Desicritics Category: Politics: Middle East

All Visitors are Gods, But Some Visitors are Higher Gods

Vinod Joseph — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 14:23:23 EDT

Recently, an Indian I know suffered verbal abuse of a racist nature at a public place in the UK. Commiserations from friends and well-wishers flowed in. Amidst all the support and handholding, which were all on the usual lines (not every Brit is racist, it’s the recession which makes people so nasty, don’t let a sicko disrupt your life), one comment stood out and set me thinking: ‘We (Indians) treat these people so well when they come to India.’

My initial reaction was to agree with that comment. I could think of so many instances when I used to work in Mumbai or study in Bangalore when I have gone out of my way to help foreign visitors. I have taken detours so that I could walk visitors to destinations they had trouble finding. I have spent valuable minutes answering questions in painstaking detail, questions on everything ranging from why Indians defecate in public to why Indian trains are usually late.

My initial reaction was buttressed by this blog post by Peter Foster, one-time Telegraph reporter based in Delhi who has very recently moved to Beijing with his family. In his post, Foster tells us of a recent experience in Beijing where an old man saved his life (from his kids) by doing some carpentry work for free. Foster goes on to wonder if he would be just as helpful to a newly arrived Chinese immigrant in London asking him for help in broken English.

So, on the fact of it, one gets the impression that Indians and other Asians and possibly even Africans are very helpful and friendly towards foreign visitors whilst nasty westerners are not. But is this true? Is this the full story, the whole truth?

How do Indians treat illegal Bangladeshi immigrants in India? You might well say that an illegal immigrant does not deserve any respect or warmth. Fine (though throwing them out of the country without even the semblance of a trial is not, in my opinion, the right thing to do), let’s look at the case of Nepalis in India. How do we treat them? I have known restaurants in Colaba (Mumbai) which has a small floating population of working class Africans, treat poor African customers shabbily (the treatment Indians reserve for servants) and at peak times, even turn them away. African students in India are frequent targets of racist abuse as are people from India’s north-east.

Arabs are legendary for their hospitality, (force) feeding their guests even after they say No, even when they don’t have enough food for themselves. Hospitality is supposed to be a duty and a matter of honour. However, this hospitality rarely extended towards the hundreds of thousands of Indian, Pakistani, Nepalese, Filipino and African workers in Arab lands.

In short, the fabled Indian or Arab hospitality is restricted to prosperous, white Western visitors. This phenomenon can be seen throughout Asia.

Bhutan is a country which strives for Gross National Happiness rather than GDP. However, it has always treated its Nepali-speaking population as second class citizens even though Nepali migration to Bhutan started in the beginning of the 20th century at the invitation of Bhutan’s rulers. Many Nepalese have been forced to leave Bhutan for refugee camps in eastern Nepal.

After the Chinese revolution, the Chinese government gave scholarships to African students to study in China. As elaborated in this article, the Chinese government’s enthusiasm for Chinese students was not shared by the Chinese populace. African students in China were frequent targets of racist abuse. Hatred towards African students was the focal point which helped galvanise Chinese students into organising themselves, which ultimately led to the student demonstration at Tienanmen Square.

Foster is right in saying that if a Chinese immigrant speaking broken English looks for help in London, he is unlikely to receive the sort of assistance which Foster (speaking broken Mandarin) received in Beijing. However, an African immigrant in China is unlikely to get more any help than a Chinese or Indian immigrant in London.

Prosperous Singapore, Hong Kong or Japan are no better than their poorer Asian neighbours in this regard.

I am not for a moment saying that a coloured person in the West who is the victim of racism doesn’t have the right to protest. However, Asians treating White people so well and treating other Asian minorities and Africans so shabbily, is a manifestation of the racism that is so deeply entrenched in the Asian psyche. In my opinion, if Asians can learn to treat all their visitors with respect and dignity, (rather than treating a few select ones as Gods and feeding them till they burst), if Asians can bury their prejudices and work with poor African countries in improving their common lot, they will be able to deal a death blow to racism.

Tall and Shrinking Muslims, Short and Growing Europeans

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Thu, 5 Mar 2009 09:01:13 EST

I have written about the Arab Human Development Report before. It is indeed shocking to read about how the Arab lands are now. It does concern the rest of the world, because the Arabs and this region play a very big role in the religious wars and terrorism now roiling the globe. The Arab Development report points to various issues that the region has to grapple with. Obviously, Human Development is a comparative study, you compare the performance of the other countries to the Arab lands to check how far they are apart.

But what happened in the past? And I don't mean along the lines of Bernard Lewis’s What went wrong type of analysis. Where did the divergence happen? Well, I think we have a partial answer to that question. As is well known, the anthropometric (height/weight etc) dimensions of human beings is a good indicator of economic and human development. In other words, there is a good correlation and causality between good nutrition, good economic development, reasonably good height / weights.

So what was the difference? An article, Tall and shrinking Muslims, short and growing Europeans: The long-run welfare development of the Middle East, 1850–1980 by Mojgan Stegl & Joerg Baten of the University of Tubingen in Germany, published in the Explorations in Economic History came into my in-box recently.

They have done a sterling job in collecting anthropometric data from a staggering variety of sources and have combined it to provide some very interesting data. Without going into the intricacies of how they managed to do it, this is their first graphical result of the heights of the populations they studied.

And these results are statistically significant, the authors ran some standard statistical tests to make sure that the populations, samples etc. etc. are accurate. So how did the wages bit turn out around the inflexion point? They calculate real wages in Istanbul and industrializing countries in grams of silver per day (weighted by population size).

Curious result, no? It shows how the divergence in urban and rural areas emerge. The main improvement in the west happened in the cities, because if you strip out the cities, then the performance was about the same as urbanised Istanbul. Here’s another way of looking at the economic impact by comparing GDP per capita:

Not looking good, is it? If you go the whole hog by applying PPP and adjusting for population size, you get this picture:

So what were the other reasons given by the authors - besides the obvious economic development driving nutrition? Well, they point to the fact that in in many areas around the Middle Eest, people lived next to animal husbandry, and given that this was a concentrated protein rich diet, their heights and weights were quite good. However, as as the number of people living off animal husbandry in the Middle East started to drop, right at the same time, the supply chains in Europe improved with developed economies and better farming technologies. Diseases were further controlled and the graphs say it all. The Arab / Muslim (so as to incorporate the non Arab world of Turkey) world in the Middle Eest has steadily lost ground since then.

Now you can definitely incorporate the elements of colonialism, history, imperialism and the like, but that will make it a bit more difficult to ascribe differences in nutrition to imperialism, no? Does this mean that till about 1900/1910, Arab/Muslim imperialism and colonialism was still existent and then it was overtaken by European imperialism so the story flipped? I wonder what the situation will be in another 100 years of time?

Technorati Tags: History, Arabs, Middle East, Europe

CUPE Canada is Anti Peace and Pro-Hate

Vijay Sappani — Sun, 1 Mar 2009 01:28:17 EST

I am disappointed with CUPE and Sid Ryan for their anti-Semitic action against Israeli Universities. In a conflict there is always difference of opinion. There is death, destruction and havoc in the lives of millions of civilians like we see in the Israel- Palestine conflict. Many of us hope to see an end to the conflict and bring permanent peace to the region.

The crisis is geographical, religious and historical that most of them are biased towards their side, making it difficult. It is always expected that those in academia have cooler heads and the best place to preach peace are educational institutions on both sides of the border.

CUPE is attacking the very nerve that can bring peace to the region. Instead of calling for a boycott, CUPE should encourage more collaborations with Israeli and other universities in the middle east. We should encourage joint chairs in our universities with those in Israel and middle east.

CUPE should foster peace, love and learning , not hatred, war and anti-Semitism. Maybe Sid Ryan should attend one of the events at Shalom-Salaam and learn from them. If you can't help bring peace, don't at least hurt.

The Crisis in Sri Lanka: Canada's Role

Vijay Sappani — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 10:52:23 EST

As Sri Lankan military forces try to overrun the last remaining strongholds of the LTTE rebel group (better known as the Tamil Tigers), how should Canada respond?

Canada once had a low-profile relationship with Sri Lanka. But that changed after the country's 1983 pogrom, when thousands of Tamils and Muslims were killed. More than 250,000 Sri Lankan Tamils have come to Canada as refugees since then, making Canada home to the largest Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora in the world. Meanwhile, the Tigers -- who once controlled large swathes of the island nation -- have engaged in an on-again, off-again war with the Sri Lankan government. Understanding the history of this conflict is critical if Canada is to help develop a solution for the conflict.

Following its independence from Britain in 1948 (at which time the country was still known as Ceylon), Sri Lanka's Sinhalese-dominated government introduced several laws to institutionalize discrimination against the minority Tamil population. In 1972, Buddhism was made the primary religion of the state, and discriminatory laws were passed against religious minorities (most Tamils are Hindu). Sinhalese rioters during this period attacked temples and churches, killing hundreds. That led to the formation of many small Tamil militant groups, one of which was the Tamil Tigers.

In the 1980s and 1990s, the West paid only modest attention to Sri Lanka's internal conflict. But since 9/11, the country is seen in a different light. The Tigers -- a conventional military force that has perpetrated acts of terror -- have been banned in 31 countries, including Canada.

The Tigers and the Sri Lankan government have had several rounds of peace talks, but the guns remained truly silent only for a short while. In 2002, the two sides entered into peace talks brokered by Norway, with both parties agreeing to the establishment of an autonomous Tamil region in the northern part of the country. Unfortunately, both groups violated the terms of the agreement, and Sri Lanka finally called off the talks in January, 2008.

Since then, Sri Lanka's army has scored many battlefield victories. But ultimately, there can be no military solution to the conflict: Even if the Tigers lose all their bases, Sri Lanka's government will not be able to defeat the Tigers as a guerrilla force. In the meantime, civilians continue to be caught in the crossfire between a racist government and a rebel force that is militarily outgunned and shunned internationally.

If a negotiated political solution is to come about, the Tigers must clarify their acceptance of a Tamil nation within a united Sri Lanka, and commit to disarm. For its part, the government of Sri Lanka must agree to treat the country's Tamils in a more humane and equitable fashion. The current stage of the conflict -- in which an alarming number of civilians have died at the hands of government forces -- only reinforces Tamil concerns in this regard.

The international community must convince the Sri Lankan government and Tigers alike to arrive at a permanent resolution through peaceful negotiations. Canada could play an especially important role. In fact, our federal system (which could be a model for Sri Lanka) and our large Tamil diaspora makes us a credible candidate to lead the peace talks

The question is: Do we have an appetite to see the world beyond Iraq and Afghanistan? If so, this could be Canada's moment.

An Open Letter to President Obama on the Israel-Palestine Issue

Vinod Joseph — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 08:17:54 EST

Dear President Obama,

How do you do, Sir? Today is your 21st day in office and you must be busy with your bailout package for all those undeserving banks. However, I’m sure you have an eye on the Israeli election results. Exit polls have shown the ruling Kadima party in the first place and dramatic gains by Likud, its conservative rival, which is a close second. Avigdor Lieberman’s right-wing Yisrael Beiteinu is in third place and Labor, Israel's founding party and Kadima's current coalition partner is fourth.

Assuming Kadima comes to power and Tzipi Livni becomes Israel’s Prime Minister, you will be dealing with a hawkish bunch of people who have repeatedly failed to make the compromises that are necessary to bring peace in the middle-east. The worst aspect of this election is that Yisrael Beiteinu, much more rightwing than even Likud, is doing better than Labour.

Please don’t get me wrong Mr. President. I have always supported Israel’s right to exist. Israel was validly created by a UN resolution. Israel was meant to be predominantly Jewish and it is right in encouraging Jews to migrate to Israel. However, Israel wasn’t meant to be entirely Jewish. The UN resolution which created Israel did not allow it to carry out ethnic cleansing of Arabs. Israel’s treatment of its Arab minority has been shameful. Its treatment of Arabs in the occupied territories has been even worse. Further, building Jewish settlements in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip is something that can never be justified. Arabs in Israel are discriminated against and are second-class citizens in their own country. Israel’s economy is not in a good shape. To be very honest, Israel has survived till date mainly because of the unbelievable levels of US aid it has received over the years.

Though Israel has shed its socialist past and has many world class companies and entrepreneurs, Israel still relies on US aid to get by, mainly because of its very high defence budget. Mr. President, I’m all for ensuring that Israel continues to survive. However, Israel must be forced to make concessions to the Palestinians. Now that (relatively) secular Palestinian organisations like the Fatah are weak and unpopular among Palestinians, Israel will have to make its peace with Hamas and Hizbollah.

To begin with, Israel must allow the creation of a viable Palestinian state. No, I’m not talking of Jordan, though it may have more Palestinians than Jordanians. This Palestinian state should include not only the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, but should also have its capital in East Jerusalem. All Jewish settlements must be withdrawn from the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Mr. President, if there is any force on earth which can force Israel to make this concession, it is the United States of America.

The US of A has many levers with which it can force Israel to change. Withholding of financial aid is definitely one option. Not sharing US military technology with Israel is another. Israel may become weak in the short run, as a result, but in the long run, it will be stronger. Mr. President, to Save Israel, it must be made weak

Yours sincerely,

A blogger from the World Wide Web

Shalom, Salam and Hello

temporal — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 03:50:46 EST

"Why ... should I not dream and hope? For is not revolution the making real of dreams and hopes? So let us work together that my dream may be fulfilled, that I may return with my people out of exile to live in one democratic state where Christian, Jew and Muslim live in justice, equality, fraternity and progress...Today I have come bearing an olive branch and a freedom fighter’s gun. Do not let the olive branch fall from my hand. I repeat: do not let the olive branch fall from my hand.” Nobel Peace Laureate Yasser Arafat, Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, UN Address November 13, 1974.

Shalom

Last week rumors floated suggesting Tzipi Livni, the Israeli Foreign Minister might be arrested to face war crimes, if she attended the Summit of European Foreign Ministers in Brussels.

Mounting fear in Israel that the country's leaders face war crimes charges over their involvement in the recent Gaza offensive pushed officials into a frenzy of activity at the weekend to forestall legal actions abroad.

According to Menachem Mazuz, Israel will soon face "a wave of international lawsuits".

In response, the government is setting up a special task force to work on legal defenses, has barred the media from naming or photographing army officers involved in the Gaza attack, and has placed restrictions on overseas visits. Today, ministers were expected to approve an aid package to help soldiers fight warrants abroad for their arrest.

The concern about war crimes trials follows a series of pronouncements by Richard Falk, the United Nations' special rapporteur on the occupied territories and a professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University in the United States.

He has accused Israel of gravely violating the laws of war during its three-week offensive, which killed more than 1,300 Gazans, most of them civilians, and wounded thousands more.

There is a well-grounded view that both the initial attacks on Gaza and the tactics being used by Israel are serious violations of the UN charter, the Geneva conventions, international law and international humanitarian law," he said during the final stages of fighting. Jonathan CookIn an attempt to make life more difficult for Israeli leaders, anonymous activists in Israel launched this website -- "outing" those it accused of war crimes, including Ehud Barak, the defence minister, Ehud Olmert, the prime minister, and Ms Livni. It also identified most of the senior military command.

This link in Hebrew could also have the support of the former, tainted politician Bibi Netanyahu and his party of right wing Likudniks in the hope of making gains in the forthcoming Israeli elections.

Israel is the non NPT Signatory nuclear power in the region and it behooves it to extend to its neighbours, including those in the occupied territories, the same dignity, rights and respects that it demands from them. all the states, and occupied territories should also learn that force is not the solution to solve their problems, however rudderless they may appear at times.

Salam

In a frank blunt assessment, unusual for the usually taciturn Saudis, Prince Turki al Faisal, former head of the Saudi Intelligence and then ambassador to UK, Ireland and the US, warned the Obama Administration that "the US-Saudi relationship and the stability of the region are at risk."

First he speaks candidly about the Bush Administration:

America is not innocent in this calamity. Not only has the Bush administration left a sickening legacy in the region, but it has also, through an arrogant attitude about the butchery in Gaza, contributed to the slaughter of innocents. If the US wants to continue playing a leadership role in the Middle East and keep its strategic alliances intact - especially its "special relationship" with Saudi Arabia - it will have to revise drastically its policies vis a vis Israel and Palestine.

And then he proffers advise to Obama Administration without mincing words:

First, President Barack Obama must address the disaster in Gaza and its causes. Inevitably, he will condemn Hamas's firing of rockets at Israel. When he does that, he should also condemn Israel's atrocities against the Palestinians and support a UN resolution to that effect; condemn the Israeli actions that led to this conflict, from settlement building in the West Bank to the blockade of Gaza and the targeted killings and arbitrary arrests of Palestinians; declare America's intention to work for a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction, with a security umbrella for countries that sign up and sanctions for those that do not; call for an immediate withdrawal of Israeli forces from Shab'ah Farms in Lebanon; encourage Israeli-Syrian negotiations for peace; and support a UN resolution guaranteeing Iraq's territorial integrity.

The Saudis believe in quiet diplomacy and almost never speak out like this. The royal family rules with consensus and these words from Turki reflect their current exasperation and fears. At stake is not only the fate of the warring factions in the the mid-east, but one can sense their own insecurities. Nobody can predict what may happen to their rule if the Kingdon's citizens rebel.

(I owe an apology to readers of Baithak, where I had linked this article by Prince Turki and dismissed it derisively, bracketing him with the double speak that emanates from the usual suspects in the region and alluding a collusion of interests bandying the Saudis, the Mubaraks and the Abdullahs with the Olmerts.)

Hello

Barak Obama in the first interview granted to a major network chose Al Arabiya. As every move by the his administration is keenly observed and analysed this first interview to Hisham Melhem when compared with his first phone call to a foreign leader (President Mahmud UncleTom Abbas of the near defunct and puppet PA) gave out mixed signals.

He spoke of instructing Mitchell to "listen" lamenting that in the past the US started off by "dictating". He was careful to mention "Syria or Iran or Lebanon or Afghanistan and Pakistan. These things are interrelated" while skirting around India.

Obama reiterated the US support for Israel in no uncertain terms to his Arab and Muslim audience ..."... Israel is a strong ally of the United States. They will not stop being a strong ally of the United States. And I will continue to believe that Israel's security is paramount." But almost in the same breath he spoke to a increasing lobby within Israel that has had enough of the mayhem and violence..."But I also believe that there are Israelis who recognize that it is important to achieve peace." and added these encouraging words, "They will be willing to make sacrifices if the time is appropriate and if there is serious partnership on the other side."

I want to communicate is the fact that in all my travels throughout the Muslim world, what I've come to understand is that regardless of your faith -- and America is a country of Muslims, Jews, Christians, non-believers -- regardless of your faith, people all have certain common hopes and common dreams. And my job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives. My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy. We sometimes make mistakes. We have not been perfect.

Steve Clemons of the The Washington Note notes that Obama's "first moves have been utterly brilliant." He also connected his Al Arbia interview with what he called "Prince Turki al-Faisal's warning in the Financial Times this week" that the Arab Peace Proposal offered by King Abdullah would not remain on the table indefinitely, and that the window could be closing in the wake of the Gaza crisis."

After the previous administration's my way or the highway attitude, Obama's respect's for "words" was evident in this interview. He used "respect" four times in his interview which ran over from the initial 6-7 minutes to over 25 minutes. While ostensibly speaking to the Arabs and Muslims he also provided a parameter that his Secretary of State, Defense and National Security Adviser would find illuminating and illustrating of Obama's approach, beyond which they would venture at their peril.

The sense that IDF and Israeli politicians could be hauled for War Crimes, the loathing and impotence felt in the Arab/Muslim Main Street articulated by a reticent Saudi Prince Turki al Faisal - and responding to them as well as the haughty disregard of the Bush era - Obama's reach out to the Muslims - will prove to be the seminal events that will cast their shadows for long.

This Obama interview reminds one of Yasser Arafat's maiden speech at the UN. Now that the neoconzix era is over, let us hope this olive branch is cherished.

poetry: different suns

temporal — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 07:02:52 EST

The 2009 massacre in Gaza will be for
international solidarity with Palestine what
the Sharpeville massacre was for the
international solidarity against apartheid
in South Africa. (Wissam Nassar/MaanImages)

here is a familiar routine
after an honest day's efforts
you head home in your car/train/bus
once home you follow the rituals
wash-change-drink-tv-dinner
retrieve messages-surf-help children
                                if any - with homework
prepare for the next day
will it rain or snow?
brush, change again, go to bed
turn off the light, read or
                               make love
                               or toss and turn
tomorrow is another sunrise away
                              for you

not for the families of gaza
their sun has not set for 60 years

Gaza 2009 - Rudderless Invasion: Wasted Lives and Opportunities

temporal — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 11:10:32 EST

Israel has agreed to another unilateral ceasefire - like Sharon did in Lebanon - to be broken at will some time in the future.

The costs are well known:

* Over 1200 dead Palestinians a majority of them civilians.
* Billions of dollars worth of infrastructure destroyed
* US arms used
* Banned substances used
* It failed in its state objective to crush Hamas

A Palestinian woman with severe facial injuries from a Dime bomb

Israel was facing demands for war crimes investigations as it declared a unilateral ceasefire in Gaza last night after a 22-day assault in which more than 1,200 Palestinians, a third of them children, were killed and 13 Israelis died. Erik Fosse, a Norwegian doctor who worked in Gaza's hospitals during the conflict, said that Israel was using so-called Dime (dense inert metal explosive) bombs designed to produce an intense explosion in a small space. The bombs are packed with tungsten powder, which has the effect of shrapnel but often dissolves in human tissue, making it difficult to discover the cause of injuries. Raymond Whitaker

Livini in DC and Ohlmert in Tel Aviv are "sorry" for civilian dead. Michael Bell, former Canadian Ambassador to Israel writes:

Israel will hold a general election on Feb. 10. Most polls show that the right-wing Likud opposition leader and former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is likely to come to power. A weak-willed reaction ... would have opened the governing coalition's departing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, the Kadima Party's new leader, and, most of all, Ehud Barak, the Defence Minister and Leader of the formerly dominant Labour Party, to devastating criticism and their portrayal as leaders unable to safeguard their country's most basic interests. Inaction would have meant humiliation for Mr. Olmert, electoral defeat for Ms. Livni and the end of Mr. Barak's political career.

Israeli elections are round the corner. Barak and Livni hope to milk this Gaza Invasion to upset Bibi Nethanyahu (another corruption tainted Israeli politician.)

Unless Israel's mindset is changed peace will remain an anathema. We desis can understand it too well. The "mindset" that we are familiar with in India and Pakistan that breeds suspicion and inculcates enmity.

The first step required to change the mindset is to shed the victim-mentality. The Israeli enemy is extinct. They should not replace and replicate the failed Nazi tactics. They have to learn to live with dignity and resilience - the same resilience they showed in the face of holocaust. And extend the same dignity and respect to the Palestinians under their occupation.

Over 400 UK writers, professors, intellectuals wrote:

The massacres in Gaza are the latest phase of a war that Israel has been waging against the people of Palestine for more than 60 years. The goal of this war has never changed: to use overwhelming military power to eradicate the Palestinians as a political force, one capable of resisting Israel's ongoing appropriation of their land and resources. Israel's war against the Palestinians has turned Gaza and the West Bank into a pair of gigantic political prisons. There is nothing symmetrical about this war in terms of principles, tactics or consequences. Israel is responsible for launching and intensifying it, and for ending the most recent lull in hostilities...Israel must accept that its security depends on justice and peaceful coexistence with its neighbours, and not upon the criminal use of force. We believe Israel should immediately and unconditionally end its assault on Gaza, end the occupation of the West Bank, and abandon all claims to possess or control territory beyond its 1967 borders. We call on the British government and the British people to take all feasible steps to oblige Israel to comply with these demands, starting with a programme of boycott, divestment and sanctions.

Never Again should mean never again the ethnic cleansing, ghettoising, discrimination and apartheid would be exercised against others in Israel and it occupied territories.

The world can and should help too.

For a start, the US under Obama should launch a Obama or Clinton Muslim Recovery Plan (a la Marshall Plan) to help the fringe Muslim States. In addition to new funding the US can also divert 3-4 billion from the aid it gives annually to Egypt and Israel.

Hope, not of the divine kind, is awol there. Economic upliftment would counter the zealots appeal more effectively than use of force and threat. The oil rich Arab states can be cajoled, co-opted or persuaded to join this plan.

The Muslims intelligentsia also has to stand up and help shape the opinion in their countries. The eunuchs (hegiRas) of the Muslim world should be exposed for what they are - the Mubaraks, the Sauds, the Abdullahs, the Asads should be exposed for their impotency and incompetency.

The one lesson that is obvious and obviously unlearned by Israel is that force is not the solution. The same lesson should be learned by the Palestinians in the occupied lands and in the diaspora.

My Upcoming Film: CoolKat Urbanoir - Life in Amrika

Sonal Panse — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 13:42:16 EST

Inspired by Slumdog Millionaire, I'm going to make a movie featuring 'gritty realism' in the USA. The movie will be called CoolKat Urbanoir.

The story goes like this -

A young African man gets kidnapped and sold as a slave in the US of A. He goes through many trials and tribulations, marries a slave girl, they have children, the children are sold, the parents suffer, fall ill, try to escape, are caught and beaten, try again and escape, join the Native Indians, are uprooted from several reservations and starved, are hunted and die under horrible circumstances.

Flash forward several hundred years.

A descendant of these slaves is born in the most dangerous part of an Inner City neighborhood to an unwed teenage hooker with a cocaine habit. Father unknown. Child is abandoned in a garbage heap. Rescued by a church mission and taken to a hospital. Suffers terribly from drug withdrawal (got the habit from Ma during the pregnancy). Later put in an orphanage and shuffled through endless foster homes. Abused physically and sexually in the foster homes. Goes to an Inner City school infrequently and learns nothing there. Gets beaten up by street gangs to and fro from school. So, to save his own hide, joins up one of the brotherhoods. Condition is that he help them peddle drugs to school children. So he does.

Gets caught. Gets sent to jail. Gets raped in jail. And beaten. Many, many, many times. Gets plenty of tattoos too and decides to do a course in body building as well.

Comes out toughened and mean and with plenty of contacts to further advance the criminal career. Furthers criminal career. Adds pimping and armed robbery to the resume. Starts freelancing as a hitman for the Columbian, Korean, Chinese and Japanese drug cartels.

Gets involved with a white woman who wrote him love letters while he was in jail and 'true love' blooms for a while. Then she gets pregnant and wants to get married. He doesn't want to get married. She says he'll have to pay for child support anyway. He doesn't fancy paying child support for eighteen whole years. He's already been stealing money from the druglords to make ends meet. So he murders her and dumps her body over a bridge into a river.

But someone sees him do this and informs the police. He is arrested and tried.

And gets released on a technicality. The police that arrested him forgot to quote that Miranda dialogue, it seems, and subjected him to racist epithets besides.

Lays low for a while and then takes revenge on the informer (a white man, incidentally).

Then goes on a run. An exhilarating chase around and around the US of A follows. Wonderful scenic scenes. Lots of clambering around the Grand Canyon and so on. Ends up in the American South in a small town where the interbred population are still fanning the fires of the Ku Klux Klan ideology. They gladly beat up the new black man in town and strung him up from a tree outside the town. They leave him for dead....

But, of course, he is still alive. Another man comes along, sees him hanging from the tree and cuts him down (in a scene borrowed/inspired from Hang 'Em High, a tribute to lovely, wonderful Clint Eastwood).

This other man happens to be a smuggler involved in the trade of smuggling Mexicans into the USA. He's home on leave, but is off to the Mexican border again and our hero decides to go with him and see how much this type of smuggling business pays.

Unfortunately luck is not favoring our hero (like it ever did!), and, after a few smuggling rounds, he gets shot at by White Nationalists patrolling the border.

He is rescued by a black US Army sergeant, who gets him to a hospital, visits him, bonds with him and feeds him the 'Join the Army, it's a great life' spiel.

Our hero swallows, gets false identification and joins the army. And is nearly killed in basic training.

Somehow he survives and is sent to Iraq to fight the just war and protect the homeland from the wogs. Unfortunately the wogs know how to kick ass. So life in the army on the warfront is not exactly great. Our hero however gets the chance to rape plenty of enemy women and torture many enemy men. A conscientious fellow soldier complains about his behavior to the 'superiors', but the superiors exonerate him saying he is 'only following orders'.

Our hero is pleasantly surprised. This is the first time in his life that the 'establishment' ever spoke out in his support. However, pleased as he is, he ensures that the 'informant' dies in a friendly fire while out on patrol.

Later, he sees an army poster asking if anyone is interested in touring Afghanistan. Our hero volunteers and has a Rambo-like career there.

He is much decorated and felicitated and comes back home on leave as a 'hero'.

Unfortunately, those pesky people in the Police Department are still on his case. They read what Thomas Friedman wrote about our hero in his usual laudatory style in the New York Times, see his photograph and exclaim "Why, that's the man we've been loooookin' for!"

So they contact the Army. The Army hedges, prevaricates, obstructs, but finally 'honorably discharges' our hero and lets the wolves have him.

The wolves have him only for a short while. Some patriotic folks, indignant that a war hero be held accountable for a long-ago murder of a long-dead woman, help him break out of police custody and drive him all the way to Canada.

He applies to stay in Canada as a conscientious protester. The Canadians don't buy that. They read Thomas Friedman in the New York Times too. They don't want him there.

So he takes a plane to Venezuela. He figures he'll be welcome in Chavez's land. Enemy of my enemy is my friend, that sort of thing. He figures that Chavez, taking a cue from the New York Times, will feature him on his TV show. He day-dreams of using the TV show to kick-start a new career as a rap artist. Maybe he'll even write an autobiography and flog it on Oprah - over videophone, of course. Our hero, you see, after a lifetime of anonymity, is beginning to enjoy the taste of fame.

However, there's fame and there is fame. Sometimes fame hurts. The minute he lands in Venezuela, he is spotted by a Columbian drug-runner. After he disappeared from their midst earlier, the druglords had figured out that he was stealing from them and now they want their pound of flesh.

Our hero is on the run again. He's running out of places to run to though. The USA is out, so also the US Army, Canada and South America. And North Korea, South Korea, Japan, and China - remember the Japanese, Korean and Chinese drugpins? They want him too and they have long arms. Italy is out too. Our hero had run-ins with the Italian Mafia when he was in jail and they're not forgetting either.

Wondering what to do, our hero seeks shelter in a low-dive in a red light area. He is nursing a drink morosely, when a stranger at the bar strikes up a friendly conversation with him. Our hero is initially suspicious, but the stranger, who is called Moshe, appears to have no underhand motives. They get along well. Just then two Arabs jump Moshe and try to knife him. Our hero goes to his assistance, saves him and their friendship is really cemented.

Our hero, over another dozen drinks, finally confides to Moshe about his 'situation'.

Moshe is sympathetic and offers to help. He is on his way back home, and suggests our hero come with him. He'll be safe there.

And so our hero goes to Israel.....

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End of Part I. Sequel to follow, featuring lots of scenic scenes from Lebanon and Gaza. Stay glued.

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So that's the story. Anyone wants to come and act in it? No pay. At least not before we sweep the Golden Globes.

Poem For Barack, Michelle, Sasha, and Melia Obama

temporal — Wed, 7 Jan 2009 09:54:02 EST

CALLIE SHELL/AP

barak and michelle
m and i share your concern
for the privacy
and well being
of sasha and melia
may your children
get good education
and medical care
and grow up
balanced individuals
ready to take their place
in the affairs of our world
unlike the children in gaza

ASHRAF AMRA/AP

let me add briefly
am disappointed
at your silence
you did speak out
as president elect
on other issues
is apartheid,
ghettoisation
ethnic cleansing
and loss of civilian lives
not important for you?