A compelling article by Suhail Naqshbandi, a Kashmiri political cartoonist, with insights into the censorship he faced as well as the place of cartoonists in journalism & resistance to occupation.

https://cartoonistsrights.org/suhail-naqshbandi-censored-into-silence/?

“How to Unblock a VPN
VPN providers are aware that some ISPs/networks are blocking VPN traffic. That’s why they invented ‘Stealth’ VPN technology.
A stealth VPN can disguise/scramble your VPN traffic so it’s either not identifiable as VPN traffic, or even better — disguised as regular TLS encrypted web traffic.
Here are the two tried and true techniques to unblock your VPN service on almost any network:
Technique #1 – Run OpenVPN on port 443
Port 443 is the port commonly used by SSL/TLS encrypted web traffic. This is a standard internet encryption protocol that you use every time you access a website with sensitive account data, like your bank, credit card, or tax account.
Since OpenVPN already uses the SSL encryption library, simply by switching the port # to 443, it will easily slip through all but the most rigorous DPI firewalls.
How to use port 443
Most high-quality, paid VPN services will allow you to switch the port # (or have dedicated server locations that access port 443). If you need help setting it up, just contact tech support for you VPN provider.
Technique #2 – StealthVPN / Obfuscation
Even if you use port 443, most VPN protocols still have a data packet ‘header’ which is like a fingerprint that can potentially allow a firewall to recognize traffic as VPN traffic.
By using a VPN service that has Obuscation or ‘Stealth’ technology, your VPN connection can rewrite or obscure the packet headers (smudge the fingerprint) so it’s unrecognizable.
VPNs with stealth/obfuscation technology:
IPVanish (or read review)
Proxy.sh (or read review)
Torguard (or read review)
VyprVPN (or read review)
VPN.ac (or read review)
See our Stealth VPN Guide for a full list.
Advanced Obfuscation Techniques
If you really want maximum privacy and unblocking power, you can run your VPN through the tor network. On the upside, this makes your VPN virtually unblockable (and highly anonymous). The downside of using the Tor network is your VPN will now be routed through multiple encrypted proxy layers (of varying speed) so you’ll be lucky to get 5mbps using this method.
Configuring OpenVPN to access Tor via obfsproxy is rather complicated, but fortunately there are several VPN providers that have built vpn-over-Tor support into their service.
VPNs with VPN-Over-Tor Support
NordVPN
Proxy.sh
BolehVPN
AirVPN
VPN providers are aware that some ISPs/networks are blocking VPN traffic. That’s why they invented ‘Stealth’ VPN technology.
A stealth VPN can disguise/scramble your VPN traffic so it’s either not identifiable as VPN traffic, or even better — disguised as regular TLS encrypted web traffic.
Here are the two tried and true techniques to unblock your VPN service on almost any network:
Technique #1 – Run OpenVPN on port 443
Port 443 is the port commonly used by SSL/TLS encrypted web traffic. This is a standard internet encryption protocol that you use every time you access a website with sensitive account data, like your bank, credit card, or tax account.
Since OpenVPN already uses the SSL encryption library, simply by switching the port # to 443, it will easily slip through all but the most rigorous DPI firewalls.
How to use port 443
Most high-quality, paid VPN services will allow you to switch the port # (or have dedicated server locations that access port 443). If you need help setting it up, just contact tech support for you VPN provider.
Technique #2 – StealthVPN / Obfuscation
Even if you use port 443, most VPN protocols still have a data packet ‘header’ which is like a fingerprint that can potentially allow a firewall to recognize traffic as VPN traffic.
By using a VPN service that has Obuscation or ‘Stealth’ technology, your VPN connection can rewrite or obscure the packet headers (smudge the fingerprint) so it’s unrecognizable.
VPNs with stealth/obfuscation technology:
IPVanish (or read review)
Proxy.sh (or read review)
Torguard (or read review)
VyprVPN (or read review)
VPN.ac (or read review)
See our Stealth VPN Guide for a full list.
Advanced Obfuscation Techniques
If you really want maximum privacy and unblocking power, you can run your VPN through the tor network. On the upside, this makes your VPN virtually unblockable (and highly anonymous). The downside of using the Tor network is your VPN will now be routed through multiple encrypted proxy layers (of varying speed) so you’ll be lucky to get 5mbps using this method.
Configuring OpenVPN to access Tor via obfsproxy is rather complicated, but fortunately there are several VPN providers that have built vpn-over-Tor support into their service.
VPNs with VPN-Over-Tor Support
NordVPN
Proxy.sh
BolehVPN
AirVPN”

–Arshad Yousuf
#AAYPosts”

Kashmiri friends: if India does succeed in shutting us off from each other again, at least now you know a solidarity movement emerged of tens of thousands all over the world to stand with you led by Kashmiris in diaspora. As a journalist put it, the issue of Kashmiri self-determination has become ‘internationalized’. The brutal occupation is no longer India’s dirty secret. Many governments seemed to think India had gone too far & jeopardized other military & economic engagements.

When you were gone, social media was like a ghost town. We dearly missed your polemics, insights, analyses, sarcasms & wit. We dread that you might be put under internet lockdown again & are deeply fearful & saddened by what you are being put through. But if that happens we will work our hardest to keep your struggle a preeminent political concern & will continue to actively build a movement to stand with you against Indian fascism.

As your commitment to azaadi is undaunted by the lockdown, so is our confidence that you will achieve it. We also think it possible that the best tech experts that India employs to shut you down will not be a match for the tech-savvy young of Kashmir.

Is it true that all VPNs will be blocked in Kashmir? Can VPNs be blocked?

Driving home from the dog park with my brood, I made a turn off a major road on to a side street. I heard a siren behind me & saw a police cruiser with lights flashing coming in my direction from across the major road & about three blocks behind me. I knew I hadn’t committed any violations so I decided to outrace the cruiser. I made a quick left, another quick right, & another quick right & pulled off to park to fool the officer. He pulled up right next to me before I had my lights off. He must have thought he was in pursuit of a criminal but he took one look at me & the dogs & just asked if I had witnessed a fight, which I had not. Then he rolled up his window & took off. Remind me never to drive the getaway car if I take up a life of crime.

You can see from this video of a funeral in Kashmir on January 27th how the lockdown has brought Kashmiri resistance to its knees.

Long live the struggle for Azaadi.

Most of those who were political hotshots in the socialist movement of my youth have been inactive for between forty to fifty years. They withdrew from antiwar activism, became bantustate Zionists, & eventually settled into comfortable retirement. Now they’re resurrecting like Saint Lazarus from the grave to defend the Iranian theocracy though they never made a peep about war against the Syrian Arab Spring–or for that matter against Afghanistan, Yemen, Iraq, Somalia, Libya. It’s not a contradiction; it’s a political corruption that defends a Jewish-only state as well as the Iranian theocracy.

It’s one thing to oppose US assassination of the Iranian general (even though he was a war criminal) & war-mongering against Iran. That’s a political imperative. But it is another thing entirely to denounce criticism of the Iranian theocracy & whitewash its repressive character when it jails Iranian women for refusing to wear the veil & for fighting for women’s rights; publicly hangs young men for being homosexual; gives draconian prison terms to human rights & environmental activists; denies Kurds the rights of self-determination; engages in terrorist death squads against the Syrian Arab Spring & against Iraqis.

If you cannot make the distinction between a repressive regime & its citizens, maybe you ought to pick up some books & inform yourself before you go all crocodile tears for the Iranian theocracy. Democracy cannot tolerate a Shia-only state any more than it can accept a Jewish, Buddhist, Christian, or Hindu-only state. It is necessary to oppose US war-mongering against Iran as part of standing with Iranian citizens against political repression.

“History says, don’t hope on this side of the grave. But then, once in a lifetime, the longed-for tidal wave of justice can rise up & hope & history rhyme.”

–Irish poet Seamus Heaney

The organizers of the 2020 Women’s Marches on January 18th are an undemocratic elite who last year expelled the pro-Palestinian leaders, including Linda Sarsour. I had my criticisms of the bureaucratic way the organization previously functioned but it was openly pro-Palestinian & organized millions of women on every continent who raised every issue of concern to women from Palestine to war, reproductive freedom, rape, work discrimination, & more.

It would be idiotic factionalism to refuse participation in the annual & massive marches because of their bureaucracy & pro-Zionism. But it is also politically obligatory to show up at them with placards standing with Palestinian women as Kashmiri women did in support of Kashmir at some of the protests this year.

A bureaucratically-run organization does not address or substitute for the urgent need to rebuild an independent, democratic women’s movement but it positions us alongside millions of other women who will be part of forging that new movement. A politically healthy movement would consider Palestinian women at the heart of it, not sidelined to placards in rogue contingents.