The Arab League officially halted its observer mission to Syria on Saturday the 28^th of February 2012, just a month after agreeing to introduce the presence of their monitors across the beleaguered republic.

The current state of the Arab Republic needs no introduction; with the number of fatalities escalating to hundreds on a daily basis under the authoritarian rule of President Bashar Al Assad, and more recently with the heavyweights China and Russia vetoing a draft UN security council resolution pressing for his immediate resignation, all news bulletins are pointing Middle East-wards.

An 18-page confidential account of the League's mission was recently just leaked, and only serves to highlight its impotence as a functioning political collective.  Citing shortage of equipment and dispatches of ill-qualified monitors among other absurd excuses for retreating from this particular mission, the Arab League can now add 'the Syria attempt' as the cherry to its metaphorical pie of failed interventions.

Ever since its formation in 1945, the Arab League has relinquished many an attempted mediation to its Western counterparts or the UN.

In the Iraq War of 2003, it was not the Arab League that intervened but the non-member nations, Iran and Turkey. Palestine in the Arab-Israeli dispute has also not been provided with any support save for a half-hearted egging on from the sidelines in the form of the proposed (yet snubbed) Arab Peace Initiative.  And more recently, the League's decision to remain mum on the twin uprisings from earlier last year in the overthrow of Presidents Ben Ali and Hosni Mubarak, as well as its silence on the violence that followed in Bahrain and Yemen.

So with just a negligible success rate since its inception 66 years ago (see timeline), and with its role in abetting the establishment of Kuwait's independence as probably its most memorable accomplishment, it really is  no wonder that faith in the organization is waning.

Experts and political commentators blame the League's inability to reconcile internally between the priorities of individual member states (wataniya) and the interests of the general Arab allegiance (qawmiya) for getting in the way of its political clout. By allowing its hands to be tied by a combination of said inter-state pressures, as well as with individual members preferring to flex economic muscles to win personal battles in deference to asserting themselves as a collective force, it has become increasingly evident that the concept of Arab unity has little or no relevance to the self-proclaimed facilitators of the 'Arab cause.'

It probably is best then that in the case of Syria as well, the Arab League hands over responsibility before inflicting more damage than doing good.

Although the standard procedure of the international community (as witnessed from other 'Arab Spring'esque interventions) when it comes to mediations is a drawn-out process of: (a)acknowledging a 'state of emergency,'(b)condemning the incumbent regime, (c)calling for (from afar) a regime change, (d)pledging assistance to the victimized citizens and threatening imposition of trade sanctions, and finally (e)military/economic arbitration, a firmer management of affairs from without appears more efficient, albeit barely. Although ideally, umpiring from within the region would have proven less protracted.

The general consensus being that this is one missed opportunity too many for the Arab League, and any hope of salvaging a beleaguered reputation as the olive branch-bearers to both member and non-member Arab nations can no longer be entertained.

So if, in this repeated show of incompetence, the Arab League is only cementing itself as just another band of witnesses to the bloodshed, perhaps then it is not just the Assad regime that needs dissolving.

From BBC

Gunmen have attacked a church in north-east Nigeria killing at least six people, the church's pastor says.

Johnson Jauro said the killings took place when gunmen burst into his Deeper Life Church in Gombe, capital of Gombe state.

He said his wife was among those killed. Ten other people were injured.

Nigeria has recently experienced a surge in ethnic and sectarian violence. The government declared a state of emergency in parts of the country.

“The attackers started shooting sporadically. They shot through the window of the church, and many people were killed including my wife,” Mr Jauro told Reuters news agency.

“Many members who attended the church service were also injured.”

No group said it carried out the attack, but the Islamist group Boko Haram recently carried out a string of bombings on Christmas Day, including against a church in the capital Abuja which killed dozens of people.

Earlier on Thursday, two suspected members of Boko Haram were arrested after a father and son were killed in Maiduguri in neighbouring Borno state.

Escalating violence

Attacks by Boko Haram have become increasingly frequent and are a major problem for the Nigerian authorities.

President Goodluck Jonathan has vowed to “crush” the group.

Several northern states surrounding Gombe have had their borders sealed off under the state of emergency declared by Mr Jonathan following the Christmas bombings.

Boko Haram is fighting to create an Islamic state and wants to impose Sharia law across Nigeria.

Followers of Boko Haram believe any political or social activity associated with Western values should be banned.

This includes voting in elections, wearing shirts and trousers and receiving a secular education.

Boko Haram regards the Nigerian state as being run by non-believers and this was the case even when the country had a Muslim president.

In unrelated violence on Sunday, at least 50 people died in the eastern state of Ebony in clashes between two ethnic groups over a land dispute

Obama as a Leader

In a recent Foreign Policy article, Aaron David Miller argues that the Israel-Palestine issue is a “lose-lose” situation in which Obama is better off not getting involved. His position has the appearance of cogency; after all, isn't the real aim of every president to get reelected? How can Obama be expected to desire anything else? “There's no deal now that anyone can broker,” Miller remarks with resignation, “The president is right to protect his political flanks. This isn't cheap or dirty politics: it's smart.”[3] Cynically concluding that “Obama should veto [any proposed bid for Palestinian membership in the U.N.] and sleep well that night,” Miller aggressively— and inexplicably— supports the status quo of American politics as if it represented some value that is now under threat and must be protected. His whole argument devolves, predictably, upon this vanity when it is revealed that the reason for him taking this stance is his belief that “reelecting Obama next year [in order to avert a Republican victory]…should be the primary goal.” All the other reasons for supporting the veto — such as protection of “interests” or the ultimate inefficacy of the UN membership bid — are just platitudes. He gives no evidence that clearing the way for Palestine's unilateral ambitions will harm US interests, and he seems not to recognize the fact that everyone is already aware that the US will veto the bid — Obama has promised it. The point of the Palestinian bid is to send a message, to oppose the status-quo.

Miller's argument that the Palestinians are not fit to declare statehood because they lack unity around a single political party forces the Palestinians into a catch-22 scenario. They cannot declare statehood unless they are unified around a single political party, yet a (successful) declaration of statehood is the one thing that would truly bring Palestinians together. Miller's assertion that “no Israeli government will be willing to make a deal with a partner thatdoesn't control and silence all the guns of Palestine” reveals the degree to which the American consciousness is warped into thinking that Palestine is required to accept the partnership (read: overlordship) of Israel in navigating its path to statehood. Moreover, expecting a stateless people to be perfectly unified is unprecedented and unfair. Not only do the Palestinians occupy widely divergent geographical areas, but they also profess two different religions. Such is the ridiculous presumption of those who want either to prevent the State of Palestine from ever coming into existence or to prevent it from being anything more than a permanent ward of Israel and the West, only half real and devoid of dignity.

Miller is right to criticize Obama for inciting false hope in Palestinians, Israelis, and Americans alike. Much of Obama's positions and rhetoric have proven to be as fragile and as empty as a balloon. This is precisely the reason why influential policy experts ought not to go as far as Miller would have them go to make sure Obama gets reelected. Even if Obama is the lesser of two evils in comparison to most of the potential Republican candidates, subordinating the Palestine question to partisan politics obscures the urgency of the real human tragedy taking place. Palestinians are trying to claim a right that was stolen from them sixty years ago, and all policy experts can talk about is “national interests,” which is, more often than not, just code for “Israeli [expansionist] interests.” But for those who are genuinely concerned about real, tangible US interests (to which maintaining a permanent alliance with Israel has absolutely nothing to offer[4]), a reversal of terms may provide a fitting admonishment: If the US were to aggressively pursue the creation of a Palestinian state, wouldn't popular anti-Americanism in the Middle East all but disappear, thus easing relations with trade partners far more lucrative than Israel, a country deficient of oil? If the US loses an ally in Israel, won't it gain one in Palestine?

The so-called “Do-Nothing Strategy” might be described with exactly the same wording Miller denies: cheap and dirty politics. Its cheapness lay in the fact that it prioritizes the exigencies of party politics over real human concerns. Whether or not Obama gets reelected next term should take a back seat to such a pressing humanitarian concern as reversing West Bank settlement and clearing the path toward Palestinian statehood. The office of the president no longer has independent significance anyway. The president frequently serves as a scapegoat for the country's problems, but he has very little power or initiative to act independently to change the status-quo. There will never be another “great president” like those of the 18^th and 19^th centuries because each one, as soon as he enters office, is pressed with the necessity to conform to the demands of the most powerful lobbies. If Obama were a great president, he would be brave enough to act on the dictates of morality rather than in the interest of self-perpetuation. If he were a great president, he would, with his own hands, permanently ruin his chances of being reelected, and he would do so with zeal. George Washington, that first and greatest American president, established the honorable democratic tradition of term limits when he refused to run for a third reelection, despite the fact that his extraordinary level of popularity would have enabled him to crown himself king if he wished. He subordinated his own ambitions to a higher moral principle.

Obscurantism and cynicism are what allow the Israel-Palestine land dispute to continue — Obscurantism that diverts focus away from the Palestinian tragedy by focusing on nebulous phrases like “national interests” and “helping our allies.” The resignation inherent in the “Do Nothing Strategy” resembles the attitude taken by David Ben-Gurion, a Zionist ideologue and one of Israel's founders:

Everybody sees the problem in the relations between the Jews and the [Palestinian] Arabs. But not everybody sees that there's no solution to it. There is no solution! . . . The conflict between the interests of the Jews and the interests of the [Palestinian] Arabs in Palestine cannot be resolved by sophisms. I don't know any Arabs who would agree to Palestine being ours—even if we learn Arabic . . .and I have no need to learn Arabic. On the other hand, I don't see why 'Mustafa' should learn Hebrew. . . . There's a national question here. We want the country to be ours. The Arabs want the country to be theirs.[5]

Resignation to the interminability of the dilemma of Israel and Palestine only buys time for the further expansion of settlements, and thus further diminishes the likelihood that the problem will ever be solved. Palestine deserves the right to make a unilateral bid for statehood. Israel hadn't obtained bilateral agreement when it seized Palestinian land in 1948, so Israel is groundless in trying to make the Palestinians do so, especially considering that the Palestinians are just trying to take back what is rightfully theirs.

Yet, based on the reaction from some quarters to a few lines in NTC chairman and Libya's interim leader Mustafa Abdel Jalil's speech, one could almost feel a tinge of regret. What did Abdul Jalil exactly say so horrible?

“anything contradicting the shari'ah is void, he gave two examples: the law forbidding polygamy, and laws allowing riba (interest)” [approx translation]

Some tweeps were in uproar. Self-declared liberal secularist, Sultan Al Qassemi, a popular and in-the-know tweep from UAE (must-follow) was quick to scoff at Abdul-Jalil:

“The Islamic Republic of Libya” brought to you by NATO.

Shrewd politicking from Mustafa Abdul Jalil to announce to thousands of freedom fighters that their quota of women just quadrupled.

The first line seems to indicate that Sultan was looking for NATO to bring something else. Was NATO there to facilitate freedom or did Sultan expect NATO to facilitate (impose) Western ideals as well? And in his second tweet, Sultan seems to have missed the fact that Abdul Jalil didn't need to announce anything that Allāh hadn't already given the fighters 1400 years ago.

The editor of Gulf News (major newspaper in the Middle East), Abdul Hamid, similarly chimed in, “Mustafa Abdul Jalil has just given an evidence to all world that Arab uprising will end up to be Islamic states.” By tying the end result of revolution to state of affairs that Abdul Hamid shows obvious distate to, he is really insiniuating that it was better for the uprising not to occur at all. Better Gaddafi, Ben Ali, Mubarak, fill-in-the-blanks than God forbid an nation whose citizens CHOOSE to live under Islam?

Habiba Hamid, seasoned writer and journalist at UAE's the National newspaper, tweeted, “No Muslim actor can claim a monopoly on Islam/Islamic thought. Any that does hijacks it”. Yet, she seems to have missed the fact that this is not the first time that Abdul Jalil has said that the new Libya will be based on shariah (yes that would be Islamic law- link below). So, what was so different this time? That he actually gave examples of what shariah might involve? Perhaps we should thank him for making clear what he is saying instead of assuming what he is not.

This blog article by Blake Hounshell sums up the sentiment of the do-gooders only when it suits their end-goals. Hounshell, normally an astute and fair-minded writer, falls prey to what I call “shariah-scare”. Just like the “ban-the-shariah” movement in the USA is based on hearsay and lack of any fundamental evidence, similarly this “shariah-scare” is based on few facts and much fear. The facts, as we have it, currently include three words: “shariah”, “polygamy” and “interest”. All of which one way or the other incorporated in most Muslim countries, even in current favorite Arab Muslim nation, Qatar.

Reading Hounshell's blog-post and his composition of revolution timeline, from how Abdul Jalil “sold the revolution” to how undercurrents of Islam were ignored, to how the issue has come roaring back, his intended thesis is quite clear. Libyans threw a fake bait at the West, and the West swallowed it all, bait and rod.

Hounshell then asks “If Libyans want to outlaw interest and bring back polygamy, fine, but let them do so in a democratic and transparent way”

But herein lies the inherent hypocrisy of those raising these alarm-bells, especially not befitting a seasoned writer such as Hounshell. First of all, this is not the first time that Abdul Jalil has talked about laws being based on shariah. But more importantly, in a speech on September 13 this year, Abdul Jalil talked about Libya being a democratic, civil society.

SO, the question for Hounshell and others who now suddenly want Abdul Jalil to wait for Libyans to vote is this: Why didn't you the raise the same alarm-bells and questions when Abdul Jalil wanted to build a democratic society? In other words, why is it okay for Abdul Jalil to promote democracy without asking the people, but it is not okay for him to promote shariah without asking the people? Shouldn't what is good for the goose be good for the gander too?

Real supporters of freedom are content that Libyans have gotten rid of a despot, and will be able to make their own mind. Abdul Jalil, as the current leader of Libyans can feel the pulse of his people and has the full right to express what that pulse might be. Those who are opposed to hearing him talk about Islamic laws should also be opposed of him talking about secularism, democracy or any other form of government or ideology. And if they don't, and they won't, then that smacks of double-standards, not befitting of sincerity to the nation of Libya or for journalists, to their profession.

On 7 October 2001, at approximately 12:30pm EST, US and British forces launched Operation Enduring Freedom, an aerial bombing campaign with the declared objectives of overthrowing the Taliban regime, destroying or capturing Taliban and al-Qaeda forces, and bringing an end to terrorist activities in Afghanistan.

In one of the fiercest displays of military might in modern history, early combat operations included air strikes from land-based B-1 Lancer, B-2 Spirit, and B-52 Stratofortress bombers; carrier-based F-14 Tomcat and F/A-18 Hornet fighters; and Tomahawk cruise missiles launched from US ships and submarines in the Arabian Sea. In spite of this overwhelming display of “shock and awe” force, it was not until April of this year that US forces found and killed the alleged culprit behind the 9/11 attacks, Osama Bin Laden, through a US covert operation in Pakistan.

Less commonly remembered is that in the weeks following 11 September 2001, the Bush Administration held high-level secret negotiations with Taliban officials. As reported by the BBC, CNN and the Washington Post, among other news outlets, US-Taliban talks included the possibility of turning over Bin Laden to an international criminal tribunal. Although most Americans are unaware and policymakers are loathe to admit, negotiations proceeded so far that the Taliban offered to hand Bin Laden over to a neutral third country for trial if they were shown evidence of his culpability in the 9/11 attacks. The Bush administration turned down the offer. Meanwhile, with the exception of one brave dissenting voice from California's ninth congressional district, Congress had already authorized the use of military force by 14 September 2001.

As the tenth anniversary of our war in Afghanistan looms, Americans have the right to ask: Would not the capture and trial of Bin Laden through negotiation and engagement—with a resultant disruption of al-Qaeda networks, and without the deaths of over 1,700 US soldiers, thousands of Afghan and Pakistani civilians, and trillions of dollars in taxpayer income—have been a preferable path?

True, history is notoriously malleable in hindsight. But as any good historian would also admit, history is not an agreed upon set of dates and facts of the past. It is rather what a nation chooses to remember—and forget. It is about collective memory. The Bush Administration's secret negotiations with the Taliban are not the only inconvenient truth left out of the dominant narrative of 9/11 and our war in Afghanistan ever since. While some hailed the killing of Bin Laden in Pakistan to a tune of “Mission Accomplished,” meanwhile in Afghanistan, civilian casualties, inexorable corruption, and mind-boggling waste have filled up the margins of the official story. According to a recent report by a bipartisan commission on wartime spending, the US government wasted thirty billion dollars in contracts in Afghanistan and Iraq over the last decade. This includes three hundred million dollars on a Kabul power plant the government will not run, and 11.4 billion dollars on facilities for the Afghan military that have been deemed unsustainable.

Behind precious American lives lost, families shattered, and the unquantifiable disservice to taxpayers and a public sector already under enormous financial strain, an even more disconcerting fact emerges from our Afghan war. From the beginning, the US-led military campaign prompted concerns over the number of Afghan civilians it was killing. Although no government has cared to count, the Los Angeles Times found that in the first five-month period from 7 October 2001 to 28 February 2002 alone, there were between 1,067 and 1,201 reported civilian deaths from the bombing campaign. An independent report by Professor Marc Herold of the University of New Hampshire states that in the twenty-month period between 7 October 2001 and 3 June 2003, US-led military operations killed at least 3,100 civilians. Shockingly, a February 2002 analysis by The Guardian estimated that as many as 20,000 Afghans died as an indirect result of the initial US airstrikes and ground invasion, due to starvation, exposure, or wounds sustained while fleeing from zones hit by air strikes.

Read rest here.

A few days ago, a fellow activist from Twitter contacted me to discuss an online campaign for Syria. The campaign called for NATO to intervene in Syria. This was a topic that I hadn't made up my mind about at that point, but I wasn't completely against due to the brutal nature of the Syrian regime toward the people of Syria. I had to question whether or not I was going support that call. My final decision was to go for it for the following reasons:

1. When it comes to bloodshed, the regime is more willing to spill the blood of its people than anyone else. When things escalate, and I believe they will, the regime will have no problem killing hundreds or thousands of Syrians on a daily basis as it did in Hama. Any targeted strikes on Shabeeha forces will reduce the number of civilians killed because the regime will be more focused on protecting itself.

2. Financially, Syria stands to gain a lot from its new-found freedom. The world has become one big trading village. The Syrian people are known to be great business people. Unfortunately they have been robbed from the opportunity to prosper as they are treated as servants of the Assad family. Any business person, especially those with large businesses, knows that they must share part of their wealth with a family member or close friend of the Assad clan. There have even been incidents where businesses were taken away from their owners by members of the Assad family with no court system to protect them.

When someone looks at the conditions of living in Syria, he or she can see that it will be nothing but better in the absence of the regime. Protesters know that stopping now is suicidal. The current circumstances all point to a continuous increase in bloodshed. Any economic restrictions that helping countries might impose on Syria will not mount to anything nearly as bad as the daylight robbery of the Syrian economy done by the Assad family on a regular basis. In addition to the previously mentioned points, I am sure that the Syrian people don't mind living the rest of their lives in a dignified manner.

The call for intervention is not limited to a specific organization, country, or method. I do believe that the most acceptable intervention is an intervention by Turkey and Arab countries. On the other hand, the most acceptable type of intervention is the establishment of a neutral zone that is protected.

Regardless of who or how, one thing is clear. The Syrian regime is not going to be toppled by street protests. It's willing to kill thousands and that is exactly what it will do if protests stop. Protection of civilians in Syria has become an international obligation.

http://mayorkhairullah.blogspot.com/2011/10/leaning-toward-intervention.html

People cross flood water in the Masti Kalan village

The last two years have been like something out of an apocalypse movie for Pakistan. The huge wounds inflicted on the economy and the populace of this nation have not even begun to heal, and a fresh flood has arrived in Sindh.
People are no doubt fed up of the same footage of water-drenched peasants being played before them, and perhaps that is why the media in its utmost sagacity has decided not to show it. This does not take away from the tragedy on the ground, which is an utterly grave one with over 5.3 million people affected and more than 475,000 in camps having lost their homes to the oncoming waters.

It's like driving in an ocean and it's seriously scary

I have along with the team of SA Relief been visiting the rain-affected areas of Khorwah, Golarchi, Badin, Nindo, Khoski, Shadi large and Kohli to distribute relief in whatever way I can. SA Relief is no great NGO with minions across the land. It's a community-based initiative put together by 6 friends who couldn't stand by and watch anymore. Four of us are bloggers, that is me, Awab Alvi, Sabahat Ashraf and Arif Rafiq; two of us are from the business community (Nabil Jangda and Rehan Bandukda). Collectively what we have seen on the ground this time is definitely worse than the floods of last year. Of course people are going to tell you that the overall scale is lower. But this year's disaster is concentrated in one province and that has brought destruction with a magnitude that is utterly unimaginable.

One only has to drive beyond Thatta about one and a half hours from Karachi and it starts. The highway is suddenly surrounded by water from both sides. Half an hour into this and the water reaches road-level on either side and stretches as far as you can see. It's like driving in an ocean and it's seriously scary. Not only is the road upon entering the Badin district littered with people seeking shelter but is in several places run over with water: you can see fish and even water snakes the length of your car if you care to stop.
The problems do not end here, sadly. The destruction of homes and crops is just the start. This area is the breadbasket of Pakistan and grows sugarcane, rice, onions and tomatoes, and 5.3 million acres of this crop has been destroyed. The economic results will be before us in a few days with double digit inflation in food staples. Add to this the fact that an over-stretched army is trying its best to evacuate people with little or no response from them, and you have a situation resembling a nightmare. (More)

Attacking children was a real low. However, it was still out in Peshawar. Today, the horror came very close to home as a bomb blast outside the house of Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of Pakistan, Chaudhry Aslam. Aslam heads the counter-terrorism unit of the CID in Karachi. According to Ali Chisti of The Friday Times, “Chaudry Aslam is the one who killed Rehman Dakait (a notorious gangster in Karachi), captured numerous TTP, alQaeda & Quetta Shura members.”

What makes ones blood boil is that Aslam's house is right next to 3 major schools of Karachi and the area has several more in the vicinity. Thus, the blast which occurred at 7:26 am was at a time when the area was filling up with school going children and their parents. Had the blast occurred 10-15 minutes later the carnage would have been horrible. The initial reported death count is 08 people which includes 06 policemen and a child and her mother. The child went to the school my cousin's wife teaches at and their children study there. They were safe Alhamdulillah but it was terrifyingly very close to home. Not that the death of any in Karachi is superior to that of that the people in Peshawar and other areas. Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan claimed responsibility for the bombing, saying Aslam had arrested and killed many of its fighters. “We will attack other police officials as well who are taking action against our people,” TTP spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan told Reuters by telephone from an undisclosed location.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Speaking to the media right after the blast (partial video above), Aslam remarked:

“I was sleeping when they carried out this cowardly act and rammed a vehicle packed with explosives into my house.”

“I will not be cowed. I will teach a lesson to generations of militants.”

“I did not know that these terrorists were such cowards that they would attack sleeping children.”

Karachi, has not been a stranger to violence and around 10000 civilians have been killed in Karachi since 2002 due to ethnic, political, sectarian violence and incidents of terrorism. In August alone more than a 100 people were killed due to ethnic violence.

Citizen's Reactions

Some of the tweets this morning showed the reaction of citizens:

#karachi blast happened outside our friends house 32nd lane (adjacent to SSP house) house totally damaged kids family safe (via @DrAwab)

Our friends driver was killed he was ringing the house bell to call out the kids and take them to school – family immensely traumatised (via @DrAwab)

Its time to raise ur voice against these brutal inhumane terrorists responsible for slaying our little children daily. #Pakistan #terrorism (via @RiazToori)

“Damn , if I wanted a holiday for my birthday, I would DEFINITELY not want one if it meant a bomb blast wd occur” – schoolgirl #Karachi (via @BeenaSarwar)

“We saw this guy next to our car, his face was filled with blood and he was waiting for the ambulance!” – says my daughter's friend #Karachi (via @BeenaSarwar)

Trying to explain to my 4yr old – who's just woken up – why its not safe to go to school. #hatethis #Karachi (via @SalmaJafri)

“the blast was shit scary!” – friend of my daughter on facebook chat #karachi #blast (via @BeenaSarwar)

Blast was more powerful than needed to target just the SSP's home: 6-10 ft crater, nearby cars and houses damaged, massive sound (via @MadihaSattar)

The school teacher who was killed worked at Washington International School. Always used to reach early. Colleague of my mother's student. (via @Sabeen)

Just spoke to wife who's at the scene. The explosion happened right behind X's school. They would've been there at the time of blast if not for the wrongly parked car blocking ours in the apartment. (via @farrukhahmed)

Kid's school closed for next 3 days , all windows blown out (via @schawlaf)

Kids have nerves of steel, if we'd seen this much carnage at our times, many would be needing psychological help #Karachi #ChangingTimes(via @schawlaf)

People plan for next 10 years or even next 10 days, here you can't even plan the next day (via @schawlaf)

#Pakistan – all is well until it doesn't happen to you and when it does you are just news :'(

#Karachi (via @DrAwab)

Related articles

• Pakistan Bomb: Explosion Kills Several Outside Police Officer's Home (huffingtonpost.com)
• Bomber targets top Pakistani policeman; 8 killed(sfgate.com)
• Blast in
  Karachi targets SSP CID, 8 killed (tribune.com.pk)
• CID arrests suspected Hizbullah terrorist (tribune.com.pk)
• Suspected Taliban commander arrested in Karachi: CID (tribune.com.pk)
• Senior al Qaeda leader arrested from Quetta: ISPR (tribune.com.pk)
• Pakistan Navy base in Karachi attacked by terrorists (muslimmatters.org)
• Heavy bomb blast in Karachi (dawn.com)

History

The June 6th 1982 invasion of Lebanon (codenamed Operation Peace of the Galilee) by Israeli forces was ordered in response to the attempted assassination of the Israeli ambassador to the UK, Shlomo Argov by the Abu Nidal Organization. Lebanon had, after the 1948-49, become the home to around 100,000 Palestinian refugees who had fled from their homes. By the early 1980s, this number had grown to about 300,000, with the PLO establishing their own area of control in southern Lebanon.   In August 1982, negotiations were conducted, conducted by an American envoy, on the principle of an evacuation of the Palestinian fighters and PLO officials and the dismantlement of PLO offices and infrastructures in Lebanon. The American envoy, led by Philip Habib, guaranteed security to the Palestinian civilians that were to remain in the camps after the PLO's departure.

1. From Sept. 16 to 18th, 1982, and in cooperation with the Israeli military, Lebanese Christian Phalangists (Kataeb) murdered anywhere from 1000 to 3000 unarmed Palestinians living in the refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila. The Kataeb were seeking revenge for the September 14th assassination of their leader, President-elect,  Bashir Gameyal.
2. Countless others were raped, tortured, and terrorized. Hundreds more were rounded up and loaded onto trucks, driven away and never heard from again. Many were never accounted for, being buried under the rubble of demolished buildings.
3. The death toll may have been higher than 9/11.
4. No one has ever stood on trial for this massacre, key witnesses involved in the massacre have died in individual attacks.
5. By the end of the summer of 1982, nearly 18,000 Lebanese and Palestinian civilians had been killed, most of them in Israeli air strikes on civilian targets.

Media Reports

But in Beirut, the victims were Palestinians. The guilty were certainly Christian militiamen – from which particular unit we were still unsure – but the Israelis were also guilty. If the Israelis had not taken part in the killings, they had certainly sent militia into the camp. They had trained them, given them uniforms, handed them US army rations and Israeli medical equipment. Then they had watched the murderers in the camps, they had given them military assistance – the Israeli Airforce had dropped all those flares to help the men who were murdering the inhabitants of Sabra and Chatila – and they had established military liaison with the murderers in the camps – Robert Fisk

Maybe when she is old enough I will have her watch the documentaries and read the rest of this description of what journalist Robert Fisk saw in the September of 1982.

Here is a link from the BBC report of September 17th, 1982.

Footage from 1982- (disclaimer: very gruesome scenes)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Testimony of Journalists covering the massacre

Click here to view the embedded video.

The BBC Panorama documentary about Sabra & Shatila

Click here to view the embedded video.

The TTP has continuously targeted civilians in their ongoing resistance against the Pakistan government. Last month over 50 were killed when a suicide bomber attacked the Friday congregation. This was not the first such attack when innocent worshippers were targeted by the TTP. However, murder of school going children is an act that is a new low.

Taliban attack school bus, kill 4 children

By Ali Hazrat Bacha | DAWN.COM

PESHAWAR, Sept 13: Militants attacked a school bus on the Kohat road in the suburbs of the city on Tuesday. Four children and the driver of the bus were killed and 14 children, two woman teachers and two other people were injured.

Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan claimed responsibility for the attack and said it wanted to punish families of the children for organizing anti-Taliban militias.

Superintendent of Police (Rural) Abdul Kalam Khan told Dawn the children from Kalakhel village of Khyber Agency were going home from the Khyber Model School at about 1.50pm when they were attacked.

“We had no information about any possibility of such an attack. However, there were reports about security threats and, therefore, police established checkpoints on the roads in the city,” the SP said.

DSP Sahibzada Sajjad said the van was attacked with rocket-launchers, hand-grenades and Kalashnikovs. In about 10 minutes, the assailants vanished from the area which is hardly 500 meters from the tribal region. (More)

Related articles

• Gunmen Kill Children In Pakistan Bus Attack (news.sky.com)
• Pakistan: Taliban kill children in attack on school bus (independent.co.uk)
• Suicide bomber strikes Pakistani mosque during Friday prayers, killing 48 and wounding 85 | AP (muslimmatters.org)
• Yasir Qadhi | Hindsight is 20-20 (muslimmatters.org)
• Losing Battle of Hearts & Minds: The Case of Raymond Allen Davis & Poor American Response (muslimmatters.org)