What’s faith got to do with it?

The truth that makes men free is often the truth that men prefer not to hear, said a sage. The initial shock over the two Chechen brothers’ apparent involvement in the Boston bombing has been followed by an endless hysteria in the United States with politicians and all sorts of terrorism experts and media wonks, rushing to blame the usual suspects and the ‘ideology’ that inspired the attack.

Neocon pundit Robert Spencer of Jihad Watch, who has made a career out of Muslim bashing, has triumphantly declared Islam as the ‘real problem’. In a piece titled ‘Excusing Jihad in Boston,’ he blasts the US media for “underplaying the religious angle” in the attack, claiming the Quran exhorts Muslims to use the “steeds of war to strike terror into the hearts of the enemies.”

Bruce Bawer of FrontPage has declared an open war on Islam and its followers saying, “All we need to know is that the attackers were jihadists, and therefore our enemy”, Think tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute are pitching the same line to claim the land of the free is under attack from ‘Islamic terrorists’ because of its glorious democracy and freedom.

And it’s not just a right-wing fringe that seems to think so. The liberal ‘world-is-flat’ pundit Thomas Friedman of The New York Times slams “radical Muslim groups and their apologists” for daring to suggest that Boston may have been a response to the continuing US wars.

Indeed, Friedman goes a step further: “We surely mustn’t tar all of Islam in this. But we must ask a question only Muslims can answer: What’s going on in your community that a critical number of your youth believes every American military action in the Middle East is intolerable and justifies a violent response, and everything Muslim extremists do to other Muslims is ignorable and calls for mostly silence?”

In other words, the ‘problem’ lies with Islam and its followers. Another liberal Andrew Sullivan of the Daily Beast had this to say: “All religions contain elements of this kind of fanaticism. But Islam’s fanatical side from the Taliban to the Tsarnaevs is more murderous than most.”

Can there be a bigger lie than this? Of course, there is no excuse or justification – by any stretch – for murder and mayhem targeting innocent people. This is something Islamic scholars, intellectuals and even ordinary people have repeatedly stressed and are totally united on. Despicable actions like the one that targeted the Boston marathon go against the fundamental teachings and spirit of the faith that strictly forbids strife and killing innocent civilians even during wars. But then these actions had nothing to do with Islam.

The issue is not with Islam or the bloodlust of its followers. The problem is with the reigning superpower and its unquenchable thirst for global power and total supremacy. The motives of the brothers Tsarnaev were not religious but political, as has been the case with numerous other such attacks in the past.

In a courageous piece in the Guardian, American journalist and author Glenn Greenwald argues that his country is living in denial about the roots of terror by portraying Islam as a militant religion, while ignoring the horrific violence and destruction the United States has unleashed on the Muslim world. Greenwald cites the last four attempted or successful attacks on US soil to support his argument:

• Attempted ‘underwear bomber’ Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, upon pleading guilty, said that he had planned to “attack the US in retaliation for US support of Israel and for the killing of innocent Muslims in Palestine, Yemen, Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan and beyond.”

• Attempted Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad, a middle-class naturalised American, said he was motivated by “US policies in the Muslim world.” When the presiding judge quizzed him how he could have killed innocent children, he replied: “Well, the drone hits in Afghanistan and Iraq, they don’t see children, they don’t see anybody. They kill women, children, they kill everybody. It’s a war, and in war, they kill people. They’re killing all Muslims. I am part of the answer to the US terrorising the Muslim nations and people. Americans only care about their own people; they don’t care about the people elsewhere in the world when they die.”

• Attempted New York subway bomber Najibullah Zazi, first Afghan American involved in such a plot, told the judge that he did so “because of what the US was doing in Afghanistan.”

• Major Nidal Hasan, the military instructor who went on a rampage at Fort Hood killing several of his comrades in arms, said he did it because of his “deep anguish” over the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Even the American Yemeni preacher, Anwar al-Awlaki, who apparently inspired both Abdulmutallab and Hasan, was once considered a ‘moderate imam.’ The Pentagon included him in post-9/11 community events and The Washington Post invited him to write a column. Al-Awlaki flipped after the attack on Iraq. He was killed in a drone strike in Yemen, the first American to be killed by his own government. His 16-year old, all-American son met the same fate two weeks later when he went to visit his father’s family in Yemen.

If these instances, indefensible as they are, do not amply prove that it’s not Islamic beliefs or teachings but unjust US-western policies and wars that are at the heart of terror and this explosive conflict, what will?

Yet the empire continues to live, as all empires do, in denial – blaming everyone and everything else but its own hubris. Indeed, the more anger and frustration the US policies and actions provoke around the world the deeper America seems to stick its head in the sand. It not only refuses to confront the roots of this corrosive rage, it’s actually adding fuel to the fire.

Many of us hoped things would change under President Barack Hussein Obama because of his background and lofty promises. How wrong we all were! Look at the endless genuflection fest that was Obama’s recent visit to Israel. Someone who passionately talked of the Palestinians’ right to their homeland in Cairo in 2009 now lectures the occupied to be more ‘realistic’ and continue talking peace with Israel even as the last remaining piece of their land is gobbled up by Israeli settlements. It’s this hypocrisy and abject American surrender to Israel that feeds Muslim angst.

This president is bending over backwards to prove he’s not a closet Muslim or ‘socialist Muslim,’ as he joked this week. Jeremy Scahill’s book, Dirty Wars: The World is a Battlefield, released last week just before the movie by the same name, paints a frightening picture of the US militarism under Obama that kills at will and makes no distinction between terrorists and innocent bystanders.

Yet the Americans are outraged when faced with a backlash. In Greenwald’s words, they seem to think “we can invade, bomb, drone, kill, occupy, and tyrannise whomever we want, and that they will never respond. If you believe militarism and aggression are justified, then fine. But don’t walk around acting surprised when violence is brought to US soil. It’s the inevitable outcome of these choices, and that’s not because Islam is some sort of bizarre or intrinsically violent religion.”

Will this cycle of violence and cause-and-effect ever end? The answer lies in the question itself. Blaming Boston on Islam will not help America tackle the spectre of terror; confronting the truth and roots of this conflict will.

By:- Aijaz Zaka Syed

Concentration

An example of concentration and patience, and the consequent nerves control.

Sarabjit Singh was Indian Spy

At last after two decades of refusal, India has come up with the truth after Sarabjit Singh’s death and just before burning body his body that Sarabjit Singh was an Indian spy. This was also proved by the full military guard of honour given to him before setting his body on fire.

The news has been broken by a renowned Indian Newspaper “Hindustan Times”.
Hindustan Times writes “Sarabjit was an Indian spy in Pakistan. He managed to accomplish the task given to him but was caught while trying to flee,” said an intelligence source who refused to elaborate more on the operation taken up by the spy.

A former intelligence official, who dealt with Sarabjit’s case, said the operation executed by Sarabjit didn’t serve any tactical purpose but still the agency had executed many such missions in Pakistan in the early and mid 90s.

“Some of the operations executed by the R&AW during the period were totally mindless. Spies like Sarabjit and their family have paid huge cost for it. Sometimes, the agency officials executed operations out of personal bravado that they can get ‘something’ done in Pakistan,” said the official.

Sources also point out that the agency is yet to evolve a policy for paying spies like Sarabjit or their families when they caught in the enemy land.

“Payments vary case to case depending on the nature of operation. There is no uniformity in discreet payments to families when such agents are caught or eliminated by the enemy,” says a source.

“Sarabjit had been awarded a state funeral because his case was mainly highlighted due to efforts of his politically astute sister Dalbir Kaur. His family is also being compensated, But there are many cases in which the spies came back from Pakistan knocked the doors of courts to get their dues,” the source said.

Advisor ? ? ?

A sincere advisor does not have enmity towards you if you do not accept his advice.

Malala or another Anne Frank

Everyone in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the tribal area was surprised and almost jealous of the coverage that Malala Yusufzai got from the national and international media soon after her assassination attempt back in 2012. Some of them were quite critical of how the media played up the incident. They argued that there are examples of hundreds of other courageous youth who were targeted and killed by militants for raising their voice, who worked for peace, education and development. But nobody in the media cared for them. So Malala’s coverage raised doubts and questions about the role of the media in promoting different agendas and much was said over the social media about conspiracy theories.

I argued with many critics in defense of the media but I was told that a Karachi-based political party with influence over the electronic media and television networks was rallying public support to put pressure on the military for a major offensive in North Waziristan. This had happened earlier in Swat with the strategically timed release of a video where a young woman was seen being beaten by a group of alleged Islamists. I was with Syed Talat Hussain early the next day after the attack on Malala and we were discussing the incident. He too was surprised by the global media response but set aside all conspiracy theories and both of us focused on straight forward reporting of the tragic event.

We were shown documents warning the father of Malala, Ziauddin, of a possible attack and how an offer was made to provide police security to the family. So a lot of questions bubbled in my mind about how, who, why and what actually happened. How can a father be so careless or so cruel that, despite early warning, he declined security arrangements and put his daughter’s life in danger? These questions reminded me of another meeting when Adam B. Ellick visited my office in Peshawar while working on a report for New York Times on Malala Yusufzai. He filmed her in a professional and thematic way but there were discussions over BBC blogger Gul Makai, a young girl’s diary from the Taliban era in Swat. I don’t know why but it just struck me then to look for a deeper understanding of what was going on.

While travelling in Europe on a visit to Amsterdam, Netherland, I had a chance to learn about holocaust victims and the Diaries of Anne Frank (1929-1945), a Jewish girl trapped in a house when the city was under the command of Nazi Germans. She received international fame when her diary was published where she wrote about her feelings, life in confinement and the situation of the city. If someone has read Anne Frank’s Diary it may be easy to draw parallels with the diaries of Malala Yusufzai alias Gul Makai, since they bear a striking resemblance and give the impression that Anne Frank revisited the world under the guise of Malala Yusufzai.

Was this planned? Or did the girl from Swat read those diaries on her own and decide to write in a similar way? Abdul Hai Kakar revealed that the BBC was in search of a character that could talk about the ground situation in Swat. Since Ziauddin was an activist working for a non-government organization, he had good networking and a relationship with the media, so he was approached. There were other people too who had tales to tell, but Ziauddin offered his daughter Malala Yusufzai for the job. Abdul Hai Kakar also shared how her father was ready to use her real name but the BBC acted more professionally and, considering security threats, decided to give her the pseudonym of Gul Makai.

Long before that, we had seen how her father used to encourage her to speak to the media. It was more like when a child is asked to recite rhymes in front of guests in a display of their intelligence and ability. This is a regular custom in most households and children often recite such rehearsed presentations even before they understand the English rhymes they are reciting. Sometimes children are also inspired by dialogue and action in a movie and they try to copy those images. To me, Malala doesn’t seem any different from such children.

In a country where extremism is at its height and even politicians, professionals, and law enforcement personnel are not safe, schools are bombed and children are kidnapped to be used as suicide bombers, bringing a young girl to the forefront meant placing an innocent sheep in front of a wolf. Particularly when she was participating in meetings with high-level foreign delegates, her father was making her a party to the war. I felt much pity for that poor little girl and always discussed my fears with fellow journalists in Swat. But they always reassured me, as part of the traditional family set up in our society she was supposed to do whatever her parents told her.

To be fair, some of the critics call this a form of child abuse and ask for an examination of evidence about why security was declined by Ziauddin. Although a First Information Report was lodged by the police and the militants living in Kunar, Afghanistan, (incidentally the area is controlled by the NATO-led International Security Assistance Forces), accepted the responsibility for the attack on Malala, no action has been taken against these barbarians. No doubt, global response to her assassination attempt has been most commendable but it is striking how this has never happened before when so many other people were killed for raising a voice against extremism. There is a need to revisit the case and bring the culprit to book, and the global community must put pressure on Afghanistan to eliminate these terrorist sanctuaries from where militants are targeting children like Malala.

Coming back to the subject, the media also needs greater introspection of its role in reporting on events. It has become a culture to “make” issues, sell issues, promote ratings, become the champions of causes and try to make an entry into the First World. We should not blame the western media for its reporting because they at least have the excuse of not understanding the local context but we, as the locals, know ground realities and how often what appears to be the truth is carpeted by western money. Being journalists covering the war, each one of us should keep these things in mind since there is no greater goal than public interest.

The war has become what I term “glocal”; issues that are local but have global impact too. So responsibility is a must in reporting on events. I have seen the work of non-government organisations with their limited areas of focus and already identified objectives and outcomes covered in the jargon of research or development projects. Their proliferation and the kind of remuneration they offer has tempted many people to start talking about problems in that particular framework and elicit funds from foreign donor agencies. These projects ultimately mask ground realities by looking at issues like the education of girls in isolation.

Although, in her time, Anne Frank was criticised for her age, her schooling, and her class environment, the documents and the place I personally visited, made me feel for the child writing it. It was a heartfelt account by a young girl in trouble and sounds quite genuine while the context and political reality in the case of Malala supports those who see her as a child being used to further the ambitions of the father, a case some people say to be made for “child abuse” of a different kind. This too makes me feel very sad for the young child.

By: Syed Fakhar Kakakhel , an independent journalist based in Peshawar