“A brigadier says, The boys of Kashmir break so quickly,
we make their bodies sing, on the rack, till no song is left to sing.”
~ Aga Shahid Ali
(Photo by Shahid Tantray)
Somalia is another US war we don’t hear about & is not protested because the international antiwar movement has become an Assadist & Stalinist cult. Amnesty reports that US bombing strikes in Somalia have increased ‘enormously’ & indiscriminately under the Trump regime & that those bombers, supported by the most sophisticated electronic & satellite systems in the world, don’t have any idea who they are killing.
US out of Somalia!
At the height of India’s murderous crackdown on the 2016 Kashmiri uprising, the Indian government sent a delegation of business representatives from the petroleum, electrical, information technology & hospitals industries to explore investment possibilities in Syria. They don’t have enough public schools or a modern sanitation system for everyone in India, but they were offering to rebuild what Assad, Russia, & the US-coalition had bombed to smithereens in Syria.
The Assad regime has not yet spoken out directly in support of India’s siege in Kashmir like Russia & the US have, but as this article from June 2019 points out, there have been high-level negotiations between India & Syria who propagandistically posit themselves at the center of the Islamophobic ‘war on terror’.
https://intpolicydigest.org/2019/06/15/deconstructing-india-s-latest-outreach-to-syria/?
“Everyone has a dream.”: a 12-year-old Rohingya boy who wants to go to school but is denied education in Bangladesh.
This is going on today in NYC to protest the Gates Foundation award to Modi. New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern has not backed out though yesterday in a description of her itinerary while in NYC, she did not mention this repugnant event. Most of us cannot be there in person but we will be in the spirit of solidarity with Kashmir.
I know I’m posting too damn much but it’s just the way I roll when these crises happen. And believe me, I’m not the only one. When we’re finished with you, there’ll be no excuses for not understanding Kashmir or for not boycotting India.
Kolkata, India #StandWithKashmir rally, September 21st, 2019.
Meanwhile, in the West Bank, Palestinians face off against Israeli troops. Palestinian solidarity will be strengthened significantly by unity in action with the Kashmiri movement so it makes sense that Palestinian Authority officials Mahmoud Abbas, Hanan Ashrawi, & the others have not uttered a peep of solidarity with Kashmir. But of course, it wasn’t that long ago that Abbas & Modi exchanged diplomatic visits & swore loyalty to each other.
(Photo via Moneeb Saada)
There are many Mexican Muslims & some participated in the Adios Modi march yesterday in Houston. Estimates of the crowd are between 10,000 & 15,000 participants.
Since the Kashmiri Pandit (Hindu) crisis of the 1990s is repeatedly thrown in our faces by nationalists falsely accusing Kashmiri Muslims of genocide & because right-wing Kashmiri Pandits are playing a central role among Hindutvavadis, it is really important to get ahold of that history. This is where rigorous attention to sources is imperative. If you want the Hindutva view, read Wikipedia. No one wants apologetics; we want reliable history. As you study the issue, you just have to ask yourself if it makes sense that Muslims would conduct a genocide against Hindus whilst at the same time they themselves were sustaining the extremes of Indian government violence. Please note that the same slander was used against Rohingya in Arakan state: as if they would stop in flight for their lives from the Burmese Army to conduct a genocide against Hindus.
https://lostkashmirihistory.com/exposing-the-kp-exodus/?
https://mha.gov.in/sites/default/files/RTI1303022012-KII-YogeshChhabra-70513.PDF?