Thousands rally against Putin, dozens detained

Aydar Buribayev

MOSCOW

(Reuters) – Russian police broke up an opposition demonstration in Moscow on Saturday, one of around 50 rallies across the country with thousands protesting falling living standards under Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

A coalition of opposition groups declared a national “Day of Anger” with nationwide rallies tapping into anger which has been rising since the economic crisis hit. The protests mixed local issues with anger at the federal government.

Opposition groups have been heartened by unusually large rallies in recent months. But riven by division they were unable to match the 10,000 people who gathered for a January rally in the western city of Kaliningrad, one of the largest in a decade.

“The mood has changed, but it has not yet turned into a movement,” said Masha Lipman, an analyst with the Carnegie Moscow Center think-tank. But for the micro-managers in the Kremlin “the stakes are extremely high,” she said.

At least 1,500 people turned out in the Pacific port of Vladivostok, raising their hands to support a motion to dismiss Putin’s government. Around 1,000 rallied in Saint Petersburg and hundreds gathered in several other cities.

“People have no work and they are fed up,” said Ivan Fotodtov, 26, a Vladivostok web designer who braved snow to protest rising bills cutting into his stagnant wages.

Local elections last week showed support for Putin’s United Russia party has fallen since the start of the economic crisis, which brought a sudden end to 10 years of growth and drove unemployment above 9 percent. Last year, gross domestic product fell by about 8 percent, Russia’s worst performance since 1994.

DETENTIONS

In the capital, hundreds of police officers blocked off the central Pushkin Square and detained dozens of protesters when they began to chant, shouting “Freedom!” and “This is our city!”

A Moscow police spokesman said 70 people were detained after 200 tried to hold an unsanctioned rally.

U.S. Senator John McCain on Thursday warned that Saturday’s protests were a test of the Kremlin’s tolerance for dissent. “The eyes of the world will be watching,” he said at the Senate.

In Kaliningrad, organizers of the January rally said they decided to cancel a demonstration on Saturday after authorities offered talks and hinted that police would break up the protest. A coalition of opposition parties split since the first rally.

Some 2,000 people gathered without placards near the site of the January protest, but quickly dispersed in heavy rain.

Protesters across the country had a dizzying array of demands, but they were united in their anger at the ruling United Russia party.

One poster in Vladivostok called for “Free Speech, Free Elections!” while others demanded more funding for children’s sports and lower household bills. A poster calling for Putin to kill himself was quickly torn down by other protesters.

Around 1,000 people gathered in the Siberian city of Irkutsk to decry Putin’s decision to reopen a factory that locals say pollutes Lake Baikal. The crowd cheered as opposition leader Boris Nemtsov called on Putin to quit.

“Yes to Baikal, No to Putin,” chanted Nemtsov, the leader of the opposition Solidarity movement, which has been criticized for hijacking local protests.

“Each region has its own issues, but everyone sees their lives are getting worse,” Nemtsov told Reuters. “The protests are only going to grow.”

(Additional reporting by Dmitry Solovyov; Writing by Conor Humphries; Editing by Jon Hemming)

Mideast Quartet ‘strongly supports’ Palestinian state: Ban

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon • • • RAMALLAH, West Bank : UN chief Ban Ki-moon on Saturday said the international community “strongly supports” Palestinian efforts to build a viable state at the start of a visit aimed at reviving peace talks. He kicked off his two-day visit by meeting Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad in the West Bank political capital of Ramallah and praising his plan to build the institutions of an independent Palestinian state by mid-2011. Ban is also expected to meet senior Israeli officials and to visit the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, still largely in ruins following a 22-day Israeli military campaign launched in December 2008. Ban arrived in Ramallah a day after the Middle East diplomatic Quartet called for Israel to halt all settlement construction and for both sides to reach a peace deal by 2012. “The Quartet has sent a clear and strong message: we are strongly supporting your efforts to establish an independent and viable Palestinian state,” he told Fayyad ahead of the formal talks. At a joint press conference after the meeting Ban called on both sides to revive talks suspended after the start of the Gaza war, saying “we have to get negotiations under way”. The Palestinians grudgingly agreed to US-led indirect talks earlier this month but those efforts largely fell apart two days later when Israel announced plans to build 1,600 new settler homes in mostly Arab east Jerusalem. Ban “condemned strongly” the decision to build the homes and warned that, “for the negotiations to succeed, it is vital that the parties act responsibly on the ground. “All settlement activity is illegal anywhere in the occupied territories, and this must stop,” he said. Fayyad had earlier taken Ban to a vantage point outside Ramallah to show him a large swathe of West Bank territory known as Area C which is under exclusive Israeli control and off limits to Palestinian development. From the observation point, Ban could see Israel’s controversial separation fence, a Jewish settlement and the skyline of Jerusalem, where the Palestinians hope to locate their future capital. “The visit to Area C was an opportunity for the secretary general to see the difficulties that we face on a daily basis in our efforts to develop and build in preparation for our state,” Fayyad said at the press conference. As part of his state-building plan, Fayyad has vowed to establish “positive facts on the ground” in Area C, which he said makes up some 60 per cent of the occupied West Bank. Fayyad, a former World Bank economist, hailed the Quartet’s statement as “positive and comprehensive”, but said more must be done, including allowing Palestinian security forces to operate throughout the West Bank. On Friday, the Quartet (the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States) issued an ambitious statement after a meeting of senior officials in Moscow aimed at getting moribund peace talks back on track. “The Quartet urges the government of Israel to freeze all settlement activity … to dismantle outposts erected since March 2001 and to refrain from demolitions and evictions in east Jerusalem,” it said. It also urged Israel and the Palestinians to resume talks on final status issues – security, borders, the fate of Palestinian refugees and the status of Jerusalem – and to reach a peace deal within 24 months. Israel has criticised the deadline, with Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman insisting that “peace cannot be imposed artificially and with an unrealistic calendar” during an address in Brussels. “This type of statement only harms the possibilities of reaching an accord.” Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat welcomed the Quartet’s call, but asked for a mechanism to insure a complete settlement freeze. The Palestinians have demanded the freeze apply to mostly Arab east Jerusalem, which Israel seized in the 1967 Six Day War and unilaterally annexed in a move not recognised by any other government. Israel’s announcement regarding the 1,600 new homes in east Jerusalem infuriated the United States, in part because it coincided with a visit by US Vice President Joe Biden. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has since discussed the matter directly with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and on Friday Clinton insisted that the strong US reaction was “paying off”. – AFP/ms

The dark face of Jewish nationalism

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By Dr Alan Sabrosky

12 March 2010

Alan Sabrosky considers the characteristics that differentiate Jewish nationalism from other nationalisms, highlighting in particular its intrinsic extremism, its xenophobia, racism and militarism, its undermining of civic loyalty among its adherents in other countries and its propensity to hatred and racial exclusivity.

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu once remarked to a Likud gathering that “Israel is not like other countries”. Oddly enough for him, that time he was telling the truth, and nowhere is that more evident than with Jewish nationalism, whether or not one pins the “Zionist” label on it.

“…whereas extremism in other nationalist movements is an aberration, extremism in Jewish nationalism is the norm, pitting Zionist Jews (secular or observant) against the goyim(everyone else)…”

Nationalism in most countries and cultures can have both positive and negative aspects, unifying a people and sometimes leading them against their neighbours. Extremism can emerge, and often has, at least in part in almost every nationalist/independence movement I can recall (e.g. the French nationalist movement had The Terror, Kenya’s had the Mau Mau, etc.).

But whereas extremism in other nationalist movements is an aberration, extremism in Jewish nationalism is the norm, pitting Zionist Jews (secular or observant) against the goyim (everyone else), who are either possible predator or certain prey, if not both sequentially. This does not mean that all Jews or all Israelis feel and act this way, by any means. But it does mean that Israel today is what it cannot avoid being, and what it would be under any electable government (a point I’ll develop in another article).

The differences between Jewish nationalism (Zionism) and that of other countries and cultures here I think are fourfold:

1. Zionism is a real witches’ brew of xenophobia, racism, ultra-nationalism and militarism that places it way outside of a “mere” nationalist context — for example, when I was in Ireland (both parts) I saw no indication whatsoever that the Provisional Irish Republican Army or anyone else pressing for a united Ireland had a shred of design on shoving Protestants into camps or out of the country, although there may well have been a handful who thought that way — and goes far beyond the misery for others professed by the Nazis;

2. Zionism undermines civic loyalty among its adherents in other countries in a way that other nationalist movements (and even ultra-nationalist movements like Nazism) did not — e.g. a large majority of American Jews, including those who are not openly dual citizens, espouse a form of political bigamy called “dual loyalty” (to Israel and the US) that is every bit as dishonest as marital bigamy, attempts to finesse the precedence they give to Israel over the US (lots of Rahm Emanuels out there who served in the Israeli army but NOT in the US armed forces), and has absolutely no parallel in the sense of national or cultural identity espoused by any other definable ethnic or racial group in America — even the Nazi Bund in the US disappeared once Germany and the US went to war, with almost all of its members volunteering for the US armed forces;

3. The “enemy” of normal nationalist movements is the occupying power and perhaps its allies, and once independence is achieved, normal relations with the occupying power are truly the norm, but for Zionism almost everyone out there is an actual or potential enemy, differing only in proximity and placement on its very long list of enemies (which is now America’s target list); and

4. Almost all nationalist movements (including the irredentist and secessionist variants) intend to create an independent state from a population in place or to reunite a separated people (like the Sudeten Germans in the 1930s) — it is very rare for it to include the wholesale displacement of another indigenous population, which is far more common of successful colonialist movements as in the US — and perhaps a reason why most Americans wouldn’t care too much about what the Israelis are doing to the Palestinians even if they DID know about it, is because that is no different than what Europeans in North America did to the Indians/Native Americans here in a longer and more low-tech fashion.

The implications of this for Middle East peace prospects, and for other countries in thrall to their domestic Jewish lobbies or not, are chilling. The Book of Deuteronomy come to life in a state with a nuclear arsenal would be enough to give pause to anyone not bought or bribed into submission — which these days encompasses the US government, given Israel’s affinity for throwing crap into the face of the Obama administration and Obama’s visible affinity for accepting it with a smile, Bibi Netanyahu’s own “Uncle Tom” come to Washington.

The late General Moshe Dayan, who — Zionist or not — remains an honoured part of my own Pantheon of military heroes, allegedly observed that Israel’s security depended on its being viewed by others as a mad dog. He may have been correct. But he neglected to note that the preferred response of everyone else is to kill that mad dog before it can decide to go berserk and bite. It is an option worth considering.

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Alan Sabrosky (PhD, University of Michigan) is a 10-year US Marine Corps veteran and a graduate of the US Army War College. He can be contacted at docbrosk@comcast.net.

Behind the Afghan imbroglio

Saturday, March 20, 2010 Saleem Safi Moscow offered to train a few officers of an Afghan law-enforcement agency. Kabul was ready to accept the offer, but the US killed the proposal. After the rebuff, the Russian ambassador publicly stated in a BBC interview that the US was creating difficulties for his country in Afghanistan. The Americans ignored two important points since the occupation of Afghanistan. One, the Afghan psyche of rising against all occupation forces. This becomes more dangerous when jihad fits into their scheme of national resistance. Similarly, the seeds of Islamism sown during the Soviet War in Afghanistan have bolstered the capacity of anti-Western Taliban and Hekmatyar forces abetted by Al-Qaeda to defeat the US-NATO alliance. Two, that all neighbouring and regional countries were involved in proxy wars in Afghanistan. These players had also become a part of the problem. The US-NATO alliance did not appreciate this fact. Rather, they mistakenly considered the occupation of Afghanistan as synonymous with expulsion of all regional players from the scene. Currently, the proxy wars of the neighbouring and regional countries are major hurdles in the way of stability and peace in Afghanistan. The changing goalposts of the US agenda, its failure to defeat opposing forces through a meaningful strategy and pushing out neighbouring countries from the equation are but a few of the gaffes. The regional players of the great game felt that the US agenda was not limited to finishing Taliban and Al-Qaeda alone. First of all, Iran was alienated for no good reasons. Initially, Iran honestly helped the US-NATO alliance against the Taliban. But George W Bush and the Neocons responded by hyphenating Iran with North Korea and Iraq as a member of an “axis of evil.” Without finishing the job in Afghanistan, the US occupied Iraq on flimsy grounds. Though Iran could make a natural ally in both places due to its strong abhorrence for Saddam Hussein and the Taliban, the overconfident George W Bush and the Neocons did not feel any need for Iranian help. The occupation of Iraq actually added to Iran’s not-so-misplaced fears of being the next target. Similarly, the growing US-Iran tensions on the nuclear issue further pushed apart these probable partners. This tension touched new heights during the last term of George W Bush in the White House when the Western media ran a campaign of leaking “official” information about a possible US-Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear sites. In this scenario, Iran decided to play its cards carefully on both fronts, Iraq and Afghanistan, to keep the US-NATO alliance at bay. The recent arrest of Jundullah leader Abdul Malik Rigi and his revelations regarding the active American support in training and equipping the group from its bases in Helmand confirmed Iran’s suspicions. A proxy war between Iran and Saudi Arabia is an equally important factor in Afghanistan. For the last three decades, any faction in Afghanistan that supports Saudi Arabia automatically opposes Iran, and vice versa. One reason for the Iranian boycott of the recently held London Conference was the Western alliance’s intention of engaging Saudi Arabia in the future reconciliation process in Afghanistan. Some analysts even believe that Arab and Western interests in Afghanistan are running in parallel. After 9/11 China wholeheartedly welcomed US arrival in Afghanistan. But the US attack on Iraq before the stabilisation of Afghanistan and the construction of a modern sprawling military base in the far-flung eastern Nooristan province close to the Chinese border raised many eyebrows in Beijing. According to some information, US intelligence had initially called in and trained some young Uyghur Muslims in Afghanistan for creating troubles in Xinjiang province. These factors also dragged China into the fray. So China responded to the Western challenges in Afghanistan on two fronts: economic diplomacy through huge investments in the mining and water sectors of Afghanistan, and partnering a friendly country for creating direct influence through dependable proxies. On both fronts, China seems to have made headway. During the attack on Afghanistan, the Russians had offered full-fledged support to the invading US and Western forces in the form of land and air routes for logistical support. The US could hardly believe such largesse from an erstwhile opponent that had taken a beating in Afghanistan from the same Western alliance. As Russia considered both Al-Qaeda and the Taliban a threat to its interests, it honestly supported the US-NATO alliance. Some routes are still being used by NATO forces for supply. But later events compelled Russia to change its tune and tone on Afghanistan. Russians deduced that the Western powers pursued a hidden agenda in Afghanistan. Similarly, the construction of large and long-term modern military bases in Afghanistan and awarding of fast-food supply contract on the bases for ten to twenty years rang alarm bills in Moscow. Such steps gave credence to the “theory” that the Western alliance was actually eyeing the vast Central Asian energy resources. Ultimately, Russia also resorted to creating influence through proxies. An example of the proxy war between Russia and the US was the latter’s rebuff to the Russian proposal for training a few officers of an Afghan law enforcement agency. Kabul was ready to accept the offer, but the US killed the proposal. After the rebuff, the Russian ambassador, Zamir Kabalov, publicly stated in an interview with BBC that the US was creating difficulties for his country in Afghanistan. Besides, a novel proxy war between the US and Germany, allies in the NATO, is most astonishing. To the dislike of the US, the Germans have independently created pockets of influence in northern Afghanistan. Since their arrival, they have focused all military, economic and political efforts on the northern half of the country. On many other occasions, UK and US priorities are also on divergent trajectories. Turkey, a NATO member, and the US are also not on the same page when it comes to priorities in Afghanistan. Turkey gave asylum to Abdul Rasheed Dostam when he was expelled by the US and brought him back against American wishes. The US made a monumental mistake by bringing India into Afghanistan in a big way. The Western alliance was in the knowledge that Pakistan had sacrificed everything to become their ally in the war against Taliban and Al-Qaeda. They knew that Pakistan ran a huge risk of a strong backlash at home from extremists and Al-Qaeda. Pakistan embraced these mortal threats on the condition that India is kept out of Afghanistan. But despite the many sacrifices by Pakistan, the US conveniently ignored Pakistani reservations, thus creating a security nightmare for this country. Pakistan half-heartedly fell back on support from some Afghan factions. On the other hand, India endeared all the powerful anti-Pakistan elements in the Afghan government. So a proxy war between the two South Asian nuclear powers has rendered peace in Afghanistan well nigh impossible. Beside these proxy wars, the regional players are also countering each other in many ways. The Central Asian states and Iran are poles apart on individual interests. The tug of war among the Central Asian states for securing individual interests is not a mystery. Similarly, Iran and Pakistan are unable to speak from the same page when it comes to their national interests in Afghanistan. The Western alliance’s blunders, the neighbours’ interference through proxy wars, regional scrambles and the international community’s inability to come up with acceptable solutions has turned Afghanistan into a melting pot. How can peace and stability be restored to Afghanistan? This question will be addressed in the next column. The writer works for Geo TV. Email: saleem .safi@janggroup.com.pk

Taliban: the unanswered questions

Saturday, March 20, 2010 By Iqbal Haider The record breaking rise in suicide attacks and the onslaught of repeated explosions all over the country, more recently in Lahore and Mingora, have naturally caused countrywide shock, anxiety and concern. People at large are anxious to find a real effective strategy to eradicate these extremist militant religious forces, their suicide bombers and the unending incidents of terrorism. Some say that the Government should hold negotiations with the Taliban. Some of the bearded or non-bearded leaders of the religious parties have been offering their services for mediating with these terrorists. The first question that needs an answer is who the Government should hold talks with? Quite often, we hear about numerous groups of these Taliban. Some are called Afghani Taliban. Some are referred to as Pakistani Taliban, are they any different in their ideology or modus operandi? Some even issue character certificates to them as being ìGood Taliban or ìBad Taliban. On what grounds are they branded so, is not known and how do they differ is also not clear. Some are classified on regional basis that is Punjabi Taliban or Pakhtun Taliban, etc. They may be soon the basis of their existence in that area but are they in any manner different from each other? This is not the end of the list. There are several other militant equally bigoted and ferocious religious groups operating in Pakistan, such as the group of Fazlullah, Sufi Muhammad, various Lashkars and Jihadi groups in the names of Islam or Jihad-e-Kashmir and many banned organisations such as the SSP, Lashkar-e-Taiba, Al-Dawa, etc. I refer to them collectively as ìTaliban. The categorisation or classification of Taliban would have been of some importance or relevance had they followed a different religious sect, norm or modus operandi. The differences of shades in their beliefs or activities are of least importance. A pertinent question that arises is would the negotiations with one group would lead to a peaceful settlement with all? It is not likely, as every group appears to have its own leader, objectives and force. Would all of these extremist barbaric violent groups agree to come on a common negotiations table? This again appears to be highly unlikely. Even if one or more groups agree to hold meaningful negotiations with sincerity of purpose with the Government, then the second most important question arises as to what the agenda would be and what should be the preconditions or steps for creating conditions conducive for successful dialogue. The parties to the negotiation and their mediators, if any, will have to determine the agenda for this meeting. It is an undeniable fact that the common denominators amongst all groups of Taliban are their peculiar religious norms and common modus operandi of enforcing their brand of religion through force and terrorism. During the tenure of the Taliban in Afghanistan, we have witnessed there a rigid ban on use of internet, education for women; destruction of schools and colleges; ban on all forms of enjoyment fine and performing arts; forcing people to grow beards; destroying invaluable historical heritage of the world i.e. the Bamyan Buddha statues; forcing non-Muslims, particularly Hindus, to wear a distinctive bracelet in their wrist; indulged in intolerance and attacks on muslims of different sects; prohibition against sports like cricket, the Pakistani football team visiting Afghanistan wearing knickers on the field was harassed, abused and returned after shaving their heads; enforcing a peculiar form of justice system and sentences in the name of their own interpretation of Islam; imposing a bigoted and retarded system of education and curriculum, opposed to the basic injunctions of Islam and norms and practices of modern societies in the world. The aforesaid is not a complete list of the lifestyle and permissible and non-permissible acts according to the Taliban. The crucial question is will the Taliban agree to give up such abhorrent stone-age norms and practices of their brand of Islam? If they will not budge an inch, then the question arises will the Government of Pakistan or the supporters of the Taliban in Pakistan accept, adopt and implement most obscurantist and oppressive laws and practices of the Taliban. I am afraid that under the policy of appeasement and encouragement of the bigoted militant sectarian religious groups, followed by their creator General Zia and promoter General Pervez Musharraf and their allies, Pakistan is being Talibanised gradually. This policy of appeasing and supporting the Taliban, either under the most ill-conceived notion of them being ìstrategic depth of Pakistan or the so-called repeated peace agreements with Taliban, signed by Musharaf regime and also by our present elected rulers, have only resulted in rise and rise of terrorism and influence of the Taliban of which, there are so many shocking instances and trends one can point out. To name a few, I may remind, the MMA Government had attempted to impose their brand of Islam under the garb of the unconstitutional ìHasba Bill. During the same period, shops selling musical instruments or music and audio videos were destroyed in Peshawer and a respected scholar and author of a book, ìShaitan Moulvi was murdered in Swat. A woman singer was killed in Peshawar. In several parts of the Frontier women were physically prevented from casting their vote repeatedly with the agreement of the national level political parties, both during the tenure of MMA rule and even now in the most recent by-elections under the present elected Government, who claims to be enlightened and progressive. During the Musharraf regime, we witnessed an alarming mushroom growth of madressahs, who were also allowed to store lethal weapons and receive arms trainings. Even in the Federal and Provincial capitals, Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi, women wearing jeans and t-shirts or half-sleeves were warned and intimidated. One cannot also ignore or deny alliance of PML-N with the banned and bigoted militant organizations such as the SSP and Jamaat-ud-Dawa in the latest by-elections held in the Punjab. Shocking is the fact that the PML-N which claims to be the most popular party of Punjab has to seek support from these undesirable banned extremist outfits. It is also a fact that until very recently, important ministers in the Punjab Cabinet have been denying the very existence of the Taliban in any part of Punjab, perhaps to provide them with covert support and mislead the people that they represent. It is not surprising that according to reports, Taliban are willing to accept Chief Minister of the Punjab as the mediator and have offered to him a ceasefire, as reported in the national dailies. Will that ceasefire be on imposing the brand of religion of the Taliban? Will this ceasefire, through PML-N or any other leaders of political parties, guarantee an end to terrorism in Pakistan? The people need answers to these questions. The people of Pakistan will under no circumstances accept the Talibanís brand of religion which is against the very basic tenets and injunctions of Islam nor do I foresee Taliban giving up their obscurantist and oppressive religion and practices. Nor are they likely to surrender arms and give up terrorist activities in Pakistan. There should be no doubt or confusion about the real aim and agenda of Taliban. Their clear object is to takeover the state of Pakistan, all its resources, wealth, weapons particularly the nuclear arms, in the name of religion. Some of the segments of the Taliban have already pronounced these aims. In fact in April 2009 the Taliban had proudly expressed their determination to takeover Islamabad as well, after they had established their control over 11% of the territory of Pakistan, according to reliable published assessments. Pakistan is already at war from within with Taliban. Never before, neither in any war with India, nor otherwise, have our top brass Army officers, along with the brave soldiers of our Army, paramilitary forces, police and thousands of innocent citizens, faced martyrdom in such a large number at the hands of Taliban. Each suicide attack and explosion causes irreparable loss of not only life, but also to our already detoriating economy. The need of the hour is that the people of Pakistan must express their determination that they are not prepared to accept the injunctions, norms and lifestyle of the Taliban under any circumstances or for any petty gain or consideration. Ceasefire with an end to terrorism is acceptable but not on the terms and agenda of the Taliban. Some of the political parties wearing the label of religion or not, must not lend any moral or material support, covertly or overtly, to the Taliban for minor gains or victories in elections. Why should we blame India, when we have within Pakistan such well-wishers, protectors and supporters of extremist militant banned obscurantist religious organizations such as the various segments of Taliban, SSP, the Jamaat-ud-Dawa and several other militant Lashkars who are enough to destroy our peace and progress. We must rise against the nefarious aims and objects of Taliban and their terrorism which is threatening not only the integrity of Pakistan, but also peace and prosperity in the South Asian region. Instead of pursuing a blame game with our neighbours which will only help the Taliban in spreading their influence, we must adopt the policy of cooperation and collaboration not only within Pakistan, but also with our neighbors particularly India, Afghanistan, Iran and China to defeat the inhumane objectives of the Taliban, through concerted efforts on a national and regional basis. The author is a former senator, senior advocate of the Supreme Court, former attorney general and ex-minister for law, justice, parliamentary affairs and human rights. Email: ihaider45@yahoo.com

Relatives of force-disappeared Baloch protest rally in front Pakistan’s PM residence

on 2010/3/20 0:40:00 (2 reads)

slamabad: The family members of forced disappeared Baloch in affiliation with Voice for Baloch Missing Persons ended their three day (17-16-19 March) token hunger strike here on Friday and took out a protest rally opposite Pakistani PM’s residence. These families had long marched via train from occupied Balochistan to Pakistan’s capital to protest in front of UN office and Pakistan Supreme Court in order to draw their attention towards the plight of those families (people of Balochistan) whose loved ones have been missing for years. Several Baloch students from Islamabad visited the Baloch protest camp to show their solidarity with the families of abducted Baloch political activists. One of the female Baloch students in Islamabad while talking to BBC Urdu said that “It is devastating to see these families wandering from one city to another and knocking door of Pakistan’s impotent judiciary. She went on to say that “It is a gross Human Rights Violation that several Baloch have now been disappeared for 9-10 years. It is a big blow on the face of those so called Human Rights Organisation which claim to be protecting the Human Rights of innocent people, off course that includes the UN as well”. Addressing the crowed Mr Nasrullah Baloch chairman of VBMP said that Balochistan and Baloch are suffering at the hands of Pakistan military from last 62 years. Baloch genocide is taking place in a planned method by the state [Pakistan]. The current ongoing military operation is the fifth offensive action against Balochistan, since the 1948, 1958, 1963 and 1973, thousands of people have been killed, many thousands displaced from their own villages, towns and cities. He alleged that presently thousands of Baloch forced disappeared person are being physically and mentally tortured in secret prisons of Pakistan military and intelligence agencies. He said according to VBMP’s findings 200,000 people have been displaced from Dera Bugti and 250,000 people were displaced from Kohlu and Barkhan regions of Balochistan. Nasrullah Baloch also alleged that around 8,000 people including the family of Zarina Marri had been arrested & disappeared from different regions in Balochistan most of whom are still missing. He said bringing forced-disappeared Baloch to surface and releasing Baloch political activists was a part of the so called relief package for Balochistan but unfortunately the people of Balochistan have neither seen any package nor the Baloch missing persons have been released. Despite the claims of Pakistan’s PM that Baloch political prisons will be release, more and more people are still being arrested, disappeared and killed by Pakistan’s intelligence agencies and security forces. He appealed the media, Human Rights Organisations, Civil Society Organisations, and the United Nations Human Rights Council to play their role for the early and safe release of Baloch abducted persons. Meanwhile families of two Marri Baloch have reported that two of their relatives were arrested on 17-03-2010 from Hazar Ganji fruit and vegetable market. The abducted men have been named as Master Sanam Hussein Marri Baloch and Ghulam Hussein Marri Baloch who had come from Sindh to visit their families in New Kahan Quetta, ‘also known as the “Gaza Strip” of Balochistan’. New Kahan and its residents have been under watch by Pakistani intelligence agencies and military since the dictator Musharraf came to power. Several people had been arrested form this tiny Marri populated area. The region have been under siege most the time, several people including Asad Marri Baloch, Banuk Gul Naz Marri, Murad Khan Marri have been killed by Pakistan military during raids on News Kahan. Courtesy : Balochistan National Newspapers

UN report criticises covert troops who committed Afghan killings

Jerome Starkey Child relatives at the gravesite of five people killed, including three women, during a joint US-Afghan night raid in Paktia province March 16, 2010 Covert troops who killed two pregnant women and a teenage girl in eastern Afghanistan went on to inflict “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment” on the survivors of a botched night raid, a report by the UN said. The family of the victims in Paktiya province have accused Nato of trying to cover up the atrocity after an investigation by The Times revealed that two men, who were also killed, were not the intended targets of the raid. One was a police commander and his brother was a district-attorney. The unpublished UN report, which was acquired by The Times, contradicts Nato’s version of events. Rear-Admiral Greg Smith, Nato’s communications director, had said that the women had been dead for several hours when US and Afghan gunmen started shooting into the family home. The report, written in the aftermath of the February 12 attack, states: “As a result of the operation, five people were killed, two men and three women, all belonging to the same family.” There were about 25 guests and three musicians at the house on the night of the raid. They had gathered to celebrate the naming of a newborn child. It was only when a musician stepped outside to go to the lavatory at about 3.30am, that someone flashed a light in his eyes and he ran back inside shouting “Taleban”. Witnesses said that Commander Dawood, the policeman, was shot with his son, Sediqullah, 15, when they ran across a courtyard. His brother, Saranwal Zahir, was shot trying to protest the family’s innocence. The three women were caught in a volley of fire behind him. The UN report said that guests and injured relatives were then “assaulted by US and Afghan forces, restrained and forced to stand barefeet for several hours outside in the cold”. “Further allegations were also raised that US and Afghan forces refused to provide adequate and timely medical support to two people who sustained bullet injuries, resulting in their deaths hours later,” the report added. The family insist that Commander Dawood and his niece Gulalai, 18, who was engaged to be married this summer, might have survived if they had been taken to hospital sooner. Waheedullah, 22, one of the guests at the party who works as an ambulance driver in Gardez, said that he was dragged across the compound by his hair. “The Afghans said put up your hands. I stood up and I don’t know who was behind me. I was kicked from behind and fell over,” he added. He saw a gunman with blond hair and a fair beard. “They were American special forces,” he said. The Afghan troops were using American rifles and wore patches on their sleeves with the local phrase for Nato’s International Security Assistance Force. The Americans were wearing “wood yellow” clothes, he said, which were different from the regular army’s green uniforms. The report also sheds light on the identity of the killers. Local US troops, who are part of the conventional US Army, denied any knowledge of the raid. “According to local authorities, the night raid was conducted by US Special Forces from Bagram, which arrived in Gardez days prior to the operation,” the report states.

:: Article nr. 64327 sent on 20-mar-2010 07:56 ECT
www.uruknet.info?p=64327

Link: www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/afghanistan/article7063184.ece

Turkish producers working on anti-Israel film

Anti-Israel protest in Turkey Photo: AFP

Turkish producers working on anti-Israel film

Production company that made ‘Valley of Wolves’ is already working on anti-Israel film version of series, according to Turkish report. Report claims movie will reveal true face of Israel, shake up Israeli-Turkish relations even further

Daniel Edelson

Published: 
01.13.10, 12:29 / Israel News

A Turkish news site reported Wednesday that the company, Pana Film, that produced the TV series “Valley of the Wolves” is already working on a film version of the show called “Valley of the Wolves – Palestine.”

The Turkish report, which was published under the title “The next item is going to arouse Israel’s anger: ‘Valley of the Wolves- Palestine’ is on its way,” wrote that the movie’s plot will focus on “actions of IDF armed forces in Palestinian territories.”

In order to create interest, members of the production crew promised that the scene that aroused anger in Israel in the current series – in which the blood of an Israeli Mossad agent is smeared on a Star of David – “will be nothing” compared to what awaits the movie’s viewers.

According to the sources, “The new movie will reveal the true face of Israel, and in accordance, the relations between it and Turkey will deteriorate even further.”

According to the Turkish news site, the production company is slated to announce the date of the movie’s premier in the coming days.

In response to a Ynet query regarding claims harming Israel made in the series, a spokesperson from the Turkish company reported that they are not the first to present Israel in such a light: “Israel has already been declared a war criminal many times in the past by international human rights’ groups, mainly the UN, which wrote reports about this.”

The spokesperson added that the series presents reality. “All of humanity, especially the Israeli public, looks on with sorrow at the insensitivity with which the Israeli authorities take action against Palestinian children. Basic rights – such as nourishment, food, and education – is denied them. How can it be that these same Israeli authorities, who without hesitating bombed children staying under a UN flag in Gaza, are now bothered by a television series that is just presenting what they did?”

A Ynet investigation revealed that the series’ creators have made sure to kick up controversy around a number of different subjects since its inception, and now the “Israeli issue” is on the table.

In previous seasons, education officials in Turkey were outraged by the abundance of violent scenes in the show.

In addition, angered responses over one season that dealt with Turkish spy plots against Kurdish terrorist organizations in the country led the show to be shelved.

Arab channels to air anti-Israel Turkish series

Scene from ‘Separation’

Saudi, Dubai channels to start showing program on plight of Palestinians that angered Jewish state for showing Israeli forces shooting innocent civilians

AFP

Israel News

Two Arab channels will soon start airing a Turkish television series on the plight of Palestinians that angered Israel, an official from the production company told AFP Friday.

The 13-episode "Separation: Palestine in Love and In War" has been sold to MBC, a Saudi-run pan-Arabic news and entertainment channel, and to a Dubai channel, said Zafer Kayaokay, art director at the Istanbul-based Çağla Productions.

MBC plans to begin the series on Saturday, he said, while the Dubai channel would follow suit in the near future.

The series was first broadcast by Turkey’s state television in October, infuriating Israel, which said the program incited "hatred against Israel" and was "not worthy of being broadcast even in an enemy state."

The first episode showed Israeli forces shooting innocent Palestinian civilians. Israeli soldiers were shown killing a newborn baby girl and an elderly man on his way to pilgrimage in Mecca.

Turkey has been a military ally of Israel since 1996, but relations between the two have been tense since Israel’s war on Gaza in early 2009, which Turkey vehemently criticized.

In January this year, bilateral ties became tense again over another television seriesdepicting the adventures of a Turkish secret agent that Israel said depicted Jews as "baby-snatchers and war criminals."

Deputy Foreign Minister Daniel Ayalon gave the Turkish ambassador apublic dressing down over the series, prompting Ankara to threaten to recall the envoy. Tensions were resolved after Israel issued a formal apology.

Does the Antiwar Movement Understand Obama Yet?

WILL THE ANTI-WAR MOVEMENT HOLD PRESIDENT OBAMA ACCOUNTABLE THIS WEEKEND?

by Ryan Jaroncyk

Thu, Mar 18th 2010

This Saturday, anti-war protestors will take to the streets in large numbers to protest US foreign policy.  Multiple political groups, ranging from the left to the right, have planned huge rallies and events to protest US-led wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and Yemen.  They also plan to discuss and protest other controversial policies including CIA Drone attacks, Guantanamo Bay, the Patriot Act, private war contractors, record military spending, and the Israeli/Palestinian issue.

These rallies could prove significant since they represent the first massive, nationally coordinated effort to challenge US foreign policy since President Obama took office.  Thus far, the anti-war movement, which was alive and well during the Bush/Cheney administration, has been largely silent during Obama’s tenure.  This is despite the fact that Obama has instituted a more costly and expansive war policy than George W. Bush, as measured by at least 11 quantifiable metrics, which I outlined in detail in last month’s article “Where has the anti-war movement gone?“.

If the anti-war movement begins to reemerge as a potent political force, especially on the left, then it will effectively erase the appearance of alleged hypocrisy and blind partisanship.  However, a brief perusal of a few websites makes one wonder if these rallies will still resist holding the Obama administration accountable instead of resorting to the anti-Bush rhetoric which fueled the movement in years past.

For example, in this Truthout article, Mary Susan Littlepage is quite critical of the Bush and Cheney administration in her discussion of the Iraq War and the PTSD epidemic our military is suffering from due to extended deployments in Iraq & Afghanistan.  Yet, she offers virtually no criticism of the Obama administration.

In this release, the ANSWER Coalition offers a balanced critique of the previous and current administrations’ war policies, but still calls out Bush & Cheney by name, while offering little direct criticism of President Obama.

And in this March20.org article, protestors are advised on what to bring to the Washington DC rally, with one of the proposed props being “Cheney puppets”, a clear reference to his past association with Halliburton, one of the leading private war contractors.  Yet, there is no mention of the fact that the number of private war contractors has further increased under the Obama administration.

On the other hand, the Peace Blimp Radio Marathon appears to be offering a potentially more multi-partisan cast of war dissenters:  Republican Congressman Ron Paul, Democratic Congressman Alan Grayson, Green Party candidate Cynthia McKinney, former Republican Governor of New Mexico Gary Johnson, Republican Congressional candidates and war veterans Adam Kokesh and RJ Harris, Scott Horton of Antiwar Radio (which has been openly critical of both the Bush and Obama administrations), and others.  Many of these anti-war personalities were extremely critical of the Bush and Cheney administration, with several of them being self-proclaimed conservatives.

Regardless, this upcoming weekend’s anti-war rallies will once again put a much-needed spotlight on the state of America’s war policy.  America is engaged in wartime operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and Yemen.  Record suicide rates and PTSD are plaguing the military.  The military budget has grown to nearly $1 trillion, despite a severe recession and record budget deficits.  And there’s a growing sense of inevitability regarding a future war with Iran.

Hopefully, these war protests will reject poisonous partisanship, hold both parties equally accountable, and spark a long overdue intellectual discussion over current policy.

Readers who participate are strongly encouraged to come back and share their experiences on this article’s comment thread.

Indian school helping the brightest Muslims

[Stories like this demonstrate the healing power inherent in India's vast diversity of peoples and religions.  It truly represents a way forward on a path to true peace between the two halves of India's previous incarnation.  The British-bisected state was created to control the former subjects, to give the Empire the means to set Hindus and Muslims at each others' throats.  Any program or effort that bridges the divisions that have been magnified or manufactured, will help transform and heal the subcontinent.]

The mould-breaking Rahmani 30 school has a record of success By Sanjoy Majumder BBC News, Patna In a congested part of Patna, capital of India’s Bihar state, stands a striking yellow building – a 100-year-old mansion that has clearly seen better days. Inside it, in a small dark room, a young bearded cleric is reading out sermons from the Muslim holy scriptures to a group of boys seated cross-legged on the floor. They are in their late teens, some are wearing skull caps and they all listen to him with rapt attention. At first glance, this could be any of the region’s hundreds of Islamic seminaries or madrassas, where young Muslims receive religious instruction. But this is no ordinary seminary. After prayers, the boys head out to a classroom, pen and notebook in hand, where they listen with equal attention to a lecture on advanced mathematics. This is the unusual setting for Rahmani 30 – a training institute which prepares talented but underprivileged young Muslims for entry into India’s best engineering colleges – the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT). Only the top 2% make it through the stiff entrance exam. Getting ahead India’s large Muslim minority is consistently placed at the bottom of social and economic rankings. I wanted to make something of my life, become someone Irfan Alam, student Part of this has to do with education – most Muslims end up studying in madrassas, which means they have little chance of being employed in the private sector or government. So the significance of Rahmani’s initiative is not lost on anyone. It is the brainchild of a senior Bihar police officer, Abhyanand, who takes time off from his day job to teach the boys physics. Rahmani was inspired by a similar school – the Super 30, where Abhyanand used to work and which is also aimed at poor children but not Muslims exclusively. “In our country, any difficult examination is very fearful because a huge number of students take part but only a few get in,” Abhyanand says. The advantage at Rahmani, he says, is the kind of students they get – mostly from poor backgrounds and determined to get ahead in life. “They come from a rural background and that is their strength. They become competitive because, for them, it is a win or lose situation. “If they don’t make it they don’t stand anywhere [socially and economically].” Great chance Irfan Alam, 15, the son of a barber who is preparing for the IIT exam due to be held in 2011, says it is a great opportunity. “I wanted to make something of my life, become someone,” he says smiling shyly. The school’s philosophy is inspired by the ideas of a madrassa “It’s the perfect platform. The teachers are amazing and the best part is that it’s completely free.” It is a chance that few others where Irfan comes from will ever get. His village is a good four hours drive north of Patna, with lush green wheat-fields, narrow dirt tracks and few proper buildings. Most people here work as farm labour and a large number of the men are barbers by trade. I meet Irfan’s father, Mohammad Shafiq, outside his modest, two-room hut made of mud and straw. Now recuperating after an eye operation, he tells me how his son displayed flashes of brilliance as a child and soon outgrew his village school. So he decided to send him away. “Nobody studies here. Most of the teenagers waste their time or start drinking heavily. “I can’t read and write myself and it was always my dream that my son should be educated and not become a barber like his father and grandfather.” Back at Rahmani the classes are done but the studying continues late into the night. Irfan sits with three of his friends inside his little dorm room, poring over textbooks and brainstorming. In another room, one of the teachers uses a webcam to conduct a tutorial with students in another part of Bihar. Cultural debate It’s a fascinating mix of the traditional and the modern. “The basic philosophy of a madrassa is that the boys live, eat and study together. There is no distinction between rich and poor – everybody is equal,” says Maulana Wali Rahmani, an influential cleric who heads this institute. “There’s also a culture of open debate. It’s something I experienced myself while growing up in a madrassa. So we thought, why not channel these strengths in a whole new direction and see what we can achieve.” To find out how spectacularly they have succeeded, you need to travel 1,000km (625 miles), to the national capital, Delhi. It is a completely different world in the tree-lined, sprawling IIT campus. Young men and women stroll into their classrooms, dressed in jeans and T-shirts, back-packs slung over their shoulders. These are India’s brightest brains, many of whom will go on to work in the country’s top software companies or head to Silicon Valley. Among them is a shy, earnest young man – Shadman Anwar, part of Rahmani’s inaugural batch of students last year, all 10 of whom made it through to the IITs. “It’s been a dream come true, being here with all the other students. And I don’t feel as if I’m any different,” he says. His is the kind of confidence that has helped raise expectations at Rahmani, whose administrators now want to establish 10 similar schools over the next couple of years. India’s Muslim community is often said to have under-achieved, plagued by poverty, low education standards and a conservative outlook. Now in one of India’s poorest states, a small initiative is trying to break the mould.

The Sickness of the Militarized American Mind

[I am surprised he didn't blame it on their baby blue helmets, as well.]

more about “US General Claims Srebrenica Massacre…“, posted with vodpod

Dutch outrage as US general blames gay soldiers for Srebrenica

(NOS/fsr/AFP/Getty Images)

The Dutch peackeepers were meant to protect the UN ‘safe area’ around Srebrenica

A retired American general has blamed the UN’s historic failure to protect the Bosnian “safe haven” of Srebrenica on the fact that there were openly gay soldiers in the Dutch peacekeeping battalion assigned to it.

The comments from former Marine Corps General John Sheehan prompted outrage in the Netherlands, where the humiliation in July 1995 of 400 armed Dutch peacekeepers and the subsequent massacre by Serb forces of 8,000 Muslim men and boys remains a subject of acute national sensitivity.

General Sheehan, one of two Nato “supreme commanders” at the time of the massacre, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee against a proposal to allow homosexuals to serve openly in the US military.

He told the senators how the Armed Forces of various European countries had lost their combat focus after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s and turned to peacekeeping because “they did not believe the Germans were going to attack again or the Soviets were coming back”.

The general said that Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and other nations all took the decision that there was no longer a need for an active combat capability in the military.

“They declared a peace dividend and made a conscious effort to socialize their military — that includes the unionisation of their militaries, it includes open homosexuality. That led to a force that was ill-equipped to go to war,” he said.

“The case in point that I’m referring to is when the Dutch were required to defend Srebrenica against the Serbs: the battalion was under-strength, poorly led, and the Serbs came into town, handcuffed the soldiers to the telephone poles, marched the Muslims off, and executed them.

“That was the largest massacre in Europe since World War II.”

Carl Levin, the Michigan Democrat, chairman of the committee, was incredulous. He asked General Sheehan: “Did the Dutch leaders tell you it was because there were gay soldiers there?”

“Yes, they did. They included that as part of the problem,” he replied.

“That there were gay soldiers?” the senator asked.

“That the combination was the liberalisation of the military; a net effect was basically social engineering.”

Mr Levin, who backs moves to allow openly gay soldiers to serve, went on to tell the general that he was “totally off-target” in his comments — presaging a flood of complaints from Dutch officials.

Jan Peter Balkenende, the Dutch Prime Minister, dismissed the general’s claim today. “A disgraceful statement,” he said. “I find it untenable … towards homosexuals. You don’t talk that way about people. I find it below standard if one speaks in this manner of the work that people have to do in difficult circumstances.”

Renée Jones-Bos, the Dutch Ambassador to the United States, said that she “couldn’t disagree more” with General Sheehan, adding there was no evidence of his claims in the extensive record of research on Srebrenica.

Roger Van de Wetering, from the Dutch Defence Ministry added: “For us it is unbelievable that a man of this rank is stating this nonsense, because that is what it is.

“The whole operation in Srebrenica and the drama that took place over there was thoroughly investigated by Dutch and international authorities and none of these investigations has ever concluded or suggested a link between homosexual military personnel and the things that happened over there. I do not know on what facts this is based, but for us it is total nonsense.

“Every man or woman that meets the criteria physically and mentally is welcome to serve in our Armed Forces regardless of (religious) belief, sexual preference or whatever.”

Pakistan wants to play a central role in the Afghan settlement

Arvind Gupta

During his recent visit to Pakistan (10-11 March 2010) Afghan President Hamid Karzai said that he did not want to see India and Pakistan fighting a ‘proxy war’ in Afghanistan. A BBC report of 11th March quoted him as saying that “Afghanistan does not want a proxy war between India and Pakistan in Afghanistan. It does not want a proxy war between Iran and the United States in Afghanistan.” He further noted that “Without Pakistan and without its co-operation with Afghanistan, Afghanistan cannot be stable or peaceful… It is also, I believe, recognised in Pakistan that without a stable and peaceful Afghanistan there cannot be stability or peace in Pakistan.” Karzai also described Pakistan as a ‘conjoined twin’ and India as a ‘friend’ thereby making a qualitative distinction between Afghanistan’s relationship with Pakistan and India.
The Afghan president’s use of the word ‘proxy war’ in relation to India’s reconstruction and rehabilitation efforts in Afghanistan is puzzling.

[There will be no way to resolve tensions between India and Pakistan until both states stop pretending that their hands are clean and their intentions purely noble, especially in regards to the issue of state terrorism.  Both states have embraced the policy of using proxy militants and mercenaries to further their foreign policy goals; to deny this is an imbecilic exercise in futility.  Pretending that state-sponsored terrorism is a thing of the past will not help anything except to deny the pretender's guilt until the day that the problems that have been created are finally resolved.  All the players in the Afghan/Pakistan tragedy will one day be held accountable by the forces of international law, even the United States.]

It will strengthen Pakistani propaganda that the Indian presence in Afghanistan is to destabilise Pakistan and underplay the importance of Indian assistance.

[It should be pointed-out that the bulk of India's "humanitarian" assistance has been keyed to support its long-time allies from the Northern Alliance and to construct a highway system tied to routes leading into Central Asia and beyond, to service projects supported by its new Farkhor Ayne Air Base in Tajikistan.]

Afghans are generally appreciative of India’s humanitarian assistance now running at over $1.2 billion and spread over several projects. India is helping train Afghan youth in large numbers. It has helped build key physical and social infrastructure in Afghanistan. Unlike Western countries, it has worked wholeheartedly with the Afghan government and local authorities to build Afghanistan. In the course of helping Afghanistan, Indian diplomats and nationals have paid with their lives. Even today nearly four thousand Indian workers are engaged in Afghanistan’s numerous projects. Most of them have gone there voluntarily on employment contracts with which the Government of India has nothing to do.
It therefore comes as a surprise that the Afghan president, who himself has appreciated the Indian help, should talk about a ‘proxy war’ between India and Pakistan.

The reason for such a reading of the situation is the rapidly changing political and security context in Afghanistan.
In recent weeks, Pakistan has apprehended Mullah Biradar, a top ranking Afghan Taliban leader and also arrested some other Afghan Taliban functionaries. It is now emerging that the arrest of Mullah Biradar was perhaps an accident rather than a pre-planned move. It has also been speculated that Mullah Biradar was arrested because he was not listening to the ISI. Pakistan has refused to extradite Mullah Biradar to Afghanistan and also restricted American access to him.
Whatever may be the truth, Pakistan has come to occupy in Western eyes a central role in Afghanistan’s fast moving political scenario. The US intention of starting troop withdrawal from July 2011 and the London Conference’s signal of starting a dialogue with the Afghan Taliban have led to a sense of urgency in thinking about the next phase in the Afghan war. The key question is: what will be the nature of political settlement that may help the Obama administration to leave Afghanistan in an honourable way? Pakistan has concluded that it must play a central role in such a settlement and at the same time deny India any part. Therefore, it has sent out signals that it has a hold over the Afghan Taliban and only those Taliban who follow the Pakistani diktat will be allowed to negotiate with the Karzai government. Pakistan wants to retain complete control over how future negotiations proceed. In the meantime, Indian personnel in Kabul continue to be attacked.
Has Pakistan changed its strategic stance of sheltering the top Afghan leadership and providing them safe havens and sanctuary? Pakistan’s sincerity is in doubt. Pakistan’s going after some Afghan Taliban leaders selectively is designed to show that in any settlement in Afghanistan, Pakistan would have the highest claim. Pakistan wants to tell the world loud and clear that no settlement is possible without Pakistan’s will. It will retain complete hold over key Taliban leaders and punish those who do not fall in line.
It is in view of the West’s fatigue in Afghanistan and the growing importance of Pakistan that President Karzai chose to describe Pakistan in the terms he did. However, it is also a matter of debate whether the Taliban, if they come to power as a result of a negotiated settlement, would not fall out with Pakistan in due course, particularly over the question of the Durand Line. The relationship between Afghanistan and Pakistan has historically not been smooth and unlikely to be so in future irrespective of the regime in Afghanistan.
India’s noncontroversial humanitarian assistance has been presented by Pakistan as a ‘proxy war’.   [This part is utter nonsense--India's proxy war concerns infiltration of and support for insurgents waging war against the people of Pakistan, emanating from Afghanistan.]

Western counties and Afghans know the truth but there is reticence in articulating the importance of Indian assistance in rebuilding Afghanistan. This is because Western countries are in thrall of Pakistan, which can play a hugely negative role if not kept in good humour. That explains why the Afghan President, despite his previous criticisms of Pakistani interference in Afghanistan, now sees Pakistan in a positive light.
Pakistan would like to see India out of Afghanistan. India is being intimidated by terrorist attacks in Kabul and through vicious propaganda. The Foreign Secretary has clarified that India would not pare down its assistance programmes in Afghanistan. India has followed the policy of assisting the people of Afghanistan to the extent it can. That is the policy which will play dividends in the long run. Nevertheless, given the recent developments, India will need to keep its policy under review and be prepared to be flexible to make tactical adjustments. In particular, India needs to be clear about its strategic priorities in Afghanistan.
Dr. Arvind Gupta holds the Lal Bahadur Shastri Chair in the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, New Delhi. The views expressed here are his own.

Message to President Obama and Americans with a Conscience

eileen fleming

“There comes a time comes when silence is betrayal…History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people…We are called to speak for the weak, for the voiceless, for victims…We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people…The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy…Cowardice asks the question: is it safe? Expediency asks the question: is it politic? Vanity asks the question: is it popular? But conscience asks the question: is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular- but one must take it simply because it is right.”-Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.

Since 1967, the Israeli authorities have demolished more than 24,000 Palestinian homes in the Occupied Territories. Some are considered “collateral damage” in military operations; such as the 4,000 homes that were demolished in Israel’s December-January assault on Gaza.

Some are as collective punishment; such as the obliteration of the Jenin refugee camp in 2002.

Many are for lack of a building permit, which Israel denies to Palestinians; and due to the unjust justice system of Israel, the courts have ordered thousands of Palestinian families to demolish their own homes while threatening them with fines and imprisonment.

Currently there are tens of thousands of demolition orders on Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem and the West Bank .

The Fourth Geneva Convention forbids an Occupying Power from extending its law and administration into an occupied territory.

The very process of granting or denying permits to Palestinians is blatantly illegal under international humanitarian law.

“Missing from Israel’s security framing is the very fact of occupation, which Israel both denies exists…and that “security” requires Israel control over the entire country…rendering impossible a just peace based on human rights, international law, reconciliation.”- American Israeli, Founder and Coordinator of ICAHD/Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, Jeff Halper, in Obstacles to Peace, A Re-Framing of the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict, page 1.

International Law states occupation is to be temporary, but Israeli courts rule on the basis that there is no occupation and therefore the Fourth Geneva Convention protecting civilians under occupation is irrelevant to their sense of justice.

Jeff also informed this reporter, “Before 1947, the Palestinians owned 94% of the country. Then the UN gave away 56% to the Jews and today they have 78% of the land. Hamas cannot accept the legitimacy of Israel stealing their land, just as no colonial people would ever give up the claim to their homeland.”

The first house ICAHD rebuilt was in 1998-the Beit Arabyia house-the name for the home of the Arabiya family with seven children which has been rebuilt at least four times by the efforts of ICAHD and the JCHR/Jurist Center for Human Rights, a Palestinian NGO focused on legal advocacy for Palestinians in the Jerusalem area.

Jeff said, “Israel has no constitution but has a Declaration of Independence which promised that Israel would abide by conditions and UN resolutions. They have not fulfilled the agreement which was the basis of their independence.”

The Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel was signed on May 14, 1948 the day the British Mandate over Palestine expired: “On the day of the termination of the British mandate and on the strength of the United Nations General Assembly declare The State of Israel will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel: it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion it will guarantee freedom of religion [and] conscience and will be faithful to the Charter of the United Nations.” – May 14, 1948. The Declaration of the Establishment of Israel

Jeff continued, “We really are only but actors in a play. When we wake up to that, and become an active participant in the human drama and pursue justice, things must change because injustice is unsustainable…One out of three Israeli children lives below the poverty line. It’s probably about 80% for Palestinians. Jews are like everyone else, those who have been abused grow up to be abusers. Things here have been turned on their head: its victim mentality and denial about the occupation. Once Israelis accept the fact that they are occupiers they will have to admit their State Terrorism.

“Since 1967 the Israeli government has destroyed over 22,000 Palestinian homes. 95% of the cases have nothing to do with security. All these homes are on Palestinian private property. The Israeli government will not grant permits for them to build on their own land, and in reality are quietly transferring the Palestinians administratively from the land. They make conditions so intolerable that the Palestinians give up and leave and this is exactly what they are after. Not only do the Palestinians receive no warning when their homes are to be destroyed they are fined $1,500.00!

“The reasons for the demolitions are: for The Wall, to establish illegal settlements, build roads and because the Israeli government wants to keep Palestinians confined to the islands [areas A and B] in the West Bank and so Palestinian land remain under the control of the Israeli government.

“When you incorporate occupied territories, highways, settlements and use resources it is all illegal according to the Fourth Geneva Convention which states the status quo must be retained so that negotiations can happen. Unilateral actions are illegal. The occupying power is responsible for those under its control.

“Tony Blair said 70% of all the conflicts in the world can be traced back to the Israeli Palestinian conflict. This conflict impacts the global community and especially everyone in the USA. This whole issue is based on Human Rights and it is a global issue requiring global intervention.

“There have been three stages to make this occupation permanent. The first was to establish the facts on the ground; the settlements. There are ½ million Israeli’s and four million Palestinians here. They have been forced into Bantustan; truncated mini states; prison states. It is apartheid and Israel is not a democracy, it is an ethnocracy: full rights to Jews, but not Palestinians.

“In 1977, Sharon came in with a mandate, money and resources to make the Israeli presence in the West Bank irreversible. The second stage began in April 2004 when America approved the Apartheid/Convergence/Realignment Plan and eight settlement blocs. This is just like South Africa!

“The Bush Sharon letter exchange guaranteed that the USA considers the settlements non-negotiable. The Convergence Plan and The Wall create the borders and that is what defines Bantustans. Congress ratified the Bush plan and only Senator Byrd of West Virginia voted no and nine House Representatives.

“Israel denies there is an occupation, so everything is reduced to terrorism. It is our job to insist upon the human rights issue, for occupied people have International Law on their side.

“Israel has set up a matrix of control; a thick web of settlements guaranteed to make the occupation permanent by establishing facts on the ground.

“Israeli policy is to maintain a 72% Jewish and 28% Arab population. Palestinians cannot get building permits to build upon their legally owned land. The Arab land has been re-zoned as green space, and the green space will be re-zoned for the settlements.

“Every single Palestinian home in Jerusalem has a demolition order. The entire West Bank has been zoned as agricultural land by Israel, and that will also be re-zoned again for more settlements.”

Under international law all the settlements are considered illegal colonies-but they are spun as “neighborhoods” by politicians and a limp and lazy media.

During an ICAHD bus tour in Nov. 2007, on our way to the Beit Arabiya Peace House, we witnessed acres of tree stumps that had once been miles of olive trees; but they were chopped off by the Israeli army.

Jeff commented, “It has been said that the Israelis do not love this land, they just want to possess it. I don’t just have a political problem with this Judiaization of the Old City; it is ecologically and environmentally offensive.”

It also is spiritually impoverished for the raping and pillaging of what is claimed holy ground refutes and denies the biblical meaning of dominion. The ancients understood dominion meant to nurture, love and protect but the destruction of indigenous peoples homes, the stealing and destroying of their legally owned property, has got to be an abomination unto God as well as a crime against humanity.

The Beit Arabiya Peace House, is at the crossroads of Areas A, B and C and the home has become a symbol of nonviolent persistent resistance and a meeting place for Israelis, Palestinian and International peace activists at the intersection of Areas A, B, and C. The smallest of the three is Area A, which is under Palestinian authority. Areas B and C are under Israeli control.

When I saw Jeff last in June 2009, he told me there was another demolition order of the Beit Arabyia home, but during my visit there, I was captivated by a mural painted on the outer wall created by the North American Workers Against the USA occupation of Iraq and the Israeli occupation of Palestine.

The mural depicted Rachel Corrie, the American who was run over by a USA made Caterpillar bulldozer in Gaza when she stood up to defend the home of a pharmacist with five children four days before the USA began bombing Baghdad.  Also depicted was a pregnant Palestinian woman of ten who had also been run over by a Caterpillar in Gaza.

The angelic images of the two women floated above a depiction of a USA made Caterpillar bulldozer that had tipped to one side and was flanked by tanks and images of weapons of destruction along with images of people and a railroad track; a reminder that prior to 1948, Jews and Palestinians had worked together in peaceful solidarity to build a railroad.

The Arabyia home/Peace Center is at the cornerstone of the village of the Anata and the Shufat refugee camps, in the very area where the prophet Jeremiah in the 6th century B.C. critiqued the violent conflicts in the Mid East, which were already old news: ”I hear violence and destruction in the city, sickness and wounds are all I see.” [Jeremiah 6:7]

Mohammad Alatar, film producer of “The Iron Wall” addressed my group after we broke bread and ate a typical Palestinian feast prepared by the Arabiya family:

“I am a Muslim Palestinian American and when my son asked me who my hero was I took three days to think about it. I told him my hero is Jesus, because he took a stand and he died for it.

“What really needs to be done is for the churches to be like Jesus; to challenge the Israeli occupation and address the apartheid practices as moral issues.

“Even if every church divested and boycotted Israel it would not harm Israel. After the USA and Russia, Israel is the third largest arms exporter in the world. It is a moral issue that the churches must address.”

The Obama Administration has demanded Israel freeze all construction of its illegal settlements; but the building continues. Money talks louder than words and people of conscience are exerting pressure to get Israel to change its behavior. The quickest and most effective way to do this is by ending U.S. military aid, which is being misused by Israel in violation of U.S. law to kill and injure Palestinian civilians and sustain Israel’s illegal occupation of the Palestinian West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza Strip.

1:19Vanunu’s Message to Hillary Clinton re: The Apartheid Wall

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http://endtheoccupation.org/ “By far the most dangerous foe we have to fight is apathy – indifference from whatever cause, not from a lack of knowledge, but from carelessness, from absorption in other pursuits, from a contempt bred of self satisfaction.” Dr. William Osler, (1849-1919) “He who allows oppression, shares the crime.”- Erasmus Darwin

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Only in Solidarity do “we have it in our power to begin the world again.”-Tom Paine

Eileen Fleming,
Founder of WeAreWideAwake.org

Yes, Hindus Really Do Drink “Holy” Cow Urine

Surabhi Gomutra Ayurveda describes Gomutra as a very holy Rasayana (health tonic) that is capable of balancing all three dosha (Vata, Pitta and Kapha) As per modern scientific researches it contains variety of many useful bio-active substances like essential amino acids, enzymes, proteins, vitamins, hormones and minerals. During various scientific studies, it has shown very strong anti bacterial, anti viral, immuno-stimulator and adaptogenic properties. Surabhi Gomutra is a pure distillate derived from cow urine through very hygienic scientific method. This cow urine is procured from a highly selective, healthy and well nurtured cows only in holy atmosphere of BAPS cattle yard. Ayurvedic recommends Gomutra in multiple diseased conditions like respiratory disorders, intestinal colic pain, polyurea, allergy, infection etc.

Indication:

Asthma, respiratory infection, tuberculosis, intestinal colic pain, liver insufficiency, polyurea, kidney stone, skin disease, low immunity

Direction for use:

1 to 2 tablespoonfuls (15 to 30 ml) twice daily or as directed by physician.

Composition:

A gift from the gods: bottled cow’s urine

By Julian West in New Delhi
Published: 12:01AM BST 02 Sep 2001

HINDU nationalists in India have launched a marketing exercise to promote cow’s urine as a health cure for ailments ranging from liver disease to obesity and even cancer.

The urine, which is being sold under the label “Gift of the Cow”, is being enthusiastically promoted by the government of Gujarat, one of three states in India dominated by Hindu nationalists.

The urine is collected daily from almost 600 shelters for rescued and wounded cattle set up by the Vishwa Hindu Parisad (VHP), or World Council of Holy men, as part of a government cow-protection programme to save the country’s sacred, but often maltreated, beasts.

Advertised as being “sterilised and completely fresh” it is available for 20 rupees (30p) a bottle at about 50 centres run by the VHP in Gujerat, from 200 of their outlets in neighbouring Madhya Pradesh, and at fairs and religious festivals throughout India.

It also comes in tablets or a cream mixed with other traditional medicinal herbs. Demand is currently outstripping supply.

Dr Jadi Patel at the VHP’s headquarters in Ahmedabad said: “It’s very popular because the results are very good, but we’ve got a shortage.” He explained that the cow protection centres had been formed after the last grand gathering of saddhus, or holy men, to save cows from “unofficial slaughter by Muslims”.

Killing cows is illegal in most Indian states but there are an estimated 32,000 illegal abattoirs and 13.7 million cows are believed to be slaughtered by Muslims for the leather industry.

Animal rights activists in India also claim that the doe-eyed, hump-backed white Brahma cattle that are to be found on almost every Indian street are subjected to various abuses, including forced pregnancies to produce more milk.

The cow protection commission was set up to protect the holy cows, and research conducted by doctors involved in the project revealed that the cows’ urine had medicinal properties.

The idea of using it came from the central Indian headquarters of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the powerful Hindu nationalist ideologues behind the country’s Bharata Janata Party (BJP), where five scientists are researching its beneficial effects.

Like all devout Hindus, RSS members believe that all cow products are sacred. Ghee, or clarified butter, is used in Indian cooking and to light lamps during temple ceremonies, and milk is commonly poured over sacred idols as an offering.

The healing properties of cow dung and cow’s urine are also mentioned in ancient Hindu texts. The research conducted by doctors at the cow-protection commission indicates that the urine can cure anything from skin diseases, kidney and liver ailments to obesity and heart ailments.

Although most Indian doctors view the medicines as eccentric, several advocates of the treatment have come forward in Gujarat, have come forward to support the doctors’ claims.

They include Vidhyaben Mehta, a 65-year-old woman with a cancerous tumour on her chest who has been taking cow’s urine for the past three years. She says she is no longer in pain and has survived in spite of medical predictions that she would die two years ago.

So enthusiastic is the Gujarat government about its cows’ urine medicines that it has asked the Indian Institute of Management to compile a database of traditional cures and verify the Hindu nationalists’ findings.

The academics have also discovered that cow’s urine is an extremely effective pesticide and plant fertiliser and are now developing for human consumption new drugs that contain the “gift of the cow”.

Prof Anil Gupta at the institute said: “This isn’t just a religious thing. If it’s useful we shouldn’t stop it simply because we think it has religious connections.”

How to Rule India: Break It Into More Pieces?

By Ishaan Tharoor

Pro-Telangana supporters hold flags and celebrate in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad Dec. 10, 2009. Following violent protests, the government will carve a new state out of southern Andhra Pradesh, a move likely to fuel more statehood demands

Krishnendu Halder / Reuters

In mid-October 1952, an acolyte of Mahatma Gandhi named Potti Sriramulu invoked the tactics of his teacher and went on a hunger strike. The nation of India — at the time just five years old — was still finding shape after centuries of division and colonial rule, with many of its diverse regions clamoring for greater political recognition. Sriramulu’s fast came on behalf of tens of millions who, like him, spoke Telugu, a prominent south Indian language, and wanted their own state within the country.

Yet his protest went unheeded for weeks by New Delhi and, 58 days after it began, Sriramulu died, a sacrifice that triggered widespread rioting and eventually forced the government into forming the Telugu-speaking state of Andhra Pradesh in 1953, as well as other new states organized on linguistic lines. No small irony then, that, almost 60 years later, another hunger strike threatens to dismember the state Sriramulu first won, and revive a fierce debate about the nature of the federal Indian nation-state.(See a pictorial history of the tempestuous Nehru dynasty of India.)

Late Wednesday, the Indian government announced it would approve the carving out of a separate state known as Telangana from Andhra Pradesh. The movement for Telangana secession is virtually as old as the Indian republic itself, but it gained traction this month after its main political leader, K. Chandrashekar Rao, commenced a week-long fast. Rao’s deteriorating health as well as coordinated protests — some violent — across the 10 districts of Andhra Pradhesh’s 23 that comprise Telangana, including the influential high-tech capital of Hyderabad, seemed to force New Delhi’s hand. But it could open a whole series of controversies for the Indian government as many other regional movements have now stepped up their own demands for statehood.(See a story about the death that may have precipitated the Andhra Pradesh controversy.)

Though Telugu-speaking as well, Telangana had once been part of a separate kingdom ruled from Hyderabad, which recognized British suzerainty during the colonial period but was not administratively part of British India. It was subsumed into the territory of Andhra Pradesh only in 1956, after a further dismemberment of the once independent Hyderabad kingdom. Though the city of Hyderabad was made the capital of the united Andhra Pradesh state, calls for greater autonomy have lingered, with many in Telangana complaining of marginalization at the hands of the coastal Andhra population.

But if New Delhi imagined it would calm tensions with its nod toward accepting a new state, the move backfired. Dozens of local legislators in Andhra Pradesh have resigned their posts and strikes by those opposing Telangana’s secession have paralyzed much of the state. Trains have been blocked, businesses shut down. According to news reports on Saturday, two activists in favor of a “united Andhra” took their lives in protest of the state’s splitting. The turmoil has also plunged Hyderabad, a booming, cosmopolitan I.T. hub, into panic as politicians and business leaders fret over the costs of the current instability. “This will be a total flop as investors will flee,” says Amruthraj Padmanabhundi, a 27-year-old I.T. professional in Hyderabad. “I am very worried [about] my prospects slipping.”

The prospect of Telangana’s creation has buoyed similar causes elsewhere as calls for secession echo in nearly a dozen states in India. A four-day strike is under way among the picturesque hills and tea estates of Darjeeling, in northern West Bengal, with protesters intensifying demands for a new state of Gorkhaland that would better address the needs of the area’s ethnic Nepalese population. More than 100 activists have begun what they call a “fast-unto-death.” On the other side of the country, in the vast desert state of Rajasthan, a caravan of some 5,000 demonstrators and 500 camels paraded into the capital of Jaipur on Friday, agitating for the formation of Maru Pradesh, a state that would be carved out of some of Rajasthan’s poorest districts. “Rajasthan is huge. It is not easy to keep track of all the villages, of the development or the lack of it,” says Jaiveer Godara, the leading voice of the movement. “The person who lives in the last village of Maru Pradesh has to wait for three days to get supply of water from outside … [And] there are no roads that lead to his village.”(See a story about the 1937 silver jubilee of the ruler of Hyderabad, reputedly the world’s richest man, from TIME’s archives.)

At the root of this looming crisis lies the still unresolved question of how the world’s largest democracy ought best to govern itself. Independent India was at first a patchwork of former British provinces and princely states threaded together into a federal republic. Some of its states remain huge and unwieldy — for example, the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, with its estimated 190 million people, would be virtually tied with Brazil as the fifth most populous country on earth but it would also possess 8% of the world’s population under the global poverty line. With a country of India’s size and diversity — as well as poverty — there is logic in having smaller states. “It will in fact strengthen [governance] through economic and administrative convenience,” says Delhi-based political analyst Paranjoy Guha Thakurta. “India can survive and prosper by breaking up.”

The Indian government last fashioned new states in 2000, when three largely remote and impoverished regions were elevated in status. At least two of them — Chhattisgarh and Uttarakhand — have shown marked progress since their inception. Small states like Kerala in the south and Haryana in the north, both with populations under 30 million, boast some of India’s highest development indicators. Backers of further decentralization even point to the original, idealistic Gandhian vision for India — of a republic brought together not by a strong central government, but an “ocean” of egalitarian and self-sufficient villages.

Of course, that sort of utopianism has little place in the current hurly-burly of Indian politics. Experts worry that new states may simply mean more jockeying for power and expanded bureaucracy in a country already notorious for its spools of red tape as well as its perpetual political horse-trading. “Ultimately, fragmentation is not a substitute for good governance,” says C.V. Madhukar, director of PRS Legislative Research, a Delhi nonprofit which advises the government.

Hoping to dampen a few of calls for new and smaller states ignited by the Andhra controversy, New Delhi has dialed back its support for Telangana, insisting that the matter now find a resolution through a vote in the Andhra Pradesh legislature. Given the current tumult, it’s unclear when or how such a motion may go through. The political party headed by Rao, the Telangana separatist leader, was trounced both in recent state and national polls. His hunger strike — now ended — and the disturbances organized around it were likely an act of desperation of a movement shorn of much of its real political capital. “Having the government buckle to this kind moral blackmail is not a healthy way to go about things,” says Madhukar. “There shouldn’t be this sword of Damocles hanging over peoples’ heads.” A young India may have come of age through such dramatic acts of Gandhian sacrifice, but a more mature nation needs more measured habits. —With reporting by Nilanjana Bhowmick/New Delhi

See a pictorial timeline of events that shaped modern India.

Read “The Insurgency Threatening India’s Schools.”

Storm over Israeli settlements as unreal as the peace process

[We will probably one day figure-out that this has all been just another psyop/Hasbara/lie meant to convince us that Obama is not controlled by the Zionists.]

aletho

Hasan Abu Nimah, The Electronic Intifada, 18 March 2010

US Vice President Joe Biden laughs with Israeli President Shimon Peres in Jerusalem, 9 March 2010. (David Lienemann/White House Photo)

Since Israel announced yet another new settlement in occupied East Jerusalem during the visit of US Vice President Joe Biden last week, Israel has been subjected to a storm of criticism from friend and foe alike. Biden was in Jerusalem to show US support for Israel and to launch "proximity talks" between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) of Ramallah. Instead the Israeli announcement caused him and the US administration deep embarrassment, prompting several officials to term it an "insult" and an "affront" and to stir talk of the worst crisis in US-Israeli relations in decades.
This might be music to the ears of those long frustrated by American silence on Israel’s constant violations of international law, but it actually amounts to little.

Just before Biden’s visit, US envoy George Mitchell had been in the region to orchestrate the proximity talks. It seemed a final hurdle had been removed when the Arab League gave diplomatic cover to PAleader Mahmoud Abbas to join the talks for a limited period of four months. Just then Israel dropped the latest settlement bombshell blowing the whole thing up.

The proximity talks device was highly controversial already. Skeptics pointed out that an additional few months of indirect talks would be of no use when almost two decades of direct negotiations — with ostensibly less hardline Israeli governments — had produced absolutely nothing. The talks were also perceived as blatant American and international capitulation to Israeli intransigence, and yet a desperately needed cover for the total US failure to get Israel to agree to a real settlement freeze as a condition for resuming direct talks. All the misgivings were confirmed by Israel’s announcement of the 1,600 settler homes.

It would have been scandalous for Palestinians — even as weak and compromised as Abbas’ authority — to engage under such conditions. The PA expressed strong objections, demanding that the Israeli plan be withdrawn before returning to the talks. So it seemed it was back to square one.

But this is only part of the story. If the proximity talks blew up, it was at least as much the fault of the US administration itself as it was that of Israel. Let’s recall the real sequence of events. On 8 March, just two days before Biden’s visit, Israel announced the construction of an additional 112 units in Beitar Illit settlement near Bethlehem — violating its own self-declared 10-month moratorium outside what it defines as Jerusalem. PA chief negotiator Saeb Erekat issued one of his routine statements, but there were no threats by the PA to boycott the talks.

Even worse, the US seemed to provide cover for the Israeli move; State Department spokesman PJ Crowley told reporters then that the Beitar Illit decision "does not violate the moratorium that the Israelis previously announced," although he allowed that "this is the kind of thing that both sides need to be cautious of as we move ahead with these parallel talks."

Netanyahu may have been — justifiably — surprised by the strength of the US rhetorical reaction later after the Jerusalem announcement (and that of EU, UN and other international officials who added their own "strong" criticism only after they got an American green light). None of these people ever bothered much about settlement expansion before. Why this one, why now? After all, Israel never told anyone it would freeze settlement construction in what it defines as "greater" Jerusalem!

Despite Netanyahu’s denial that he knew in advance of the announcement, it is clear Israel was sending a message to the peace process chorus. First, that renewed talks would not mean any slow down in colonization schemes on occupied lands. Second, that Israeli-defined Jerusalem is outside the scope of any negotiations. Third, Netanyahu does not need the talks — for him they are only a cover for colonization — so he could afford the risk that the talks would be jeopardized knowing full well that the US reaction would be limited at worst to words of criticism.

Netanyahu has nevertheless admitted that it was a miscalculation to announce a major new settlement when Biden was visiting precisely to emphasize US support for Israel. But for him the mistake was only in timing, not in substance. Indeed, despite all the strong American criticism over the weekend, Netanyahu announced on Monday that settlement-building in Jerusalem and the rest of the West Bank would continue as normal as it has for 43 years. Since 1967, settler roads and settlements, now home to half a million Israeli Jews, have eaten up more than 46 percent of the West Bank.

During the colonization years which have been constantly accompanied by Israeli aggression, confiscation of territory and additional ethnic cleansing and displacement of Palestinians, the international community showed little or no anger at Israel, other than occasional empty statements of disapproval, and it kept up business as usual.

The Palestinian Liberation Organization and later the Palestinian Authority, also negotiated year after year with Israel and signed accords and agreements while the land was being openly colonized and thePalestinian people were constantly persecuted and viciously uprooted. Arab states for their part have negotiated and signed peace treaties while the occupation remained firmly in place and the process of settlement building went on.

So if for 43 years there has been continuous occupation accompanied with continuous settlement building while the international community was maintaining a deadly and a cowardly silence, why all the sudden noise over 1,600 additional housing units? It is neither the first project nor will it be the last. And notice that for all its complaints, the United States pointedly did not require Israel to cancel the project. It would never dare do that. Instead within a few days, the US will be pressuring the PA to return to futile negotiations while the settlement construction carries on.

Remember Jabal Abu Ghneim, the forested hill near Bethlehem that Netanyahu decided to build on in the 1990s against strenuous American and international objections that it would "destroy the peace process?" Today the trees are gone and in their place are only Israeli apartment buildings. But the fake, fraudulent "peace process" continues as if nothing happened. This theatrical storm will also slowly die down and the settlements construction will steadily keep up.

Hasan Abu Nimah is the former permanent representative of Jordan at the United Nations. This essay first appeared in The Jordan Times.