Despite the Indian Supreme Court ruling that the internet lockdown in Kashmir is illegal, the Indian government will not restore the internet for media or Kashmiri citizens citing “anti-national elements” & “terrorists” as the reason. The US has often cited ‘national security’ & terrorism as reasons to violate the US Bill of Rights, even before Trump. It’s absolute horse manure & if India really had a democracy the Supreme Court would step in & order the restoration of all internet services. But of course, the court ruling left an escape clause big enough to parade a team of Clydesdale horses through.
Daily Archives: February 11, 2020
After the fearless resistance of Kashmiri women & the women protest at Shaheen Bagh, it’s going to be a lot tougher to sustain that ‘saving Muslim women’ narrative of the so-called ‘war on terror’.
Some may think it too extreme to characterize the politics of Assad & Russia propagandist Eva Bartlett as fascist even though she makes no secret of her associations with Russian & European fascists, including writing obituaries for them when they croak. She has had a long association with anti-Semite David Icke, including as an editor for one of his publications. She mocks the children being bombed by Syria & Russia as ‘crisis actors’, denies the Uyghur & Rohingya genocides, & vilifies the Hong Kong protesters. Bartlett has never declared herself a leftist of any kind but her most ardent supporters believe they are revolutionists. That’s how deranged left politics are these days.
What do Bartlett’s ‘revolutionary’ supporters think of her support for Putin’s coup throwing out the entire Russian government so he can rule like Caesar or Stalin? Or Assad. How do they explain that she affirmatively posted this comment by British rightwing journalist Marcus Papadopoulos?: “Russia needs a strong leader & today’s developments indicate that Vladimir Putin will remain in overall charge of the country after 2024, which is to rejoice over. It should also be said that Russia must develop a strong system & an all-powerful party, as the CPSU was.” Papadopoulos wants Putin to be just like Stalin & Bartlett thinks that’s a good thing.
Marcus Papadopoulos is the editor of the extreme rightwing journal Politics First & is, like Bartlett, a Russia propagandist & frequent contributor to Russian media. He is an Assadist, a supporter of the Chinese regime against the Hong Kong protesters, a denier of the Bosniak (Muslim) massacre at Srebrenica in 2016, recently lauding the genocidaires for their fight against Wahhabism. Current articles in Politics First include “How the Conservatives will take Britain forward” by Boris Johnson & “As we leave the European Union, let us look to Israel for a pioneering trade deal” by Bob Blackman, a Conservative MP & Vice-Chair of the All-Party Britain-Israel Parliamentary Group. Since Bartlett derives some authority from (ostensibly) supporting Palestinians, would her ‘revolutionary’ supporters explain why she promotes a man publishing a call to defy BDS & why she frequently cites him as an authority on politics?
One could argue that Bartlett is not a fascist but only extreme rightwing. The distinction at a time of genocide shades into folly & apologetics.
(Photo is Bartlett with Grand Mufti Hassoun, the guy who signs off on all those hung to death in Assad’s gulag.)
“The torture specialist and the henchman of police in occupied Kashmir, DSP Davinder Singh was caught by a mistake. I don’t believe that they intended to expose themselves. It was a mistake. A cover-up will follow. Whatever he has done, torture, killing and terrorizing of the natives, every member of JKP was in on it. They know it and are completely complicit in it. Now you know who are those unknown gunmen that lurk like swines in our beautiful land.”
–Kashmiri Zachriah Sulayman
No lawyers agree to defend the young Indian woman who held up the “Free Kashmir” placard. Rapists & murderers in India get legal counsel so supporting Kashmiri self-determination is deemed an even worse ‘crime’.
https://kashmirobserver.net/2020/01/14/no-lawyer-to-defend-free-kashmir-girl/amp/?
An average of one child per day has been killed over the past year by Syrian & Russian bombing & Iranian, Russian, Syrian, & Hezbollah ground forces in Idlib.
In addition to demanding ‘no US war against Iran’, we should be demanding ‘no Iranian war against the Syrian Arab Spring’. Demand the immediate, unconditional withdrawal of all foreign military forces & mercenaries from Syria.
(Photo from White Helmets, January 14, 2020)
“Q: Why did Davindar Singh work with militants for 12 Lakh when he could have handed them over to his colleagues and claimed the 20 lakh reward on their heads?”
–tweeted by a. @Kashmirology
(12 Lakh is worth US$16,968; 20 Lakh is worth US$28,280)
“On July 11, 2016, more than 40 men from the upper caste Darbar community assaulted seven members of the Sarvaiya family for skinning a dead cow in Gir Somnath district’s Una town. The Sarvaiyas were leather tanners & skinning dead cattle was part of their traditional occupation. But the assailants accused them of cow slaughter. During the attack, four of the Sarvaiya brothers were stripped, tied to the back of a car & beaten with sticks & iron rods, while some of the attackers filmed the assault.”
Now, Vashram Sarvaiya, one of the Dalit victims of the incident, has asked the president of India to deport him & his brothers to a country where they will not face discrimination. He told the president that the incident deprived them of their fundamental rights & livelihood & that if they are not deported they should be allowed to choose euthanasia. He also threatened that the victims will immolate themselves outside the presidential palace in New Delhi
Ashaq Hussain Parray exposes the political malignancy of those who denounce ‘identity politics’ as divisive.
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“The Great Anxiety
As the Indian left/liberal and secular people are standing shoulder to shoulder with the Muslim minority against the divisive CCA and NRC, there however is a strange anxiety that is prevalent in these supporting groups. A student from Aligarh Muslim University writes an article arguing why she fights as a Muslim. Another student from the same university writes in response to this article arguing for a case that the Indian Muslims should fight without resorting to the slogan of la ilaha illalh, the central credo of the Muslim faith. She believes raising this slogan automatically throws non-muslims out of the current movement.
Now, one may ask with all the humility why does left/liberal lot have problem with La-Ila-Illallah? There can be many reasons, foremost among them, that they equate it with RSS shouting Jai Shri Ram and this is where the problem lies. There is a heck of a difference. These guys have failed to understand the nature of Indian secularism. The constitution of India provides full freedom to practise one’s religion, a part of one’s identity. Muslims while shouting the Islamic slogan don’t impose or lynch people of other faiths for not following it whereas the Hindutva forces do force people to chant their religious slogans and that is what differences the Hindutva fascism from the Muslim secularism. Muslims are really working on a secular plane when they raise Islamic slogans, whereas the Hindutva forces are not because they believe others should follow and accept their worldview.
These people who are suffering from these anxiety attacks play a divisive politics where they want to deprive Muslims of the opportunity to make a case for their own survival. They are anxious about a Muslim movement that they equate with being under oppression and backwardness. Shashi Tharoor as an Indian liberal has a right to write a huge book like why I am a Hindu, though he does not engage with his predecessor Kancha Iliah’s Why I am not a Hindu, and claims himself to be a proud scion of a faith that is plural and diverse invoking the great Hindu sages like Vivekananda. He has an absolute right as a liberal Hindu to express his freedom and call himself as a proud Hindu because he believes it is his faith and constitutes part of his identity. No Muslim has any problem with his liberal Hinduism, but when a Muslim raises a slogan like there is no God but God, expressing the central credo of his/her faith, it sends shivers down to the likes of Tharoor. I don’t know how Muslims can assert their identity without their faith. Just how?
Muslims have been assaulted because of their faith and they can only assert their presence by openly practicing their faith, otherwise what is the fun of it all. Telling Muslims to keep their faith at home while they come for protests is another way of saying them that “convert and be like us first, only then you will be acceptable.” It is that simple.”
“Indian propaganda TV channel Times Now is running a story on Free Kashmir graffiti spotted among the anti-CAA-NRC-NPR graffiti, which it attributes to “miscreants who sneaked in at night”. From JNU 2016 to now, it has been obvious that the greatest weapon of Hindu fascism against anti-fascists is not Hindutva, but Indian nationalism based on the statist fantasy that “Kashmir is an integral part of India”. Fascism will win every battle in India so long as the majority of people are vulnerable to being turned against those who can be accused of supporting Kashmiri self-determination. It’s high time anti-BJP/RSS sections of the Indian people understood this reality, and acknowledged the fact that Azadi for Kashmir is the defining anti-fascist task in India. Without this necessary leap in political consciousness among the opponents of Hindutva, they have little chance of surviving the fascist regime.”
–Satyadeep Satya