After 30-years in an Israeli military prison, Fares Mohammed Baroud from Gaza City died due to lack of medical treatment. May he Rest In Peace.
Build the economic & cultural boycott of Israel for colonialism, apartheid, genocide so that his life was not lived in vain.
The reason I’m not a lesser evil kind of girl is that 99.9-percent of Democrats support Zionism & the genocide of Palestinians. Their struggle against colonialism & apartheid is a touchstone in modern politics, not an issue that can tolerate compromise. I would rather jump off the 500-ft. Cliffs of Moher in Ireland than betray Palestinian justice. Don’t ever ask me to support a Democrat no matter how good their populist rhetoric on other issues.
Tariq Ali, the éminence grise of left politics who rah-rahs for Assad & Maduro, posted a video of Tulsi Gabbard (Zionist, anti-Semite, Islamophobe, Hindutva supporter, Assadist, General Sisi supporter) opposing US intervention in Venezuela. That’s not unlike holding up Hitler propagandist Joseph Goebbels as an authority on the Nazi holocausts. With gurus like this guy, young progressives don’t stand a chance unless they learn to think for themselves.
Sophisticated apologists for the repressive Maduro regime are circulating a five-year-old article by an uncritical apologist for Maduro (Mark Weisbrot) claiming that the unarmed protesters in Venezuela are all middle-class. That makes it okay to shoot them? It was demonstrably not true five years ago & it is indisputably not true of protesters today. To make that claim is beyond criminality. Why can’t these sophisticates oppose US military intervention without sucking up to dictators like Assad or repressive tyrants like Maduro?
Calling Maduro out for political repression, corruption, & anti-working class policies does not compromise with US military aggression or make concessions to the hypocrisy of European countries who remain silent about the Rohingya genocide & are guilty of war crimes in several countries. It is the only principled way to stand with the working people protesting Maduro while also opposing US intervention. To rah-rah for Maduro as they do for the murderous Assad is the very essence of betrayal of working people.
Let me tell you my Oscar Arias story: in 1986, he drew up a peace plan for Central America at a time when the US was heavily engaged there militarily, including through proxy armies like the Nicaraguan Contras. I don’t recall the details of the plan now but it legitimized & called for more US military involvement. He had already been nominated for the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize for his nefarious plan when Harvard invited him to speak. He was readying himself for his Nobel acceptance speech.
At the time I lived in Boston, was of course active in the antiwar movement, & a delegation of us attended his public Harvard speech. He went on at length about the defeat of the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, promoting it as the restoration of democracy. The audience of mostly Harvard students & faculty frequently interrupted his speech with vigorous applause for democracy in Nicaragua. In the Q & A session, I stood up & respectfully but directly challenged him on the inclusion of US intervention in his plan asking him to explain it. During the entirety of my question the audience went wild with booing. They considered this a moment of sycophancy, not challenge. For those who have not experienced being booed, it’s like being fish getting shot in a barrel. I said to the audience “You can stop the booing because I intend to finish my question.” And I did. But after my adrenaline calmed down & to this day, I regret not saying “Is the same crowd that applauded the so-called restoration of democracy in war-torn Nicaragua not allowing me to ask a serious & important question at Harvard University?”
After his Nobel, Arias became known—like Suu Kyi after him—as a human rights icon. They belong to a false pantheon. It is fitting that Arias, the war criminal who did so much harm to the people of Central America, live his final years exposed as a pervert & sexual predator.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/05/world/americas/oscar-arias-sanchez-sexual-assault.html?
That the British army authorized the killing of unarmed civilians in Iraq comes as no surprise. That’s the very nature of war. What is unspeakable is that so many today who call themselves progressive & antiwar justify & support US, European, Russian, Iranian, & other foreign intervention in Syria. The moment you support the bombing & killing of civilians & justify it by vilifying them as terrorists—or as some kind of humanitarian venture—you have crossed the line of human solidarity & joined the side of the oppressors. Take your place alongside the US, UK, Russian, Syrian, & Iranian special forces. And don’t forget to hang your head in shame.
Mumbai Man Plans To Sue Parents For Giving Birth To Him Without His Consent
“I’m leaving to another galaxy. That’s it.”
—Zachriah Sulayman
I’m right behind you, Zachariah.
—Mary Scully
“Waiting for the door to open outside the Maharaja’s palace, I was deeply engrossed in the enchanting view around me, when suddenly the thought of the Maharaja, with whom the malignancy of this beautiful valley took birth facilitated by a chain of collaborators till date sent a chill down my spine. This entire white drape seemed to be sprinkled with red stains of blood ,some old clots as old as seventy years and some fresh as fresh as the snow itself. Though it was just a perception, but the thought was based on the prevailing truth. Per day at least two young buds fall prey to the bullets of oppression , but the thirst for blood seems far from being quenched. I stood up and looked at the clear sky with a question in my eyes, how much blood does my homeland require to be liberated? A quick reply came from my heart, When Allah says, Be! It happens.”
Shajarat U Durr
(Photo is of Shajarat sitting in front of the palace of Maharaja Hari Singh, the last king of independent Kashmir.)
A reality check for those who call for US humanitarian bombing in Syria. Even though, in my experience, reality has no powers against the siren song of militarism for those who have no belief in the power of popular uprisings.
https://www.facebook.com/1625357681040688/videos/380372369414254/?hc_ref=ARSgrBBmZB7-