Peace and Justice Post

Nasir Khan, January 6, 2015

There has been not tangible move to resolve the Kashmir issue that had started at the partitioning of India in 1947 when the British raj came to an end there. Soon military hostilities started between the two new neighbours, India and Pakistan, over the princely State of Jammu and Kashmir. It was only through the UN mediation that the hostilities between the two countries were brought to an end and the parties occupying the areas were accepted as de facto powers. The temporary border-line between these powers was demarcated as the Line of Control.

Editor’s remarks:   In this article eminent scholar and peace activist Richard Falk shows the delusional side of the liberal Zionism and debunks all the claims made by its vocal advocates. His penetrating analysis cuts across the deception and misleading projections that are tossed around as a way forward in the present situation. Diverse views and opinions offered by the liberal Zionists are meant to cover-up the designs of the Israeli government and facilitate the expansionist policies in the West Bank by illegal settlements and marginalising the Palestinians to the extant that they have nothing left but to accept what the occupier decides for them. It is easy to see that the ‘two-state solution’ has been a useful tool in the hands of Israel while expanding its illegal settlements and thus making a viable Palestinian state virtually impossible if it didn’t relinquish the land it occupied in 1967. We have to keep in mind that Israel has not planted 600,000 militant Jewish settlers in the West Bank with the idea of dislodging them at some time. On the contrary, they have been put there as an essential part of the colonisation of the occupied Palestine. Their numbers are increasing and new settlements are expanding. The Palestinians have hopes and aspirations for self-determination and creating a sovereign state in their own land. But Israel has the military power and the backing of the United States to impose its will on a captive people.

Nasir Khan, Editor

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Richard Falk, MWC News, January  5, 2015

Editor’s comment: Salman Taseer was the governor of the Punjab Province, Pakistan. He stood for justice, religious toleration and the protection of the rights of religious minorities. He voiced his opposition to the victimization of innocent Christians who were falsely accused of insulting Islam and the Qur’an by some goons and were tried under the Blasphemy Laws of Pakistan. The governor’s bodyguard, a religious fanatic, killed him. While thousands of people were appalled by this ghastly assassination of a noble person, hundreds of thousands of fanatic people and mullahs in Pakistan openly supported the murderer and held demonstrations in his favour. Such is the social and political reality of Pakistan where dogmatic indoctrination has paralysed people in the last few decades. Gone are the days of humane thinking and respect for other peoples’ differing views or outlook.

Nasir Khan, Editor
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http://blogs.tribune.com.pk/story/20417/why-should-we-remember-salman-taseer/

Salman Taseer was certainly not a leader of the masses. He didn’t have the charisma of Bhutto or the populist support of Benazir. He was, however, a man who believed in a liberal Pakistan. PHOTO: FILE

January 4 and 5 are two days that every PPP (Pakistan Peoples Party) supporter will remember, but for two very different reasons. January 5 is the birthday of their enigmatic party founder Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. January 4, on the other hand, remains one of the darkest days in our history of political murders – a day that is, surprisingly, not spoken of enough.

January 4, 2011, was the day when the serving Governor of Punjab, Salman Taseer, was shot dead by his guard, because the guard was in disagreement with Taseer’s opposition to the blasphemy law. Salman Taseer’s assassin was a man called Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri, reportedly a member of Dawat-e-Islami.

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Editor’s comment: The rejection of the Palestinian resolution in the Security Council was expected because of the role of American power in the world and also in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). There was hardly any indication of any change in the US policy in the UNSC. But in case of more favourable voting in favour of the resolution, the US would have vetoed it. Such has been the standard US practice in the UNSC on numerous occasions when any matter came up regarding Israel’s violations of human rights or violence against the Palestinians in the occupied land. In any case, the US has been pivotal in supporting the Israeli occupation of Palestine for many decades and it will continue to do so because of the power of Israel and Israeli lobby on the US Governemnt and the US Congress. Therefore, America is the main hurdle to the Palestinians’ right to self-determination, the guarantor of the continued Israeli occupation of Palestine and its firm supporter for the oppression, suppression and enslavement of the people of Palestine.

Nasir Khan, Editor

I wish a happy new year to all including political activists who have stood for the rights of the captive and brutalised people of Palestine under the occupation of a powerful colonial settler state, defenders of human rights and religious minorities, anti-war and anti-imperialism friends and comrades.

–Nasir Khan, 31 Dec. 2014

Nasir Khan, Dec. 30, 2014

It is not what the Taliban stood for when they held power that any sane person could have sided with them and supported them with regard to their crude views of Islam and forcing it upon a war-weary people. But let’s see things in their political context to judge how they emerged as a political force.

They were able to take political power in Afghanistan easily because of US military and diplomatic support they received in their war against the Soviet forces that had come to uphold the socialist government in Afghanistan. They finished off the socialist regime in Kabul by the symbolic hanging of President Najibullah in the most savage manner. That signalled the shape of the things to come and the sort of theocratic system they had in store for the land. These mujahiddin, the Soldiers of God, that American policy-makers had groomed and used against the Soviet forces opened up a new chapter in Afghanistan’s history with their vision of a state based on the Sharia laws that had not the slightest regard to basic human needs of civilised behaviour and outlook.

But soon American policy in the region brought them in conflict with their major sponsor, the United States of America. When in 2001 America invaded and occupied Afghanistan, the whole political scenario underwent a drastic change. Now Afghanistan was under a foreign occupying power. A nascent movement of national resistance against the occupier started. Even those Afghans who had opposed the Taliban for their harsh policies and their primitive ways of imposing Islam when they were in power made a common cause with them to fight the occupiers. The puppet Karzai regime had to follow his masters. He had no leverage on American policy, ongoing war and frequent civilian deaths.

The US imperialists used barbaric methods to humiliate Afghan prisoners who were blind-folded and hooded before they put them on aeroplanes for transferring to Gitmo or other prisons around the world. President Bush and Defence Secretary Rumsfeld showed great cowardly chutzpah because they were able to impose their will upon a defenceless people and humiliate a proud people. What they didn’t take into account was Afghanistan’s old history. Foreign invaders like the Greeks, the Mongols and the British had occupied Afghanistan in the past but they were not able to maintain their occupation for long. The Afghans drove them out of their country. But was the same thing going to happen to American invaders? Or was the American occupation to be an exception in Afghan history because US was the greatest military power in human history and the world recognised ‘American exceptionalism’? What happened was something like this.

The Taliban became the leading voice of resistance. In this long American war American imperialists got bogged down in one of the most intractable militaristic quagmires from which they were not able to extricate themselves. The resistance continued against them and the Taliban never wavered in their determination to wear down the foreign occupiers. As we have seen in this 13 year war, they succeeded in doing exactly what they had aimed to do. American invaders and their international allies were tied down. Despite their overwhelming superiority in arms and armies Americans could only kill and terrorise but that didn’t stop the resistance and opposition to their occupation and war. New people continued to join the ranks of the Taliban in the warfare.

Now when the foreign forces are supposedly ending their active military operations, the Taliban are on the offensive and are targeting the forces of Afghan regime and its backers. They have not been defeated or weakened. American hegemon knows this fully well. The reason for their victory lies in the fact of leading a successful resistance by guerilla warfare against US military occupation and its military might.

How will things turn out in the  coming months and years is difficult to tell. The Taliban may take power and oust the present regime. If that happens then the Taliban’s primitive version of theocracy will be imposed and the cycle of more disasters and oppression will gain a new lease of life.

Nasir Khan, Dec. 29, 2014

First and foremost Dr Mohammad Iqbal (1877-1938) was an eminent poet in Urdu and Farsi, a poet whose ideas had a wide range and profound impact upon the educated Muslim masses. (As I have written about his political and social effect a few times earlier in my articles, I will not discuss him at length here.) What we see in the early period of his poetry are his universalist and humanist ideas – with no communalist or reactionary leanings as they became apparent later in his poetry.

Nasir Khan, Dec. 20, 2014

A Facebook friend of mine wrote me about the importance of education in fighting against superstitious beliefs and belief-systems. In a sense, education is seen as a vehicle of change against indoctrination. My brief reply is as follows:

Yes, I agree. Apparently education is the way to enlighten people and negate the superstitious beliefs held by people. But in many Afro-Asian countries, education is part of indoctrination process in religious dogmas. Once such beliefs are instilled in impressionable minds of children, they become part of their whole life. It is not easy to shake off these because for most of us what we internalised as truth in our younger days stays with us. Only a very limited number of people manage to break out of that mould.

The recent massacre of school children and teachers in Pakistan was a savage act of the Taliban. But this tragedy has also some other relevant issues we need to take into consideration and let not the inhuman callousness of the killers make us oblivious of the broader picture when we are traumatised by the enormity of the crime.

The Taliban have shown hostility to girls’ education all along. In North Waziristan Pakistan army has indiscriminately targeted many civilian villages as well as the militant hideouts causing much suffering and enormous dislocation amongst the civilian population. The Taliban have resorted to revenge killings as a response to the military operations. They kill and target wherever they can including the school children in schools. For the Taliban their mission is to further the cause of Islam as their leaders and mentors have set for them. (Who created the Taliban and what for is a question, I wouldn’t discuss here and now.)

Due to the pervasive indoctrination and resultant ignorance caused by mullahs, Islamist teachers and preachers, the Taliban feel they are the soldiers of Islam. They have no remorse for what they do. Instead they are proud of what they do and they justify their actions as in the service of a higher cause – the cause of creating a pure Islamic state with the Sharia laws (regarded as ‘God’s laws’) that will be the foundation of the new political and social system. So many ordinary, non-militant millions of Pakistani Muslims have been brainwashed to the extent that they support anyone who wants to work for an Islamic state based on the Sharia laws.

Consequently, tens of millions of such people are clamouring for a total Islamic system. Islamic zealots and fanatics can count on the support of millions of ‘educated’ people such as teachers, lawyers, academics, journalists, etc., who stand for a religious state and the enforcement of the Sharia laws. They want to use their religion, their Sunni version only, as the ultimate standard that is to take precedence over all other minority religions, other Islamic sects and secular views to force obedience to God, His Holy Book, His Holy Sharia Laws, and His Holy Prophet. At present they support the existing blasphemy laws that are easy to use against anyone who says a single word that is seen as derogatory of God, Islam or the Prophet or accuse falsely anyone for having done that bears fatal consequences for the accused ones.

So ‘education’ can mean many different things depending on the society and the people we talk about. In brief, education and indoctrination are two different things and we need to emphasize their different approaches, methods and goals.