Brown Pundits

……Yazidi refugees survived by hiding in cave dwellings,
drinking from springs, hunting animals…..families
scattered across Mount Sinjar, a barren range stretching 35 miles
near the border with Syria….there are fears aid will not reach them all……One pershmerga fighter said: “There’s
not enough for everyone….It’s five people to one bottle”…..
…
There seems to be no hope left for the Yazidis dying in droves from thirst (and pain). Just like that, a community will vanish from the face of the Earth, while the world watches (mostly) in silence.

………….

Handfuls of refugees have managed to escape on the helicopters but many are
being left behind because the craft are unable to land on the rocky
mountainside. There, they face thirst and starvation, as well as the
crippling heat of midsummer.



Hundreds, if not more, have already died, including scores of children. A
Yazidi Iraqi MP, Vian Dakhil, told reporters in Baghdad: “We have one or two days left to help these people. After that they will
start dying en masse.”



The Iraqi Army is running several aid missions every day, bringing supplies
including water, flour, bread and shoes. The helicopter flights aim to airlift out refugees on each flight, but the
mountains are sometimes too rocky to land on, meaning they return empty.



Even when it can land, the single helicopter can take just over a dozen
refugees at a time, and then only from the highest point of the mountain
where it is out of range of jihadist missiles. Barely 100 have been rescued
in this way.



 



The flights have also dropped off at least 50 armed Peshmerga, Kurdish forces,
on the mountain, according to Captain Ahmed Jabar.



Other refugees have made their way through Islamic State lines, evading the
jihadists to reach safety, or travelling through Kurdish-controlled sections of Syria to reach the town of Dohuk. 

So far the
Yazidi refugees left behind have survived by hiding in old cave dwellings,
drinking from natural springs and hunting small animals, but with families
scattered across Mount Sinjar, a barren range stretching for around 35 miles
near the border with Syria, there are fears aid will not reach them all
unless the humanitarian relief operation is significantly stepped up .

Hundreds can now be seen making their way slowly across its expanse, carrying
what few possessions they managed to flee with on their backs. Exhausted
children lie listlessly in the arms of their parents, older ones trudging
disconsolately alongside while the sun beats down overhead.



…
The small amount of relief the peshmerga militia can bring up into the
mountain is not simply enough.



One pershmerga fighter, Faisal Elas Hasso, 40, said: “To be honest, there’s
not enough for everyone,” he said. “It’s five people to one bottle.”



….
The refugees who made it out described desperate scenes as they awaited help
from the outside world. “There were about 200 of us, and about 20 of that number have died,” said
Saydo Haji, 28. “We can live for two days, not more.”



…
Emad Edo, 27, who was rescued in an airlift on Friday at the mountain’s
highest point explains how he had to leave his niece, who barely had enough
strength to keep her eyes open, to her fate. “She was about to die, so we left her there and she died,” he said.



….
Others shared similar stories. “Even the caves smell very bad,” Mr Edo added.
According to several of the airlifted refugees, the Geliaji cave alone has
become home to 50 dead bodies. Saydo Kuti Naner, 35, who was one of 13 Yazidis who snuck through Islamic
State lines on Thursday morning, said he travelled through
Kurdish-controlled Syria to get to Kurdistan.



….
He left behind his mother and father, too old to make the rough trip, as well
as 200 sheep. “We got lucky,” he said. “A girl was running [with us] and she
got shot.” He added that this gave enough cover for the rest of them to get
away.



….
Mikey Hassan said he, his two brothers and their families fled up into Mount
Sinjar and then managed to escape to the Kurdish city of Dohuk after two
days, by shooting their way past the jihadists. Mr Hassan said he and his
family went for 17 hours with no food before getting their hands on some
bread.



….
The Yazidis, an ethnically Kurdish community that has kept its religion alive
for centuries in the face of persecution, are at particular threat from the
Islamists, who regard them as ‘devil worshippers’, and drove them from their
homes as the peshmerga fighters withdrew.



….
There have been repeated stories that the jihadists have seized hundreds of
Yazidi women and are holding them in Mosul, either in schools or the prison.
These cannot be confirmed, though they are widely believed and several
Yazidi refugees said they had been unable to contact Yazidi women relatives
who were living behind Islamic State lines.



…..
Kamil Amin, of the Iraqi human rights ministry, said: “We think that the
terrorists by now consider them slaves and they have vicious plans for them.”



….
Tens of thousands of Christians have also been forced to flee in the face of
the advancing IS fighters, many cramming the roads east and north to Erbil
and Dohuk. On Thursday alone, up to 100,000 Iraqi Christians fled their
homes in the Plain of Ninevah around Mosul.

….
Refugees said the American air strikes on IS positions outside Erbil were too
little, too late. They said they felt abandoned by everyone – the central
government in Baghdad, the Americans and British, who invaded in 2003, and
now the Kurds, who had promised to protect them.



….
“When the Americans withdrew from Iraq they didn’t protect the Christians,”
said Jenan Yousef, an Assyrian Catholic who fled Qaraqosh, Iraq’s largest
Christian town, in the early hours of Thursday. “The Christians became the scapegoats. Everyone has been killing us.”

The situation in Sinjar has irreparably damaged the notion of home for the
Yazidis. For a large portion of them, the unique culture of the area will
never return, and they will therefore have nothing to go back for.



….
“We can’t go back to Sinjar mountain because Sinjar is surrounded by Arabs,”
said Aydo Khudida Qasim, 34, who said that Sunni Arab villagers around
Sinjar helped Islamic State take the area. Now he as well as many of his
friends and relatives want to get out of Iraq altogether. “We want to be refugees in other countries, not our own,” he said.

….

Link: http://Iraq-crisis-It-is-death-valley.-Up-to-70-per-cent-of-them-are-dead.html

….

regards

We all know that Canada is welcoming of immigrants, but something like this is still a matter of concern. …

Sikhs are noted as a prosperous community in India (and in the West) but they are facing considerable violence, recently three Sikhs died in Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh, India and one in Peshawar, Khyber Pakhtunwa, Pakistan. Six members of a Sikh congregation were killed and four injured two years ago (August 05, 2012) in an attack on a Gurudwara in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. One Sikh veteran (Gulf War) was killed by the police in Lodi, California in January, 2014. Sikhs (two) were also killed in Sacramento in 2011.
 …………

 ….
It is clear that being a model minority will not save Sikhs, especially when native (white) populations are feeling threatened everywhere by the changing face (more and more browns, blacks) of their communities, in the Americas and in Europe.

……

 …….
It is also interesting to speculate on how much animosity is directed against Sikhs because they are being confused with Muslims. Indeed, Sikhs in USA and UK have from time to time campaigned on the theme of Sikhs are not Muslims!!! Needless to say, brown-on-brown ill-feeling has been brought over from the old country. When the time comes, it is wise to remember, the crocodile will be unsparing.
…….
Police are investigating a racist anti-immigration flyer recently distributed in Brampton. “Peel Regional Police have become aware of the most recent flyer that
is now in circulation in our region depicting insensitive and racially
intolerant messaging,” a police release put out Saturday stated. Cops don’t know who the creator of the flyer is, Const. George Tudos said. “Obviously we’re going to look at all avenues,” he said.

…
According to a statement by the Canadian Race Relations Foundation,
the flyer in question singles out the Sikh community that resides in
Brampton. “By crossing out the image of a Sikh individual while raising the
fear of a ‘massive third-world invasion of Canada’ and claiming that
‘white Canadians’ were being reduced to a ‘minority’, the creators of
the flyers have crossed the line from dialogue into outright racism,”
the CRRF statement said.

….
This is not the first time an anti-immigration flyer has been spotted in Brampton.

In April this year, a group called Immigration Watch Canada
distributed pamphlets showing a picture of white people and a picture of
Sikhs, with numbers indicating immigration population growth as well as
a caption: “Is this what you really want?”

….
IWC spokesman Dan Murray said Saturday the group “did not authorize the distribution of the flyer in Brampton.” Tudos said police still plan to speak with IWC andthe author of the latest flyer is still unknown.

….
Once the investigation is complete, “investigators will be consulting
with the Ministry of the Attorney General to seek the authorization, if
applicable, to lay hate-crime-related charges,” Peel police said in
their statement.

….
Brampton NDP MPP Jagmeet Singh criticized the flyer in a tweet on
Thursday: “Brampton, let’s reject this racist flyer’s message of hate
& instead stand united for diversity & acceptance of all.”

A Rally Against Racism – organized by a group called Brampton United
Against Racism and attended by Singh – was held on Friday outside
Brampton City Hall in response to the flyer. 

….

Link (1): http://www.torontosun.com/police-probe-racist-flyers-in-brampton

Link (2): http://antiimmigration_flyers_single_out_sikh_community_in_brampton.html
….

regards

…..Kashmir and Telangana…..annexed to the Indian union….After 1947, we became a part of India…Then
the troubles really started…..We need to
come out clean on Kashmir….Few parts were not ours….we should redraw the lines and move on……Development is suffering…. frequent bombings….R2.50 lakh crore allotted to defence…..If we have a peaceful environment we can spend money on education, women’s development or sanitation……
…

…
To be duly noted that K Kavitha is (i) Hindu, (ii) a Member of the Parliament (Lok Sabha, Nizam-abad constituency from Telengana district, member of Telengana Rashtra Samithi party, daughter of TRS founder K Chandrashekar Rao), and (iii) a woman.  

Kavitha is also – as a strong, independent woman should be- standing up for her sisters and for the Uniform Civil Code!!! Eat your heart out, Arundhati Roy.
……
Let us try and unpack the statement (for transcript excerpts, see below) and the history behind it. Telengana (Muslim ruler, significant Muslim population) and Kashmir (Hindu ruler, majority Muslim population) wished to remain independent post-1947 (Jodhpur, Bhopal and Travancore had similar ambitions). The powerful combination of Patel, Menon and Mountbatten persuaded most royals to join India, in exchange for payment of an annuity (the “privy purse”). This privilege was abolished by Indira Gandhi (arguing for a socialist state) through a constitutional amendment in 1971.
……
There were also a number of irregularities as to how parts of Bengal and Punjab were awarded to India or to Pakistan. In the Sylhet district (then East Pakistan, now Bangladesh) Hindus lost in a close vote. It is alleged (by Hindu Bengalis) that this process was aided by Asomiya (Hindu) leaders who were worried that Sylhet as part of India would lead to Bengali domination in the North-East.OTOH Gurdaspur district (East Punjab) was awarded to India (allegedly because of romantic link between Nehru and Edwina Mountbatten). Similarly it was possible that Lahore would be go to India while Calcutta would be go to Pakistan.

Any Indian law-maker who says today that some territory should be an independent nation is liable to face sedition charges. This
is because Kavitha (unlike Roy) has sworn by  the Indian constitution
to protect the nation. It will be interesting to see what the courts
make of her statements.

However on free speech grounds
it is simply remarkable that in today’s climate (if left-liberals are to
be believed), one can even think of making such statements. Indeed she
should have pointed out that Goa, Sikkim, and Junagadh were also
annexations, albeit with varying levels of coercion.

Where Kavitha (in our opinion) goes off-track is the claim that all “troubles” started after 1947- meaning oppression of Telengana people by Andhra people. People may conclude from this that she is making a pro-royalist argument in the form of either the British (de-facto), or the Dogras (Kashmir) and Nizam (Hyderabad). Actually we suspect it is something far more sinister.

If the plea is for devolution of power to the lowest level of administration, we would agree in full measure. Panchayati Raj (village rule) was what Gandhi had wanted. Instead what we have are 29 powerful states with a lot of inequalities at the district (and lower) level.

What she really means is that in a state where her dad is the (genuine) people’s hero, she can’t wait to be king. Just like Odisha where Naveen (Patnaik) Babu has benefited from the legacy of Bjiu Babu. Also see Punjab (Badal) and Tamil Nadu (Karunanidhi). The paid goondas of her party would be merrily going around extorting money from Andhra business-people (just like Kashmiri muslims are pelting stones at Pandits who plan to visit temples). This is why Hyderabad should have been declared an Union Territory but then Congress was busy playing (desperate) vote games. 

If the proposed BJP plan to forcibly settle Pandits in Kashmir goes through (we are not in favor, many many more killings aka “sacrifice” on both sides) it will only work if they are settled in Union territories (feel free to draw Palestine analogies).  True peace will not come to Kashmir unless Pakistan Army co-operates and that is unlikely to say the least.

Finally one thing that did bother us…a lot. Kavitha mentioned the defense spend and we agree that we should spend much less on defense and more on social justice. But then she talked about “frequent bombings” as a justification for (unilateral) surrender. It is our opinion that extremists will always find a reason to bomb us, Kashmir or no Kashmir. The same bunch of jihadis are responsible for “frequent bombings” in Pakistan, destroying shrines and killing fellow muslims (forget for the moment, the atrocities against non-muslims). There are very good reasons why we should settle the Kashmir problem but violence is not the answer and violence will be met with more violence (as has been indeed the case).
…………….

K Kavitha, Anupriya Patel and Pratap Simha, first-time MPs of
TRS, Apna Dal and BJP respectively, talk about the hurdles they face in
Parliament and their views on J&K and Article 370. This Idea
Exchange was moderated by Senior Editor D K Singh

…
K KAVITHA: I am a Masters in Computer Science and I
was part of the Telangana movement for seven years. I run an NGO called
Telangana Jagruthi, and we have tried to revive ethnic festivals that
are getting lost in these Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day etc… 

After the
formation of the Telangana state, our TRS party formed the government.
Then I won the (Lok Sabha) election from Nizamabad. My area of interest,
other than representing the aspirations of the people of Telangana, is
the Jammu and Kashmir issue. I hope that this government, which has a
massive majority, will take serious decisions and implement them.

….
ANUPRIYA PATEL: My journey is not very old in
politics. I joined politics after my father’s demise in 2010, and 2012
was the first election of my life. I spent two years as an MLA and now I
am an MP from Mirzapur, UP. One of my prime concerns is uplifting the
living conditions of tribals in Mirzapur. 

There are other issues — the
poor standard of education and medical facilities — which I will try to
bring to the notice of the government. I’m one of the allies of the BJP,
a very small ally with only two members in the House. So I have my
party issues as well. My party is working for the backwards, tribals and
Scheduled Castes. I feel the government is not giving attention to this
aspect. I have tried to speak to the Prime Minister on these issues,
that a major section of the OBCs and the SC/STs turned in your favour.
They quit the SP, BSP, and turned to you because they found that you’re a
man of hope.

….
Coming to Parliament is a great experience because now you know what a
big responsibility it is and how the House works, the rules,
techniques, devices. It’s an enriching experience and, as a young MP,
exciting also. You become anxious because you don’t know lots of things
and at the same time you feel good too because it’s such a big platform,
the entire nation is watching you and you can learn  and contribute so
much.

….
PRATAP SIMHA: I represent Mysore-Kodagu constituency in Karnataka.
I’m a Kannada journalist. My column is called Bettale Prapancha, which
means ‘naked world’, it bares facts. I write on contemporary issues,
sports, politics — anything, except science and technology. 

When the
general elections were announced, the state and central BJP were looking
for an image makeover, so they looked for achievers from other fields.
Two or three names were announced, and one was mine. I’m also the
biographer of the first unofficial biography of Narendra Modiji. I
published it in 2008 and it was released by Arun Jaitley. It got
translated into Gujarati and Marathi. That is how I came in contact with
Modiji. 

My constituency comprises two districts, Mysore and Coorg. In
one part of my constituency, they grow world-class tobacco, a majority
is exported. Coorg is the hometown of coffee breweries. Mysore has eight
engineering colleges, but only one major software firm. We need to
provide jobs to graduates. Also, the road connectivity between Mysore
and Bangalore is quite bad.

…..
D K SINGH: Being the son/daughter of a politician is an
advantage. But do you think it also becomes a baggage because people
have huge expectations from you and even if you do something great, it’s
attributed to your parents?

K KAVITHA: It’s an advantage because whatever
positive things come from my father (K Chandrasekhar Rao) are attributed
to me. At the same time, I’m compared to him. He’s a very good orator.
So whenever I pick up a mike, everybody, especially in Telangana, looks
at me with expectation. 

The fear of failing is horrible and takes a toll
on your own creativity. To come out of that shadow is very difficult.
On a lighter note, people who cannot reach my father to either vent out
their anger or appreciate him come to me. Somebody who’s really upset
with my father will say, ‘Arre, his daughter is not good’. Politically,
it’s an advantage because we already have our own agenda, set map,
ideology. We practically grew up in a political atmosphere. I’ve seen
people flocking around my father from my childhood. So I understand the
dynamics of the system.

…..
ANUPRIYA PATEL: I don’t fall in Kavita’s or Pratap’s
category. Although my father (Sone Lal Patel) started the Apna Dal, the
party didn’t achieve success. He was not an MLA or MP. He left me with
the legacy of some votes which never converted into a powerful position.
So I see myself as a beginner. There’s nobody in my party to guide me.
But people perceive that Anupriya comes from a political background, so
she knows all.

…..
Pratap Simha: Having a political background
certainly helps you on the way. If my father was a politician or had
money, I would’ve gone to St Stephen’s or another good college. My
English would have been better. I would have learned other languages,
and studied in foreign colleges. 

Whenever I enter the premises of
Parliament, there are a lot of photographers. No one takes our
photographs. When Jyotiraditya Scindia comes in, some daughters and sons
of great politicians, they’ll rush towards them, they’ll take their
photographs. If I have to raise my voice in Parliament, I have to
struggle to ask questions, or struggle during the zero hour. If there’s a
quota in every job sector, in Parliament also, we should be allotted
some time. Those who come up on their own should be allowed to speak.

……
Manoj C G: Kavitha, you said you feel strongly about Jammu
and Kashmir. As young MPs, how do you feel about issues like Article 370
and the uniform civil code which are on the BJP’s agenda?

K Kavitha: Jammu and Kashmir and Telangana were both
forcefully and at the same time annexed to the Indian Union. When I say
I feel strongly, it’s because we were both separate countries, but were
merged with the Indian Union after Independence. 

In 1947, we were not a
part of India.  After 1947, we became a part of India. Then the
troubles really started. None of our people was very rich before. So
it’s from the people’s perspective that I’ve started reading about Jammu
and Kashmir. We need to solve issues, particularly the Kashmiri
Pandits’ issue which is put up in the agenda of the BJP. They say we can
all take them back home, but it is just a political statement. You have
to create a safe environment before you take them there. 

We need to
come out clean on Jammu and Kashmir. Few parts were not ours, we should
agree, we should redraw the international lines, and move on.
Development is suffering and you see frequent bombings.


 
Our economy takes a toll. Even in the Budget, almost Rs 2.50 lakh
crore has been allotted to defence.  If we have a peaceful environment
in our bordering states, we don’t have to spend so much on defence. We
can spend that money on education, women’s development or sanitation.
Today, if I talk about no bathrooms in girls’ schools, I should be
ashamed of being a citizen of this country.

…..
MANOJ C G: What about uniform civil code?
K Kavitha: A lot of Muslim organisations are opposing
it, but I am for uniform civil code. We cannot control anybody’s
religion, but when it comes to law and order, to controlling the
internal security issues, a citizen is a citizen and should be dealt
with that way. So certain clauses need to be included in the uniform
civil code, some could be debated about. Only the marriage clause could
be excluded and dealt with separately.

…..
ANUPRIYA PATEL: To me, this idea is very strange
that we are a nation and we have a separate system in a state that falls
within the boundary of the Indian Union. However, I totally agree where
Article 370 is concerned. I heard the honourable PM say that, ‘Why
can’t we talk about it? Why can’t we discuss it?’. I feel that there
should be debate over Article 370, its existence and its relevance.

….
PRATAP SIMHA: As far as the uniform civil code is
concerned, the BJP has a stated stand on this, I don’t want to talk more
on this issue, and Modiji has called for a debate on Article 370. Has
Article 370 achieved what it intended to? If a Kashmiri woman marries
someone not from J&K, her children will not have the right to her
property. We need to raise our voice against this kind of
discrimination. There are no industries in Jammu and Kashmir because
they will not allow the industries to flourish there. And in 2009,
during the Amarnath Yatra, the pilgrims were not allowed to have a
permanent structure there.

…..
K KAVITHA: On the issue of not owning land or
property, Kashmir and Telangana have similar laws. We also had a
condition, a council, which said that no outsider could hold land in
Telangana. 

But when N T Rama Rao came to power and scrapped the council,
he violated the Constitution, nobody was there to hear our voice, it’s
all gone. But Kashmir still has that law and council, so natives have
that protection. 

But when you want to completely remove it, we have to
seriously think of the capacity of the natives regarding the issue. The
same thing we had in Telangana, but once it was removed, we suffered
very, very seriously. So when we are talking about the property rights
of Kashmiris, the opinion of the natives should be sought.

……

Link: http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/no-one-guides-us-in-parliament/99/

….

regards

….credit for Taru
Bandhan festival goes to Mahadev Mahato from Dudhmatia village……Mahato has helped restore 25,000 acres of
forestland…..“for natives of Jharkhand, forest is a part of life…why not include trees as part of our family and rituals”…. 
 …

…
Of the many traditions that cut across communities in India, Raksha-bandhan or Rakhi is probably the most popular and one with the longest historical record (unfortunately that does not protect such traditions in Pakistan…for example).  There is the story of (Rajput Queen) Karnavati sending a rakhi to (Mughal Emperor) Humayun seeking protection against Bahadur Shah (Muslim ruler of Gujarat). The rakhi legends extend even further back to Alexander the Great (see below).

….

 ….
As part of an unique movement for conservation in the eastern, tribal
dominated state of Jharkhand, even the trees get a rakhi (see below).
If it works, it has our blessings. 
…..

….
Are girls (especially didi-s or elder sisters, even little girls of those sisters) born to be matriarchs? It may be a stereotype, but it certainly holds true in our extended family. Many a time we restore
our oppressed spirits by mumbling “hitler” sotto voce, but if the lady
is perceptive, she will come back with a ki bolle? (what did you say?).

…..

 ….
Regardless, sisters are very precious and getting a band from a
sister is a privilege. Sad to say, these traditions are dying out, however, we
did update the practice so that in our home brothers tie a band on the
sisters as well. Wishing all the brothers and sisters out there all the best. Everyone have lots of fun and stay safe. 
….

…

…..

Raksha Bandhan means “Knot of Protection,” and the festival ceremonies include the sister tying a rakhi
bracelet around her brother’s wrist, which symbolizes the sister’s love
and the brother’s lifelong duty to protect his sibling. The festival is
often simply referred to as “Rakhi” after the name of this ceremonial
bracelet.

…
Saturday, the President of India, Pranab Mukherjee, and the Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi, issued a greeting
for tomorrow’s celebration, focusing on women: “May the festival be an
occasion for re-dedication to the well being of women, particularly the
girl child.”


…
Raksha Bandhan is an ancient celebration and its history is inter-woven with various stories and myths.
One story tells the tale of Mughal emperor Humayun and widowed queen
Rani Karnavati of Chittor. In the 16th century AD, Sultan Bahadur Shah
of Gujarat rode with a conquering army into Chittor, prompting Rani
Karnavati to sent a rakhi to Emperor Humayun in a request for help. 
…
Touched by her plea, the Mughal emperor rode to her defense but was too
late, as the princess and all the other women of the fortress had
committed suicide and the fortress had been captured. Humayun defeated
and expelled Sultan Bahadur and placed Rani’s son on the throne, and the
rakhi subsequently became a symbol of brotherly protection.


…
Another legend even involves the West, invoking the figure of Alexander the Great. When Alexander invaded India in the 4th
century BC, the story holds that his wife Roxana sent a rakhi to King
Porus of Paurava. Roxana implored the king not to harm Alexander in
battle, and Porus respected her request, staying a killing blow to
Alexander on the battlefield while wearing the rakhi. Historically, the
Greeks won the battle and Porus continued to rule Paurava in service to
Alexander.


….
During the festival,
participants wear fine Indian clothing and prepare many traditional
Indian foods and snacks. During the rakhi ritual, the sister will first
tie the bracelet around her brother’s wrist, then bless him and pray
over him. She will then feed him, usually with some sweets that have
been prepared. The two will then hug and exchange gifts, thus ending the
ritual. The brother will keep the rakhi and wear it for the rest of the
day as a reminder of his duty to protect his sister.


….
Not only Hindus, but Sikhs, Jains, and even some Indian Muslims
celebrate Raksha Bandhan as well. In recent decades, Raksha Bandhan has
spread to other parts of South Asia, developing different regional and
cultural variants and practices. For many, it has extended beyond the
traditional brother-sister relationship and is used to celebrate the
love of ones cousins or even very close friends. 
….
The festival takes
place in the Hindu calendar month of Shraavana, and falls on August 10
this year.

….

Link (1): http://hindus-prepare-raksha-bandhan-annual-celebration-brother-sister-love

Link (2): http://infochangeindia.org/environment/stories-of-change/a-rakhi-for-trees.html
….

regards

….Amarinder Singh said, “We are facing failure of monsoon. I wonder if it’s god’s will….I  wonder if it’s El Nino or El
Modi effect…….There has been some sin. God does not like that. We all
remember what happened in Gujarat in 2002” …..
…..
A bit of music, philosophy and policy riddles to take a bit of your time away from all the cheers and gaiety spread across India and the diaspora today.

A monsoon (bollywood) tune pictured on the iconic Marine Drive in Mumbai (movie: Manzil, song: Rim Jhim Ghire Sawan, Year: 1979, music: RD Burman, voice: Kishore Kumar, Lata Mangeshkar, lyrics: Yogesh, actors: Amitabh Bachhan, Mousumi Chatterjee).
…..

…..
For people who prefer the instrumental version, here is a nice one by Mubasher Hasan Syed
…..

…..
Incidentally Yogesh was a brilliant lyricist (see Wiki profile below) and composed for some of our best loved songs (Kahin Door Jab Din Dhal Jaye and Zindagi Kaisi Hai Paheli from Anand, also the songs of Rajnigandha and Baton Baton Mein). 
…….
Rains in Mumbai is also the best time to pursue (non-academic grade) philosophy. We
pause to contemplate on the twin concepts of instant karma (revenge
pulao served hot) and instant moksha (sweet kheer for absolution).

It was in June of this year that the newly elected MP from Amritsar, Captain (Sardar) Amarinder Singh Sahib [son of late Maharaja Yadavindra Singh and Maharani Mohinder Kaur of
Patiala] declared that the penalty for electing sinners will be a failed
monsoon. Voting the wrong way will cost millions of farmers their livelihood and in many cases their lives.

In order to avert the worst drought in a decade there came a deluge of rain-invoking pujas in
Varanasi (Sankat Mochan deity – one who removes all stress and grief –
Shiva), Kathmandu (Pashu-Pati-Nath deity – one who takes care of all
living beings – Shiva) and elsewhere. The rain-Gods were apparently mollified and Mumbai recorded one of the wettest July-s ever, in the past 50 years.
……

According to India Meteorological Department (IMD) rainfall figures
since 1959, Santacruz received 1547.5 mm rainfall in the month of July,
breaking the previous highest total rainfall measured in the month of
July, at 1455.5 mm (Santacruz, 1965). Similarly,
Colaba this year, recorded a total July rainfall of 1401.7 mm, the second highest total rainfall in July (1441.3 mm in 1974).
……..

….
Now that the monsoon has recovered in large measure does it follow that the stains from 2002 have been washed away by the rains in 2014….no, we do not think so.  We respectfully suggest that Sardarji should re-think his claims of divine retribution and focus like a laser on getting justice for the victims of 2002, 1984,….there are too many of them to count.

……

….
It is the (strange but true) case that peninsular India depends significantly on hydro-electric power. If rainfall is lacking there will be a four-way competition for water (residential, industrial, agricultural and for power generation). Things are now thankfully better, however drought persists in Telengana and Andhra Pradesh (is this due to the sin incurred by Partition?). But here is hoping that rain gods keep smiling and the bounty of water is available to all…..for the sinners and for the pure.
………
That brings us to the main question at hand. Even after so many decades following independence, India is sunk without a good monsoon. Why is this? Because of corruption on a gigantic scale, agriculture and religion are probably the two areas where the money is maximum (and so is the corruption).

Dialing down the dependence on monsoon may be difficult but is a must for a nation that demands a high seat at the United Nations (another incomprehensible problem: India grows sufficient food but loses 30% due to inadequate storage).
……………

…..

[ref. Wiki] Yogesh was born in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh.


…
He moved in search of work, his cousin was a screenplay director. His first work was with Hrishikesh Mukherjee, and wrote Kahin Door Jab Din Dal Jaaye. He wrote songs like Zindagi Kaisi Hai Paheli and Rimjhim gire Saawan, Kai baar yunhi dekha hai from Rajnigandha and Na bole tum na maine kuch kaha from Baaton Baaton Mein.


..
Yogesh also worked in television serials as a writer.


…
Lyric writer Yogesh Gaur was a man in great demand among the slice-of-life filmmakers like Basu Chatterjee and Hrishikesh Mukherjee.
The story goes that Mukherjee heard the lyrics of two songs Yogesh had
written for producer LB Lachman’s film, and wanted them for Anand.


…
Lachmanji was adamant about keeping the songs, but Rajesh Khanna,
Amitabh Bachchan and Mukherjee pleaded with him. Bachchan, who was a
young man then, would say to me, Please get us these two songs somehow.
Finally, Lachmanji relented and gave them one of the songs, says Yogesh.


…
The song, Kahin door jab din dhal jaaye, shot the lyricist to
overnight popularity. Mukherjee was so happy he got Yogesh to pen
another song for him, Zindagi kaisi yeh paheli for Anand too. Soon, the
fan mail was pouring in.


…
Funnily, people also sent me flowers for Maine tere liye, which was written by Gulzar,
says the man, popularly known as ‘shaayar’ by actresses of that time.
The nickname happened because the heroines, when they reported on the
sets, would insist he recite some of his shaayari. “Producers thought
the heroines were getting distracted by my poetry, especially when I
waxed eloquent about their beauty,” he laughs.


….
Known as the ‘sensible film lyricist’, Yogesh worked primarily with Chatterjee and Mukherjee, rather than ‘masala’ filmmakers. My
problem was similar to that faced by the filmmakers themselves. My work
was appreciated, but was restricted to ‘art’ films. But they were more
real than arty, he says.


…
Working with Basu Chatterjee was not the easiest, says Yogesh.  

Basuda
was a master of his craft, but brainstorming sessions with him weren’t
all that fun. While discussing a song for Rajnigandha, he would say, in
true Bengali style: ‘Uske baad, Vidya wahan se aata hai.’ I had to stop
him and ask if he meant heroine Vidya Sinha’s character or hero Amol
Palekar’s. He got angry and said he was referring to Vidya. I didn’t
bother explaining to him that he had actually mixed up the gender while
speaking in Hindi, Yogesh says. 

But the collaboration was a fruitful
one. Yogesh wrote some of his best songs for Chatterjee, like Kai baar
yunhi dekha hai from Rajnigandha and Na bole tum na maine kuch kaha from
Baaton Baaton Mein.
…..

Link (1): http://strong-monsoon-recovery-rains-hopes-on-food-front

Link (2): http://Poor-monsoon-Gods-punishment-for-Gujarat-riots-Amarinder-Singh

……

regards

…..Erdogan lashed out at
Zaman, calling her a “shameless
woman”…… “A militant in the guise of a journalist, a shameless woman… Know your place!” he declared…….“They gave you a pen… and
you insult a society that is 99 per cent Muslim”…..
….

….
This is why we like to see women on top, not because all men are bad, not because women are superior, but just to show that women are (in public life) in every way possible equal to men. To show that women can be LOL funny, and….they do not need permission from men to LOL in public.
……..

….
Indira Gandhi (also Margaret Thatcher) was referred to as the only man in her cabinet. We prefer Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s comparison of Mrs Gandhi to Goddess Durga. Legend has it that when all the men failed, it was up to the Goddess to stop the Mahish-Asura. We need women to help out as Mahish-Asura-Mardini (demon slayer) today….because the men are just not competent enough.

Erdogan is just a three-penny bully in the Turkey shop, and most South Asian politicians probably think like him (if not talk like him). In our opinion Middle East would be a better place if it was led by women. Golda Meir was thousand times the “man” that Bibi Netanyahu ever would be. She made the prescient comment: Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us. Except that she was only half right, peace requires the Jews to stop hating Arabs as well.
…..
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan faced a new outcry on
Friday over his attitude to the media and women after he branded a
prominent female journalist a “shameless woman” and told her “to know
your place”.

Just ahead of Sunday’s presidential election which
he is clear favourite to win, Erdogan savaged Amberin Zaman,
who writes for the Economist and the Turkish daily Taraf, over comments
she made in a television debate. She had asked the main opposition
leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu in the debate whether any Muslim society was
capable of challenging its authorities.

Erdogan lashed out at
Zaman, without mentioning her directly by name, at an election rally in
the eastern city of Malatya on Thursday, calling her a “shameless
woman”.

“A militant in the guise of a journalist, a shameless woman… Know your place!” he declared.
“They gave you a pen and you are writing a column in a newspaper… and
you insult a society that is 99 per cent Muslim,” he said, drawing loud
boos from the crowd.

This is not the first time Erdogan has
lashed out at journalists, who have come under increasing pressure in
Turkey, which has more reporters behind bars than any other country in
the world.

The government’s attitude towards women is also under
heavy scrutiny, after Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc caused a furore
by suggesting women should not laugh loudly in public.

The Economist released a statement in response to the salvo, saying “we stand firmly by” its correspondent of 15 years. “The intimidation of journalists has no place in a democracy. Under Mr
Erdogan, Turkey has become an increasingly difficult place for
independent journalism,” it said.

Zaman responded to Erdogan
through her column in the Taraf newspaper, writing: “You are lynching a
Muslim woman who described what you are doing.

……
Turkish Deputy Prime Minster Bulent Arinc is the latest government official to put his foot in his mouth.

…
In a speech last week, this high-ranking official preached his perverted
version of morality to Turkish women by telling them not to laugh in
public! “Chastity is so important,” Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç said. “A
woman will know what is haram and not haram. She will not laugh out
loud in public. She will not be inviting in her attitudes and will
protect her chasteness.”

….
Arinc, a co-founder of the ruling AK Party, continued his chauvinist
sermonizing: “Where are our girls who slightly blush, lower their heads,
and turn their eyes away when we look at their faces, becoming the
symbol of chastity?” He ridiculed women for discussing cooking recipes
and other “frivolous things” on cell phones. Imitating a female voice,
he squeaked: “What happened to Ayse’s daughter? When is the wedding?” He
told the women to talk about such insignificant matters “face to face,”
not on the phone!

….
The Deputy Prime Minister’s demeaning remarks spread like wildfire. In
defiance, tens of thousands of Turkish women went on social media
(Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram) posting ‘selfies,’ pictures of
themselves, laughing out loud. Rather than stopping their laughter,
women started laughing … at him!

….

Link (1): http://www.dawn.com/uproar-over-erdogans-remarks-against-woman-reporter

Link (2): http://www.huffingtonpost.com/harut-sassounian/turkish-deputy-prime-min

…..

regards

…
Are “fair-skinned” children really the be-all and end-all of
adoption and is it the case that a “fair skinned child” always “look like us”?  

We do not know how to say this politely, but in the pale-world
all browns are sand-niggers. Our cousins – one of whom can be fairly
described as golden white in complexion – who grew up down under were
called “chocolate” in school.
…….

…
Meanwhile…a huge surrogacy scandal. One golden-hearted Australian couple – with the dad-to-be, a remorse-free, child sex offender – had twins through surrogacy. One of the kids has Down’s syndrome and was abandoned (see below). In response, Thailand plans to ban commercial surrogacy effective yesterday, and 200-odd aussie parents-to-be will be facing maximum pain (and monetary loss).

India is the only other nation widely open to surrogacy. Recent rules have been tightened here as well, this path is supposedly blocked for same sex couples or single parents-to-be. But knowing how the rules work in India, one can always find a way out, if you know what we mean. Unlike Thailand, you may even be able to dump the kid if you do not like her, pay off the agency a bit of hush money and no one would be wiser.

Here is the thing that is truly bothersome. Why is adoption such a headache? Leaving aside the fair-skinned child supply-demand mismatch, how is it fair that Non Resident Indians are finding the adoption process to be more cumbersome than Ethiopia? Why not have a fast-track process available for people who can afford it? NRIs have a lot of clout with Indian babu-dom, remittances from abroad is a precious lifeline for India.There should be a full-fledged effort to settle children as quickly as possible. Who knows, with the right incentives in place, people may fall in love with a dark-skinned child as well!!

If the new rules treat everyone at par, then that counts as progress. We are a bit scared of Shrimati Maneka (first animal lover, wife of Sanjay) Gandhi but we are rather pleased with her efforts in this direction.
……
Five
years after they submitted documents for adopting a child in India, Devi
and Joseph will finally get to see their six-year-old ‘daughter’ when
the non-resident Indian couple settled in Dallas in the United States
comes to Delhi next month to take her home.
……
It has been a long
wait filled with home studies, delays and court procedures. “The
adoption agency in Delhi has been regularly sending us pictures of
Siara, but we feel we have missed out a good part of her childhood,”
said Joseph, 43, who hails from Bangalore and works as software analyst
in the US. 
   “At one point, we had decided to adopt a child from China or
Ethiopia, where the delay is much less, but my wife was insistent our
child should at least look like us,” said Joseph, speaking over the
phone. Indian expatriates hoping to adopt a child from their home
country may soon have to submit to a much less gruelling experience than
Devi and Joseph.

NRI couples could be treated on a par with
their resident Indian counterparts following changes being made to
adoption rules by the Ministry of Women and Child Welfare. As a result,
NRI couples could have equal opportunities for adopting a child in
India. This will spell a major change from the existing rules, under
which the first preference is given to India-based couples.

Maneka Gandhi, whose ministry is working towards finetuning the Juvenile
Justice (JJ) Act with an entire chapter on adoption for the first time,
has already written to adoption agencies in states, child welfare
committee heads and judges not to delay the processing of adoption
applications.

A few years ago adoption agencies were asked to
stick to a ratio of 80:20, with only a fifth of the eligible children
for adoption abroad, in a move introduced to curb overseas child
trafficking in the garb of adoption. This led to a fall in overseas
adoptions from 628 in 2010-11 to 430 in 2013-2014.

“What the
NRIs get is often the `rejects’ of the Indian parents. NRIs insist on
having fair-skinned, healthy children less than one year of age but such
children are to be first picked by couples here,” said a senior
official at Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA), the body that
handles and monitors adoptions in India.

The official, who did
not wish to be identified, added, “The NRIs, even after waiting for many
months, are left to choose from children with medical issues, which is
why they choose to go to other countries or give up on the process.”

In the past ten years, over 8,000 NRI couples have applied for Indian
children but only a few have been shortlisted. “We screen the NRI
couples many times to keep the number very small because we know due to
the existing rules we don’t have many children to list for adoption. We
will expand the list once the new rules are notified,” the official
said.
 This should change as the company’s restructuring paves the way for growth .

 ……..

HUNDREDS of Australians with infants
newly born or being carried by pregnant Thai surrogates are in limbo
after Thailand moved to outlaw commercial ­surrogacy.

The National Council of Peace and Order interim military government
yesterday announced the drastic measure, aimed at shutting a burgeoning
industry mostly catering to foreign biological parents, in the wake of
the baby Gammy scandal.

Surrogacy Australia executive officer
Rachel Kunde estimated there were up to 200 Australian couples whose
surrogates were pregnant in Thailand or whose infants had been born in
recent days and weeks.

In Surrogacy Australia’s network, there were close to 100 ­couples in that situation. “We
are very concerned for those people and we hope that they can bring
their babies home without any trouble from Thai authorities,” Ms Kunde
said.

Last night an Australian woman whose surrogate is 30 weeks pregnant
in Bangkok said she was highly anxious about the prospect of the
surrogate “going underground” if she were pressured.

“I called the
nurse at the clinic this morning and she told me all the surrogates are
still coming in for their scans,” said the woman, who asked for
anonymity to protect her daughter, born to a Thai surrogate. “It is a
horrible wait for us. We are due to go there in eight weeks but we are
really worried about whether we will be able to leave with the baby.”

The
foreign surrogacy scandal was triggered a week ago by the revelation a
West Australian couple, Wendy and David Farnell, had left behind in
Thailand a Down syndrome baby with his birth mother.

The birth
mother, Pattaramon Janbua, 21, claims the couple refused to accept the
boy, Gammy, now seven months old, but returned home with his twin
sister.

The Farnells have denied this account but in a statement and through a friend have given varying accounts.

Ms
Pattaramon, on hearing Mr Farnell had in the past been convicted of
child sex offences, has demanded the girl be returned to her.

The
new law is currently in draft form — it has been proposed since 2012 but
the previous democratic government “sat on it” ­according to one of its
drafters — and could take several months to pass and implement.

In
the meantime, the government says it will strictly apply Thailand
Medical Council regulations that prohibit surrogacy except for blood
relatives and on condition there is no payment.

This effectively
prevents Thai fertility clinics and doctors from offering the service,
which has been used by an estimated 200 Australians — couples and
potential sole parents — a year in recent years.

However, serious
questions remain about the implementation of the law as it affects
foreign ­people’s children just born to Thai surrogates, or fetuses
still being carried to term by birth mothers.

NCPO spokesman
Colonel Winthai Suvaree said yesterday the law would allow infants who
have just been born to be suckled by their birth mothers for six months,
but then would allow the baby to be taken home by parents.

Health
Ministry general-secretary Samphan Komrit was very vague about how the
law would apply to the foreign biological parents of fetuses being
carried by Thai women for payment, however. He would only say those
cases would be dealt with “according to morality”.

Colonel Winthai
said: “Commercial surrogacy is illegal, according to the Medical
Council. We don’t know the whereabouts of the (currently pregnant)
surrogate mothers, so it is a difficult question to answer.” He
said the new law was aimed at protecting infants and Thai women,
although Ms Kunde said she was concerned also about the potential for
Thai surrogates to be harassed or persecuted.

The new law will punish doctors and fertility clinics carrying out the procedures, and surrogacy agents, from today onwards. Under
the current TMC regulations, enabling commercial surrogacy is
punishable by one to three years’ imprisonment and fines of 20,000 to
60,000 baht ($670-$2000).

Currently there is no law specifically
covering surrogacy, although Thai Medical Council regulations specify
any such pregnancy must be altruistic — not for payment — and the birth
mother must be a blood relative of the ­donors.

Police are
investigating the Bangkok clinic, agent and doctors involved in Ms
Pattaramon’s pregnancy with a view to laying charges under current TMC
­regulations.

The scandal escalated on Tuesday when police and
welfare officers found nine infants and a pregnant Thai woman,
accompanied by nannies, in several apartments at Latphrao, a northern
Bangkok condominium block. Police were yesterday still trying to establish the identities and parentage of the babies. They are planning DNA tests. 

A
lawyer acting for a Japanese man he claims is a wealthy businessman
said his client wanted the babies for himself and planned to raise them
in Thailand. He claimed the Japanese father was planning to pay about
one million baht for the 10 surrogacies.

However, a Japanese woman
interviewed at the scene on Tuesday claimed one of the children was
hers and several witnesses said most of the children appeared Western.

Yanee
Lertkrai, the director-general of the Department of Social Development
and Welfare, said: “The babies all look different and it is hard to
believe they share the same blood. Personally, I think the surrogacy of the babies is illegal.”

Surrogacy Australia’s Ms Kunde yesterday blamed rogue operators for causing the crackdown.
 “The
people in our network have all used reputable clinics and they have
talked to other couples first — most people do the right thing,” she
said.

Yesterday, West Australian Child Protection Minister Helen
Morton declined to reveal whether her department was still considering
leaving the twin sister of baby Gammy with their Australian parents
following fresh details about the child sex offences of the husband,
Bunbury electrician David John Farnell.

His offending spanned a 10-year period and a magistrate found he had no remorse for his youngest victim.

….

Link (1): http://New-adoption-rules-NRIs-to-be-treated-on-par-with-Indians

Link (2):  http://thai-crackdown-strands-surrogacy-couples

…..

regards

…..prohibit those who wear veils, head scarves, jilbab, clothing with the crescent moon and star, long
beards from boarding buses in the northwestern city of Karamay...…Urumqi ban….cigarette lighters, yogurt and water,
in a bid to prevent violent attacks.….

…

We are admittedly in favor of banning religion-inspired parties. After receiving feedback from liberty-conscious people we have reformed a bit (all lefty-s are secret Stalinists) and propose a more incremental (and hopefully, practical) approach.

….
We have in mind a directive principle (constitutionally desirable but not enforceable, just like the uniform civil code) that India being a federation of states, all political parties (as represented by their state units) must strive for cross-community representation both in primary membership as well as candidates for positions at all levels (gram-panchayat, municipality, state assembly).

A nationally recognized party (there are specific qualification rules in place) must (in addition to the above) work towards having a designated number of cross-community candidates for Lok/Rajya Sabha. Currently, the BJP does not have a single muslim MP in the Lok Sabha (there were a few muslim BJP candidates), and only a couple of MPs in the Rajya Sabha.

Thus in Bengal, where muslims are 40% of the population, the BJP has to ensure a certain minimum of party members and candidates which are muslims. Same goes for hindu representation in Muslim League (Kerala), AUDF (Asom), AMIM (Telengana), National Conference (Jammu and Kashmir) and Akali Dal (Punjab). If the minority numbers fall below some threshold in a state this principle may not apply.

The idea is to encourage broad based agenda for political parties and discourage polarization as a vote-winning approach. If we do not take this seriously then the social fabric will continue to be damaged over time. Food for thought.

There is another way ahead and the Chicoms have just indicated how they would like to tackle the “diversity problem.” We feel that such a heavy-handed approach is counter-productive, but it is certainly better than shooting/starving tens of thousands of people (like what is going on in Iraq right now). Not that the Chicoms are shy about killing, 59 people were gunned down in reaction to the recent uprising last week.

………………..
A city in China’s restive western region of Xinjiang has banned
people with head scarves, veils and long beards from boarding buses, as
the government battles unrest with a policy that critics said
discriminates against Muslims.
…………

Xinjiang, home to the Muslim
Uighur people who speak a Turkic language, has been beset for years by
violence that the government blames on Islamist militants or
separatists.

Authorities will prohibit five types of passengers —
those who wear veils, head scarves, a loose-fitting garment called a
jilbab, clothing with the crescent moon and star, and those with long
beards – from boarding buses in the northwestern city of Karamay, state
media said.

The crescent moon and star symbol of Islam features
on many national flags, besides being used by groups China says want to
set up an independent state called East Turkestan.

The rules were
intended to help strengthen security through August 20 during an
athletics event and would be enforced by security teams, the ruling
Communist Party-run Karamay Daily said on Monday. “Those who do not comply, especially those five types of passengers, will be reported to the police,” the paper said.

In
July, authorities in Xinjiang’s capital Urumqi banned bus passengers
from carrying items ranging from cigarette lighters to yogurt and water,
in a bid to prevent violent attacks.

Exiled Uighur groups and
human rights activists say the government’s repressive policies in
Xinjiang, including controls on Islam, have provoked unrest, a claim
Beijing denies.

“Officials in Karamay city are endorsing an
openly racist and discriminatory policy aimed at ordinary Uighur
people,” Alim Seytoff, the president of the Washington-based Uyghur
American Association, said in an emailed statement.

While many
Uighur women dress in much the same casual style as those elsewhere in
China, some have begun to wear the full veil, a garment more common in
Pakistan or Afghanistan than in Xinjiang.

Police have offered money for tips on everything from “violent terrorism training” to individuals who grow long beards.

Hundreds
have died in unrest in Xinjiang in the past 18 months, but tight
security makes it almost impossible for journalists to make independent
assessments of the violence.

About 100 people were killed when
knife-wielding attackers staged assaults in two towns in the region’s
south in late July, state media said, including 59 “terrorists” shot
dead by police.
…….

Chinese police gunned down 59 people and
arrested 215 during a violent uprising last week in the Xinjiang region,
the government said Sunday, in a statement that shed fresh light on
what dissident groups had earlier described as a major clash in the
area.

Later in the week, assailants, identified by Chinese authorities as Uighurs, knifed to death the government-appointed imam of Id Kah Mosque in the nearby city of Kashgar. On Friday, police in Xinjiang had shot dead nine suspected terrorists and captured another in Xinjiang’s Hotan prefecture.
……

Link(1): http://china-bans-beards-veils-from-xinjiang-citys-buses

Link(2): http://china-says-violent-xinjiang-uprising-leaves-almost-100-dead

…..

regards

….Karim’s father refused to go along…“Let them
kill me in my town, but I will never leave it.” Fortunately, the
father’s paralyzed cousin, pleaded with him, and at the last minute the two old men joined the
exodus….Thousands of other Yazidi families had to flee on foot into the
mountains: “They couldn’t leave. They didn’t know how to leave. They
waited too long to leave,” Karim said….
…..
For the Yazidis in Iraq, things are right now in extremis.
….

….
Similar brutalities happened during Partition (I) in South Asia (first Bengal and then Punjab), indeed some of our own family members were affected. There
is a hill-top temple near Chittagong (also called Chattagram or Chatga
in short, now Bangladesh). During Siva-ratri night (February), thousands
of pilgrims were visiting. The extremists closed off the hill and
massacred everyone within. Almost everyone. Our grand-uncle survived by
being buried under corpses. He was a very talented young man and never
quite recovered for the rest of his life.
………….
Stranded on a barren mountaintop, thousands of minority Iraqis are
faced with a bleak choice: descend and risk slaughter at the hands of
the encircled Sunni extremists or sit tight and risk dying of thirst.
……

Humanitarian agencies said Tuesday that between 10,000 and 40,000 civilians remain trapped on Mount Sinjar since being driven out
of surrounding villages and the town of Sinjar two days earlier. But
the mountain that had looked like a refuge is becoming a graveyard for
their children.

Unable to dig deep into the rocky mountainside,
displaced families said they have buried young and elderly victims of
the harsh conditions in shallow graves, their bodies covered with
stones. Iraqi government planes attempted to airdrop bottled water to
the mountain on Monday night but reached few of those marooned.

“There
are children dying on the mountain, on the roads,” said Marzio Babille,
the Iraq representative for the United Nations Children’s Fund
(UNICEF). “There is no water, there is no vegetation, they are
completely cut off and surrounded by Islamic State. It’s a disaster, a
total disaster.”

Most of those who fled Sinjar are from the
minority Yazidi sect, which melds parts of ancient Zoroastrianism with
Christianity and Islam. They are considered by the al-Qaeda-inspired
Islamic State to be devil worshippers and apostates.


….
A humanitarian crisis that could turn into a genocide is taking place
right now in the mountains of northwestern Iraq. It hasn’t made the
front page, because the place and the people are obscure, and there’s a
lot of other horrible news to compete with. I’ve learned about it mainly
because the crisis has upended the life of someone I wrote about in the magazine several weeks ago.


Last Sunday, Karim woke up around 7:30 A.M.,
after coming home late the night before. He was about to have breakfast
when his phone rang—a friend was calling to see how he was doing. Karim
is a Yazidi, a member of an ancient religious minority in Iraq.
Ethnically, he’s Kurdish. An engineer and a father of three young
children, Karim spent years working for the U.S. Army in his area, then
for an American medical charity. He’s been waiting for months to find
out whether the U.S. government will grant him a Special Immigrant Visa
because of his service, and because of the danger he currently faces.

Karim
is from a small town north of the district center, Sinjar, between
Mosul and the Syrian border. Sinjar is a historic Yazidi area with an
Arab minority. Depending on who’s drawing the map, Sinjar belongs to
either the northernmost part of Iraq or the westernmost part of
Kurdistan. Since June, when extremist fighters from the Islamic State in
Iraq and al-Sham captured Mosul, they’ve been on the outskirts of
Sinjar, facing off against a small number of Kurdish peshmerga
militiamen. ISIS regards Yazidis as devil worshippers,
and its fighters have been executing Yazidi men who won’t convert to
Islam on the spot, taking away the women as jihadi brides. So there were
many reasons why a friend might worry about Karim.

“I don’t know,” Karim said. “My situation is O.K.” “No, it’s not O.K.!” his friend said. “Sinjar is under the control of ISIS.”

Karim had not yet heard this calamitous news. “I’ll call some friends and get back to you,” he said.

But
the cell network was jammed, so Karim walked to his father’s house. His
father told him that thousands of people from Sinjar were headed their
way, fleeing north through the mountains to get out of Iraq and into
Kurdistan. It suddenly became clear that Karim would have to abandon his
home and escape with his family.

ISIS had
launched its attack on Sinjar during the night. Peshmerga militiamen
were outgunned—their assault rifles against the extremists’ captured
fifty-caliber guns, rocket-propelled grenades, mortars, anti-aircraft
weapons, and armored vehicles. The Kurds began to run out of ammunition,
and those who could retreated north toward Kurdistan. By dawn, the
extremists were pouring into town. Later, ISIS posted triumphant photos on Twitter: bullet-riddled corpses of peshmerga in the streets and dirt fields; an ISIS
fighter aiming his pistol at the heads of five men lying face down on
the ground; Arab locals who stayed in Sinjar jubilantly greeting the new
occupiers.

Karim had time to do just one thing: burn all the
documents that connected him to America—photos of him posing with Army
officers, a CD from the medical charity—in case he was stopped on the
road by militants or his house was searched. He watched the record of
his experience during the period of the Americans in Iraq turn to ash,
and felt nothing except the urge to get to safety.

By 9:30 A.M.,
Karim and his extended family were crowded into his brother’s car and
his father’s pickup truck. They’d had no time to pack, and for the drive
through the heat of the desert they took nothing but water, bread,
canned milk for Karim’s two-year-old son, and their AK-47s. At first,
Karim’s father refused to go along. A stubborn man, he said, “Let them
kill me in my town, but I will never leave it.” Fortunately, the
father’s paralyzed cousin, who had been left behind by his family,
pleaded with him, and at the last minute the two old men joined the
exodus. Karim’s twenty or so family members were the last to get out of
the area by car, and they joined a massive traffic jam headed northwest.
Thousands of other Yazidi families had to flee on foot into the
mountains: “They couldn’t leave. They didn’t know how to leave. They
waited too long to leave,” Karim said.

Karim drove in a convoy of
two hundred and fifty or three hundred cars. They stuck together for
safety. The group decided against taking the most direct route to
Kurdistan, which would have taken them through the Arab border town of
Rabiya. ISIS wasn’t the only danger—Yazidi Kurds have
come to regard Sunni Arabs generally as a threat. So they drove across
the border at an unmarked point into Syria, where Kurdish rebels—who
form one side in the complex Syrian civil war—were in control of the
area. 

The rebels waved the convoy on, while Syrian Arab villagers stared
or took videos with their mobile phones. A relative of Karim’s happened
to be a cigarette smuggler and knew the way across the desert once the
roads disappeared. (“Everyone and everything has his day,” Karim told
me.) The undercarriage of Karim’s car began to break off in pieces. They
drove for hours through Syria, crossed back into Iraq, and shortly
afterward reached a checkpoint into Kurdistan, where the line of cars
was so long that they had to wait for hours more. It wasn’t until
nightfall, nearly twelve hours after they had fled their home, that
Karim and his family reached the Kurdish town of Dohuk, where he
happened to have a brother who gave them shelter in his small apartment.

“Compared
with other people here, I’m in heaven,” Karim said by phone from Dohuk.
“Some are in camps for refugees. It’s very hot and very hard. We are
safe, but thousands of families are in the mountains. Thousands.”

Karim heard that one young man had been executed by ISIS
for no reason other than being Yazidi. A friend of Karim’s was hiding
in the mountains, running low on supplies, and out of battery power in
his phone. Another friend, an Arab (“He is not a religion guy, he’s
open-minded, it doesn’t matter if you’re Christian or Yazidi,” Karim
said), had stayed in Sinjar and was trapped in his home. Now ISIS
was going house to house, with information provided by locals, looking
for Iraqi soldiers and police, for people with money, for Kurds. They
had already taken away the friend’s brother, a police officer. No one
knows for sure how many people ISIS has killed since the attack on Sinjar. Karim heard that it is many hundreds.

Prince Tahseen Said, “the world leader of the Yazidis,” has issued an appeal
to Kurdish, Iraqi, Arab, and European leaders, as well as to Ban
Ki-moon and Barack Obama. It reads: “I ask for aid and to lend a hand
and help the people of Sinjar areas and its affiliates and villages and
complexes which are home to the people of the Yazidi religion. I invite
[you] to assume [your] humanitarian and nationalistic responsibilities
towards them and help them in their plight and the difficult conditions
in which they live today.”

It’s hard to know what, if anything,
is left of the humanitarian responsibilities of the international
community. The age of intervention is over, killed in large part by the
Iraq war. But justifiable skepticism about the use of military force
seems also to have killed off the impulse to show solidarity with the
helpless victims of atrocities in faraway places. 

There’s barely any
public awareness of the unfolding disaster in northwestern Iraq, let
alone a campaign of international support for the Yazidis—or for the
Christians who have been driven out of Mosul or the Sunni Arabs who
don’t want to live under the tyranny of ISIS. The
front-page news continues to be the war in Gaza, a particular Western
obsession whether one’s views are pro-Israel, pro-Palestinian,
pro-peace, or pro-plague-on-both-houses. Nothing that either side has
done in that terrible conflict comes close to the routine brutality of ISIS.

Karim
couldn’t help expressing bitterness about this. “I don’t see any
attention from the rest of the world,” he said. “In one day, they killed
more than two thousand Yazidi in Sinjar, and the whole world says,
‘Save Gaza, save Gaza.’ ”

It was encouraging to learn that humanitarian supplies might be on the way, but we always seem to be at least a step behind as ISIS rolls over local forces and consolidates power. ISIS
is not Al Qaeda. It operates like an army, taking territory, creating a
state. The aim of the Sinjar operation seems to be control of the Mosul
Dam, the largest dam in Iraq, which provides electricity to Mosul,
Baghdad, and much of the country. 

According to one expert, if ISIS
takes the dam, which is located on the Tigris River, it would have the
means to put Mosul under thirty metres of water, and Baghdad under five.
Other nearby targets could include the Kurdish cities of Erbil and
Dohuk. Karim reported that residents of Dohuk, inundated with refugees,
felt not just a sense of responsibility for Sinjar but also alarm, and
that they were stocking up on supplies in case of an attack.

One way to protect the innocent and hurt those who are terrorizing them would be for the U.S. to launch air strikes on ISIS
positions. That option has been discussed within the administration
since the fall of Mosul, in June, but it runs against President Obama’s
foreign-policy tendencies. “The President’s first instinct is, ‘Let’s
help them to do it,’ ” the official told me. “The minute we do
something, it changes the game.” 

This time, unlike in Syria, it isn’t
hard to figure out how to “help them to do it”: send arms to the Kurds,
America’s only secular-minded, pluralistic Muslim allies in the region,
and the only force in the area with the means and the will to protect
thousands of lives. (Dexter Filkins wrote, on Monday, about the possibility of American military aid to the Kurds.)
Perhaps the U.S., Europe, and the U.N. can’t or won’t prevent genocide
in northwestern Iraq, but the Kurds can. The fact that the peshmerga
were outgunned by ISIS and ran out of ammunition in Sinjar says that we are a step behind on this front, too. According to the Times,
Washington has turned down Kurdish requests for American weapons for
fear of alienating and undermining Iraq’s central government in Baghdad.

The official said that peshmerga forces are organizing
to retake Sinjar. Karim heard the same thing in Dohuk, and he said that
he wants to be in the first group that returns to his hometown.
Meanwhile, he’s volunteering with the American medical charity he used
to work for, helping other refugees in Dohuk. He told his children that
they’re on an extended vacation in Kurdistan.

……

Link (1): http://iraqi-yazidis-stranded-on-isolated-mountaintop-begin-to-die-of-thirst/

Link (2): http://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/friend-flees-horror-isis

…..

regards

…synagogues attacked….in the Paris suburb of Sarcelles, firebombed by a
400-strong mob….the crowd’s chants included “Slit Jews’ throats”…..Germany, molotov cocktails were lobbed into the Bergische synagogue
in Wuppertal – previously destroyed on Kristallnacht…….notable slogans included: “Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas”…..
….
Pakistanis in the UK and others (in our opinion) need to exercise a bit more care as to how to put on display their (genuine) grievances. One suggestion is to make the protests more inclusive, to demonstrate that Muslims in Europe are capable of feeling empathy toward the Christians of Iraq (for example). And yes, please do stuff the Hitler/Nazi love – from what we know of him and his Aryan values – he would not have hesitated to stuff Muslims (and Hindus and other unter-mensch) in gas chambers.
….
Destroying Jewish property in Paris, displaying ISIS flags in London, chanting “Death to Jews” in Berlin will not
make things better in Gaza, but will tear apart the social fabric in
Europe.  
………

 ……
Right now there is a powerful Muslim-Left coalition in Europe aligned against Israel. Western societies are facing tremendous stress, impacted not only by the Gaza war but also other events unfolding in the Middle East and North Africa, whereby some people/sects are doing incalculable harm to other people/sects.

It is alarming to see anti-semitism has been spreading thick and fast making a come-back across Europe, even amongst the middle class, and even in Germany (see below).

If things become truly insufferable for Jews, they can migrate to Israel (indeed large numbers are doing so), or the USA. However the same option is not available to Euro-Muslims. Remember, if the hell-fires break out, it will not make any distinction between Jews and Muslims.
………………………………
A black flag with white Arabic writing, similar to those flown by jihadist groups, was flying at the entrance of an east London housing state near Canary Wharf.
……..
In
a highly provocative gesture, the emblem was planted on top of the
gates of the Will Crooks estate on Poplar High Street, and is surrounded
by flags of Palestine and slogans.

The flag bears similar writing to the jihadi flags that have been
flown by the extremist group in Iraq and other jihadi groups since the
1990s. When the estate was approached last night, a group of about 20
Asian youths swore at Guardian journalists and told them to leave the
area immediately. One youth threatened to smash a camera.

When a
passerby tried to take a picture of the flag on a phone, one of the gang
asked him if he was Jewish. The passerby replied: “Would it make a
difference?” The youth said: “Yes, it fucking would.” Asked if the flag
was an ISIS flag, one local man said: “It is just the flag of Allah.” But another man asked: “So what if it is?”

One
local man said that the flag has been there for several days. “People
were taking photos of it last night,” he said. A Metropolitan police
spokesman said on Thursday that they had received no complaints about
offensive flags in the Tower Hamlets area. The Dutch government has
banned the public display of the Isis flag, but it is not illegal in the
UK.
……….
 
In the space of just one week last month, according to Crif, the
umbrella group for France’s Jewish organisations, eight synagogues were
attacked. One, in the Paris suburb of Sarcelles, was firebombed by a
400-strong mob. A kosher supermarket and pharmacy were smashed and
looted; the crowd’s chants and banners included “Death to Jews” and
“Slit Jews’ throats”. That same weekend, in the Barbes neighbourhood of
the capital, stone-throwing protesters burned Israeli flags: “Israhell”,
read one banner.

In Germany
last month, molotov cocktails were lobbed into the Bergische synagogue
in Wuppertal – previously destroyed on Kristallnacht – and a Berlin
imam, Abu Bilal Ismail, called on Allah to “destroy the Zionist Jews …
Count them and kill them, to the very last one.” Bottles were thrown
through the window of an antisemitism campaigner in Frankfurt; an
elderly Jewish man was beaten up at a pro-Israel
rally in Hamburg; an Orthodox Jewish teenager punched in the face in
Berlin. In several cities, chants at pro-Palestinian protests compared
Israel’s actions to the Holocaust; other notable slogans included: “Jew,
coward pig, come out and fight alone,” and “Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas.”

Across Europe,
the conflict in Gaza is breathing new life into some very old, and very
ugly, demons. This is not unusual; police and Jewish civil rights
organisations have long observed a noticeable spike in antisemitic
incidents each time the Israeli-Palestinian conflict flares. During the
three weeks of Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in late 2008 and early 2009,
France recorded 66 antisemitic incidents, including attacks on 

Jewish-owned restaurants and synagogues and a sharp increase in
anti-Jewish graffiti.But according to academics and Jewish leaders, this
time it is different. More than simply a reaction to the conflict, they
say, the threats, hate speech and violent attacks feel like the
expression of a much deeper and more widespread antisemitism, fuelled by
a wide range of factors, that has been growing now for more than a
decade.

“These are the worst times since the Nazi era,” Dieter
Graumann, president of Germany’s Central Council of Jews, told the
Guardian. “On the streets, you hear things like ‘the Jews should be
gassed’, ‘the Jews should be burned’ – we haven’t had that in Germany
for decades. Anyone saying those slogans isn’t criticising Israeli
politics, it’s just pure hatred against Jews: nothing else. And it’s not
just a German phenomenon. It’s an outbreak of hatred against Jews so
intense that it’s very clear indeed.”

Roger Cukierman, president
of France’s Crif, said French Jews were “anguished” about an anti-Jewish
backlash that goes far beyond even strongly felt political and
humanitarian opposition to the current fighting: 

“They are not screaming
‘Death to the Israelis’ on the streets of Paris,” Cukierman said last
month. “They are screaming ‘Death to Jews’.” Crif’s vice-president
Yonathan Arfi said he “utterly rejected” the view that the latest
increase in antisemitic incidents was down to events in Gaza. “They have
laid bare something far more profound,” he said.

Nor is it just
Europe’s Jewish leaders who are alarmed. Germany’s chancellor, Angela
Merkel, has called the recent incidents “an attack on freedom and
tolerance and our democratic state”. The French prime minister, Manuel
Valls, has spoken of “intolerable” and clearly antisemitic acts: “To
attack a Jew because he is a Jew is to attack France. To attack a
synagogue and a kosher grocery store is quite simply antisemitism and
racism”.

France, whose 500,000-strong Jewish community is one of Europe’s
largest, and Germany, where the post-war exhortation of “Never Again” is
part of the fabric of modern society, are not alone. In Austria last
month, a pre-season friendly between Maccabi Haifa and German Bundesliga
team SC Paderborn had to be rescheduled after the Israeli side’s
previous match was called off following an attempted assault on its
players.

The Netherlands’
main antisemitism watchdog, Cidi, had more than 70 calls from alarmed
Jewish citizens in one week last month; the average is normally three to
five. An Amsterdam rabbi, Binjamin Jacobs, had his front door stoned,
and two Jewish women were attacked – one beaten, the other the victim of
arson – after they hung Israeli flags from their balconies. In Belgium,
a woman was reportedly turned away from a shop with the words: “We
don’t currently sell to Jews.”

In Italy,
the Jewish owners of dozens of shops and other businesses in Rome
arrived to find swastikas and anti-Jewish slogans daubed on shutters and
windows. One slogan read: “Every Palestinian is like a comrade. Same
enemy. Same barricade”; another: “Jews, your end is near.” Abd al-Barr
al-Rawdhi, an imam from the north eastern town of San Donà di Piave, is
to be deported after being video-recorded giving a sermon calling for
the extermination of the Jews.

There has been no violence in Spain,
but the country’s small Jewish population of 35,000-40,000 fears the
situation is so tense that “if it continues for too long, bad things
will happen,” the leader of Madrid’s Jewish community, David Hatchwell,
said. 

The community is planning action against El Mundo after the daily
paper published a column by 83-year-old playwright Antonio Gala
questioning Jews’ ability to live peacefully with others: “It’s not
strange they have been so frequently expelled.”

Studies suggest
antisemitism may indeed be mounting. A 2012 survey by the EU’s by the
Fundamental Rights agency of some 6,000 Jews in eight European countries
– between them, home to 90% of Europe’s Jewish population – found 66%
of respondents felt antisemitism in Europe was on the rise; 76% said
antisemitism had increased in their country over the past five years. In
the 12 months after the survey, nearly half said they worried about
being verbally insulted or attacked in public because they were Jewish.

Jewish
organisations that record antisemitic incidents say the trend is
inexorable: France’s Society for the Protection of the Jewish Community
says annual totals of antisemitic acts in the 2000s are seven times
higher than in the 1990s. French Jews are leaving for Israel in greater
numbers, too, for reasons they say include antisemitism and the
electoral success of the hard-right Front National. 

The Jewish Agency
for Israel said 1,407 French Jews left for Israel in 2013, a 72% rise on
the previous year. Between January and May this year, 2,250 left,
against 580 in the same period last year.

In a study completed in
February, America’s Anti-Defamation League surveyed 332,000 Europeans
using an index of 11 questions designed to reveal strength of
anti-Jewish stereotypes. It found that 24% of Europeans – 37% in France,
27% in Germany, 20% in Italy – harboured some kind of anti-Jewish
attitude.

So what is driving the phenomenon? Valls, the French
prime minister, has acknowledged a “new”, “normalised” antisemitism that
he says blends “the Palestinian cause, jihadism, the devastation of
Israel, and hatred of France and its values”.

Mark Gardner of the
Community Security Trust, a London-based charity that monitors
antisemitism both in Britain and on the continent, also identifies a
range of factors. Successive conflicts in the Middle East he said, have
served up “a crush of trigger events” that has prevented tempers from
cooling: the second intifada in 2000, the Israel-Lebanon war of 2006,
and the three Israel–Hamas conflicts in 2009, 2012 and 2014 have “left
no time for the situation to return to normal.” In such a climate, he
added, three brutal antisemitic murders in the past eight years – two in
France, one in Belgium, and none coinciding with Israeli military
action – have served “not to shock, but to encourage the antisemites”,
leaving them “seeking more blood and intimidation, not less”.

In 2006, 23-year old Ilan Halimi was kidnapped, tortured and left for
dead in Paris by a group calling itself the Barbarians Gang, who
subsequently admitted targeting him “because he was a Jew, so his family
would have money”. Two years ago, in May 2012, Toulouse gunman Mohamed
Merah shot dead seven people, including three children and a young rabbi
outside their Jewish school. And in May this year Mehdi Nemmouche, a
Frenchman of Algerian descent thought to have recently returned to
France after a year in Syria fighting with radical Islamists, was
charged with shooting four people at the Jewish museum in Brussels.

If
the French establishment has harboured a deep vein of anti-Jewish
sentiment since long before the Dreyfus affair, the influence of radical
Islam, many Jewish community leaders say, is plainly a significant
contributing factor in the country’s present-day antisemitism. But so
too, said Gardner, is a straightforward alienation that many young
Muslims feel from society. “Often it’s more to do with that than with
Israel. Many would as soon burn down a police station as a synagogue.
Jews are simply identified as part of the establishment.”

While he
stressed it would be wrong to lay all the blame at the feet of Muslims,
Peter Ulrich, a research fellow at the centre for antisemitism research
(ZfA) at Berlin’s Technical University, agreed that some of the
“antisemitic elements” Germany has seen at recent protests could be “a
kind of rebellion of people who are themselves excluded on the basis of
racist structures.”

Arfi said that in France antisemitism had
become “a portmanteau for a lot of angry people: radical Muslims,
alienated youths from immigrant families, the far right, the far left”.
But he also blamed “a process of normalisation, whereby antisemitism is
being made somehow acceptable”. One culprit, Arfi said, is the
controversial comedian Dieudonné: “He has legitimised it. He’s made
acceptable what was unacceptable.”

A similar normalisation may be
under way in Germany, according to a 2013 study by the Technical
University of Berlin. In 14,000 hate-mail letters, emails and faxes sent
over 10 years to the Israeli embassy in Berlin and the Central Council
of Jews in Germany, Professor Monika Schwarz-Friesel found that 60% were
written by educated, middle-class Germans, including professors,
lawyers, priests and university and secondary school students. Most,
too, were unafraid to give their names and addresses – something she
felt few Germans would have done 20 or 30 years ago.

Almost every
observer pointed to the unparalleled power of unfiltered social media to
inflame and to mobilise. A stream of shocking images and Twitter
hashtags, including #HitlerWasRight, amount, Arfi said, almost to
indoctrination. “The logical conclusion, in fact, is radicalisation: on
social media people self-select what they see, and what they see can be
pure, unchecked propaganda. They may never be confronted with opinions
that are not their own.”

…..

Link (1): http://www.theguardian.com/flag-isis-jihadi-islamic-state-flown-poplar-east-london

Link (2): http://www.theguardian.com/antisemitism-rise-europe-worst-since-nazis