Musings by Shahidul Alam
Continue reading “In Defense of Hezbollah, a ?Terrorist? Organization”
He was in southern India after nearly 30 years. He had come to Kerala to deliver the Chinta Ravindran Memorial Lecture at Thrissur. My friend, the well-known writer Paul Zacharia and I were showing him the sights and we had just been to the site of the archaeological dig at Pattanam near Kodungalloor where he saw the unearthed pottery and artefacts that were reconstructing the fascinating story of an early society in these parts, already in maritime contact with West Asian ports and ancient Rome. From there we proceeded to the nearby Cheraman juma masjid, considered the first mosque in India, and perhaps the second in the world, dating back to A.D. 629. There was only a little evidence of that ancient patrimony left; the quaint old native structure had been all but pulled down some 50 years back and a more commodious, more standardised edifice built around it. All that was left were some pillars, a section of a doorway, another of a beamed ceiling and a crumbling staircase leading up to the attic, all in wood. But a photograph of the structure, as it was in 1905, hung on the wall. Continue reading “The New World Disorder”
Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee, said today that President Obama ?really ought to consider? returning his Nobel Peace Prize Medal immediately, including the ?really nice? case it came in. Continue reading “Nobel Committee Asks Obama ?Nicely? To Return Peace Prize”
BBC journalist Jihad Masharawi carries his son?s body at a Gaza hospital. (Associated Press)
The?front page?photo on?Thursday?s Washington Post?tells, in a single frame, a very personal story from Wednesday?s Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip.?Jihad Misharawi, a BBC Arabic journalist who lives in Gaza, carries the body of his 11-month old son, Omar, through al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City.
Omar Misharawi (Jihad Misharawi, via Paul Danahar)
An Israeli round hit?Misharawi?s four-room home in Gaza Wednesday, killing his son, according to BBC Middle East bureau chief Paul Danahar, who arrived in Gaza earlier Thursday. Misharawi?s?sister-in-law was also killed, and his brother wounded.?Misharawi told Danahar that, when the round landed, there was no fighting in his residential neighborhood.
?We?re all one team in Gaza,? Danahar told me, saying that Misharawi is a BBC video and photo editor. After spending a ?few hours? with his grieving colleague, he?wrote?on Twitter,??Questioned asked here is: if Israel can kill a man riding on a moving motorbike (as they did last month) how did Jihad?s son get killed.?
Danahar also shared the following photos of?Misharawi?s small Gaza home, which appears to have been heavily damaged. The place where the round punctured his ceiling is clearly visible.
Jihad Misharawi?s home. (Paul Danahar/BBC)
Jihad Misharawi?s home. (Paul Danahar/BBC)
BBC World editor Jon Williams?sent a memo?about the young child?s death to colleagues, according to The Telegraph:
Our thoughts are with Jihad and the rest of the team in Gaza.
This is a particularly difficult moment for the whole bureau in Gaza.
We?re fortunate to have such a committed and courageous team there. It?s a sobering reminder of the challenges facing many of our colleagues.
Reuters also had a photographer at the Gaza City hospital where Misharawi took his son. The story that these photos tell, of loss and confusion, may help inform the Palestinian reactions ? and, as the photos continue to spread widely on social media, perhaps the reactions from beyond the Palestinian territories ? to the violence between Israel and Gaza.
Jihad Masharawi mourns his son?s death in Gaza. (Mohammed Salem ? Reuters)Everyone, regardless of whether they belonged to the Awami League or to the BNP or Jamaat,?or was an ordinary citizen, suddenly became a Muslim.
— Adnan Wahid
HE WAS speaking of September 29, 2012, trying hard to explain to us, as we sat at a cafe in Dhaka, of how it could have been possible for local Bengali Muslims — who had lived peacefully with Buddhists, both Bengalis (Barua) and Rakhains, for many generations??in Ramu — to take part in wave after wave of assaults which destroyed innumerable Buddhist monasteries and temples where neighbours had worshipped and prayed, to take part in armed attacks which set fire to houses where Buddhist neighbours had lived. Continue reading “PART I: Punishing the innocent”
Pakistan’s war?Insight
?By Mohammad Shehzad
A report on the changing organization and loyalties of the Pakistani Taliban
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Hakimullah Mehsud is the emir of Pakistan’s biggest terrorist group Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan. He is also wanted by the US for murdering seven Americans on December 30, 2009 at a CIA base in Khost, and the failed bombing of Times Square in New York City on May 1, 2010. Washington and Islamabad have announced a bounty of $5m and Rs50m on his head. But the chief of the country’s biggest religious party – Jamaat-e-Islami – says he does not exist. Continue reading “Brotherhood of bombs”
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“If Anybody here, came hoping to hear a balanced presentation, then they are going to be sorely disappointed. I say this, because a lot of the things that you are about to hear to night are difficult to hear.”
?Miko Peled is a peace activist who dares to say in public what others still choose to deny. He has credibility, so when he debunks myths that Jews around the world hold with blind loyalty, people listen. Miko was born in Jerusalem in 1961 into a well known Zionist family. His grandfather, Dr. Avraham Katsnelson was a Zionist leader and signer on the Israeli Declaration of Independence. His father, Matti Peled was a young officer in the war of 1948 and a general in the war of 1967 when Israel conquered the West Bank, Gaza, Golan Heights and the Sinai.
Miko Peled, author of The General?s Son, whose father was the renowned Israeli general Matti Peled, speaking in Seattle, October 1, 2012.
Video Posted October 13, 2012
Related piece on use of images by Israeli government for disinformation in Satish Sharma’s blog Rotigraphy
extract:?The art of the past no longer exists as it once did. It’s authority is lost. In its place there is a language of images. What matters now is who uses that language for what purpose.” ~ John Berger
The image supplies little in itself. What counts is its use and the power to fix a particular interpretation of the events, objects or people depicted. Some people, and especially some institutions, have much more clout in this process than others do.” ~ Steve Edwards
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Three years ago, the Sri Lankan cricket team rode through the streets of Lahore, Pakistan, on the third day of a five-day test match. Team captain Mahela Jayawardene, who is to his country what Derek Jeter is to the city of New York, rode near the back of the bus. The convoy, with a police escort, rolled through the streets outside the stadium. Mahela, known as MJ, took out his phone to call his wife, and that’s when they all heard what sounded like fireworks. Someone shouted, “They’re shooting at the bus!” They heard the bullets, marching down the side exposed to the terrorist gunmen, sounding like rain on a metal roof. Mahela dove for the floor, and the first 30 seconds of what happened next ended up on Christina Jayawardene’s voice mail. An RPG flew over the bus. A grenade rolled under it. It was a blur: policemen being shot in the street, dying on a Tuesday morning, bullets striking the tires, players screaming. When she played the message for Mahela’s oldest friend, tears flowed down her face as he listened. Continue reading “Sri Lanka's stars bridge past, future”
“Daddy, what is blowback?”
Here’s a fable to tell our children, by the fire, in a not so-distant post-apocalyptic, dystopian future.
Once upon a time, during George “Dubya” Bush’s “war on terra”, the Forces of Good in Afghanistan captured – and duly tortured – one evil terrorist, Abu Yahya al-Libi.
Abu Yahya al-Libi was, of course, Libyan. He slaved three years in the bowels of Bagram prison near Kabul, but somehow managed to escape that supposedly impregnable fortress in July 2005. Continue reading “THE ROVING EYE: Mr Blowback rising in Benghazi”
