iran, according to Michael J. Totten, an internationally known blogger who covers the Middle East.
"Hizbullah is as strong, or at least nearly as strong, as they were last July," Totten told The Jerusalem Post this week.
Totten has lived in Beirut for a period and splits his time now between the Middle East and Portland, Oregon.
He spent time in Lebanon and Israel during and after last year's war, and has met with many of the leaders of sects and parties in Lebanon, including Hizbullah.
Totten raises money from readers and publishes dispatches from the Middle East on his Web site, michaeltotten.com.
With the financial help of his readers, Totten moved to Beirut to blog from the ground. He is distinct among bloggers in that he supports himself through blogging, and has a dedicated following across the political spectrum.
He considers himself an "American centrist," saying his views on Israel are "mainstream," even though he says "I often disagree with what Israel does." He talked with the Post about what he sees lies ahead regarding Hizbullah.
What are Hizbullah's plans with regards to Israel? Do they wish to engage Israel again anytime soon?
Hizbullah says they want to continue their "resistance" against Israel indefinitely. Most, if not all, their weapon stocks depleted from the war in July have been replenished from Iran via Syria.
Hizbullah requires an open-ended war with Israel as an excuse to exist as an illegal militia and a parallel government, a state within a state. They would have to disarm and evolve into a mainstream political party like everyone else if their war with Israel were to come to an end. So they need the war, even if the war injures them terribly, because war gives them power over other Lebanese sects and political parties. Peace with Israel is Hizbullah's worst nightmare.
Small border skirmishes don't really register in Lebanon, but medium-sized battles with Israel help Hizbullah a great deal. It gives them propaganda points. They can say "See, Israel is our enemy and only we can fight them. So we cannot give up our weapons." It's theoretically possible that Hizbullah fears Israel now more than ever and never intends to fight again. I doubt this is the case, though, because Hizbullah's headquarters are not in Lebanon.
Hizbullah's decision-makers are in Teheran and Damascus. If Israel wants to deter Hizbullah, Israel will need to deter Teheran and Damascus. No amount of damage inflicted on Beirut will deter Hizbullah. They themselves are in a state of near-war with Beirut and the Lebanese government.
Do you know anything about the kidnapped soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev?
I wish I did.
You have met with some of the Hizbullah bigwigs. What are your personal impressions of the group?
They're thugs. Hizbullah's former media relations liaison Hussein Naboulsi threatened me with violence because I cracked a joke about them on my blog. He was the same guy who led CNN's Anderson Cooper around by the nose during the war. Cooper wasn't impressed either and he explained on national television how they operate, how they maniupulate journalists.
I was detained by Hizbullah at one of their events because they suspected an American colleague of mine was Jewish. They didn't harm either of us, but they did physically detain us for over an hour. They screamed at us - mostly at him, actually - and deleted pictures from his camera. Two days later they threatened me.
Chris Allbritton, who sometimes works for Time Magazine, briefly mentioned on his blog during the war that several journalists he knows were threatened by Hizbullah because of what they were writing.
I interviewed one of Hizbullah's top officials, Muhammad Afif - who is Naboulsi's brother, by the way - but I never published the interview.
It was boring and useless. My translator told me that everything he said to me was exactly, word for word, what Hizbullah says every day on their Al Manar TV station. He was a Hizbullah robot, basically. I learned much more about how Hizbullah really thinks from talking to random civilians who support them, and by talking to Lebanese who can't stand them.
Are Syria and Iran still supplying Hizbullah? Have they recovered from the war last summer?
Absolutely. Hizbullah is as strong, or at least nearly as strong, as they were last July. Iran and Syria will continue supplying Hizbullah until they fear the consequences of continuing their support or until no one in Lebanon is willing to receive their support. Right now everyone who dies because of Syrian and Iranian support for Hizbullah is Lebanese or Israeli. They have no reason to stop until that equation is altered.
What role is Iran playing in Lebanon?
Hizbullah is a creation of and proxy for Iran's Revolutionary Guards.
The Iranian regime is Hizbullah's primary patron and armorer. Syria acts as a logistical middle man, basically, between Teheran and South Lebanon.
The Iranian regime projects military power beyond its borders more than any other state in the Middle East. Hizbullah is Iran's imperial project in Lebanon, their base so to speak in the Levant.
The Iranians are primarily interested in using Hizbullah as a weapon against Israel while the Syrians are primarily interested in using Hizbullah as a weapon against Lebanon.
How has Lebanon recovered from this summer?
It depends on which region we're talking about. The South and Beirut's southern suburbs sustained heavy damage. I recently returned from Bint Jbail, Hizbullah's de-facto capital in South Lebanon. The city center is almost completely in ruins.
The outskirts are in fine shape, but the downtown is practically gone. Rubble has been cleared out of the way, but I saw no evidence of any reconstruction there whatsover. Maroun al Ras, the first village Israel occupied during the war, is in similar condition.
Haret Hreik, Hizbullah's capital south of Beirut, looks like World War II hit the place. Whole swaths of towers are just gone. Again, rubble has been cleared but reconstruction hasn't begun. At least I didn't see any.
The rest of the country was less damaged to begin with, so rebuilding is cheaper, easier, and faster. Bombed bridges are under reconstruction along the coastal highway. Traffic is a mess because the work isn't finished, but the work will be finished soon and there will be no evidence a war even happened.
The Israel Air Force bombed Lebanon's milk factory for reasons I still don't understand. There were still severe milk shortages in Lebanon at least as recently as Christmas. I don't know if that's still the case.
The airport seemed completely undamaged. It looked and functioned exactly as it did every time I flew into and out of Beirut before the war. The terminal was reportedly destroyed by the Israeli Air Force, but as it turned out that didn't happen.
The economy is still in bad shape, but it's hard to say how much of that is because of the war and how much of it is a result of Hizbullah's ongoing siege in the capital.
You have traveled in Palestinian refugee camps and the territories, yet your writings come across as fair and at times even pro-Israel. What are your ideological views?
I'm an American, so I think in American political terms. Within the American political system I'm basically a centrist. I vote for both Democratic and Republican candidates and suspect I will do so for a very long time. Each party gets some things right and some things wrong.
A huge majority of Americans support Israel. I'm right in the mainstream when it comes to Israel, even though I often disagree with what Israel does. I thought the invasion of Lebanon was foolish, counterproductive, and a waste of money and lives in both Lebanon and Israel. But I sympathize with what Israel was trying to do, and of course with Israel's right to exist and defend itself. So my criticism wasn't the shrieking axe-grinding kind that I'm sure you're all too familiar with. If Israel would have clearly won the war last summer I would have changed my mind, admitted I was wrong, and supported it in hindsight.
Source
"Hizbullah is as strong, or at least nearly as strong, as they were last July," Totten told The Jerusalem Post this week.
Totten has lived in Beirut for a period and splits his time now between the Middle East and Portland, Oregon.
He spent time in Lebanon and Israel during and after last year's war, and has met with many of the leaders of sects and parties in Lebanon, including Hizbullah.
Totten raises money from readers and publishes dispatches from the Middle East on his Web site, michaeltotten.com.
With the financial help of his readers, Totten moved to Beirut to blog from the ground. He is distinct among bloggers in that he supports himself through blogging, and has a dedicated following across the political spectrum.
He considers himself an "American centrist," saying his views on Israel are "mainstream," even though he says "I often disagree with what Israel does." He talked with the Post about what he sees lies ahead regarding Hizbullah.
What are Hizbullah's plans with regards to Israel? Do they wish to engage Israel again anytime soon?
Hizbullah says they want to continue their "resistance" against Israel indefinitely. Most, if not all, their weapon stocks depleted from the war in July have been replenished from Iran via Syria.
Hizbullah requires an open-ended war with Israel as an excuse to exist as an illegal militia and a parallel government, a state within a state. They would have to disarm and evolve into a mainstream political party like everyone else if their war with Israel were to come to an end. So they need the war, even if the war injures them terribly, because war gives them power over other Lebanese sects and political parties. Peace with Israel is Hizbullah's worst nightmare.
Small border skirmishes don't really register in Lebanon, but medium-sized battles with Israel help Hizbullah a great deal. It gives them propaganda points. They can say "See, Israel is our enemy and only we can fight them. So we cannot give up our weapons." It's theoretically possible that Hizbullah fears Israel now more than ever and never intends to fight again. I doubt this is the case, though, because Hizbullah's headquarters are not in Lebanon.
Hizbullah's decision-makers are in Teheran and Damascus. If Israel wants to deter Hizbullah, Israel will need to deter Teheran and Damascus. No amount of damage inflicted on Beirut will deter Hizbullah. They themselves are in a state of near-war with Beirut and the Lebanese government.
Do you know anything about the kidnapped soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev?
I wish I did.
You have met with some of the Hizbullah bigwigs. What are your personal impressions of the group?
They're thugs. Hizbullah's former media relations liaison Hussein Naboulsi threatened me with violence because I cracked a joke about them on my blog. He was the same guy who led CNN's Anderson Cooper around by the nose during the war. Cooper wasn't impressed either and he explained on national television how they operate, how they maniupulate journalists.
I was detained by Hizbullah at one of their events because they suspected an American colleague of mine was Jewish. They didn't harm either of us, but they did physically detain us for over an hour. They screamed at us - mostly at him, actually - and deleted pictures from his camera. Two days later they threatened me.
Chris Allbritton, who sometimes works for Time Magazine, briefly mentioned on his blog during the war that several journalists he knows were threatened by Hizbullah because of what they were writing.
I interviewed one of Hizbullah's top officials, Muhammad Afif - who is Naboulsi's brother, by the way - but I never published the interview.
It was boring and useless. My translator told me that everything he said to me was exactly, word for word, what Hizbullah says every day on their Al Manar TV station. He was a Hizbullah robot, basically. I learned much more about how Hizbullah really thinks from talking to random civilians who support them, and by talking to Lebanese who can't stand them.
Are Syria and Iran still supplying Hizbullah? Have they recovered from the war last summer?
Absolutely. Hizbullah is as strong, or at least nearly as strong, as they were last July. Iran and Syria will continue supplying Hizbullah until they fear the consequences of continuing their support or until no one in Lebanon is willing to receive their support. Right now everyone who dies because of Syrian and Iranian support for Hizbullah is Lebanese or Israeli. They have no reason to stop until that equation is altered.
What role is Iran playing in Lebanon?
Hizbullah is a creation of and proxy for Iran's Revolutionary Guards.
The Iranian regime is Hizbullah's primary patron and armorer. Syria acts as a logistical middle man, basically, between Teheran and South Lebanon.
The Iranian regime projects military power beyond its borders more than any other state in the Middle East. Hizbullah is Iran's imperial project in Lebanon, their base so to speak in the Levant.
The Iranians are primarily interested in using Hizbullah as a weapon against Israel while the Syrians are primarily interested in using Hizbullah as a weapon against Lebanon.
How has Lebanon recovered from this summer?
It depends on which region we're talking about. The South and Beirut's southern suburbs sustained heavy damage. I recently returned from Bint Jbail, Hizbullah's de-facto capital in South Lebanon. The city center is almost completely in ruins.
The outskirts are in fine shape, but the downtown is practically gone. Rubble has been cleared out of the way, but I saw no evidence of any reconstruction there whatsover. Maroun al Ras, the first village Israel occupied during the war, is in similar condition.
Haret Hreik, Hizbullah's capital south of Beirut, looks like World War II hit the place. Whole swaths of towers are just gone. Again, rubble has been cleared but reconstruction hasn't begun. At least I didn't see any.
The rest of the country was less damaged to begin with, so rebuilding is cheaper, easier, and faster. Bombed bridges are under reconstruction along the coastal highway. Traffic is a mess because the work isn't finished, but the work will be finished soon and there will be no evidence a war even happened.
The Israel Air Force bombed Lebanon's milk factory for reasons I still don't understand. There were still severe milk shortages in Lebanon at least as recently as Christmas. I don't know if that's still the case.
The airport seemed completely undamaged. It looked and functioned exactly as it did every time I flew into and out of Beirut before the war. The terminal was reportedly destroyed by the Israeli Air Force, but as it turned out that didn't happen.
The economy is still in bad shape, but it's hard to say how much of that is because of the war and how much of it is a result of Hizbullah's ongoing siege in the capital.
You have traveled in Palestinian refugee camps and the territories, yet your writings come across as fair and at times even pro-Israel. What are your ideological views?
I'm an American, so I think in American political terms. Within the American political system I'm basically a centrist. I vote for both Democratic and Republican candidates and suspect I will do so for a very long time. Each party gets some things right and some things wrong.
A huge majority of Americans support Israel. I'm right in the mainstream when it comes to Israel, even though I often disagree with what Israel does. I thought the invasion of Lebanon was foolish, counterproductive, and a waste of money and lives in both Lebanon and Israel. But I sympathize with what Israel was trying to do, and of course with Israel's right to exist and defend itself. So my criticism wasn't the shrieking axe-grinding kind that I'm sure you're all too familiar with. If Israel would have clearly won the war last summer I would have changed my mind, admitted I was wrong, and supported it in hindsight.
Source
Is Israel the Problem?
Amir Taheri - Feb 01, 2007
Commentary Magazine
Fifteen years ago, after the first defeat of Saddam Hussein and the liberation of Kuwait, President George H.W. Bush and his Secretary of State James Baker faced the question of how best to exploit the American victory as a means of stabilizing the Middle East. The obvious course would have been to deploy the immensely enhanced prestige of the United States, backed by its unprecedented military presence in the Persian Gulf, to help create new and durable security structures in a region regarded as vital to American national interests.
How might this have been done? The U.S. could have urged its Arab allies to introduce long-overdue reforms as a step toward legitimizing their regimes and broadening their domestic political support. At the very least, the U.S. might have urged the six member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council to end their decades of intramural feuding and forge a broader alliance with Jordan and Egypt. This, with American support, might have helped create a new balance of power in the region to counter the ambitions of adventurist regimes like Iran, Iraq, and Syria.
But nothing of the sort was ever considered in Washington. Instead, as Baker declared in September 1991, the administration would go for “the big thing”: that is, finding a solution to the century-old conflict between the Jews and the Arabs. The result was the Madrid conference, an impressive show of heads of state but, as the decade’s subsequent events would prove, a wholly counterproductive exercise in peacemaking.
The two key analytical assumptions that led to Madrid were, first, that the Arab-Israeli conflict was the issue, the Ur-issue, of Middle Eastern politics and, second, that all the other issues in the region were inextricably linked to it. Despite everything that has happened in the interim to disprove these two assumptions, they still underlie the thinking of diplomats today. Most recently, they were repeated almost word for word in the long-awaited report of the Iraq Study Group (ISG) headed by the very same James Baker.
Charged by the present Bush administration with finding ways to win the war in Iraq more quickly and at a lower cost in blood and treasure, the ISG found itself irresistibly drawn to the old notion of the Ur-issue. Evidently regarding the Bush Doctrine, with its diametrically opposed analysis, as too irrelevant even to merit mention, the ISG suggested instead that “solving” the Israel-Palestine dispute was the key to winning in Iraq.
In this, moreover, Baker and his team are hardly alone. Kofi Annan, the former Secretary-General of the United Nations, has long been of the same mind. So too, apparently, is his successor Ban Ki-Moon, who told a South Korean newspaper that “If the issues in the conflict between Israel and Palestine [sic] go well, other issues in the Middle East . . . are likely to follow suit.”
That Arab despots should long have sought to divert their tyrannized subjects with dreams of driving the “Zionist enemy” into the sea is no surprise. Each time the late Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt faced social and political unrest at home, he would assure his own people and the Arab “nation” at large that social and political reform had to wait until “the enemy” was dislodged from “our beloved Palestine.” For a group of American “wise men” to embrace such retrograde and easily refuted notions bespeaks a truly dangerous ignorance of reality.
In fact, far from being the root cause of instability and war in the wider Middle East, one could argue that the Arab-Israeli conflict is rather peripheral, and that the region’s deeper and much more intractable problems lie elsewhere. And one would be right. In the last years we have all become acquainted with televised images of the brutal carnage that Shiites and Sunni are capable of inflicting on each other in Iraq, the ghastly work of Baathist death squads, the steady rhythm of political assassinations, and the laying waste of civilian life. And that is just within one country. For our purposes here, however, it may be more instructive to look at the Middle East at the regional level, and to examine in particular the huge number of inter-state conflicts that have bedeviled this area in the modern era—conflicts that have nothing whatsoever to do with the struggle between Israel and the Palestinians.
Covering a vast swath of territory between the Atlantic and Indian oceans, the “arc of crisis,” as British Prime Minister Tony Blair has accurately referred to the greater Middle East, consists of 22 states, sixteen of them Arab, plus Iran, Israel, Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. Few could be regarded as nation-states in classical European terms; all are remnants of various empires.
As such remnants, indeed, none of the states in the region enjoys fully defined or internationally recognized borders. Every one of them is engaged in pressing irredentist claims of one kind or another against one or more of its neighbors, and most have entered into armed battle with each other as a consequence. A brief tour of the region, proceeding roughly from east to west, yields a depressingly uniform catalog.
Afghanistan, to begin there, maintains a claim over neighboring Pakistan’s Northwest Frontier Province. This is the home of the Pathans, whose Pushtun kin form the largest ethnic bloc north of the colonial border fixed by Britain in the 19th century. In the 1960’s, the two neighbors fought a series of border wars over this province, which the Afghans call Pakhtunistan.
For its part, Pakistan has been engaged in a longstanding territorial dispute with India over the ownership of Kashmir, divided between the two in 1947 (with China snatching a portion for itself in 1960). The Indo-Pakistani conflict has led to three major wars and countless border clashes over the past half-century, and in part accounts for the determination of the two neighbors to develop their respective arsenals of nuclear weapons.
Pakistan is involved in a dispute with Iran as well—this one over territorial waters in the Arabian Sea as well as over the nationality of a number of Baluch tribes astraddle the international frontier. Iran, in turn, claims a right of supervision (droit de regard) in western Afghanistan based on the Paris Treaty of 1855. Iran and Afghanistan have likewise been in militant dispute for more than six decades over the waters of three border rivers, the Hirmand, the Parian, and the Harirud.
Then, on a much larger scale, there is the Iran-Iraq conflict. Between 1936 and 1974, these two neighbors fought a series of wars for control of the Shatt al-Arab border estuary. In 1975, they signed an accord to end the dispute, only to see the agreement declared null and void by Saddam Hussein in 1980. Invading Iran, he started a conflict that lasted eight years and claimed a million lives on both sides.
Since 2003, Iran has seized the opportunity presented by the fall of Saddam Hussein to redraw the border to its advantage. Iranian forces have gained control of Zaynalkosh, a strategic salient pointing to Baghdad like a gun. Iran has also revived a series of old accords with the former Ottoman empire, known as the Erzerum treaties, to claim a right of supervision over the Shiite holy shrines in present-day Iraq (Samara, Kazemayn, Karbala, Kufa, and Najaf).
Iran is in disputes elsewhere as well. To the south, it is trying to retain its hold over three strategically valuable islands near the Straits of Hormuz, through which passes each day half of the world’s exported oil. Iran seized these islands from Great Britain in 1971, just hours before the British ended their protectorate over the seven sheikhdoms that together form the United Arab Emirates (UAE). To its north, Iran is fighting with Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Azerbaijan over the Caspian Sea. These littoral neighbors want the territorial waters divided in accordance with the respective lengths of the five countries’ coastlines, leaving Iran with only 10 percent of the sea’s oil, gas, and fishing resources. Iran wants the Caspian to be divided equally among the five, thus doubling its share to 20 percent. Ever since 1995, it has taken action to underline its demands, creating a navy and preventing Western oil companies from exploring in Azerbaijani and Turkmen waters that Tehran regards as its own.
Iran has also acted to ensure its hold over the oil-rich province of Khuzestan, the object of a pan-Arab campaign to claim the region as part of the “Arab homeland.” This territory, which did indeed boast an ethnic Arab majority until the late 1940’s, has been steadily Persianized.
Recently, in what amounts to an administrative ethnic cleansing, several Arab tribes living in areas close to the Iraqi border have been expelled, their members replaced by new arrivals, mostly from central Iran.
That the Arabs of the Middle East have long regarded Iran as an alien power is true enough. But their preoccupation with Tehran has hardly deterred them from fighting bitterly among themselves as well. Quite the contrary.
Consider the six members of the inaptly named Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). All six are monarchies, often linked by tribal blood bonds, and four of them share a strong common interest as members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). Nevertheless, in 1955, Saudi Arabia and the sultanate of Oman fought a war over the Buraimi Oasis, an area rumored to hold vast petroleum resources; decades of negotiation have failed to produce an accord. A third party in the same dispute is Abu Dhabi, the richest and most powerful of the entities forming the UAE. Last year the UAE publicly renounced a 1974 accord with Saudi Arabia over the oasis, thus opening the way for entering its own claim of sovereignty there.
Since the late 1990’s, another GCC member, Qatar, has been quarreling with Saudi Arabia over the oil-rich area of Khor al-Udaid. In 2000, the Saudis expelled the last remaining Qatari garrison and formally annexed the area, thus cutting off Qatar’s border with the UAE. Elsewhere, Qatar has been in dispute with its neighbor Bahrain, fighting a naval war in 2001 over control of the Hawar Islands. A more ancient dispute, this one over the Zibarah tribes who live in the Qatar peninsula but claim loyalty to Bahrain, remains unresolved.
Even Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, arguably the GCC members enjoying the closest ties, have not managed to sort out their differences. Although they have agreed to share the oil resources in the so-called “neutral zone,” a joint commission set up in 2006 failed to demarcate the two countries’ frontiers there.
Kuwait’s principal cause of concern, however, is not Saudi Arabia but Iraq. Although the Iraq-Kuwait border was internationally guaranteed in 1992-93 after the first Gulf war, many Kuwaitis still fear a return of the Iraqi “demons.” And not without reason. Iraq’s democratically elected parliament has yet to put aside Iraqi claims against the Kuwaiti islands of Warbah and Bubiyan as well as the southern portion of the Rumailah oilfields granted to Kuwait by the UN. The uncertainty has forced Kuwait to postpone its ambitious plans for developing Bubiyan into a free-trade zone; tourist projects in Warbah and in the nearby island of Failakah have also been frozen. To keep the Iraqis out, Kuwait has built a series of fortifications along the border, including electrified ditches, anti-tank traps, and a no-man’s land at a depth of 10 miles. Saudi Arabia is building similar structures along its own border with Iraq.
Another dormant source of tension in the region is the old claim of suzerainty maintained by the Hashemite dynasty of Jordan over the Saudi province of Hejaz, where the holy cities of Mecca and Medina are located. The Hashemites have been careful to keep up relations with families in the province who suffered losses of land, power, and prestige when the al-Saud tribes drove out the Hashemites in 1924. Whenever the Saudi royal family comes under pressure from one or another of its many enemies, including al-Qaeda terrorists and Shiite militants in the eastern province, noises from Amman about a potentially independent Hejaz climb a notch higher.
In the past five years, Saudi Arabia has succeeded in settling its oldest and potentially most dangerous border dispute with Yemen, ceding to the latter more than 8,000 square kilometers of territory annexed in a 1936 war. But Yemen still has problems elsewhere. It has failed to define its borders with Oman along the Gulf of Hauf and the Rub al-Khali (or “empty quarter”), and it fought a war against Eritrea in 1999 over the Hanish islands in the Red Sea, a strategically valuable archipelago that could create a chokepoint in one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes. As for the vicious spectacle presented by Eritrea, Somalia, and Ethiopia, that deserves an essay unto itself.
The list continues. Ever since the 1940’s, both Iraq and Syria have pursued irredentist claims against Turkey, accusing that country of denying them their fair share of the waters of the Euphrates. More importantly, both Syria and Iraq claim the Turkish province of Iskanderun, where ethnic Arabs account for some 30 percent of the population. For its part, Turkey, basing itself on the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne, claims a right of supervision in northern Iraq, especially over the two oil-rich areas around Mosul and Kirkuk, and it has recruited, trained, and armed tribal Turkmen groups there. For much of the 1990’s, Turkey also intervened militarily in northern Iraq in pursuit of its war against the Marxist Kurdish guerrillas known as the PKK.
As for Syria, it most notoriously claims the entirety of Lebanon as part of “Greater Syria” (a fictitious unit that supposedly includes not only historical Palestine but also parts of what is now the kingdom of Jordan). For almost three of the five decades of Lebanon’s history as an independent state, Syria maintained an army of occupation there, and it has been involved in provoking and prolonging all three of Lebanon’s civil wars, including the longest one from 1975 to 1991. By dragging Lebanon into the broader conflicts of the region, Syria has been partly responsible for the deaths of an estimated 100,000 Lebanese and the flight of more than 2.5 million more. Last summer, Syria and its principal ally, Iran’s Islamic Republic, encouraged the Lebanese branch of Hizballah to trigger a five-week war with Israel, and then to attempt to destroy Lebanon’s democratically elected government through street agitation and political assassinations.
This brings us to Egypt, the most populous of the Arab states and one that has always vacillated between a policy of distancing itself from “the Arab mess,” as the nationalist premier Nahas Pasha liked to call it, and carving out an empire for itself in the name of pan-Arabism. For much of the 1950’s and 1960’s, Egypt under Nasser was in an empire-building mode. It created the United Arab Republic, to which Syria and, more briefly, Libya and Iraq were attached. It also did much to foment and prolong the 1958-1962 war in Algeria, partly within a grander, Soviet-backed scheme to keep the French army, the largest NATO force in Europe at the time, pinned down for as long as possible.
In the 1960’s, in the name of pan-Arabism, Egypt supported the military coup d’état in Yemen that led to a six-year civil war there. By 1962, an Egyptian expeditionary army of 60,000 men was fighting the forces of the deposed Yemeni imam. Over 200,000 people died in that war, including some 30,000 Egyptians.
Egypt’s defeat in the 1967 war against Israel ended Nasser’s Yemeni adventure. Even so, however, he could not refrain from throwing Egypt’s weight behind the radical regime in the newly independent state of South Yemen, which was to become the only Arab country to build a thorough-going Communist system. With Egypt’s help, South Yemen became a major cold-war base for the Soviet Union, offering it naval facilities in Aden, Mukalla, and the island of Soccotra. From 1969 until the mid-1970’s, South Yemen was also a base of aggression against Oman, as Marxist rebels from the Popular Front for the Liberation of the Occupied Arab Gulf tried to seize control of the Omani province of Dhofar with the help of Cuban and East German military experts. That war claimed over 100,000 lives and produced almost a half-million refugees on both sides of the border.
More recently, Egypt has flexed its muscles against Sudan, annexing chunks of Sudanese territory known as the Halaieb, home to the trans-border Bashara tribes. On its other side, Egypt has engaged in intermittent conflict with Muammar Qaddafi’s Libya over an area of the Egyptian desert. Indeed, the great irony is that the only neighbor with whom Egypt enjoys demarcated and internationally recognized borders is Israel.
Libya, too, has been involved in territorial disputes—with Chad, Sudan, and Tunisia. In the case of Chad, Libyan claims led to a decade-long war in the 1970’s and 1980’s that at one point drew in French forces on the Chadian side. In the case of Sudan, the point at issue is Khartoum’s support for Islamist guerrillas fighting Qaddafi on his home turf of Tripoli.
Further to the west, Algeria, Morocco, and Mauritania have been locked in a triangular struggle over the former Spanish Sahara, which Morocco annexed in 1975 with financial and military help from the Shah of Iran. In retaliation, Algeria has set up and supported the Polisario front that claims to be the legitimate government of the Saharaoui people. Most Arab and African states recognize the Polisario claim, despite Morocco’s protests, and a low-intensity war that started in 1976 has continued ever since.
In 1992, the UN asked none other than James Baker to mediate an agreement on the Sahara. Eight years later, America’s “diplomatic wizard” threw in the towel, having failed to bring the disputants an inch closer to agreement. In the 1990’s, Morocco repaid Algeria for its support of the Polisario by turning a blind eye to Islamist terrorists waging a bloody campaign in Algeria that claimed over 250,000 lives.
This provides only the briefest glimpse into one aspect of reality in the “arc of crisis.” All told, in the past six decades, this region has witnessed no fewer than 22 full-scale wars over territory and resources, not one of them having anything to do with Israel and the Palestinians. And these international disputes, as I mentioned at the outset, are quite apart from the uninterrupted string of domestic clashes, military coups, acts of sectarian and ethnic vengeance, factional terrorism, and other internal conflicts that have characterized the greater Middle East, not infrequently attaining impressive heights of cruelty and despoliation. Nor is that the end of it. Underlying all of this are the unmoving facts, documented at length in the annual volumes of the Arab Human Development Report, of chronic instability, severe economic underachievement, social atrophy, and cultural backwardness. The greater Middle East is the only part of the world still largely untouched by the wave of positive change that followed the end of the cold war.
The notion that all of these problems can be waved away by “solving” the Arab-Israeli conflict is thus at best a delusion, at worst a recipe for maintaining today’s wider political, diplomatic, and social paralysis. For what is the reason behind the failure of the 1991 Madrid conference, the slow but steady death of the 1993 Oslo accords, the collapse of President Bill Clinton’s final effort to negotiate a peace deal at Camp David in 2000, and the faltering history of President George W. Bush’s “road map”? The reason is hardly the want of diplomatic efforts, especially on the part of the United States. No, the reason lies elsewhere, and is plain to see in the sorry tale we have rehearsed.
It is this: with the exception of Israel and with the partial exception of Turkey, the entire Middle East lacks a culture of conflict resolution, let alone the necessary mechanisms of meaningful compromise. Such a culture can only be shaped through a process of democratization. Only democracies habitually resolve their conflicts through diplomacy rather than war, and only popular-based regimes possess the political strength and the moral will to build peace. This is why, unless we mean to consign the Middle East back to the “swamps” from which the United States, its allies, and the region’s reformers have been seeking to extricate it, democratization remains the only credible strategy in and for the “arc of crisis,” and the only hope for its suffering inhabitants.
Source
Commentary Magazine
Fifteen years ago, after the first defeat of Saddam Hussein and the liberation of Kuwait, President George H.W. Bush and his Secretary of State James Baker faced the question of how best to exploit the American victory as a means of stabilizing the Middle East. The obvious course would have been to deploy the immensely enhanced prestige of the United States, backed by its unprecedented military presence in the Persian Gulf, to help create new and durable security structures in a region regarded as vital to American national interests.
How might this have been done? The U.S. could have urged its Arab allies to introduce long-overdue reforms as a step toward legitimizing their regimes and broadening their domestic political support. At the very least, the U.S. might have urged the six member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council to end their decades of intramural feuding and forge a broader alliance with Jordan and Egypt. This, with American support, might have helped create a new balance of power in the region to counter the ambitions of adventurist regimes like Iran, Iraq, and Syria.
But nothing of the sort was ever considered in Washington. Instead, as Baker declared in September 1991, the administration would go for “the big thing”: that is, finding a solution to the century-old conflict between the Jews and the Arabs. The result was the Madrid conference, an impressive show of heads of state but, as the decade’s subsequent events would prove, a wholly counterproductive exercise in peacemaking.
The two key analytical assumptions that led to Madrid were, first, that the Arab-Israeli conflict was the issue, the Ur-issue, of Middle Eastern politics and, second, that all the other issues in the region were inextricably linked to it. Despite everything that has happened in the interim to disprove these two assumptions, they still underlie the thinking of diplomats today. Most recently, they were repeated almost word for word in the long-awaited report of the Iraq Study Group (ISG) headed by the very same James Baker.
Charged by the present Bush administration with finding ways to win the war in Iraq more quickly and at a lower cost in blood and treasure, the ISG found itself irresistibly drawn to the old notion of the Ur-issue. Evidently regarding the Bush Doctrine, with its diametrically opposed analysis, as too irrelevant even to merit mention, the ISG suggested instead that “solving” the Israel-Palestine dispute was the key to winning in Iraq.
In this, moreover, Baker and his team are hardly alone. Kofi Annan, the former Secretary-General of the United Nations, has long been of the same mind. So too, apparently, is his successor Ban Ki-Moon, who told a South Korean newspaper that “If the issues in the conflict between Israel and Palestine [sic] go well, other issues in the Middle East . . . are likely to follow suit.”
That Arab despots should long have sought to divert their tyrannized subjects with dreams of driving the “Zionist enemy” into the sea is no surprise. Each time the late Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt faced social and political unrest at home, he would assure his own people and the Arab “nation” at large that social and political reform had to wait until “the enemy” was dislodged from “our beloved Palestine.” For a group of American “wise men” to embrace such retrograde and easily refuted notions bespeaks a truly dangerous ignorance of reality.
In fact, far from being the root cause of instability and war in the wider Middle East, one could argue that the Arab-Israeli conflict is rather peripheral, and that the region’s deeper and much more intractable problems lie elsewhere. And one would be right. In the last years we have all become acquainted with televised images of the brutal carnage that Shiites and Sunni are capable of inflicting on each other in Iraq, the ghastly work of Baathist death squads, the steady rhythm of political assassinations, and the laying waste of civilian life. And that is just within one country. For our purposes here, however, it may be more instructive to look at the Middle East at the regional level, and to examine in particular the huge number of inter-state conflicts that have bedeviled this area in the modern era—conflicts that have nothing whatsoever to do with the struggle between Israel and the Palestinians.
Covering a vast swath of territory between the Atlantic and Indian oceans, the “arc of crisis,” as British Prime Minister Tony Blair has accurately referred to the greater Middle East, consists of 22 states, sixteen of them Arab, plus Iran, Israel, Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. Few could be regarded as nation-states in classical European terms; all are remnants of various empires.
As such remnants, indeed, none of the states in the region enjoys fully defined or internationally recognized borders. Every one of them is engaged in pressing irredentist claims of one kind or another against one or more of its neighbors, and most have entered into armed battle with each other as a consequence. A brief tour of the region, proceeding roughly from east to west, yields a depressingly uniform catalog.
Afghanistan, to begin there, maintains a claim over neighboring Pakistan’s Northwest Frontier Province. This is the home of the Pathans, whose Pushtun kin form the largest ethnic bloc north of the colonial border fixed by Britain in the 19th century. In the 1960’s, the two neighbors fought a series of border wars over this province, which the Afghans call Pakhtunistan.
For its part, Pakistan has been engaged in a longstanding territorial dispute with India over the ownership of Kashmir, divided between the two in 1947 (with China snatching a portion for itself in 1960). The Indo-Pakistani conflict has led to three major wars and countless border clashes over the past half-century, and in part accounts for the determination of the two neighbors to develop their respective arsenals of nuclear weapons.
Pakistan is involved in a dispute with Iran as well—this one over territorial waters in the Arabian Sea as well as over the nationality of a number of Baluch tribes astraddle the international frontier. Iran, in turn, claims a right of supervision (droit de regard) in western Afghanistan based on the Paris Treaty of 1855. Iran and Afghanistan have likewise been in militant dispute for more than six decades over the waters of three border rivers, the Hirmand, the Parian, and the Harirud.
Then, on a much larger scale, there is the Iran-Iraq conflict. Between 1936 and 1974, these two neighbors fought a series of wars for control of the Shatt al-Arab border estuary. In 1975, they signed an accord to end the dispute, only to see the agreement declared null and void by Saddam Hussein in 1980. Invading Iran, he started a conflict that lasted eight years and claimed a million lives on both sides.
Since 2003, Iran has seized the opportunity presented by the fall of Saddam Hussein to redraw the border to its advantage. Iranian forces have gained control of Zaynalkosh, a strategic salient pointing to Baghdad like a gun. Iran has also revived a series of old accords with the former Ottoman empire, known as the Erzerum treaties, to claim a right of supervision over the Shiite holy shrines in present-day Iraq (Samara, Kazemayn, Karbala, Kufa, and Najaf).
Iran is in disputes elsewhere as well. To the south, it is trying to retain its hold over three strategically valuable islands near the Straits of Hormuz, through which passes each day half of the world’s exported oil. Iran seized these islands from Great Britain in 1971, just hours before the British ended their protectorate over the seven sheikhdoms that together form the United Arab Emirates (UAE). To its north, Iran is fighting with Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Azerbaijan over the Caspian Sea. These littoral neighbors want the territorial waters divided in accordance with the respective lengths of the five countries’ coastlines, leaving Iran with only 10 percent of the sea’s oil, gas, and fishing resources. Iran wants the Caspian to be divided equally among the five, thus doubling its share to 20 percent. Ever since 1995, it has taken action to underline its demands, creating a navy and preventing Western oil companies from exploring in Azerbaijani and Turkmen waters that Tehran regards as its own.
Iran has also acted to ensure its hold over the oil-rich province of Khuzestan, the object of a pan-Arab campaign to claim the region as part of the “Arab homeland.” This territory, which did indeed boast an ethnic Arab majority until the late 1940’s, has been steadily Persianized.
Recently, in what amounts to an administrative ethnic cleansing, several Arab tribes living in areas close to the Iraqi border have been expelled, their members replaced by new arrivals, mostly from central Iran.
That the Arabs of the Middle East have long regarded Iran as an alien power is true enough. But their preoccupation with Tehran has hardly deterred them from fighting bitterly among themselves as well. Quite the contrary.
Consider the six members of the inaptly named Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). All six are monarchies, often linked by tribal blood bonds, and four of them share a strong common interest as members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). Nevertheless, in 1955, Saudi Arabia and the sultanate of Oman fought a war over the Buraimi Oasis, an area rumored to hold vast petroleum resources; decades of negotiation have failed to produce an accord. A third party in the same dispute is Abu Dhabi, the richest and most powerful of the entities forming the UAE. Last year the UAE publicly renounced a 1974 accord with Saudi Arabia over the oasis, thus opening the way for entering its own claim of sovereignty there.
Since the late 1990’s, another GCC member, Qatar, has been quarreling with Saudi Arabia over the oil-rich area of Khor al-Udaid. In 2000, the Saudis expelled the last remaining Qatari garrison and formally annexed the area, thus cutting off Qatar’s border with the UAE. Elsewhere, Qatar has been in dispute with its neighbor Bahrain, fighting a naval war in 2001 over control of the Hawar Islands. A more ancient dispute, this one over the Zibarah tribes who live in the Qatar peninsula but claim loyalty to Bahrain, remains unresolved.
Even Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, arguably the GCC members enjoying the closest ties, have not managed to sort out their differences. Although they have agreed to share the oil resources in the so-called “neutral zone,” a joint commission set up in 2006 failed to demarcate the two countries’ frontiers there.
Kuwait’s principal cause of concern, however, is not Saudi Arabia but Iraq. Although the Iraq-Kuwait border was internationally guaranteed in 1992-93 after the first Gulf war, many Kuwaitis still fear a return of the Iraqi “demons.” And not without reason. Iraq’s democratically elected parliament has yet to put aside Iraqi claims against the Kuwaiti islands of Warbah and Bubiyan as well as the southern portion of the Rumailah oilfields granted to Kuwait by the UN. The uncertainty has forced Kuwait to postpone its ambitious plans for developing Bubiyan into a free-trade zone; tourist projects in Warbah and in the nearby island of Failakah have also been frozen. To keep the Iraqis out, Kuwait has built a series of fortifications along the border, including electrified ditches, anti-tank traps, and a no-man’s land at a depth of 10 miles. Saudi Arabia is building similar structures along its own border with Iraq.
Another dormant source of tension in the region is the old claim of suzerainty maintained by the Hashemite dynasty of Jordan over the Saudi province of Hejaz, where the holy cities of Mecca and Medina are located. The Hashemites have been careful to keep up relations with families in the province who suffered losses of land, power, and prestige when the al-Saud tribes drove out the Hashemites in 1924. Whenever the Saudi royal family comes under pressure from one or another of its many enemies, including al-Qaeda terrorists and Shiite militants in the eastern province, noises from Amman about a potentially independent Hejaz climb a notch higher.
In the past five years, Saudi Arabia has succeeded in settling its oldest and potentially most dangerous border dispute with Yemen, ceding to the latter more than 8,000 square kilometers of territory annexed in a 1936 war. But Yemen still has problems elsewhere. It has failed to define its borders with Oman along the Gulf of Hauf and the Rub al-Khali (or “empty quarter”), and it fought a war against Eritrea in 1999 over the Hanish islands in the Red Sea, a strategically valuable archipelago that could create a chokepoint in one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes. As for the vicious spectacle presented by Eritrea, Somalia, and Ethiopia, that deserves an essay unto itself.
The list continues. Ever since the 1940’s, both Iraq and Syria have pursued irredentist claims against Turkey, accusing that country of denying them their fair share of the waters of the Euphrates. More importantly, both Syria and Iraq claim the Turkish province of Iskanderun, where ethnic Arabs account for some 30 percent of the population. For its part, Turkey, basing itself on the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne, claims a right of supervision in northern Iraq, especially over the two oil-rich areas around Mosul and Kirkuk, and it has recruited, trained, and armed tribal Turkmen groups there. For much of the 1990’s, Turkey also intervened militarily in northern Iraq in pursuit of its war against the Marxist Kurdish guerrillas known as the PKK.
As for Syria, it most notoriously claims the entirety of Lebanon as part of “Greater Syria” (a fictitious unit that supposedly includes not only historical Palestine but also parts of what is now the kingdom of Jordan). For almost three of the five decades of Lebanon’s history as an independent state, Syria maintained an army of occupation there, and it has been involved in provoking and prolonging all three of Lebanon’s civil wars, including the longest one from 1975 to 1991. By dragging Lebanon into the broader conflicts of the region, Syria has been partly responsible for the deaths of an estimated 100,000 Lebanese and the flight of more than 2.5 million more. Last summer, Syria and its principal ally, Iran’s Islamic Republic, encouraged the Lebanese branch of Hizballah to trigger a five-week war with Israel, and then to attempt to destroy Lebanon’s democratically elected government through street agitation and political assassinations.
This brings us to Egypt, the most populous of the Arab states and one that has always vacillated between a policy of distancing itself from “the Arab mess,” as the nationalist premier Nahas Pasha liked to call it, and carving out an empire for itself in the name of pan-Arabism. For much of the 1950’s and 1960’s, Egypt under Nasser was in an empire-building mode. It created the United Arab Republic, to which Syria and, more briefly, Libya and Iraq were attached. It also did much to foment and prolong the 1958-1962 war in Algeria, partly within a grander, Soviet-backed scheme to keep the French army, the largest NATO force in Europe at the time, pinned down for as long as possible.
In the 1960’s, in the name of pan-Arabism, Egypt supported the military coup d’état in Yemen that led to a six-year civil war there. By 1962, an Egyptian expeditionary army of 60,000 men was fighting the forces of the deposed Yemeni imam. Over 200,000 people died in that war, including some 30,000 Egyptians.
Egypt’s defeat in the 1967 war against Israel ended Nasser’s Yemeni adventure. Even so, however, he could not refrain from throwing Egypt’s weight behind the radical regime in the newly independent state of South Yemen, which was to become the only Arab country to build a thorough-going Communist system. With Egypt’s help, South Yemen became a major cold-war base for the Soviet Union, offering it naval facilities in Aden, Mukalla, and the island of Soccotra. From 1969 until the mid-1970’s, South Yemen was also a base of aggression against Oman, as Marxist rebels from the Popular Front for the Liberation of the Occupied Arab Gulf tried to seize control of the Omani province of Dhofar with the help of Cuban and East German military experts. That war claimed over 100,000 lives and produced almost a half-million refugees on both sides of the border.
More recently, Egypt has flexed its muscles against Sudan, annexing chunks of Sudanese territory known as the Halaieb, home to the trans-border Bashara tribes. On its other side, Egypt has engaged in intermittent conflict with Muammar Qaddafi’s Libya over an area of the Egyptian desert. Indeed, the great irony is that the only neighbor with whom Egypt enjoys demarcated and internationally recognized borders is Israel.
Libya, too, has been involved in territorial disputes—with Chad, Sudan, and Tunisia. In the case of Chad, Libyan claims led to a decade-long war in the 1970’s and 1980’s that at one point drew in French forces on the Chadian side. In the case of Sudan, the point at issue is Khartoum’s support for Islamist guerrillas fighting Qaddafi on his home turf of Tripoli.
Further to the west, Algeria, Morocco, and Mauritania have been locked in a triangular struggle over the former Spanish Sahara, which Morocco annexed in 1975 with financial and military help from the Shah of Iran. In retaliation, Algeria has set up and supported the Polisario front that claims to be the legitimate government of the Saharaoui people. Most Arab and African states recognize the Polisario claim, despite Morocco’s protests, and a low-intensity war that started in 1976 has continued ever since.
In 1992, the UN asked none other than James Baker to mediate an agreement on the Sahara. Eight years later, America’s “diplomatic wizard” threw in the towel, having failed to bring the disputants an inch closer to agreement. In the 1990’s, Morocco repaid Algeria for its support of the Polisario by turning a blind eye to Islamist terrorists waging a bloody campaign in Algeria that claimed over 250,000 lives.
This provides only the briefest glimpse into one aspect of reality in the “arc of crisis.” All told, in the past six decades, this region has witnessed no fewer than 22 full-scale wars over territory and resources, not one of them having anything to do with Israel and the Palestinians. And these international disputes, as I mentioned at the outset, are quite apart from the uninterrupted string of domestic clashes, military coups, acts of sectarian and ethnic vengeance, factional terrorism, and other internal conflicts that have characterized the greater Middle East, not infrequently attaining impressive heights of cruelty and despoliation. Nor is that the end of it. Underlying all of this are the unmoving facts, documented at length in the annual volumes of the Arab Human Development Report, of chronic instability, severe economic underachievement, social atrophy, and cultural backwardness. The greater Middle East is the only part of the world still largely untouched by the wave of positive change that followed the end of the cold war.
The notion that all of these problems can be waved away by “solving” the Arab-Israeli conflict is thus at best a delusion, at worst a recipe for maintaining today’s wider political, diplomatic, and social paralysis. For what is the reason behind the failure of the 1991 Madrid conference, the slow but steady death of the 1993 Oslo accords, the collapse of President Bill Clinton’s final effort to negotiate a peace deal at Camp David in 2000, and the faltering history of President George W. Bush’s “road map”? The reason is hardly the want of diplomatic efforts, especially on the part of the United States. No, the reason lies elsewhere, and is plain to see in the sorry tale we have rehearsed.
It is this: with the exception of Israel and with the partial exception of Turkey, the entire Middle East lacks a culture of conflict resolution, let alone the necessary mechanisms of meaningful compromise. Such a culture can only be shaped through a process of democratization. Only democracies habitually resolve their conflicts through diplomacy rather than war, and only popular-based regimes possess the political strength and the moral will to build peace. This is why, unless we mean to consign the Middle East back to the “swamps” from which the United States, its allies, and the region’s reformers have been seeking to extricate it, democratization remains the only credible strategy in and for the “arc of crisis,” and the only hope for its suffering inhabitants.
Source
Quartet Goes Gaga Over Gaza
By David Singer
Gaza has all the trappings of a State except declared Statehood.
The 22 members of the Arab League and the Quartet - America, Russia, the United Nations and the European Union - have allowed this farce to continue for the last 18 months.
Gaza, larger in area than Malta, has a President, a Parliament, a Prime Minister, multiple police and security forces, a burgeoning bureaucracy, observers to every United Nations Committee you can think of, delegations to countries all around the world, a flag and an anthem and most important of all - not one Jew.
The 7000 Jews living in Gaza were forcibly removed from their homes and businesses 18 months ago. That they were so evicted by other Jews, supposedly for their own safety, is shameful. However given half a chance the Gazan Arabs would have done the job willingly They even boasted that it was their campaign of terror and violence that finally forced the Jews to leave.
Ethnic cleansing is apparently acceptable in international humanitarian law where Jews are the victims.
The violence against Jews has been replaced by the killing and intimidation of Gaza's now exclusively Arab citizenry, as Hamas and Fatah each battle to assert their authority over the other in an internecine struggle that shows no signs of abating.
The people without a land who had been yearning for a land for the last 40 years was suddenly in full possession and control of part of that land but just couldn't bring itself to utter the magic words of independence.
Figuratively speaking the jilted bride was left waiting at the mosque.
The occupation had ended, the occupiers had gone but the population acted as though nothing had changed.
There was no rejoicing and dancing in the streets, no hugs embraces and tears among the populace who now found themselves in full control of their destiny and self-determination.
There have been no exciting nation building programs implemented to give new direction and vision to Gaza's population.
Destruction, not creation, has become the buzzword in Gaza.
Sadly statehood is the last thing that Gaza wanted because it would put an end to the claim of statelessness, terminate the claim to refugee status by a large proportion of its population and signal the end of the perpetual financial support received from UNWRA since 1948.
Furthermore statehood might be taken to be an abandonment of further claims to any land that was formerly comprised in the Mandate of Palestine.
The reticence of the Arab League in these circumstances was misplaced. True, Statehood for Gaza would pull the rug from under the feet of this cartel and put pressure on it to end its refusal to recognize or negotiate with the State of Israel. But the League's policy of inaction and its' failure to call for statehood has seen Gaza's population become a killing field of ever growing proportions.
The Quartet however need not have been so coy. It had a different agenda aimed at solving "the Palestinian question" which it considered to be the most intractable problem in the Middle East.
The unexpected removal of all Jews from Gaza presented the Quartet with the opening it had been desperately seeking to take a giant step forward in solving this problem. Yet the Quartet faltered dismally in failing to demand that the Parliament in Gaza declare statehood within the boundaries that separate it from Israel and Egypt.
This single act could have been the circuit breaker towards ending 130 years of conflict resulting from competing claims by Jews and Arabs over the same land.
Instead the Quartet focused its efforts on attempting to achieve an overall rather than a partial solution to Arab claims in the West Bank and Gaza in fulfilment of its' misconceived Road Map aimed at misguidedly creating a third State in Mandatory Palestine between Israel and Jordan.
The Quartet has now paid the price for its' folly.
It has created a void into which Hamas has stepped making it impossible now to achieve statehood in Gaza until Hamas is removed from power.
The frantic shuttle diplomacy and endless meetings continue to be held . They achieve no positive outcome other than the accumulation of frequent flyer points for their participants.
Meanwhile the killing and mayhem in Gaza continue to head the news bulletins.
It is now time to call on Jordan and Egypt to play a constructive role in cleaning up the mess in Gaza, which is quickly sinking into the arms smuggling tunnels it has been so busily excavating under its very foundations.
The time for playing semantic word games, holding joint press conferences and grabbing photo opportunities is surely over.
David Singer is an Australian Lawyer and Convenor of Jordan is Palestine International - an organization calling for sovereignty of the West Bank and Gaza to be allocated between Israel and Jordan as the two successor States to the Mandate for Palestine.
Source
Gaza has all the trappings of a State except declared Statehood.
The 22 members of the Arab League and the Quartet - America, Russia, the United Nations and the European Union - have allowed this farce to continue for the last 18 months.
Gaza, larger in area than Malta, has a President, a Parliament, a Prime Minister, multiple police and security forces, a burgeoning bureaucracy, observers to every United Nations Committee you can think of, delegations to countries all around the world, a flag and an anthem and most important of all - not one Jew.
The 7000 Jews living in Gaza were forcibly removed from their homes and businesses 18 months ago. That they were so evicted by other Jews, supposedly for their own safety, is shameful. However given half a chance the Gazan Arabs would have done the job willingly They even boasted that it was their campaign of terror and violence that finally forced the Jews to leave.
Ethnic cleansing is apparently acceptable in international humanitarian law where Jews are the victims.
The violence against Jews has been replaced by the killing and intimidation of Gaza's now exclusively Arab citizenry, as Hamas and Fatah each battle to assert their authority over the other in an internecine struggle that shows no signs of abating.
The people without a land who had been yearning for a land for the last 40 years was suddenly in full possession and control of part of that land but just couldn't bring itself to utter the magic words of independence.
Figuratively speaking the jilted bride was left waiting at the mosque.
The occupation had ended, the occupiers had gone but the population acted as though nothing had changed.
There was no rejoicing and dancing in the streets, no hugs embraces and tears among the populace who now found themselves in full control of their destiny and self-determination.
There have been no exciting nation building programs implemented to give new direction and vision to Gaza's population.
Destruction, not creation, has become the buzzword in Gaza.
Sadly statehood is the last thing that Gaza wanted because it would put an end to the claim of statelessness, terminate the claim to refugee status by a large proportion of its population and signal the end of the perpetual financial support received from UNWRA since 1948.
Furthermore statehood might be taken to be an abandonment of further claims to any land that was formerly comprised in the Mandate of Palestine.
The reticence of the Arab League in these circumstances was misplaced. True, Statehood for Gaza would pull the rug from under the feet of this cartel and put pressure on it to end its refusal to recognize or negotiate with the State of Israel. But the League's policy of inaction and its' failure to call for statehood has seen Gaza's population become a killing field of ever growing proportions.
The Quartet however need not have been so coy. It had a different agenda aimed at solving "the Palestinian question" which it considered to be the most intractable problem in the Middle East.
The unexpected removal of all Jews from Gaza presented the Quartet with the opening it had been desperately seeking to take a giant step forward in solving this problem. Yet the Quartet faltered dismally in failing to demand that the Parliament in Gaza declare statehood within the boundaries that separate it from Israel and Egypt.
This single act could have been the circuit breaker towards ending 130 years of conflict resulting from competing claims by Jews and Arabs over the same land.
Instead the Quartet focused its efforts on attempting to achieve an overall rather than a partial solution to Arab claims in the West Bank and Gaza in fulfilment of its' misconceived Road Map aimed at misguidedly creating a third State in Mandatory Palestine between Israel and Jordan.
The Quartet has now paid the price for its' folly.
It has created a void into which Hamas has stepped making it impossible now to achieve statehood in Gaza until Hamas is removed from power.
The frantic shuttle diplomacy and endless meetings continue to be held . They achieve no positive outcome other than the accumulation of frequent flyer points for their participants.
Meanwhile the killing and mayhem in Gaza continue to head the news bulletins.
It is now time to call on Jordan and Egypt to play a constructive role in cleaning up the mess in Gaza, which is quickly sinking into the arms smuggling tunnels it has been so busily excavating under its very foundations.
The time for playing semantic word games, holding joint press conferences and grabbing photo opportunities is surely over.
David Singer is an Australian Lawyer and Convenor of Jordan is Palestine International - an organization calling for sovereignty of the West Bank and Gaza to be allocated between Israel and Jordan as the two successor States to the Mandate for Palestine.
Source
John Rambo on vacation
A tour bus of US senior citizens defended themselves against a group of alleged muggers, sending two of them fleeing and killing a third in the Atlantic coast city of Limon, Costa Rica police said on Thursday.
One of the tourists - a retired member of the US military - put assailant Warner Segura in a head lock and broke his clavicle after the 20-year-old and two other men armed with a knife and gun held up their tour bus Wednesday, said Luis Hernandez, the police chief of Limon, 130 kilometers (80 miles) east of San Jose.
The two other men fled when the 12 senior citizens started defending themselves. The tourists then drove Segura to the Red Cross where the man was declared dead. The Red Cross also treated one of the tourists for an anxiety attack, Hernandez said.
Source
One of the tourists - a retired member of the US military - put assailant Warner Segura in a head lock and broke his clavicle after the 20-year-old and two other men armed with a knife and gun held up their tour bus Wednesday, said Luis Hernandez, the police chief of Limon, 130 kilometers (80 miles) east of San Jose.
The two other men fled when the 12 senior citizens started defending themselves. The tourists then drove Segura to the Red Cross where the man was declared dead. The Red Cross also treated one of the tourists for an anxiety attack, Hernandez said.
Source
Have they sentenced themselves to death?
By Roni Singer Heruti
The murder of Hamda Abu-Ghanem, whose bullet-riddled body was found in mid-January at her parents' house in Ramle, surprised nobody.
As police set about their investigation, everyone was aware that the victim's brother had been threatening to kill her, and that long before the murder, she had taken refuge in a battered women's shelter.
It was a typical "honor killing," meant to remove some perceived stain on the family's reputation.
The perpetrators of most honor killings in the Arab community are not apprehended. Hamda's murder, however, was one too many for the women in the Abu-Ghanem family. She was the eighth woman to be murdered in the extended family in the last six and a half years. All her predecessors also lost their lives in "honor killings."
This time, instead of keeping mum when the police questioned them, the Abu- Ghanem women gave detailed testimonies of everything they knew. One said she had seen Rashad enter the house where Hamda was. Shortly afterward she heard shots and seconds later saw Rashad, the key suspect, fleeing from the building.
The victim's mother told the police that Rashad had forbidden his sister to leave
the house after some men had called her a "prostitute."
"It was a women's revolt against the men of the family. While the men refused to cooperate with the police and forbade the women to speak, the women revealed all. They decided to put an end to the bloody circle of silence," Chief Inspector Haim Shreibhand, who was in charge of the investigation, told Haaretz.
The detectives gathered testimonies from 20 Abu-Ghanem women and assembled the pieces of the puzzle together into an indictment, he said.
Kamal Rashad Abu-Ghanem, 30, was arraigned in Tel Aviv's District Court yesterday for murder. His cousin Mahmoud, who was also arrested, was released for lack of sufficient evidence to file charges.
Rashad Abu-Ghanem was charged with entering the family's home, in Ramle's Juarish neighborhood. His sister was alone in the house, lying on her bed. She probably knew she was about to die. He went up the stairs with a loaded 9-mm. handgun, entered his sister's room and fired nine bullets at her.
Before Hamda, the other women of the Abu-Ghanem family who lost their lives for honor were Naifa, Suzan, Zinat, Sabrin, Amira, Reem and Shirihan.
Like some of the other victims, Hamda had spent the last few years in a shelter, hiding from her brother. Her "crime" was apparently her numerous telephone conversations, and being seen talking to her cousin once.
About a year ago, she asked to move back to her parents' house in Ramle. A few months later, she filed a police complaint against her brother, who had assaulted her. He was arrested, but later released by the court.
"The hardest thing at these murder scenes is the awful silence," said Yifrah Duchovny, Coastal Plain police commander. "Nobody cries, nobody speaks."
"We held everyone who was in the neighborhood at the time of the murder for questioning, and started collecting testimonies. The first one who cooperated with us, perhaps without meaning to, was a relative who said the murder wasn't justified, that Hamda had not breached any honor. Then a female relative agreed with him," Shreibhand said.
The detectives told Hamda's mother, sisters and cousins what the first two relatives had said and asked for their opinion. "Gradually they started to speak. Each one started by saying she had had enough, that she didn't want this situation to continue. The mother, who had first stood behind her son, suddenly started speaking against him, sharing things she knew with us. She said she was angry that he had murdered her daughter."
Hamda's sisters went further. When they confronted Rashad at the police station they spat out at him: "You're a dog," and "Sit in prison for life, murderer." One of them asked him, "Why don't you try to murder me too? I'm not scared of you any more."
The men, on the other hand, hardly said a word to the police. "After the women began to talk, they found themselves receiving threats," said Shreibhand.
The witnesses have been put in safe houses, for fear the men would try to harm them. However, several women were not comfortable in the safe houses and are returning to the neighborhood. "The relations between the men and women in the family have become really tense. We've had special meetings about how to protect the women after they testify and we have a plan," the inspector said.
However, Aida Touma-Suleiman, director of the Women Against Violence group in the Arab sector, said she has grave fears for the women's lives. "I support these brave women. They finally broke the circle of blood and silence. But I'm also afraid they will be hurt. As long as there is no witness protection program, these women will be abandoned after they testify. They may have been courageous, but they have also sentenced themselves to death," she said.
Rashad Abu-Ghanem is represented by Attorney Giora Zilberstein.
Source
The murder of Hamda Abu-Ghanem, whose bullet-riddled body was found in mid-January at her parents' house in Ramle, surprised nobody.
As police set about their investigation, everyone was aware that the victim's brother had been threatening to kill her, and that long before the murder, she had taken refuge in a battered women's shelter.
It was a typical "honor killing," meant to remove some perceived stain on the family's reputation.
The perpetrators of most honor killings in the Arab community are not apprehended. Hamda's murder, however, was one too many for the women in the Abu-Ghanem family. She was the eighth woman to be murdered in the extended family in the last six and a half years. All her predecessors also lost their lives in "honor killings."
This time, instead of keeping mum when the police questioned them, the Abu- Ghanem women gave detailed testimonies of everything they knew. One said she had seen Rashad enter the house where Hamda was. Shortly afterward she heard shots and seconds later saw Rashad, the key suspect, fleeing from the building.
The victim's mother told the police that Rashad had forbidden his sister to leave
the house after some men had called her a "prostitute."
"It was a women's revolt against the men of the family. While the men refused to cooperate with the police and forbade the women to speak, the women revealed all. They decided to put an end to the bloody circle of silence," Chief Inspector Haim Shreibhand, who was in charge of the investigation, told Haaretz.
The detectives gathered testimonies from 20 Abu-Ghanem women and assembled the pieces of the puzzle together into an indictment, he said.
Kamal Rashad Abu-Ghanem, 30, was arraigned in Tel Aviv's District Court yesterday for murder. His cousin Mahmoud, who was also arrested, was released for lack of sufficient evidence to file charges.
Rashad Abu-Ghanem was charged with entering the family's home, in Ramle's Juarish neighborhood. His sister was alone in the house, lying on her bed. She probably knew she was about to die. He went up the stairs with a loaded 9-mm. handgun, entered his sister's room and fired nine bullets at her.
Before Hamda, the other women of the Abu-Ghanem family who lost their lives for honor were Naifa, Suzan, Zinat, Sabrin, Amira, Reem and Shirihan.
Like some of the other victims, Hamda had spent the last few years in a shelter, hiding from her brother. Her "crime" was apparently her numerous telephone conversations, and being seen talking to her cousin once.
About a year ago, she asked to move back to her parents' house in Ramle. A few months later, she filed a police complaint against her brother, who had assaulted her. He was arrested, but later released by the court.
"The hardest thing at these murder scenes is the awful silence," said Yifrah Duchovny, Coastal Plain police commander. "Nobody cries, nobody speaks."
"We held everyone who was in the neighborhood at the time of the murder for questioning, and started collecting testimonies. The first one who cooperated with us, perhaps without meaning to, was a relative who said the murder wasn't justified, that Hamda had not breached any honor. Then a female relative agreed with him," Shreibhand said.
The detectives told Hamda's mother, sisters and cousins what the first two relatives had said and asked for their opinion. "Gradually they started to speak. Each one started by saying she had had enough, that she didn't want this situation to continue. The mother, who had first stood behind her son, suddenly started speaking against him, sharing things she knew with us. She said she was angry that he had murdered her daughter."
Hamda's sisters went further. When they confronted Rashad at the police station they spat out at him: "You're a dog," and "Sit in prison for life, murderer." One of them asked him, "Why don't you try to murder me too? I'm not scared of you any more."
The men, on the other hand, hardly said a word to the police. "After the women began to talk, they found themselves receiving threats," said Shreibhand.
The witnesses have been put in safe houses, for fear the men would try to harm them. However, several women were not comfortable in the safe houses and are returning to the neighborhood. "The relations between the men and women in the family have become really tense. We've had special meetings about how to protect the women after they testify and we have a plan," the inspector said.
However, Aida Touma-Suleiman, director of the Women Against Violence group in the Arab sector, said she has grave fears for the women's lives. "I support these brave women. They finally broke the circle of blood and silence. But I'm also afraid they will be hurt. As long as there is no witness protection program, these women will be abandoned after they testify. They may have been courageous, but they have also sentenced themselves to death," she said.
Rashad Abu-Ghanem is represented by Attorney Giora Zilberstein.
Source
Say no to condoms, say yes to brit mila
LONDON - In an "extraordinary development" in the fight against
AIDS, a medical journal article published Friday says that conclusive data shows there is no question circumcision reduces men's chances of catching
HIV by up to 60 percent.
ADVERTISEMENT
The question now is how to put that fact to work to combat AIDS across Africa.
The findings were first announced in December, when initial results from two major trials — in Kenya and Uganda — showed promising links between circumcision and HIV transmission. However, those trials were deemed so definitive that the tests were halted early.
The full data from the trials, carried out by the U.S.
National Institutes of Health, were published Friday in The Lancet.
"This is an extraordinary development," said Dr. Kevin de Cock, director of the
World Health Organization's AIDS department. "Circumcision is the most potent intervention in HIV prevention that has been described."
Circumcision has long been suspected of reducing men's susceptibility to HIV infection because the cells in the foreskin of the penis are especially vulnerable to the virus.
A modeling study last year projected that in the next decade, male circumcision could prevent 2 million AIDS infections and 300,000 deaths. Last year, 2.8 million people in sub-Saharan Africa became infected with HIV, and 2.1 million people died.
Experts say the breakthrough's significance is on par with the identification of the virus and the use of lifesaving combination drug therapy.
The two U.S. studies confirm similar results from an earlier trial in South Africa.
But experts warn that solid evidence is not justification for mass circumcisions, noting that African health systems are already overburdened, and circumcision requires more planning than, for example, an immunization campaign.
"It's a tricky one, but it's something we're going to have to move on," said Dr. Catherine Hankins, a scientific adviser at
UNAIDS. "Male circumcision is such a sensitive religious and cultural issue that we need to be careful."
Several African countries have met with U.N. agencies to explore strategies for increasing circumcision.
Together with the
United Nations AIDS agency, WHO is convening a meeting in Switzerland in March to evaluate the data and decide the next steps in slowing the AIDS pandemic.
In the Kenyan study, 1,391 circumcised men were compared to 1,393 who were not. And in Uganda, 2,474 circumcised men were compared to 2,522 men who were not. Scientists tracked the men for two years and found that those who were circumcised were 51-60 percent less likely to contract HIV.
Source
AIDS, a medical journal article published Friday says that conclusive data shows there is no question circumcision reduces men's chances of catching
HIV by up to 60 percent.
ADVERTISEMENT
The question now is how to put that fact to work to combat AIDS across Africa.
The findings were first announced in December, when initial results from two major trials — in Kenya and Uganda — showed promising links between circumcision and HIV transmission. However, those trials were deemed so definitive that the tests were halted early.
The full data from the trials, carried out by the U.S.
National Institutes of Health, were published Friday in The Lancet.
"This is an extraordinary development," said Dr. Kevin de Cock, director of the
World Health Organization's AIDS department. "Circumcision is the most potent intervention in HIV prevention that has been described."
Circumcision has long been suspected of reducing men's susceptibility to HIV infection because the cells in the foreskin of the penis are especially vulnerable to the virus.
A modeling study last year projected that in the next decade, male circumcision could prevent 2 million AIDS infections and 300,000 deaths. Last year, 2.8 million people in sub-Saharan Africa became infected with HIV, and 2.1 million people died.
Experts say the breakthrough's significance is on par with the identification of the virus and the use of lifesaving combination drug therapy.
The two U.S. studies confirm similar results from an earlier trial in South Africa.
But experts warn that solid evidence is not justification for mass circumcisions, noting that African health systems are already overburdened, and circumcision requires more planning than, for example, an immunization campaign.
"It's a tricky one, but it's something we're going to have to move on," said Dr. Catherine Hankins, a scientific adviser at
UNAIDS. "Male circumcision is such a sensitive religious and cultural issue that we need to be careful."
Several African countries have met with U.N. agencies to explore strategies for increasing circumcision.
Together with the
United Nations AIDS agency, WHO is convening a meeting in Switzerland in March to evaluate the data and decide the next steps in slowing the AIDS pandemic.
In the Kenyan study, 1,391 circumcised men were compared to 1,393 who were not. And in Uganda, 2,474 circumcised men were compared to 2,522 men who were not. Scientists tracked the men for two years and found that those who were circumcised were 51-60 percent less likely to contract HIV.
Source
Nasrallah: thank Allah for Amir Peretz
Israeli newspapers have printed photos of Defence Minister Amir Peretz trying to watch military manoeuvres through binoculars with the lens caps still on.
Mr Peretz was inspecting troops in the Golan Heights with the Israeli army's new chief of staff, Gen Gabi Ashkenazi.
According to the photographer, Mr Peretz looked through the capped binoculars three times, nodding as Gen Ashkenazi explained what was in view.
Analysts say it is a new blow for the embattled defence minister.
Mr Peretz's popularity has fallen in the wake of last year's war against Hezbollah militants in Lebanon.
But one Israeli paper pointed out that he is not the first prominent official to make this mistake.
According to daily Yediot Ahronot, US President George W Bush and former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon have both done the same thing.
Source
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Palestinians are the largest recipients of aid in the world
It’s not that the Palestinians have been subjected to any cut in aid - quite the contrary: As the United Nations under-secretary general for political affairs reported on the recent anniversary of Hamas' election victory, international aid to the Palestinians increased in 2006 by nearly 10 percent, amounting to a staggering $1.2 billion. Indeed, Palestinians are today the largest per capita recipients of foreign aid in the world.
Source
So why are they hungry?
Source
So why are they hungry?
Half of Palestinians in West Bank and Gaza malnourished
By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem
Published: 22 February 2007
Around 46 per cent of Gaza and West Bank households are "food insecure" or in danger of becoming so, according to a UN report on the impact of conflict and the global boycott of the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority.
The unpublished draft report, the first of its kind since the boycott was imposed when the Hamas government took office last March, says bluntly that the problem "is primarily a function of restricted economic access to food resulting from ongoing political conditions".
The report, jointly produced by the UN's World Food Programme and the Food and Agriculture Organisation, paints a bleak picture of the impact on food consumption and expenditure throughout the occupied Palestinian territories. It says that the situation is "more grim" in Gaza where four out of five families have reduced their spending - including on food - in the first quarter of last year alone.
The report acknowledges that "traditionally strong ties" among Palestinian families tend to reduce the possibility of "acute household hunger". But it warns that against a background of decreasing food security since the beginning of the Intifada since 2000 and the loss of PA salaries because of the boycott there are now "growing concerns about the sustainability of Palestinians' resilience".
The report is the latest of a series detailing deepening Palestinian poverty as a result of both closures blocking exports from Gaza and the international and Israeli boycott of the PA. Its timing is especially sensitive, coming to light after both Israel and the US indicated that they will maintain the boycott after the planned Fatah Hamas coalition cabinet takes office unless it clearly commits itself to recognition of Israel, renunciation of violence and adherence to previous agreements with Israel.
The UN report says 34 per cent of households - with income below $1.68 per day and/or showing decreasing food expenditures - are "food insecure" . The WFP officially defines "food security" as "the ability of a household to produce and/or access at all times the minimum food needed for a healthy and active life". It goes on to say that 12 per cent of households are "vulnerable" to food insecurity.
The report acknowledges that the findings are broadly similar to those - albeit estimated on a different basis - at the peak of the Israeli Palestinian conflict in 2003 but points out that the number of Palestinians suffering, including children, are much higher because of rapid population growth
While recognising that "significant per capita humanitarian aid" is helping to contain the problem, the report points out that some action taken by families to continue to feed themselves - including the sale of land, jewellery and other assets" - will have an "irreversible impact on livelihoods". It also points out that limitations to PA budget support, the private sector and job programmes because of the boycott are likely to exacerbate Palestinians' dependency on humanitarian assistance and postpone sustainable improvement."
Pointing out that Palestinian families have been caught between rises in food prices - partly because of interrupted supplies through closures - and rapidly falling incomes, it details changes to diet by many to ensure enough to eat. These include reductions in consumption of fruits, sweets, olive oil, and - normally a staple in Gaza - fish.
The report also indicates that for other families - including "new poor" suffering from loss of PA incomes - there has been a "decrease in the quality of and/or quantity of food consumed."
The UN report comes against a background in which a 2004 survey of Palestinian households showed a "slow but steady" growth in actual malnutrition - as measured by reduced growth, vitamin deficiencies, anaemia and other indicators - among a minority of the population. The 2004 survey found "stunting" rates of abnormal height-to-body ratio at just under 10 per cent.
Source
Published: 22 February 2007
Around 46 per cent of Gaza and West Bank households are "food insecure" or in danger of becoming so, according to a UN report on the impact of conflict and the global boycott of the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority.
The unpublished draft report, the first of its kind since the boycott was imposed when the Hamas government took office last March, says bluntly that the problem "is primarily a function of restricted economic access to food resulting from ongoing political conditions".
The report, jointly produced by the UN's World Food Programme and the Food and Agriculture Organisation, paints a bleak picture of the impact on food consumption and expenditure throughout the occupied Palestinian territories. It says that the situation is "more grim" in Gaza where four out of five families have reduced their spending - including on food - in the first quarter of last year alone.
The report acknowledges that "traditionally strong ties" among Palestinian families tend to reduce the possibility of "acute household hunger". But it warns that against a background of decreasing food security since the beginning of the Intifada since 2000 and the loss of PA salaries because of the boycott there are now "growing concerns about the sustainability of Palestinians' resilience".
The report is the latest of a series detailing deepening Palestinian poverty as a result of both closures blocking exports from Gaza and the international and Israeli boycott of the PA. Its timing is especially sensitive, coming to light after both Israel and the US indicated that they will maintain the boycott after the planned Fatah Hamas coalition cabinet takes office unless it clearly commits itself to recognition of Israel, renunciation of violence and adherence to previous agreements with Israel.
The UN report says 34 per cent of households - with income below $1.68 per day and/or showing decreasing food expenditures - are "food insecure" . The WFP officially defines "food security" as "the ability of a household to produce and/or access at all times the minimum food needed for a healthy and active life". It goes on to say that 12 per cent of households are "vulnerable" to food insecurity.
The report acknowledges that the findings are broadly similar to those - albeit estimated on a different basis - at the peak of the Israeli Palestinian conflict in 2003 but points out that the number of Palestinians suffering, including children, are much higher because of rapid population growth
While recognising that "significant per capita humanitarian aid" is helping to contain the problem, the report points out that some action taken by families to continue to feed themselves - including the sale of land, jewellery and other assets" - will have an "irreversible impact on livelihoods". It also points out that limitations to PA budget support, the private sector and job programmes because of the boycott are likely to exacerbate Palestinians' dependency on humanitarian assistance and postpone sustainable improvement."
Pointing out that Palestinian families have been caught between rises in food prices - partly because of interrupted supplies through closures - and rapidly falling incomes, it details changes to diet by many to ensure enough to eat. These include reductions in consumption of fruits, sweets, olive oil, and - normally a staple in Gaza - fish.
The report also indicates that for other families - including "new poor" suffering from loss of PA incomes - there has been a "decrease in the quality of and/or quantity of food consumed."
The UN report comes against a background in which a 2004 survey of Palestinian households showed a "slow but steady" growth in actual malnutrition - as measured by reduced growth, vitamin deficiencies, anaemia and other indicators - among a minority of the population. The 2004 survey found "stunting" rates of abnormal height-to-body ratio at just under 10 per cent.
Source
Lawrence of Arabia was a Zionist
Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas Ed-ward Lawrence - better known as "Lawrence of Arabia" - and renowned as a champion of Arab independence, actually had "a sort of contempt for the Arabs" and was an advocate of Jewish statehood from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, according to acclaimed British historian Sir Martin Gilbert.
Lawrence believed that only with a sovereign Jewish entity in the area would the Arabs "ever make anything of themselves," according to Gilbert.
T.E. Lawrence, immortalized on film by Peter O'Toole, fought with Arab irregulars against the Ottoman Empire in World War I, wore Arabian clothes and adopted many Arab customs. He is widely perceived, Gilbert told The Jerusalem Post this week, as "the great Arabist, right? The man who supported the Arabs, and who pushed for Arab nationhood in the 1920s. He's always pictured wearing Arab robes."
The "astonishing" truth, however, Gilbert went on, is that Lawrence was "a serious Zionist. He believed that the only hope for the Arabs of Palestine and the rest of the region was Jewish statehood - that if the Jews had a state here, they would provide the modernity, the 'leaven,' as he put it, with which to enable the Arabs to move into the 20th century."
Gilbert, who said he had written about this issue in his forthcoming book, Churchill and the Jews, went so far as to say that Lawrence "had a sort of contempt for the Arabs, actually."
"He felt that only with a Jewish presence and state would the Arabs ever make anything of themselves. And, by a Jewish state, he meant a Jewish state from the Mediterranean shore to the River Jordan," said Gilbert, adding his own comment that this "will never come to pass."
Gilbert, in Israel for the International Book Fair, described his discovery of Lawrence's Zionist orientation as the most surprising archival revelation he had come across from an Israeli perspective.
But he stressed that archival sources consistently showed major discrepancies between what is really going on in world affairs and the inaccurate way in which events and personalities are perceived at the time.
"As a historian, I'm very cautious about anyone's claiming to know what any government is doing at the present time," he said. "I study archives as soon as they are open - normally 30 years after an event; sometimes a bit less. What you see when you do this is that the people you imagined had been strong were weak; the people you thought weak were strong; and things you thought couldn't possibly be taking place were taking place."
(The full interview with Sir Martin Gilbert appears in Friday's UpFront magazine.)
Source
Lawrence believed that only with a sovereign Jewish entity in the area would the Arabs "ever make anything of themselves," according to Gilbert.
T.E. Lawrence, immortalized on film by Peter O'Toole, fought with Arab irregulars against the Ottoman Empire in World War I, wore Arabian clothes and adopted many Arab customs. He is widely perceived, Gilbert told The Jerusalem Post this week, as "the great Arabist, right? The man who supported the Arabs, and who pushed for Arab nationhood in the 1920s. He's always pictured wearing Arab robes."
The "astonishing" truth, however, Gilbert went on, is that Lawrence was "a serious Zionist. He believed that the only hope for the Arabs of Palestine and the rest of the region was Jewish statehood - that if the Jews had a state here, they would provide the modernity, the 'leaven,' as he put it, with which to enable the Arabs to move into the 20th century."
Gilbert, who said he had written about this issue in his forthcoming book, Churchill and the Jews, went so far as to say that Lawrence "had a sort of contempt for the Arabs, actually."
"He felt that only with a Jewish presence and state would the Arabs ever make anything of themselves. And, by a Jewish state, he meant a Jewish state from the Mediterranean shore to the River Jordan," said Gilbert, adding his own comment that this "will never come to pass."
Gilbert, in Israel for the International Book Fair, described his discovery of Lawrence's Zionist orientation as the most surprising archival revelation he had come across from an Israeli perspective.
But he stressed that archival sources consistently showed major discrepancies between what is really going on in world affairs and the inaccurate way in which events and personalities are perceived at the time.
"As a historian, I'm very cautious about anyone's claiming to know what any government is doing at the present time," he said. "I study archives as soon as they are open - normally 30 years after an event; sometimes a bit less. What you see when you do this is that the people you imagined had been strong were weak; the people you thought weak were strong; and things you thought couldn't possibly be taking place were taking place."
(The full interview with Sir Martin Gilbert appears in Friday's UpFront magazine.)
Source
Official antisemitism erupts in Venezuela
Armed police raided the Jewish elementary and high school at the Jewish Cultural Centre in Caracas on 29 November 2004 implementing a court order that alleged that materials of a criminal nature, such as electronic equipment, arms and explosive devices were concealed in the building.
The swoop started at 6.30 am, when school buses and parents had already started to bringing children to the school, but, after rooting through the building for three hours, the police left having found zilch. The court order, it has since been revealed, had been issued three days earlier but the police waited until Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez, arrived in Teheran for a state visit to Iran.
That was two years ago, but things have only got worse in the intervening period. Indeed, since election of the left-wing populist Chavez in 1998, Venezuela has witnessed a proliferation of virulently anti-Israel and anti-Zionist propaganda, frequently entwined with nakedly anti-Jewish slogans.
The Jewish population in Venezuela numbers only around 25,000 out of a total population of close to twenty-seven million. So, why does the official media of a government that claims to be socialist, devote its energy to poisonous attacks on a very small Jewish community?
One possible explanation given is the fact, that one of Chavez’s important early advisers and political mentors was a – now deceased – Argentine Holocaust denier called Norberto Ceresole, a friend of the French fascist Robert Faurisson and the French ex-Communist Roger Garaudy who converted to Islam and also took up Holocaust denial. Ceresole strongly believed that Latin America must forge alliances with Arab nations to fight the United States and what he called “the Jewish financial mafia.â€
The tendencies towards distortion of the Holocaust might, further, be explained partly against the background of the increasingly close relationship between oil-rich Venezuela and Iran and other Muslim countries. As such, this kind of nonsense has been incorporated into the Chavez government’s anti-imperialist rhetoric with Israel is viewed as a key factor in US politics and, thus, an enemy of the ‘anti-imperialist revolution’.
Antisemitic ranting is not confined to government circles but is spread throughout the mass media. For example, in the Diario VEA newspaper, as recently as 20 September, the hardcore antisemite Basem Tajeldine raved: “The Holocaust perpetrated by the Nazis was directed to eliminate the social basis of Judaism that believed in assimilation with the Europeans, the low class majority of Jews … The ideological affinity and the great ties of collaboration that existed between German Zionism and Nazism is undeniable … Sionazis is the most appropriate term to catalogue (sic) the organisation of the political capitalist Jewish elite of Israel that is responsible for the present Holocaust of the Arab peopleâ€.
Similarly in El Diario de Caracas earlier this year, Tarek Muci Nasir claims that “The only resource they [the Jews – Editor] have left to stay united, is to cause wars and self- genocide,†Nasir goes on to urge that his readers “pay attention to the behaviour of the Israelite-Zionist associations, unions and federations that conspire in Venezuela to seize our finances, industries, commerce, construction, even infiltrating public positions and politics†and warns that “Possibly it will again be necessary to expel them from the country, like other nations have done before… this is the reason why the Jews are always in a continuous stateless exodus and thus in the year 1948 they invaded Palestine.â€
Commenting on the September visit to Caracas by Iranian’s fanatic president Ahmadinejad, Freddy Pressner, head of the Confederation of Jewish Associations of Venezuela, expressed “outrageâ€, citing the Iranian leader’s open denial of the Holocaust and his statements about erasing Israel from the face of planet. Chavez’s bloc with Iran is making Venezuelan Jews worry about their own security for the first time.
Sammy Eppel, a Caracas-based columnist, addressed the deepening antisemitism in Venezuela in his presentation at a recent conference, in Budapest, of the Tel Aviv University-based Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism and Racism. In his lecture, he revealed that he had found no fewer than 195 examples of antisemitic content in the official and pro-government media in a 65-day period ending on 31 August 2006.
Among slides shown by Eppel was one depicting the front page of a government publication called Docencia (Teaching) which denounced the “Jewish killers†perpetrating the war in the Lebanon and which conflates the Star of David with the Nazi swastika, Eppel pointed out that, until a few years ago, “there were hardly any antisemitic articles†in the Venezuelan media and that “the government has adopted an antisemitic policy.â€
At meetings between Jewish community leaders and top-level government officials, including Chavez himself, the government, according to Pressner, has bleated that its hands are tied, saying, “We’ll do what we can, but we can’t deny people freedom of speech.â€
The antisemitism evident even in the political cartoons published in government-owned newspapers is now finding explosive expression at street level. For example, antisemitic slogans, bearing the “signature†of the Venezuelan Communist Party and its youth organisation, have even been sprayed on the walls of the Jewish Cultural Centre in Caracas in broad daylight. The perpetrators were filmed on CCTV but when a complaint was lodged with the police and interior ministry nothing happened.
It is clear beyond any question that under Chavez’s leadership, Venezuela is experiencing a disturbing rise in antisemitism, fostered in large part by Chavez’s own rhetoric and that of governmental institutions. The relentless and baseless attacks on the Jewish community are now putting it at great risk.
Karl Pfeifer
A number of images from Sammy Eppel's presentation are available online, here. It is well worth a look. Just click on the images for the slide-show to progress.
Source
The swoop started at 6.30 am, when school buses and parents had already started to bringing children to the school, but, after rooting through the building for three hours, the police left having found zilch. The court order, it has since been revealed, had been issued three days earlier but the police waited until Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez, arrived in Teheran for a state visit to Iran.
That was two years ago, but things have only got worse in the intervening period. Indeed, since election of the left-wing populist Chavez in 1998, Venezuela has witnessed a proliferation of virulently anti-Israel and anti-Zionist propaganda, frequently entwined with nakedly anti-Jewish slogans.
The Jewish population in Venezuela numbers only around 25,000 out of a total population of close to twenty-seven million. So, why does the official media of a government that claims to be socialist, devote its energy to poisonous attacks on a very small Jewish community?
One possible explanation given is the fact, that one of Chavez’s important early advisers and political mentors was a – now deceased – Argentine Holocaust denier called Norberto Ceresole, a friend of the French fascist Robert Faurisson and the French ex-Communist Roger Garaudy who converted to Islam and also took up Holocaust denial. Ceresole strongly believed that Latin America must forge alliances with Arab nations to fight the United States and what he called “the Jewish financial mafia.â€
The tendencies towards distortion of the Holocaust might, further, be explained partly against the background of the increasingly close relationship between oil-rich Venezuela and Iran and other Muslim countries. As such, this kind of nonsense has been incorporated into the Chavez government’s anti-imperialist rhetoric with Israel is viewed as a key factor in US politics and, thus, an enemy of the ‘anti-imperialist revolution’.
Antisemitic ranting is not confined to government circles but is spread throughout the mass media. For example, in the Diario VEA newspaper, as recently as 20 September, the hardcore antisemite Basem Tajeldine raved: “The Holocaust perpetrated by the Nazis was directed to eliminate the social basis of Judaism that believed in assimilation with the Europeans, the low class majority of Jews … The ideological affinity and the great ties of collaboration that existed between German Zionism and Nazism is undeniable … Sionazis is the most appropriate term to catalogue (sic) the organisation of the political capitalist Jewish elite of Israel that is responsible for the present Holocaust of the Arab peopleâ€.
Similarly in El Diario de Caracas earlier this year, Tarek Muci Nasir claims that “The only resource they [the Jews – Editor] have left to stay united, is to cause wars and self- genocide,†Nasir goes on to urge that his readers “pay attention to the behaviour of the Israelite-Zionist associations, unions and federations that conspire in Venezuela to seize our finances, industries, commerce, construction, even infiltrating public positions and politics†and warns that “Possibly it will again be necessary to expel them from the country, like other nations have done before… this is the reason why the Jews are always in a continuous stateless exodus and thus in the year 1948 they invaded Palestine.â€
Commenting on the September visit to Caracas by Iranian’s fanatic president Ahmadinejad, Freddy Pressner, head of the Confederation of Jewish Associations of Venezuela, expressed “outrageâ€, citing the Iranian leader’s open denial of the Holocaust and his statements about erasing Israel from the face of planet. Chavez’s bloc with Iran is making Venezuelan Jews worry about their own security for the first time.
Sammy Eppel, a Caracas-based columnist, addressed the deepening antisemitism in Venezuela in his presentation at a recent conference, in Budapest, of the Tel Aviv University-based Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism and Racism. In his lecture, he revealed that he had found no fewer than 195 examples of antisemitic content in the official and pro-government media in a 65-day period ending on 31 August 2006.
Among slides shown by Eppel was one depicting the front page of a government publication called Docencia (Teaching) which denounced the “Jewish killers†perpetrating the war in the Lebanon and which conflates the Star of David with the Nazi swastika, Eppel pointed out that, until a few years ago, “there were hardly any antisemitic articles†in the Venezuelan media and that “the government has adopted an antisemitic policy.â€
At meetings between Jewish community leaders and top-level government officials, including Chavez himself, the government, according to Pressner, has bleated that its hands are tied, saying, “We’ll do what we can, but we can’t deny people freedom of speech.â€
The antisemitism evident even in the political cartoons published in government-owned newspapers is now finding explosive expression at street level. For example, antisemitic slogans, bearing the “signature†of the Venezuelan Communist Party and its youth organisation, have even been sprayed on the walls of the Jewish Cultural Centre in Caracas in broad daylight. The perpetrators were filmed on CCTV but when a complaint was lodged with the police and interior ministry nothing happened.
It is clear beyond any question that under Chavez’s leadership, Venezuela is experiencing a disturbing rise in antisemitism, fostered in large part by Chavez’s own rhetoric and that of governmental institutions. The relentless and baseless attacks on the Jewish community are now putting it at great risk.
Karl Pfeifer
A number of images from Sammy Eppel's presentation are available online, here. It is well worth a look. Just click on the images for the slide-show to progress.
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