Many Questions, No Answers

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#33 by drdre on June 30, 2003 10:23am PT

[Use your own thoughts my friend, not a soundboard for what others write. If you read what I wrote, you would understand that atrocities and negativism are prevalent on both sides.]

Hahahaha!! That did hurt, didn`t it? Your post proves what I`ve always suspected. That Pakis who have no valid arguments turn to moralizing. But then, does anyone take it seriously when it comes from a Paki? So go on my friend.

[But at this stage, you can include yourself in the Studebaker, Jay mold. Writing babble and inflammatory garbage that is of no particular interest to anyone out there.]

Didn`t you say in a previous post that the cat closes its eyes and thinks its night? Well that`s what I think of the above statement. You may call all those news articles `inflammatory garbage` for all that I care. But that`s what is what the world reads, and the fact that you Pakis have always chosen to conveniently ignore that which is unpalatable is what has brought Pakiland to the brink. But that wouldn`t change deluded beings like you, will it?

And then my friend, compared to some of your fellow Pakis like urstruly, hrrehman, Honorable_syed, faisaluno etc., Jay comes across as a saint, because what he talks are facts, not medieval crapola like those guys do.

drdre #33

India is not in the line of fire as far as North Korea, Taliban, Al Qaeda goes. Indians are not handing over people to USA. Indians and India may their own set of problems. At least they control their destiny.

If you want to refute Hoagland`s article please do so.

This is in response to Harish. Read what I wrote again, and add yourself to the list of deluded Indians, who think that by cutting and pasting articles from different sources criticizing Pakistan, they can conceal their true lack of reason and intelligent rebuttal. Use your own thoughts my friend, not a soundboard for what others write. If you read what I wrote, you would understand that atrocities and negativism are prevalent on both sides. Just own up to your own failings and your country`s holier than thou attitude and I will consider you worthy of discussion. But at this stage, you can include yourself in the Studebaker, Jay mold. Writing babble and inflammatory garbage that is of no particular interest to anyone out there.

Your response is eagerly awaited. Hopefully a more credible and intelligent response. Not cutting and pasting and certainly not the mindless, gramatically-challenged stuff coming from your sympathizers.

Well, at least the American media realizes it better than the American leadership. But you can fool some people all the time, all the people some times, but you cannot fool all the people all the time. Pakis who are gloating over that pittance of an aid (alms would be a better word?) that Bush threw at Mushy boy, will wake up and realize this very soon.


Fool`s Gold in Pakistan
By Jim Hoagland
Sunday, June 29, 2003; Page B07

Turning the other cheek is not one of President Bush`s best-known traits. But he is ready to forgive a lot in the case of Pakistan, where a skillful political alchemist is transforming a record of failure, extremism and betrayal into gold from the U.S. Treasury.

A year after U.S. intelligence confirmed that Pakistan had supplied North Korea`s rogue regime with nuclear weapons technology, Bush lavished a much-coveted Camp David welcome on President Pervez Musharraf last week. The general also won a $3 billion aid package.

Bush did this at the urging of his defense and spy chiefs, who face the day-to-day demands of hunting down al Qaeda and other terror groups. They are desperate for whatever immediate cooperation they can squeeze, cajole or buy from Pakistan. But they risk confusing the urgent with the important.

Their needs force Washington to look the other way as Pakistan`s Islamic extremists grow more powerful under Musharraf`s rule, as cross-border terrorism continues in Kashmir and India (despite Musharraf`s promises to end it ``permanently``) and as it becomes plain that Musharraf intends to remain president indefinitely.

All this is bad enough. But Musharraf`s calculated pushing of the American envelope also imperils what promised to be Bush`s most innovative and important foreign policy initiative: the building of a new strategic relationship with democratic India.

The Bush effort on India has been poised to take a giant step forward. At the president`s request, India has been considering sending about 20,000 peacekeeping troops for duty in Iraq.

No country could provide more immediate help for the beleaguered U.S. presence there. India`s military command is intimately familiar with Iraq, having trained the Iraqi army in the past. Indian troops are experienced peacekeepers. New Delhi is a leader in Third World politics. Its participation could help mute outside criticism of the coalition effort.

But the decision to help may now be held up as India waits to see how Washington will allocate the $1.5 billion in military aid that is part of the five-year package promised to Musharraf at Camp David.

Bush did keep hopes for a yes from India alive when he refused the Pakistani president`s request for nuclear-capable F-16 fighter jets. But New Delhi will want to know more about which arms were not refused to Musharraf before deciding about an Iraqi mission and deeper engagement with the United States.

When he came to office, Bush did not envision walking a tightrope between these two South Asian enemies. He was impressed with India`s large economy, democratic politics and the readiness of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee`s Hindu nationalist government to move beyond New Delhi`s Cold War fealty to Moscow. Bush set out to make India a meaningful U.S. strategic partner for the first time.

But 9/11 changed U.S. priorities. Pakistan was suddenly needed in the war against al Qaeda and the Taliban, the very monsters Islamabad had helped create. To justify a first large infusion of difficult-to-monitor aid, the United States leaned heavily on Musharraf to pledge publicly to end extremism at home and halt terror operations against India from Pakistani-held territory.

But no one -- not even Musharraf -- seriously disputes today that the cross-border infiltration from camps run by Pakistan`s intelligence services and army continues unabated.

Instead of claiming as he has in the past that there was no infiltration occurring at all, Musharraf told editors and reporters at The Post last week that it was impossible to state with mathematical certainty that movements across the remote, rugged frontier had stopped.

``I can`t tell you if there is any cross-border terrorism going on,`` he said. He responded affirmatively when asked if the position he had conveyed to Bush last week was that he has done everything possible to stop Kashmiri-related terrorism and could do no more. This is a change of emphasis that is certain to upset India.

Musharraf shut off questions about U.S. protests over Pakistan`s swapping of nuclear weapons technology for North Korean missiles with a similarly opaque comment: ``That chapter is closed.`` But he carefully avoided disputing that the exchange had occurred, as Pakistani officials have in the past.

Privately, U.S. officials voiced disappointment after the visit that Musharraf gave so little in return for the cash and glory Bush showered on him. But the Pakistani understands the secrets of political alchemy better than they do.

The weaker and more ineffective he seems to become in carrying out his promises, the more the Bush administration will have to give Musharraf to keep him afloat. After all, he proved at Camp David that having some terrorists around to pursue buys a lot of forgiveness.

Here`s a must read for those Pakis whose hearts bleed for the Muslims of Gujarat, especially the indignant drdre. Here`s some more of it my friends.

Christians besieged in Pakistan
By Julia Duin
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

The photos from Pakistan were anything but travel brochure material.
One showed a 9-year-old girl with dark eyes, large black burns on her legs and a heavily bandaged right arm.
Another showed a 14-year-old girl with a face partly melted away like candle wax. The right side was a mass of charred skin after an assailant threw acid into her eyes.
Their attackers said the girls` injuries are payback for the American invasion of Iraq. Americans may not have seen much retaliation on their own soil because, several human rights groups say, Christians in Pakistan are taking the brunt of it.
The 9-year-old, Razia Masih, was beaten and raped on April 26 in the town of Faisalabad, near Lahore, ending up in the hospital with multiple burns, a lacerated left eye, a broken right arm and rope marks around her hands and mouth.
``She was working as a maid in a Muslim house,`` said Shabazz Bhatti, chairman of the All Pakistan Minorities Alliance.
``When the Iraq war happened, it was on the TV,`` he said. ``The family [that she worked for] would call her into the TV room and start torturing her. Her skin was burned by the irons, her body wounded by a cricket bat and a medical report showed 15 wounds on her body. She was told by them, `You are Christian and infidel, and we will take revenge on you for the killings of Iraqi children.`
``The case has been registered [with police], but the culprits have not been arrested. Meanwhile, the girl`s family has fled elsewhere, just to save their lives. The government authorities are not giving them protection.``
According to International Christian Concern (ICC), a religious-persecution watchdog group, the girl`s family had unsuccessfully tried to get her out of her employers` home several times. After beating and burning her for a final time, the family sent her home to die.
The All Pakistan Minorities Alliance, representing Christian, Hindu, Sikh, Balmeek, Bheel, Maingwal, Zoarastrian, Bahai and Kelash communities, has compiled a ``catalogue of terror`` on attacks against female Christians, beginning with the May 3, 2000, gang rape of eight Christian girls by militant Muslims near Lahore.
A series of either gang rapes or acid-in-the-face attacks happened in July 2000, twice in 2001, twice in 2002 and three times so far in 2003.
On March 31, Natasha Emmanuel, 10, from a town near Rawalpindi, was raped by a Muslim neighbor linked with extremist Islamic organizations. The girl ended up in a hospital intensive-care unit for three days, the ICC says.
``Christians in Pakistan are increasingly vulnerable to religiously motivated hate crimes, and Christian girls and women seem to be specially targeted,`` said Stuart Windsor, director of Christian Solidarity Worldwide in London. ``We are outraged by the unwillingness of the police to investigate the complaints as this only emboldens extremists to continue to victimize Christians and other non-Muslims.``
Fearing such reprisals, the U.S. Commission on Religious Freedom wrote Secretary of State Colin L. Powell on March 19, asking him to remind foreign governments of their responsibility to protect religious minorities.
``The commission is concerned that extremists have tried to portray military action against Iraq as part of an alleged U.S. attack on Islam,`` they wrote, ``and that retribution will be sought against Christians, Jews and others throughout the Islamic world ....``
The commission also asked President Bush to bring up the matter with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf during their meeting Tuesday at Camp David, Md.
``Since the U.S. military action began in Afghanistan,`` they wrote last week, ``Christian institutions in Pakistan repeatedly have been targeted by religious extremists, resulting in over 50 deaths.``
But neither President Bush or Gen. Musharraf mentioned religious minorities at a Tuesday press conference to announce a $3 billion U.S. military and economic aid package for Pakistan.
``The Bush administration has with this package applauded Pakistan for carrying out egregious human rights abuses and religious-freedom violations,`` said Joseph Grieboski, president of the Institute on Religion and Public Policy.
``President Bush told the world that the United States will turn a blind eye to universal values and fundamental freedoms in exchange for political expediency and convenience.``
There are only about 3 million Christians among Pakistan`s 140 million citizens.
Gen. Musharraf said Wednesday he knew nothing of the recent attacks on Christian women and denied there is an ongoing problem.
``All the people involved in attacks have been eliminated or put behind bars,`` he said at a meeting sponsored by the U.S. Institute of Peace. ``There has not been an attack in the last year against a Christian minority.``
Mr. Grieboski said Gen. Musharraf was either uninformed or lying.
``He gives a speech about Islam being a moderate religion every time he panders to the West,`` Mr. Grieboski said. ``But there`s an ongoing targeting of Christians in general, with women being raped and men beaten and arrested. The government has yet to do anything to protect the rights of minority religious believers, whether they be Christian, Ahmadi Muslim, Hindu or any other faith.``
The plight of Christian women is entangled with the politics of rape in Pakistan, which has engaged human rights and women`s groups for years. There is no category for rape in Pakistani law; only for ``zina,`` which is either adultery or fornication. Unless four male Muslim witnesses can be found to back the woman`s story or if the attacker denies the charges, the woman is blamed and usually jailed on charges of illicit sex.
According to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, a woman in that country is raped every six hours and another is gang-raped every fourth day. Since women often do not report rape in the country, the actual numbers are likely to be far higher.
Since September 11, Pakistan`s government has stepped up its security measures for Christians, providing extra armed guards for churches and other Christian buildings after a series of bomb and grenade attacks on churches, foreign tourists and western embassies killed 40 persons and injured dozens more. On Sept. 29, 2002, two gunmen broke into the offices of a Christian charity in Karachi, killing seven Christians and seriously wounding two others. On Christmas Day 2002, three girls were killed and 17 persons injured when masked terrorists threw hand grenades into their Presbyterian church in Punjab province.
Christians are being accused of transgressing Pakistan`s blasphemy law, where to criticize the Prophet Muhammed by word, deed or imputation is a capital crime. However, Gen. Musharraf said the law has not targeted Christians in particular.
``Under this blasphemy law, more Muslims have been acted against than non-Muslims,`` he said. ``Secondly, no capital punishment at all till now has been given on the basis of blasphemy.``
But there are long jail sentences on trumped-up charges. One Christian, Aslam Masih, imprisoned since 1998 on blasphemy charges, was recently acquitted. Mr. Masih, a local pronunciation of Messiah, is a common family name among Christians in Pakistan, which recently required people to have a given and family name; until then, many rural villagers went through life with a single name.
Two other Christians, brothers Saleem and Rasheed Masih, were acquitted in March 1999 of blasphemy charges stemming from a dispute with an ice cream vendor in the Pasrur region in northeast Pakistan.
But while Saleem Masih was in prison, his wife was raped in July 2000.
``The police refused to investigate it,`` said Ann Buwalda, director of the Jubilee Campaign in Fairfax. ``Most people feel it was connected to the case of her husband.``
She is trying to get all three men and their families out of the country.
``As long as they stay there,`` she said, ``it`s open season on them by any radical Muslim.``

drdre 25,

You have spoken like a true child of the TNT, educated in the k for kafir tradition, still sipping from the poisoned chalice held out by the ghost sipping sherry. In line with your world view, a member of the muslim umma, you are cincerned very much about the murders in Gujarat, you havnt heard of the murder of hindus at marad beach in kerala. You have all the time to talk of the hindutwa, but never heard of the killers of pakistan.

Hindu extremist should not be your concern till they are attacking the mosques in pakistan, till they are attacking the pilgrims to mecca, till they are hyjacking PIA planes.

Learn about omar sheikh, he was educated in london school of economics, still like you could not overcome the hatred of TNT transmitted to him in mothers milk, he killed german tourists in india, escaped in a hijack and went on to kill danial pearl in pakistan. Learn about the dawood ibrahim, honoured guest in pakistan, while all his accomplices are being deported from all over the world.

You are at par with other pakistanis, the ones arrested in the uS for jihadic activities, the one in kenya and the largest chunk in guantanamo bay. Pakistanis get bashed on chowk because of people like you and the ones I have listed above, the children of TNT, and the bashing will continue till you remove the photos from the dark background of which the ghost of TNT appears at night, poisoning your minds.

Tipu #27

`` I AM SPEAKING AS AMERICAN HINDIAN .. ``

I am also an Indian American with the same rights as you. The era of Mughal rule is over. Wake up dear.

`` Till you confirm depositting your full of communicable virus and bacteria blue Pass port you shouldSHATTAP.!!!!
I canbe sweet i can be bitter i sometmes biggot to bigot b/c they dont understand anything else and
forgiving Compromising and generous for others too ... ``

Personal attacks again !!!

You are a chavunist unable to accept that your notion of Muslim culture has no answer to the forces and influences of modern civilization. Deal with it !!!

Why do not call a school a school and stop using words like madrassah. I am still waiting to hear the difference between a secular Indian school and your version of madrassah.

`` Why do you ead my post .. ``

for sake of clarity and brevity

`` I dont yours b/c i know your are at the level ionly end up TEACHING YOU ....so SHATTAP ``

The people who taught me are either people of accomplishment and culture or people in a position of authority. You are neither.

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#12 by Studebaker on June 27, 2003 10:03pm PT

I would surely have made an attempt to answer your post had it meant any sense to me. I`m sorry I didn`t understand a single word.

Regards,
Harish

just to recap...
----------

No country can democratise another
By forgetting its own history, America risks turning those who might have been friends of democracy in Iraq into enemies

Benjamin Barber
Sunday June 29, 2003
The Observer

Can the West democratise the Middle East? Clearly, the answer is no. But whether the Middle East can become democratic is a very different question.

The notion that any country can democratise any other country leads us to misunderstand the fundamental concept of democracy building and misread our own history in Britain or America, where the struggle for democracy was a long, slow and internal: a struggle in which people over centuries seized their own rights, and not one in which overnight a foreign invading army somehow liberated us from external conquerors and made us free.

Wars fought even in the name of noble objectives create not democracy but anarchy. Any social scientist will tell you that anarchy is the condition in which tyranny breeds. Where you have previously had a secular tyranny like in Iraq, you might get a theocratic tyranny. In places like Afghanistan where you have had a theocratic tyranny, you may get a warlord tyranny.

Left to its own devices, Iran is far more likely to achieve democracy, though slowly, than Iraq where it has been imposed from the outside. Democracy comes bottom up and not top down.

Recent events show therefore that ``preventative democracy`` is a better answer to terrorism than preventative war, but for ``preventative democracy`` to work we must understand the nature of democracy. By failing to do so, America has turned what might have been friends of the democratic process in Iraq into humiliated and vengeful enemies of the US military.

The US and British Governments seemed to imply that if you liquidated the Ba`athist dictatorship, automatically in its place would appear overnight a democracy, as if the only thing that stood between Iraqi society and democracy was the presence of a dictator.

American history from 1776-1789 and through the civil war shows the 200 hundred years it took to achieve an insufficient democracy in the United States. Our leaders would do well to first read our own history prior to talking about having to democratise other people. You don`t start with a Parliament, a Bill of Rights, a constitution, a free press and an independent judiciary, but with citizenship, education and civic institutions in the neighbourhood. When Alex de Tocqueville toured America in the 1830s, he found much that was wrong, but was pleased that liberty was local and started with civic institutions.

Real democracy building requires a concentration on education, a fact recognised in the formative years of the US when John Adams of Massachusetts agreed with Thomas Jefferson of Virginia that the constitution would not work without state education for all who would be citizens. In the formative years of the United States, If America had understood this it would have put its tanks not in front of the Iraqi Energy Ministry but the schools and libraries.

The most militant and adversarial Islamic sect has not hesitated to create Wahhabi schools in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to educate 40,000 children of Afghani refugees. They understand the value of schools, even where hate is the pedagogy. We`ve forgotten. American largesse is spent on training the Pakistani military at the same time as we`re neglecting to help develop the indigenous schools system.

But, though we must support civil society, outside powers cannot prescribe a democratic formula. Democratisation has taken many different paths, from Anglo-American common law to Continental Roman law; from the emphasis in Switzerland on communal freedom with American emphasis on individual freedom. When it comes to the rest of the world, we think it`s got to be done the American way.

We Fed-exed the Afghanis the Bill of Rights rather than seeing the need for democracy to develop that accommodates the local history and culture. The only thing that we can export from our own experience is the heterogeneity of that experience. Even today in Afghanistan the one democratic institution that looks like it could work is the grand council, or Loya Jirga, the only genuinely indigenous institution. If democracy is exogenous it cannot take root and will be blown away by the first gale, as in Haiti where there was a short-lived experiment with democracy America style.

Democracy means the right of people to make mistakes on the way to reclaim their own liberty. When France thought, along with the US and Britain, that the Algerians had made a mistake in voting in the 1991 primary elections for a relatively modest Islamic party in conjunction with the Algerian military they withdrew the democratic mandate. The resultant ten years of civil war, terrorism and the death of the middle class were far worse than if the electoral results had been supported.

Finally, democracies must be allowed to make fundamental political and economic decisions. The US with the complicity of Britain is making all of the vital decisions that will determine the future shape of Iraqi society before there is a government to either approve or disapprove of the decision. They have announced that there will be a privatised media, a privatised energy industry, an independent judiciary, a Bill of Rights and that Ba`athists will be persona non grata in future governments.

These may be prudent and wise decisions but they are not decisions for the United States to make. By making these sweeping changes on the ground, the fundamental sovereign decisions of an Iraqi regime have been removed. Even if in a couple of years Iraq achieves some form of minimalist democracy, the government will have nothing to do but decide the detail of how to apply the blueprints dreamt up in Washington. Democracy that empowers people is an apt answer to terrorism, which is an ideology of the powerless, but that democracy must be real.

Dr Benjamin Barber is a former advisor to President Clinton and author of Jihad versus McWorld and Fear`s Empire (forthcoming this summer). This article is extracted from his Foreign Policy Centre/Civility lecture `Can the west promote democracy in the Middle East` at the London School of Economics last week.

Dear Shahid-

Enjoyed your informative and timely article on extremism in its various forms. I`m sure that others with intelligence could comment ad nauseum, both positive and negative, on the points you raise in your piece.

However, I will reserve my comments for now and instead, I would like to draw the attention of our fellow Chowk readers to the deplorable, mindless, and overall useless comments that have been brought to this forum by two people in particular. Their pseudonyms are Studebaker and Jay. As is typical with uninformed and ignorant people in general, these two self-absorbed, brainless and witless people have polluted this forum with inflammatory remarks with no basis in fact and certainly with no regard to a potentially intelligent discourse. Instead, we are subjected to tit for tat responses and what is left is nothing of value to any of us who actually would like to understand Shahid`s viewpoint.

There is an alarming cancer that is growing in the subcontinent and it comes in the form of holier than thou, superiority complex-laden, armchair Indian conversationalists, who unlike their smarter, more reasonable and more appealing fellow countrymen who actually care about finding solutions to problems, just perpetuate the already evident truths that plague this group of individuals. In our case, we have these two characters as proof of this cancer. The recent events of atrocities committed in Gujrat, the rising tide of Hindu mullahs and their own madrassah`s, preaching hate and fascism, and the absolute apathy of their so called democratic, representative government, teaches one great lesson - that look at yourself before you throw epitaphs and gross generalities around indiscriminately. The Indian nation, like Pakistan, would be much better off without these rabid, trouble mongers, with no other agenda but hate, intolerance, and violence. So please, Studebaker and Jay, get off this website and move over, and give some enlightened people a chance to speak moderately and allow their view points to be aired in an atmosphere of intelligent debate. Go yourselves, and try to write something down of substance, post it on this web page, and then we will take you seriously. Don`t bore us with your lack of substance and your sarcasm. Write something and then you have a leg to stand on regarding your comments.

The problems in Pakistan and the muslim world are apparent and need rectification. But inflammatory comments by Indians, who forget about their own intolerance, excesses and brutalities, are not going to forge trust or create solutions between the two nations. Like Israeli Zionists, who harp on their past and all that is owed to them, Indians similarly have developed the same complex. Deal with your past, and accept that you are no better than anyone else.

Romair #3

`` The Canadians, I think, have done a decent job of maintaining a neutral and relatively moral stance in all of this. The key to solving these problems of the current, ``us vs. them,`` lies in Europe. The sudden wave of European common person`s opposition to Bush`s actions in Iraq was surprising. It has turned the whole Clash of Civilisations debate on its head. ``

Run to the Canadians when you want military hardware or any advanced technologies or billions of dollars in cash tomorrow. We will see how far you can go.

`` At the same time, the Muslims of the world need to keep pressure on the OBLs and keep them isolated. ``

Big words from someone who supports a military cabal that nurtured OBL and still shelters him.

`` All wars should be made to pass through the litmus test of human rights. The only legal wars are for self-defence if attacked, against occupational forces, etc. And they should only be targeted against soldiers and not civlians. OBL`s attack on the USA and the USA`s attack on Iraq, both fail on all these three accounts. The world is a more dangerous place after both these attacks....... ``

I still oppose the US attack on Iraq for different reason. Let us face it - 3000-4000 Iraqi civillians died. Saddam and his henchmen probably execute that many every year. US attack on Afghanistan killed 3000-5000 civillians. Let us face Taliban starved more people to death with their brutal policies.

Pakistanis are opposed to Iraq attack because it is one less potential client for their nukes.

Tipu #6

Irrespective of the colonial origins of modern education system or English they have done much better than madrassas. Most of Southern India has adopted English medium education, three language formula and is doing just fine. Do not rehash a dead horse.

I am not opposed by any means to secular education or religious education in Urdu or Arabic. But the onus is upon proponents to make it work. Till then I suggest you keep your mouth shut and refrain comments upon things you do not understand.