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By Mary Shaw

06 January, 2013

@ Countercurrents.org

January 11, 2013, will mark the 11th anniversary of the arrival of the first prisoners at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

In 2009, just two days after taking office, President Obama issued an executive order calling for the Guantanamo prison to be closed within a year, and for detainees to be given fair trials in U.S. federal courts. But, since then, he has repeatedly signed Congress’s defense bills that keep Gitmo going, even while blaming Congress for his failure to keep his promise.

As several human rights groups have pointed out, until this changes and the prison is closed as promised, Gitmo will remain a big, black blemish on our national image, and a symbol of an immoral “war on terror” that will continue to serve as a recruiting tool for terrorists. It’s an atrocity that Obama inherited, but now he owns it.

“It’s not encouraging that the President continues to be willing to tie his own hands when it comes to closing Guantanamo,” said C. Dixon Osburn, Director of the Law and Security Program at Human Rights First. “The injustice of Guantanamo continues to serve as a stain on American global leadership on human rights.”

As long as Gitmo remains in business, so will the faulty military tribunals that are trying the detainees who are “lucky” enough to be charged and tried rather than held in legal limbo. According to Amnesty International, “[military commissions] have been specifically crafted to enable the U.S. authorities to circumvent protections that defendants would enjoy in a civilian courtroom. The fact that they have undergone multiple statutory and procedural revisions suggests that they fall short of the ‘regularly constituted court’ standard required by Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions.”

And these military trials are also less efficient, noted Laura Pitter, Counterterrorism Advisor for Human Rights Watch: “The attacks of 9/11 were a great tragedy for all Americans and without doubt a crime that must be prosecuted. But it’s disturbing to watch that horrific crime so dramatically change the U.S. system of justice – a source of pride for so many Americans. It’s more disturbing given that it’s not necessary or prudent. Federal courts have completed hundreds of terrorism cases since 9/11, while the commissions have dispensed with a mere seven.”

I strongly urge President Obama to think about this again as he starts his second term. As a constitutional attorney, he should know as well as anyone that ensuring true justice does not mean that you’re weak on terror. Indeed, it takes far more strength to do the right thing.

Mary Shaw is a Philadelphia-based writer and activist, with a focus on politics, human rights, and social justice. She is a former Philadelphia Area Coordinator for the Nobel-Prize-winning human rights group Amnesty International, and her views appear regularly in a variety of newspapers, magazines, and websites. Note that the ideas expressed here are the author’s own, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Amnesty International or any other organization with which she may be associated. E-mail: mary@maryshawonline.com

By Glenn Greenwald,

@Guardian UK

05 January 13

As the Pentagon’s former top lawyer urges that the war be viewed as finite, the US moves in the opposite direction.

Last month, outgoing pentagon general counsel Jeh Johnson gave a speech at the Oxford Union and said that the War on Terror must, at some point, come to an end:

“Now that efforts by the US military against al-Qaida are in their 12th year, we must also ask ourselves: How will this conflict end? … ‘War’ must be regarded as a finite, extraordinary and unnatural state of affairs. We must not accept the current conflict, and all that it entails, as the ‘new normal.’ Peace must be regarded as the norm toward which the human race continually strives…

    “There will come a tipping point at which so many of the leaders and operatives of al-Qaida and its affiliates have been killed or captured, and the group is no longer able to attempt or launch a strategic attack against the United States, that al-Qaida will be effectively destroyed.”

On Thursday night, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow interviewed Johnson, and before doing so, she opined as follows:

    “When does this thing we are in now end? And if it does not have an end – and I’m not speaking as a lawyer here, I am just speaking as a citizen who feels morally accountable for my country’s actions – if it does not have an end, then morally speaking it does not seem like it is a war. And then, our country is killing people and locking them up outside the traditional judicial system in a way I think we maybe cannot be forgiven for.”

It is precisely the intrinsic endlessness of this so-called “war” that is its most corrupting and menacing attribute, for the reasons Maddow explained. But despite the happy talk from Johnson, it is not ending soon. By its very terms, it cannot. And all one has to do is look at the words and actions of the Obama administration to know this.

In October, the Washington Post’s Greg Miller reported that the administration was instituting a “disposition matrix” to determine how terrorism suspects will be disposed of, all based on this fact: “among senior Obama administration officials, there is broad consensus that such operations are likely to be extended at least another decade.” As Miller puts it: “That timeline suggests that the United States has reached only the midpoint of what was once known as the global war on terrorism.”

The polices adopted by the Obama administration just over the last couple of years leave no doubt that they are accelerating, not winding down, the war apparatus that has been relentlessly strengthened over the last decade. In the name of the War on Terror, the current president has diluted decades-old Miranda warnings; codified a new scheme of indefinite detention on US soil; plotted to relocate Guantanamo to Illinois; increased secrecy, repression and release-restrictions at the camp; minted a new theory of presidential assassination powers even for US citizens; renewed the Bush/Cheney warrantless eavesdropping framework for another five years, as well as the Patriot Act, without a single reform; and just signed into law all new restrictions on the release of indefinitely held detainees.

Does that sound to you like a government anticipating the end of the War on Terror any time soon? Or does it sound like one working feverishly to make their terrorism-justified powers of detention, surveillance, killing and secrecy permanent? About all of this, the ACLU’s Executive Director, Anthony Romero, provided the answer on Thursday: “President Obama has utterly failed the first test of his second term, even before inauguration day. His signature means indefinite detention without charge or trial, as well as the illegal military commissions, will be extended.”

There’s a good reason US officials are assuming the “War on Terror” will persist indefinitely: namely, their actions ensure that this occurs. The New York Times’ Matthew Rosenberg this morning examines what the US government seems to regard as the strange phenomenon of Afghan soldiers attacking US troops with increasing frequency, and in doing so, discovers a shocking reality: people end up disliking those who occupy and bomb their country:

    “Such insider attacks, by Afghan security forces on their Western allies, became ‘the signature violence of 2012’, in the words of one former American official. The surge in attacks has provided the clearest sign yet that Afghan resentment of foreigners is becoming unmanageable, and American officials have expressed worries about its disruptive effects on the training mission that is the core of the American withdrawal plan for 2014…

    “But behind it all, many senior coalition and Afghan officials are now concluding that after nearly 12 years of war, the view of foreigners held by many Afghans has come to mirror that of the Taliban. Hope has turned into hatred, and some will find a reason to act on those feelings.

    “‘A great percentage of the insider attacks have the enemy narrative – the narrative that the infidels have to be driven out – somewhere inside of them, but they aren’t directed by the enemy,’ said a senior coalition officer, who asked not to be identified because of Afghan and American sensitivities about the attacks.”

In other words, more than a decade of occupying and brutalizing that country has turned large swaths of the population into the “Taliban”, to the extent that the “Taliban” means: Afghans willing to use violence to force the US and its allies out of their country. As always, the US – through the very policies of aggression and militarism justified in the name of terrorism – is creating the very “terrorists” those polices are supposedly designed to combat. It’s a pure and perfect system of self-perpetuation.

Exactly the same thing is happening in Yemen, where nothing is more effective at driving Yemenis into the arms of al-Qaida than the rapidly escalated drone attacks under Obama. This morning, the Times reported that US air strikes in Yemen are carried out in close cooperation with the air force of Saudi Arabia, which will only exacerbate that problem. Indeed, virtually every person accused of plotting to target the US with terrorist attacks in last several years has expressly cited increasing US violence, aggression and militarism in the Muslim world as the cause.

There’s no question that this “war” will continue indefinitely. There is no question that US actions are the cause of that, the gasoline that fuels the fire. The only question – and it’s becoming less of a question for me all the time – is whether this endless war is the intended result of US actions or just an unwanted miscalculation.

It’s increasingly hard to make the case that it’s the latter. The US has long known, and its own studies have emphatically concluded, that “terrorism” is motivated not by a “hatred of our freedoms” but by US policy and aggression in the Muslim world. This causal connection is not news to the US government. Despite this – or, more accurately, because of it – they continue with these policies.

One of the most difficult endeavors is to divine the motives of other people (divining our own motives is difficult enough). That becomes even more difficult when attempting to discern the motives not of a single actor but a collection of individuals with different motives and interests (“the US government”).

But what one can say for certain is that there is zero reason for US officials to want an end to the war on terror, and numerous and significant reasons why they would want it to continue. It’s always been the case that the power of political officials is at its greatest, its most unrestrained, in a state of war. Cicero, two thousand years ago, warned that “In times of war, the law falls silent” (Inter arma enim silent leges). John Jay, in Federalist No. 4, warned that as a result of that truth, “nations in general will make war whenever they have a prospect of getting anything by it . . . for the purposes and objects merely personal, such as thirst for military glory, revenge for personal affronts, ambition, or private compacts to aggrandize or support their particular families or partisans.”

If you were a US leader, or an official of the National Security State, or a beneficiary of the private military and surveillance industries, why would you possibly want the war on terror to end? That would be the worst thing that could happen. It’s that war that generates limitless power, impenetrable secrecy, an unquestioning citizenry, and massive profit.

Just this week, a federal judge ruled that the Obama administration need not respond to the New York Times and the ACLU’s mere request to disclose the government’s legal rationale for why the President believes he can target US citizens for assassination without due process. Even while recognizing how perverse her own ruling was – “The Alice-in-Wonderland nature of this pronouncement is not lost on me” and it imposes “a veritable Catch-22” – the federal judge nonetheless explained that federal courts have constructed such a protective shield around the US government in the name of terrorism that it amounts to an unfettered license to violate even the most basic rights: “I can find no way around the thicket of laws and precedents that effectively allow the executive branch of our government to proclaim as perfectly lawful certain actions that seem on their face incompatible with our Constitution and laws while keeping the reasons for their conclusion a secret” (emphasis added).

Why would anyone in the US government or its owners have any interest in putting an end to this sham bonanza of power and profit called “the war on terror”? Johnson is right that there must be an end to this war imminently, and Maddow is right that the failure to do so will render all the due-process-free and lawless killing and imprisoning and invading and bombing morally indefensible and historically unforgivable.

But the notion that the US government is even entertaining putting an end to any of this is a pipe dream, and the belief that they even want to is fantasy. They’re preparing for more endless war; their actions are fueling that war; and they continue to reap untold benefits from its continuation. Only outside compulsion, from citizens, can make an end to all of this possible.

By Alaa al-Aswany

05 January, 2013

@ As-Safir

Egyptian novelist Alaa al-Aswany writes that Salafist sheikhs and Muslim Brotherhood leaders do not adhere to the principles of Islam, but rather are focused on maintaining power by any means necessary

Here’s what the camera recorded: The minister of information, who belongs to the Muslim Brotherhood, went to vote on the day of the constitutional referendum. When he saw the long lines of voters stretching endlessly, he ducked into the Electoral Commission from the back door and voted within a few moments… while ordinary voters had to wait outside for hours just to get inside the commission building. As the minister was leaving, a courageous reporter had the temerity to ask him: “Why didn’t you come in through the main door like everyone else?”

Without hesitation the minister answered: “I did come in though the main door. I didn’t go in through any side door.”

And so the minister lied openly, shamelessly, in front of all the assembled cameras and journalists. In a democratic country, such a lie from a government minister would constitute a scandal, maybe even lead to the minister’s dismissal. But here in Egypt, now under the beneficent rule of the Supreme Guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Brotherhood’s minister will remain in his position as long as he holds the guide’s favor.

The odd thing is that the minister is a religious man, who no doubt makes sure to say his daily prayers, in preparation for which Muslims must enter a state of ritual purity — and yet he lied.

The question is: does a lie not sully one’s purity? Does this religious minister not know that lying is forbidden by Islam, and that God does not accept prayers uttered by liars?

The question does not address itself to this lying minister alone, but to the entire leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood, including Mohammed Morsi. They do not practice what they preach. They make promises but do not fulfill them.

They are prepared to do anything in order to hold on to power. The Brotherhood’s lies cannot be counted, but the latest of them was this referendum, the results of which were brazenly falsified in order to ram through their constitution. All manner of violations took place in the course of this referendum, beginning with preventing the Copts from voting, irregular ballots, terrorizing voters and buying the votes of the poor, to collective voting and cutting power to the commissions’ facilities in order to rig the results. All this was done by men calling themselves “Muslim Brothers,” men who failed to consider for even a moment that lying, deceit and tampering with the will of the people are all behaviors that contravene the most fundamental tenets of Islam.

And should you attempt, dear reader, to direct some criticism at the guide of the Brotherhood, whether by Facebook or Twitter, you will be bombarded by obscene insults hurled by devoted young men specifically tasked by the guide’s office with insulting Brotherhood opponents over the internet.

How can obscene liars dare to call themselves “Muslim Brothers,” when Islam urges us to be upright, honest and polite? What is the secret of this flagrant contradiction between belief and practice? The followers of political Islam (including the Brotherhood, Salafists and jihadists) simply do not understand their religion as ordinary Muslims do. Rather, their understanding of religion is based on the following guidelines:

First: Absolute obedience to the supreme guide

The Salfists and Muslim Brothers are loathe to admit to anything not professed as true by the supreme guide of the Brotherhood or by Salafist sheikhs. In order to become a member of the Brotherhood, one must not only swear allegiance and obedience to the supreme guide’s instructions, but to believe them at heart as well.

A soldier might carry out the orders of his superior without being convinced of their soundness, but how can you demand that thousands of people be convinced that whatever another (ordinary, fallible) human being said is true? That they must support everything he does and look upon it as though it were flawless? In effect, one has completely nullified their minds and removed their powers of discernment, rendering them pliant tools in the hand of the supreme guide, to be moved about at his will.

Many Muslim Brothers are highly educated young men, among them doctors and engineers. But they are in a state of total intellectual subordination to their Shaykh, who has deprived them of the ability to think independently or reason critically.

For evidence, one need look no further than what Sheikh Hazim Salah Abu Ismail did with his followers. This man preoccupied the entire country with the question of his mother’s nationality. Though it became clear that she was an American citizen, contrary to what Abu Ismail had said, he constantly called upon his followers to go out and riot, even while he retired to his home where he could enjoy the warmth and the delicious meals he craved. Meanwhile his followers were left to absorb the clubs and blows of the police. Yet none of Abu Ismail’s followers dared to reprove him for his repeated flights or to criticize him over the question of his mother’s nationality. For everything he did, in their eyes, was righteousness absolute.

Take another example. When the Brotherhood’s supreme guide came out of the mosque, the Brothers knelt at his foot and competed with one another for the honor of putting his shoe on. The sense of humility needed to cause a proud man to beg another man to put his shoe on his noble foot indicates the degree of the Brothers’ submissiveness to their supreme guide and their inability to think for themselves.

Second: An exclusivist understanding of religion

With the Salafists and the Muslim Brothers, there is no room for discussion or airing different points of view on religion. Their Islam is whatever their sheikh or supreme guide says it is: no more, no less. The strange thing is that most of their comments on the internet are filled with major grammatical errors. This indicates that they do not read, and that their culture is an oral one, where they sit at the foot of their sheikh, absorb his words and then repeat them.

There is no point in engaging them in discussion, because they would refuse to hear out any opinion that does not accord with that of their sheikh, even if it were to come from the most widely respected clerics, even if you beseech them to talk things through, they will act belligerently toward you. They have built their lives upon the belief that the sheikh’s words are truth itself. If you tell them something that causes them to doubt that, they will attack you in defense of their beliefs (that, if shaken, would force them to re-evaluate their entire lives).

Third: Demonizing dissidents

The Brotherhood’s supreme guide and the Salafist sheikhs normally attempt to dehumanize their opponents. The Salafists and Muslim Brothers do not believe that their opponents are individuals, each with their own private life. Instead they place them all under the same negative, all-embracing category of “secularists,” “followers of the West,” or “enemies of Shariah law.” They don’t look upon their political opponents as people simply hold a different opinion, but as godless infidels or Zionist collaborators.

This contempt for their opponents naturally makes it easier to assault their rights. If you thought of yourself as the only person who possesses absolute truth, while all who opposed you were collaborators or enemies of the faith, it would be illogical for you to grant them the same rights as you, because you are superior to them. You bear the message of God; they are the followers of Satan. You are a pure soul, implementing the will of God, while they are impure enemies of Islam. Assaulting their rights is tolerable and, at any given moment, may even become necessary. We saw just this when Morsi called up the Brotherhood’s militias to attack those protesting in front of the presidential palace.

Here the contradiction between belief and practice appeared in full force: groups of bearded men who would never permit themselves any moral backsliding in prayer were committing heinous crimes without the slightest sense of guilt: beating young girls, attacking protesters, subjecting them to hideous torture, brutally assaulting fellow Egyptians whose only crime lay in the fact that they were Christians. The Brothers’ and Salafists’ understanding of the faith had put them in a state of war with whoever disagreed with them. And all is fair in war. Beginning with lying, rigging elections and ending in beating and torture…

Fourth: Searching for the grand conspiracy

The American ambassador in Cairo went to monitor the referendum, when a group of Salafist and Brotherhood youth gathered around her and began to angrily chant: “Islamic! Islamic!” These youth had been convinced by their sheikhs that there was a grand conspiracy against Islam being led by America. And because they are in mental thrall to their sheikhs, it was difficult for them to see that the truth was the exact opposite: the US doesn’t care about Islam at all. It only cares about protecting its interests and Israel’s security. America would happily welcome an Islamic government as long as it would protect these interests. Examples abound: America’s greatest ally for half a century is the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which the Salafists and the Brotherhood consider a model for Islamic government. Then there’s the Taliban, which was originally founded by American intelligence. In Pakistan, General Zia al-Haq took power with Saudi funding so that he could become an American-allied ruler.

The Brotherhood has come to understand this equation, and since the days of Mubarak has opened its own channels to the American administration. Morsi has sought to guarantee Israeli security by using his influence with Hamas. And one who follows international press will find a great deal of Western officials praising Morsi just as they once praised Mubarak. The American administration prefers that Egypt be ruled by a cooperative dictator who can control his people and guarantee America’s interests. It does not want a democratic regime in Egypt, for this would turn the country into a regional giant that would determine the fate of the Middle East and might threaten Israel. This truth shines clear as day, but the sheikhs of political Islam continue to convince their followers that the US is conspiring against Islam even as they meet with American officials and seek to please them in every way. The notion of a vast conspiracy against Islam is a delusion, but it possesses important value to the sheikhs, for it enables them to sharpen the religious sentiments of the young and prepares them to accept their elders’ commands.

These are the four cornerstones of political Islam. It radically upends the meaning of religion. Instead of becoming a path to truth, justice, liberty and equality, it is turned into a tool for hating others, holding them in contempt, assaulting their liberties and their lives. And so the first elected president of Egypt has transformed himself into a dictator who nullified the constitution, and imposed a distorted replacement in its place, held a rigged referendum, and sent his thugs to besiege the constitutional court to terrorize the judges and intimidate them into not invalidating the new constitution.

Even so this unfortunate transformation of Morsi’s has not been without its positive effects. For example, it has inspired patriotic and revolutionary groups to unite and combine forces for the first time to save the state from the Brotherhood attempting to hijack it. The Brotherhood’s ascent to power has been a long-delayed but necessary test that Egypt had to undergo. The revolution has always had to overcome three obstacles: Mubarak, the army and the Brotherhood. It has succeeded in ousting Mubarak and putting him on trial. It succeeded in getting rid of the power of the army. Now all that remains is the Brotherhood. They have failed the test of rule, and revealed their ugly face within a few short months.

Stop any ordinary Egyptian in the street and ask him what he thinks about the Brotherhood. Whatever level of education he has, you’ll find he understands the difference between true Islam and the Brotherhood’s Islam, the “Islam” that permits lying, fraud and aggression. Every day, the Brotherhood loses more and more of its popularity, until it becomes impossible for any of its leaders (including Morsi himself) to appear in public without being hounded by hostile chants from the passerby. The crimes committed by the Brotherhood over the last few months have cost them their popularity, and the more they sense this, the greater their violence and belligerence will grow.

I expect that, in the near future we will see more repressive measures, acts of aggression and assassinations against all who oppose the Brothers. Our duty now is to topple the distorted, bastardized constitution by any peaceful means possible. The rigged referendum on this constitution counts for nothing. It was manufactured by an invalid, illegal constitutional committee that the judiciary almost dissolved for a second time, and would have but for Morsi’s blocking judicial rulings with his own dictatorial announcement.

The revolution will continue until the Brotherhood’s rule is toppled as completely as Mubarak’s regime. Then, and only then, will Egypt be able to move toward the future that it deserves.

Democracy is the solution.

*Al- Monitor, http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/politics/2012/12/how-to-lie-and-remain-pure.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

Translated by Mike Nahum. Original title: How to Lie and Remain Pure. Posted on: Dec 25, 2012. Translated from: As-Safir (Lebanon),

By Ismail Salami

05 January, 2013

@ Countercurrents.org

In what can be seen as a blatantly overt interference in Iran’s affairs, US President Barack Obama has recently enacted a law “aimed at countering Tehran’s alleged influence in Latin America” through a new diplomatic and political strategy to be designed by the State Department.

Iran has strongly slammed the move as an overt intervention.

“It is an overt intervention in Latin American affairs… that shows they are not familiar with new world relations. The United States still lives in the Cold War era and considers Latin America as its back yard”.

Strategically dubbed as ‘Countering Iran in the Western Hemisphere Act of 2012′, the act calls for the State Department to develop a plan within 180 days to “address Iran’s growing hostile presence and activity”.

Also, the text calls on the Department of Homeland Security to bolster surveillance at US borders with Canada and Mexico to “prevent operatives from Iran, the IRGC [Iranian Revolution Guards Corps], its Quds Force, Hezbollah or any other terrorist organization from entering the United States.”

In recent years, the Islamic Republic has formed a solid alliance with a number of Latin American countries which have readily welcomed Iran ‘s good will gestures. Without a doubt, the influence of Iran has travelled far beyond the Middle East and has reached Latin America , a fact which has ruffled many feathers in Washington .

Time and again, the US has declared that it closely monitors Iran’s activities (i.e. influence) lest the ever-increasing influence of the country may disturb its political and military equations in the Middle East in particular and the world in general.

The new act which can be viewed but as a salad of lame excuses concocted by the US to ‘counter’ Iran’s influence has been formulated with the express intention of stifling an already sprouting intellectual apology for Iranian nuclear energy program which the US and the West have always sought to depict as anything but intended for peaceful purposes.

The act directly indicates that the US is hell bent on blocking the route to any ways which may be used to assuage the ‘painful effect of the sanctions’ on Iran and that the country “is pursuing cooperation with Latin American countries by signing economic and security agreements in order to create a network of diplomatic and economic relationships to lessen the blow of international sanctions and oppose Western attempts to constrict its ambitions.”

The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars has conducted a research on Iran’s influence in Latin America and has aptly called it ‘ Iran in Latin America : Threat or ‘Axis of Annoyance’?’. According to the research, the growing and multi-layered relationship between Iran and Latin American countries since Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s election in 2005 “is driven by a combination of factors. These include, for both sides, and economic self-interest, shared anti-U.S. and anti-imperialist ideology, and the desire—especially evident in the Brazilian case—to play a larger role on the world stage, assert foreign policy independence, and diversify international partners beyond the United States .”

It should be noted that the phobia of Iran ‘s influence in Latin America has long started to pinch the US government. This has provided the advocates of Washington ‘s policies to disseminate unfounded lies in the media about Iran . In an article, Rep. Allen B. West voices his agonized exasperation over Iran-Venezuela ties that ‘Right here, under our noses, a strategic alliance is being formed between Iran and Venezuela ”.

Mr. West offers a poor case against Iran and accuses the country of forming “a complex financial web to bypass international sanctions against the ayatollahs and an operational infrastructure for carrying out terrorism against the nations of the free world, especially the United States and Israel .” According to Mr. West, the United States and Israel constitute parts of the free world. By any standards, this slanted definition renders all other definitions of the ‘free world’ grotesquely appalling.

Mr. West goes to extremes when he brings up the threadbare allegation of Washington that Iran sought to ‘hire an operative known as Mansour Arbabsiar’ to assassinate Saudi Ambassador Adel A. al-Jubeir. Accusative lies and fabrications of this nature abound in Western media. Interestingly, Mr. West repeats Israel and the welfare of Israel several times in his article as if to pledge his allegiance to Tel Aviv.

He even recklessly accuses Iran of introducing “into the modern Middle East the concept of religiously sanctioned suicide terrorism” and lays bare his ignorance of the fact that Iran has been constantly a victim of terrorism backed and financed by terrorists groups such as MKO which was recently delisted by Washington as a terrorist organization ‘for not inscrutable reasons’.

For Washington and allies, Iran is not a real threat but rather an ‘axis of annoyance’, a thorn in their side, a political counterbalance to their sinister modus operandi in the region.

Dr. Ismail Salami is an Iranian writer, Middle East expert, Iranologist and lexicographer. He writes extensively on the US and Middle East issues and his articles have been translated into a number of languages.

By Colin Todhunter

05 January, 2013

@ Countercurrents.org

“I recognized my two selves: a crusading idealist and a cold, granitic believer in the law of the jungle” – Edgar Monsanto Queeny, Monsanto chairman, 1943-63, “The Spirit of Enterprise” , 1934.

When rich companies with politically-connected lobbyists and seats on government-appointed bodies bend policies for their own ends, we are in serious trouble. It is then that our democratic institutions become hijacked and our choices, freedoms and rights are destroyed. Corporate interests have too often used their dubious ‘science’, lobbyists, political connections and presence within the heart of governments, in conjunction with their public relations machines, to subvert democratic machinery for their own benefit. Once their power has been established, anyone who questions them or who stands in their way can expect a very bumpy ride.

The power and influence of the GMO sector

The revolving door between the private sector and government bodies has been well established. Over the past few years in Britain, the media has occasionally shed light on the cosy and highly questionable links between the armaments industry and top people in the Ministry of Defence. In the US, many senior figures from the Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) industry, especially Monsanto, have moved with ease to take up positions with the Food and Drug Administration. Writer and researcher William F Engdahl writes about a similar influence in Europe, noting the links between the GMO sector within the European Food Safety Authority. He states that over half of the scientists involved in the GMO panel which positively reviewed the Monsanto’s study for GMO maize in 2009, leading to its EU-wide authorisation, had links with the biotech industry.

“Monsanto should not have to vouchsafe the safety of biotech food. Our interest is in selling as much of it as possible. Assuring its safety is the FDA’s job” – Phil Angell, Monsanto’s director of corporate communications. “Playing God in the Garden” New York Times Magazine,October 25, 1998.

When corporate interests are able to gain access to such positions of power, little wonder they have some heavy-duty tools at their disposal to (attempt to) fend off criticism by all means necessary.

Take the GMO sector, for instance. A well-worn tactic, certainly not exclusive to that sector, has been to slur and attack figures that have challenged the ‘science’ and claims of the industry. With threats of lawsuits and UK government pressure, some years ago top research scientist Dr Arpad Pusztai was effectively silenced over his research concerning the dangers of GM food. A campaign was set in motion to destroy his reputation. Similarly, a WikiLeaks cable highlighted how GMOs were being forced into European nations by the US ambassador to France who plotted with other US officials to create a ‘retaliatory target list’ of anyone who tried to regulate GMOs. Now that clearly indicates the power of the industry!

Champions of the poor: GM frontier technology

What the GMO sector fails to grasp is that the onus is on it to prove that its products are safe. And it has patently failed to do this. No independent testing was done before Bush senior allowed GMOs onto the US market. The onus should not be on others to prove it is safe (or unsafe) after it is on the market.

Now that scientists such as Professor Seralini at the University of Caen in France are in a sense playing catch-up by testing previously independently untested GMOs, he is accused of “lies” and “deceit.” In fact, a prominent figure in the GMO sector recently told me that “You people (the ‘anti-GM brigade’) have no shame. You are all disgusting enemies of the poor farmers around the world by trying to block a safe product of a frontier technology…”

Little mention there of the tens of thousands of poor farmers who took their own lives in the Indian cotton belt because they became indebted due to this “frontier technology” not delivering the results that the GMO industry has said it would. If there is a ‘disgusting enemy’, surely it is the profiteering corporate-controlled terminator seed technology of the GMO industry that has resulted in mass suicides and the destruction of traditional farmer-controlled agricultural practices developed over thousands of years.

But this is symptomatic of the industry: it says a product is safe, therefore it is. We are expected to take its claims at face value, not least because the industry has gained an air of pseudo respectability: the US FDA sanctions such products. I use the word ‘pseudo’ because, as already noted, the revolving door between top figures at Monsanto and positions at the FDA makes it difficult to see where the line between the two is actually drawn. People are rightly suspicious of the links between the FDA and GMO industry in the US and the links between it and the regulatory body within the EU.

The impact of the corporate hijacking of food and agriculture

The corporations currently forwarding their GM agenda represent the so-called “Green Revolution’s” second coming. Agriculture has changed more over the last two generations than it did in the previous 12,000 years. Environmentalist Vandana Shiva notes that, after 1945, chemical manufacturers who had been involved in the weapons industry turned their attention to applying their chemical know-how to farming. As a result ‘dwarf seeds’ were purposively created to specifically respond to their chemicals. Over the coming years, agriculture became transformed into a chemical-dependent industry that has destroyed biodiversity. What we are left with is crop monocultures, which according to Shiva reflects a monoculture of thinking. In effect, modern agriculture is part of the paradigm of control based on mass standardization and a dependency on corporate products: corporate monoculture.

The implications have been vast. Chemical-industrial agriculture has proved extremely lucrative for the oil and chemicals industry and has served to maintain and promote Western hegemony, not least via ‘structural adjustment’ and the consequent uprooting of traditional farming practices in favour of single-crop export-oriented policies, dam building to cater for what became a highly water intensive industry, loans and indebtedness, etc.

Apart from tying poorer countries into an unequal system of global trade and reinforcing global inequalities, the corporate hijacking of food and agriculture has had many other implications, not least where health is concerned.

Dr Meryl Hammond, founder of the Campaign for Alternatives to Pesticides, told a Canadian parliament committee in 2009 that a raft of studies published in prestigious peer-reviewed journals point to strong associations between chemical pesticides and a vast range of serious life-threatening health consequences. Shiv Chopra, a top food advisor to the Canadian government, has documented how all kinds of food products that were known to be dangerous were passed by the regulatory authority and put on the market there due to the power of the food industry.

Severe anemia, permanent brain damage, Alzheimer’s, dementia, neurological disorders, reproductive problems, diminished intelligence, impaired immune system, behavioural disorders, cancers, hyperactivity and learning disability are just some of the diseases linked to our food.

Of course, just like cigarettes and the tobacco industry before, trying to ‘prove’ the glaringly obvious link will take decades as deceit is passed off as ‘science’ or becomes institutionalized due to the hijacking of government bodies by the corporations involved in food production.

In ‘GMOs Ticking Time Bomb’, Rima E Laibow, Medical Director of Natural Solutions Foundation, argues that every single independent study conducted on the impact of GMOs shows they damage organs and cause infertility, immune system failure, holes in the GI tract and multiple system failure when eaten. She argues that they cause a variety of changes, some of which we can’t even guess at as new proteins are coded due to altered DNA – some which we’ve never seen before. Laiblow concludes we are playing with genetic fire. Yet, they are on the commercial market in the US and elsewhere.

We are standing in the way of progress!

Science has become a political football. Anyone who questions the safety of GMOs is “clueless” and indulges in “scare mongering” and “falsehoods.” In fact, the same prominent GMO sector figure referred to earlier says about such people that all they know “is to stop progress.” Furthermore, he stated that “scientific jokers” like Professor Seralini would not be allowed to set foot in the “real world of science” in North America and that they have a “hey day” in countries like India because of “ignoramuses.”

But can we expect much better from an industry that has a record of smearing and attempting to ruin people who criticise it? Are those of us who question the political links of the GMO industry and the nature of its products ready to take lessons on ethics and high-minded notions of ‘human progress’ from anyone involved with it?

This is an industry that has contaminated crops and bullied farmers with lawsuits in North America, an industry whose companies have been charged with and most often found guilty of contaminating the environment and seriously damaging health with PCBs and dioxins, an industry complicit in concealing the deadly impact of GM corn on animals, an industry where bribery seems to be second nature (eg Monsanto in Indonesia), an industry associated with human rights violations in Brazil and an industry that will not label its foods in the US.

As Vandana Shiva has noted, the 2005 US-India nuclear deal (allowing India to develop its nuclear sector despite it not being a signatory of the Non-Proliferation Treaty and pushed through with a cash for votes tactic in the Indian parliament!) was linked to the Knowledge Initiative on Agriculture, which was aimed at widening access to India’s agricultural and retail sectors. This initiative was drawn up with the full and direct participation of representatives from various companies, including Monsanto, Cargill and Walmart.

When the most powerful country comes knocking at your door seeking to gain access to your market, there’s good chance that once its corporate-tipped jackboot is in, you won’t be able to get it out. In India, the pressure is building to release GM food onto the market.

So far, Bt cotton has been the only GM crop allowed in India , but the GM sector is ‘lobbying’ to bring in other GM crops, including rice, tomato and wheat. It is interesting to note that the Supreme Court has not banned open field trials of genetically modified food crops. Contamination of traditional crops by GM crops thus remains a serious issue.

    “The hope of the industry is that over time the market is so flooded [with GMOs] that there’s nothing you can do about it. You just sort of surrender” – Don Westfall, biotech industry consultant and vice-president of Promar International, in the Toronto Star,January 9 2001.

Open field planting is but one way of achieving what Westfall states. T he European Commission has already suspected GMO contamination in exported basmati rice from India .

    “What you are seeing is not just a consolidation of seed companies, it’s really a consolidation of the entire food chain” – Robert Fraley, co-president of Monsanto’s agricultural sector 1996, in the Farm Journal. Quoted in:Flint J. (1998) Agricultural industry giants moving towards genetic monopolism. Telepolis, Heise.

As powerful agribusiness concerns seek to “consolidate the entire food chain,” it is patently clear that it’s not just the health of the nation (any nation) that is at stake, but global control of food, countries and populations too.

Colin Todhunter Originally from the northwest of England, Colin Todhunter has spent many years in India. He has written extensively for the Deccan Herald (the Bangalore-based broadsheet), New Indian Express and Morning Star (Britain). His articles have also appeared in various other newspapers, journals and books. His East by Northwest website is at: http://colintodhunter.blogspot.com

By Countercurrents.org

04 January , 2013

@ Countercurrents.org

Hunger haunts all. Hunger ultimately determines path of politics. War against hunger is going on for decades. What will be the number of hungry people in the world in 2013? The World Food Programme provides a list of 10 facts related to hunger.

A news item* of the WFP said:

How many hungry people are there in the world and is the number going down? What effect does hunger have on children and what can we do to help them? Here is a list of 10 facts that go some way to explaining why hunger is the single biggest solvable problem facing the world today.

1. Approximately 870 million people in the world do not eat enough to be healthy. That means that one in every eight people on Earth goes to bed hungry each night. (Source: FAO, 2012)

2. The number of people living with chronic hunger has declined by 130 million people over the past 20 years. For developing countries, the prevalence of undernourishment has fallen from 23.2 to 14.9 percent over the period 1990–2010 (Source: FAO, 2012)

3. Most of the progress against hunger was achieved before 2007/08. Since then, global progress in reducing hunger has slowed and leveled off. (Source: FAO, 2012)

4. Hunger is number one on the list of the world’s top 10 health risks. It kills more people every year than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined. (Source: UNAIDS, 2010; WHO, 2011).

5. A third of all deaths in children under the age of five in developing countries are linked to undernutrition. (Source: IGME, 2011)

6. The first 1,000 days of a child’s life, from pregnancy through age two, are the critical window in which to tackle undernutrition. A proper diet in this period can protect children from the mental and physical stunting that can result from malnutrition. (Source: IGME, 2011)

7. It costs just US $0.25 per day to provide a child with all of the vitamins and nutrients he or she needs to grow up healthy. (Source: WFP, 2011)

8. If women in rural areas had the same access to land, technology, financial services, education and markets as men, the number of hungry people could be reduced by 100-150 million. (Source: FAO, 2011)

9. By 2050, climate change and erratic weather patterns will have pushed another 24 million children into hunger. Almost half of these children will live in sub-Saharan Africa. (Source: WFP, 2009)

10. Hunger is the single biggest solvable problem facing the world today.

* World Food Programme, “10 Things You Need To Know About Hunger In 2013”, Jan. 2, 2013, http://www.wfp.org/stories/10-things-you-need-know-about-hunger-2013

By Ranjan Soloman

3 January 2013

@ Palestine Update

Syria is on the brink of a huge externally sponsored disaster. Everything about what is happening in that country is repugnant and deplorable. The western allies are supporting a proxy war – a typical colonial tactic to destabilize and then conquer. The theory under construct now is that the Syrian regime is treacherous and dubious because it is preparing to assault the rebels with chemical weapons. The corporate media deals out this gobbledygook with a regularity and data that nudge gullible unthinking readers to swallow the bait. Not new, this strategy – echoes of Iraq and the invention of the Weapons of Mass Destruction conspiracy theory. The ‘chemical weapon’ theory has many buyers in the west. The media’s tactics in prompting and propping up ‘Islamaphobia’ is working. When war is announced and their armies and air force invades Syria to complete the job that the rebels cannot win on their own, the people of the west would have sanctioned the invasion believing that their leaders were engaged in the noble task of saving Syria from a maniac by a new name other than Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein, or Osama Bin laden.

To do what it did in Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, the West lied. It is lying now. The report is out and it is bad news. The US is now officially at war with Syria. They have de facto recognized the rebel fighters as a legitimate Syrian authority. The hard truth is that rebels have probably got the chemical weapons in their hands – they were smuggled from Libya months ago. They will be unleashed on innocent populations, the crime will be uncovered with devious propaganda and the west will then enter to announce their moral outrage! Then hand over Syria to the oil capitalists! Of course, there will be a stooge regime made functional and managed by the west. The terrorists would be transformed into rulers, diplomats, bureaucrats, and official army thugs.

Meanwhile the destabilisation of Syria will be intensified, the larger strategy being to generate chaos and disenchantment with President Assad- who may not have the support of all his people, but carries more credibility and standing than the rag tag opposition who strut around as ‘rebels with a cause’. The ‘rebels’ are mercenaries from outside Syria having infiltrated under orders to be ruthless, to kill, and be merciless. It is predicted that by the time the conflict sees any final solutions; more than 100,000 people could be killed. It could be even worse.

Chances for peace are denied only because they do not serve the interests of the west and Israel. Reasonable formulas for peace are dismissed as unworkable. The Syrian rebels reject dialogue until the departure of President Assad.

Russia and Iran are playing pivotal roles in preventing a human catastrophe in the country and seeking to resolve the crisis through diplomacy. They are not looking at regime change. Iran is vilified in the western world as a desperado nation whose only intent as a nation is criminal and, in the last few years, a nuclear risk. Iran has shown the maximum maturity and positive intent. Iran has, in fact, proposed a 6-point peace plan which assigns the Syrian nation the lawful right to decide it’s the destiny and future through an internationally-recognized democratic process. The plan, among others, calls for an immediate end to any armed actions; ushering in a UN-monitored democratic process; the Damascus regime and the opposition to cooperate with UN and its special committee to stop armed operations especially in the residential areas to restore peace and stability; an immediate, serious and just distribution of humanitarian aids to Syrian people; the lifting of economic sanctions on the Syrian people in order to prepare the ground for the return of all Syrian refugees to their homeland; the resumption of comprehensive national dialogues by different opposing social and political parties and Damascus to rapidly form a national reconciliation committee in order to unanimously form a transitional government; a free and competitive election for the formation of a new parliament and senate and the composition of a constitution; and the immediate release of all political prisoners from all parties by the government and opposition groups, and establishment of a competent court of justice to investigate cases of those who committed crimes in that country. Ironically, the plan also steps outside Syrian terrain when it asks for the media to cease wrong reporting about Syria- a ploy to ease international suspicion about the Assad regime and the character of the Syrian regime. With no counter argument worthy of contesting the Iranian plan, the Syrian rebels dismissed it as a “last-ditch bid to save the regime of President Bashar al-Assad”. The Syrian regime, on the other hand, is eager to examine legitimate options to bring to an end the nearly two-year crisis through political dialogue.

Syria faces a tragedy of incalculably sadistic scope. How many more deaths in war and post-war will it take to forge a peace?  There are still individuals and groups in the west who see through the cruel and self-fulfilling designs of their governments. Despite the hurdles, they are examining legal options in favour of Syria – an option that can take the western allies to the International Court of justice. The Rule of Law could well go in favour of Syria. If only the western allies truly believe in international law they would recognize that they are on the wrong side of the law. Mere sanctions – unilateral as they are in this case- are enough for a verdict in favour of Syria because sanctions are as bad as war and crimes that inflict suffering on innocent populations by bringing on disaster in the form of deprivation of the basics of life. Unless, the west is challenged for its illegal wars and leaders declared criminals, the assaults will continue with increased arrogance and brazenly. Moreover, the west is supporting armed crimes that it funds. Syria is a good test case for such action. The evidence against the west is quite harsh.

Badayl-Alternatives offer you the views expressed above along with weblinks that provide more analysis and perspectives into the Syrian tragedy. We hope this is useful in your understanding of the conflict especially at a time when the media provides a one-sided standpoint

By Cynthia Stephen

30 December, 2012

@ Countercurrents.org

It is a real shame that our society has not understood the basic reason behind the increasing sexual violence against women and girls. The reason is that our society is deeply misogynistic, that is, woman-hating. This is seen even in ancient mythologies where women are almost always shown in poor light, as slaves to the men. Thus there is a denial of their basic humanity in the collective consciousness of our society. That is why crimes against women – not only rapes, but beating, mental violence, stalking, dowry violence – is not seen as a crime or treated as such, whether by the perpetrator, the police, or indeed the justice system itself.

In Bangalore we had the recent high-profile case of a famous actor who had a history of severe violence against his wife – finally being “compromised” with his wife, who had the courage to speak up in public, but then faced severe criticism for having dragged the family’s affairs into the public eye and pressure to compromise. But I think she has to be commended for speaking up. Because often victims of violence, and thier families, think that it is better to be silent about violence. This is again because of the lack value for a woman and her person – and many of the women are also co-dependents in the violent situations they face daily. This is not to blame the victim but to understand the reality that women are seen, and also taught by society that they are weak, vulnerable, and hence second-class citizens. Unless this situation is clearly understood and challenged, till everyone – the law, the police, families, each individual, and especially the men – are made to understand the equality, even the superior role, played by a woman in society, and this is given its due worth, such incidents will continue to happen.

The attempt to justify the violence by saying that women provoke men with their clothes or behaviour deserves to be dismissed with contempt. What justifies the now fairly commonly reported sexual attacks on minor children under the age of 8? what about the numerous cases of incest committed on children of thier families by fathers, cousins, uncles and grandfathers?

The role of increased and unmonitored access to pornography is an important factor that cannot be discounted. The young men and boys who consume pornography are predisposed to sexual violence, especially against a vulnerable ‘object’. Thus they are dehumanised and fail to see the sex act not in its human, relational aspect but only as a means to gratifying appetites aroused by the pornographic images.

This points to a failure in the way our society rears its young men and women. While something is being done to address women through empowerment programmes and education, nothing positive is being done to educate young men in this area. They need to see the world as not only thier space, but as the common heritage of both men and women. They have to be taught that women are to be valued highly for thier role in the family, society, and economy, and as common heirs of this world. They have to be taught that women and girls too have rights, they too are human, and they have to be respected, who ever and whatever they are.

The justice delivery to women is most neglected. This has to change. As far as possible, judges and prosecutors should be women to enable victims to speak with comfort, especially in the case of rape and sexual violence.

Cynthia Stephen is an Independent Writer and Researcher based in Bangalore

By R.B Sreekumar

30 December, 2012

@ Countercurrents.org

Mere legislation will not eradicate gender prejudice, sex crimes and emancipate women from inhuman man-made disabilities

The massive youth movement subsequent to the recent gruesome gang-rape in Delhi has rekindled discussion on gender justice. Socio-religious and cultural reforms, simultaneous to intellectual revolution, precede action towards political and legislative transformation. Our freedom struggle was born out of the Modern Indian Renaissance, enlightening many arenas of community life, heralded by Rajaram Mohan Rai, Mahatma Jyotiba Phule and others in the 19th Century. By the time Mahatma Gandhi launched the Non-cooperation Movement in 1921, large chunk of Indian elite was fully engaged in purifying Indian society from evils of widow-burning (Sati), child marriage, ban on widow remarriage, untouchability and numerous ghastly anti-women traditions. The enthusiasts of women reservation in legislative bodies, largely drawn from the creamy layer of urbanised educated middle class and protestors against sex crimes, have to have meaningful durable schemes to confront and stamp out multifarious obscurantist socio-religious practices and conventions, perpetuating subordination and discrimination of women in practically all facets of civil life in India. Grater presence of women in high positions of the First, Second Estates, Judiciary and leadership of political parties, devoid of massive campaigns to exorcise pre-modern religion – ordained traditions, would generate euphoria of equality, without substantial results and attitudinal change of Indian male, for the vast majority in the feminine world of India.

Lofty ideals of gender equality guaranteed by the Indian Constitution is cleverly nullified by socio-religious conventions in our society, by largely adhering to retrogressive customs glorified in the Smritis, particularly of Manu, Vyasa, Parasara and Vasista. Manu Smriti denigrated women, in chapter IX sloka 2 and 3, to slavish depth as part of divine order (Varnalingadharma). Daksha Smriti praised widows for committing suicide on their husband’s funeral pyre as “they will be respected in the heaven for such acts – Swarga lokae mahiyate”

Etymology of words relating to women in Sanskrit language does reflect their intrinsic lower status vis-à-vis men. Mahila (woman) means “land of festival (of course for men)”- Maham lati iti mahila. Bharya (Wife) denotes a person liable to be ruled – Bhartum yogya iti Bharya. Chastity and integrity are imperative for women whereas it is just optional for men. Ancient Indian compilation – Nitisara (edited by Shri K.P.A Menon) directed husbands to abandon wives if they were, argumentative; stealing husband’s money; disloyal; bad mouthing husbands; eating before husband taking food; going to other houses for gossip; even if ten sons were delivered by them, Sloka 12. Alas! there are no such stipulations for husbands, nor the word ‘patnivratan’ is ever in use like ‘pativrata’. In India, even waste material can fetch money, when accepted by others but for some body to accept a girl as wife her parents have to bribe him with dowry.

Puranas (18) and Epics – Ramayana and Mahabharata, are acclaimed as stories of illustrative actualisation of scriptural ideals that people ought to model themselves. None can / will dare to challenge or deviate from projected conduct of worshipful but patriarchal masculinity – centric Epic heroes like Dasarata, Rama, Bheesma , Krishna and so on. Hence anti women traditions got cemented and sanctified. Instances of gender prejudice is reflected in :- 1) Dasaratha not permitting his biological daughter Princess Santha, elder sister of Rama to inherit the throne of Ayodhdya; 2) Rama telling his step mother Kaikyei that if his father wanted he would abandon his mother also like the kingdom; 3) Parasuram (an incarnation of Lord Vishnu) killing his own mother, Renuka, on the orders of his father, Jamadagni; 4) Bheesma kidnapping three princesses of Kasi for making them brides of his brothers; 5) Rama and Krishna doing nothing to end practice of Sati – Urmila committing Sati after Lakshmana’s death and queen Madri entering the pyre of her husband Pandu and so on.

Women of all castes deeply suffered rigorous slavery than even men of lower castes and out-castes. Acceptance of slave women (dasis) as dowry from King Janaka Maharaja by Rama and his brothers (five hundreds slave women had gone along with Rama to Ayodhya from Mithila after his marriage); presentation of well ornamented slave girls as property for dice game by Yudhishtira, the paragon of virtue in Mahabharata, are a few abominable occasions, in the Epics. Pandavas not preventing mass suicide of Yadava women after the death of Krishna was another illustration of depravity. On the whole, the women characters in the Epics were dispensable and disposable commodity. King Yayati gave his daughter – Madhavi, famous for her ravishing beauty, to Muni Galavan, in lieu of horses which Yayati could not supply. Galavan kept Madhavi in the company of three Kings, for one year each, and obtained the required number of horses. Abandonment of pregnant Sita by Rama even after her proven chastity in the fire ordeal (Agniparisha) and later Ram asking Sita to publicly declare her honesty, which prompted self-respecting Sita to disappear into the Mother Earth (suicide), were demonstrative episodes of gross injustice. The audacity of many from the present decadent elite of India (politicians – note “dented and painted pretty ladies” – comment, senior police officials, self styled God men, priestly order of all religions) to blame female victims of sex crimes for the brutalities of men emerges from sacrilegious de-spiritualized legacy of pseudo-religions, and egregious and inequitable social ambience. This could explain our political parties fielding persons accused of sex crimes as candidates in elections, merely based on the factor of win-ability. The mentality of treating wife as a private property of the husband has recently prompted our legislators to legalize marital rape of wives above the age of 16 as lawful.

These Epic realities, religiously accepted by vast majority of people as sacrosanct had, set the tone and tenor of gender discrimination in the present times also. Hypocritical over projections viz extensive worship of female deities being a laudable feature (but even in major Devi Temples – Shaktipeedams – women are not appointed as even assistants to priests, thanks to economics and commerce); Goddesses being depicted as symbolic custodians of knowledge (Saraswathi), wealth (Lakshmi), and power (Amba/Parvathy), though in real life women are kept away from knowledge, wealth and power as far as possible in family, social and religious institutions, and so on, are meant for tokenist exhibitionism of gender equality. In most of the major religious bodies, Mathas and Ashrams no suitable female cadre is raised and nurtured for assuming positions of leadership and authority. Though Lord Buddha permitted women in the Buddhist Sanghams, that tradition was neglected later by the Monks later.

The much euologised Brahmavadinis (female hermits) in the Early Vedic period (1500 to 800 BC) were less than 30 as against 100’s of Rishis and Munis, enjoying all material pleasures including polygamy. No Goddess could aspire for more than one husband, whereas Gods are allowed multiple consorts.

For practicing Hindus, observance of 16 socio-religious and cultural rites (Shodasa Samskar), from conception of the child to funeral ceremonies, prescribed by Smritis and Dharmasastras, is unavoidable. Marginalisation and degradation of women in most of these 16 observances is quite pronounced. Girl child is not even entitled for Upanayan (investiture of sacred thread), Vedarambha (initiation to study) and Samavartan (convocation) ceremonies, while Namakaran (Naming) is conventionally avoided in many places for girls. Strangely the father or senior male family member do all auspicious rituals in most of the sixteen Samskaras, particularly Namakaran, Annaprashana (giving first cereal food), – though biology makes mother to be the food provider (Annadada) from the time of conception-, Vedarambha, Samavartan and so on. In Antyeshti (Funeral) son, nephew or male kith and kin of the deceased are alone permitted to do ceremonies.

Scriptural architecture of patriarchal Semitic religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam is equally averse to the legitimate rights of women in domestic, social, religious and cultural fields. There are no prospects for a Lady Pope, Abbot or Archbishop of Anglican Church in the religion of apostle of love to all – Jesus Christ. In the priest-less faith of Islam also women are not permitted to do prayers (Namas) in mosques in many places, give religious discourses, and guide devotees in congregations, nor they can preside over religious or social gatherings like marriage, circumcision and funeral.

Any criticism against obscurantist anti-women practices in Hindu society will be counted by champions of orthodoxy by quoting egalitarian ideals of Sanatana Dharma, enshrined in Vedas, Bhagavat Gita and Upanisads, permitting the right of liberation (Moksha) or merger with God to animals also, display of devotion during Navrathiri to Goddesses, concept of mother being equal to God (Matrudevobhava), and so on. Those engaged in these symbolic lip-service and superfluous actions do not move further towards reform of Smriti – centered subjugation of women. Will they be ready to march out of retrogressive feudal medievalism of Smritis and recast conventions and traditions in tune with the ideals of Upanishads and other Sruti literature and ennobling concepts of post-Renaissance European enlightenment and modernism? Does women’s biology make her ineligible for priesthood and thereby gaining empowerment in socio-religious field?

Votaries of women reservation should campaign for induction of eligible women in Hindu priesthood, ecclesiastical order of Christianity and moulavi / imam cadre of Islam. Can we hope to have women pujaris in major Devi Temples – Shaktipeetas – Kamakhya in Assam, Ambaji in Gujarat, virgin Goddess temple in Kanyakumari (Tamilnadu) and Attukal Devi temple in Trivandrum (where largest congregation of women in whole world happens for annual Pongala – ceremonial offering of food by devotees) and so on? In 16 Samskaras of Hindus and similar rituals in the social life of minorities, mother, daughter and female members in the family should be given their due status and position in consonance with dictates of biology and laws of Nature. Reformers should target the core base area of socio-religious and behavioral barbarism practiced against women, so that we can usher in for gender justice and emancipation of 50% of Indian people from religion-ordained and culture-conditioned slavery. Let legislation and words pass and deeds prove.

R.B Sreekumar (IPS), Former DGP- Gujarat

By David Ignatius

30 November 2012

@ Washington Post

Syrian opposition leaders report an alarming growth within their ranks of fighters from Jabhat al-Nusra, an extremist group linked to al-Qaeda.

The Jabhat group now has somewhere between 6,000 and 10,000 fighters, according to officials of an non-governmental organization that represents the more moderate wing of the Free Syrian Army (FSA). They say that the al-Qaeda affiliate now accounts for 7.5 percent to 9 percent of the Free Syrian Army’s total fighters, up sharply from an estimated 3 percent three months ago and 1 percent at the beginning of the year.

The extremist group is growing in part because it has been the most aggressive and successful arm of the rebel force. “From the reports we get from the doctors, most of the injured and dead FSA are Jabhat al-Nusra, due to their courage and [the fact they are] always at the front line,” said a message sent today to the State Department by the moderate Free Syrian Army representatives, warning of the extremists’ rise.

These estimates are very rough, given the scattered and disorganized nature of the opposition. But they are based on detailed reporting from the field by the members’ military councils, which are the closest thing to an organized command structure among the rebels. In reports sent this week to the State Department, the NGO representing the Syrian moderates offered a detailed breakdown of the extremists’ growth:

* In Aleppo, the Jabhat force is reckoned at around 2,000, mostly in the Al-Bab area northeast of the city. This estimate is based partly on reports from a doctor in the area who has treated injured fighters. The total FSA presence in the Aleppo area is about 15,000.

* In Idlib province, west of Aleppo, Jabhat’s ranks number 2,500 to 3,000, or about 10 percent of the total number of FSA fighters there.

* In Deir al-Zor, to the northeast, the extremist group has about 2,000 of the FSA’s total force of 17,000, according to the reports. Among Jabhat al-Nusra’s most spectacular operations were recent seizures of the Al-Ward oil field and a Conoco gas field, the reports said.

* In Damascus, the Jabhat al-Nusra force is somewhere between 750 and 1,000. Another 1,000 fighters are spread around the country in Latakia, in northwest Syria, Homs in the center and Daraa in the south.

The Syrian reports paint a picture of a disorganized rebel force in which the extremists are filling the vacuum caused by the lack of clearly established command and control.

“In some areas, other extreme groups are merging with [Jabhat] al-Nusra, in others many are leaving it because they did not fulfill promises of support,” notes one report sent to the State Department.

In the chaos of the Syrian battlefield, smaller battalions drawn from neighborhoods or small towns are combining forces with larger groups to form brigades, many of them led by extremists. “This means more [mergers] of extreme groups within Jabhat al-Nusra as it becomes more and more franchised,” the report explains. “Their risk is paying off. They are on a high [rate] of growth.”

A message sent earlier this week from the Free Syrian Army representatives touted the new use of anti-aircraft missiles to down a Syrian helicopter: “It’s thrilling to see it [the anti-aircraft weapon] in action finally. The bad news is that it was not through the U.S. but from the regime bases fallen into the hands of the [FSA] battalions. The other bad news is that it’s not under the control or the supervision of the MC [Military Council] commanders.”

“We are feeling the heat, time is closing up, the fall of Assad appears to be in the very near future,” continued this message, sent last Tuesday.

As the rebels gain momentum, the spoils of war apparently are going to the rebel group that captures a particular Syrian army base. This is one factor boosting the rapid growth of Jabhat al-Nusra. Its fighters provide the muscle and weapons and, as a result, explained an official of the NGO that represents the moderate FSA fighters: “They will get all the goodies, reputation and recognition.”