Vignette from the life of a Rohingya refugee in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh:
An elderly Rohingya man, formally registered as a refugee with the UNHCR, has been suffering from liver cancer for about two years. His acute pain causes him to scream, making his suffering unbearable for his family to witness. He is not being hospitalized or provided suitable home care treatment because the UNHCR claims there is a budget crisis & providing treatment to an elderly person likely to die soon is not possible.
Stand in solidarity with the Rohingya struggle for human, democratic, citizenship, refugee rights.
For Senator McCain to drag his bony ass out of a death bed to deprive millions of working people of shoddy healthcare plans makes him not just a putz but an utterly contemptible one. Him, with the best healthcare plan in the world at taxpayer’s expense.
We don’t lower ourselves to his level to wish evil on him. At least not in this world. But when he croaks, let him rot in hell for all eternity. Amen.
A fascinating video about parkour in Kashmir & its relationship to resistance against occupation. It features Zahid Shah, the founder of parkour in Kashmir, & someone I consider a friend.
Came across this Kashmiri tribute to the role of Rollie Mukherjee’s art in building solidarity & educating about the occupation. How the hell I got honorable mention in the article beats me but I am more than honored. Reposting it out of my immense respect for Rollie’s artistic & political work which she combines with a powerful humanity.
Srinagar: imagine coming of age under occupation with this measure of conflict & tension, with soldiers–one to every seven Kashmiris–prowling the streets. All they have to do to end it is submit to colonialism, give up all claims to living as a free people, agree to live like whipped puppies under Modi-think & Hindutva nationalism. That’s why the Kashmiri struggle is so important: because they won’t.
The Kashmiri struggle may & certainly a Kashmiri victory would contribute monumentally to the titanic struggles in India against caste oppression, religious persecution & intolerance, the struggle against scorched earth neoliberal economics. That’s why so many of the most powerful voices of solidarity with Kashmiri self-determination are Indians. They understand the dialectical unity between freedom for Kashmir & the struggle against oppression in India.
Long live Kashmiri Intifada. End the occupation. Self-determination for Kashmir.
Snotty impulses overwhelm me again so I must ask: where are all the intellectual left hotshots on the issue of Al Aqsa? Busy thinking deep thoughts? Inventing new theories no one can understand & which have no relevance? Making themselves as irrelevant as Zizek?
Israel, under pressure from massive Palestinian resistance in the streets, has decided to remove metal detectors at entrances to the Noble Sanctuary of the Al Aqsa mosque but intends to keep surveillance cameras. Netanyahu’s office issued a statement that the metal detectors would be replaced with “advanced technologies & other means” of controlling the compound.
A partial occupation isn’t good enough; it’s still an occupation & is by no means seen as a victory. The director of Al Aqsa said keeping the surveillance cameras does not satisfy Palestinian objections to occupation of the compound. Sheikh Raed Dana of the Islamic Waqf trust which administers the Noble Sanctuary said: “This movement is a movement of the street. We at the Waqf listen to the street. The street says yes & we say yes; if the street says no to the measures, we will say no.” “The street” of course is Intifada.
Photo is Israeli security (with their tails between their legs) removing the metal detectors.
Unelected president Mahmoud Abbas stopped sniveling & groveling long enough to declare the Palestinian Authority (PA) will “freeze contact on all levels” with Israel until metal detectors are removed from entrances to Al Aqsa compound. Bully for him, but the majority of Palestinians have been calling for an end to his groveling & collusion with Israel for a long time.
Talking tough for effect, he did not clarify whether the PA security force would stop collaborating with Israeli security & undercover intelligence units against Palestinians in the occupied territories. Such collaboration to crush Intifada, support the occupation, & facilitate expropriations under the Oslo Accords is the primary purpose for the existence of the PA.
He can huff & he can puff but as long as the PA colludes with the occupation, he is nothing more than a windbag, all sound & fury signifying betrayal.
End the occupation. Self-determination for Palestine. #HandsOffAlAqsa
There’s no apologizing for posting a lot about the siege & occupation of Al Aqsa compound & there’s no too much. If this is not the time to stand with Palestinians, then what is the time?
