Filtered Posts
Fighting The War On Terrorism, Hollywood Style
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#37 by rsridhar on December 11, 2002 8:38pm PT
re:#32 by faisaluno
Here is a question for you Sherlock. Britain ruled India and Pak. Both became free in 1947, right? Today, India is not exporting terrorism worldwide but Pakistan is. Why? Let me give you a hint. It has nothing to do with Islam but a lot to do with ideology.
------------------------------------------------
Sridhar
Its INCIDENTAL YOU SAID ABOUT EXPORT .Sen Patrick Moynihan once on t.v. interview referred to India, in a casual tone :``ONLY THING INDIA EXPORTS IS COMMUNICABLE DISEASES ``
I know everybody doesnt agree with Moynihan the Senator AND Prez. of U.S.A. c.in.c. of war on Terrorism doesnt think same as Sridhar.
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 13, 2002 02:11 pm
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
#37 by rsridhar on December 11, 2002 8:38pm PT
re:#32 by faisaluno
Here is a question for you Sherlock. Britain ruled India and Pak. Both became free in 1947, right? Today, India is not exporting terrorism worldwide but Pakistan is. Why? Let me give you a hint. It has nothing to do with Islam but a lot to do with ideology.
------------------------------------------------
Sridhar
Its INCIDENTAL YOU SAID ABOUT EXPORT .Sen Patrick Moynihan once on t.v. interview referred to India, in a casual tone :``ONLY THING INDIA EXPORTS IS COMMUNICABLE DISEASES ``
I know everybody doesnt agree with Moynihan the Senator AND Prez. of U.S.A. c.in.c. of war on Terrorism doesnt think same as Sridhar.
Moderate Muslims
IF MADARSAH & LACK OF MODERN EDUCATION(as if we didnt know muslim literacy to bee lowest)THEN HOW COME NON MUSLIM INDIANS DO NOT RISE ABOVE ANY MORE????
Arun Shourie Literature: A Study– III
Harvesting Hatred
-- Dr. J. Kuruvachira
Shourie uses a clever method of using others to express his views. In fact, he effectively uses certain eminent personalities as his mouthpiece and quotes extensively from them. For example, he frequently uses the writings of Mahatma Gandhi and Swami Vivekananda, in order to impress upon the reader how badly Hinduism has been treated by the Christian missionaries. For instance, Shourie says; ``The viciousness of the distortions and misrepresentations of the missionaries, the virulence of their abuse, the length of time over which they kept up the barrage we cannot imagine these today. Swami Vivekananda had to face these at every turn, Gandhiji knew them well`` (Missionaries, 45-46). He says again: ``Swami Vivekananda has given the most heart-rendering accounts of the calumnies that Christian missionaries spread about Hinduism, about India, about him personally.`` (Missionaries, 3-4).
When Shourie wants to tell the Christians that Jesus Christ is not the Son of God, he uses the words of Mahatma Gandhi who said: ``Jesus was the son of God only in the sense that we are all children of God, […] The belief that Jesus is the only begotten son of God is to me contrary to Reason`` (Missionaries, 240). (Elsewhere he uses the Quran to tell the same to Christians. See A. Shourie, Indian Controversies, 424-426). Again, when Shourie wishes to express the view that laws should be passed to prevent the so-called proselytisation he quotes Gandhiji again: ``If I [Gandhiji] had power and could legislate, I should certainly stop all proselytising`` (Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi 46, 110 as cited in Missionaries, 37). He further states: ``Gandhiji said, it would be better for non-Indian missionaries to return to their countries and attend to problems there`` (Missionaries,39). One wonders why Shourie does not state his opinions about Christianity on his own authority without employing others as his mouthpiece and quoting them selectively and often out of context.
Denial of fundamental rights to minorities
Christianity neither accepts nor condones any conversion by force or fraud or allurement. Forced conversion is a contradiction in terms. It is totally against the basic principles of human rights and freedom of conscience. In fact, the Church explicitly forbids it. But Christians do try to witness to Christ and proclaim their belief in him. Similar things are also being done by almost all the religions of the world, including those of India. Freedom to profess, practice and propagate one’s faith is guaranteed by the Constitution as one of the fundamental rights. It says: ``All persons are equally entitled to Freedom of Conscience and the right to freely profess, practice and propagate religion`` (Art.25). Therefore, a Christian for that matter the follower of any religion if he proclaims his faith, it is not a violation of anyone, for he is only exercising one of his fundamental rights.
But Shourie’s Missionaries in India is written with the objective of denying this fundamental right to Christians. He also demands that, all cases of conversions be open to scrutiny by the State authorities (Missionaries,40). He says: ``The freedom of religion guaranteed by Articles 25 and 26 of the Constitution should be subject to the same sort of restriction as is a secular right like freedom of speech. [….] In a secular country, why should the right to practice and propagate religion not be subject to the same sorts of perimeters as applied to other secular rights?`` (Missionaries, 232).
Shourie goes on to accuse the Christians that, the missionaries have successfully fought off every effort to enjoin on the State the duty to scrutinise conversions (Missionaries,204). But if an ordinance or law is unjust or discriminatory towards a particular group, it is unacceptable. In India, certain States want to scrutinise the practice and propagation of faith of some selected minority religions only, and not others who are engaged in similar activities. It is well known that practically all over India the Hindu missionaries and groups are seriously involved in propagating their faith. They are also engaged in the same activity in North America, Europe and elsewhere. For example, the Rama Krishna Mission, International Society for Krishna Consciousness, Siddha Yoga Meditation, Integral Yoga, Movement of Satya Sai Baba, Sanatana Dharma Samgha, the Self-Realisation Fellowship of Yogananda, Ananda Margis, Transcendental Meditation of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the Centre of Aurobindo and Mère and so on, are agents for the propagation of Hinduism outside India especially in North America and Europe (See T.A. Tweed, S. Prothero (eds), Asian Religions in America, 241-260; E.Fizzotti, F. Squarcini, (eds), L’Oriente che non tramonta,34-37;97-110; 131-242.). Besides, if all conversions are to be subject to scrutiny by the State, the so-called re-conversions in which many Hindu groups in India are engaged, should also be subject to the same scrutiny, for it is also conversion from one faith to another.
Shourie’s ‘feet of clay’ on Indian history
In the book Missionaries in India, Shourie deals with Christianity in India as if it is a vestige of British colonialism and nothing more.His historical treatment of it seldom goes beyond the period of British imperialism. Thus, he reduces the history of 2000 years of Christianity in India to 200 years of British rule. But in reality, Christianity in India is as old as Christianity itself. In fact, Benjamin Walker comments: ``Christianity is of greater antiquity in India than in any other country in the world except Palestine – it is older in India than in Rome itself`` (B. Walker, Hindu World I, 238).
Shourie’s ‘feet of clay’ on Indian history becomes even more evident in what he has to say about the role of Christians in the Indian national movement. He says: ``For over a hundred years thus missionary activity was interwoven with, and inextricably tied up with British imperial control of India: that the missionaries even those of Indian origin did not join the Independence Movement was not an accident`` (Missionaries,200. Italics added). It is a serious accusation against the Indian Christian community and is a gross distortion of facts.
The true history of the Indian Independence movement presents us with a different picture than that which Shourie provides. George Thomas, a well known Church historian maintains that, the Indian Christian Community played an influential role, especially in the early phase of the Indian National Congress founded in 1885 which was the premier instrument of political nationalism. According to him, the influence of Christians was impressive in the various sessions of the Indian National Congress. For example, in the third annual session of the Congress in 1887, out of 607 participants in the session, 15 were Indian Christians, and among those who addressed the assembly was Madhu Sudhan Das, a well-known leader from the Christian community in Orissa. The number and influence of Indian Christians continued to be impressive in the subsequent sessions of the Congress. Kali Charan Banerjee (1847-1907), a Bengali Christian and a fine orator, regularly addressed the Congress’ annual sessions in moulding the policy of National Movement. In the Congress session of 1889, among the ten women delegates, three were Christians: Pandita Ramabai Saraswati (1858-1922), Mrs. Triumbuck and Mrs. Nikambe (G. Thomas, ``The Christians and the Freedom Movement``, 63).
George Thomas further notes that Barhmabandhab Upadhyaya (1861-1907) a ‘Hindu Catholic’ sadhu and theologian, played a leading role in the Swadeshi movement. He was also one of the early leaders who enunciated the philosophy of non-co-operation movement. He edited Sandhya, a national journal founded in 1904, and it had a decisive influence on the masses because it was the only vernacular paper in Bengali, which boldly advocated complete Indian Nationalism. Again, a conference of leading Christians from all over India held at Ranchi in 1923 passed a resolution to give full support to the national movement. In 1930, among the 78 persons who accompanied Mahatma Gandhi during his Salt March from Sabarmati ashram to Dandi, there was a Christian named Thevarthundiyil Titus Titus, a young disciple of Gandhi and a member of a Christian family of Travancore. In the freedom and pro-democracy movement in Travancore in the 1930s and 1940s, prominent Christian leaders like T.M. Varghese, A.J. John, Anne Mascarene and Akkamma Cherian were pioneering forces. (G. Thomas, ``The Christians and the Freedom Movement``, 64-67).
Christians actively participated in the Swaraj Movement (1905), the Non Co-operation Movement (1920), the Civil Disobedience Movement (1930) and the ‘Quit India’ Movement (1942). Since the 1920s, many Christian associations and organisations like, the All India Conference of Indian Christians, the National Christian Council of India, Christian leaders and student groups related to United Theological College (Bangalore), Serampore College (Bengal), the Youth Christian Council of Action (Kerala), the Student Christian Movement of India, the Indian Christian Association of Bengal, a conference of Christians in Bombay, a meeting of Christians in Palayamcotta and Tinnavelly, and the like, passed resolutions expressing complete solidarity with the freedom movement. Some of them even took part in massive manifestations. In this way, the Christians truly identified themselves with the Indian national movement and demonstrated their deepest concern for the cause. In fact, they were among those pioneered and shaped the goals of Indian Nationalism. Therefore, George Thomas claims that the Indian Christian community was not behind any other community in their desire for national freedom and in their readiness to work and make sacrifices for it (See G.Thomas, ``The Christians and the Freedom Movement``, 64-66).
Superficial knowledge of Christianity
Shourie examines the Bible, the New Testament in particular, in an extremely incompetent manner. Without being competent in the science of hermeneutics and knowledge of Biblical languages, Shourie ventures to comment on the Christian Bible and its contents in an air of authoritativeness (See Missionaries, 141-142,211-213. Shourie’s Harvesting our Souls,2000 is the best example of his profession to be a ‘Bible scholar’). According to Shourie, the command of Jesus to ‘go into the whole world to preach the good news’ is a later interpolation (Missionaries,212). Unfortunately, he does not realise that, even if this verse is a later addition, it would not in any way change the basic belief of the Christians on the matter. Christians do not base all their activity of proclaiming their faith, on this one verse from the New Testament. There are other weighty reasons for proclaiming the message of Jesus Christ. Thus, in discussing the Bible, Shourie lacks scholarship and sensitivity. His cynicism reveals his blatant fundamentalist leanings. Biblical books, some of which go back to more than 3000 years, and which continue to inspire millions of people all over the world, deserve greater respect than Shourie is willing to concede.
Shourie in his book discusses several Christian theological issues, such as, the infallibility of the Pope, moral teachings of the Catholic Church, theology of Vatican Council II, salvation outside the Church, ‘contextualisation’ of the Church, inculturation, inter-religious dialogue, liberation theology, etc. His analysis lacks depth of scholarship. He often uses sources that are dubious. For example, when he discusses the doctrine of ‘infallibility’, first of all, he does not understand the concept correctly for he says: ``the history of the Popes and their actual conduct had left little ground for believing that, being the representatives of God on earth, they were infallible`` (See Missionaries,212). Secondly, it seems that he depends on Hans Küng a theologian ``censured`` by the Catholic Church precisely for his wrong views on the issue as the reliable authority on the matter!
On the occasion of the CBCI meeting in Pune in 1994, Archbishop Alphonse Mathias of Bangalore told Bishop Valerian D’Souza of Pune, teasing him and Shourie: ``He [Shourie] knows more about Christianity than your students,`` […] ``He knows more about Christianity``, […] ``than many of our professors`` (Missionaries,241-242). From the manner in which Shourie discusses Christian theological matters and passes judgements on them, it seems that he took too seriously what was said as a ‘joke’!
A trust betrayed
Shourie’s Missionaries in India is also an epitome of a betrayed trust. In the introduction to his book, he states: ``For some reason the organizers were so kind as to ask me to give the Hindu perception of the work of Christian missionaries in India. That lecture and the discussion which followed forms the scaffolding of this book`` (Missionaries, ix-x). Christians often have a quality to be open, welcoming, to think well of others, to be nice and courteous to people. Shourie concludes his Missionaries in India with these words: ``They [Bishops, senior clergy and scholars gathered at Pune for the CBCI meeting in 1994] heard me out in pin-drop silence, and with unbroken patience. […] They were courteous and the very models of dignity and decorum throughout. I left feeling I had been among friends`` (Missionaries, 242. Italics added). Later, the person (Shourie) who was treated as a friend by the Christian leaders wrote a book accusing and denigrating them. The book proves that he neither had the magnanimity to return the courtesy shown to him nor the nobility to respect truth and to be as objective as possible in his evaluation of Christians. Instead, he betrayed their trust by writing a book based on half-truths and distorted facts concerning them. The betrayal of trust was complete when Shourie published the seminar material of the Catholic Bishops Conference of India (1994) without authorisation from the organisers (See Missionaries,245-293).
Conclusion: Shourie’s anti-minority syndrome
It is said that, falsehood oft repeated, achieves the semblance of truth and some are sure to believe it. Shourie’s Missionaries in India is a typical example of such an attempt at propagating falsehood with persistence and malice. Thus, a bundle of partial truths, many distorted facts, several outdated sources and plenty of imagination form the source material for the above work. He also uses the writings of scholars, administrators and Christian missionaries of the colonial India in order to assess the Christianity of today, as if the same conditions and circumstances still prevail. Therefore, the arguments in the book carry little conviction. The work epitomises his prejudices against Christianity, and in the process, reveals his ‘anti-minority syndrome’.
Shourie seldom has a good word for the services which the Christian missionaries have rendered to the nation, to himself personally and to his family. In this, he seems to make his own, the words of Swami Vivekananda who said: ``The college founded by the missionaries are all right, so far as the education is concerned. But with religion it is different. The Hindu is acute; he takes the bait but avoids the hook`` (Collected works 8, 216 as cited by Shourie in his Missionaries, 21.Italics added). We may say that, Shourie has taken the bait in as much as he has benefited from the Christian institutions. He is not an exception. There are also many others who have benefited by the education provided by the Christian institutions. But what Shourie and his ilk want to tell the Christian missionaries is that Christian education is all right, their social and humanitarian services are welcome, but let them not utter the word ‘Christianity’ or the name of Jesus Christ. In other words, Shourie’s philosophy is: let the Christians do their duty to serve the nation but let them not ask for their rights. But Shourie should know that, without Jesus Christ and Christianity, there is neither Christian education nor Christian service nor Christian humanitarian activity.
Many of Shourie’s comments on Christianity and Christian missionaries are provocative, scornful, and provide a philosophy for religious fundamentalists to shatter the centuries old fabric of religious pluralism in India. He does not hesitate to say that, the Church is a vendor of goods, that the Bible contains many contradictions and interpolations, that Jesus Christ is not the Son of God, that the objective of the Christian institutions and Christian humanitarian activities is to convert the non-Christians, that Christians instigate and support the insurgency movements in Northeast India, that the focus of the Church is not depth of the spiritual search but numbers, that there was a conspiracy between Christianity and British colonialists, and between Christian missionaries and scholars to Christianise India, etc.
Therefore, it takes little effort for a reader of Missionaries to understand that the picture of the Christians which Shourie paints is that, they are villains, criminals and anti-nationals and they deserve to be served notice to ‘Quit India’. Shourie’s book is a pre-meditated and well-calculated campaign of calumny against the Christian community. It may be noted that the Christian community though a minority, has a commendable record of patriotism and service and that it has not taken to violence or aggression in its 2000-year-old existence in India.
Besides the Missionaries in India which we have analysed at some length, there is a formidable quantity of ‘Shourie literature’ — most of them targeting religious minorities and secular ideologies with venom and aggression. He sows prejudices and harvests hatred. He destroys rather than builds. Basically Shourie is a negative writer. Yet his capacity as a ‘pen-pusher’ has won him readers who tend to credit him with scholarship. He has emerged as a theoretician and ideologue providing legitimacy to religious fundamentalism. His writings have contributed much to the crisis that India today faces, as was witnessed in recent events in Gujarat. History bears ample testimony to the fact that acts of fascism is always preceded by carefully concocted ideological distortions. It is writings of people like Shourie which have rendered legitimacy to acts of violence, crime and murder carried out regularly by the foot soldiers of fundamentalist ideologies.
(Concluded)
Home
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 13, 2002 02:11 pm
POUND FOR POUND THERE ARE MORE RSS VHP BAJRANG DAL & SHIV SENAS THAN PAKI JEHADIS .IF MADARSAH & LACK OF MODERN EDUCATION(as if we didnt know muslim literacy to bee lowest)THEN HOW COME NON MUSLIM INDIANS DO NOT RISE ABOVE ANY MORE????
Arun Shourie Literature: A Study– III
Harvesting Hatred
-- Dr. J. Kuruvachira
Shourie uses a clever method of using others to express his views. In fact, he effectively uses certain eminent personalities as his mouthpiece and quotes extensively from them. For example, he frequently uses the writings of Mahatma Gandhi and Swami Vivekananda, in order to impress upon the reader how badly Hinduism has been treated by the Christian missionaries. For instance, Shourie says; ``The viciousness of the distortions and misrepresentations of the missionaries, the virulence of their abuse, the length of time over which they kept up the barrage we cannot imagine these today. Swami Vivekananda had to face these at every turn, Gandhiji knew them well`` (Missionaries, 45-46). He says again: ``Swami Vivekananda has given the most heart-rendering accounts of the calumnies that Christian missionaries spread about Hinduism, about India, about him personally.`` (Missionaries, 3-4).
When Shourie wants to tell the Christians that Jesus Christ is not the Son of God, he uses the words of Mahatma Gandhi who said: ``Jesus was the son of God only in the sense that we are all children of God, […] The belief that Jesus is the only begotten son of God is to me contrary to Reason`` (Missionaries, 240). (Elsewhere he uses the Quran to tell the same to Christians. See A. Shourie, Indian Controversies, 424-426). Again, when Shourie wishes to express the view that laws should be passed to prevent the so-called proselytisation he quotes Gandhiji again: ``If I [Gandhiji] had power and could legislate, I should certainly stop all proselytising`` (Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi 46, 110 as cited in Missionaries, 37). He further states: ``Gandhiji said, it would be better for non-Indian missionaries to return to their countries and attend to problems there`` (Missionaries,39). One wonders why Shourie does not state his opinions about Christianity on his own authority without employing others as his mouthpiece and quoting them selectively and often out of context.
Denial of fundamental rights to minorities
Christianity neither accepts nor condones any conversion by force or fraud or allurement. Forced conversion is a contradiction in terms. It is totally against the basic principles of human rights and freedom of conscience. In fact, the Church explicitly forbids it. But Christians do try to witness to Christ and proclaim their belief in him. Similar things are also being done by almost all the religions of the world, including those of India. Freedom to profess, practice and propagate one’s faith is guaranteed by the Constitution as one of the fundamental rights. It says: ``All persons are equally entitled to Freedom of Conscience and the right to freely profess, practice and propagate religion`` (Art.25). Therefore, a Christian for that matter the follower of any religion if he proclaims his faith, it is not a violation of anyone, for he is only exercising one of his fundamental rights.
But Shourie’s Missionaries in India is written with the objective of denying this fundamental right to Christians. He also demands that, all cases of conversions be open to scrutiny by the State authorities (Missionaries,40). He says: ``The freedom of religion guaranteed by Articles 25 and 26 of the Constitution should be subject to the same sort of restriction as is a secular right like freedom of speech. [….] In a secular country, why should the right to practice and propagate religion not be subject to the same sorts of perimeters as applied to other secular rights?`` (Missionaries, 232).
Shourie goes on to accuse the Christians that, the missionaries have successfully fought off every effort to enjoin on the State the duty to scrutinise conversions (Missionaries,204). But if an ordinance or law is unjust or discriminatory towards a particular group, it is unacceptable. In India, certain States want to scrutinise the practice and propagation of faith of some selected minority religions only, and not others who are engaged in similar activities. It is well known that practically all over India the Hindu missionaries and groups are seriously involved in propagating their faith. They are also engaged in the same activity in North America, Europe and elsewhere. For example, the Rama Krishna Mission, International Society for Krishna Consciousness, Siddha Yoga Meditation, Integral Yoga, Movement of Satya Sai Baba, Sanatana Dharma Samgha, the Self-Realisation Fellowship of Yogananda, Ananda Margis, Transcendental Meditation of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the Centre of Aurobindo and Mère and so on, are agents for the propagation of Hinduism outside India especially in North America and Europe (See T.A. Tweed, S. Prothero (eds), Asian Religions in America, 241-260; E.Fizzotti, F. Squarcini, (eds), L’Oriente che non tramonta,34-37;97-110; 131-242.). Besides, if all conversions are to be subject to scrutiny by the State, the so-called re-conversions in which many Hindu groups in India are engaged, should also be subject to the same scrutiny, for it is also conversion from one faith to another.
Shourie’s ‘feet of clay’ on Indian history
In the book Missionaries in India, Shourie deals with Christianity in India as if it is a vestige of British colonialism and nothing more.His historical treatment of it seldom goes beyond the period of British imperialism. Thus, he reduces the history of 2000 years of Christianity in India to 200 years of British rule. But in reality, Christianity in India is as old as Christianity itself. In fact, Benjamin Walker comments: ``Christianity is of greater antiquity in India than in any other country in the world except Palestine – it is older in India than in Rome itself`` (B. Walker, Hindu World I, 238).
Shourie’s ‘feet of clay’ on Indian history becomes even more evident in what he has to say about the role of Christians in the Indian national movement. He says: ``For over a hundred years thus missionary activity was interwoven with, and inextricably tied up with British imperial control of India: that the missionaries even those of Indian origin did not join the Independence Movement was not an accident`` (Missionaries,200. Italics added). It is a serious accusation against the Indian Christian community and is a gross distortion of facts.
The true history of the Indian Independence movement presents us with a different picture than that which Shourie provides. George Thomas, a well known Church historian maintains that, the Indian Christian Community played an influential role, especially in the early phase of the Indian National Congress founded in 1885 which was the premier instrument of political nationalism. According to him, the influence of Christians was impressive in the various sessions of the Indian National Congress. For example, in the third annual session of the Congress in 1887, out of 607 participants in the session, 15 were Indian Christians, and among those who addressed the assembly was Madhu Sudhan Das, a well-known leader from the Christian community in Orissa. The number and influence of Indian Christians continued to be impressive in the subsequent sessions of the Congress. Kali Charan Banerjee (1847-1907), a Bengali Christian and a fine orator, regularly addressed the Congress’ annual sessions in moulding the policy of National Movement. In the Congress session of 1889, among the ten women delegates, three were Christians: Pandita Ramabai Saraswati (1858-1922), Mrs. Triumbuck and Mrs. Nikambe (G. Thomas, ``The Christians and the Freedom Movement``, 63).
George Thomas further notes that Barhmabandhab Upadhyaya (1861-1907) a ‘Hindu Catholic’ sadhu and theologian, played a leading role in the Swadeshi movement. He was also one of the early leaders who enunciated the philosophy of non-co-operation movement. He edited Sandhya, a national journal founded in 1904, and it had a decisive influence on the masses because it was the only vernacular paper in Bengali, which boldly advocated complete Indian Nationalism. Again, a conference of leading Christians from all over India held at Ranchi in 1923 passed a resolution to give full support to the national movement. In 1930, among the 78 persons who accompanied Mahatma Gandhi during his Salt March from Sabarmati ashram to Dandi, there was a Christian named Thevarthundiyil Titus Titus, a young disciple of Gandhi and a member of a Christian family of Travancore. In the freedom and pro-democracy movement in Travancore in the 1930s and 1940s, prominent Christian leaders like T.M. Varghese, A.J. John, Anne Mascarene and Akkamma Cherian were pioneering forces. (G. Thomas, ``The Christians and the Freedom Movement``, 64-67).
Christians actively participated in the Swaraj Movement (1905), the Non Co-operation Movement (1920), the Civil Disobedience Movement (1930) and the ‘Quit India’ Movement (1942). Since the 1920s, many Christian associations and organisations like, the All India Conference of Indian Christians, the National Christian Council of India, Christian leaders and student groups related to United Theological College (Bangalore), Serampore College (Bengal), the Youth Christian Council of Action (Kerala), the Student Christian Movement of India, the Indian Christian Association of Bengal, a conference of Christians in Bombay, a meeting of Christians in Palayamcotta and Tinnavelly, and the like, passed resolutions expressing complete solidarity with the freedom movement. Some of them even took part in massive manifestations. In this way, the Christians truly identified themselves with the Indian national movement and demonstrated their deepest concern for the cause. In fact, they were among those pioneered and shaped the goals of Indian Nationalism. Therefore, George Thomas claims that the Indian Christian community was not behind any other community in their desire for national freedom and in their readiness to work and make sacrifices for it (See G.Thomas, ``The Christians and the Freedom Movement``, 64-66).
Superficial knowledge of Christianity
Shourie examines the Bible, the New Testament in particular, in an extremely incompetent manner. Without being competent in the science of hermeneutics and knowledge of Biblical languages, Shourie ventures to comment on the Christian Bible and its contents in an air of authoritativeness (See Missionaries, 141-142,211-213. Shourie’s Harvesting our Souls,2000 is the best example of his profession to be a ‘Bible scholar’). According to Shourie, the command of Jesus to ‘go into the whole world to preach the good news’ is a later interpolation (Missionaries,212). Unfortunately, he does not realise that, even if this verse is a later addition, it would not in any way change the basic belief of the Christians on the matter. Christians do not base all their activity of proclaiming their faith, on this one verse from the New Testament. There are other weighty reasons for proclaiming the message of Jesus Christ. Thus, in discussing the Bible, Shourie lacks scholarship and sensitivity. His cynicism reveals his blatant fundamentalist leanings. Biblical books, some of which go back to more than 3000 years, and which continue to inspire millions of people all over the world, deserve greater respect than Shourie is willing to concede.
Shourie in his book discusses several Christian theological issues, such as, the infallibility of the Pope, moral teachings of the Catholic Church, theology of Vatican Council II, salvation outside the Church, ‘contextualisation’ of the Church, inculturation, inter-religious dialogue, liberation theology, etc. His analysis lacks depth of scholarship. He often uses sources that are dubious. For example, when he discusses the doctrine of ‘infallibility’, first of all, he does not understand the concept correctly for he says: ``the history of the Popes and their actual conduct had left little ground for believing that, being the representatives of God on earth, they were infallible`` (See Missionaries,212). Secondly, it seems that he depends on Hans Küng a theologian ``censured`` by the Catholic Church precisely for his wrong views on the issue as the reliable authority on the matter!
On the occasion of the CBCI meeting in Pune in 1994, Archbishop Alphonse Mathias of Bangalore told Bishop Valerian D’Souza of Pune, teasing him and Shourie: ``He [Shourie] knows more about Christianity than your students,`` […] ``He knows more about Christianity``, […] ``than many of our professors`` (Missionaries,241-242). From the manner in which Shourie discusses Christian theological matters and passes judgements on them, it seems that he took too seriously what was said as a ‘joke’!
A trust betrayed
Shourie’s Missionaries in India is also an epitome of a betrayed trust. In the introduction to his book, he states: ``For some reason the organizers were so kind as to ask me to give the Hindu perception of the work of Christian missionaries in India. That lecture and the discussion which followed forms the scaffolding of this book`` (Missionaries, ix-x). Christians often have a quality to be open, welcoming, to think well of others, to be nice and courteous to people. Shourie concludes his Missionaries in India with these words: ``They [Bishops, senior clergy and scholars gathered at Pune for the CBCI meeting in 1994] heard me out in pin-drop silence, and with unbroken patience. […] They were courteous and the very models of dignity and decorum throughout. I left feeling I had been among friends`` (Missionaries, 242. Italics added). Later, the person (Shourie) who was treated as a friend by the Christian leaders wrote a book accusing and denigrating them. The book proves that he neither had the magnanimity to return the courtesy shown to him nor the nobility to respect truth and to be as objective as possible in his evaluation of Christians. Instead, he betrayed their trust by writing a book based on half-truths and distorted facts concerning them. The betrayal of trust was complete when Shourie published the seminar material of the Catholic Bishops Conference of India (1994) without authorisation from the organisers (See Missionaries,245-293).
Conclusion: Shourie’s anti-minority syndrome
It is said that, falsehood oft repeated, achieves the semblance of truth and some are sure to believe it. Shourie’s Missionaries in India is a typical example of such an attempt at propagating falsehood with persistence and malice. Thus, a bundle of partial truths, many distorted facts, several outdated sources and plenty of imagination form the source material for the above work. He also uses the writings of scholars, administrators and Christian missionaries of the colonial India in order to assess the Christianity of today, as if the same conditions and circumstances still prevail. Therefore, the arguments in the book carry little conviction. The work epitomises his prejudices against Christianity, and in the process, reveals his ‘anti-minority syndrome’.
Shourie seldom has a good word for the services which the Christian missionaries have rendered to the nation, to himself personally and to his family. In this, he seems to make his own, the words of Swami Vivekananda who said: ``The college founded by the missionaries are all right, so far as the education is concerned. But with religion it is different. The Hindu is acute; he takes the bait but avoids the hook`` (Collected works 8, 216 as cited by Shourie in his Missionaries, 21.Italics added). We may say that, Shourie has taken the bait in as much as he has benefited from the Christian institutions. He is not an exception. There are also many others who have benefited by the education provided by the Christian institutions. But what Shourie and his ilk want to tell the Christian missionaries is that Christian education is all right, their social and humanitarian services are welcome, but let them not utter the word ‘Christianity’ or the name of Jesus Christ. In other words, Shourie’s philosophy is: let the Christians do their duty to serve the nation but let them not ask for their rights. But Shourie should know that, without Jesus Christ and Christianity, there is neither Christian education nor Christian service nor Christian humanitarian activity.
Many of Shourie’s comments on Christianity and Christian missionaries are provocative, scornful, and provide a philosophy for religious fundamentalists to shatter the centuries old fabric of religious pluralism in India. He does not hesitate to say that, the Church is a vendor of goods, that the Bible contains many contradictions and interpolations, that Jesus Christ is not the Son of God, that the objective of the Christian institutions and Christian humanitarian activities is to convert the non-Christians, that Christians instigate and support the insurgency movements in Northeast India, that the focus of the Church is not depth of the spiritual search but numbers, that there was a conspiracy between Christianity and British colonialists, and between Christian missionaries and scholars to Christianise India, etc.
Therefore, it takes little effort for a reader of Missionaries to understand that the picture of the Christians which Shourie paints is that, they are villains, criminals and anti-nationals and they deserve to be served notice to ‘Quit India’. Shourie’s book is a pre-meditated and well-calculated campaign of calumny against the Christian community. It may be noted that the Christian community though a minority, has a commendable record of patriotism and service and that it has not taken to violence or aggression in its 2000-year-old existence in India.
Besides the Missionaries in India which we have analysed at some length, there is a formidable quantity of ‘Shourie literature’ — most of them targeting religious minorities and secular ideologies with venom and aggression. He sows prejudices and harvests hatred. He destroys rather than builds. Basically Shourie is a negative writer. Yet his capacity as a ‘pen-pusher’ has won him readers who tend to credit him with scholarship. He has emerged as a theoretician and ideologue providing legitimacy to religious fundamentalism. His writings have contributed much to the crisis that India today faces, as was witnessed in recent events in Gujarat. History bears ample testimony to the fact that acts of fascism is always preceded by carefully concocted ideological distortions. It is writings of people like Shourie which have rendered legitimacy to acts of violence, crime and murder carried out regularly by the foot soldiers of fundamentalist ideologies.
(Concluded)
Home
The Unmaking Of Gujrat
Vijay Dutt
London, December 13
The British TV network Channel 4 News, in an investigative report, has alleged that a high-profile Indian charity group SEWA International has been raising funds for extreme Hindu groups involved in Gujrat massacre in the name of riot victims.
SEWA, which has been praised even by Prince Charles and backed by eminent British Asians, ``has been raising funds for extreme Hindu groups involved in the massacre,`` the channel alleged in the special report telecast on the eve of Gujarat polls.
``We show that some of its donations are channelled directly
ITS A 4PAGES LONG for THOSE interstedTO KNOW
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 13, 2002 09:04 am
http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_119775,0008.htmIndian charity in UK funded Guj Hindu extremist groups: Report Vijay Dutt
London, December 13
The British TV network Channel 4 News, in an investigative report, has alleged that a high-profile Indian charity group SEWA International has been raising funds for extreme Hindu groups involved in Gujrat massacre in the name of riot victims.
SEWA, which has been praised even by Prince Charles and backed by eminent British Asians, ``has been raising funds for extreme Hindu groups involved in the massacre,`` the channel alleged in the special report telecast on the eve of Gujarat polls.
``We show that some of its donations are channelled directly
ITS A 4PAGES LONG for THOSE interstedTO KNOW
Moderate Muslims
Launch Date: Mid December
Visit http://www.pbs.org/muhammad for more information about Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet.
Website Highlights
I. The Virtual Hajj will offer visitors from all walks of life the opportunity to experience the extraordinary pilgrimage that only Muslims are allowed to undertake.
II. Muhammad and... uses video, audio, stills, and new text from the program`s producers to go beyond the content of the broadcast and offer more information about Muhammad and women, violence, other religions, the Quran, the Jews of Medina, and America.
III. The Life of Muhammad includes an interactive timeline and a concise summary of the main events of the Prophet`s life.
IV. The Discussion Forum will allow users to express their opinions about issues raised in the program. All topics of conversation will be moderated.
V. The Film will offer background on the individuals and organizations responsible for bringing Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet to the screen.
VI. Learning Tools will provide essays by key characters in the program as well as links to other web-based resources for those who want to learn more about Muhammad or Islam.
FRONTLINE will rebroadcast Muslims,a two-hour special on the many diverse interpretations of Islam around the world, on Thursday, December 19 at 9:00 PM on PBS.
A variety of community-based events that use Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet and Muslims as a catalyst for dialogue about Islam are taking place around the country in conjunction with these broadcasts.
Funding for Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet has been provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, The David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Arabian Bulk Trade, Sabadia Family Foundation, Irfan Kathwari Foundation, El-Hibri Foundation, Qureishi Family Trust, and many individual contributors.
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 13, 2002 09:04 am
Launch Date: Mid December
Visit http://www.pbs.org/muhammad for more information about Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet.
Website Highlights
I. The Virtual Hajj will offer visitors from all walks of life the opportunity to experience the extraordinary pilgrimage that only Muslims are allowed to undertake.
II. Muhammad and... uses video, audio, stills, and new text from the program`s producers to go beyond the content of the broadcast and offer more information about Muhammad and women, violence, other religions, the Quran, the Jews of Medina, and America.
III. The Life of Muhammad includes an interactive timeline and a concise summary of the main events of the Prophet`s life.
IV. The Discussion Forum will allow users to express their opinions about issues raised in the program. All topics of conversation will be moderated.
V. The Film will offer background on the individuals and organizations responsible for bringing Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet to the screen.
VI. Learning Tools will provide essays by key characters in the program as well as links to other web-based resources for those who want to learn more about Muhammad or Islam.
FRONTLINE will rebroadcast Muslims,a two-hour special on the many diverse interpretations of Islam around the world, on Thursday, December 19 at 9:00 PM on PBS.
A variety of community-based events that use Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet and Muslims as a catalyst for dialogue about Islam are taking place around the country in conjunction with these broadcasts.
Funding for Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet has been provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, The David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Arabian Bulk Trade, Sabadia Family Foundation, Irfan Kathwari Foundation, El-Hibri Foundation, Qureishi Family Trust, and many individual contributors.
Moderate Muslims
Ralphy
If the hindutva like Jay Harami Ou Modi & Joshi have there way very soon you will be a endangered species ......Indian christian.
No european or American will come to rescue you ...
5000 Christians to embrace Hinduism
=============================
CHENNAI: The Dalit Ethnic Liberation Organisation (DELO), headed by D Periyasamy, an erstwhile associate of DPI leader Thirumavalavan, is organising a programme in Tiruchi on April 13, next year to re-convert Christians to Hinduism.
In a media briefing, he claimed that about 5,000 Christians would get converted to Hinduism on the occasion.
He further said his organisation would fight against the practice of untouchability in Hinduism and urged Kanchi Pontiff Jayendra Saraswathi to provide representation to Dalits in the Kanchi Mutt.
Welcoming the Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Forcible Conversion Act, Periyasamy said the status of converted Dalits had been changed from scheduled caste to backward class whereby they lost the privileges for which they were entitled to and to get back such facilities, many of them were returning to their parent religion.
Endorsing Periyasamy`s suggestions, Hindu Makkal Katchi general secretary Arjun Sampath who was also present on the occasion, appealed to the state government to appoint ``qualified and devout`` Dalits as archakas in temples as per the recent Supreme Court ruling.
source: www.newindpress.com
Bharat Mata has some step sons (christians muslims sikhs& other minoreties)
she smothers the prodigal loafer gunda hindu son with love & disowns muslims christians & sikhs
Post
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 13, 2002 06:50 am
#158JAY #89,91,126,128,129,146,RALPHRalphy
If the hindutva like Jay Harami Ou Modi & Joshi have there way very soon you will be a endangered species ......Indian christian.
No european or American will come to rescue you ...
5000 Christians to embrace Hinduism
=============================
CHENNAI: The Dalit Ethnic Liberation Organisation (DELO), headed by D Periyasamy, an erstwhile associate of DPI leader Thirumavalavan, is organising a programme in Tiruchi on April 13, next year to re-convert Christians to Hinduism.
In a media briefing, he claimed that about 5,000 Christians would get converted to Hinduism on the occasion.
He further said his organisation would fight against the practice of untouchability in Hinduism and urged Kanchi Pontiff Jayendra Saraswathi to provide representation to Dalits in the Kanchi Mutt.
Welcoming the Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Forcible Conversion Act, Periyasamy said the status of converted Dalits had been changed from scheduled caste to backward class whereby they lost the privileges for which they were entitled to and to get back such facilities, many of them were returning to their parent religion.
Endorsing Periyasamy`s suggestions, Hindu Makkal Katchi general secretary Arjun Sampath who was also present on the occasion, appealed to the state government to appoint ``qualified and devout`` Dalits as archakas in temples as per the recent Supreme Court ruling.
source: www.newindpress.com
Bharat Mata has some step sons (christians muslims sikhs& other minoreties)
she smothers the prodigal loafer gunda hindu son with love & disowns muslims christians & sikhs
Post
Fighting The War On Terrorism, Hollywood Style
The rest i dont expect the willing victimto be aware ....
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 13, 2002 06:09 am
But what is this one Ana on Guppp Shupp & another on Chowk ??The rest i dont expect the willing victimto be aware ....
Trapped In A Communal Riot
Satyajit Ray himself was very frugal & made movies literally in``pennies``.Bengal is knownto have given Bimal roy ,Mrinal Sen,Ritwik Ghatak ,Hrishikesh Mukherjee,& others hopefully Aparna will be next .
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 13, 2002 06:09 am
Her self discovered by Satyajit Roy & matured under the thespian director himself ,i am sure she will be a damn good & innovative director /producer herself.Satyajit Ray himself was very frugal & made movies literally in``pennies``.Bengal is knownto have given Bimal roy ,Mrinal Sen,Ritwik Ghatak ,Hrishikesh Mukherjee,& others hopefully Aparna will be next .
Fighting The War On Terrorism, Hollywood Style
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
#21 by arjun_m on December 9, 2002 8:32pm PT
#20 by AAmir on December 9, 2002 6:36pm PT
++
Very soon you wil learn movie making doesnt bother muslims as much WHAT ACTUALLY ZIONIST DOES!!!!!
++
Most of the civilized world wishes muslims made movies rather than doing the things they are doing these days...
Who died & made Arjun_M Prez of the world
Then let me speak for all humanities
It would be most helpfull to all LIVING BEINGS plant Animals &yes HUMANS if USA stopped DOING things too Consuming 70% of world resources by some 6% of bully arrogant ppl.
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 10, 2002 09:00 am
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
#21 by arjun_m on December 9, 2002 8:32pm PT
#20 by AAmir on December 9, 2002 6:36pm PT
++
Very soon you wil learn movie making doesnt bother muslims as much WHAT ACTUALLY ZIONIST DOES!!!!!
++
Most of the civilized world wishes muslims made movies rather than doing the things they are doing these days...
Who died & made Arjun_M Prez of the world
Then let me speak for all humanities
It would be most helpfull to all LIVING BEINGS plant Animals &yes HUMANS if USA stopped DOING things too Consuming 70% of world resources by some 6% of bully arrogant ppl.
What is Intelligence?
Saminasha ......Yes there is some primitive form of communication in ALL life form ,my theory cant always prove it though.But language as we know for human consisting of writing ,....speech .....auditary comprehension ....speech pathologist or therapist can tell you .
Communicate yes ...you can communicate WITHOUT ability of LANGUAGE (bengali ,.urdu ,english)
Eslurf .....Again you are correct about intelligence being more faceted than just mathematical skills .....social skills as measured by Emotional Quotient is just as important b/c even if you are a brilliant technical person ,interpersnal relation ship ,ability to get along ,empathise & sympathise with appropriate deserving situations.Not being aloof ,distant detached & lacking in social skills.
So far we are all like the 4 blind men feeling the elephant called intelligence .One person feels the tail & says it is a rope ,Another feels the leg & says it is Pillar & one feels the trunk & says it is Snake .....
IMHO the ability to predict the future or outcome before (to some reasonable degree of accuracy )is also one of the highest intelligence based on knowedge & intuiion.and position one self based on that skill to avoid being the victim of some unknown event in future .
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 10, 2002 07:50 am
Godot ....i agree LANGUAGE (not just ability to communicate)is expression of highest function of brain.No non human so far as we know have language .Saminasha ......Yes there is some primitive form of communication in ALL life form ,my theory cant always prove it though.But language as we know for human consisting of writing ,....speech .....auditary comprehension ....speech pathologist or therapist can tell you .
Communicate yes ...you can communicate WITHOUT ability of LANGUAGE (bengali ,.urdu ,english)
Eslurf .....Again you are correct about intelligence being more faceted than just mathematical skills .....social skills as measured by Emotional Quotient is just as important b/c even if you are a brilliant technical person ,interpersnal relation ship ,ability to get along ,empathise & sympathise with appropriate deserving situations.Not being aloof ,distant detached & lacking in social skills.
So far we are all like the 4 blind men feeling the elephant called intelligence .One person feels the tail & says it is a rope ,Another feels the leg & says it is Pillar & one feels the trunk & says it is Snake .....
IMHO the ability to predict the future or outcome before (to some reasonable degree of accuracy )is also one of the highest intelligence based on knowedge & intuiion.and position one self based on that skill to avoid being the victim of some unknown event in future .
Kissinger of Death
Its one thing Madison ave .would like us to belive that but Elizabeth Taylor marrieD many men for other reasons including a Construction worker Larry Fortado (?)FinanciAlly independent women dont care for degree of wealth.
***********************
In which Madrassa did you learn your english. Your posts are almost impossible to understand.
So now Liz Taylor represents the ``Financially independent`` woman........Now I really want to know which madrassa you went to.
SSDhillon
What you need is a tinge of creativity & a dab of Imagination!
That cliche of madarssa & english is becomng stale .I am using a manual typwriter with few alphabets missing .
What is there not to understand which A in financially & D in married was so difficult for you to figure out Professor ?
I still insist professor your BMW will only get you Hooker not ladies !!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 10, 2002 12:07 am
*******************************8 Its one thing Madison ave .would like us to belive that but Elizabeth Taylor marrieD many men for other reasons including a Construction worker Larry Fortado (?)FinanciAlly independent women dont care for degree of wealth.
***********************
In which Madrassa did you learn your english. Your posts are almost impossible to understand.
So now Liz Taylor represents the ``Financially independent`` woman........Now I really want to know which madrassa you went to.
SSDhillon
What you need is a tinge of creativity & a dab of Imagination!
That cliche of madarssa & english is becomng stale .I am using a manual typwriter with few alphabets missing .
What is there not to understand which A in financially & D in married was so difficult for you to figure out Professor ?
I still insist professor your BMW will only get you Hooker not ladies !!!!!!!!!!!!
Kissinger of Death
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
#46 by scout on December 9, 2002 7:23am PT
hamidm2,
just a question....
would you be truly happy if your daughter decided to join beauty pageants instead of studying for her SAT`s and doing something intellectual and meaningful with her life?
how would you feel if she started all kinds of crazy diets, perhaps even became anorexic or bulimic to try and attain the figure of one of these bimbos?
Dubious SCOUT
What an irrelevent question ?
What Hamidm got to do with what Jasmine Hamidm does for her career?
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 9, 2002 06:36 pm
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
#46 by scout on December 9, 2002 7:23am PT
hamidm2,
just a question....
would you be truly happy if your daughter decided to join beauty pageants instead of studying for her SAT`s and doing something intellectual and meaningful with her life?
how would you feel if she started all kinds of crazy diets, perhaps even became anorexic or bulimic to try and attain the figure of one of these bimbos?
Dubious SCOUT
What an irrelevent question ?
What Hamidm got to do with what Jasmine Hamidm does for her career?
Kissinger of Death
#49
``....Thats like asking women to marry a construction worker instead of a guy who drives a BMW. How many women would do that? Is the fact that women prefer the BMW driving guy to Joe sixpack demeaning for the man driving the BMW?
urstruly is getting his undies in a know because the contests are ``demeaning to women``....i dont see the women participating of their own free will expressing this sentiment. ....``
Arjun_M
Ill let you go as a male but i doubt it can go unchallenged from women point of view.
Its one thing Madison ave .would like us to belive that but Elizabeth Taylor marrie many men for other reasons including a Construction worker Larry Fortado (?)Financillay independent women dont care for degree of wealth.
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 9, 2002 06:36 pm
#49
``....Thats like asking women to marry a construction worker instead of a guy who drives a BMW. How many women would do that? Is the fact that women prefer the BMW driving guy to Joe sixpack demeaning for the man driving the BMW?
urstruly is getting his undies in a know because the contests are ``demeaning to women``....i dont see the women participating of their own free will expressing this sentiment. ....``
Arjun_M
Ill let you go as a male but i doubt it can go unchallenged from women point of view.
Its one thing Madison ave .would like us to belive that but Elizabeth Taylor marrie many men for other reasons including a Construction worker Larry Fortado (?)Financillay independent women dont care for degree of wealth.
The Christian Coalition & Israel - An Open Letter
#29
``..I stand by my statement. These folks as a class and a culture are bunch of rich backward-looking nothings. 70 years is not likely to make a difference. ......``
P.Misra
Ill not mention about beduin but there are some things in there favour ..may be not P.Hd & patent but one doesnt have to be all that to live with dignity .
For the 1 st intalment ,scaling back the Israelis myth ,let me tell you.
SAVAGES ARE PEOPLE WHO KILL LIKE THEY WERE KILLED BY HITLER.
May be b/c of Hitler they became SAVAGES ,the zionist force (excluding the common jew)are an animal ,you can psycho analyze the cause to Hitler ,all we shareef ,5 times praying & 5 times abulating almost a priestly livingmuslims know
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnew...ll&siteid=50143
ROBERT MAXWELL WAS A MOSSAD SPY New claim on tycoon`s mystery death
By Gordon Thomas And Martin Dillon
ELEVEN years after former Daily Mirror owner Robert Maxwell plunged from his luxury yacht to a watery grave, his death still arouses intense interest.
Many different theories have circulated about what really happened on board the Lady Ghislaine that night in May 1991.
Some believe the 67-year-old tycoon simply slipped into the sea, perhaps after a few drinks.
Others think Maxwell took his own life amid increasing troubles in his business empire - after his death investigators discovered he had been secretly diverting millions of pounds from two of his companies and from employee pension funds in an effort to keep solvent.
But now, after two and a half years of investigative journalism, we believe we have unearthed the true story of Maxwell`s death and can reveal how he was murdered by the Israeli secret service, Mossad.
Our work, supported by documents, including FBI reports and secret intelligence files from behind the Iron Curtain, shows Maxwell had worked as a secret super spy for Mossad for six years.
The Czech-born millionaire and former Labour MP died the way he had lived - threatening. He had threatened his wife. Threatened his children. Threatened the staff of this newspaper.
But finally he issued one threat too many - he threatened Mossad.
He told them that unless they gave him £400million to save his crumbling empire, he would expose all he had done for them.
In that time, he had free access to Margaret Thatcher`s Downing Street, to Ronald Reagan`s White House, to the Kremlin and to the corridors of power throughout Europe.
On top of that he had built himself a position of power within the crime families of eastern Europe, teaching them how to funnel their vast wealth from drugs, arms smuggling and prostitution to banks in safe havens around the globe.
MAXWELL passed on all the secrets he learned to Mossad in Tel Aviv. In turn, they tolerated his excesses, vanities and insatiable appetite for a luxurious lifestyle and women.
He told his controllers who they should target and how they should do it. He appointed himself as Israel`s unofficial ambassador to the Soviet Bloc. Mossad saw the advantage in that.
Having learned many of the key secrets of the Soviet empire, Maxwell was given his greatest chance to be a super spy.
Mossad had stolen from America the most important piece of software in the US arsenal. Maxwell was given the job of marketing the stolen software, called Promis.
Mossad had reconstructed the software and inserted into it a device which enabled them to track the use any purchaser made of the it.
Sitting in Israel, Mossad would know exactly what was going on inside all the intelligence services that bought it. In all, Maxwell sold it to 42 countries, including China and Soviet Bloc nations. But his greatest triumph was selling it to Los Alamos, the very heart of the US nuclear defence system.
The more successful Maxwell became the more risks he took and the more dangerous he was to Mossad. At the same time, the very public side of Maxwell, who then owned 400 companies, began to unwind.
He spent lavishly and lost money on deals. The more he lost, the more he tried to claw money from the banks. Then he saw a way out of his problems.
He was approached by Vladimir Kryuchkov, head of the KGB.
Spymaster and tycoon met in the utmost secrecy in the Kremlin.
Kryuchkov had an extraordinary proposal. He wanted Maxwell to help orchestrate the overthrow of Mikhail Gorbachev, the reformist Soviet leader. That would bring to an end a fledgling democracy and a return to the Cold War days.
In return, Maxwell`s massive debts would be wiped out by a grateful Kryuchkov, who planned to replace Gorbachev. The KGB chief wanted Maxwell to use the Lady Ghislaine, named after Maxwell`s daughter, as a meeting place between the Russian plotters, Mossad chiefs and Israel`s top politicians.
The plan was for the Israelis to go to Washington and say that democracy could not work in Russia and that it was better to allow the country to return to a modified form of communism, which America could help to control. In return, Kryuchkov would guarantee to free hundreds of thousands of Jews and dissidents in the Soviet republics.
Kryuchkov told Maxwell that he would be seen as a saviour of all those Jews. It was a proposal he could not refuse. But when he put it to his Mossad controllers they were horrified. They said Israel would have no part in such a madcap plan.
For the first time, Maxwell had failed to get his own way. He started to threaten and bluster. He then demanded that, for past services, he should receive immediately a quick fix of £400million to bale him out of his financial difficulties.
Instead of providing the money, a small group of Mossad officers set about planning his murder. They feared that he was going to publicly expose all Mossad had done in the time he worked for them.
They knew that he was gradually becoming mentally unstable and paranoid. He was taking a cocktail of drugs - Halcion and Zanax - which had serious side effects.
The group of Mossad plotters sensed, like Solomon, he could bring their temple tumbling down and cause incalculable harm to Israel.
The plan to kill him was prepared in the utmost secrecy. A four-man squad was briefed.
Then Maxwell was contacted. He was told to fly to Gibraltar, go aboard the Lady Ghislaine and sail to the Canary Islands. There at sea he would receive his £400million quick fix in the form of a banker`s draft. Maxwell did as he was told.
ON the night of November 4, 1991, the Lady Ghislaine, one of the world`s biggest yachts, was at sea. Unknown to its crew, the death squad had cast an electronic net over the yacht to block all radio transmissions.
The security cameras on board had been switched off. After midnight there were only two men on the bridge. One hundred and twenty feet behind them, Maxwell appeared on deck.
He had been instructed to do so in a previous message from Mossad.
A small boat came alongside. On board were four black-suited men. Three scrambled on to the yacht.
In a second it was all over. Two held Maxwell. The third plunged a syringe into his neck behind his ear. A measured dose of nerve agent was injected. Robert Maxwell was immobilised. He was lowered off the deck into the water.
As Victor Ostrovsky, a former Mossad agent told us: ``On that cold night Mossad`s problems with Robert Maxwell were over.``
The incontrovertible facts about his murder are contained in a previously-unseen autopsy report by Britain`s then-leading forensic pathologist Dr Iain West and Israel State Pathologist Dr Yehuda Hiss.
Of all the documents in our possession, these reports confirm the truth about Maxwell`s death.
Gordon Thomas & Martin Dillon are authors of The Assassination of Robert Maxwell: Israel`s Super Spy, published by Robson Books.
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 9, 2002 06:36 pm
#29
``..I stand by my statement. These folks as a class and a culture are bunch of rich backward-looking nothings. 70 years is not likely to make a difference. ......``
P.Misra
Ill not mention about beduin but there are some things in there favour ..may be not P.Hd & patent but one doesnt have to be all that to live with dignity .
For the 1 st intalment ,scaling back the Israelis myth ,let me tell you.
SAVAGES ARE PEOPLE WHO KILL LIKE THEY WERE KILLED BY HITLER.
May be b/c of Hitler they became SAVAGES ,the zionist force (excluding the common jew)are an animal ,you can psycho analyze the cause to Hitler ,all we shareef ,5 times praying & 5 times abulating almost a priestly livingmuslims know
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnew...ll&siteid=50143
ROBERT MAXWELL WAS A MOSSAD SPY New claim on tycoon`s mystery death
By Gordon Thomas And Martin Dillon
ELEVEN years after former Daily Mirror owner Robert Maxwell plunged from his luxury yacht to a watery grave, his death still arouses intense interest.
Many different theories have circulated about what really happened on board the Lady Ghislaine that night in May 1991.
Some believe the 67-year-old tycoon simply slipped into the sea, perhaps after a few drinks.
Others think Maxwell took his own life amid increasing troubles in his business empire - after his death investigators discovered he had been secretly diverting millions of pounds from two of his companies and from employee pension funds in an effort to keep solvent.
But now, after two and a half years of investigative journalism, we believe we have unearthed the true story of Maxwell`s death and can reveal how he was murdered by the Israeli secret service, Mossad.
Our work, supported by documents, including FBI reports and secret intelligence files from behind the Iron Curtain, shows Maxwell had worked as a secret super spy for Mossad for six years.
The Czech-born millionaire and former Labour MP died the way he had lived - threatening. He had threatened his wife. Threatened his children. Threatened the staff of this newspaper.
But finally he issued one threat too many - he threatened Mossad.
He told them that unless they gave him £400million to save his crumbling empire, he would expose all he had done for them.
In that time, he had free access to Margaret Thatcher`s Downing Street, to Ronald Reagan`s White House, to the Kremlin and to the corridors of power throughout Europe.
On top of that he had built himself a position of power within the crime families of eastern Europe, teaching them how to funnel their vast wealth from drugs, arms smuggling and prostitution to banks in safe havens around the globe.
MAXWELL passed on all the secrets he learned to Mossad in Tel Aviv. In turn, they tolerated his excesses, vanities and insatiable appetite for a luxurious lifestyle and women.
He told his controllers who they should target and how they should do it. He appointed himself as Israel`s unofficial ambassador to the Soviet Bloc. Mossad saw the advantage in that.
Having learned many of the key secrets of the Soviet empire, Maxwell was given his greatest chance to be a super spy.
Mossad had stolen from America the most important piece of software in the US arsenal. Maxwell was given the job of marketing the stolen software, called Promis.
Mossad had reconstructed the software and inserted into it a device which enabled them to track the use any purchaser made of the it.
Sitting in Israel, Mossad would know exactly what was going on inside all the intelligence services that bought it. In all, Maxwell sold it to 42 countries, including China and Soviet Bloc nations. But his greatest triumph was selling it to Los Alamos, the very heart of the US nuclear defence system.
The more successful Maxwell became the more risks he took and the more dangerous he was to Mossad. At the same time, the very public side of Maxwell, who then owned 400 companies, began to unwind.
He spent lavishly and lost money on deals. The more he lost, the more he tried to claw money from the banks. Then he saw a way out of his problems.
He was approached by Vladimir Kryuchkov, head of the KGB.
Spymaster and tycoon met in the utmost secrecy in the Kremlin.
Kryuchkov had an extraordinary proposal. He wanted Maxwell to help orchestrate the overthrow of Mikhail Gorbachev, the reformist Soviet leader. That would bring to an end a fledgling democracy and a return to the Cold War days.
In return, Maxwell`s massive debts would be wiped out by a grateful Kryuchkov, who planned to replace Gorbachev. The KGB chief wanted Maxwell to use the Lady Ghislaine, named after Maxwell`s daughter, as a meeting place between the Russian plotters, Mossad chiefs and Israel`s top politicians.
The plan was for the Israelis to go to Washington and say that democracy could not work in Russia and that it was better to allow the country to return to a modified form of communism, which America could help to control. In return, Kryuchkov would guarantee to free hundreds of thousands of Jews and dissidents in the Soviet republics.
Kryuchkov told Maxwell that he would be seen as a saviour of all those Jews. It was a proposal he could not refuse. But when he put it to his Mossad controllers they were horrified. They said Israel would have no part in such a madcap plan.
For the first time, Maxwell had failed to get his own way. He started to threaten and bluster. He then demanded that, for past services, he should receive immediately a quick fix of £400million to bale him out of his financial difficulties.
Instead of providing the money, a small group of Mossad officers set about planning his murder. They feared that he was going to publicly expose all Mossad had done in the time he worked for them.
They knew that he was gradually becoming mentally unstable and paranoid. He was taking a cocktail of drugs - Halcion and Zanax - which had serious side effects.
The group of Mossad plotters sensed, like Solomon, he could bring their temple tumbling down and cause incalculable harm to Israel.
The plan to kill him was prepared in the utmost secrecy. A four-man squad was briefed.
Then Maxwell was contacted. He was told to fly to Gibraltar, go aboard the Lady Ghislaine and sail to the Canary Islands. There at sea he would receive his £400million quick fix in the form of a banker`s draft. Maxwell did as he was told.
ON the night of November 4, 1991, the Lady Ghislaine, one of the world`s biggest yachts, was at sea. Unknown to its crew, the death squad had cast an electronic net over the yacht to block all radio transmissions.
The security cameras on board had been switched off. After midnight there were only two men on the bridge. One hundred and twenty feet behind them, Maxwell appeared on deck.
He had been instructed to do so in a previous message from Mossad.
A small boat came alongside. On board were four black-suited men. Three scrambled on to the yacht.
In a second it was all over. Two held Maxwell. The third plunged a syringe into his neck behind his ear. A measured dose of nerve agent was injected. Robert Maxwell was immobilised. He was lowered off the deck into the water.
As Victor Ostrovsky, a former Mossad agent told us: ``On that cold night Mossad`s problems with Robert Maxwell were over.``
The incontrovertible facts about his murder are contained in a previously-unseen autopsy report by Britain`s then-leading forensic pathologist Dr Iain West and Israel State Pathologist Dr Yehuda Hiss.
Of all the documents in our possession, these reports confirm the truth about Maxwell`s death.
Gordon Thomas & Martin Dillon are authors of The Assassination of Robert Maxwell: Israel`s Super Spy, published by Robson Books.
Fighting The War On Terrorism, Hollywood Style
Ralphy
Very soon you wil learn movie making doesnt bother muslims as much WHAT ACTUALLY ZIONIST DOES!!!!!
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnew...ll&siteid=50143
ROBERT MAXWELL WAS A MOSSAD SPY New claim on tycoon`s mystery death
By Gordon Thomas And Martin Dillon
ELEVEN years after former Daily Mirror owner Robert Maxwell plunged from his luxury yacht to a watery grave, his death still arouses intense interest.
Many different theories have circulated about what really happened on board the Lady Ghislaine that night in May 1991.
Some believe the 67-year-old tycoon simply slipped into the sea, perhaps after a few drinks.
Others think Maxwell took his own life amid increasing troubles in his business empire - after his death investigators discovered he had been secretly diverting millions of pounds from two of his companies and from employee pension funds in an effort to keep solvent.
But now, after two and a half years of investigative journalism, we believe we have unearthed the true story of Maxwell`s death and can reveal how he was murdered by the Israeli secret service, Mossad.
Our work, supported by documents, including FBI reports and secret intelligence files from behind the Iron Curtain, shows Maxwell had worked as a secret super spy for Mossad for six years.
The Czech-born millionaire and former Labour MP died the way he had lived - threatening. He had threatened his wife. Threatened his children. Threatened the staff of this newspaper.
But finally he issued one threat too many - he threatened Mossad.
He told them that unless they gave him £400million to save his crumbling empire, he would expose all he had done for them.
In that time, he had free access to Margaret Thatcher`s Downing Street, to Ronald Reagan`s White House, to the Kremlin and to the corridors of power throughout Europe.
On top of that he had built himself a position of power within the crime families of eastern Europe, teaching them how to funnel their vast wealth from drugs, arms smuggling and prostitution to banks in safe havens around the globe.
MAXWELL passed on all the secrets he learned to Mossad in Tel Aviv. In turn, they tolerated his excesses, vanities and insatiable appetite for a luxurious lifestyle and women.
He told his controllers who they should target and how they should do it. He appointed himself as Israel`s unofficial ambassador to the Soviet Bloc. Mossad saw the advantage in that.
Having learned many of the key secrets of the Soviet empire, Maxwell was given his greatest chance to be a super spy.
Mossad had stolen from America the most important piece of software in the US arsenal. Maxwell was given the job of marketing the stolen software, called Promis.
Mossad had reconstructed the software and inserted into it a device which enabled them to track the use any purchaser made of the it.
Sitting in Israel, Mossad would know exactly what was going on inside all the intelligence services that bought it. In all, Maxwell sold it to 42 countries, including China and Soviet Bloc nations. But his greatest triumph was selling it to Los Alamos, the very heart of the US nuclear defence system.
The more successful Maxwell became the more risks he took and the more dangerous he was to Mossad. At the same time, the very public side of Maxwell, who then owned 400 companies, began to unwind.
He spent lavishly and lost money on deals. The more he lost, the more he tried to claw money from the banks. Then he saw a way out of his problems.
He was approached by Vladimir Kryuchkov, head of the KGB.
Spymaster and tycoon met in the utmost secrecy in the Kremlin.
Kryuchkov had an extraordinary proposal. He wanted Maxwell to help orchestrate the overthrow of Mikhail Gorbachev, the reformist Soviet leader. That would bring to an end a fledgling democracy and a return to the Cold War days.
In return, Maxwell`s massive debts would be wiped out by a grateful Kryuchkov, who planned to replace Gorbachev. The KGB chief wanted Maxwell to use the Lady Ghislaine, named after Maxwell`s daughter, as a meeting place between the Russian plotters, Mossad chiefs and Israel`s top politicians.
The plan was for the Israelis to go to Washington and say that democracy could not work in Russia and that it was better to allow the country to return to a modified form of communism, which America could help to control. In return, Kryuchkov would guarantee to free hundreds of thousands of Jews and dissidents in the Soviet republics.
Kryuchkov told Maxwell that he would be seen as a saviour of all those Jews. It was a proposal he could not refuse. But when he put it to his Mossad controllers they were horrified. They said Israel would have no part in such a madcap plan.
For the first time, Maxwell had failed to get his own way. He started to threaten and bluster. He then demanded that, for past services, he should receive immediately a quick fix of £400million to bale him out of his financial difficulties.
Instead of providing the money, a small group of Mossad officers set about planning his murder. They feared that he was going to publicly expose all Mossad had done in the time he worked for them.
They knew that he was gradually becoming mentally unstable and paranoid. He was taking a cocktail of drugs - Halcion and Zanax - which had serious side effects.
The group of Mossad plotters sensed, like Solomon, he could bring their temple tumbling down and cause incalculable harm to Israel.
The plan to kill him was prepared in the utmost secrecy. A four-man squad was briefed.
Then Maxwell was contacted. He was told to fly to Gibraltar, go aboard the Lady Ghislaine and sail to the Canary Islands. There at sea he would receive his £400million quick fix in the form of a banker`s draft. Maxwell did as he was told.
ON the night of November 4, 1991, the Lady Ghislaine, one of the world`s biggest yachts, was at sea. Unknown to its crew, the death squad had cast an electronic net over the yacht to block all radio transmissions.
The security cameras on board had been switched off. After midnight there were only two men on the bridge. One hundred and twenty feet behind them, Maxwell appeared on deck.
He had been instructed to do so in a previous message from Mossad.
A small boat came alongside. On board were four black-suited men. Three scrambled on to the yacht.
In a second it was all over. Two held Maxwell. The third plunged a syringe into his neck behind his ear. A measured dose of nerve agent was injected. Robert Maxwell was immobilised. He was lowered off the deck into the water.
As Victor Ostrovsky, a former Mossad agent told us: ``On that cold night Mossad`s problems with Robert Maxwell were over.``
The incontrovertible facts about his murder are contained in a previously-unseen autopsy report by Britain`s then-leading forensic pathologist Dr Iain West and Israel State Pathologist Dr Yehuda Hiss.
Of all the documents in our possession, these reports confirm the truth about Maxwell`s death.
Gordon Thomas & Martin Dillon are authors of The Assassination of Robert Maxwell: Israel`s Super Spy, published by Robson Books.
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 9, 2002 06:36 pm
Ralphy
Very soon you wil learn movie making doesnt bother muslims as much WHAT ACTUALLY ZIONIST DOES!!!!!
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnew...ll&siteid=50143
ROBERT MAXWELL WAS A MOSSAD SPY New claim on tycoon`s mystery death
By Gordon Thomas And Martin Dillon
ELEVEN years after former Daily Mirror owner Robert Maxwell plunged from his luxury yacht to a watery grave, his death still arouses intense interest.
Many different theories have circulated about what really happened on board the Lady Ghislaine that night in May 1991.
Some believe the 67-year-old tycoon simply slipped into the sea, perhaps after a few drinks.
Others think Maxwell took his own life amid increasing troubles in his business empire - after his death investigators discovered he had been secretly diverting millions of pounds from two of his companies and from employee pension funds in an effort to keep solvent.
But now, after two and a half years of investigative journalism, we believe we have unearthed the true story of Maxwell`s death and can reveal how he was murdered by the Israeli secret service, Mossad.
Our work, supported by documents, including FBI reports and secret intelligence files from behind the Iron Curtain, shows Maxwell had worked as a secret super spy for Mossad for six years.
The Czech-born millionaire and former Labour MP died the way he had lived - threatening. He had threatened his wife. Threatened his children. Threatened the staff of this newspaper.
But finally he issued one threat too many - he threatened Mossad.
He told them that unless they gave him £400million to save his crumbling empire, he would expose all he had done for them.
In that time, he had free access to Margaret Thatcher`s Downing Street, to Ronald Reagan`s White House, to the Kremlin and to the corridors of power throughout Europe.
On top of that he had built himself a position of power within the crime families of eastern Europe, teaching them how to funnel their vast wealth from drugs, arms smuggling and prostitution to banks in safe havens around the globe.
MAXWELL passed on all the secrets he learned to Mossad in Tel Aviv. In turn, they tolerated his excesses, vanities and insatiable appetite for a luxurious lifestyle and women.
He told his controllers who they should target and how they should do it. He appointed himself as Israel`s unofficial ambassador to the Soviet Bloc. Mossad saw the advantage in that.
Having learned many of the key secrets of the Soviet empire, Maxwell was given his greatest chance to be a super spy.
Mossad had stolen from America the most important piece of software in the US arsenal. Maxwell was given the job of marketing the stolen software, called Promis.
Mossad had reconstructed the software and inserted into it a device which enabled them to track the use any purchaser made of the it.
Sitting in Israel, Mossad would know exactly what was going on inside all the intelligence services that bought it. In all, Maxwell sold it to 42 countries, including China and Soviet Bloc nations. But his greatest triumph was selling it to Los Alamos, the very heart of the US nuclear defence system.
The more successful Maxwell became the more risks he took and the more dangerous he was to Mossad. At the same time, the very public side of Maxwell, who then owned 400 companies, began to unwind.
He spent lavishly and lost money on deals. The more he lost, the more he tried to claw money from the banks. Then he saw a way out of his problems.
He was approached by Vladimir Kryuchkov, head of the KGB.
Spymaster and tycoon met in the utmost secrecy in the Kremlin.
Kryuchkov had an extraordinary proposal. He wanted Maxwell to help orchestrate the overthrow of Mikhail Gorbachev, the reformist Soviet leader. That would bring to an end a fledgling democracy and a return to the Cold War days.
In return, Maxwell`s massive debts would be wiped out by a grateful Kryuchkov, who planned to replace Gorbachev. The KGB chief wanted Maxwell to use the Lady Ghislaine, named after Maxwell`s daughter, as a meeting place between the Russian plotters, Mossad chiefs and Israel`s top politicians.
The plan was for the Israelis to go to Washington and say that democracy could not work in Russia and that it was better to allow the country to return to a modified form of communism, which America could help to control. In return, Kryuchkov would guarantee to free hundreds of thousands of Jews and dissidents in the Soviet republics.
Kryuchkov told Maxwell that he would be seen as a saviour of all those Jews. It was a proposal he could not refuse. But when he put it to his Mossad controllers they were horrified. They said Israel would have no part in such a madcap plan.
For the first time, Maxwell had failed to get his own way. He started to threaten and bluster. He then demanded that, for past services, he should receive immediately a quick fix of £400million to bale him out of his financial difficulties.
Instead of providing the money, a small group of Mossad officers set about planning his murder. They feared that he was going to publicly expose all Mossad had done in the time he worked for them.
They knew that he was gradually becoming mentally unstable and paranoid. He was taking a cocktail of drugs - Halcion and Zanax - which had serious side effects.
The group of Mossad plotters sensed, like Solomon, he could bring their temple tumbling down and cause incalculable harm to Israel.
The plan to kill him was prepared in the utmost secrecy. A four-man squad was briefed.
Then Maxwell was contacted. He was told to fly to Gibraltar, go aboard the Lady Ghislaine and sail to the Canary Islands. There at sea he would receive his £400million quick fix in the form of a banker`s draft. Maxwell did as he was told.
ON the night of November 4, 1991, the Lady Ghislaine, one of the world`s biggest yachts, was at sea. Unknown to its crew, the death squad had cast an electronic net over the yacht to block all radio transmissions.
The security cameras on board had been switched off. After midnight there were only two men on the bridge. One hundred and twenty feet behind them, Maxwell appeared on deck.
He had been instructed to do so in a previous message from Mossad.
A small boat came alongside. On board were four black-suited men. Three scrambled on to the yacht.
In a second it was all over. Two held Maxwell. The third plunged a syringe into his neck behind his ear. A measured dose of nerve agent was injected. Robert Maxwell was immobilised. He was lowered off the deck into the water.
As Victor Ostrovsky, a former Mossad agent told us: ``On that cold night Mossad`s problems with Robert Maxwell were over.``
The incontrovertible facts about his murder are contained in a previously-unseen autopsy report by Britain`s then-leading forensic pathologist Dr Iain West and Israel State Pathologist Dr Yehuda Hiss.
Of all the documents in our possession, these reports confirm the truth about Maxwell`s death.
Gordon Thomas & Martin Dillon are authors of The Assassination of Robert Maxwell: Israel`s Super Spy, published by Robson Books.
Fighting The War On Terrorism, Hollywood Style
WAG THE DOG SYNDROME
HBO Recycles the Incubator Hoax
****************************
By Lucy Komisar, Pacific News Service
December 3, 2002
Remember the phony story about the Kuwaiti woman who testified in 1990 that Iraqi soldiers were throwing Kuwaiti babies out of incubators? It was later exposed as a public relations fabrication – but now it`s back on HBO.
``Live From Baghdad,`` made by HBO, purports to tell how CNN covered the 1991 Gulf war. It is based on a memoir by Robert Wiener, then a CNN field producer, who wrote the script with three others. Airing Dec. 7, this ``fiction`` based on ``fact`` propagates the famous Kuwaiti government incubator hoax. As the United States stands at the brink of war with Iraq, such fabrications may invite other, more dangerous hoaxes.
Midway through the movie, an actor playing CNN anchor Bernard Shaw informs viewers that ``more allegations of Iraqi brutality emerged today as Kuwaiti refugees testified before a congressional committee.`` He segues to a tearful young woman declaring, ``They took the babies out of the incubators, took the incubators and left the babies to die on the cold floor!`` It is a real clip of the 15-year-old Kuwaiti, identified at the time as Nayirah ``to protect her from reprisals,`` who in August 1990 said those words to an ersatz ``congressional committee`` operating out of Hill and Knowlton headquarters.
The intrepid CNN crew (featuring Michael Keaton as Wiener and Helena Bonham Carter as his associate producer, Ingrid Formanek) goes off to Kuwait with their Iraqi handler to investigate. They manage to interview one hospital director who nervously asserts, ``All the incubators are here and none of our babies are missing.``
CNN correspondent: You are aware of the allegations, doctor?
Doctor: I have heard these stories.
Formanek (sotto voce): He`s scared.
Wiener (sotto voce): Yeah, this is bad.
Doctor: I can tell you, nothing has happened at this hospital (pause) that I know.
CNN: But in other hospitals?
Doctor: I cannot tell about other hospitals.
Iraqi handler: Finish! Finish! We go now!
Formanek: To the other hospitals?
Handler: No, back to Baghdad!
Wiener: Hey, hey, that was part of the deal!
Handler: Not this story.
The implication is that the Iraqis are hiding the unspeakable crime that occurred in hospitals the reporters couldn`t see. Except that it didn`t. The incubator story was a fabrication, first invented for the London Daily Telegraph by an exiled Kuwaiti housing minister, picked up by Reuters, and then propagated by the international PR firm Hill and Knowlton, which received $10.7 million from the Kuwaiti government for this and other services.
The October 1990 hearing was held by California Democrat Tom Lantos and Illinois Republican John Porter, co-chairs of the self-styled ``Human Rights Foundation,`` lodged in Hill and Knowlton`s Washington, D.C., office. Craig Fuller, chief of staff for George Bush when he was vice-president, ran the PR firm. Nayirah was coached by the firm`s vice-president, Lauri Fitz-Pegado, who later got a job in the Clinton Commerce Department.
The story was repeated by the Americans to the U.N. Security Council and by President George Bush in a January 1991 speech before he ordered the bombing of Iraq.
The incubator tale was a lie from start to finish – exposed after the war by ABC`s John Martin and denounced by the respected rights group Middle East Watch as ``a complete hoax.`` Nayirah was a member of the Kuwaiti Royal Family, daughter of Kuwait`s Ambassador to Washington.
A recent ``Live From Baghdad`` screening, sponsored by HBO and the Council on Foreign Relations, included a panel discussion. Present were: Wiener; moderator Garrick Utley (formerly with NBC, now with CNN); Deborah Amos, correspondent with ABC News; Tom Johnson, former president of CNN; and Eason Jordan, chief news executive at CNN. None of the eminent journalists mentioned the incubator story.
At question time, two people in the audience shot up their hands to ask why the film had perpetrated the phony incubator story. Jordan evaded the first question by relating how Saddam Hussein had ordered a Kuwaiti oppositionist cut up in pieces. A follow-up query pointed out that Jordan hadn`t answered the question, and that the film perpetuated rather than corrected the phony incubator story. The film ends with text over the close telling what happened to some of the characters; surely, it was suggested, the film could easily run lines telling the truth about the hoax.
Some on the panel agreed that was a good idea, but Jordan of CNN explained that they had nothing to do with the movie. (He might easily phone the suggestion to HBO, which, like CNN, is a Time-Warner company.) Wiener, the ex-CNN producer who co-authored the script, said nothing.
A few days after the screening, Wiener was interviewed on CNN and, disputing that the network had promoted Iraqi propaganda, pointed out the trip to investigate the incubator charge. He admitted that the incubator allegations ``turned out to be false`` because those accusations were made by the daughter of the Kuwaiti minister of information and were never proven. ``That was my regret in one instance,`` he said.
He didn`t regret it enough to tell the truth in the film.
« Home « MediaCulture
Pri
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 9, 2002 02:43 pm
WAG THE DOG SYNDROME
HBO Recycles the Incubator Hoax
****************************
By Lucy Komisar, Pacific News Service
December 3, 2002
Remember the phony story about the Kuwaiti woman who testified in 1990 that Iraqi soldiers were throwing Kuwaiti babies out of incubators? It was later exposed as a public relations fabrication – but now it`s back on HBO.
``Live From Baghdad,`` made by HBO, purports to tell how CNN covered the 1991 Gulf war. It is based on a memoir by Robert Wiener, then a CNN field producer, who wrote the script with three others. Airing Dec. 7, this ``fiction`` based on ``fact`` propagates the famous Kuwaiti government incubator hoax. As the United States stands at the brink of war with Iraq, such fabrications may invite other, more dangerous hoaxes.
Midway through the movie, an actor playing CNN anchor Bernard Shaw informs viewers that ``more allegations of Iraqi brutality emerged today as Kuwaiti refugees testified before a congressional committee.`` He segues to a tearful young woman declaring, ``They took the babies out of the incubators, took the incubators and left the babies to die on the cold floor!`` It is a real clip of the 15-year-old Kuwaiti, identified at the time as Nayirah ``to protect her from reprisals,`` who in August 1990 said those words to an ersatz ``congressional committee`` operating out of Hill and Knowlton headquarters.
The intrepid CNN crew (featuring Michael Keaton as Wiener and Helena Bonham Carter as his associate producer, Ingrid Formanek) goes off to Kuwait with their Iraqi handler to investigate. They manage to interview one hospital director who nervously asserts, ``All the incubators are here and none of our babies are missing.``
CNN correspondent: You are aware of the allegations, doctor?
Doctor: I have heard these stories.
Formanek (sotto voce): He`s scared.
Wiener (sotto voce): Yeah, this is bad.
Doctor: I can tell you, nothing has happened at this hospital (pause) that I know.
CNN: But in other hospitals?
Doctor: I cannot tell about other hospitals.
Iraqi handler: Finish! Finish! We go now!
Formanek: To the other hospitals?
Handler: No, back to Baghdad!
Wiener: Hey, hey, that was part of the deal!
Handler: Not this story.
The implication is that the Iraqis are hiding the unspeakable crime that occurred in hospitals the reporters couldn`t see. Except that it didn`t. The incubator story was a fabrication, first invented for the London Daily Telegraph by an exiled Kuwaiti housing minister, picked up by Reuters, and then propagated by the international PR firm Hill and Knowlton, which received $10.7 million from the Kuwaiti government for this and other services.
The October 1990 hearing was held by California Democrat Tom Lantos and Illinois Republican John Porter, co-chairs of the self-styled ``Human Rights Foundation,`` lodged in Hill and Knowlton`s Washington, D.C., office. Craig Fuller, chief of staff for George Bush when he was vice-president, ran the PR firm. Nayirah was coached by the firm`s vice-president, Lauri Fitz-Pegado, who later got a job in the Clinton Commerce Department.
The story was repeated by the Americans to the U.N. Security Council and by President George Bush in a January 1991 speech before he ordered the bombing of Iraq.
The incubator tale was a lie from start to finish – exposed after the war by ABC`s John Martin and denounced by the respected rights group Middle East Watch as ``a complete hoax.`` Nayirah was a member of the Kuwaiti Royal Family, daughter of Kuwait`s Ambassador to Washington.
A recent ``Live From Baghdad`` screening, sponsored by HBO and the Council on Foreign Relations, included a panel discussion. Present were: Wiener; moderator Garrick Utley (formerly with NBC, now with CNN); Deborah Amos, correspondent with ABC News; Tom Johnson, former president of CNN; and Eason Jordan, chief news executive at CNN. None of the eminent journalists mentioned the incubator story.
At question time, two people in the audience shot up their hands to ask why the film had perpetrated the phony incubator story. Jordan evaded the first question by relating how Saddam Hussein had ordered a Kuwaiti oppositionist cut up in pieces. A follow-up query pointed out that Jordan hadn`t answered the question, and that the film perpetuated rather than corrected the phony incubator story. The film ends with text over the close telling what happened to some of the characters; surely, it was suggested, the film could easily run lines telling the truth about the hoax.
Some on the panel agreed that was a good idea, but Jordan of CNN explained that they had nothing to do with the movie. (He might easily phone the suggestion to HBO, which, like CNN, is a Time-Warner company.) Wiener, the ex-CNN producer who co-authored the script, said nothing.
A few days after the screening, Wiener was interviewed on CNN and, disputing that the network had promoted Iraqi propaganda, pointed out the trip to investigate the incubator charge. He admitted that the incubator allegations ``turned out to be false`` because those accusations were made by the daughter of the Kuwaiti minister of information and were never proven. ``That was my regret in one instance,`` he said.
He didn`t regret it enough to tell the truth in the film.
« Home « MediaCulture
Pri
What is Intelligence?
Akalpit /Akal Put (aql means intelligence Put .means son of );-)
If you did research onI.Q.testing you would know it is `ancient`for the very same reason you are perplexed.Many newer psychological tests like MMPI ,Myers-Briggs,etc are needed to boost the credibility & relevence of any such testing.
Ask the early civil rights leaders who were firstr to challege this white oriented ways of using themselves as yaardstick to measure rest of the world.
A General Intelligence Quotient Score (IQ Score) is a statistically derived number which indicates relative and comparative abilities that can be used to obtain academic skills and knowledge. You have hundreds of specific mental abilities. Some of these abilities can be measured accurately. Some of these measurements can be reliable predictors of an individual`s academic achievements. Though an IQ test measures only a few of a human`s mental abilities, these few abilities are targeted for measurement, because they are well known to positively correlate highly to many other human abilities. How high you score in one of these measured abilities, will strongly indicate how high you would be expected to score on the unmeasured abilities.
Statistically the following statements are true about IQ scores obtained by taking this test:
An IQ of 100 is higher than 50% of all persons taking this test.
An IQ of 110 is higher than 75% of all persons taking this test.
An IQ of 120 is higher than 93% of all persons taking this test.
An IQ of 130 is higher than 98% of all persons taking this test.
The best reason to know one`s IQ score is to obtain an independent observation of one`s probable academic potential. If your score is high, you may use that knowledge to see the possibility to achieve, easily, education that you now may feel incapable of obtaining. If your score is low, you may use that knowledge to set realistic educational goals for yourself that can be achieved using the amount of time and effort that you feel you can provide.
It is very important to always keep in mind that an IQ test does not measure most kinds of human abilities such as musical talent, artistic talent, emotional stability, physical coordination, or spiritual level.
A higher IQ score is not a guarantee that an individual will achieve happiness, maintain sanity, or obtain spiritual growth.
A lower IQ score does not mean that an individual will be unsuccessful financially, emotionally, or morally.
There are ``high IQ`` individuals in all walks of life, and conversely, even traditionally exalted groups such as ``physicians`` can have individuals who would be measured as having only ``normal`` intelligence.
Almost all ordinary human tasks require an individual to have an IQ Score of only 50 or higher. (75% of all people have this or a higher IQ) Though a score of 50 would indicate that that individual would find educational success only with special teaching methods and more time spent studying, it should be noted that persons between 50 and 75 IQ ordinarily can obtain licenses to drive, can succeed at 71% of all jobs, can have normal or above normal IQ children, and generally can be quite capable of successful lives.
History is filled with stories of humans of limited intellectual ability who have nevertheless been among humankind`s most important contributors.
It is also true, that all of history`s worse tales are about very smart individuals who nevertheless were incapable of solving the problem of how to be a human whose actions had a positive effect on one`s fellow humans.
Bottom line: if you score high on this test, get out there and do the right thing. We need you.
No test of human ability is capable of testing every kind of human being who takes it, and thus, you could possibly be inaccurately measured by this test. No IQ test has ever been devised that measures all human intellectual abilities.
Posted by
AAmir
Dec 9, 2002 01:58 pm
Akalpit /Akal Put (aql means intelligence Put .means son of );-)
If you did research onI.Q.testing you would know it is `ancient`for the very same reason you are perplexed.Many newer psychological tests like MMPI ,Myers-Briggs,etc are needed to boost the credibility & relevence of any such testing.
Ask the early civil rights leaders who were firstr to challege this white oriented ways of using themselves as yaardstick to measure rest of the world.
A General Intelligence Quotient Score (IQ Score) is a statistically derived number which indicates relative and comparative abilities that can be used to obtain academic skills and knowledge. You have hundreds of specific mental abilities. Some of these abilities can be measured accurately. Some of these measurements can be reliable predictors of an individual`s academic achievements. Though an IQ test measures only a few of a human`s mental abilities, these few abilities are targeted for measurement, because they are well known to positively correlate highly to many other human abilities. How high you score in one of these measured abilities, will strongly indicate how high you would be expected to score on the unmeasured abilities.
Statistically the following statements are true about IQ scores obtained by taking this test:
An IQ of 100 is higher than 50% of all persons taking this test.
An IQ of 110 is higher than 75% of all persons taking this test.
An IQ of 120 is higher than 93% of all persons taking this test.
An IQ of 130 is higher than 98% of all persons taking this test.
The best reason to know one`s IQ score is to obtain an independent observation of one`s probable academic potential. If your score is high, you may use that knowledge to see the possibility to achieve, easily, education that you now may feel incapable of obtaining. If your score is low, you may use that knowledge to set realistic educational goals for yourself that can be achieved using the amount of time and effort that you feel you can provide.
It is very important to always keep in mind that an IQ test does not measure most kinds of human abilities such as musical talent, artistic talent, emotional stability, physical coordination, or spiritual level.
A higher IQ score is not a guarantee that an individual will achieve happiness, maintain sanity, or obtain spiritual growth.
A lower IQ score does not mean that an individual will be unsuccessful financially, emotionally, or morally.
There are ``high IQ`` individuals in all walks of life, and conversely, even traditionally exalted groups such as ``physicians`` can have individuals who would be measured as having only ``normal`` intelligence.
Almost all ordinary human tasks require an individual to have an IQ Score of only 50 or higher. (75% of all people have this or a higher IQ) Though a score of 50 would indicate that that individual would find educational success only with special teaching methods and more time spent studying, it should be noted that persons between 50 and 75 IQ ordinarily can obtain licenses to drive, can succeed at 71% of all jobs, can have normal or above normal IQ children, and generally can be quite capable of successful lives.
History is filled with stories of humans of limited intellectual ability who have nevertheless been among humankind`s most important contributors.
It is also true, that all of history`s worse tales are about very smart individuals who nevertheless were incapable of solving the problem of how to be a human whose actions had a positive effect on one`s fellow humans.
Bottom line: if you score high on this test, get out there and do the right thing. We need you.
No test of human ability is capable of testing every kind of human being who takes it, and thus, you could possibly be inaccurately measured by this test. No IQ test has ever been devised that measures all human intellectual abilities.
- AAmir
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