Muslims and The West After 11th September

DRUMZ,

Glad to know that you have a weak heart.

May I remind you of a few things?

Gen.Zia ul Haq of the Pakistan Army in Jordan c.1969-71 on assignment - target Palestinian refugee camps - casualties 5,000.

Gen.Tikka Khan and Co. in Bangladesh 1971 - Casualties 1 million in three months - a kill rate better than Stalin`s, Pol Pot`s and Hitler`s!

Gen.Tikka Khan in Balochistan 1972 - Casualties entire villages wiped out.

CEO/President/Gen.Musharraf in Gilgit 1998 - Casualties thousands!

First take care of the mess in your backyard before blaming the Americans. They are soldiers fighting a a war for their country. I am glad that the Hamas. Hizbollah, Al Faran, Hurrrats and others get the idea. Don`t mess around.

This seems the typical reaction of a bully. When you are in power crow about it. When you get hammered complain about ``human rights`` Spare us the sanctimony!

I don`t remember anyone writing about the sack of Bamiyan barely two years ago by the Taliban - which nearly provoked Iran into attacking Afghanistan.

rajanjua # 85, 86

Two great posts. Keep them coming.

I am just sick and tired of those who brush every problem under the moronic ``it`s economics`` rug.

After the gulf war, innocent people dying became known as ``colateral damage.`` The same idiots came up with U.S. ``National Interests`` to justify what can only be described as genocide. And you cowards buy that bullsh1t? Take in whatever they feed you, dont ask any questions??!

I suppose when America assassinated a democratically elected leader (allende) in Chile and put a puppet dictator (pinochet) in power, they were preserving their ``national interests.``

You people cannot be that stupid. The same folks who think the taliban are backwards think that economic genocide in iraq and cuba is okay cuz it preserves their ``national Interests.`` Hypocrits!

What the fukk are your national interests???

National = state. Interests = A feeling of wanting to know, do etc.

Your nation feels it should kill innocent iraqis?

What about your bloodthirsty animal-like nature propells you towards this sort of action? How is it different from the taliban who beat and kill women?

Look, Im being honest. A part of me wants to know how you all got SOOOO stupid. Compare this interest to a psychiatrist who studies a serial killer cuz thats what yall are supporting. The difference being your too stupid to even know what your agreeing with.

I doubt anyone of you has the balls (intelligence left us 3 pages ago) to answer them questions...

And, you guyz have the AUDACITY to respond to samina??? This is Unbelievable. I only get this mad when Im talking to my idiot taliban supporting uncle. Enjoy the company.

Chowk staff: Im surprised yall havent censored me yet. Ill try and me cordial this time, no promises.

Chowk: Lets look at this Akash sellout...

``Why cant all these whiners``

Look up the definition of ``whiners.``

``American Govt is answerable to American public not to some Third World poors.``

Im tearing up. How patriotic. Who is asking amerika to answer to third world poors? (After the collapse of the USSR, there was no second world, thus there cant be a third world). Im saying stop killing innocent people, see the dilineation?

``not to sit back and waste American resources in reforming the world.``

This kid is lost. We are not asking you to reform the world. Just stop committing genocide.

``If Iraqi children die because of American sanctions, so be it. This is a cruel world where only ``interests`` are permanent,``

Nothing much to say to that other then if you were standing here youd be knocked the fukk out.

``Why cant Iraqi people rise up and overthrow a dictator who has caused them so much misery.``

If a woman is being raped, this mufuka would say ``why dont u stop letting them rape you.``

``I am not heartless but this is how the world operates and people should get better used to it.``

Youd have to be human to be heartless. Unfortunately, not everyone will get used to genocide.

``The rule of survival is:- amass strength be it economic or miliatry, create a free and open society in your country and dont think of yourself as the preserver of morality of the world.``

And kill anyone who disagrees...



I hope the rest of you cowards see how easy it is to shoot down all of your arguments. You are children talking to grown azz adults. And dont confuse arrogance with intensity.

Actually, this whole intellectual exercise of appying the clash of civilizations to what`s going on in Afghanistan is pure bull. The reality is that Afghanistan was used by everyone - Americans, Russians, Pakistanis, Arabs etc. as a place to play out their proxy wars. Religion had the very little to do with it except to supply the ideology. The fact that the Taliban collapsed so quickly is ample proof.

I was going through some Yahoo pictures and there were two next to each other which were fascinating. One was of an entrepreneurial Afghan who`d just set up swings, slides and a small ferris wheel and was charging kids a small amount to ride on them. There was a line of kids waiting for their turn. Another was of a rally in Pakistan organized by the fundos which showed a 3 year old kid brandishing a toy AK-47 wearing a bandana with an obviously defiant slogan.

These two pictures just about summed up the current war: Afghans want peace while the rest of the world wants to play their own kind of games there.

Ahhhh Robert Fisk :-(

http://www.commondreams.org/views01/1209-07.htm

Scout # 97

This is the most dishonest and malicious accusation I have ever heard. I regret that I ever interacted with you.

pennathur: Please never respond to me after this...

To expose your idiocy...

``Glad to know that you have a weak heart.``

So im a little hoe because I care about innocent people dying?

``First take care of the mess in your backyard before blaming the Americans. They are soldiers fighting a a war for their country.``

I dont have a fukkin backyard. All that rhetoric you use on some white hippy will not apply here (anyone else who tries that sh1t will be made an example of). Since when did I only mention american oppression? My first post explicitly stated that I am opposed to ALL oppression. Reading comprehenion is another item in the long list of what are not your strong suits.

Hamzad: I apologize for questioning you. Just seemed out of character for u to make those posts. Anyways i havent heard of the guys u mentioned, I will look out for them. If u have the time, some day break down the etemology for ``amin`` Ill be damned if that doesnt come from Amen-ra.

Prem: My sister, Im sorry if my language offended you. Im just being real here.

Peace

Loke his other articles, this one is also meant to stimulate thinking. It really does not matter if one agrees to his opinion partially, totally or not at all. He has written this article as a teacher who has been involved in research in Physics for many years and not a journalist although it has appeared in the todays edition of Dawn in op-ed section. One can be highly opinionated as a journalist or interactor at chowk a good teacher will not hesitate to say what is more rational and logical even his/ her heart desires otherwise.

The response or counter his assertions without logic is meaningless. Norms are to be challenged by norms and not the exceptions. It is silly to post news about an individual converting or a school in Germany choosing to teach a particular course. Life of a nation as well as individual is a series of norms. Exceptions are for memorabilia; making video or taking photographs or reading exceptional historical events of one`s choice. Exceptions are rare and one can not spend their life running after exceptions. That is what Secular Humanism is all about. It is the scientific way of thinking, considering all arena scientific in nature.

In the Muslims world also, there are norms and exceptions. Lower literacy level of women, more children per women, poor treatment of minorities, low GNP, poor economy, poor industrialization, supression of individual freedom, authoritative rulers-dictatorships, corruption and so on are the norms while likes of Abdus Sattar Edhi are exceptions. Who denies the good work of Imran Khan for cancer hospital or our modern day saint Edhi. Such exceptions are/ were always present in even the worst of socities in the history of the world. Just because one taxi driver wins lotto does not mean to adopt that profession to increase the probability of winning because there is no correlation. The few and far between ``goodness of Islam or Muslims`` at present in many many places has no correlation with the ideology of religion. They made it against all odds. However if 900+ million out of a billion population suffer from a series of malaises to a worse level that their next door neighbor, you have to wonder: why? The overwhelming numbers on one side can not be 950 million exceptions.

The norms are what Prof Hoodbhoy is talking about. Being a scientist, he has to be out of his mind or have past services at ISI to propose anything or idea based on few exceptions. Then within exceptions, some have extremely low probability such as Taliban defeating US without being able to reach the enemy in the sky who can bomb with impunity and with precision. So what should one conclude about the mental capabilities of people like Hamid Gul and Mirza Aslam Beg? Those who can not distinguish between norms and exceptions are bound ot make mistakes because they live and believe in illusions. What might have happened to the Yemenite elephants in distant past has little probability of happening again to US War Machine.

To response to US right or wrong policies is not to get yourself killed like sitting ducks. Without indulging myself in the discussion about right/ wrong policies of USA with respect to thirld or Muslim world, I would only say this: I am glad to be alive in a time period when USA is the sole super power and not Romans, Colonialists, Islamic Khalifas, Moghuls, Mongols, Hitler or Stalin. I may not agree with everything USA does but think of other sole super powers of the past and just compare their treatment of enemies with USA`s treatment of nemesis. While USA has the power to pulverize Iraq, it did not even go for Baghdad. Yes, Iraqi children are dying and we should raise reasonable concerns provided we also raise the concerns of other unfair practices of large and small countries around the world. China is suppose to be the enemy of the future for USA and how we are treating them. Just visit any departmental store and everyhting is ``Made in China``. Can anybody name anyother empire in the history who actuallt helped intentionally their enemy to boast 7-8 percent economic growth mainly due to export based economy?

Re: Chomsky discussion.

His criticism of USA on the basis of ``necessary illusions`` and manufactured consent`` is not all that irrational provided he applies same theories to the super powers of the past. He is strong leftist dating back to Veitnam war and went farther than even many communnists when he criticized the west and USA for creating necessary illusion through propaganda about Khmer Rouge of Kampuchia. We know quiet well now all about those past Taliban.

Dear Rajanjua 84,

Regarding your comment, I must agree with you; an atmosphere of learning combined with a good economy must be there for science to flourish.

But your example of Saudi Arabia and menstruation etc. are childish. Majority of Saudi capital is within the hands of the very few.

Take care

UM

Intelligence services wanted me killed, says journalist:Yvonne Ridley makes astonishing claim in book about her days of captivity with the Taliban.



By Jo Dillon, Political Correspondent

09 December 2001

Yvonne Ridley, the British journalist captured by the Taliban, this week makes the extraordinary claim that Western intelligence agencies tried to get her killed to bolster public support for the air strikes on Afghanistan.

In her new book, In The Hands of the Taliban, published tomorrow, Express journalist Ms Ridley, 43, says despite her release from captivity she still has ``unfinished business`` surrounding her time in Afghanistan.

She claims that on her return to Pakistan she found her hotel room had been searched. In London, the locks on her Soho flat had apparently been tampered with. A journalist on the Arab TV station Al Jazeera then showed her a collection of as yet unverified documents. They purported to be copies of a dossier of personal and financial papers and pictures.

When told they had been handed to the Taliban, Ms Ridley asked: ``Who the hell was trying to get me shot?``

With the help of prominent QC Michael Mansfield, the Al Jazeera journalist, Nacer Bedri, and contacts in the security and intelligence services, Ms Ridley is now trying to piece together what happened.

She says the documents were photocopies of genuine-looking Inland Revenue tax returns and the title deeds to a previous London home owned by her. There was also a copy of an Israeli passport belonging to her third husband, Hermosh, along with a Mossad code number and ID card also said to belong to him. The figures in the financial documents were exaggerated, Ms Ridley said. Also in the bundle was a photograph of Ms Ridley, Hermosh and her daughter Daisy, now aged nine, ``taken on a river in Iran when you entered the country illegally``.

Ms Ridley`s book says: ``I looked at the picture again and initially laughed, when I realised it had been taken in October 1998 in Stratford-upon-Avon. Then an awful feeling came to my stomach and I wanted to vomit. I remembered where I had last seen that picture – in my top drawer at my new flat in Soho. I had kicked out Husband No 3 a couple of weeks after those pictures were taken; they weren`t developed until later – after he had gone. So who had been in my flat?``

Ms Ridley is convinced the intelligence services must have somehow been involved – and has vowed to prove it. ``Without giving too much away, I can say the matter isn`t going to rest,`` she said yesterday.

The publication of her book and the claims it makes are certain to throw Ms Ridley back into the spotlight – a place that has not been particularly comfortable for her since she was captured by the Taliban on 28 September and after her release on 8 October.

Ms Ridley was lambasted for making a ``foolhardy`` decision to go into Afghanistan with a number of commentators accusing her of being ``selfish`` for taking such a risk as a single mother.

Others raised questions about Ms Ridley`s time in Afghanistan, one report claiming that rather than being captured in the country where she was carrying out a newspaper investigation; she was picked up over the border in Pakistan and had never entered Afghanistan.

On her return, Ms Ridley was criticised for failing to pay enough attention in her account of her ordeal to the two guides – then still in prison – captured helping her or the aid workers held alongside her. Early reviews of her book were far from flattering. But Ms Ridley is determined to get to the bottom of her own story.

ROBERT FISK--beaten by Afghan Mob.

A great man this ``Goraa``---Robert Fisk.Why can`t we be so courageous & outspoken,and tell the truth even as we suffer?

When will the ``third`` worlders learn to invite such honorable people and publicly thumb their noses at the Great Satan for the world to see...like Malaysia for instance.An international shutting out by the ``consumer`` world can easily bring ``producer`` down to the grovelling & whimpering it deserves.The Satan`s nation is a nation of traders & tradesmen.Nothing hurts them more than losing market & money.Their parents & childrens ``honour`` is for sale by auction anytime...only if they can confirm the lineage.

__________________________________________________

My beating by refugees is a symbol of the hatred and fury of this filthy war

Report by Robert Fisk in Kila Abdullah after Afghan border ordeal

10 December 2001

They started by shaking hands. We said ``Salaam aleikum`` – peace be upon you – then the first pebbles flew past my face. A small boy tried to grab my bag. Then another. Then someone punched me in the back. Then young men broke my glasses, began smashing stones into my face and head. I couldn`t see for the blood pouring down my forehead and swamping my eyes. And even then, I understood. I couldn`t blame them for what they were doing. In fact, if I were the Afghan refugees of Kila Abdullah, close to the Afghan-Pakistan border, I would have done just the same to Robert Fisk. Or any other Westerner I could find.

So why record my few minutes of terror and self-disgust under assault near the Afghan border, bleeding and crying like an animal, when hundreds – let us be frank and say thousands – of innocent civilians are dying under American air strikes in Afghanistan, when the ``War of Civilisation`` is burning and maiming the Pashtuns of Kandahar and destroying their homes because ``good`` must triumph over ``evil``?

Some of the Afghans in the little village had been there for years, others had arrived – desperate and angry and mourning their slaughtered loved ones – over the past two weeks. It was a bad place for a car to break down. A bad time, just before the Iftar, the end of the daily fast of Ramadan. But what happened to us was symbolic of the hatred and fury and hypocrisy of this filthy war, a growing band of destitute Afghan men, young and old, who saw foreigners – enemies – in their midst and tried to destroy at least one of them.

Many of these Afghans, so we were to learn, were outraged by what they had seen on television of the Mazar-i-Sharif massacres, of the prisoners killed with their hands tied behind their backs. A villager later told one of our drivers that they had seen the videotape of CIA officers ``Mike`` and ``Dave`` threatening death to a kneeling prisoner at Mazar. They were uneducated – I doubt if many could read – but you don`t have to have a schooling to respond to the death of loved ones under a B-52`s bombs. At one point a screaming teenager had turned to my driver and asked, in all sincerity: ``Is that Mr Bush?``

It must have been about 4.30pm that we reached Kila Abdullah, halfway between the Pakistani city of Quetta and the border town of Chaman; Amanullah, our driver, Fayyaz Ahmed, our translator, Justin Huggler of The Independent – fresh from covering the Mazar massacre – and myself.

The first we knew that something was wrong was when the car stopped in the middle of the narrow, crowded street. A film of white steam was rising from the bonnet of our jeep, a constant shriek of car horns and buses and trucks and rickshaws protesting at the road-block we had created. All four of us got out of the car and pushed it to the side of the road. I muttered something to Justin about this being ``a bad place to break down``. Kila Abdulla was home to thousands of Afghan refugees, the poor and huddled masses that the war has produced in Pakistan.

Amanullah went off to find another car – there is only one thing worse than a crowd of angry men and that`s a crowd of angry men after dark – and Justin and I smiled at the initially friendly crowd that had already gathered round our steaming vehicle. I shook a lot of hands – perhaps I should have thought of Mr Bush – and uttered a lot of ``Salaam aleikums``. I knew what could happen if the smiling stopped.

The crowd grew larger and I suggested to Justin that we move away from the jeep, walk into the open road. A child had flicked his finger hard against my wrist and I persuaded myself that it was an accident, a childish moment of contempt. Then a pebble whisked past my head and bounced off Justin`s shoulder. Justin turned round. His eyes spoke of concern and I remember how I breathed in. Please, I thought, it was just a prank. Then another kid tried to grab my bag. It contained my passport, credit cards, money, diary, contacts book, mobile phone. I yanked it back and put the strap round my shoulder. Justin and I crossed the road and someone punched me in the back.

How do you walk out of a dream when the characters suddenly turn hostile? I saw one of the men who had been all smiles when we shook hands. He wasn`t smiling now. Some of the smaller boys were still laughing but their grins were transforming into something else. The respected foreigner – the man who had been all ``salaam aleikum`` a few minutes ago – was upset, frightened, on the run. The West was being brought low. Justin was being pushed around and, in the middle of the road, we noticed a bus driver waving us to his vehicle. Fayyaz, still by the car, unable to understand why we had walked away, could no longer see us. Justin reached the bus and climbed aboard. As I put my foot on the step three men grabbed the strap of my bag and wrenched me back on to the road. Justin`s hand shot out. ``Hold on,`` he shouted. I did.

That`s when the first mighty crack descended on my head. I almost fell down under the blow, my ears singing with the impact. I had expected this, though not so painful or hard, not so immediate. Its message was awful. Someone hated me enough to hurt me. There were two more blows, one on the back of my shoulder, a powerful fist that sent me crashing against the side of the bus while still clutching Justin`s hand. The passengers were looking out at me and then at Justin. But they did not move. No one wanted to help.

I cried out ``Help me Justin``, and Justin – who was doing more than any human could do by clinging to my ever loosening grip asked me – over the screams of the crowd – what I wanted him to do. Then I realised. I could only just hear him. Yes, they were shouting. Did I catch the word ``kaffir`` – infidel? Perhaps I was was wrong. That`s when I was dragged away from Justin.

There were two more cracks on my head, one on each side and for some odd reason, part of my memory – some small crack in my brain – registered a moment at school, at a primary school called the Cedars in Maidstone more than 50 years ago when a tall boy building sandcastles in the playground had hit me on the head. I had a memory of the blow smelling, as if it had affected my nose. The next blow came from a man I saw carrying a big stone in his right hand. He brought it down on my forehead with tremendous force and something hot and liquid splashed down my face and lips and chin. I was kicked. On the back, on the shins, on my right thigh. Another teenager grabbed my bag yet again and I was left clinging to the strap, looking up suddenly and realising there must have been 60 men in front of me, howling. Oddly, it wasn`t fear I felt but a kind of wonderment. So this is how it happens. I knew that I had to respond. Or, so I reasoned in my stunned state, I had to die.

The only thing that shocked me was my own physical sense of collapse, my growing awareness of the liquid beginning to cover me. I don`t think I`ve ever seen so much blood before. For a second, I caught a glimpse of something terrible, a nightmare face – my own – reflected in the window of the bus, streaked in blood, my hands drenched in the stuff like Lady Macbeth, slopping down my pullover and the collar of my shirt until my back was wet and my bag dripping with crimson and vague splashes suddenly appearing on my trousers.

The more I bled, the more the crowd gathered and beat me with their fists. Pebbles and small stones began to bounce off my head and shoulders. How long, I remembered thinking, could this go on? My head was suddenly struck by stones on both sides at the same time – not thrown stones but stones in the palms of men who were using them to try and crack my skull. Then a fist punched me in the face, splintering my glasses on my nose, another hand grabbed at the spare pair of spectacles round my neck and ripped the leather container from the cord.

I guess at this point I should thank Lebanon. For 25 years, I have covered Lebanon`s wars and the Lebanese used to teach me, over and over again, how to stay alive: take a decision – any decision – but don`t do nothing.

So I wrenched the bag back from the hands of the young man who was holding it. He stepped back. Then I turned on the man on my right, the one holding the bloody stone in his hand and I bashed my fist into his mouth. I couldn`t see very much – my eyes were not only short-sighted without my glasses but were misting over with a red haze – but I saw the man sort of cough and a tooth fall from his lip and then he fell back on the road. For a second the crowd stopped. Then I went for the other man, clutching my bag under my arm and banging my fist into his nose. He roared in anger and it suddenly turned all red. I missed another man with a punch, hit one more in the face, and ran.

I was back in the middle of the road but could not see. I brought my hands to my eyes and they were full of blood and with my fingers I tried to scrape the gooey stuff out. It made a kind of sucking sound but I began to see again and realised that I was crying and weeping and that the tears were cleaning my eyes of blood. What had I done, I kept asking myself? I had been punching and attacking Afghan refugees, the very people I had been writing about for so long, the very dispossessed, mutilated people whom my own country –among others – was killing along, with the Taliban, just across the border. God spare me, I thought. I think I actually said it. The men whose families our bombers were killing were now my enemies too.

Then something quite remarkable happened. A man walked up to me, very calmly, and took me by the arm. I couldn`t see him very well for all the blood that was running into my eyes but he was dressed in a kind of robe and wore a turban and had a white-grey beard. And he led me away from the crowd. I looked over my shoulder. There were now a hundred men behind me and a few stones skittered along the road, but they were not aimed at me –presumably to avoid hitting the stranger. He was like an Old Testament figure or some Bible story, the Good Samaritan, a Muslim man – perhaps a mullah in the village – who was trying to save my life.

He pushed me into the back of a police truck. But the policemen didn`t move. They were terrified. ``Help me,`` I kept shouting through the tiny window at the back of their cab, my hands leaving streams of blood down the glass. They drove a few metres and stopped until the tall man spoke to them again. Then they drove another 300 metres.

And there, beside the road, was a Red Cross-Red Crescent convoy. The crowd was still behind us. But two of the medical attendants pulled me behind one of their vehicles, poured water over my hands and face and began pushing bandages on to my head and face and the back of my head. ``Lie down and we`ll cover you with a blanket so they can`t see you,`` one of them said. They were both Muslims, Bangladeshis and their names should be recorded because they were good men and true: Mohamed Abdul Halim and Sikder Mokaddes Ahmed. I lay on the floor, groaning, aware that I might live.

Within minutes, Justin arrived. He had been protected by a massive soldier from the Baluchistan Levies – true ghost of the British Empire who, with a single rifle, kept the crowds away from the car in which Justin was now sitting. I fumbled with my bag. They never got the bag, I kept saying to myself, as if my passport and my credit cards were a kind of Holy Grail. But they had seized my final pair of spare glasses – I was blind without all three – and my mobile telephone was missing and so was my contacts book, containing 25 years of telephone numbers throughout the Middle East. What was I supposed to do? Ask everyone who ever knew me to re-send their telephone numbers?

Goddamit, I said and tried to bang my fist on my side until I realised it was bleeding from a big gash on the wrist – the mark of the tooth I had just knocked out of a man`s jaw, a man who was truly innocent of any crime except that of being the victim of the world.

I had spent more than two and a half decades reporting the humiliation and misery of the Muslim world and now their anger had embraced me too. Or had it? There were Mohamed and Sikder of the Red Crescent and Fayyaz who came panting back to the car incandescent at our treatment and Amanullah who invited us to his home for medical treatment. And there was the Muslim saint who had taken me by the arm.

And – I realised – there were all the Afghan men and boys who had attacked me who should never have done so but whose brutality was entirely the product of others, of us – of we who had armed their struggle against the Russians and ignored their pain and laughed at their civil war and then armed and paid them again for the ``War for Civilisation`` just a few miles away and then bombed their homes and ripped up their families and called them ``collateral damage``.

So I thought I should write about what happened to us in this fearful, silly, bloody, tiny incident. I feared other versions would produce a different narrative, of how a British journalist was ``beaten up by a mob of Afghan refugees``.

And of course, that`s the point. The people who were assaulted were the Afghans, the scars inflicted by us – by B-52s, not by them. And I`ll say it again. If I was an Afghan refugee in Kila Abdullah, I would have done just what they did. I would have attacked Robert Fisk. Or any other Westerner I could find.

samina,

{{I also disagree with your notion that principles, ethics and humane morales are something people grow out of.}}

Whoah! Hold on there, Mother Teresa! Please dont misunderstand my sarcasm. I said that people (esp. Americans) grow more conservative as they grow older. Thats doesnt mean they ``grow out`` out of their ethical values.

I DONT disagree with your principle that human life is equally precious--be it American,Iraqi, hindu, muslim, jewish etc etc. I dont think any decent human being disagrees with that.

What I DO disagree with you is that you hold the US responsible for all the crap thats going on in this world--esp the Islamic world. Maybe I`m misunderstanding you by making this broad, sweeping generalisation.

American liberals have this misguided notion that their govt can solve all the social problems of their citizens & the citizens of the world. Then they identify the victims---innocent children who suffer. Oh! that pulls on the heart strings of every human being--whether liberal or conservative.

When unwed African American teenagers get pregnant & their poor children suffer--I can use gol mal logic & say its because it was the white person`s fault that these teenagers have lost all sense of responsibility. Better yet,its the white dominated govt`s fault that its not doing enough for African Americans. What the HELL happened to individual responsibility?!

Now expand that concept to the whole world.

Sigh...so I hope you understand why ``liberal`` men blame EVE!!

DRUMZ,

Take some unsoliticed advice from a janitorial psychiatrist. Before you blow a gasket--SMOKE A FRIKKING JOINT!

Drumz, I knew the Canadians are a bit thick but you take the cake.

You use the word genocide like I use the word toothpaste. Where is the US commiting ``Genocide``??

Iraq? Let`s see now, if Saddam allows inspections today, sanctions will be eased tommorrow. Stated position of the US. Why can`t Iraq take up the offer?

You remind me of the Soviet Commisars who built up a halo around ``Comrade Hitler``, until he launched his attack on the USSR that is.

#: 82

babu

``US foreign policy has been self-serving at times.

US has done a lot of help for other countries. They did give food when Pakistan faced a famine in 1954.``

baboooo,

MAY BE YOU HAVENT HEARD OF FAMINES OF BENGAL & IN 66-67 WHEN NORTHERN INDIA DEVASTATED BY MONSOON FAILURE FOR CONSECUTIVE YEARS WENT IN TAIL SPIN ,THE LIKE OF WHICH HAS YET TO BE SEEN IN ASIA & PAKISTAN.IT LEFT AN INDELIBLE MARK IN THE PSYCHE OF ``THE WORLD`` OF HUNGRY CHILDREN & PEOPLES OF INDIA.HAVE YOU EVER HEARD OF PL480?

IT WAS NOT LONG AGO INDIA WAS HOARSE CRYING ABOUT PAKISTAN BEING HELPED IN HER DEFENCEBY U.S.A..

IT WAS CLINTONS MARCH 2000 THAT YOU CAN FIND HINDIANS LIKE YOU THUMPING YOUR CHEST AS AMERICANS OTHERWISE MOST OF THE 5 DECADES INDIANSPENT EFFIGY OF AMERICAN PRESIDENTS.THAT SANGHI PARIVAR & HINDU MAHASABHA HAS MAJOR HAND IN DIVERTING THE INDIAN POLICY FROM THE LEFT TO PRO AMERICAN BEARINGS.

THE 2 iiTS ARE aMERICAN GIFT ,ALL BE IT INDIANS DONT ADMIT IT THAT IT BASICALLY SERVES AS THE OVERSEAS CAMPUS OF ANY TYPICAL V.T.I. OF AMERICAN TOWN WHICH FILLS AMERICAN TECHNICIAN HANDS TO KEEP ITS MACHINES RUNNING.

But compare that to the foreign policy of Pakistan with respect to Afghanistan. I have read countless articles by the likes of Nasim Zehra, Shireen Mazari professing Pakistan was not involved in propping up the Taleban.

COMPARE THIS TO LOSER FOREIGN POLICY OF INDIA SUPPORTING THE RUSSIANS IN 60S NOT TO CONDEMN SOVIET INVASION OF CHECKLOVAKIA.DO YOU THINK THEY HAVE FORGOTTEN FOR 30 YRS OF THERE LIVES GONE UNDER THE DRAIN ,THANKS TO RUSSIANS BEFORE HAVEL RESURRECTED IT .OR WHEN AFGHANI THE RIGHT KIND REALIZE THAT IT WAS FILTHY INDIRAS INDIA THAT SUPPORTED RUSSIAN INVASION & WAR WITH GENOCIDE OF MILLION OF AFGHANI PEOPLE.80-89.THERE IS NO CREDIT TO A NEIGHBOUR WHICH SIDES WITH ONE OF THE TWO CLASHING DOMESTIC WARRING FANCTIONS n.a. VS pUSHTUN .ITS CALLED FISHING IN TROUBLED WATERS & WONT BE LONG BEFORE CONNIVING SHORT TERM GOAL OF INDIAN CONTINUED OCCUPATION OF KASHMIR WILL BE SEEN EVEN BY N.A.INDIA HAVE ALWAYS TRIED TO CREATE HIATUS AMONG MUSLIMS JUST AS IT DID IN BANGLADESH THERE IS NOTHIONG NEW.BUT IF SUPER POWER HAS NEVER BEEN ABLE TO RELY ON ITS ALL MUSLIM ALLIANCE AGAINST MUSLIM ISLAMIC PAKISTAN ,INDIA CANNTRY AS MUCH AS IT LIKES BY TOKEN BOLLYWOOD MOVIE ,HOSTING POLITICAL & CULTURAL EXCHANGE ITS OWN DIVERSION FOR THE 15% INDIAN MUSLIMS ,THEY HAVE NONE TO OFFER.

I think we are dealing with lots of hurt pride and bruised egos here, the shrillness here is probably worse then the caves of Tora Bora.Come on you guye`s fess up were u not cheering the rise of talibans,the defiant stance of obl and finally the attack on wtc. NARA-E-TAKBIR ALAH-O-AKBAR true the only true faith had finally challenged the decadent west.Amir-ul Momineen hazrat MM Omar will soon teach them that the only true islamic emirat also the destroyer of super powers will now teach them a lesson.

Well sorry, the rest as they say is history the nara-takbir has turned into nara-e-takleef oee allah. The purest islamic emirat is now the laughing stock of the world.the hurt and bruised egos are understandable.

The sad part is that idiot Islamists will not learn any lessons from all this,they have already started ``we the victims`` charade.

The talk about dead and dying Iraqi/Afghani children oh the big bad wolf america and its slave like defenders will not listen that genocide is beng committed.

In the course of my business I`ve had the privilege/pleasure or I should say horror of having visited a number of so called Islamic countries including Iraq,Iran, Afghanistan,Yemen,Libya,Sudan,Saudi and one and all they are extremely corrupt and horribly repressive,the kinds of repression,brutality and a total disregard for basic human rights and dignity these governments perpetrate on their own people absolutely pales in comparison with what any one else can do to their people.And the sad irony is that these same people have totally brainwashed people into believing that everything bad there is the result of Western power`s collusion to destroy Islam. Give me a break.

We somehow have to grow out of this mindset,the world we live in today has no precedent in the past.There is nothing we can copare it to in the past to gain a meaningful understanding of the present.Forget the sixth and thirteenth centuries.The gap between the haves and have not in terms of knowledge and resources is widening so rapidly that those people who choose to be left behind will be no better then chimpnzees in their overall understanding.

Those of you lucky enough to have migrated to the west even those with rabid islamist thinking will be absorbed in the general milieu in another generation or two,but the seething masses of humanity left behind i suspect will revert back to their primal animal origins in the next hundred years or so.Their only salvation is their learned bretheren provide enlightned leadership,forget this warmongering mentality and begin a period of genuine reconstrution,not just material but mental first and foremost.Accept all people as equal, accept rationality as the foundation to build the infrastructure,practice religion as a form of spirituality that must be confined to the inner sanctum of home and mind.And Allah may then decide to guide us from there.

Ameen Summa Ameen.