This crying, scared little girl in the town of Kfar Ruma, Idlib is running for cover from airstrikes by Syrian & Russian bombers. Contrary to the claims of the Assad dictatorship & its irredeemable guppies, there were over three million civilians in Idlib, including one million children, when the bombing offensive began on April 26th. Over 300,000 have been forced to flee for their lives. Idlib is not a place where only terrorists live–even if we agreed about who was a terrorist under the rubrics of the Islamophobic ‘war on terror.’
Political analysis is complex because human societies are complex & contradictory so there are many issues that need to be debated for clarity & understanding. But bombing or shooting at civilians is not one of them, especially if barrel bombs & incendiary weapons are involved. There is no possible & certainly no principled justification for carpet bombing Idlib for now almost three months. For Assad, his propagandists & his guppies to claim only terrorists are holed up in Idlib & that all civilians long ago fled is nothing more than a contemptible lie to justify bombing the place to smithereens. Like it or not, even Assadists have to concede to the Geneva Conventions or take their place with war criminals.
These four little kids who look like siblings were among the recently killed in Syrian & Russian bombing of the village of Mhambil in Idlib. That al-Qaeda is so devious. These four may look like little kids to us but the Assad dictatorship recognized them immediately as top commanders in the “al-Qaeda affiliated Salafi-jihadi terrorists” that Max Blumenthal, Ben Norton, Rania Khalek, & their unquestioning guppies constantly denounce.
Syrians in their village however are mourning their loss because they knew them to be just four little kids, not terrorists.
Stop the bombing of Idlib. They are civilians, not terrorists.
The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) claim they have 60,000 new members. Who gives a rat’s ass where they stand on the collected works of Marx & Engels? What matters is what they’re doing to oppose Syrian, Russian, US-coalition bombing in Syria, the US-NATO wars in Afghanistan, Yemen, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, what they’re doing about the genocide against Rohingya & Uyghur Muslims, & what they’re doing to defend refugees dumped in concentration camps. Theory is important, but textual exegesis & throwing quotes around from political writings is not theoretical work nor what socialism, or any kind of politics, is about. It’s about standing with the oppressed as one of them & if isn’t that, it’s pointless. If DSA has 60,000 members, why aren’t they in the streets opposing war & genocide?
An investigation into a showpiece Chinese brainwashing center for Uyghur Muslims which the far-right & Islamophobic left consider a model for how to deal with Muslim political resistance to persecution, including genocide.
A Syrian journalist in Idlib posted an image of a small boy in a refugee camp beheaded in a Syrian bombing attack. Without his head, it will be harder to identify which terrorist group the little boy belonged to but since Assad, his propagandists, & US antiwar groups claim al-Qaeda rules Idlib, he must belong to an al-Qaeda faction. Or is this child’s death another war crime supported by Pilger, Tariq Ali, Chomsky, Fisk, Prashad, all the leading voices of the so-called left & the corrupted antiwar movement to defend the Assad dictatorship’s right to self-determination?
Stop the bombing of Idlib. They are civilians, not terrorists.
Scene from the occupation of Kashmir: another little boy grown old before his time from witnessing & being traumatized by the constant presence of violence.
This is the third anniversary of the murder of a Kashmiri militant by occupying forces. His name & image cannot be shown on FB without being suspended but his funeral prayers were attended by 600,000 Kashmiris. His murder set off months of massive protests against the occupation which the Indian army countered with extreme violence. By December 2016, 115 Kashmiris, including children were killed; 17,000 were injured, including 7,330 by pellets; 22 young people were totally blinded, 1,255 were partially blinded; 505 women were molested; 65,000 houses, shops, & other structures were damaged; 37 schools were torched; 9,700 people were arrested; 608 were arrested under the Public Safety Act allowing indefinite detention without charges.
Lest we forget the nearly 18-year US-NATO occupation of Afghanistan which has created millions of war refugees denied asylum in Europe; nearly two decades of carpet bombing cities, mosques, fields, homes, schools, hospitals; created millions of displaced & homeless Afghans; caused thousands of injuries & amputations from land mine explosions; included the torture & executions of thousands of detainees who end up buried in mass graves: this is a little Afghan boy who was injured but was one of those who survived US-NATO bombing.
Demand the immediate, unconditional withdrawal of all US-NATO forces from Afghanistan & the payment of reparations for the destruction wrought on the Afghan people.
