Quem lamenta a morte de bin Laden?

Amplify’d from sultanknish.blogspot.com

European media elites are sniffing their hardest over the barbaric Americans celebrating the death of Osama bin Laden.

Nicolas Demorand, editor of the left-leaning French daily Libération, on Tuesday bemoaned the “toxic rhetoric” of the campaign against terrorism. From that rhetoric, he wrote, stems “this base, uncomfortable joy, unprecedented in a democracy, that blew yesterday over the streets of New York.” Even the editor of the centrist weekly L’Express, Christophe Barbier, cautioned, “To victory one must not add provocation.” He added: “To desecrate the cadaver or the memory of Bin Laden is to revive him. To cry one’s joy in the streets of our cities is to ape the turbaned barbarians who danced the night of Sept. 11.

As Jonathan Tobin writes, the European reaction of the elites says more about them than about us. But it also shows they have a rather short memory. Or a very selective one. For a French newspaper editor to seriously state that such behavior is unprecedented in a democracy shows a shocking ignorance of his own country's history. French democracy is built on much worse. La Marseillaise makes the US national anthem seem downright pacifist with its naked bloodlust. Lines like "Qu'un sang impur Abreuve nos sillons" and "Que tes ennemis expirants Voient ton triomphe et notre gloire!", "That their impure blood should water our fields" and "That your dying enemies should see your triumph and glory" certainly put the celebrations into perspective. In more recent history, there is the treatment of collaborators in Europe after WW2. And the death of Mussolini as depicted in the photo.

On 29 April 1945, the bodies of Mussolini, Petacci, and the other executed Fascists were loaded into a moving van and trucked south to Milan. There, at 3:00 am, they were dumped on the ground in the old Piazza Loreto. After being shot, kicked, and spat upon, the bodies were hung upside down on meathooks from the roof of an Esso gas station. The bodies were then stoned by civilians from below. The corpse of the deposed leader became subject to ridicule and abuse.

That is a somewhat polite summation of events. European elites might talk about values, but such talk is hollow. Nor would they seriously condemn what was described above. Many European leftists view it as a glorious moment. Their sneering at the American celebrations is a fact of emotional detachment. Nothing else. If it were Bush, they would be popping champagne faster than you could say Unilateralism.

But it's an embedded narrative that Americans are the rough country cousins and European intellectuals are the progressive vanguard of civilization. A narrative that goes back to colonial times.

Had the execution of Bin Laden happened on Bush's watch, there would be a vocal display of nauseated anger, condemnations of American barbarity and a few amateur art exhibits or two featuring Bush biting off the head of Bin Laden or some such thing. But it's Obama, and they don't quite know what to do with him. They aren't about to peg him into the cartoon monster that Bush was turned into. They recognize that Obama is pandering ahead of an election to what they see as the baser instincts. And they feel that what happened reflects more on Americans, than on Obama.

But Obama has pandered far more to the sensibilities of Muslims. Getting Bin Laden was an act of political necessity, but pandering to his co-religionists is another matter. From the burial to the refusal to release the photos, the concern over what Muslims will think has dominated much of the decision making.

But despite all that the Muslim reaction is predictable. There are protests in Egypt outside the US embassy. European Muslims are none too happy either

A man who gave his name as Mohammed demanded to see photographic evidence. Asked how he might react to graphic photos of a dead bin Laden, shot in the head in the 40-minute raid, he said: "Well, I'll know when I see them." "Americans are creating problems all over the world," he added. "Why can't they just leave Muslims alone?"

Indeed, why couldn't Americans leave poor Bin Laden alone. It's not like he was harming anyone who mattered. Like Mohammed.

Current events in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Europe and North America though raise the question of why Muslims keep creating problems all over the world. Why can't they just leave non-Muslims alone?

In London, there was also outrage over Bin Laden's untimely bullet derived demise

In London, about 100 members of the radical Islamist group, Muslims Against Crusades (MAC), staged a protest and "funeral prayers" in honor of Osama bin Laden outside the U.S. Embassy. The group shouted slogans such as "Freedom burn in hell" and "USA will pay" while waving banners stating "Jihad against crusaders" and "Sharia law for UK." Anjem Choudary, one of the leading MAC figures, said they were protesting against "injustices" committed by the United States: "The latest injustice is the assassination of an old man in his home in front of his family, Sheikh Osama bin Laden." He warned of future revenge attacks by militants. "I believe al Qaeda will take revenge. The next operation I believe will be called 'Operation bin Laden' and will match the magnitude and character of the past. "The philosophy of al Qaeda is to take the war to the enemy on their own homeland, so it will be in the West." The MAC protesters were confronted by about 50 members of the right-wing, anti-Islamist organization the English Defense League (EDL), with police having to keep the two chanting groups apart, amid minor scuffles.

Incidentally members of the EDL are in jail, but Choudary is a free man. It's not like he's a bigot inciting violence... not like those mean EDL people. Why can't they and the Navy SEALS just leave Muslims like Bin Laden and Choudary alone?

The bin Laden supporters waved banners reading "US govt are the real terrorists" and US leaders were branded "murderers" by the radicals, who warned revenge attacks were "guaranteed". "It is only a matter of time before another atrocity -- the West is the enemy," Abu Muaz, 28, from east London, said.

Luckily law enforcement jumped into action and...

Officers confiscated an effigy of bin Laden being waved by the EDL supporters but police said they had no immediate reports of any arrests at the ongoing demonstration.

Well there problem solved.

A judge in Hamburg filed a criminal complaint against Chancellor Angela Merkel Friday for "endorsing a criminal act" because at a news conference in Berlin Tuesday she has said: "I'm glad that killing bin Laden was successful." The labor court judge, Heinz Uthmann, told Reuters that he believed Merkel's comments violate German law. He said, however, he expected his complaint to end up in the rubbish bin.

Who needs a Choudary or a Bin Laden, when you've got a Heinz Uthman? Or the UN which is also on the case.

U.N. human rights investigators called on the United States on Friday to disclose whether there had been any plan to capture Osama bin Laden and if he was offered any "meaningful prospect of surrender and arrest."

Over in Cairo's Tahrir Square, heart of the new Arab Spring and love for democracy and puppies, there were also devoted human rights campaigners to be found

“They martyred Osama, who was able to stand up to the world’s harshest power,” Sheikh Hafez Salama Salama said at a stop along the way, where a small, eclectic crowd had gathered as usual in Tahrir Square, reliving the revolution. “We are all Osama bin Laden.”

Clearly someone never bothered to inform Sheikh Hafez Salama that he is a member of the Religion of Peace. But there were also more mainstream views being expressed.

We are very against violence,” said Ibrahim Haggag, 45, speaking of Muslims generally. “They could be framing him as an excuse to attack Arabs, an excuse to take their wealth.” “The Jews were the ones who planned 9/11,” said Amina Mohame, 28. “If the U.S. is a civil society, why did they fund Bush’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan?”

Who knew Cindy Sheehan and Alex Jones were so popular in Egypt?

The demonstrators rallied at the Fatih mosque in central Istanbul at the call of Islamist newspaper Milli Gazete and with support of the Islamist organization Ozgur-Der. The mainly male protestors, with a small group of veiled women, brandished banners reading "Terrorist USA, warrior Osama" and chanted "God is great."

Ozgur-der was one of the groups involved in the very peaceful Gaza flotilla and its members were on board the peaceful ship Mavi Marmara which at no point in time ever tried to kill anyone or support terrorists. Absolutely not. They were just delivering cheese and missiles for the kids.

And Omar Bakri joined in on the fun from his new spiffy place in Lebanon.

Radical cleric Omar Bakri, on bail in Lebanon on charges including incitement to murder, has called for prayers to mourn Osama bin Laden in Lebanon and outside US embassies around the world. "We call on our followers in Europe, Canada and especially Britain to pray for his soul outside American embassies," Bakri, who was based in Britain for nearly two decades, told AFP.

Still more good news from Obama's homeland in Indonesia, that tolerant place where ummm

Scores of Indonesian youths vow to avenge bin Laden's death Scores of Indonesian men rallied on Friday to publicly vow their readiness to sacrifice their lives to avenge the death of Osama bin Laden, in a sign of the al Qaeda leader's popularity among hard-core Islamists in the most populous Muslim country. "One hundred youths from Solo are ready to die to take revenge on the death of Osama," declared Choirul, a cleric in Al Kaida Solo and also a member of the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) which has a history of violence including attacks on bars, nightclubs and the offices of Indonesia's Playboy magazine.

In addition the clerics are very upset about disrespecting the body of Sheikh Usama PBUH (Pigs Be Upon Him)

The Indonesia Ulema Council (MUI), which is the top Islamic body in Indonesia, has strongly criticized the sea burial of bin Laden, saying that “it was done with extraordinary hatred against him” and the body should have been buried in the earth. “A Muslim, whatever his profession, even a criminal, their rites must be respected. There must be a prayer and the body should be wrapped in white cloth before being buried in the earth, not at sea,” MUI chief H. Amidhan told AFP.

So I'm confused. Was Osama a Muslim or not? We kept being told he wasn't, but now it kinda seems like he might be. Cut to Manilla, where the Muslim population that the Philippines are plagued by also made their peaceful sentiments known.

Officers used anti-riot shields to push back the marchers from Manila's main mosque before they reached the boulevard leading to the seaside embassy compound after Friday's noon prayers. The protesters later dispersed peacefully. Protest leader and Islamic cleric Alim Jamil Yahya says he condemns the "brutal killing" of bin Laden and describes the al-Qaida founder's burial at sea as a desecration of his body. He says that although many Muslims did not agree with bin Laden's methods, they still revered him as a martyr because he fought for freedom against oppression by "the satanic U.S. hegemony." The group also expressed support for Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and called for an end to the NATO bombings. They carried a banner saying "Stop genocide in Libya! Let Muslims rule their own land. US allies: Stay out of Muslim lands."

Any chance of Muslims staying out of Christian countries like the Philippines. Or least not murdering people while living there? Of course we cannot forget Pakistan. Our close ally in the War on Terror. A shining beacon of moderate Islam. A population that stands strong against all forms of extremism.

"Osama's services for Muslims will be remembered forever," said Abdul Qadir Looni, a senior JUI figure addressing the rally. "He challenged the greatest Satan and usurper like America and awakened Muslims across the globe. This gathering pays tribute to him," Looni said. Hafiz Fazal Bareach, a former federal senator and senior party leader, said the US killing of bin Laden would create thousands of others like him. "One Osama has been martyred and now thousands of Osamas will be born, because he created a movement against anti-Muslim forces which is not dependent on personalities," Bareach said. "America first martyred Osama and then desecrated his corpse," he said, vowing that "jihad (holy war) will continue against America and its allies." Pakistan's largest religious political party Jamaat-e-Islami called for protests across the country on Friday to denounce the US operation that killed bin Laden in the garrison city of Abbottabad earlier this week.

They're shouting in Istanbul. They're shouting in Cairo, in London, in Manilla, Indonesia, Pakistan and Lebanon. If they start shouting in Atlanta, then we'll know we hit the motherlode.

In Berlin, a planned BinLadenFest isn't going according to plan

A radical German Muslim was set to hold a controversial open air rally in Frankfurt Saturday after a court overturned a ban, but a judge warned him and his supporters not to even utter the words 'Osama bin Laden.' City officials had earlier tried to stop the event in Frankfurt after Pierre Vogel, a former boxer who has converted to Islam, said he would recite a prayer for bin Laden. Vogel, a preacher, says on his website he does not sympathize with bin Laden. However, authorities, who regard him as a menace, suspect his sermon, entitled 'Islam's Attitude to Terrorism,' will be subtly supportive of extremism.

I refuse to believe that a Muslim event could be subtly supportive of extremism.

But of course no news cycle would be complete without the dread plague of our time being mentioned. Islamophobia. It's in your neighborhoods, your pants and maybe even your drinking water. Scientists it has killed twice as many people as saran wrap and peking duck combined.

The aftermath of Osama Bin Laden’s death has undoubtedly amplified ignorant thoughts and feelings of paranoia against Muslims in this country. Earlier this week, a ninth grade algebra teacher disrespected an American-born Muslim student when he asked her if she was grieving because her “uncle” had died, referring to Osama Bin Laden. The teacher, whom school officials did not identify, allegedly made the remark to his student during class at Clear Brook High School in Friendswood, a city located 23 miles southeast of Houston, TX. School officials were notified about the teacher’s unprofessionalism when another student repeated the remark to her mother, according The Washington Post. “The student did the right thing and immediately notified an adult regarding the teacher’s comments. The principal at Clear Brook High School notified the child’s parents and has been in communication with the family,” said Clear Creek school district spokeswoman Elaina Polsen. The teacher has been placed on leave pending an investigation into his comment.

I hope we can get as many investigators as possible on this case. It's just shocking how much time is wasted on rapes, murders and that minor incident where 3,000 people were killed by some random crazies... when serious cases like this cry out for serious and obsessive investigation. And the answer is, yes she was grieving, but after having some ice cream she feels much better now.

Finally in the roundup of fat idiots weeping big fat tears for Bin Laden, please welcome Michael Moore. According to Moore "We've lost something of our soul here in this country" by "executing" Osama bin Laden In his trademark fashion, Moore also asked piercing questions such as

"How come no headline ever read "Multi-Millionaire Murders 3,000"? It would have been correct. No, best to focus on OBL being a "Muslim,'"

Oddly it's because Bin Laden's killing spree took place in the name of Islam, rather than capitalism. Just as when discussing Moore's movies, we don't say, "Multimillionaire creates fake propaganda film masquerading as documentary."

But don't worry. Moore isn't upset because he supports terrorists. It's because he's deeply religious.

Does it matter if he was executed? Do you think he deserved a trial? I am a Catholic, and the position of the Catholic Church and the Pope is that we are 100 percent against the death penalty unless it is in self-defense. Look at the Nuremberg Trials. We didn’t just pop a bullet in the heads of the worst scum in history. We thought it was important to put them on trial and expose their evil. In a democracy we believe in a system of justice and we believe in a judicial system that gives people a day in court...and then we hung them. It doesn’t mean we can’t hang them afterward.

Michael Moore, abortion loving Catholic. Who is absolutely against executing terrorists without a trial because he's opposed to the death penalty. I could try to follow the logic here, but I'd probably end up a hangover.

There's more of a case to make that America has lost its soul when someone like this has bestselling books and movies. Also when things like this keep happening...

But as we all know there is no compulsion in Islam. If you convert to Islam, but your family refuses, then you don't compel them. You just butcher them. And in a Come to Allah moment, that's just what one Chicago man did.

A man who was angry that his family would not go along with his conversion to Islam was sentenced to life in prison Wednesday in the slayings of his mother, pregnant wife, infant son and two nieces in a rampage last year on the South Side. ... “He was upset at his wife and their family — he felt disrespected that they would not join his religion,” Assistant State’s Attorney Jim McKay said. “It didn’t matter if they were young or old, pregnant or not. He wanted them dead.” ... The massacre began in the early morning hours April 14, at the family home in the 7400 block of South Mozart Street. Larry first shot his mother, Leona Larry, 57, as she slept on a sofa in the living room. He then went systematically through three first-floor bedrooms, fatally shooting his wife, Twanda Thompson, 19; his 7-month-old son, Jihad; his 3-year-old niece, Keleasha Larry; and his 16-year-old niece, Keyshai Fields, who was pregnant. Larry also shot his 13-year-old nephew, Demond Larry, in the face, but the boy survived. The defendant then kicked in the bedroom door of a man who lived in the basement of the home and tried to shoot him, but no bullets fired, prosecutors said. ... When Larry was arrested a short time later, he said to police that Allah told him to kill his family, according to court records. A police report quoted him as saying: “I wish I had more bullets. I wish I had more bullets.”

This is what happens when Allah tells you to kill your family, but doesn't provide you with enough ammo.

I think Larry was experiencing the same mixed emotions as Osama bin Laden, on realizing that maybe following the dictates of a 7th century madman is not such a good plan after all, once people with bigger guns and more ammo show up on the scene.

But I know that most Muslims would strongly differ with what he did. It doesn't seem like he offered the man whose door he kicked down a chance to convert to Islam before trying to kill him. And that is just not Halal.

But Cliffs of Insanity has the ultimate All-American way to commemorate the ascension of Sheikh Usama to the Choir of the Bodily Defunct, with a pigskin football (via Western Rifle Shooters) Read more at sultanknish.blogspot.com

 

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a11t5a

Quem lamenta a morte de bin Laden?

Amplify’d from pajamasmedia.com

As so often happens, a peripheral issue has taken over the Western debate regarding the killing of Osama bin Laden. Whether or not the U.S. government releases a photo of the body isn’t so important. If bin Laden isn’t dead, let him prove it by sending a video to Al Jazeera. The issue is whether or not killing him was a good thing.

As for photos, those who believe that bin Laden isn’t dead won’t be convinced by photos. Ironically, many of them will simultaneously say that the United States didn’t kill bin Laden but the fact that the United States killed bin Laden is a crime for which revenge should be taken.

We should have learned this from September 11, since many say that al-Qaeda wasn’t responsible and it was done by the U.S. government and Israel while, at the same time, saying that it was an operation that made Muslims and Arabs feel proud and America deserved it.

Welcome to the Middle East!

Today — and for some years now — people in the Middle East haven’t hated America because of its policies so much as defining whatever it does as hateful because America is already an enemy. If you don’t want revolutionary Islamists to take over countries, repress all freedom, suppress women, wipe Israel off the map, and expel all Western influence from the region then you are their enemy. You can be a weak, contemptible enemy or a strong, bullying — enemy but that’s about the extent of your choice.

The reaction to the killing of OBL takes place in this context — those Islamists and radical nationalists who saw bin Laden as a rival in life are finding him a useful martyr in death. Again, the issue is not whether bin Laden is dead but whether the United States was bad in killing him.

So far Hamas, the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, the highest Muslim cleric in Egypt, and Western favorite phony moderate Tariq Ramadan have all basically endorsed OBL as a great guy, a real martyr, and the victim of an evil United States.

The al-Aqsa Brigades of Fatah also apparently said so though it quickly withdrew the statement when it made the public relations-conscious Palestinian Authority leadership uncomfortable. Yet the idea that this is just another American atrocity — one more reason to hate the United States — is a powerful force among Palestinians and also in public opinion in Egypt and Jordan.

And so the killing of OBL will enter the long list of U.S. policies for which America is disliked by many Muslims and Arabs in particular. There is a lesson here: whatever the United States does will be criticized because America as a great power, a civilization, a set of policies, and a presence internationally is hated by many, especially by revolutionary Islamists.

Consider the very “moderate” and sophisticated Mr. Ramadan, or perhaps I should say Professor Ramadan since he’s currently at Oxford University and Notre Dame wants to hire him. That’s pretty good for the grandson of a Nazi collaborator and the son of an agent working for a Nazi collaborator (Amin al-Husaini, the mufti of Jerusalem).

Not only did Ramadan criticize the killing of OBL, but he also called the burial at sea “against all the Islamic rituals.” Well, was bin Laden behind the September 11 attacks? Ramadan replies: “We don’t know. Nobody knows — even the Americans.” So much for moderation.

The killing poses a complex issue for Iran, Syria, and Hizballah. Iran is harboring scores of al-Qaeda leaders but the Tehran government — and also Hizballah — are Shia Muslims, a group that bin Laden despised. So no tears will be shed though perhaps some anti-Americanism can be stirred up in the Sunni Arab world by Iran.

Syria worked closely with al-Qaeda in Iraqi terrorism but Damascus has also blamed al-Qaeda for internal attacks (ranging from possible regime hoaxes to democratic demonstrations) and so it isn’t well placed to cheer OBL now.

Regarding Pakistan, it has been an open secret — even published in the mass media — that the Pakistani government has sponsored terrorism and collaborated with al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Yet the U.S. government continued to pour money into the country.

Consider the murderous attack on Mumbai, India that took hundreds of hostages and killed so many people in cold blood. The group that conducted it operates from Pakistan with the knowledge of the authorities there. That government refused to cooperate with investigation or to extradite terrorists. We’re now supposed to be surprised that bin Laden was sheltering there?

In an official press release, the Pakistani army simultaneously claims credit for killing OBL and criticizes the United States for doing so. An official statement from the chief of staff of Pakistan’s army states:

“[We have] made it very clear that any similar action, violating the sovereignty of Pakistan, will warrant a review on the level of military / intelligence cooperation with the United States.

“The Corps Commanders were informed about the decision to reduce the strength of US military personnel in Pakistan to the minimum essential.

“As regards the possibility of similar hostile action against our strategic assets, the Forum reaffirmed that, unlike an undefended civilian compound, our strategic assets are well protected and an elaborate defensive mechanism is in place.”

So the U.S. killing of bin Laden is a cowardly attack on “an undefended civilian compound”; if the United States tries something like that again the Pakistani army will fight America; and the Americans are to be punished by expelling some of their personnel.

That’s quite a highly subsidized ally you have there!

Speaking of allies, a lot of the European media coverage revolved around whether the U.S. government broke international law by killing OBL. See previous paragraph.

And, once again, let me point out that al-Qaeda is a terrorist threat but not a strategic threat. The real problem is with revolutionary Islamists: Hamas, Hizballah, Iran, Syria, and the Muslim Brotherhood. If U.S. policy goes soft on these groups — even helping them at times — terrorism, anti-Americanism, and instability are going to get worse. Read more at pajamasmedia.com

 

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a11sw4

Greenfield: «Muslim Rape Culture and Lara Logan»

Leitura indispensável: Muslim Rape Culture and Lara Logan

When Lara Logan traveled to Egypt to cover the Tahrir Square protests, she was unaware that she was going to be working in a country where sexual harassment rates of women and especially foreign women are so high as to be universal. In a politically correct profession, such truths are politically incorrect. And even now all of the coverage studiously avoids mentioning one dangerous word. Islam.


Muslim rape culture did not begin in Tahrir Square and it won't end there. Not when it actually began in the year 624 when Mohammed came up with an ingenious means of rewarding his followers. In addition to the trophies of war, he made it legal for them to capture and rape married women. Previously that would have been considered adultery. Now it was an incentive to become one of Islam's Holy Warriors. It doesn't take much to imagine how ugly and awful the camp of Mohammed's followers was for a woman. That's why the Burka was invented. Muslim apologists insist that the Burka has something to do with female modesty. But the Koran spells out clearly the reason for it. "Tell your wives and your daughters and the women of the believers to draw their cloaks (veils) all over their bodies that they may thus be distinguished and not molested." The Hijab was invented for similar reasons in 1970's Lebanon to mark out Shiite women so they wouldn't be molested by Muslim terrorists. The purpose of the Burka was closer to a cattle brand, separating women married to Muslim husbands, from slave women who were captured in war. The former were the property of their husbands and untouchable, the latter were fair game for everyone. To a Muslim, the Burka is a sign that says, 'only my husband may rape me' and the lack of a Burka means, 'everyone can rape me.' When Australia's Grand Mufti Sheikh Hilaly justified a notorious series of gang rapes by comparing women to uncovered meat left out in the presence of a cat, he laid out the basis of Muslim rape culture. Women are always the guilty party, because they are women. If they refuse to defeminize themselves by putting on a Burka and becoming just another dark ghost haunting the streets of Cairo or Sydney with their lack of selfhood, then they are automatically guilty of their own rape. In the West rape is a crime because it an assault on a human being. In Islam, it is only a crime because it is a sex act that takes place outside of marriage. In many Islamic countries, 'Zina' meaning adultery or immoral sexual conduct in general, is a charge that can be levied against both the rapist and his victim. Even in a case where Mohammed ordered the execution of a rapist, he first 'forgave' his victim for her part in it. To the extent that Islam criminalizes rape, it is as a property crime or a disruption of public order. And it imposes a high standard of proof that is unlikely to be met. In Islam, women are objects, not subjects. Physically their entire bodies are considered 'Awrah', an Arabic word meaning 'nakedness', 'fault' or 'defect', terms that amply sum up the Islamic view of women. Even their voices are considered 'Awrah' meaning that even a fully covered up woman speaking is an immoral thing. A woman exists within Islam as an immoral object. And that gives Muslim men implicit permission to assault her, while holding her very nature accountable for tempting them to commit the act. Islam does not consider rape to be a crime against a woman. It is a crime against their fathers and husbands. There is no crime involved in a husband raping his own wife. That is a ruling Muslim scholars continue to preach today. And the UK's Islam Channel was shut down for broadcasting that view. Under Islamic law, a husband is fully entitled to beat his wife if she refuses to service him until she finally consents. The woman has no control over her body. Only the men she belongs to do. In a tribal society, rape is a crime against property and honor. To a father, his daughter's virginity is a valuable item that increases her market value. Marrying her off is way to build a relationship between two families. To a husband, his wife's chastity maintains the value of his property and insures that the offspring is his. To assault a woman is to commit a crime against the communal property of a family. But a woman herself has no rights over her body that any man is bound to respect. As Lara Logan discovered in Tahrir Square. An unaccompanied woman is ownerless. A foreign woman is outside the protection of the tribal system which uses family vendettas to settle disputes. It's no wonder that the already stratospheric sexual harassment rates in Cairo climb to a universal value where foreign women are concerned.


The Burka placed responsibility on women to defeminize themselves and mark themselves as property. Centuries of Islamic jurisprudence put the burden of responsibility for any assault on a woman as the object that tempts men to sin. The circular reasoning of Islam says that if a man assaults a woman, it is because she tempted him. That femininity is inherently an object of temptation. The Burka and the Hijab began as a way of defeminizing women for their protection, but then became an indictment of women. Women were no longer being defeminized to protect them, but to protect men from them. Why else do women have to be defeminized, their faces masked and their voices silenced, if there isn't some terrible mysterious force about femininity that causes men to act out? That is exactly what the first president of Iran claimed, when he said that, "Scientific research had shown that women's hair emitted rays that drove men insane." More recently an Iranian cleric explained that women who do not dress modestly corrupt men and cause earthquakes. The flight routes of Iranian planes had to be diverted from a stadium where women played soccer for fear that their hair rays might affect passengers in the planes above. Behind this hair ray nonsense lurks an uglier notion, that women are unnatural creatures and that men are not responsible for their conduct around women. If a man rapes a woman, maybe her hair rays made him do it. If they can cause earthquakes, why not. Western legal culture says that men have more control over a situation with a woman. Islamic jurisprudence creates reasons why women do to exonerate their rapists. How do you sell the notion of equal rights to people who view women as dangerous objects that have to be kept under lock and key? Under Islam a woman can't say 'no' except passively by defeminizing herself. By remaining in Purdah at home or taking a mobile purdah along by covering up her entire body and face in a Burka, never meeting a man's eye or speaking to him. And even if she follows all those rules and is still assaulted, then maybe those hair rays can punch through stifling black cloth after all. There's no way for a woman to be innocent, except by never being born. As an object, she is always guilty of luring men on. The levels of guilt may vary. If the levels are low enough, then she may be 'forgiven' for causing immorality and her rapist may face punishment. And her family may still kill her anyway to bury the shame that she represents for them along with her body. Like all social rules, they don't apply equally. The daughter of a wealthy and westernized urban family will enjoy an immunity from them, that the daughter of a poor family in a village will not. The wealthy daughter will attend the London School of Economics, use Twitter and serve as an example that her country and Islam are really very liberated. The poor daughter will be a second wife to some bored fat merchant and be considered lucky if he doesn't beat her to death when she loses her looks. Meanwhile the young men will roam the streets bored and frustrated. They will steal anything not nailed down, join protests and sexually harass women. When Western reporters poured into Cairo to report on a pro-democracy movement, they surrounded themselves with what they thought were pro-democracy protesters. What they were actually doing was walking into one of the largest overcrowded cities in the world, where gangs of protesters had smashed the police, and created an open state of anarchy. Muslim rape culture did the rest. As far as her attackers were concerned, Lara Logan had no rights they were bound to respect. She wasn't the wife or daughter of anyone they knew. She wasn't even a Muslim. They had no bond of kinship with her. Which meant that just like the uncovered in Mohammed's camp, she didn't belong to anyone. And that meant she was fair game. In Muslim rape culture, a woman cannot actively decline a man. She can only passively demonstrate that she is off limits by defeminizing herself. Lara Logan hadn't done that. But even if she had, it wouldn't have done much good. Previous gang assaults on women in Cairo a few years back had targeted even those covered from head to toe. To add fuel to the fire, came the chants of, "Yahood, Yahood." "Jew, Jew". Mohammed's ruling had made it legal to capture and rape Jewish women. The association may not have been directly made, but indirectly it was there. Lara Logan had been marked as a member of an enemy tribe. The reasoning is awkward, but Islamic jurisprudence is the product of such awkwardness. It derives from the will of Mohammed whose only consistent principle was to do whatever he wanted. As a prophet he frequently made and broke his own laws, and then made new ones. Four witnesses are required for an act of sexual immorality, because at one point three witnesses accused Mohammed's own wife of such an act. Prior to that Mohammed had taken action based only on a single witness. Mohammed modified the law to allow him to marry his son's wife and to shift the turns of his own wives. After Mohammed had received another urgent 'revelation' allowing him to do as he sexually pleased, his wife Aisha said, "O Allah's Apostle I do not see but that your Lord hurries in pleasing you." There you find the whole of Islamic jurisprudence. It was a code that existed only to please Mohammed's sexual impulses. If Allah existed only to enable women to sexually service Mohammed-- what agency can women have in Islam? Muslim rape culture springs from that same code. A code that exists to please and flatter the Muslim male and demean the female as an inferior specimen, whose body is filth, whose form is corruption and who can only be good to the extent that she becomes a non-person. Remaining quiet and out of sight. It begins with the inferiority of women, and ends with a paradise filled with eternal virgins who can never say no. What do women get, some ask. But it doesn't matter. It was never intended for them.

«Bin Laden is dead; long live jihad»

A morte de Osama bin Laden é uma boa notícia mas, nem de perto, significa o fim da jihad global: essa dura desde 622 e não dá sinais de abrandar.
É caso para dizer que por morrer um mujahid não acaba a jihad:

Osama bin Laden is dead. So what?

Osama bin Laden has gone to claim his virgins, and while that is fine news, it really won't change anything. The role of al-Qaeda in the global jihad, and the role of Osama bin Laden in al-Qaeda, have both been wildly overstated. Al-Qaeda is not the only Islamic jihad group or Islamic supremacist group operating today, and Osama bin Laden was not some charismatic leader whose movement will collapse without him. The exaggeration of his role, in fact, was a result of the general unwillingness to face the reality that the global jihad is a movement driven by an ideology, not an outsized personality, and that that ideology is rooted in Islam.Read more at www.jihadwatch.org

Berlim nazi, Vichy e Damasco

Amplify’d from www.gees.org

Siria, decían los oficialistas, es un régimen reformista y laico. Lo que querían decir, bienintencionadamente escondido en lenguaje pedagógico apto para masas, es que el régimen de Asad es nazi.

En 1940, Francia se rindió al Eje y formó un Gobierno colaboracionista en Vichy. Sus colonias se encontraban más allá del alcance de los nazis. Los gobernadores podían elegir: permanecer con Vichy o unirse a de Gaulle. La mayoría eligió Vichy. Así, el mandato francés Siria-Líbano quedó abierto a los nazis. Recibía órdenes de Vichy, quien a su vez las recibía de Berlín. Los nazis hicieron un esfuerzo de propaganda e incluso se expandieron hacia Irak para establecer un régimen pro-fascista. En este periodo se formaron los partidos que serían el núcleo de lo que se convirtió en el partido Baaz. Y el partido Baaz es el de Asad, y era el de Sadam.

Mientras miramos con recelo las consecuencias de la llamada primavera árabe, hasta hoy limitada al Norte de África, que incluyen desde los tunecinos que escapan su naciente democracia para visitar las declinantes de Europa, hasta los desplazados del proceso democratizador de la plaza Tahrir, pasando por el gasoducto hacia Israel atacado ya tres veces, sin olvidar el concurso de contradicciones de la guerra de Libia que algún día ganaremos, o no, conviene no perder de vista una expresión que ha entrado en desuso. Read more at www.gees.org

 

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Intervenção na Líbia e nada na Síria?

Por que razão os Ocidente intervém na Líbia (e, já agora, na Costa do Marfim) e se limita a uns tíbios protestos face à situação na Líbia?
Leia algumas razões por que seria mais conveniente e avisado ajudar a oposição síria que intervir militarmente na Líbia:

Amplify’d from www.gees.org

¡Bombardead Damasco!

por GEES, 26 de Abril de 2011

En todo conflicto, saber quiénes son los amigos y quiénes los enemigos es de una importancia capital. Estados Unidos y sus aliados de la OTAN parecen incapaces de trazar una línea divisoria entre unos y otros. Y así les va. Mientras andan enzarzados en una guerra absurda contra Gadafi, el régimen dictatorial y brutal de los Assad en Siria se ve puesto en cuestión por manifestantes pacíficos por primera vez en cuarenta años. ¿Y cuál es la reacción de nuestros preclaros líderes? Tomar nota de lo que sucede y pedir que el régimen cese en el uso de la violencia. Mientras que contra Gadafi se moviliza la Alianza Atlántica y los americanos vuelan sus aviones no tripulados para forzar un cambio de régimen, el pueblo sirio sólo recibe un tibio telegrama.

Y, sin embargo, la importancia estratégica de un cambio de régimen en Siria es mucho mayor que en Libia. Para empezar, poner fin a los días de Assad significaría poner fin al intervencionismo sirio en el Líbano, un país acosado directamente por sus agentes y por las fuerzas de Hizbollá a su servicio. De hecho, sin Siria que les ayudara, Hizbollá decaería en poder y Líbano podría retomar de nuevo el rumbo de la libertad, alejándose del islamismo radical.

En segundo lugar, acabar con Assad representaría un duro golpe a los intereses y ambiciones iraníes. Siria es su mejor y único aliado (con la exótica excepción de la Venezuela de Chávez). Le sirve de apoyo político pero, sobre todo, como instrumento de alcance del levante en sus aspectos logísticos y en su diseño político. Sin Siria, mantener armados a los terroristas de Hizbollá, por ejemplo, sería mucho más complicado. Como pasaría también con Hamás y otros grupos radicales en Gaza.

Por último, acabar con Assad representaría un duro golpe contra la proliferación nuclear. Siria se ha visto involucrada en el desarrollo de instalaciones nucleares cuyo origen técnico venía de Corea del Norte y el financiero de Irán. Es más, se sospecha fuertemente que Siria podría estar dando apoyo a la dispersión de las instalaciones relacionadas con el programa atómico iraní, en un intento de preservarlo frente a una posible acción militar israelí.

Ah, y hay otra razón nada desdeñable: a diferencia de Libia donde los rebeldes son unos perfectos desconocidos, la oposición siria sí que sabemos quiénes son y dónde está cada uno.

Todo llevaría a pensar que si de verdad se quiere que la llama de la primavera árabe prospere, los esfuerzos deberían concentrarse en forzar la caída del régimen de Damasco. Pero hasta el momento, y a pesar de las semanas de protestas y la represión feroz orquestada por Basher el Assad, Occidente no está haciendo nada. Como dice un disidente sirio: "Menos que cero".

Libertad Digital

Read english version Read more at www.gees.org

 

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B. Rubin: médiorientização do Ocidente

Amplify’d from pajamasmedia.com

I have long thought that we are experiencing what might be called the Middle Easternization of the West but never fully understood it until a friend asked me a question.

What is needed is a foolproof tactic, one to which there is no institutionalized opposition so that even your enemies must bow their heads in shame and knees in homage when called names.

So how has the Middle Eastern approach revolutionized Western discourse? What slogans are potent enough to shut people up instantly?

Racism! Homophobia! Islamophobia! And to a lesser extent, perhaps, Sexism! The minute you are accused of racism you are finished. There’s no effective response. And fear of being accused shuts most people up. Criticize the policies of President Obama? Racism!

Call for enforcement of immigration laws? Racism!

Explore the boundaries between religious Islam and political Islamism? Islamophobia!

Suggest that thousands of years of history has defined marriage exclusively as between a woman and a man? Homophobia!

There are no pro-racism, pro-Islam-hating, pro-sexist, or pro-homosexual-baiting lobbies. Indeed, all of these things are at an all-time low in the West, rare to a degree unthinkable a decade ago. Yet the pretense must be that such dangerous enemies are lurking everywhere, just as Communist regimes constantly uncovered conspiracies that justified their existence and repression.

Thus, freedom of speech, rational discussion, and opposition are trumped by “higher values.” The most basic and long-held principles are quickly jettisoned in fear. Newspapers accept censorship, intellectuals embrace telling lies, and women’s rights groups cheer the suppression of women’s rights in Muslim societies. Those who have spent years fantasizing how they would have been heroic resistance fighters against dictatorship fold, trembling, in the face of a single letter of complaint.

Remember, victims of this tactic don’t have to be actually guilty but merely accused to be considered guilty. Consequently, and most likely of all, they would already have been intimidated into silence.

And then you are finished as completely as any Arab or Muslim accused of being a running dog of the Zionists and imperialists. In many cases, those in public life so branded might as well get a shopping cart and hang out on street corners collecting bottles to return for the deposit.

The critical point is this: For every bit of “hate speech” or action, there are hundreds, even thousands of false, politically motivated accusations. Like the secret police in a dictatorship, the forces must seek out new crimes and conspiracies. But unlike an earlier phase of genuine efforts to promote tolerance, the strategy becomes a political one for crushing dissent and consolidating support for the prevailing ideology and rulers.

The idea that the West would transform the Middle East in its image has become a bad joke. It is the West that is becoming transformed into another version of the Middle East. And if you want evidence, three of the Arab world’s main taboos — support for Israel, praise for America, and any critical discussion of Islam –have also become among the things forbidden in large sectors of Western society. Read more at pajamasmedia.com

 

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A fraude «Che»

A verdade acaba sempre por vir ao de cima:

Amplify’d from www.minutodigital.com

Ché, el otro lado de un ídolo

El título no es mío, se trata del último documental realizado por el cineasta cubano Agustín Blázquez, que se estrenó ayer en la Maison de l’Amérique Latine de París, y la semana pasada en varias ciudades estadounidenses, comprendida Miami.

Primero existió un libro, sumamente esclarecedor, titulado La otra cara del Ché. Ernesto Guevara, un sepulcro blanqueado, de Marcos Bravo (Término editorial, 2003), luego otro, también de suma información y enjundioso análisis, titulado La face caché du Ché, de Jacobo Machover (Buchet-Chastel, 2007), publicado en España por Ediciones del Bronce, en 2008, bajo el título: La cara oculta del Ché: Desmitificación de un héroe romántico, y ahora le sigue la película documental que complementa y reitera los testimonios de los estudios anteriores.

“Los mandaron matar”

En Cuba nos hemos pasado todos estos años, desde el 67 (año de la muerte del Ché) hasta la fecha, celebrando la Jornada de homenaje en honor a Camilo Cienfuegos y al Ché Guevara en la primera semana del mes de octubre. A ambos los mandaron a matar los mismísimos Raúl y Fidel Castro.

Al primero lo desapareció en un avión y al segundo lo embarcó para (y en) Bolivia, harto de que los soviéticos le halaran las orejas debido a los desplantes del argentino; para que allí los bolivianos -que no habían pedido guerrilla alguna ni la cabeza de un guanajo- hicieran lo que finalmente hicieron con él, lo chivatearan y lo asesinaran.

Testimonios de víctimas

El documental de Agustín Blázquez cuenta con valiosos testimonios de familiares de víctimas a los que el Ché mató de un tiro en la nuca, y de otros, de cuyos parientes ordenó su fusilamiento sin contemplaciones de ningún tipo. Además, muestra las investigaciones y certificaciones de estudiosos del tema como son Antonio de la Cova, Humberto Fontova, Armando Lago, entre otros.

Uno de los testimonios más terribles es el de la hija y la nieta de Cornelio Rojas, cuyo fusilamiento fue mostrado a través de la televisión cubana. La nieta cuenta lo que le trasmitieron sus padres.

Su madre, la hija de Rojas, también testimonia, que ella estaba embarazada, habían metido a su padre preso, y ellos empezaron a hacer gestiones para que lo liberaran ante el temor de que corriera la suerte de otros, de que fuese fusilado.

El Ché le aseguró que lo liberarían, incluso firmó un documento en que confirmaba la liberación, sin embargo, mientras otro familiar iba en busca del reo, la hija encendió la televisión y vio cómo sacaban a su padre de la celda, lo conducían al paredón, y cuando el hombre levantó un brazo para dirigirse al pelotón de fusilamiento, lo que tuvo tiempo de hacer, fue ejecutado.

No se pierdan la revolución

El video existe, se puede ver su cabeza que explota contra el muro mientras el hombre dirige unas palabras. Esas palabras fueron más o menos: “Muchachos, ahí les dejo la revolución, no la pierdan?” Y la perdieron, por supuesto, en el mismo momento en que le partieron el cráneo a tiro limpio.

La hija de Cornelio Rojas, al ver el fusilamiento de su padre a través de la pequeña pantalla, se puso tan mal que le sobrevino el parto. Y entonces, intentó salir hacia un hospital, pero las hordas castristas no la dejaron, tuvo que llamar a una comadrona, y parió a su primer hijo en la cama de su padre que acababa de morir.

El Ché también le dio el tiro en la nuca a unos cuantos adolescentes, de 14 y 15 años, que habían falsificado la edad para entrar en la policía de la República, como bien señala uno de los testigos, que no era la policía de Batista, y subraya, era la de la República. El argentino acostumbraba a citar a reos a su oficina y ahí mismo les metía el disparo.

De vileza inimaginable

Una señora lo fue a ver para pedirle de favor, que intercediera por su hijo, que estaba visto para ser fusilado un viernes, y que ella ya no podía más. El Ché se viró a su ayudante y le espetó: Adelanten el fusilamiento de este muchacho, para que su madre no tenga que esperar hasta el viernes. Así fue el carnicerito de La Cabaña, como empezó a llamarlo el pueblo: despiadado, cruel, de una vileza inimaginable.

Es la razón por la que todavía muchos nos preguntamos ¿por qué los jóvenes visten camisetas con su imagen, porqué todavía la gente cree que fue un santo que dio su vida por los pobres? No lo fue ni remotamente, el documental de Agustín Blázquez brinda todas las respuestas.

Zoé Valdés Read more at www.minutodigital.com

 

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