Thursday, March 31, 2011

Leading To Barbarity

Imagine a poll with questions deliberately designed to obtain a specific result. Such polls do exist. So how much credence can be placed in what results from them? With questions that skirt an issue, but make skewed references to that issue in the most ambiguous manner to elicit a particular response certain to gladden the hearts of those whose purpose in parsing those responses to obtain a designed outcome has been a roaring success.

The Canadian-Ukrainian community and the Canadian-German community, for their own reasons, have been decidedly uncomfortable with the initiative originally undertaken by the Jewish owner of a news conglomerate, to make plans to engage the public and receive government support in the building of a Holocaust Museum. Those ethnic communities have been outspoken and vociferous in their rejection of a Museum to commemorate the Holocaust though the concept of that museum was altered to reflect a presence as a Museum of Human Rights.

That museum would of necessity reflect the issue of genocide, and the single most extreme example of an ethnic-religious-cultural group of people singled out for systematic social isolation, mass incarceration and finally annihilation on a carefully calibrated and designed scale that would see success in the extinguishing of six million lives of men, women, children of all ages would be front and centre. What united the victims as victims was their Jewishness.

Others suffered a similar fate under the Nazis during World War Two; political prisoners, the mentally and physically impaired, gypsies, homosexuals and many clerics who defied the fascists. But it was for Europe's Jews that special attention in weeding them out of the general population, removing their human rights entitlements, slandering them, pauperizing them, and systematically murdering them that makes this attempt at eradicating Jews from the face of the Earth special.

There were others who suffered grievously throughout modern history; the Russians, Chinese, Poles, Ukraines, Rwandans, Cambodians; the list is long and dreadful. Many still suffer, in North Korea, Burma, Sudan and elsewhere in the world as they are exploited and torn from their land, maimed and slaughtered. They will have their place in The Canadian Museum for Human Rights which is also designed to offer a special place to commemorate the Holocaust and the Aboriginal experience in Canada.

This afflicts its critics with the angst of having their particular dreadful political, social, existential experiences take second place. All the other miseries and dread occurrences experienced by other people in other times and other places are meant to have their place in the Museum. Its critics demand that all be given equal space and equal place; that there be no special memorial for any one dire event.

Ignoring the reality that many other countries of the world consider the Holocaust to represent a unique and dreadful event in human history, needful of its own memorial as a remembrance to what human beings are capable of descending to. So in their need to succeed in turning public opinion to their support, the poll was designed to elicit a desired response. The poll, undertaken by NANOS Research, commissioned by Canadians for Genocide Education.

Canadians for Genocide Education describes itself as a coalition of 50 associations representing 27 different ethno-cultural communities. There is no Internet presence, and its volunteer chairman is an Ontario lawyer who was once head of the Canadian Arab Federation, James Kafieh. The 44-member group he claims to represent is a peculiar one. Some when contacted claim never to have heard of him or the coalition.

Others could not be contacted as the contacts were 27 years stale, others had no working telephones or contact information. But Mr. Kafieh is adamant that the focus of the Museum is quite wrong, and represents the result "of politicians pandering to a special interest group". Of course Mr. Kafieh would be intimately familiar with the considerations and agendas of 'special interest groups'.

Lybomyr Luciuk, director of research for the Ukrainian Civil Liberties Association, another staunch detractor of the main focus of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, and which aided in the funding of the poll, insists the results of the poll confirms that a museum funded by taxpayers must not give 'preference' to one group's suffering over that of another's.

"I know this will sound harsh, but there is fundamental ignorance [on the museum board] of history and a preoccupation with their own community's suffering", Mr. Luciuk explained, neatly summing up his own and his partners-in-adversarial denial of the original purpose of the Museum's own singular, self-involved agenda.

"This is not a genocide museum", clarified Angela Cassie, director of communications for the Museum. "It's a museum about human rights. And, she points out, the Holocaust is the most meticulously documented genocide in history, and as such is eminently capable in its presentation of teaching in the most absolute manner how abuse of human rights leads to dreadful barbarity.

So let's hear it like it is. The Winnipeg museum, a federally-funded institution, which will also be funded by private and corporate subscriptions is meant to have an area dedicated to the carefully planned and executed murder of six million Jews. It is intended that atrocities committed against Canadian Aboriginals will receive similar treatment. Other atrocities will be housed collectively in an adjacent area of the Museum.

This is not a display of the hierarchy of suffering, it is an object lesson in the degradation of humankind, using as its focal point the most singular descent into the black hole of nihilistic destruction through meticulous state and ideological planning ever documented. The poll that asked a few relatively innocuous questions about preferences, never once referencing the Museum itself, resulted in 60.3% of Canadians polled expressing a preference for "one exhibit which covers all genocides equally".

More than adequately reflecting the Canadian spirit of egalitarian compassion. Without informing those whose opinion was being solicited any of the inconvenient details. Which leads one to the indelible and damning impression that a rather nasty, hidden agenda to have a conclusion reached that would reflect the demands of a disparate, grudging group afflicted with anti-Semitism will stoop to any means to validate their point of view.

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posted by Pieface @ Thursday, March 31, 2011

Netanyahu Interview

Netanyahu is 3rd on YouTube World View Series
by Hillel Fendel Bibi #3 on YouTube World View

A Wednesday interview with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu appears on the YouTube World View series, based on questions from viewers around the world.

The 25-minute long interview with the Israeli leader, featuring a clear and succinct presentation of Israel’s stance on critical issues, is the third in the YouTube World View series. The series features interviews with world leaders based on questions from viewers around the world; Netanyahu follows U.S. President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron.

The interview was held in Netanyahu’s home in Jerusalem, and was screened live on Channel Two news, whose star interviewer, Dana Weiss, asked the questions. The queries were asked and voted upon by the YouTube community around the world. A record number of questions - 3,673 - from a record number of countries - 90 - were asked of PM Netanyahu.

Brother's Death Steered His Life

Asked what experience most changed his life, Netanyahu said that it was the fall in battle of his brother Yoni as he commanded the Entebbe rescue of Israeli hostages from the hands of German and Arab terrorists.

“That event changed my life and steered it towards its present course,” Netanyahu said. “Yoni believed that the war against terrorism was not merely military, but also political and moral - and that is the war that I have been waging for these 35 years… When I go to visit a bereaved family [of Israelis murdered by terrorists or killed in battle] and I see a mother grieving for her son, I say, ‘That’s my mother.’ And when I see a father grieving for his son, I say, ‘That’s my father.’ And when I see a brother grieving for her son, I say, ‘That’s me.’ When I have to send our soldiers into harm’s way, I think [an extra time], and I think it makes me a more responsible leader.”

How to Wake Up the World

He was similarly asked, as were Obama and Cameron before him, “If you could ask one question of a world leader, what it would be and to whom?”

Netanyahu said, “I would ask Winston Churchill, the prime minister of Britain during World War II, ‘Is there anything you could have done differently to persuade the world to act in time against Nazism?’ Because even though he was a great leader, he failed in this task of getting the world to wake up to Nazism in time. Perhaps his answer would be, 'Naah, nothing could have been done differently, because ultimately there’s such a thing as the slumber of democracies, they have to be banged on the head.' I feel that same frustration now, because I’ve been talking for 15 years about the danger of Iranian nuclear terrorism, how they could control the world’s oil supply, and how they threaten our country with obliteration and could do the same with others. You try, and you try, and you try, and I don’t want to say that there’s been no progress - but not the kind of mobilization that is required against something so great.”

One question dealt with the violence and uprisings in Middle Eastern countries: “What side are you [Israel] on, and do you feel threatened?”

Netanyahu: “We’re all on the same side – Israel, America, the democratic world, we all want to see the triumph of democracy. This includes the people of Iran, where it really all began a year and a half ago – not in Tunisia, as is widely thought. The Iranians stormed the streets because they had a fake election there. So we want democracy, but we’re all concerned, I suppose, that the democracy will be hijacked by radical or militant Islamic regimes. That’s what happened five years ago in Lebanon. People there wanted to see a liberal, open, tolerant Lebanon – but five years later, we don’t have that kind of democracy: we rather have a theocracy, with Iran and Hizbullah controlling Lebanon. We don’t want militant theocracies.”

Netanyahu reiterated several times that Israel “is the only country in the Middle East where Arabs and Muslims enjoy full civil rights.”

The Real Issue: PA Refusal

The top vote-getting question was this: “Do you believe that approving more homes in the settlements in response to the slaughter in Itamar will bring peace, and if so, how?”

Netanyahu: “Well, look, first of all, I think that a few houses is not the real issue. I think the real issue is –"

At this point, interviewer Weiss interrupted and said, “One second. Because the asker is not here, I’m going to ask you to answer his question, and not the question that you think is the main issue.”

Netanyahu: “No, no, I’m answering: He asks if the settlements will stop peace, and I’m saying that this is not the reason we don’t have peace! The reason we don’t have peace is because the Palestinian Authority, so far, refuses to recognize a Jewish State in any borders.

“They negotiated for 18 years when there was plenty of settlement construction, and they didn’t make it a pre-condition, so a few houses on less than 1% of 1% of the land is not a big thing. Yes, it’s disputed land – we have a historical connection to it. My name is Benjamin; the first Benjamin, the son of Jacob, walked these hills 4,000 years ago, so we have some connection with this land. The Palestinians claim it, so we have to sit down and discuss it, we’re prepared to negotiate; they’re not.”

Every Fair-Minded Person Knows

Netanyahu also explained that the new units are being built “in areas that every fair-minded person knows will remain in our hands - suburbs of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.” Reminded that U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon had just called for an end to settlement construction, Netanyahu said, “Any one in his right mind knows that this is part of the ancestral Jewish homeland; it’s in the Bible. We have to reach a compromise, everyone knows we can’t kick out 350,000 or 400,000 Jews from their homes; many of them, by the way, were kicked out [from their homes in Arab countries] before the founding of Israel by hostile Arab armies…”

Continuing to attack the PA obstinacy of Jewish construction in Judea and Samaria, Netanyahu said, “We had 50 years of conflict before there was a single Israeli in any of these settlements – what was that all about? For decades, when [Judea and Samaria] was in Arab hands, they attacked us again and again, even though there were no Jewish settlements [in Judea and Samaria].”

Jewish day school students in Ohio asked Netanyahu if he was concerned about a new Palestinian intifada – apparently a reference to the plans to march on Israel on May 15 - and what can be done to stop it. He did not address the question directly, but said only that he hopes the Palestinians will choose peace and not alliance with Hamas.

Are You Kidding?

Asked what the United States gains from its alliance with Israel, the prime minister said, “My answer would be: Are you kidding? The entire Middle East all the way up to India is shaking and rocking, and the only stable country in the whole place is Israel! … If we didn’t exist, America would have to invent us! If not for Israel, the entire Middle East would simply collapse.”

He concluded by listing what he felt were the two great missions facing our generation and the next one: “We must make sure Iran and other radical regimes do not get nuclear weapons, and we must find a substitute for oil.”

As published online at Arutz Sheva, 31 March 2011

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posted by Pieface @ Thursday, March 31, 2011

Islamism In the United States

America: Beware Giving in to the False Concept of Islamophobia
by Prof. Phyllis Chesler Chesler: It's Not Islamophobia

We are drowning in anti-Israel propaganda, and still it never stops coming.



Simultaneously, the “Palestinian narrative” appears to us as if in a dream, over and over again, always slightly surreal and yet overly familiar. By now the “Palestinian narrative” is a brand and we have all been hypnotized. This is not surprising.

For more than 40 years, the Soviet, Arab, and Saudi Lobbies, eventually joined by the Iranian Lobby, have funded the demonization of Israel and the popularization of Palestine. The condemnation of Israel for crimes it has never committed (“ethnic cleansing,” “genocide,” “apartheid”) and the call for a Palestinian one-state solution is echoed, similarly, in films, books, poems, academic papers and lectures; we see and hear this on television, at conferences, at campus demonstrations, in the halls of the United Nations, the European Union, in Parliaments, and, of course, in the Arab and Islamic worlds.

By now, the “Palestinian narrative” has effectively rendered Jews unsafe and unwelcome in Europe. Jews who look “Jewish” or “religious” are not safe on the streets of certain European countries such as England, France, Holland, Belgium, and Scandinavia. European pagan, Christian, and Nazi-era Judeophobia has found a new outlet in the obsessive demonization of Israel, the only Jewish state. This is also the way Europeans hope to appease Muslim immigrants who live in Europe but in parallel universes, who are hostile to the Western enterprise, and who demand the right to be brutally intolerant as a Western civil right.

This same false Palestinian narrative has morphed into a belief that all Muslims—who are, themselves, the largest practitioners of religious apartheid in the world, and who persecute all non-Muslims—are, as Muslims, being persecuted in the West. This may be because Islam is not (yet) dominant in the West.

In my opinion, the success of the “Palestinian” narrative is what has led to the unquestioning acceptance of the false concept of “Islamophobia.”

Those Europeans who have challenged the idea of “Islamophobia” and who have told the truth about Islam in Europe—or who have chosen to leave the Religion of Peace—have put themselves in harm’s way. Either they are sued for blasphemy or defamation—or they must live in exile and with bodyguards. Some have been murdered, even butchered.

What about America? Surely that is not true here.

In 2008, America’s FBI found that 66.1% of religious hate crimes targeted Jews, but only 7.5% of religious hate crimes targeted Muslims. On March 29, 2011, The Center for Security Policy released a revised edition of their groundbreaking longitudinal study, Religious Bias Crimes 2000-2009: Muslim, Jewish and Christian Victims — Debunking the Myth of a Growing Trend in Muslim Victimization. It is based on annual FBI statistics and contradicts the assertions that religious bias crimes against Muslims have increased in America and that the alleged cause is widespread “Islamophobia.” In fact, the study shows that religious bias crimes — also known as hate crimes — against Muslim Americans, have remained relatively low with a downward trend since 2001, and are significantly less than the numbers of bias crimes against Jewish victims.

According to the Center’s analysis, in 2009, Jewish victims of hate crimes outnumbered Muslim victims by more than 8 to 1 (1,132 Jewish victims to 132 Muslim victims). From 2000 through 2009, for every one hate crime incident against a Muslim, there were six hate crime incidents against Jewish victims (1,580 Muslim incidents versus 9,692 Jewish incidents). Even in 2001 when religious bias crimes against Muslims increased briefly for a nine-week period, total anti-Muslim incidents, offenses and victims remained approximately half of the corresponding anti-Jewish totals.”

Nevertheless, American Muslims have alleged rampant “Islamophobia” in America. Countless number of Talking Heads have taken this allegation seriously.

Thus, it is not surprising that CNN just aired a documentary which was titled Not Welcome: The Muslims Next Door.

On camera, the Muslims are all so very…peaceful. There is not one angry or hate-filled Muslim man on camera. Not one. Despite the fact that we have seen hundreds, possibly thousands of angry, frightening, violent Muslim demonstrations, including prayer services, all across America and across the Islamic world, and many hate-filled captured Islamic and Palestinian terrorists on camera, CNN’s chosen Muslim-American men of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, including the Sheikh of the planned Islamic Center, are all soft-spoken, emotional, tearful, non-violent. Except for the Sheikh’s American wifewho converted to Islam, the Muslims on camera are all innocent, good, non-white people.

Soledad O’Brien, CNN’s special anchor, likes them, and, as someone with Afro-Cuban as well as Caucasian Australian parents, perhaps she even identifies with them. In any event, O’Brien questions them very politely, sympathetically.

However, the white, Christian-Americans on camera—all of them, without exception—are portrayed as hateful, cruel, insidious, dislikable, selfish, phobic, and no doubt racist. O’Brien interviews them with barely disguised hostility and contempt.

At issue, according to CNN’s website are America’s post-9/11 fears about radical Islam, terrorism, and “Sharia Law.” As CNN sees it:

“Murfreesboro, Tennessee has just over 100,000 people, 140+ churches, and one mosque. For decades, Muslims have lived and prayed in Murfreesboro without incident, but last May, when the Muslim community gained county approval to build a new 52,000 square foot Islamic center in town, hundreds of Murfreesboro residents took to the streets in protest…. O'Brien chronicles the dramatic fight to block the mosque project in Murfreesboro and the fight over religious freedom; a fight that would ultimately include protests, vandalism, arson and an explosive lawsuit that would involve the U.S. Department of Justice.”

What’s wrong with Murfreesboro is that it is too damn Christian and too damn white. It is not diverse enough.It is not Middle Eastern enough.

O’Brien, herself a Harvard graduate, dresses as a modern American woman. She has absolutely no comment to make about the fact that most of the adult Muslim women on camera are all wearing long, shapeless dresses and severe hijab—while the Muslim men are all dressed in modern, American style. The Sheikh’s wife insists that women are not “oppressed” under Sharia Law, that she is not oppressed, that no Muslim woman she knows has ever been oppressed, etc.

Interestingly enough, the Sheikh has a foreign accent. One wonders why so many Sheiks have been imported from the Middle East to America. Asra Nomani is a religious Muslim feministwho was born in India and raised in America. Her father founded the mosque of Morgantown, West Virginia. Nomani tried to persuade her mosque to become more woman-friendly. She failed. In a PBSdocumentary about this story, Nomani claimed that when Arab Muslims joined her mosque, her battle to bring it into the 21st century failed. On camera, she says:

“Extremists — mainly Arabs — led by one rather physically and verbally violent Egyptian, Hany Ammar, took over. At that point, I began hearing really scary sermons. An unchaste woman is worthless. The West is on a bad path. We must hate those who hate us. Women should be silent in a mosque. Jews are descendants of apes and pigs.”

Incredibly, on camera, Ammar says: “I pray to Allah that you be punished. May Allah get revenge for Ammar.” Ammar is also heard, but not seen, physically attacking a young moderate Muslim man. Ammar’s wife Mona is even more conservative, more aggressive than he is. She minces no words in expressing her contempt, even hatred for Nomani. Like certain kinds of religious women, she is even more zealous in upholding the patriarchal status quo, more aggressively empowered to strike down any other woman who dares challenge male supremacy or Islamic gender apartheid.

Ultimately, Ammar tries to ban Nomani from the mosque. Eventually, both she and her family leave.

Why do I even bring this in? Because Murfreesboro’s Sheikh Ossama Mohamed Bahloul is also a foreign-born Arab Muslim. All this means is that he may (or may not) be a religious Muslim supremacist or an Islamist. Bahloul is an Egyptian-born graduate of Al-Azhar University in Cairo. He was the Imam of the Islamic Society of Southern Texas, in Corpus Christi, and then the visiting Imam for the Islamic Center of Irving, Texas.

Sheikh Bahloul is not a terrorist, nor did he have anything to do with the trial of the Holy Land Foundation, an organization which raised money for Hamas and was based in a suburb of Dallas, Texas. However, he was summoned from Egypt to work in Texas, and left for Murfreesboro a year after the Holy Land trial began. Texas is known as a hotbed of increasingly fundamentalist Islam. Perhaps Bahloul was chosen for his radical beliefs and for his ability to mask them as something else. After all, his wife is dressed as if they live in Cairo, not in America.

To me, this is a sign and signal of a desire to live in a parallel universe, one in which Muslims are taught that they are superior to non-Muslims; one in which Muslims are taught to hate Jews and other infidels;one in which Muslims are taught that Sharia Law is, indeed, superior to American law. That is why CNN invites Harvard Professor Noah Feldman on. He assures people that “Our constitution prohibits any religion from becoming the law of the land.”

It does. But look at how Sharia law and/or Islamic custom has usurped the law of the land both in Europe and in America, where female genital mutilation, child arranged marriage, polygamy, the burqa and honor killings are pandemic.

An Egyptian father killed his two American daughters in Irving, Texas. Yaser Said came from Egypt, married his American-born wife when she was fifteen years old, honor murdered their daughters in 2008, and then fled. He has yet to be found.

A series of attacks were perpetrated against the building of the mosque. “Not Welcome” was spray painted on the sign which announced the mosque opening, arson was perpetrated, a lawsuit was brought. The graffiti and the arson are unacceptable. But no one who opposes the mosque is given a fair hearing or the slightest respect on camera. And, Sheikh Bahloul may be as clever as he is soft-spoken. In a very emotional but determined voice, pitched precisely to gain sympathy for his causehe says: “This is America. This is too much.”

Ah, so the Egyptian-born Sheikh understands America and fully knows what his rights are here. Funny, he only arrived here post 9/11. Actually, for all I know, he could have arrived here sooneror more recently. None of his many biographies and interviews share this information with us.

Is he, perhaps, asecret lover of Zion, an admirer of the American way of life, a Sufi-style peaceful Sunni Muslim? He graduated from the most prominent school of Islamic learning in the Sunni world. If he is really a man for the 21st century, he will have to take some very prominent and public stands which prove that this is so.

As published online at Arutz Sheva, 31 March 2011

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posted by Pieface @ Thursday, March 31, 2011

News Worthy

  • Israel is studying plans to create an artificial island along the Gaza Strip with sea and air ports to be controlled by the Palestinian Authority. The project, under development for three months by Yaakov Katz, the Transport Minister, proposes building a man-made island four kilometres long and two km wide, Israel's Channel 2 television reported. Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister, backs the plan for the island, which would also contain a tourist area, a marina, hotels and a desalinization plant for sea water. It would be linked to Gaza by a 4-km bridge. The project is estimated to cost $5-billion to $10-billion and take six to 10 years to complete. The project's backers in the government would like to see the island managed by Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority, freezing out the Islamist movement Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip. Agence France-Presse

  • Iraq: At least 53 people were killed Tuesday when gunmen took hostages at a provincial council headquarters in Saddam Hussein's hometown, precipitating a battle with security forces. It was one of the deadliest attacks in Tikrit since a suicide bombing killed up to 60 police recruits in January and was the first hostage incident since 52 people were killed in a Baghdad church raid by al-Qaeda-linked gunmen in October. The assailants set off car bombs, explosive belts and hand grenades as they stormed the building and grabbed hostages. Those who did not die as a result of explosions were executed by the gunmen. Sabah al-Bazee, a freelance Iraqi journalist, and three council members were among those killed. Reuters

  • Ivory Coast appeared to have succumbed to full-scale civil war on Tuesday after six key towns fell to forces opposed to the sitting president. Fighting that has already killed 460 people and forced one million from their homes had been contained to the country's far west and some suburbs of the main city Abidjan. But on Tuesday armed groups swept south of the ceasefire line drawn after the end of the last civil war in 2004, taking several towns in succession. Those fighters support Alassane Ouattara, the former World Bank executive internationally recognized as the winner of November's elections. But his rival, Laurent Gbagbo, the incumbent president, has refused to step down. The Daily Telegraph

  • Brussels: Guards blocked the sealed offices Tuesday of disgraced MEPs after a fresh resignation in a string of corruption scandals engulfing the European Parliament. Hella Ranner, an Austrian conservative, became the latest to quit after a newspaper report alleged she planned to clear a $9.8-million business debt using expenses meant for staff and office running costs. Three other lawmakers are already facing probes after a sting by Britain's Sunday Times newspaper showed them agreeing to take bribes of up to $140,000 to draft new laws. Last week, the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg ordered Dan Dover, a veteran British Conservative MEP, to repay $540,000 in unjustified expenses. Agence France-Presse

  • Pakistan has agreed to establish a counter-terrorism hotline and allow Indian detectives investigating the 2008 Mumbai terror plot to visit the country, in the most significant confidence-building measures since the massacre. After two days of talks in New Delhi, India's home secretary and Pakistan's interior secretary said Tuesday the hotline would help "facilitate real-time information sharing with respect to terrorist threats". Security analysts said the moves were a major concession by Pakistan, aimed at persuading India of its sincerity in tackling terrorism and preventing any further attacks being plotted from its territory, like the Mumbai attacks, which were planned by the hardline Islamist Lashkar-e-Taiba. The Daily Telegraph

  • Italy: A woman was paid to say she was a victim of Italy's 2009 earthquake and praise the government's reconstruction efforts. Marina Villa, 50, appeared Friday on a popular television program on Canale 5, one of the television channels owned by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. "L'Aquilla is going back to what it was before [the earthquake]. I'd like to thank, if I can, the Prime Minister", she said. "Those who are still staying in hotels, it's convenient for them. They eat, they drink and they don't do anything". Messages left by acquaintances on social networking sites revealed she was not from L'Aquila, but from a small town in the Abruzzo region. The woman admitted Monday she had been paid $420 to appear and read a statement. Reuters

  • United States: Three inmates and their loved ones have been charged with attempting to smuggle drugs into a New Jersey jail on the pages of a children's colouring book. Subozone, which is used to treat heroin addiction and classified as a controlled dangerous substance, was dissolved into a paste, then painted into the colouring book, Sheriff Gary Schaffer of Cape May county, Philadelphia said Tuesday. Pages with "To Daddy", scribbled on top were sent to the prisoners. The New Jersey drug bust was the second this month involving Suboxone smuggling behind bars. Authorities at a prison in Pennsylvania arrested 11 people in what they said was a scheme to hide the drug beneath postage stamps on letters to prisoners. Reuters

  • Tokyo: France and the United States are to help Japan in its battle to contain radiation from a crippled nuclear complex where plutonium finds have raised public alarm over the world's worst atomic crisis since Chernobyl in 1986. The high-stakes operation at the Fukushima plant has added to Japan's unprecedented humanitarian disaster, with 27,500 people dead or missing from a March 11 earthquake and tsunami.

  • Syria may be in the throes of a major power struggle as the country's Cabinet stepped down Tuesday in a last desperate bid to curb nearly two weeks of increasing unrest. The resignation of the 32-member Cabinet led by Naji al-Otari, may clear the way for President Bashar al-Assad to lift a state of emergency that has been in place since 1963 in order to introduce some of the reforms demanded by increasingly restive Syrians. For the last two weeks, while security forces gunned down anti-government demonstrators, state-owned news media have blamed the killings on "armed gangs" who have been sending and receiving more than 1 million text messages "mostly from Israel". National Post

  • A Canadian government's Integrated Threat Assessment Centre stated that "several Islamist insurgent groups" were based in eastern Libya and mosques in Benghazi were urging followers to fight in Iraq. The intelligence report, written in late 2009, called the anti-Gadhafi stronghold of eastern Libya an "epicentre of Islamist extremism", and said "extremist cells" operated in the region, now being defended by a Canadian-led NATO coalition. National Post

  • Canada: A Parti Quebecois government would not hesitate to use public funds to promote sovereignty, party leader Pauline Marois said Tuesday. Ms. Marois said a PQ government would use public money to achieve sovereignty, once in power, notably by commissioning studies on the impact of an independent Quebec. Ms. Marois also noted she would adopt a tougher language law, a citizenship law and a Quebec constitution in preparation for sovereignty before a referendum. Postmedia News

  • China is reinforcing fences and has stepped up patrols along its border with North Korea as fears mount of a catastrophic famine in the secretive state. Fences more than four metres high, topped with barbed wire, are now being erected along a 12-kilometre stretch of the Yalu river around Dandong, a popular entry point for North Korea refugees. "It's the first time such strong border fences are being erected here. It looks like it is related to the unstable situation in North Korea", a resident said of the work, which began in November. The Daily Telegraph

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posted by Pieface @ Thursday, March 31, 2011

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

The Ubiquity of al-Qaeda

They are everywhere. In Iraq where assaults against civilians continue. Where 55 people were killed and 95 injured as gunmen stormed the Salahuddin provincial council building in Tikrit, taking dozens hostage, executing three council members, setting them on fire, and then detonating their explosive belts, blowing themselves and the rest of their hostages to shredded flesh. And as police arrived on the scene, a car bomb exploded.

In Libya, in the east of the country where rebels have been infiltrated by members of al-Qaeda they present as a quandary to the prospects of arming the rebels whose munitions and trucks cannot deflect the superior fire power of government forces. Arm the rebels and who else is being armed through the generosity and concern of Western countries, anxious to assist the rebels to victory, unseating Moammar Gadhafi.

And in Yemen where a nationwide revolt against President Ali Abdullah Saleh is ongoing, the presence of al-Qaeda is manifest, seizing control of Jaar and surrounding villages. With President Saleh's political longevity in question who will the United States depend upon to battle al-Qaeda in Yemen, well ensconced among the tribal villages and respected there.

The vast regions of Yemen, like Somalia, where the arm of government security does not reach, has become an al-Qaeda base of operations in the Arabian Peninsula. "If we do not act, along with good-willed and friendly countries, to close the rift and start a political dialogue, there will be a devastating civil war that will disturb the whole region", warned President Saleh.

The nationwide revolt against his rule, with mass protests demanding that he step down from office is well into its second month. President Saleh, a staunch ally of the West and the United States, refuses demands to abdicate his presidency, explaining reasonably enough that he has no intention of handing over the reigns of government to unproven rebels, those who have no experience and cannot be trusted.

But this is yet another Muslim state whose people, fed up with insecurity, lack of employment, and basic freedoms are finally realizing that mass demonstrations that refuse to back down in the face of government brutality in desperate attempts to retain power, have the initiative. People are dying, as government troops attempt to repress the dissenting protests, but this only makes people more determined.

An ammunition factory in Abyan, south Yemen was looted by al-Qaeda, taking what they wanted and then fleeing. In the wake of their looting foray, a fire and explosion occurred as nearby townspeople, including women and children, arrived to pick through what had been left. It's speculated that al-Qaeda fighters deliberately left explosive powder around, triggered by a resident's cigarette to cause a huge conflagration.

Over 120 people were killed outright as the plant was destroyed through a series of blasts. Many more were wounded severely, and may end up adding to the total figure of those killed. Everyone is accustomed to carrying firearms in the country. It's estimated that there are three guns for each individual in the 24-million population.

The al-Qaeda gunmen, armed and hooded, came away with cases of weapons. Their growing presence throughout the Arab world comprises a direct threat to the populations their fanatical predations impact upon. As they become more assured and bolder, and there are fewer government defences to unseat their presence.

As fundamentalist Islamism sweeps through the world of Islam, violent political Islam partners with it. Their sinister, destructive swath through the Muslim world will not be contained in the Muslim world. It will inevitably spill over into the world at large, as it continues to wage its vicious jihad elsewhere, through sacrificial martyrdom operations and the overall commitment to global shariah-led Islam.

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posted by Pieface @ Wednesday, March 30, 2011

What If?

It's not all that far a stretch of probability. It happened in Afghanistan with the U.S. and Pakistan conspiring to aid the mujahadeen, training and arming them to confront Soviet forces in the invasion of Afghanistan. And those mujahadeen formed the core of the Taliban which then ruled Afghanistan when the Soviet troops left.

And from among the mujahadeen another corps was formed, that of al-Qaeda. The alliance between the Taliban and al-Qaeda was a natural one.

And the flaming enmity of al-Qaeda toward the West and specifically the United States became the most evident turning point of the Islamist revival. Which has since spread incorrigibly throughout the Muslim world. The Islamists have succeeded in overturning moderate Islam to reflect a fundamentalist, fanatic version of Islam which conducted its own internal war within the ummah.

Islamists who fought in Afghanistan were recruited from all over the Muslim and Arab world. Many of them returned to their source, and one of those sources was eastern Libya. In 2009 a Canadian intelligence report described eastern Libya as an "epicentre of Islamist extremism", where "extremist cells" were well represented.

Canada's Integrated Threat Assessment Centre identified "several Islamist insurgent groups" based in mosques in Benghazi, urging its members to fight in Iraq. They are suspected of having infiltrated the ranks of the rebel forces now battling Moammar Gadhafi's forces. And, like a nightmare recurring, the United States, Britain , France and Qatar are considering arming the rebels.

A recently-convened conference of 40 governments and international bodies reached agreement to continue the NATO-led aerial bombing of Libyan forces, hoping to force Gadhafi to comply with the United Nations resolution to end its violence against its civilians. The conflict in Libya is between the West and the East of the country; a tribal conflict.

In many of the cities that rebound from government control to rebel occupation and then back again, there are citizens who battle on the government side, against the rebel forces. This is a country that has been riven by clan warfare and tribal antipathies, a reflection of what exists in every Arab and Muslim country globally.

It is into this melee that the West has intervened, focusing on the presence of a maniacal tyrant determined to continue his personal ownership of a country, violating the human rights of his own exploited people, celebrating his ownership of the proceeds of the country's natural resources. In the West this is considered moral anathema; in the Middle East it reflects tradition.

International aid agencies are on the scene, concerned that the conflict has cut off medical supplies, water, electricity and food to countless civilians. The focus of concern from within the international community and the reason for their involvement has been the security and safety of the civilian population. But the civilian population appears fractionated by loyalties, further complicating matters.

And through all of this, while the West and their Arab and African state allies remain anxious to have Western powers involved and commit to what they will not, Moammar Gadhafi keeps insisting that he is concerned for his peoples' welfare: "Stop your brutal and unjust attack on our country ... Hundreds of Libyans are being killed because of this bombardment. Massacres are being mercilessly committed against the Libyan people."

And on their part, the spokesmen for the rebels deny al-Qaeda links, despite damning admissions seen elsewhere. And the head of the U.S. European Command informs the U.S. Senate that American intelligence on rebel forces, while demonstrating some involvement of al-Qaeda or Hezbollah, they are lacking "detail sufficient to say there is a significant al-Qaeda presence."

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posted by Pieface @ Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

All Together, Now

Human rights groups are now accusing loyalist forces in Libya of 'disappearing' their opposition, claiming political activists and critics of the regime have been abducted, held incommunicado, likely to be tortured and perhaps murdered. This is Africa, and the Middle East, and represents traditional backward, tribal societies, so should this be a surprising revelation?

NATO has announced that in taking command of the UN-mandated coalition to ensure that Gadhafi's forces do not run amok over the rebel strongholds, slaughtering too many civilians so as to make the civilized world wince in pain, they will be neutral. They have been authorized to ensure that a no-fly zone is in effect, and they state that means neither government flights nor rebel flights will be permitted.

Who knew the rebels were so well equipped with warplanes as to rival those of the Libyan airforce?

Speaking of which, when it comes to arming either the government or the rebel forces, NATO will ensure that neither takes place; complete neutrality. While at the same time, American President Barack Obama, states that he will not authorize the removal of Moammar Gadhafi on the one hand, while also stating that Gadhafi must decamp, then muses about arming the rebel forces.

For, he has stated the United States will not and must not and can not stand by and permit a slaughter to occur, for such a massacre "would have reverberated across the region and stained the conscience of the world. It was not in our national interest to let that happen. I refused to let that happen." Cue the cymbals and the drums in recognition of true nobility.

And then try this on for size: the rebel groups singing "the martyr is loved by Allah", and declaiming while carrying the body of a rebel fighter to the back of a waiting vehicle: "See how his body smells only of the martyr's scent. We have God with us and the winds of paradise are blowing in our faces."

And these poor deluded souls who have no yardstick of intelligent reality of the outside world: "Gadhafi told us for years that America was the great Satan. He said Britain was Satan's tail and France was trashed. If we ever believed him, then we don't now. We prayed to God for help and he turned our enemies into our allies."

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posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, March 29, 2011

UN Effectiveness

"There is rarely a vision beyond fundraising, and rarely an organizing narrative that draws together disparate capacities. What is needed is a complete overhaul of strategic and operational leadership in the UN. Regrettably, the leadership, management and co-ordination of the international community's efforts have not risen even to the challenges we currently face. Unless we radically improve the quality of the leadership of the international effort in humanitarian crises, we will not succeed in dealing with what is ahead. In all but one of the case studies for this review, UN leadership was poor. This was especially true in the larger disasters." Paddy Ashdown, Humanitarian Emergency Response Review
So much for the salvation of the world at the dedicated and faithful hands of the experts assembled by that great world body, the United Nations. Acquiring the required operating funds to launch humanitarian missions all around the Globe on behalf of global citizenry, those who live in countries who are advantaged by good governance and wealth, transferring funding to the world body on behalf of the disadvantaged has not resulted in needed resource delivery.

Raising funding is evidently no problem; those member countries who can afford the tariff cough it up, leaving it to the expert panels working on behalf of humanity under the auspices of the United Nations, to spend it wisely. Spending the funding raised by UN appeals to its membership to ameliorate natural disasters, bringing medical and food aid and shelter where it is required; operating refugee camps; diplomatically intervening in calamitous conflicts.

The world depends on the work of the United Nations. That august body was organized, established and is trusted to launch missions to rescue humanity from nature's disasters, and more tellingly from humanity's own folly. The study just concluded on the effectiveness of the UN's various humanitarian missions studied responses to recent humanitarian disasters; famine in Niger, flooding in Pakistan, earthquake in Haiti.

The conclusion reached is dispiriting and most definitely unflattering to the purported professionalism of the world body. While governments regard the United Nations as the "only legitimate authority" in grave and desperate situations where a specific government of a country affected by some kind of disaster proves incapable of mounting its own humanitarian response, the result of the study indicates the authority's effectiveness is sadly lacking.

Only the UN's World Food Program is exonerated for the extent and value of its effectiveness in its ability to "rapidly deliver[ing] food to seven million people in flood-hit Pakistan". And UNICEF is pointed out as another success story, supplying infant food throughout Niger. But the failure of the UN seen in its "inability to treat and contain" Haiti's cholera outbreak does not reflect well on its capabilities and dedication.

The report points out the communication dysfunctionality of the various UN agencies, commenting on their need to work together "more collegially". Critics of the United Nations - and there are many, mostly those drawing their conclusions from the political sphere of diplomatic influence and ingrained corruption - will not be surprised that this aspect of the world body's vital work is also horribly impaired by incompetence.

The United Nations has become a lobby emporium for some of the world's most human-rights-abusing nations; its effectiveness is stifled by bureaucratic ennui and moral corruption. Its submission to the ideological dictates of member-countries outnumbering democratic, forward-looking countries of the world merely reflect its unforgivable inadequacies.

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posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, March 29, 2011

MEMRI on Pakistan's Anti-Semitism

Antisemitism Documentation Project


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March 13, 2011
Inquiry & Analysis Series Report No.676
Pakistan's Jewish Problem
By: Tufail Ahmad*


A Jewish family in Karachi, circa: unknown (Image courtesy: Dawn.com)

Table of Contents

Introduction

I. Brief Historical Background: The Jews and Pakistan

II. Main Characteristics of Antisemitism in Pakistan
a) Antisemitism in Pakistan is Interconnected with Pakistan's Other Perceived Enemies: The "Three Satans" – India, the U.S. and Israel (i.e. Hindus, Christians and Jews)
b) Antisemitism is Used Instrumentally by the Pakistani Military
c) Antisemitism is Used to Designate Threats to Pakistan, Such As the Taliban

III. Range of Motifs in Antisemitic Attacks
a) Sports – Jews and Indians Lobby against Pakistani Cricketers
b) Polio Vaccination Campaign – A Dangerous Jewish Conspiracy
c) Pakistan-India Water Dispute – Israel's Hand
d) The U.N. – A Jewish Conspiracy
e) Pakistani Interests Abroad Harmed by Jews/Israel
f) Valentine's Day and April's Fool Day – Used by Jews and Hindus against Muslims
g) Ahmadi Muslims – Agents of Israel/India
h) Video of Taliban Flogging Woman – Made by Jews to Smear Pakistan
i) Facebook – A Jewish/Israeli Conspiracy
j) Pakistan's Nuclear Weapons – Targeted by Jews/Israel
k) Faisal Shehzad's Times Square Attack – A CIA/Mossad Plot to Implicate Pakistan

IV. The Jews and the West Undermine the Identity of Pakistan
Conclusion

Introduction

This paper examines: a) the history of Jews in Pakistan; b) violence against Jews and their synagogues following the creation of the Islamic nation of Pakistan in 1947; c) contemporary protests by Pakistani Muslims against Jews and Israel; and d) Pakistani political and religious leaders' penchant for blaming most problems facing Pakistan on a U.S.-India-Israel axis.

Looking at Pakistani media reports over the past few years, this paper outlines how Pakistani opinion makers – barring a small segment of liberal intelligentsia – are deepening the anti-Jewish mindset that is typical across the Islamic world. For the purposes of this analysis, this paper does not include statements, protests, editorials, cartoons or viewpoints of Pakistani leaders and the government that are deemed to be justified criticism of Israel over its policies regarding the Palestinian problem and the occupied territories.

This paper does discuss the narrative of antisemitism in Pakistani society, examining how Israel is seen by Islamic scholars and political leaders in Pakistan as representing the Jews rather than the state and government of Israel in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. In the context of this paper, a definition of antisemitism means political/religious/cultural attacks on Jews and Israel that are not related to the Palestinian problem but over supposed Jewish-Israeli involvement in international conspiracies.

I. Brief Historical Background: The Jews and Pakistan

There is a long-held view that the Pashtun tribes, who inhabit the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region, are one of the 10 lost tribes of Israel. Navraas Aafreedi, a Pashtun academic at Lucknow University in northern India, told a newspaper in January 2010: "Pathans, or Pashtuns, are the only people in the world whose probable descent from the lost tribes of Israel finds mention in a number of texts from the 10th century to the present day, written by Jewish, Christian and Muslim scholars alike, both religious as well as secularists."[1] However, attempts by anthropologists to establish a definitive Jewish link to the Pashtun tribes have been unsuccessful.

Nevertheless, historical records indicate that Jews, with no connection to the Pashtuns, have lived in Pakistan and the wider South Asian region over the past several centuries. A 2007 report in the Pakistani daily Dawn noted: "The earliest graves... [of Jews in Karachi] are from 1812 and 1814, with a vast majority from the 1950s."[2] The report also cited Aitken's Gazetteer of the Province of Sind, a British-era government document which was published from Karachi in 1907, as recording that "there were only 428 Jews enumerated in the census of 1901, and these were really all in Karachi. Many belonged to the Bene Israel community who observed Sephardic Jewish rites and are believed to have settled in India [which included Pakistan] shortly after the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus [the Roman Emperor in 69 AD]."[3]

The Dawn report added: "Other research documents record about 2,500 Jews in Karachi, with about 100 in Peshawar at the beginning of the 20th century. At the time of [Pakistan's] independence [in 1947], many Jews migrated to India, but about 2,000 stayed in Pakistan. Their first real exodus occurred soon after the creation of Israel, which triggered many incidents of violence against Jews, and the Karachi synagogue became a site of anti-Israel demonstrations."[4]

In the late 19th century, one of Karachi's notables was Soloman David, who died in March 1902. He was a surveyor of the Karachi municipality and built the Magain Shalom synagogue in Karachi. His gravestone reads: "The widely known and highly respected Soloman David always sought the welfare of the Jewish community and through his liberality erected at his own expense a handsome synagogue, Magain Shalome [sic]."[5]

Another report estimated the Jewish population of Karachi at 2,500 prior to August 14-15, 1947 when Pakistan was created.[6]

After Pakistan's creation as an Islamic nation, relations between the Jews and their Muslims neighbors began to deteriorate. This strain in Jewish-Muslim relations also resulted from Muslim protests in Pakistan against the newly created State of Israel. Some Pakistani Jews migrated to India and the U.K., and others to Israel. In early 2010, a Pakistani daily carried this first-person observation of anti-Jewish violence in the newly created Islamic nation of Pakistan: "The synagogue in Karachi was set on fire, and several Jews were attacked. The frequency of attacks increased after each of the Arab-Israeli wars, i.e. 1948, 1956 and 1967."[7]

In 2008, a Karachi resident reminisced about the Jews of Karachi in a conversation with Pakistani journalist Syed Intikhab Ali: "[The Jews] were peaceful people having limited relations with local people and used to keep a distance from political activities. When [the] Arab-Israel war broke out in late sixties, they were isolated and started migrating silently and only a few Jewish people [were] left in the city."[8]

From various accounts, it appears that some Jews might be living in Pakistan even now, possibly by hiding their religious identity lest it may not be possible for them to move to Israel due to absence of diplomatic ties between the two countries.

Although there is no notable Jewish presence in Pakistan now, the anti-Jewish and anti-Israel protests in Pakistan have taken on an ideological nature, with religious and political leaders blaming Jews/Israel, Christians/the West/U.S., and Hindus/India as the cause of almost all of their problems. By 2010, it could be said that not a week passed in Pakistan without a religious leader, a columnist, or a politician issuing a statement against Israel and the Jewish people, blaming them as well as the United States and India for one or another of the problems facing Pakistan. Although not all criticism of Israel can be described as antisemitic, it does not appear that the Pakistani leaders in their own minds see subtle differences between their hateful ideological sloganeering against the Jews and possibly justified criticism of Israel's policies.

II. Main Characteristics of Antisemitism in Pakistan

The new generations of Pakistani youth are being taught by the influential Urdu-language press that all major problems facing the society and state of Pakistan are created by Israel, the U.S., and India – or Jews, Christians, and Hindus respectively. Such thinking originates from deep-rooted antisemitism that has become part of the collective conviction in the Islamic world in contemporary times and has become solidly rooted in the Pakistani public consciousness, with Jews and Israel blamed for almost every problem even when they are not remotely connected to an issue.

With India strengthening its ties to Israel since the mid-1990s, and the United States enhancing its relations with India rapidly in recent years, Pakistani religious leaders view these developments in international relations of the early 21st century as a tripartite "alliance" that threatens the Pakistani state and its Islamic identity. Such an ideological pattern informs the conspiracy-theory narrative that runs through the collective Pakistani psyche and public debate in Pakistan.

a) Antisemitism in Pakistan is Interconnected with Pakistan's Other Perceived Enemies: The "Three Satans" – India, the U.S. and Israel (i.e. Hindus, Christians and Jews)

India, the United States, and Israel are seen in Pakistani public consciousness as three Satans acting against the Islamic nuclear state of Pakistan. This view is illustrated in various statements of Pakistani opinion makers. A sample of such statements is given below as representative of a sustained ideological campaign against the three countries.

In 2009, Liaqat Baloch, secretary-general of Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, the country's largest religious-political party and a mobilizer of mass public opinion, accused India, Israel and the U.S. of pursuing "a single agenda" against Pakistan, stating: "The U.S., Israel and India are pursuing a single agenda [of weakening Pakistan]. The U.S. aims to weaken Pakistan on the economic and military fronts, while India wants to weaken Pakistan internally."[9] Syed Munawwar Hassan, emir of Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, has criticized the Pakistani Army operations against the Taliban, arguing that Pakistan faces threats not from the militants but from the "three enemies, in the form of the U.S., Israel and India, which are the center of evils."[10]

In July 2010, the Taliban suicide bombers, who enjoy theological support from Deobandi clerics, bombed the shrine of 11th century Sufi mystic Syed Ali Hajveri in Lahore. The Sufi shrines in South Asia get their theological justification from Barelvi clerics, a school of Sunni Islam disapproved of by Deobandi clerics. Soon after the attack, clerics of Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan accused "U.S. Marines, Jews, and Blackwater" (the private U.S. security firm now known as Xe Worldwide Services) of planning and executing the shrine bombing.[11] Syed Munawwar Hasan, emir of Jamaat-e-Islami, said that the Pakistani government was accusing religious organizations of attacking the shrine in order to divert public attention from the U.S.'s role in the shrine bombing, and added: "No Muslim can do what happened in the tomb of Data Sahab [aka Syed Ali Hajveri]. American Marines and Blackwater are responsible for it."[12] Former Jamaat-e-Islami Emir Qazi Hussain Ahmed claimed that India and Israel were involved in the bombings, and stated: "[Indian intelligence] RAW and [Israel's] Mossad are responsible for attacks on the tombs of Sufi mystics. They want to spread sectarian strife in Pakistan."[13]

Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri, secretary-general of the religious organization Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, blamed India, American agents such as Blackwater, and the Jews for the terror attacks in Pakistan, stating: "Blaming the Taliban for every terrorist activity serves the purpose of the United States. The fact that Blackwater and Jewish elements are involved in terrorism gets ignored. It's not that the Taliban are not involved – yet blaming them for everything is not right."[14]

A few weeks before the July 2010 Lahore shrine bombing, Hafiz Ibtisam Elahi Zaheer, general secretary of the puritan Islamic group Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith, accused India and Israel of fomenting terrorism in Pakistan, stating: "The government of Pakistan needs to check the involvement of India and Israel in the current stream of terror attacks in Pakistan. India and Israel... are patronizing the terrorist activities in Pakistan."[15]

The Lahore shrine bombing led to the emergence of anti-Deobandi, anti-Taliban alliance called Sunni Ittehad Council, which has pressed ahead with its demand that the government act against the Sunni militant organizations. To counter this group led by Barelvi clerics, the rival Deobandi scholars organized a conference in the first week of July at the Jamia Naeemia madrassa of Karachi, where prominent cleric Mufti Mohammad Naeem slammed the terrorists for attacking the shrine but in the same breath also criticized the Sunni Ittehad Council for demanding action against pro-militant religious organizations as well as the Tablighi Jamaat's congregations. Mufti Mohammad Naeem told the press conference: "The demand for a ban on Tablighi congregations by the Sunni Ittihad Council is like reiterating demands by the Jews and Christians. The demands for a ban on Lashkar-e-Taiba and Tablighi Jamaat are being put forward at the behest of India and other anti-Islam forces."[16] Tablighi Jamaat is a revivalist Islamic movement while Lashkar-e-Taiba is a jihadist organization, with both the organizations having their bases in Muridke, near Lahore.

In October 2010, a joint statement on the issue of the emerging Deobandi-Barelvi dispute was signed by clerics of various Islamic schools, among them: Maulana Abdul Malik, the Emir of Jamiat-e-Ittehadul Ulema Pakistan (JIUP); Maulana Abdur Rauf Malik, the chief of Muttahida Ulema Council; JIUP Secretary General Allama Ghulam Rasool Rashidi and his deputy Maulana Abdul Jalail Naqshbandi; JIUP's Punjab chief Maulana Ataur Rehman; and prominent clerics Maulana Abdul Akbar Chitrali and Hafiz Muhammad Idrees of Idara Ma'raf-e-Islami Mansoorah. The statement accused what it called the "U.S.-India-Israel troika" of hatching a conspiracy to foment Deobandi-Barelvi clashes, and expressed concern that "a conspiracy is being implemented by the U.S.-India-Israel troika to cause Deobandi-Barelvi clashes to further divide and weaken the Muslim Ummah."[17]

Addressing young students on the 23rd day of an ideological summer school in Lahore in July 2009, Majeed Nizami, editor-in-chief of the influential Urdu-language Roznama Nawa-i-Waqt, stated: "The trinity of satanic alliance [U.S., Israel, and India] is opposed to Pakistan..."[18] This is one point on which Nizami has consistently campaigned to create mass public opinion, especially among young students from schools across Pakistan. In October 2010, Nizami stated that the "real target" of the U.S.-led war on terror is Pakistan, adding: "The U.S. has currently launched a Crusade against the world of Islam... Instead of ending the drone attacks [in Pakistan], the U.S. has increased them. It will not desist until we reply to them [i.e. to the drone attacks]."[19] He also accused India of being on a mission to "undo Pakistan."[20] Nizami has regularly described India, the U.S. and Israel as "three Satans" out to destroy Pakistan.[21]

In mid-2009, Colonel Imam, a prominent and widely interviewed former Pakistani spy who is credited for raising the Taliban and whose real name is Amir Sultan, was speaking about the U.S. military operation in Afghanistan's Helmand province. He went on to speak about Israel, stating that six intelligence international agencies are active against the state of Pakistan, though he named only three – RAW of India, the CIA and Israel's Mossad, and also alleged that Mossad has opened an office in Kabul to eliminate Pakistan.[22]

Over the past few years, the Jang Group, the largest media conglomerate in Pakistan, has carried out a concerted campaign to unseat the elected government of President Asif Zardari. Late in 2009, several senior journalists writing in the Urdu-language daily Roznama Jang were dubbed "Israeli agents" by Gul Muhammad Jakhrani, a lawmaker of the ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP).[23] Jakhrani said: "[Journalists] Kamran Khan, Shaheen Sehbai, Shahid Masood, Ansar Abbasi and Saleh Zaffir are Israeli agents and they were assigned the task of creating instability in Pakistan and pitting the institutions of the country against one another so that the Israeli desire to keep Pakistan unstable might be fulfilled."[24] It can be said that the lawmaker was probably not serious about his statement that these journalists are Israeli agents; nevertheless, his statement illustrates how Pakistani leaders blame Jews and Israel for every issue that is not even remotely connected to Jews.

b) Antisemitism is Used Instrumentally by the Pakistani Military

Such conspiracy theories against Jews and Israel have also penetrated the Pakistani military establishment, which is strengthened by the day-to-day arguments forwarded by a large number of Pakistani religious organizations. In early 2009, Pakistan's secular leaders signed a shari'a-for-peace deal with Taliban leader Maulana Fazlullah; soon after the deal, the Taliban imposed a total ban on girls' education in Swat district. Later, an international outcry against the Taliban forced Pakistan to carry out a military operation in Swat, leading to arrests of hundreds of militants and seizure of arms and ammunition.

The Urdu-language daily Roznama Express alleged in a report that Pakistani "security officials have also confirmed that the weapons seized [from militants in Swat] were Russian-, Indian- and U.S.-made, while Israel provided them modern technology. Evidences have also been secured regarding the use of such technology in the installation of FM radio by Maulana Fazlullah."[25] The reference to FM radio means a radio channel that was run by Maulana Fazlullah to advocate his mission of jihad and the need to enforce Islamic shari'a in Pakistan.

In June 2009, the mass-circulation Urdu-language newspaper Roznama Jang quoted senior Pakistani military and national security officials as saying that there is "irrefutable evidence" that Israel and India are fomenting trouble in Pakistan's Baluchistan and Waziristan region.[26] The military and security officials were unidentified in the report, as is the norm. Another report in the Urdu-language newspaper Roznama Express alleged that there is evidence that Taliban commanders Maulana Fazlullah and Baitullah Mehsud (who was killed later in August 2009) conducted meetings with officials of India's external intelligence Research & Analysis Wing (RAW).[27]

Throughout 2010, Pakistan Army was under pressure from the U.S. to carry out a military operation in North Waziristan, a safe haven for terrorists belonging to the Taliban, the Haqqani Network and Al-Qaeda. In early 2010, the Pakistan Army dropped pamphlets in North Waziristan, linking the Taliban with Israel, India and Al-Qaeda.[28]According to a report in the Lahore-based newspaper Daily Times, the pamphlet gave a detailed account of how the Taliban derives its power from its connections with "[the] anti-Islamic (Indian) RAW and (the Israeli) Mossad intelligence agencies and Indian consulates in Afghanistan."[29]

Urging the tribes to support the government, the two-page pamphlet "informed the tribal people about the Taliban's source of income, which is mainly generated from drug smugglers and 'contacts' (India and Israel)."[30] According to another report in The News daily, the military's pamphlet, which was titled "Correct Decision and First Step Towards Right Direction," accused the Taliban of acquiring funds from India, Israel and Al-Qaeda to buy heavy weapons and brainwash innocent youth.[31]

Earlier, in October 2009, when the Pakistan Army launched an operation against the Taliban in South Waziristan, former Jamaat-e-Islami chief Qazi Hussain Ahmed described the military offensive to be the "result of an Indian and Israeli conspiracy to create distance between jihadi organizations and the Pakistan Army."[32] He also said that the "tribesmen" – a reference to Taliban militants belonging to the Mehsud tribe – of South Waziristan who were considered the Pakistan Army's hands, and the U.S. and India were afraid of, are now being pitched against the Pakistan Army.[33]

c) Antisemitism in Pakistan Used to Designate Threats to Pakistan, Such As the Taliban

Pakistan has seen a wave of suicide attacks in recent years. There is a trend of explaining such threats to Pakistan as emanating from outside Pakistan. For example, the Pakistani leaders generally accuse the Taliban militants of being agents of the United States, India and Israel.

In November 2009, a Peshawar-based daily, The Post quoted what it called "reliable sources" as saying that India and Israel had in 2008 agreed on a plan "to start a deadly episode from July 2009 in which regular suicide attacks will be a permanent feature in Pakistan, and no one knows how long this episode will take."[34] The newspaper accused the two countries of setting up what it called the Indo-Israel Intelligence (Triple III) agency to carry out this plan, adding: "The trained commandos of the said agency have been given the tasks to attack security forces, foreign donor agencies offices, communication lines and public places [in Pakistan]... Sources also disclosed that the Mumbai terrorist attack [of November 2008] was actually a conspiracy against Pakistan, planned by the Triple III Agency, to defame Pakistan."[35]

In December 2009, lawyers belonging to the Islamabad Bar Association did not attend court proceedings in order to protest against what they called "the unreasonable interference of the U.S. in Pakistan and the presence of Blackwater (Xe) in the country."[36] Riast Ali Azad, general secretary of the Islamabad Bar Association, told the protesters at a public rally, "Besides the Taliban, Blackwater is also involved in the current incidents of terrorism in the country. Blackwater, Mossad and RAW have teamed up against Pakistan and are supporting miscreants to destabilize our country."[37]

Addressing a meeting in Sialkot town of Punjab province in April 2010, Syed Salahuddin, chairman of the Pakistan-based terrorist organizations alliance Muttahida Jihad Council, accused the Zardari government of describing "heroes of jihad" as terrorists, adding: "Declaring heroes [of jihad] as terrorists is the worst dishonesty this government could do with history under the pressure of Jews and Hindus."[38]

General Mirza Aslam Baig, former Pakistan Army chief, , has accused Indian, U.S. and Israeli secret agencies of supporting the militant organization Jundallah – a Sunni militant organization formed by two Pakistan military officers and that has carried out attacks against Shi'ite Muslims in Iran and Pakistan.[39] General Baig said, "The Indian secret agency RAW, the CIA, and Israel's Mossad are supporting Jundallah. Unfortunately, all this is being carried out from [the Jundallah base in] Baluchistan."[40]

In March 2010, Professor Sajid Mir, emir of the Jamiat Ahle Hadith, said that the United States, India and Israel are carrying out acts of terrorism in Pakistan while the Pakistani rulers are wrongly holding the Taliban responsible for terrorism. He stated: "The policy to put terrorism on the account of the Taliban is baseless and has failed, and needs to be reviewed."[41] Syed Munawwar Hasan, emir of the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, has accused India of sending suicide bombers into Pakistan, stating: "India is engaged in destabilizing Pakistan under Israeli and U.S. patronage... India is engaged in hatching conspiracies against the ideological and geographical borders of Pakistan and is creating unrest in the country... India is sending suicide bombers to our country and is also involved in terrorism [in Baluchistan]."[42]

In mid-2009, Sahibzada Abul Khair Muhammad Zubair, the chief of Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan, criticized the Taliban for attacks on Sufi shrines in Pakistan, describing the militants as agents of Jews and Christians. According to a report in the Urdu-language newspaper Roznama Jasarat, Zubair said that the Taliban attacks are part of a conspiracy aimed at creating sectarian conflict in Pakistan, calling for confronting the "agents of Jews and Christians who are attacking the shrines of Sufis (mystics) and are killing the Sunni scholars and mystics."[43]

At a Defense of Pakistan conference in Lahore in June 2009, several clerics, including Dr. Sarfraz Naeemi (who later that month was killed by a Taliban suicide bomber) and Pir Sajid-ur-Rehman, asked the Pakistani government to stop fighting in the U.S.-led war on terror and "instead to wage the war to save Pakistan from external and internal enemies, by cutting off the Taliban's supply line of funds from U.S., India, Israel, UAE, and Saudi Arabia."[44] Pir Sajid-ur-Rehman, who called for the enforcement of Nizam-e-Mustafa (the rule of the Prophet) in Pakistan, also accused Washington and New Delhi of running over 50 training centers in Pakistan's tribal areas to prepare Taliban fighters and suicide bombers.[45]

III. Range of Motifs Used in Antisemitic Attacks

The antisemitic thinking of Pakistani leaders spills over into many issues, from sports, the polio vaccination campaign, the Pakistan-India water dispute, Valentine's Day, and April's Fool Day to the United Nations, the Taliban, Islam, and many more. Some, given below, illustrate the extensive scale of antisemitism in Pakistan.

a) Sports – Jews and Indians Lobby against Pakistani Cricketers

In August 2010, Pakistani cricketers were allegedly involved in a match-fixing scandal in England, which was revealed in a sting operation by the British tabloid News of the World. Although the cricket scandal was not even distantly linked to Israel or to Jews, the Urdu-language Pakistani newspaper Roznama Khabrain carried a report alleging that "Indian and Jewish lobbies" in the United Kingdom were responsible for trapping the Pakistani cricket team in order to defame Pakistan and to get rising Pakistani cricketers banned from international cricket.[46]

The Roznama Khabrain report also stated that Jews, through the Indian lobby and Indian bookmakers, paid cash to the match fixers who had Indian wives.[47]

b) The Polio Vaccination Campaign – A Dangerous Jewish Conspiracy

In October 2009, Mahnama Banat-e-Aisha, an Urdu-language monthly magazine which is part of the Haftroza Al-Qalam group of publications belonging to the militant group Jaish-e-Muhammad, alleged in a lengthy article that the international polio eradication campaign was a "dangerous Jewish conspiracy."[48] The article, "Polio: Disease or Dangerous Jewish Conspiracy," read in part:

"The Jews, who dream of ruling the world, have invented different types of vaccines, drugs, and injections in an organized way to weaken Muslims in their beliefs on spiritual, practical, and moral levels, and make their bodies contaminated.

"The oral polio vaccine campaign is being run under a worldwide conspiracy – except in the Zionist countries. Its total focus is now on South Asian countries – India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. The U.S. has already marked this area as an extremely strategic region..."[49]

"Have we ever thought why these greedy Jews and Christians are spending millions of dollars on this campaign...? An analysis of how the polio vaccination is prepared is sufficient in order to understand how the viruses of haram [forbidden] and unpious animals... are being injected into our [Muslim] bodies..."[50]

c) Pakistan-India Water Dispute – Israel's Hand

The dispute between India and Pakistan over the issue of sharing the waters of the rivers that flow from India into Pakistani territory is a purely bilateral matter between the two neighbors. Nevertheless, while articulating their grievances against India, Pakistani leaders make it a point to drag Jews and Israel into the dispute.

In October 2008, Majeed Nizami, editor-in-chief of Roznama Nawa-i-Waqt, wrote an article about the water dispute in which he also described Israel, the U.S. and India as "three Satans" – accusing them of being united against "nuclear-capable Pakistan" and warning: "If, in order to resolve our [water and other] problems, we have to wage a nuclear war with India, we will."[51]

At a seminar on the water issue held by the Nazaria-e-Pakistan Trust in April 2008, Lt.-Gen. Hamid Gul, the former chief of Pakistan's powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), spoke about the water issue but also added: "Two states came into existence in 1947 and 1948: one, Pakistan; two, Israel. The two are threats to each other. Ultimately, only one of them will survive... Pakistan can be saved by making a role model of the Prophet [Muhammad]."[52]

The former ISI chief also alluded to Samuel P. Huntington's clash-of-civilizations thesis, stating: "At this point, the matter is not of a war between civilizations, but that of a clash between systems. Islam is a humanity-loving religion. The West is fighting the last battle for its survival."[53]

Hafiz Zahoorul Hassan Dahir, a prominent anti-India Pakistani activist who works with Hamid Gul and Majeed Nizami, has repeatedly argued the following point about the water dispute: "With the cooperation of the Jewish lobby, India has opened a battlefront of a water war aimed at making Pakistan's fertile lands barren."[54]

d) The UN – A Jewish Conspiracy

In 2008, the British government expressed support for India's bid for the permanent membership of the UN Security Council (UNSC). This move was declared by Raja Basharat Khan, convener of the Jamaat-e-Islami (South Zone-UK), to be a result of the West's "enmity with Islam," and warned that if India became a permanent UNSC member, there would be a new campaign against the interests of Pakistan and other Islamic nations.[55] Islamic clerics of Pakistani origin in the UK such as Raja Basharat Khan and those visiting regularly from Pakistan make similar allegations routinely.

In November 2010, when U.S. President Barack Obama expressed support for India's bid for permanent UNSC membership, former Pakistan Army Chief General (retired) Mirza Aslam Baig criticized Obama and added: "After India, the U.S. will make Israel a member of the Security Council."[56]

In June 2010, when the UNSC approved a new set of sanctions against Iran, former ISI chief Lt.-General Hamid Gul said that the move was part of a plot hatched by the U.S. and Israel against Islam and Iran.[57] Gul added: "The U.S. and the Zionist regime (of Israel) are plotting against Islam, and Iran in particular... 'The enemies of Islam do not know that Iran's nation and government will stand against these sanctions as they stood up to the previous sanctions..."[58]

Jamaat-e-Islami chief Syed Munawwar Hasan commented on the UN sanctions on Iran, stating that they had been "clamped [due to] the plea that Tehran was continuing its nuclear programme despite UN warnings and was not cooperating with the world body – a complaint levelled against Tel Aviv with higher intensity... The Zionists and the Hindus are united against the Muslims, but the Muslim rulers are acting as the U.S. stooges... Israel also rejected the UN resolutions on Palestine, but no sanctions were imposed against it."[59]

Speaking on the issue of Israel's May 2010 commando action against the Gaza flotilla, Mian Mehboob Ahmed, retired chief justice of Pakistan's Federal Shariat Court, said in June 2010: "Muslim countries should quit the United Nations Organization (UNO) and strengthen the Organization of Islamic Countries (OIC) to contest the conspiracies by the Jews and the Christians."[60] The former chief justice went on to describe the United Nations as "an extension of the power of Jews and nothing else."[61]

e) Pakistani Interests Abroad – Harmed by Jews/Israel

In Pakistani consciousness, nurtured by the religious organizations over the past six decades, Pakistan is seen as an Islamic nation, leading the likely emergence of a global Islamic caliphate. Dr. Rafiq Ahmed, a right-wing thinker and motivational speaker, said in June 2010 that Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, was not secular, and described the Pakistan movement that had led to the creation of the country as an Islamic movement. Addressing a congregation of madrassa students in Lahore, Ahmed said, "The Pakistan movement was an Islamic movement which aimed at establishing and reviving the Caliphate after achieving a separate state for Muslims."[62]

Issues related to Pakistanis abroad as well as to Islam are also explained in Pakistan in terms of antisemitic references to Israel and Jews, as Pakistan is viewed as defender of Islamic interests internationally.

UK Prime Minister David Cameron appointed Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, who is of Pakistani origin, as the chair of his Conservative Party. Warsi's rise to prominence in British politics has been celebrated in Pakistan. In 2010, Baroness Sayeeda Warsi was barred by her party from attending an Islamist conference in London. The Global Peace and Unity conference was organized by the Islam television channel, which has been accused of promoting Islamic extremism. The Urdu-language daily Roznama Nawa-i-Waqt published a report stating that the "Jewish lobby" played a key role in stopping Warsi from taking part in the Islamic conference.[63] The report alleged that UK Home Secretary Theresa May and her advisor Mr. Nick Timothy acted at the behest of the Jewish lobby in Britain to stop Warsi from taking part in the event, stating that Ms. May told Warsi that she could not attend the conference. When, according to the report, Warsi told her that she could not stop her, Ms. May contacted her superiors in the Conservative Party and used her influence to stop Ms. Warsi.[64]

The report added that the UK's denial of a visa to former Jamaat-e-Islami chief Qazi Hussain Ahmed to attend the same conference came at the behest of the Jewish lobby.[65]

In February 2010, there was a row in India over a newspaper's publication of a sketch of Jesus Christ. It provoked a strong reaction in Pakistan, where Islamic clerics, speaking at an event organized by the Muhammadia Students, a pro-jihadist youth group, alleged an "Israeli hand" in the publication of the "blasphemous" sketch of Jesus and urged the Indian government to take action against such "an old habit of infidels."[66]

In mid-May 2010, Mohammad Hussain Mehnati, a Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan cleric, addressed a meeting of religious leaders in Karachi soon after attending the funeral ceremony of a Jamaat-e-Islami militant who was killed in Indian Kashmir. He told them: "The majority of the Kashmiri population wants annexation of Kashmir with Pakistan, but India, with the consent of the U.S. and Israel, is forcefully depriving them of their right to self-determination. The Muslim Ummah is facing the wrath of Allah for it has distanced itself from Jihad. Jamaat-e-Islami supported jihad and the mujahideen yesterday and will always support them."[67] Maulana Javaid Kasoori, a senior militant commander of Hizbul Mujahideen was among those present at the meeting.

f) Valentine's Day and April Fools' Day – Used by Jews and Hindus against Muslims

Pakistani leaders use almost every occasion to talk negatively about Israel, the U.S. and India. While some religious leaders can be credited for terming events like Valentine's Day and April Fools' Day in purely scholarly terms, as bid'a (innovation in Islam), and therefore lacking sanction in Islam, a large number of them make Jews, Hindus, and Christians targets in their public speeches.

In February 2008, Samia Raheel Qazi, the daughter of Jamaat-e-Islami leader Qazi Hussein Ahmed, described Valentine's Day as an irreligious event and criticized the Pakistani media for presenting it in a positive manner. In the same breath, she added: "Jews and Hindus have specially designed this occasion in order to weaken the beliefs and traditions of Muslims."[68]

Any event that might have originated in the West is seen by Pakistani leaders as anti-Islam and therefore as anti-Pakistan. Prominent Pakistani cleric Allama Qazi Ahmad Noorani Siddiqui, a leader of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan, stated in 2010 that events like April Fools' Day or Valentine's Day are bid'ah (innovation or digression), blind imitations of the West, and have no connection to Islam.[69] He noted that April Fools' Day marks the large-scale killings of Muslims in Islamic Granada (Spain) on April 1, 1492 by the armies of Christian ruler Ferdinand II, and the defeat of the Muslims in Spain.

g) Ahmadi Muslims – Israeli/Indian Agents

Ahmadi Muslims, whom Islamic clerics accuse of not believing that the Prophet Muhammad is God's final prophet, have been declared to be non-Muslims in Pakistan, are barred from calling themselves Muslims, may not use Islamic symbols, and may not call their places of worship mosques. They are simply called Ahmadis, even by fair-minded Pakistani nationals, due to legal reasons, or pejoratively dismissed as Qadianis, after the Indian town of Qadian where the Ahmadiyya movement began in the late 19th century.

Haftroza Al-Qalam, an Urdu-language weekly published by jihadist organization Jaish-e-Muhammad, published an article accusing "the U.S., Israel and India" of trying to divide Pakistan into pieces.[70] The article alleged that India has sent 10,000 troops to Afghanistan, adding: "The U.S. and NATO forces based in Afghanistan have also deployed 40,000 personnel along Pakistan's border... The U.S. also plans to establish a Qadiani state, consisting of Kashmir and northern areas; Greater Pashtunistan; Greater Baluchistan; Punjab; and Karachi Free Port."[71]

Maulana Allahyar Arshad, the leader of the International Tehreek-e-Tahaffuz-e-Khatm-e-Nabuwat, an anti-Ahmadi Muslim movement, accused Qadianis (Ahmadi Muslims) of utilizing their pilgrimages to Qadian in India to connect with Israeli spy agencies and Israeli Qadianis, and added: "The Qadianis [Ahmadi Muslims] are spying on Pakistan and reveal Pakistani secrets during their visit to Qadian for pilgrimage... The Qadianis were traitors yesterday and are so also today; trusting them means playing with the stability of Pakistan."[72]

In March 2010, Liaqat Baloch, general secretary of Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, accused Ahmadi Muslims and the Israeli Mossad of trying to jointly destabilize religious institutions, adding: "Anti-Islam and anti-Pakistan forces want to destabilize religious institutions by igniting violence between the Deobandi and Barelvi [sects of Sunni Islam]. The Mossad and Qadiani lobby are involved in this wicked conspiracy..."[73]

In April 2010, Islamic clerics from the International Khatm-e-Nabuwat Movement, which campaigns against Ahmadi Muslims, accused the "Qadiani lobby" of engaging in activities to eliminate Islam from Pakistan, adding: "Qadianis [i.e. Ahmadi Muslims] have always been trying to achieve the status in Pakistan that Jews have in America."[74] The statement was made at a conference in Lahore where Maulana Abdul Hafeez Makki, a leading cleric of the anti-Ahmadi Muslims movement, was among the speakers.

h) Video of Taliban Flogging Woman – Made by Jews to Smear Pakistan

In early 2009, a video emerged showing Pakistani Taliban militants flogging a girl in Pakistan's Swat district, as she lay sobbing in pain. There has been some debate in Pakistan about the authenticity of the video.

Senator Azam Khan Swati, Pakistan's U.S.-educated science and technology minister, blamed the Jews for the video, stating: "The flogging of the 17-year-old girl in Swat was a Jewish conspiracy aimed at destroying peace in Swat and [at] distorting the image of Islamists who sport beards and wear turbans."[75]

i) Facebook – A Jewish/Israeli Conspiracy

In 2010, the social networking site Facebook was the focus of an international controversy, after one of its millions of users launched a Draw Muhammad Day page asking people to post sketches of Islam's Prophet Muhammad. Facebook was condemned widely in Pakistan and was, along with YouTube and hundreds of other websites, blocked by the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority (PTA) for publishing content blaspheming against the Prophet Muhammad. However, the PTA did not block any of the numerous websites of Pakistani religious organizations that publish hateful materials.

Maulana Ilyas Chinioti, a prominent Pakistani cleric from the International Khatm-e-Nabuwat Movement, which campaigns to enforce the Islamic doctrinal principle that Islam's Prophet Muhammad was the last prophet of god, commented on the Facebook campaign, urging Muslims worldwide to boycott all products marketed or made by companies that are owned by Jews.[76]

Addressing a public protest meeting against Facebook, Chinioti blamed the Jews for organizing the drawing contest, and added: "We will foil all conspiracies against the sanctity of the prophet; and I have submitted a proposition to condemn this shameful act in the Punjab legislative assembly... I appeal to all the Muslims to stop buying products made by Jews. They earn from us and spend the money on heretic activities against our religion. We are indirectly supporting them in heresy by paying thousands of dollars to them daily."[77]

In July 2010, a report in the pro-Taliban Urdu-language daily Roznama Islam described Facebook as anti-Islam, noting that Facebook is owned by a Zionist Jew, that Israel is using Facebook to recruit spies from Muslim countries, and that after collecting information about people from the website, they are trapped or blackmailed into spying for Israel.[78]

j) Pakistan's Nuclear Weapons – Targeted by Jews/Israel

Over the past few years, there has been an ongoing international concern over the security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons amid the Taliban terror attacks. Pakistani leaders think that there is an international game plan to destroy the Islamic nuclear identity of Pakistan.

In November 2009, in the town of Wana, the headquarters of Pakistan's tribal district of South Waziristan, Pakistani tribesmen held a protest rally against a report in the U.S. magazine The New Yorker that Pakistan and the U.S. were in talks about ways to secure Pakistan's nuclear weapons. According to a report in the Pashtu-language newspaper Wrazpanra Wahdat, thousands of weapons-brandishing tribesmen took part in a jirga, a meeting of tribal elders, which passed a resolution stating: "Pakistan's nuclear command and control system is active. Patriotic tribesmen are always ready for the defense of the motherland."[79] The same resolution inserted an argument about Israel, asking the Afghan government to stop international intelligence agencies' anti-Pakistan activities on Afghan soil, and added: "Israel's secret agency Mossad and the Indian secret agency RAW are using Afghan soil against Pakistan."[80]

According to an Urdu-language daily, Major-General (Retired) Rahat, a former military officer, has said: "The U.S., India and Israel have been trying to capture our nuclear assets or to get the nuclear program rolled back. For this purpose, they have been hatching conspiracies to weaken the two strong institutions of Pakistan, the army and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI)."[81] Muhammad Ibrahim Khan, the emir of Jamaat-e-Islami for Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province (formerly North West Frontier Province), has urged the Pakistani government to quit its role in the war on terror, stating: "The U.S.-India-Israel nexus is against Pakistan, and is busy hatching conspiracies against Pakistan's nuclear power."[82]

Lt.-Gen. Talat Masood, a retired military officer and well-known political commentator, has accused India, Israel and U.S. non-proliferation lobbies of demonizing Pakistan. In an article that urged the Pakistan Army to stop supporting militant organizations, Masood accused the U.S., India, Israel, and non-proliferation groups worldwide of demonizing Pakistan. He said: "Indian, Israeli and non-proliferation lobbies are... active in demonizing Pakistan and trying to block, delay and reduce U.S. assistance. And these detractors are working overtime to keep reminding the Obama administration of Pakistan's history of proliferation and its support of the Taliban and jihadi groups – not realizing that all of these policies were adopted in a certain historical and geostrategic context. The situation now is indeed very different, as Pakistan is locked in a survival struggle fighting the Taliban and militants on a broad front..."[83]

Majeed Nizami, the veteran editor, told a seminar: "The United States has drawn up a plan to hand over Pakistan to India, and Iran to Israel, because Pakistan is an atomic power and Iran is heading to be an atomic power."[84] The Urdu-language newspaper Roznama Khabrain wrote in late 2008 that there was "confirmed information about a [likely] Indian attack on Pakistan's nuclear installations" and added: "In order to attack Pakistan's nuclear installations and the installations of [Pakistan] air force with the help of Israel, the Indian Air Force painted the Indian flag on Israeli fighters planes."[85]

Criticizing the deployment of additional U.S. troops in Afghanistan, Lt.-Gen. Hamid Gul, the former chief of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), said: "India and Israel have placed stress upon the U.S. to destroy Pakistan's nuclear assets before leaving Afghanistan... India and Israel will not be safe if the U.S. withdraws from Afghanistan and Pakistan's nuclear assets, ISI, and Pakistan Army remain intact."[86]

In early 2009, Roznama Jasarat, an Urdu-language newspaper of the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, alleged that Israel is spying on Pakistani nuclear program via Fatah, the organization of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud 'Abbas. It added: "Israel is directly monitoring Pakistan's nuclear program through the Fatah network in Pakistan..."[87] The Urdu daily added that Israel has stations in Afghanistan and India to monitor the Pakistani nuclear program.[88]

Jamaat-e-Islami leader Liaqat Baloch, arguing that the Americans are now suffering defeat in Afghanistan, said: "The U.S. and Israel want to capture the nuclear installations of Pakistan and gain access to the water and air of Pakistan to reach Iran and China."[89] Abdul Basit, the spokesman of Pakistan's Foreign Office, has also officially described what he called "India-Israel nexus" as a threat to regional security in South Asia, adding: "We are concerned over the domination of India in traditional and nuclear arms. However, minimum nuclear deterrence would be maintained [by Pakistan] in the region for lasting peace in the region."[90]

k) Faisal Shehzad's Times Square Attack – A CIA/Mossad Plot to Implicate Pakistan

On the evening of May 1, 2010, Faisal Shehzad, a U.S. citizen of Pakistani origin, carried out a failed car bombing in New York's Times Square. A video that emerged of Faisal Shehzad afterward showed him embracing Hakimullah Mehsud, the emir of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP or the Movement of Pakistani Taliban).

However, Sajid Ansari, a columnist with The Frontier Post, a Peshawar-based daily, alleged that the Times Square terror attack was plotted by the CIA and the Israeli Mossad. He wrote: "It may be true, in the wake of 'Times Square Bomb,' possibly a 'set-up' plan [has been] made by CIA and Mossad, to create pleas and justifications to attack and invade Pakistan, as a last resort after failing to achieve the 'desired objectives' to denuclearize Pakistan, exactly as they did with Iraq on a fake CIA report of the presence of WMDs in Iraq... However, in the case of Pakistan, after miserably failing to lay hands on Pakistani nuclear sites and arsenals, through the... Pakistani Taliban and Indian army infiltrators in the cities of the... [Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of] Pakistan, the U.S./CIA and the Mossad have now possibly 'set up' a plan to attack Pakistan [using the pretext provided by the] 'Times Square bomb.' And they will, as they are out of time, because President Barack Obama has asked them to 'finish the job' by July 2011... I foresee a possible pre-emptive (nuclear) attack by U.S. and NATO on Pakistan, in collaboration with India..."[91]

Soon, Faisal Shehzad was arrested by the U.S. authorities as he tried to flee the U.S. A report in the Urdu-language Pakistani daily Roznama Nawa-i-Waqt underlined the fear of an international conspiracy in the arrest of Faisal Shehzad, stating: "The fact that [U.S.] federal attorney [Preet Bharara] is a Hindu with a Jewish wife gives the story an air of a conspiracy against Pakistan, jointly hatched by Indian and Israeli lobbies in the U.S."[92] The report also alleged that a number of Pakistani-American citizens are working as American agents and that Faisal Shahzad could be one of them.[93]

IV. The Jews and the West Undermine the Identity of Pakistan

In the intellectual world of Pakistani leaders, Israel, India and the U.S. are out to wipe out the identity and existence of Pakistan. Much of the antisemitism that is being witnessed in Pakistan is rooted in perceived threats seen by Pakistani leaders as emanating from a range of national and international issues, including from statements on the human rights situation in Pakistan by various nongovernmental organizations. Even the internal struggle between secularists and religious groups to shape the identity of Pakistan – a struggle that has been ongoing since the creation of the Islamic nation in 1947 – is described in terms of antisemitic references to Jews and Israel, Hindus and India, Christians and the U.S.-led Western world.

In 2008, Jamaat-e-Islami leader Qazi Hussain Ahmed accused "the United States and the Jews" of trying to make Pakistan a secular country.[94] He went on to state that the U.S.-led war on terror is a pretext for secularizing Pakistan, and called U.S. aid a dangerous conspiracy against Pakistan.[95] In late 2010, a move by liberal politicians of the ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP) to press for amendment in Pakistan's controversial blasphemy law invited strong opposition from all religious organizations in Pakistan. Jamaat-e-Islami chief Syed Munawwar Hasan called for foiling "secular conspiracies" against Pakistan.[96] A number of religious organizations joined hands against what they called a "conspiracy of the secular lobby in Pakistan at the behest of the West to repeal the blasphemy laws."[97] During the August 2010 floods that devastated most of Pakistan, Qari Hanif Jalandhari, secretary general of the Wafaqul Madaris Al-Arabia (which controls thousands of Deobandi madrassas in Pakistan), condemned the secular nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) for their flood relief work, stating that the NGOs are anti-Islam and are advancing a Western agenda through their relief work.[98]

Madrassas – i.e. the Islamic seminaries responsible for training Taliban militants – are seen as fortresses of Islam and as essential to the identity of Pakistan. Commenting on the role of Pakistani madrassas, Pakistani women's rights activist Dr. Fouzia Saeed remarked in early 2010: "All Madrassa students are not suicide bombers, but every suicide bomber hails from a madrassa... The ideology of militancy uses Madaris [Islamic seminaries] as breeding grounds for extremists, militants and suicide bombers."[99]

However, demands by Pakistani social reformers and the Western countries for eradicating extremist influence from madrassas are seen as a Western and Jewish plot to attack at the roots of Pakistan. An attempt in April 2008 to organize a cricket competition – a sport widely popular in South Asia – among students of various madrassas was opposed by the clerics of Jamiat Ahle Sunnat and Wafaqul Madaris Al-Arabia, who said: "None of our madrassas will take part in the cricket tournament, and if anyone does, we will take action against it as per the rules."[100] These views were expressed during a press conference by the deputy secretary of Wafaqul Madaris Al-Arabia, Maulana Qazi Abdur Rashid, and other Islamic scholars.

Pakistan's Minister of Education Khwaja Asif Ahmed Ali said in November 2010 that the madrassa system of education in Pakistan cannot be abandoned just because the Western countries do not like it.[101] In January 2010, the executive council of Wafaqul Madaris Al-Arabia, which controls more than 10,000 madrassas in Pakistan, adopted a resolution criticizing negative media propaganda against madrassas. The resolution said that linking religious seminaries to lawlessness, insecurity and terrorism is the "biggest lie of history" and "part of Jewish and Christian propaganda."[102] The executive council which adopted the resolution included Maulana Fazlur Rehman, Maulana Samiul Haq, Salimullah Khan, Mufti Rafi Usmani and others. On another occasion, Qari Muhammad Hanif Jalandhari, chief of Wafaqul Madaris Al-Arabia, said that the "baseless propaganda campaign" against the madrassas was launched under "a Jewish plan to defame them."[103]

Views about Jews and Israel are also defined by a conception held by numerous ideologues in Pakistan – that out of the two states of Pakistan and Israel, only Pakistan should exist. This viewpoint has been singularly articulated by Lt.-Gen. Hamid Gul who, as noted above, has said: "Two states came into existence in 1947 and 1948: one, Pakistan; two, Israel. The two are threats to each other. Ultimately, only one of them will survive."[104]

In 2010, a pro-Palestinian Pakistani website published an article stating: "All Pakistanis who support the just cause of Palestine and like-minded people across the world are on the same page. Our supporters across the world are our natural allies. Our opponents are on wrong side of history. They cannot be our friends or allies without siding with us against Zionist Israel. Factually speaking, founder of Pakistan, Quaid-e-Azam [Great Leader] Mohammad Ali Jinnah always demanded a just and honorable solution to the Palestine problem. A just solution means one Palestine, and not the Zionist state of Israel. The supporters of Israel are not qualified to influence Pakistan's foreign policy. The United States must choose between support for Israel and friendship with the Pakistani nation. We Pakistanis must ask the U.S. and other allies of Israel in Europe and other continents who they choose: the Pakistani nation or the Zionist regime of Israel. It is high time to tell everyone that Pakistan and supporters of Israel cannot go together..."[105]

In 2010, the WikiLeaks website published classified Pentagon documents and diplomatic cables from U.S. embassies worldwide, causing an international controversy. Some of the WikiLeaks revelations exposed Pakistani military and political leaders' private opinions of each other and Arab leaders' opinions of Pakistani leaders, thereby straining relationships and ties among Islamic nations. The Pakistani Defense Committee of the Cabinet (DCC), which held a meeting under the chairmanship of Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani in Islamabad, described the WikiLeaks revelations as "an attempt to damage the tashakkhus [identity/image] of Pakistan."[106]

Speaking about the Pentagon documents, which referred to Pakistan's continued support of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, former ISI chief Hamid Gul blamed Israel and India for the leaks, stating that India and Israel want to use the U.S. against the ISI.[107] A report in the Roznama Nawa-i-Waqt daily also quoted Gul as saying that the documents were leaked by WikiLeaks to create a charge sheet against Pakistan Army Chief General Ashfaq Kayani and Lt.-Gen. Shuja Pasha, the current chief of ISI and Kayani's successor, over the issue of support to the militants in Afghanistan.[108]

Former Pakistani minister Azam Khan Hoti described the release of U.S. diplomatic cables as part of "the CIA's game plan" to create differences between Islamic nations and to defame all those who refuse to toe the U.S. line on international relations.[109] Jamaat-e-Islami chief Syed Munawwar Hasan said: "The U.S. is behind the WikiLeaks revelations, the purpose of which is to cause turmoil in Pakistan and conflicts among Islamic nations."[110]

Pakistani columnist Matloob Ahmad Warraich penned a lengthy article in the Urdu language, alleging a Jewish/Christian/Indian conspiracy behind the WikiLeaks revelations. Given that his article summarizes many arguments at one place which otherwise are articulated by Pakistani leaders in bits and pieces, detailed excerpts from the lengthy article are worth stating here:

"The facts are something like this: the owners of the WikiLeaks website are purely Americans and Jews, who from time to time achieve their objectives by causing havoc to international peace..."[111]

"In the U.S., the fast growing and prospering religion of Islam was giving trouble to the orthodox Christians and Jews. And according to a survey, by 2010 an added seven percent of Americans would have converted to Islam if there had been no 9/11, and by 2050 Islam would have become the largest religion followed in the U.S... After the Twin Towers incident in America, we find a wave of transformation and hatred there, the brunt of which was borne only by the Muslim community there..."[112]

"After the tragedy of 9/11, which was in fact a tragedy for Muslims, the alliance between our eternal enemy India and Israel has prospered so much that Israel, which used to fear us [i.e. Pakistan], now together with our enemy is grinning at us. And we keep quiet at times due to the allegations [against us] in the [2008] Mumbai attacks and at times for the allegation of the [2001] attack on the Indian parliament... If the present WikiLeaks revelations are seen in an international context, it comes near to the possibility that Israel and the international organization of Jews [WikiLeaks, probably] have once again tried to hatch a conspiracy to cause instability in the Islamic world by making Muslims fight against each other..."[113]

"On the one hand, there is an attempt to pit Saudi ruler Shah Abdullah against Iran. The world knows that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, once declared Hitler by WikiLeaks, is not only fighting valiantly against the international conspiracy of the U.S., but was also successful in briefing world opinion about the truth, in his last UN address. The U.S. would not dare to attack Iran... despite all efforts, while in the past it has achieved its goal by bringing Iran and Iraq to the battlefield. The two big Muslim forces were weakened not only in their defense and economy by the Iraq-Iran War [of the 1980s], but over two million people were killed in this war, which lasted for more than 10 years.

"Even then the thirst of these white wolves [i.e. Western nations] was not quenched. And the U.S. unleashed a reign of barbarism on the defeated Iraqis, and trampled the remaining Iraqis under its defiled feet. The American and the Jewish lobbies, whose mouths have tasted human blood – these wolves now want to create confrontation between Saudi Arabia and Iran... According to WikiLeaks, the Saudi ruler has suggested to the U.S. to attack Iran's nuclear program.

"And on the other hand, India is engaged in its unpious game plan [against Pakistan], and the world knows that Indians residing in the U.S. make the second largest community and these Indian-born Hindus are occupying major posts and positions in the U.S., including in the daily life there.

"On the other hand, Pakistan, which is trapped in its internal trouble and economic instability, has been getting monetary benefits from its friendly country Saudi Arabia. In every difficult situation – be it the wars of 1965 and 1971 or be it the Pakistani nuclear program or the earthquake of 2006 [sic] or the flood of 2010 – the Saudi government has always stood by Pakistan; it has never left the Pakistani people alone in a difficult time. There might be some truth in this fact [revealed by WikiLeaks] that Saudi Arabia may have had differences of opinion on the issue of the woman ruler [i.e. Benazir Bhutto being the prime minister of Pakistan] or due to personal dislike of [her widower] President Asif Ali Zardari; but when it comes to the people of Pakistan, the Saudi people have always been ready to give free oil and blood to Pakistan.

"Through WikiLeaks, Jewish and Indian lobbies have tried to kill many birds with one stone... WikiLeaks and the Jewish and Christian lobbies should note that no rescue operation can save them if the jungle catches fire. India and Israel go unmentioned in WikiLeaks, and this is what [leads] us to wonder."[114]

Conclusion

In addition to the thousands of Islamic clerics in small towns whose opinions fail to appear in the major newspapers for want of space, some of the prominent Pakistani personalities and ideologues who are engendering anti-Jewish and anti-Israel prejudices and conspiracy theories in Pakistani society are senior editor Majeed Nizami, former Pakistani Army officer Lieutenant-General Hamid Gul, jihadist demagogue Zaid Hamid, Jamaat-e-Islami chief Syed Munawwar Hasan and his predecessor Qazi Hussain Ahmed. While it can be argued that the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan cannot, for example, win an election on its own, it is nevertheless the largest mass organization in the country. Like other religious organizations, its role in shaping public opinion in Pakistan is thorough.

Retired Lt.-Gen. Hamid Gul, the former chief of the Pakistani military's all-powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), has assumed the role of a spokesman for the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in recent years. On numerous occasions and in media interviews, he analyzes various Pakistani and international issues of the day in terms of a presumed unified role played by the U.S., India and Israel internationally. Zaid Hamid is a political campaigner who has been leading the mass movement in Pakistan in favor of jihad and has been strengthening antisemitism in the country.

Majeed Nizami is not an average Pakistani journalist trying to shape public opinion in Pakistani society. He enjoys a greater role in influencing a generation of Pakistani journalists. Nizami heads the Nazaria-e-Pakistan Trust, or the Ideology of Pakistan Trust – a think tank created under a legislation passed by the legislative assembly of Punjab, the most influential province in Pakistani politics, armed forces and governance. In October 2010, Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani lauded Nizami for his 50 years of journalism and for keeping alive "in all circumstances" the Two-Nation Theory – the idea that Hindus and Muslims cannot live together, which led to the creation of Pakistan.[115]

The use of antisemitism is prevalent among all sections of Pakistani society, including leaders of a large number of religious organizations which have mass followings, military officers who cannot be identified, former military leaders who can be quoted by name in the media, politicians and lawmakers, columnists and journalists, and others. There is a small liberal class of political commentators, members of non-governmental organizations, columnists and journalists whose views are limited to mainly English-language media, especially the Dawn and Daily Times newspapers.

However, in Pakistan it is the Urdu-language newspapers and magazines, not the English-language media, which exercise massive influence on mass public opinion. It is also pertinent here to note that in Pakistan, the right-wing is the mainstream, which means that the public space for expression of views by the secular commentariat is indeed small.


* Tufail Ahmad is Director of MEMRI's South Asia Studies Project.

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posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, March 29, 2011

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