Anar Gul gestures to the body of her grandchild, killed by Sergeant Robert Bales in Kandahar (Photo: AP)
An incident like this leads Afghans to think that maybe the US media and elite --- including those running the Government --- don't look at Afghans the way they look at other peoples. While people need to know everything about a mass murderer, they might not require knowledge of the victims because they belong to a culture that is too primitive.
Yes, "primitive". That was the word used by National Review Online in an editorial yesterday about Afghans and Afghan culture, as it pondered the Kandahar Massacre.
An American soldier goes to Afghanistan and massacres 16 civilians inside their homes, then burns their bodies. And we are the ones who are primitive.
Hana Shalabi has been on hunger strike for over a month. Her condition has been deteriorating so badly that prison officials had to transfer her to a Haifa hospital (though she wasn't admitted to the hospital).
Shalabi is protesting being held in administrative detention. These detentions are quasi-legal action through which Israel incarcerates individuals without charge or proper trial. Israel inherited this undemocratic procedure from the British mandate, which enacted it as part of the 1945 emergency regulations.
International humanitarian law frowns on this procedure and Israel was asked by the international community on numerous occasions to end this practice. Over 300 Palestinians are presently held without charge.
The massive turnout of the Iranian people in the country’s parliamentary elections brought the US and Europe such a failure that they had to ease their sanctions against Iran....This blow forced the US to soften sanctions endorsed by its allies on the country’s oil industry...The Iranian nation's move compelled them to regret their wrongdoings.
Khatami was far from the only voice making the proclamation. Deputy Speaker of Parliament Mohammad Reza Bahonar said the US had retreated while the European Union "realised its mistake".
Now --- given not only questions about the supposed enthusiasm of Iranians for the elections but also the escalating effect of sanctions, with Iran facing increasing difficulty selling oil and financing its transactions, the issues over even basic supplies of food, and the European Union "realising its mistake" on Friday by putting more Iranians on its list of those sanctioned over human rights --- how could regime officials put out their assurances?
Thursday night's protest rally in the Douma suburb of the Syrian capital Damascus
2200 GMT: We're closing yet another crazy Friday. Here's a summary.
In Bahrain, there were nine very large protests, most or all of which were attacked by police who used teargas to disperse the crowds. Though protests were planned, they were larger and more energetic today after the news that a man died last night from tear gas inhalation.
Some protesters destroyed closed-circuit TV cameras and threw rocks at police. Apparently, there was at least one occurrence of youth throwing Molotov cocktails.
This anger was sparked by what the activists consider widespread police brutality. Large parts of the island nation were covered in teargas again today, and riot vehicles reportedly chased down protesters in an attempt to run them over. There are also more unconfirmed reports of injured children, and another unconfirmed report that police sexually molested a young girl. Earlier in the week activists say that the police molested and tortured a 16-year-old boy, Ali.
At the end of the day, resolution to this conflict seems further away than it has ever been.
In Syria, the primary headline was arguably the use of helicopters to attack ground targets for the first time that we can confirm. There were several instances of this today and last night, all of them between Aleppo and the border with Turkey.
At nightfall, there are more reports of widespread fighting between FSA soldiers and the Assad military, specifically in Hama and to the east of Damascus.
However, once again the fact that will be lost to most headline writers is that there were large and widespread protests across the country, including in Damascus and Aleppo. Once again the Syrian opposition has used another Friday to prove that their resistance to the regime cannot be shot or shelled into submission.
After a career of nearly forty years in journalism, including assignments and newsroom work for some 30 years with Western news organizations, I can say with a clear conscience that there is nothing to compare with the knowledge and courage of some Arab journalists who work with foreign media and whose input to the Middle East coverage has been invaluable.
Yet, these journalists have remained "unknown soldiers" in the raging battle for truth and accuracy, in a crude manifestation of denial and prejudice. Those who are familiar with what I am talking about know pretty well that this is a phenomenon which speaks volumes about the kind of reporting the Middle East receives in the Western media.
Turkish President Erdogan & Supreme LeaderThe Arab Spring has heightened the ideological tension between Ankara and Tehran, and Turkey's model seems to be winning. Last spring, Iran often claimed that the Arab revolutions were akin to the Iranian one decades before and would usher in similar governments. Yet in Tunisia and Egypt, for the first time, leading figures in mainstream Islamist parties have won elections by explicitly appealing to the "the Turkish model" rather than to an Iranian-style theocracy. What's more, in December 2011, the Palestinian movement Hamas salted the wound when a spokesman announced the organization's shift toward "a policy of nonviolent resistance", which reflected its decision to distance itself from Syria and Iran and to move closer to Egypt, Turkey, and Qatar.
1739 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. Gholam Reza Mesbahi Moghaddam, a leading member of Parliament's Economy Committee, has claimed that "some want the next Majlis to be obedient to Ahmadinejad". He continued that "Ahmadinejad Discourse" is a kind of senseless myth, set against the Supreme Leader's "Imam and Revolution Discourse".
1734 GMT: Tehran Friday Prayer Update. Another snippet from Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami's sermon, this one with significance as a message to President Ahmadinejead, Parliament, and the judiciary about the Supreme Leader's proclamation for Iranian New Year: "National production is a strategy not a slogan; the three powers must support it."
Mass protest in Jarjanaz in Idlib Province in northwest Syria today
2130 GMT: A disturbing close to our coverage today --- footage has been posted claiming to be of women executed by regime "shabiha" (plainclothes forces) in Addawia in Homs in Syria.
2057 GMT: An evening demonstration in Kharab Al-Shaham in Daraa Province in southern Syria:
2114 GMT: Human Rights Watch. The United Nations Human Rights Council renewed the mandate of the UN Special Rapporteur for Iran, Ahmad Shaheed, on Thursday by a 22-5 vote with 20 abstentions.
Russia and China voted against the resolution that expressed "serious concerns" about Iran's human rights record.
2104 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. Mohammad Nabi Habibi, the leader of the conservative Motalefeh Party, has echoed the warning of MP Alireza Marandi (see 1220 GMT), "I pray for Ahmadinejad that he ends his term as President on good terms."
MP Asadollah Badamchian adds that the President made the mistake, in his Parliamentary "interrogation" last week, of insulting legislators and callig them unworthy if they wld not give him high marks.
1920 GMT: Following Israel's confiscation of a Palestinian plot in Valaja village in the West Bank and its plan to turn it into a park for Jewish settlers, a statement released by the Turkish Foreign Ministry said that Israel's settlement activities despite all warnings by the international community are unacceptable.
It is also stated that Israel is blocking the peace process by its negative position and deprive vision of two state solution by physical conditions it creates in the region.
1725 GMT: Deputy Prime Minister Ali Babacan said that almost no one earns less than $2 a day in Turkey, and the number of those who earn less than $4 a day is only 3.6 percent.
According to officials, the government is abandoning dialogue and negotiations with the leaders of the outlawed terrorist/separatist organisation, PKK. Instead, some believe that the government will hold negotiations with the pro-Kurdish party, BDP; whereas others think that the priority will be given specifically to the Turkish public opinion, in order to prevent increasing anger of Turks against Kurdish people.
Just hours ago, Prime Minister Erdogan called on Kurdish citizens to abandon BDP. If BDP and Ocalan (the imprisoned leader of PKK) are sidelined, then with whom AKP is going to talk? If BDP is wanted to be negotiated with, then the question is that how is it possible to convince the party to change its strategies while the party-Kurdish base alliance is anchored on a nationalistic platform where Ocalan and PKK militia are seen as the leader and "guerillas" of a "freedom-seeking" nation, respectively?
Saturday, March 24, 2012 at 8:06
