Desicritics Category: Politics: US

Israel's Gaza Offensive

Vinod Joseph — Tue, 6 Jan 2009 12:18:10 EST

I believe that the air attacks being carried out by Israel on various targets in the Gaza Strip and the incursion by the Israeli army into the Gaza Strip are justified. I also believe that these air attacks and land offensive will serve no purpose at all, other than help Ehud Barak and the Labour Party in the forthcoming Israeli elections.

Ever since the cease fire between Hamas and Israel came to an end on 19 December 2008, Israel has been targeted by Hamas which started to fire around 80 rockets per day into Israel. Most of the rockets did not cause much damage and so far, only a handful of Israelis have died as a result. However, the number of people killed in Gaza has exceeded five hundred. Clearly the Israeli response to the rocket attacks is not proportionate. Why then do I say that Israeli is justified in its actions?

Imagine for a moment that you own a fertile piece of land in a desolate part of the world. You land adjoins a barren piece of land. A tall barbed wire fence separates your land and the barren land. The people who own the barren land don’t like your presence in the neighbourhood. They have a nasty habit of throwing stones into your land, a few stones every day. Mostly they don’t do any damage, but once a month or so, a worker in your land gets hit by a stone. Once in a while, your neighbours cut through the barbed wire fence and creep into your land at night and uproot a few fruit trees before returning to their barren land, all this in order to make you abandon your fertile property. How should you respond? If your response has to be strictly proportionate, you can only throw stones into your neighbour’s barren land, something which will distress your neighbour a lot less than you are distressed by the stones thrown into your land. You can also creep into your neighbour’s land at night and uproot his fruit trees, except that your neighbour does not have any fruit trees! So, you post guards on the periphery of your land, mount powerful search lights at certain vantage points and instruct your guards to shoot dead anyone caught in the act of throwing stones into your land. Intruders who enter your fertile land are also to be locked up for a year before they are released. Once this new policy comes into effect, your guards do manage to kill a few stone throwers and catch a few intruders, but the stone throwing and intrusions don’t cease. This is mainly because there is a total difference in values between you and your neighbour and your neighbour is willing to sacrifice the lives of his people in order to cause trouble for you. He just does not want you in the neighbourhood, though you have every right to be there. Soon the number of fruit trees you lose to your neighbour’s men goes up. Your workers start to quit. You start making a loss. Unless you manage to stop the stone throwing and the uprooting of fruit trees, you will have to vacate the neighbourhood. What do you do then? There is no police force worth the name in your part of the world. You have no choice but to send a team of armed men into your neighbour’s land and capture or kill everyone who has thrown stones or intruded into your land and teach your neighbour such a lesson that he does not try to harm your property ever again.

Now imagine for a moment that you acquired your fertile piece of land after a prolonged litigation. You won the legal dispute and the loser was your neighbour who owns the adjacent barren piece of land. They are many in your town who say that the court ruling was unfair, though the bulk of the local residents support the judicial ruling and are happy for you to occupy your piece of land. Does this additional piece of information make you change your mind? Do you now think that the neighbour has the right to throw stones into your land or intrude into your land and uproot your fruit trees? The answer is a clear No. Instead, what your neighbour ought to do if unhappy with the court ruling is appeal to a higher court. If further appeal is not possible, your neighbour ought to get public opinion on his side and in the meantime, try and make his barren piece of land as fertile as possible.

Israel is in the position of the owner of the fertile land. Its neighbour is Hamas, an organisation whose charter calls for the destruction of the State of Israel and its replacement with a Palestinian Islamic State. I have always believed that the creation of Israel through an UN resolution was absolutely fair. If you believe that the creation of Israel by the UN in 1948 was correct, it naturally follows that Israel has the right to defend its territory and pre-empt any possible attack that may pose an existential threat to Israel. I have many good friends who ardently believe that the creation of Israel was unfair. All those friends tell me that Israel’s Gaza offensive is totally unjustified.

It must be admitted, most of what followed after the fair and legal creation of Israel was neither fair nor legal. Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians and its Arab minority has almost always been very, very unjust. In particular, I don’t think that Israel was justified in placing an economic blockade on the Gaza Strip in reaction to Hamas’s election victory. Though no one likes the idea of fundamentalists of the Hamas variety on their door step, Israel had no right to make life unbearable for the people in the Gaza Strip. Also, it must not be forgotten that Hamas is largely a creation of Israel. If Israel were not so desperate to undermine the secular Palestine Liberation Organisation and the Fatah, fundamentalist Hamas would not have come into existence.

The Gaza Strip is not a sovereign state, but Hamas runs it as if it is. As per the UN resolution which created Israel, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and East Jerusalem ought to form an independent Palestinian state. However, East Jerusalem is illegally occupied by Israel and the West Bank is under the control of the Fatah. Hamas won the Palestinian Parliamentary Elections in January 2006 and came to power. After infighting broke out between Hamas and Fatah, Hamas was evicted from the West Bank in mid 2007. For good measure, the Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas declared Hamas to be an illegal force. I don’t think Mahmud Abbas was right in doing so and I do think that Hamas got a raw deal in being evicted from the West Bank, considering the fact that they won 74 seats to the ruling-Fatah's 45 in the Parliamentary elections in January 2006. Most probably Israel played a key behind-the-scenes role in all this.

However, despite all these drawbacks on the part of Israel, the random launching of rockets into Israel with the intention of killing civilians cannot be justified. Hamas’s attacks on Israel are not just a reaction to the economic blockade. Instead, it arises out of Hamas’s determination that Israel should not exist as a state. The range of Hamas’s rockets has been increasing in range and accuracy by the month and soon there may be a day when Hamas is able to target any part of Israel at its will. When faced with such a situation, Israel is perfectly entitled to defend itself against such attacks and do all that is necessary to prevent such attacks in future.

The forthcoming elections in Israel and the need for the ruling Labour Party to show itself to be as tough on Hamas as the Likud Party, has definitely influenced Israel’s decision to attack the Hamas in Gaza. Nevertheless, Israel’s right to defend itself is so fundamental that it is entitled to do so even on election’s eve.

All of what I have stated above begs the question whether India is entitled to respond against Pakistan in a similar fashion in response to the Mumbai attacks. The answer is yes, though, considering the fact that Pakistan is not the Gaza Strip and it possesses nuclear weapons, India would be foolhardy to do so.

Israeli air strikes have led to heavy civilian casualties. It is not easy to watch visuals of civilians, including young children being killed, and say with a straight face the Israel’s actions are justified. However, Israel’s actions are indeed justified. Hamas has intentionally mixed up its military infrastructure with civilian infrastructure in Gaza. Hamas seems to enjoy a high degree of civilian support in Gaza. If a near-sovereign state supported by its population launches attacks on another sovereign state using equipment and men who are mixed up with civilians, the ensuing retribution will cause civilian causalities. Hamas is as much to blame for the civilians killed in the air strikes as are the people of Gaza who voted for an organisation whole sole objective is to remove Israel from the face of this earth.

Will Israel succeed in its objective? In 2006, Israel launched an offensive against the Hezbollah in Lebanon and was fought to a standstill. Hezbollah’s survival made it a lot more popular and Israel’s aura of invincibility was badly dented. Hamas is no Hezbollah. It is not as tough or as capable as Hassan Nazarallah’s organisation. Also, unlike in 2006, this time Israel seems to be successfully avoiding battles in dense population centres where die-hard Hamas fighters could take a heavy toll of its fighters. If Israel’s only objective is to stop the rocket attacks altogether, it will not succeed. If its aim is to only make Hamas pay a price for the rocket attacks, it may succeed. However, Hamas will continue to exist as an organisation even after this offensive is over. It will also retain its ability to launch attacks on Israel, as before. Its popularity in Gaza Strip and the rest of the Arab world may even go up. In short, the Israeli offensive will most probably do nothing other than help the Labour Party and Ehud Barak win the next elections.

Israel & Palestine: Force Is Never the Solution

temporal — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 01:25:14 EST

Taking advantage of the lame duck Presidency of Bush, the deliberate distancing of President Elect there-is-only-one-president Obama, the holidays in the West and the attending low emphasis of politicians, Israeli Air Force launched a devastating attack on Gaza.

Israel is the non NPT signatory Occupier in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, Golan and East Jerusalem, aided (up to 5 billion a year) and abetted by the West.

President of the Palestinian Authority Mahmood Abbas is perceived as an Palestinian Uncle Tom and he was soundly beaten in the elections by Hamas.

The infamous US dichotomy re: democracy sprung into action and immediately cut off all aid to Hamas in the Gaza Strip. It also twisted its allies and lackeys' arms (including Canada's) to do the same. This US amnesiac approach is well documented and understood globally. Do as I say, not as I do.

Hamas leadership did not go to the same school.

This latest foray into the Gaza Strip would wane away sooner or later. But the violence and "terrorism" it would spawn would perpetuate the cycle for long.

Can anything be done to avoid the unnecessary spiralling of violence? I have written about the solution before here: Peace With Dignity: Another Gift For Israel

Criticizing Zionism is NOT anti-Semitism. States do not exist without an “official” map. Israel has to exist. Its citizens have a right to live in peace and harmony within its defined borders. They forget that to ensure this its neighbors should also have the same rights.

Both Israel and Palestinians have to demonstrate more effectively that they want to live in peace and do not want to kill, maim, expel from their land. It is for them to deliberate and decide if this should come under One State of Two State solution.

The world should help them reach this decision but should not refrain to remind Israel that it should curb its policies of occupation, subjugation, ethnic cleansing, and terrorising.

We should encourage initiatives that will let all Israelis and Palestinians to live in peace, with dignity, justice and guaranteed fundamental human rights in secure borders, as enshrined in the various UN resolutions.

To remove misgivings, doubts and suspicions, international bodies including the UN, the European Union, OIC should be enlisted to provide guarantees. Peace in the region is not to be equated with death for the state of Israel.

Israel portrays itself as the David but acts as the Goliath in the region. Here are the (boxing preliminary) statistics of Israel and the Palestinians of the occupied Gaza Strip.

The Occupier Goliaths

High quality tanks 970
Medium and low quality tanks 1830
APCs, IFVs, ARVs, LCVs 6930
Self-propelled artillery 1204
Combat warplanes 875
Transport warplanes 84
Training warplanes 171
Military helicopters 286
Heavy SAM batteries 25
Warships 13
Submarines 3
Patrol boats 50 50
nuclear bombs over 300-500

The Occupied Davids

Five major militant factions operate in Gaza. These are the Islamic groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad; the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, which is loosely tied to Abbas' Fatah faction; the Popular Resistance Committees, a shadowy umbrella group; and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. The size of the groups is unclear, but they are equipped with assault rifles, mortars, anti-tank missiles, homemade rockets and other explosives.

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The point neoconzix in Israel and the West refuse to fathom: force is never the solution.

Gaza Is Aflame. Again!

Sarah Islam — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 16:10:05 EST

Just heard on the television that Israeli F-16 bombers have carried out massive air strikes in Gaza which have killed 200 and injured 400 mostly women and children. Scores of dead bodies have been thrown out on the streets as hospitals have no place to keep them.

They said that the weather had been exceptionally beautiful in the West Bank, for the past couple of days. Christmas was celebrated with much pomp and splendor and tourists had thronged Bethlehem for the first time in many years in record breaking numbers. Taking advantage of good weather, Israeli planes bombed around 40 Palestinian police stations, posts and other targets early Saturday morning. Time says that the ‘the first strikes came in a coordinated three-minute blitz’.

Israeli officials say the strikes are being carried out on response to the rocket attacks from Gaza, a Hamas ruled territory. The Israeli Government spokesperson on BBC told viewers that the ‘Palestinians were exaggerating the number of civilian casualties for propaganda purposes’.

Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire in June this year. Israel wants the release of captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shilat. Hamas needed a break to consolidate its control over Gaza. Neither side recognizes the other’s legitimacy but had agreed to negotiate through an Egyptian mediator.

On November 5 this year, the Israeli government sealed all the ways into and out of Gaza. fuel, electricity, food, medical supplies and water equipment are no longer being allowed to enter the besieged Palestinian Territories.

According to Oxfam only 137 trucks of food were allowed into Gaza in November.

Sara Roy, author of Failing Peace: Gaza and the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict says in the LRB: ‘The majority of commercial bakeries in Gaza – 30 out of 47 – have had to close because they have run out of cooking gas. People are using any fuel they can find to cook with. As the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has made clear, cooking-gas canisters are necessary for generating the warmth to incubate broiler chicks. Shortages of gas and animal feed have forced commercial producers to smother hundreds of thousands of chicks. By April, according to the FAO, there will be no poultry there at all: 70 per cent of Gazans rely on chicken as a major source of protein.’

The holocaust is happening all over again right here, right now. The International Community is not bothered and apart from a few UN warnings, there is no concentrated effort to stop Israel from carrying out violent attacks on the Palestinian people, their properties, their civil institutions, their livestock and their very dignity.

The EU announced recently that it wanted to strengthen its relationship with Israel while the Israeli leadership openly calls for a large-scale invasion of the Gaza Strip . Ehud Barack has just announced that ‘the time to fight in Gaza has come.’

The world is talking about change, countries are quick to pounce on their ‘right to defend’ themselves and Barak Obama’s victory in the US presidential elections has triggered a Mexican wave of joy across the world. It is scary that here is a man who has not even taken over the office yet and people everywhere are already treating him like he is the next best thing after sliced bread.

Obama has already shown his pro-Israel stand and is said to be a firm believer in Israel’s right to defend itself. I suppose we should resign ourselves to Obama murmuring the same clichéd lines when asked to comment on the Isreal-palestine conflict. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has already accused Hamas of having triggered the new bout of violence. So Israel’s hands are clean. Again.

The mind boggles how the world can be so spineless once again and not ask Israel a simple question that Sara Roy asks: ‘How can keeping food and medicine from the people of Gaza protect the people of Israel? How can the impoverishment and suffering of Gaza’s children benefit anyone? International law as well as human decency demands their protection.’

Never before has a noble and dignified slogan like ‘Never Again’ been twisted into such a cruel joke.

India has the dubious distinction of being Israel's principal arms market, as well as being eager customers of Israeli intelligence reports, technological expertise and its propaganda prone foreign policy. Haven’t we all seen how we in India were singing hymns in favour of Israel after the terrorist attacks in Mumbai? Didn’t we all listen in as various experts and the aam junta upheld Israel as a ‘model state’ against combating terrorism on their soil?

Pakistan, on the other hand has always had a hardnosed religious approach to the issue of Palestine. Hardliners in that country have always treated Israel as another Kashmir that is theirs to be fought for. Calls for Jihad have been given many times and truckloads of eager illiterate Pakistani and Afghani youth have left their families to fight for their Palestinian 'brothers and sisters'. Again, a supreme example of how agood idea can be completely distorted.

What Palestine needs right now is not patronizing behavior but a few brave countries to stand in its corner and help their cause in front of the international community. No amount of humanitarian aid or sympathy can help the West Bank. The political leadership in that country has failed. It needs civilian action, not violence, to make the world hear its plight.

There is an overkill of the Israel-Palestinian issue in world media and I suppose a certain fatigue has set in with the common man who does not live in the Middle East. What we need to do right now is to shake ourselves out of this apathy, yes, you and me, and do whatever we can to make the Two-nation theory a plausible option for the world community. Let’s write letters, blog about it and create a human network that not only sympathizes with the Palestinians and their troubles, but is also active enough and strong enough to take this to the end.

This is not a Muslim-Jewish-Christian conflict. This is the unraveling of a society and the annihilation of a people and their way of life. Violence is the not the way forward. Neither is helplessness.

19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East by Naomi Shihab Nye

Vivek Sharma — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 02:03:31 EST

Naomi Shihab Nye's collection contains sixty poems about Palestinians and Middle East, about love and longing for lost and imaginary homelands. The poems are fragrant with spices of the Middle-East, flavors of figs and olives, and served with a tenderness of a grandmother talking to a grandchild, a five year old to his mother, an aged man to his beloved he unites with after a lifetime.

In the world torn by religious and political conflicts, these poems represent an oasis of hope. It is the humanity of these verses, that leaps from the page like the memory of nineteen varieties of gazelle described in the title poem.

The poems assume special significance in the context of post-September 11 world, for they contain a platter of understanding and taste served to assuage our need to be comforted. The solace is brought in by the mint green language of a poet born to a Palestinian father and an American mother. Perhaps the unique identity of Nye offers her perspectives about the Arab East and American West which her creativity has shaped into a narrative that offers respite from the reactionary rhetoric that dominates our daily thinking and actions.

As an Indian residing in America, I sense a brotherhood with Nye's characters, who chase the voices, flavors, visions, music and familiarity that maps their nostalgic world. As a poet with Indian heart and Americanized mind, I find Nye, like Agha Shahid Ali, present our cultural and emotional duality in a lyric that is both powerful and poignant. The tapestry of inheritance of the East is laced with tales quite unknown in the West, and this wealth can nourish many a chasms that exist between the material and spiritual. It is voices like Amichai's and Nye's that remind us that the transcendental humanity within us can help us to outlive the wounds inflicted by the fanatic forces everywhere.

My Name is Prerna and I am an Undocumented American

Prerna — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 08:35:24 EST

You Passed the US Citizenship Test

Congratulations - you got 10 out of 10 correct!

"You can no longer claim legal residency under the petition filed by your grandmother. You are over 21 now and aged-out under the I-130," said my latest attorney. I didn't quite understand what he meant, the fear and confusion hidden in my nervous laughter.

"You are joking, right? They didn't give me an F-1 visa to study here because my parents had filed for permanent residency and now you are telling me that I can't get the permanent residency for which my visa was initially rejected?" I tried to grapple with the logic of the law.

He shrugged, like it was no big deal. "You luckily have a 245-I and can get a Green Card in several years once your parents file for you again. Or you can just get married to a U.S. citizen," he offered.

"What? I have already waited a decade and marriage doesn't help me--I am gay," I answered, gyrating at the reminder of how another set of discriminatory laws worked against me.

"You can always get a marriage of convenience?" he shrugged.

I am writing this a day after International Migrants Day - In all seriousness, every day should be a day to celebrate migration but there is a story to the migration of my people that I have not blogged about.

My sister (29) and I (24) have both been in the United States for a decade. We have grown up American, we are both hard-working, hold advanced degrees, possess great English skills, and even look alike but there is a fundamental way in which we are different: she is a US citizen while I am undocumented; she has grown up legally in America, while I am an 'illegal alien.'

The 'attrition through enforcement' advocates often tell DREAM Act beneficiaries to go home to our countries. I want to know what that means:

Fiji: The country where I was born tells me that I am a colonizer, that I don't belong there.

India, Pakistan and Bangladesh: The countries of my ancestry predetermine me as a criminal even though I have never stepped foot anywhere in the Indian subcontinent.

The United States of America: The country where I have spent close to a decade, continues to demand a Green Card and a nine-digit number in order to accept me, regardless of the fact that the rest of my family comprises tax-paying citizens and legal permanent residents.

As a Pacific Islander of undocumented status, I am consistently relegated to a parenthetical and non-existent status in the legal-illegal immigration binary. While illegal presence is not a crime, since the tag of "illegal alien" comes with an assumption of criminality, I am wrongfully deemed a criminal. At the same time, I have had to challenge the additional presumption of foreignness based on language, the stigma of both gay and 'illegal' in the Indo-Fijian community, and stemming from that, cultural, economic and structural limits to inclusion in my home.

What is American? Who is an American? I hail from the Fiji Islands; My favorite food is Chinese; I root for Italy and Juventus when it comes to soccer; I am disappointed when India loses a major cricket tournament; I love Pakistani music with Jal as my most favorite band; I speak several dialects of Hindi, English, understand Urdu and am finally grappling with Spanish and French; the L-word is my favorite television show with Jennifer Beals as my biggest idol; I think Indian actress Anita Hassanandani is the most beautiful woman in the world; I love Maroon 5, Simple Plan, U2 and Kasabian; my best friends live in various parts of the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom; the San Francisco Bay Area is my home and Chicago is my favorite city. My likes and dislikes know neither borders nor boundaries. And if my diversity of taste and pleasure-seeking avenues is not American, than I don't know what is.

With multitudes of identities in this world of constructed binaries and boundaries, I have multitudes of questions. What precisely is my home country? Where do I belong? Why am I being punished for something that was out of my control? Why does this country not consider me equal to the rest of my family? Why can't I use my postgraduate education to help my family, community and country in these tough economic times? Why can't I get married to adjust my status? How does deporting me help legal residents and U.S. citizens whom I help every single day?

I work 15-20 hours a day for pro-migrant, pro-LGBT civil rights reforms. This is not merely a job or a cause; it is about our lives. And I plan to stay here, attend law school, become a public interest lawyer, and serve my community. The federal bipartisan DREAM Act can help make this a reality for me and countless other students who are rendered stateless in the only country they know as home.

For weeks, I had been nicknamed the V for Vendetta for the DREAM Act movement. That phase is over - DreamActivist, the blog handle for Brave New Films, has now transformed into a rallying point for the United We DREAM coalition. I have lost an identity for myself, but we have gained momentum for the DREAM Act in 2009. Goodbye DreamActivist. Welcome DreamACTivist - United We DREAM.

So in the Harvey Milk fashion, I would like to begin by saying that my name is Prerna (meaning 'inspiration' in Hindi), and I want to recruit you in the fight for our limpid dreams.

There are many undocumented Desi students in the closet. Let's come together to bring them out of the shadows. If you know students that are undocumented in America, tell them to contact me.

admin@dreamactivist.org

Visit and even register at DreamActivist.org for more information and to receive updates on how you can help us in this struggle to achieve our DREAMs.

Iraq - Shoe-ing Away The Question

Suresh Naig — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 08:28:18 EST

Asking a question is very important for development. A society which is discouraged from asking questions, is a society deprived of development. A person is not expected to ask a question in an autocratic state and it may even cost the life of a person, if the question happened to be uncomfortable to the ruler. Even in a democratic country, many people have lost their lives, asking uncomfortable questions. They are known as “whistle blowers”, and in the recent past an engineer from Karnataka, Manjunath had paid with his life in Bihar, for asking uncomfortable questions to road contractors and Highways department Babus.

However we might have been deprived of many useful things for the society, if Issac Newton had not asked that question, ‘why an apple falls down?’ Had Alexander Fleming not asked that vital question, ‘why one mould is interfering with the growth of another mould’, we might have been deprived of anti-biotics – the powerful arsenal in medicine to fight infections.

Had Gandhi not asked that question, ‘why I am not allowed to travel in first class compartment, even after paying for it?’ we would not have experienced a non-violent philosophy “ahimsa”. The whole Bhagavat Geeta is a treatise in the form of questions and answers, and the central theme of Zen philosophy is only questions.

However, certain questions could be embarrassing in diplomatic parlance, even if it happened to be true. Our earlier Prime Minister Morarjee Desai was known for his diplomatic lapses, by his pointed and uncomfortable questions. He reportedly walked straight to one of the aides, who accompanied the Soviet Premier to India and asked, ‘are you from KGB?’ to the embarrassment of MEA personnel. However they were happy, that their Prime Minister, who was a proponent of “auto urine therapy”, did not offer his “favourite drink” to the Russian delegation.

Though we have been benefited by the answers for certain freak questions, we are better off, by not asking one question, which does not have an answer. This question is an expression of our wishful thinking and the question is “what if it’s true?”

Two persons had asked the above question in Bangalore and they were poorer by few lakhs of rupees. One had asked the question on receiving a mail in his mail box, declaring him as the winner of an international lottery. The other asked the question in response to a mail asking him to be a conduit, in retrieving huge funds stashed away in a foreign country. I am sure most of us would have received these mails and we ignored it, because we are not gullible.

At times even many top leaders showed traits of gullibility, by not only asking that question themselves, but also instigating others to ask the same question ‘what if it’s true?, for certain information which is worth shoeing away.

By not shoeing away the information pertaining to WMD (weapons of mass destruction), Bush had asked the question ‘what if it’s true?’ and he got shoe-d away in Iraq.

A Love For Shoes: This Has Nothing to Do With Iraq and Yet...

temporal — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 14:32:20 EST

mera joota hay japani
yeh patloon inglistani
sir pay laal topi roosi
phir bhee dil hay hindustani
shailendra - shri 420

tr:

my shoes are Japanese
this trouser is English
the red cap 'ver my head is Russian
but my heart is all Indian

Shoes had a fascination for me. (Notice the tense?)

The diabolical reason for that fascination was champagne. I had seen some actor drink champagne from his companion's red high heels. I was enamored with the companion too, but geography won over anatomical inquisitiveness by a few thousand miles - more in kilometers.

Backgrounder: Prince Henry of Prussia visited the Everleigh Club of Chicago in 1902. A dancer's shoes flew off, hit a wine bottle, spilling some champagne into the shoe. A guest at the table picked up the shoe and imbibed the wine. As if on a cue, everyone there borrowed a shoe from their companion and drank wine from it. In case the reader is fascinated with this more here.

In the mall, or on the street, passing by a shoe store, eyes inadvertently look for red high heeled shoes - whirling sleek stilettos.

And if encountered on a hourglass bombshell - double the envy. More on Kelly shortly.

***

Leather can be tough. It protects the animal through ravages of heat and cold and when turned into footwear it can withstand the wear and tear of trudging miles upon miles.

Memory is fickle - high school or college it was - when I heard a sweet one warn a friend "jooti khao gay." Gold Rush and Charlie Chaplin aside, there was something in her tone that sent a chill up my spine even though the young lady was so diminutive.

A movie still shows Charlie Chaplin in the

classic shoe-eating scene from The Gold

Rush (1925). (Bettmann/Corbis)

The scar above my left eyebrow, comes in handy when government directives blatantly ask one to mention scars or body marks on official applications. In the pre-scan passport days they even used calligraphy to highlight this minor blemish for foreign officials.

Yes, a leather chappal caused it. She hurled it at my friend J. He ducked. Passports can reveal unusual stories sometimes. [Reading a draft of this M says, 'hmmmmmm.' - translation - so you did not fall on your face?]

Wonder what George W's passport says. He ducked today. Luckily no one was standing behind him. The shoe hurler also called him man's best friend.

I wonder if in Arab culture what is worse, calling one a dog or a pig? Yasmin can you help?

I also wonder where is Kelly LeBrock? Am not sure if it is the shoes or...

Terrorism - The Communist Perception

Suresh Naig — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 11:08:20 EST

Sitaram Yechury declared in the Rajya Sabha, that the Indo-US nuclear deal had exposed our country to new threats of terrorism. As per the News paper reports he said

"What brought the terrorist outfits to our shores, with the Indo-US nuclear deal you are seen as an ally of the US, a strategic partner. There seems to be a total lack of appreciation of this thought from the government's side"

In the same breath he said "we need to avoid the compartmentalised approach in combating terrorism in the country. Witch-hunting of a particular community would further breed terror".

After compartmentalising the terror attack of Mumbai to Indo-US nuclear deal, Sitaram Yechury, advises the government to shed compartmentalised approach in combating terrorism.

The two points he had raised in the Rajya Sabha are unfathomable for me.

1. Instead of coming out with a comprehensive suggestion to combat the menace of terrorism, he has concocted a new reason for the terrorists and terrorism to exist. We have not sent them to the Parliament to act as the spin doctors, spinning reasons for the existence of terrorism. If not the nuclear deal, exported terrorism from Pakistan would be for Godhra carnage, or Babri Masjid, or Kashmir or Bangladesh, or just for the fun of it. When we know the real source which is Pakistan, why waste our time in looking for additional and apparent reasons for terrorism. He should have come with his solution to weed out terrorism from its source.

2. His next advice to the government is to refrain from witch-hunting of a particular community. He knows pretty well that in India, witch-hunting is done only for electoral gains, and not for fighting terror. We cannot expect Sitaram Yechury to be so pragmatic, in his advice to the government to stop "witch-hunting of a particular community for electoral gains."

Leftists never seem to come out of their self spun cocoons; they may as well call their party as CPM "Cocoons Party of India (Marxists)"

Pakistan Acts Against The Terrorists

Ashish — Tue, 9 Dec 2008 10:22:02 EST

After the devastating attacks in Mumbai late November 2008, the pressure on Pakistan escalated tremendously. For the last two decades, Pakistan has been using the policy of sponsoring terrorists (not only Pakistan, since after the Russian invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, Pakistan along with the US and Saudi Arabia armed people to fight against the Russians, using religion as the driving force), and this is something that is confirmed by the intelligence agencies of many countries as well as by Pakistani politicians at different periods. As with many other Frankensteins that get created, this is one creation that is hurting people across the globe, including the state of Pakistan where the terrorists believe that the state is under the control of the infidel United States and that a pure religious state needs to come into existence.

All this was highlighted with dramatic effect on November 26th when a band of terrorists came to the Indian city of Mumbai, and with precision, caused major damage to the city and killed almost 200 people. Now, investigations that have been carried out (by Indian investigators and those of other countries (since nationals from other countries have also died)) have come to a conclusion that the attacks were planned by the Lashkar-e-Taiba and supported by many former intelligence officials and ex-army men. Inspite of Pakistani denials (maybe to provide the effect that the Pakistani nation does not buckle under pressure), the United States and other countries have applied a lot of pressure, and this pressure seems to be having an effect:

After mounting pressure from the United States and India, Pakistani authorities raided a camp run by the militant group suspected of carrying out the Mumbai attacks, Pakistani and American officials said Monday. The operation on Sunday appeared to be Pakistan's first concrete response to the demands from India and the United States to take action against the militants suspected in the attacks, which have raised tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbors to their highest point in years.

A senior Pakistani security official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said about a dozen people had been arrested in the raid, which took place in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani-administered Kashmir. The raid on Sunday appeared to be the first step by the Pakistanis that at least tacitly recognized the American and Indian claims. Counterterrorism experts familiar with the behavior of the Pakistani security services said there was a need by Pakistan to be seen to be doing something to alleviate the American and Indian pressure, as well as to avert the possibility of an Indian military strike.

However, the reality is that Pakistan is facing tremendous pressure, which is limiting the ability to do much:
- For the first time, US and other western tourists were targeted, and given the soft nature of these targets, a successful attack such as this will make these tourists seem more susceptible to such dangers
- Pakistani politicians, because of their past projection of India as the enemy, cannot afford to be seen as acting against so-called Kashmiri freedom fighters under US pressure
- The Pakistani military as well as the Government are financially strapped and need desperate financial support (especially when China and Saudi Arabia have refused to provide support)
- The military has just shown how powerful it is in the running of the country, and it would seem that the civilian leadership is buckling under the pressure, especially with the ISI being seen as a rogue party
- These militants, at the same time attack many Pakistani interests (including a much higher rate of suicide and other bombings)
- The incoming US administration comes in with the understanding that Pakistani was deceiving them in terms of previous efforts against the militants, and a lot of the aid was not used as the way that the Americans intended
- The US remains dependent on the Pakistani authority for the war against the Taleban, given that the last few days have seen the support convoys for the Americans in Afghanistan getting attacked in Peshawar

With all these factors, many of them at cross-purposes, it is hard to really guess what the Pakistanis will do. For their own survival, and under tremendous US pressure, they need to show action, while carrying the military along, and yet the public projection should be as low key as possible to avoid being seen to be acting under foreign pressure.

Problems Exposed By the Mumbai Attacks

Ashish — Wed, 3 Dec 2008 13:18:49 EST

Ever since the spate of bomb attacks in the last couple of years, leading to the extraordinary spectacle of bombs across Jaipur, Delhi, Bangalore, and Surat, there has been an element of insecurity building up. One would never be sure of where the next attack would come from, and any place or mode of transport was considered insecure. There was a lot of public anger, but the Congress Government had the policy of try to calm things down, promise that this would never happen again, and then wait for people to forget the enormity of these attacks, and continue with their normal politics.

Taking a stricter action against terrorism was fraught with risks, since a number of terrorists doing these bomb blasts were driven by a radical Islamist agenda, where these attacks were a way of retaliation, a way of terrorising the country. And making stricter laws or digging much deeper into the roots of these conspiracies could expose the Congress to the charge of "being against the Muslim community", something that causes jitters to the top leadership of the Congress, including the Madam at the head. Or maybe, the Ministers and the Cabinet were not upto the job of taking steps to make the country secure. So, when the bomb blasts in the BJP ruled states, and then Delhi took place, there was massive pressure, but quickly died away, since "the resilient country absorbed these attacks and moved on, showing their spirit".

Now this unprecedented disaster that was the terror attacks in Mumbai takes place. First there were cries of intelligence failure, and then it slowly emerged that the intelligence agencies were apparently doing their job, and were reporting signs from all over about something going to happen. It was not apparently a real failure of intelligence, but a failure of the intelligence analysis system, which is commanded by the Home Ministry, and supposed to be supervised by the National Security Advisor. Both have failed beyond the wildest nightmares that anybody could have. It now turns out, as reports have started coming out, that inspite of so many reports, the Government did not take any action. It is quite obvious that no Government in the world will ever really get to know that terrorists are coming to the beach at this time, on this day - you need to be prepared to handle such an eventuality; this is not a banana republic, this is a massive economy undergoing huge development, a potential super-power.

What was this super-power incapable of doing ? One does not fault the police or the commandos who did a great job in actually going in and fighting the terrorists, and took casualties themselves, including the head of the ATS, Hemant Karkare. However, one cannot get around the problems that are being reported, and which will dog us the next time something like this happens:

- The NSG, because of logistical reasons, took 9 hours to reach. 9 hours in a terrorist situation allows the terrorist to setup a solid base, harass the hostages, and overall make the job much more difficult. With 9 hours, the NSG cannot be called a Rapid Reaction Force. They need to be spread out over the country, and if politicians can command their own planes, surely the NSG can also have a couple for these needs.

- It has been reported again and again that the NSG and Marine commandos did not know the layout of the buildings. This is inexcusable. Before going in, commandos need to know the layout of the building they are attacking, otherwise you end up giving the terrorists a huge advantage. Given that it took the commandos some time to reach, the plans for the buildings should already have been arranged for them when they were to reach.

- It is reported from time to time that the media reported on the times of attacks, from where the commandos were going to attack, and so on. If the attackers indeed did have satellite phones (or even simple mobile phones), it would have been simple for them to get information about the goings-on from their associates watching on television. Typically a media blackout with a perimeter cordon should have been in place (with one person being the overall spokesperson for the various Government agencies, to avoid confusion). News now available seems to indicate that they used this mechanism, and used satellite phones for this purpose and normal cell phones that they took from hostages. Why are there no jammers (I am not real technical on this, but it seems logical) employed at such times ?

- There are negative reports already on the level of communication between different intelligence agencies and the armed forces, with finger-pointing and blame-evading happening at a high speed. After the Kargil War, one of the major recommendations of the post-war report was that intelligence sharing was flawed, and needs much better coordination.

- Reports from Maharashtra state that the state of police training and equipment is abysmal. They don't have modern weapons, no training, no firing range to practise, so it is hard to believe that even when motivated, they would be able to take a stand against Ak-47 armed dedicated and well trained terrorists.

So what is the way ahead? This act of terrorism has exposed the inability of the country to have a unified security mechanism that can effectively handle such incidents. You cannot prevent terrorism, but the problem in this case is that the lack of security (and consciousness regarding security) is such that terrorists in this case felt that they could easily commit all these tasks, and even go away. There is a lot of skepticism about whether, besides changing some people, there will be any action taken. The fight against terror, as seen by policies of the US, Britain, etc, can be messy, and needs to happen on a continuous basis.