The third space

Been way too long huh?

2008-11-30T02:52:00.000-08:00

Not sure if anyone's even checking this blog anymore, but hello and sorry to those of you who might periodically stop in for updates. I'm still in the middle east, living and working and equally enjoying and getting agitated with the way things are... you know, life as it would be anywhere. I've had some amazing opportunities come my way here and I'm on the edge of yet another big change. From Ras Al Khaimah, I'm moving to Abu Dhabi over the next couple of weeks to begin work on an exciting government initiative. Also, I'll finally have my own place... yes, my first ever to do in and with what I please. No one else's dishes to deal with, no one else's hair in the shower, no OCD organizing battles or unsolicited opinions about what should go where (you know what I mean if you live with family).

I like to think I can return to blogging after this move, but judging from the last year I seem to find a lot to keep me busy away from the computer. Maybe it'll be a new years resolution? We'll see friends. Until New Years... Eid Mubarak, season's greetings, be well.

October update

2007-10-26T07:23:00.000-07:00

I keep opening up blogger and having no idea what to say or where to begin!

It's almost the end of October now, and I am in Istanbul again but not for long. I've been in Turkey since late June, worked at a daily newspaper, got an offer in the United Arab Emirates, quit my job here, flew to London to spend a night with my favorite cousin, went back to the US to go to a wedding, see some friends, and pack up whatever of my life I could fit into a couple of suitcases and boxes (ahhh!), spazzed out a whole lot, returned to Turkey, have taken the time here to recollect myself and will be off to the Emirates on Sunday night to start a whole new thing for at least the next six months.

This really is the year that I hope never to forget.

There's still a lot of clean up that I have to do, a lot of loose ends that need to be tied and wounds that need to be healed (I mean wounds I seem to have inflicted this time) and a lot a lot a lot (did i say a lot) of communicating and checking in that I have to do with people and a lot of self-adjustment that I have to work on.

But I feel like I'm in a much better space to do it now, like the noise in the background is gone now and things are clearer--really, I'm clearer.

But not clear enough to focus on this posting to make it any longer than this right now.

Am I really leaving... again?! Snap! Wish me luck.

Greetings from a new-ish home

2007-09-16T16:09:00.000-07:00

I know, it's been forever since I've last posted anything but sometimes, as we all know, other things take priority over blogging. I'll give a quick update of the last... what... year or more.

That huge change in my life I referred to in a previous post that was supposed to give me more time to blog turned out to have the opposite affect actually.

If ever the rug has been pulled out from under your feet so hard that you didn't realize what happened until you looked around and saw nothing but pieces of what used to be your life and found them foreign, you might understand. A personal Hurricane Katrina happened and I never knew it could. Of course, who ever does?

The brighter side of this is that all the cracks in the system--that is, my system--became clear, but so did the blessings. And after the ego bruising, all you can do is brush yourself off, go on, and learn.

So I have and I am.

This spring, I decided to take the vacation I'd waited for for two or three years. I was waiting for someone and, as it turned out, that someone wasn't coming or going anywhere with me anymore. So I planned the trip I dreamt of: France, Italy, Greece... and maybe, maybe Turkey. It was a lot for three weeks, I knew, but really at the point I was planning the trip, the only thing I could think of was leaving. Where I ended up actually going wasn't important. I had a departure date and a return date, and everything else would be up in the air--except for one place I knew I had to go to heal.

France reminded me of something I lost touch with; Italy helped me let go of some things I shouldn't have carried with me in the first place; In Greece, I finally was able to float in the most beautiful Mediterranean water I'd ever laid eyes on. And float, I did...all the way to Turkey.

And I'm still in Turkey. Istanbul, to be exact. I've been here for over two months now and am loving it. I'm working at an English news paper, living with a Greek co-worker/friend, and a somewhat crazy British English teacher in a nice part of town. Enjoying Ramadan in a Muslim country again after almost 10 years of being in the U.S. and loving it. Retraining my ears for sounds and words that are completely foreign but delight me nonetheless. Learning a new geography and new social rules that are both familiar and not at the same time. Already, I've had a couple of visitors here and have a nice community of friends and coworkers.

So that's the update... next will be the journey. I miss writing here though I have been keeping up with my personal journal much more than ever before. Blogging is different though, and I have a lot of stories to share.

NY Times: 400,000 of Libyan Govt Labor Force to be Laid Off

2007-01-30T02:04:00.002-08:00

Comments to follow. Initial thoughts are where is the NY Times getting info from and what the hell is going on and how much will this impact the Libyan economy and are loans what people really need? Also, have the Libyan people really been living off petrolium? Because I kinda think our standard of living is much different than other comparable oil producing countries and standards of living.. like, say, Kuwait.

Don't get me wrong--yes, Libya has universal health care and a lot of basic living needs are subsidized. I just can't help but wonder whether if less was spent on soccer clubs and designer sun-glasses and sending the children of comrades to reknowned universities, that maybe the pot-holes of the streets of Tripoli might be taken care of. I also wonder about the second/third phase of the brain drain as it's happening right now.

I don't think that government employment is the answer. But it was an economic policy, which means that people came to rely on it as somewhat of a right. And, like the US labor force and outsourcing, I'm not sure that these decisions do so well at helping people deal with the reality of economic liberalization and globalization.

C'est la vie, I suppose. I just don't really like it.

More notes soon.

Libya Says It Will Lay Off 400,000
Published: January 22, 2007

The Libyan government plans to lay off 400,000 people, or more than a third of its work force, to try to ease budget pressures and stimulate the private sector, Prime Minister Al-Baghdadi Ali al-Mahmoudi told Parliament on Saturday.

Mr. Mahmoudi said that the number of civil servants and state employees had grown excessively in recent years, to more than a million, and that their total salaries cost the government more than $3 billion in 2006.

Outlining a $25.3 billion draft budget for 2007 at the meeting, in the town of Sirte, Mr. Mahmoudi said those who lost their jobs would receive assistance.

Each public employee who is laid off will be given a full salary for three years or will be granted up to $40,800 in loans to start a business, he said in his speech, which was broadcast on national television.

''The objectives of this budget are to increase Libyans' standard of living by 5 percent during this year and to promote productive activities,'' he said, without elaborating.

Mr. Mahmoudi added that he wanted to improve health and education and encourage the private sector to make manufactured goods of sufficient quality to compete with imports.
The Libyan leader, Col. Muammar al-Qaddafi, has frequently said that his nation of five million people, a member of OPEC, depends too heavily on its income from oil, which is the source of almost all of Libya's hard currency earnings.

He has also said Libyans are too dependent on foreigners and imports of consumer goods. Colonel Qaddafi has said he intends to move toward economic self-reliance and to make changes that will support the private sector in an effort to reduce unemployment, now at least 13 percent.

Eid Mubarak, Happy 2007, and my Mother

2006-12-31T17:30:00.000-08:00

It's time to bid farewell to a passing year and greet with warmth and hope another one. Not sure about you, but the last couple of years have been a bit rough for me. I've tested and been tested and will continue to test myself from what I hope is a healthier, more centered place. I've never done the resolution thing, but I think this year I just might hold myself to something... or a few things.

A number of people have entered my life this year and some have left it too. I've done some of my own leaving and I hope that even if it's not understood that people can find it in their hearts to forgive me. I've needed to hybernate for a while and given myself time to lick some wounds I discovered had been ignored. To those of you who have shared with me over this year, thank you and kisses at midnight. To those of you frustrated by my disappearance, expect a more personal apology and explanation. To everybody, HAPPY 2007!

It's been hectic with so many things happening at the same time. First, it's Eid el-Adha (Sacrificial Holiday), which celebrates Abraham's obedience to God and God's reciprocal generosity to him. One of my favorite aspects of this holiday (as well as Ramadan) is that it demonstrates the sense of social responsibility in Islam in a tangeable way--the meat of the slaughtered animal (sheep or lamb in most places) is distributed among friends, neighbors, and the poor. And while I'm on the secular end of things, I appreciate this as well as the emphasis on family.

In addition to Eid and the New Year, it's my mother's birthday! Born exactly 71 years to this day in Tripoli, Libya, was the lovely lady that would later have her own 7 children of which I am musmasit il karsha (womb rinser is the strange nick-name for the youngest in Libya--don't ask where that comes from).

She would become one of the first generation of Arabic Libyan students and teachers and dropped off by her father (a true revolutionary) in Msilata to teach at a new school as a part of the government's education program. From msilata, she adopted the custom of using way too many jalapeno peppers in just about everything she cooked. This would be a source of contention for some years between us as my pallet wasn't yet accustomed to 3rd degree fires in my mouth. But as is predictable, I have turned into my mother: I now happily create fires in my own cooking, causing others to resent me in exactly the same way. And it was true when she said she didn't intend do because I don't either.

This amazing woman would marry an ambitious hotty from the small eastern village of Derna--a neighbor of her older sister's husband from the same town--and they would begin their adventures together thereafter. And the adventures were only beginning when he flew in Dutch cows and brought a small calf home one day because he couldn't figure out what was wrong with it. This would eventually lead them to actually move to the small ranch (villas and cows don't mix well) and dabble in dairy products. Other adventures I've heard of include cross North African road trips during which eccentric hitch-hikers were picked up.

She later returned to teaching and school administration and is gleefully addressed as "Abla A---" by many women throughout Tripoli and even abroad. Her disciplinary method of choice was a tight pinch on the inner thigh--sufficiently horrifying hundreds of students into behaving. Besides that, she's the kind of person whose gentility and kindness elicit respect from children and adults alike (and you don't want to get on her bad side lest you continuously are at the receiving end of subtle yet effective looks of disappointment).

When life brought tragedy and trouble to her, she buckled down and got to work. And when she saw the opportunity to take back what was rightfully hers, she would take the risk that so many others before her were afraid to do. As much as the approval of her loved ones mattered to her, her sense of right, wrong, and justice were strongly centered in her faith. And if God is on her side, nothing could make her back down. So she didn't. And she was right.

I owe so much to my mother and I can't possibly list it here. She's wise, perceptive, and gentle--and has a killer smile! Lucky for me, I look exactly like her (though she's really prettier). Happy Birthday to la madre mia! Inshallah next year, I'll be with her on this day.

Salams/Peace to all!

Words Without Borders--Spotlight on Libya

2006-11-20T04:32:00.000-08:00

THE MAGIC LANTERNS OF LIBYAN LITERATURE
"Like a bottled genie, Libya’s literature whispers to us mysteriously, until those moments when its container is buffed properly, its luster blazes and the spirit within reveals marvels and wonders beyond the imagination. It happened when Libya discovered oil in the 60s, and it struck a well of poetry, prose, and press that its fearful master soon bottled up." --Words Without Borders

And the stories remain albeit mostly hidden still. I'm no longer sure if it's external censorship, self-censorship, or just a conservative culture of privacy that makes it this way. It's possible that people prefer to keep to the oral tradition of story telling in addition to a fear of leaving written documentation that could lead back to them. What I do believe is that there are treasures of stories among Libyans that are waiting for the right time or the right question.

I am positively amazed that Khaled Mattawa and Words Without Borders have put together a Libyan publication. I'm also thankful. The stories are super interesting and I send my blessings to Mattawa for facilitating this.

For some Libyan stories, check out Mint Flavored Hiccups or Wet Sleeves. Or al-Koni's "Sufi Shaykh."

Let me know what you think... I'd be interested in discussing.

Prominent Gaddafi son leaves to work abroad - Yahoo! News

2006-11-11T13:17:00.000-08:00

Prominent Gaddafi son leaves to work abroad - Yahoo! News

"TRIPOLI (Reuters) - Saif al-Islam, a prominent son of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi who made a rare public criticism of the country's political system in August, is leaving to work overseas, an official source said on Friday. "

Interesting developments in Libya. Definitely got my brow raised...

Prominent Gaddafi son leaves to work abroad - Yahoo! News

2006-11-11T13:16:00.000-08:00

Reporters sans frontières - Libya: In Libya, you can criticize Allah but not Gaddafi

2006-11-05T22:12:00.000-08:00

Reporters sans frontières - In Libya, you can criticize Allah but not Gaddafi

"Beyond the high-sounding and often sincere declarations, in the view of Reporters Without Borders only the appearance of privately-owned and really independent news media will allow us to talk of real change in Libya. This is not yet the case."--RWB

Reporters without Borders (or Reporters sans frontières) published the above article in October 2006. Yes, I guess it is self serving, but sometimes you gotta do it. I found some other Libya-related goodies that I'll be posting soon too.

Eid Mubarak

2006-10-23T13:02:00.000-07:00

Eid Mubarak to everyone. I will likely have more time to blog soon due to a major change in my life... a difficult but hopefully good one. I'll post soon.
ss

On terrorists and freedom fighters

2006-10-17T04:19:00.000-07:00

Before I even begin to try to address any of the comments, I should let you know that the publication of the last post was kind of an accident. I meant to edit it more carefully, and to be honest some of the comments were in response to what should have remained internal thoughts. Some would have been altered or taken out of the whole post. And then there are things pointed out that I concede are straight up mistakes.

This post is a comment response one. After responding to comments from my last post, I figured that three pages may as well be a separate post. For background or reference, this is a response to the October 9, 2006 post. Here’s the web link-- http://smokeyspice.blogspot.com/2006/10/welsh-terror-raid-leads-to-arrest-of.html .

Anyways, after responding and again letting myself get carried away, I found that I had such a big comment that it might as well be a post. And since I’ve been lagging on the posts, I figured that it made more sense to make this a post.

Jeames- You're right about the term freedom fighter and how it's ultimately used or misused. I made the mistake of not really looking at the word itself and its meaning outside of my own head in this particular context.

The conventional use of the term invokes the idea of armed resistance, which now in American terms translates into terrorism in most cases. Okay, but...

I personally would include recently murdered Anna Politkovskaya as a freedom fighter. How was she armed? With a voice and a pen that she made public. And that was enough to make her a threat to someone, a terrorist in one sense of the term.

PC: Please understand that the term 'Islamist' to me means little in the context of this discussion. Please allow me that for the sake of communication.

Islamist, to me, means little more than a title that gives some understanding of where an organization goes to for justification. The interpretation may be different than what was originally intended, just as the interpretation of the US Constitution seems to be different for armed militias in the US. I don't take the militias' interpretation to then question the entire document, but I do take it as a reference of their supposed basis.

Given that-

Victory for whom or for what?

An organization can be founded and connected with anybody and be considered anything. Are organizations that defend/appeal for convicts on death row in the US saying they support murder or violent crime? No. But they are saying that there may be a problem in a system that disproportionately convicts people of lower economic classes that can’t afford super star lawyers and that these problems may be beyond the legal system. Is it treason or terrorism to defend convicts that are affiliated with gangs or that sometimes women who are supposed to be maternal flip out and kill their own children? Where does the concept of rights actually stem from if it’s not universal? Am I supporting either by raising the question or do I wonder what might lie below the surface?

Back on the international note- the Taliban was a 'freedom fighting' group during the Cold War. They were championed, funded, and supported by the US much like Hamas was supported by Israel as an opposing organization to the PLO. You tell me what changed.

They were Islamist back then too, but Islamists weren't the problem. Now they are.
Also tell me what happened with Iraq, Iran, and Libya. What worth is left to calls of democracy when they're abandoned by the very callers? And this is exactly what I think you or Jeames do not make space for nor come close to understanding though you act like and think you do.

The Cold War was really cold to you, but it was actually HOT in other parts of the world and its legacy is what we're still experiencing in my opinion. While in the US, people practiced hiding under desks, people in other countries were actually bombed and responded because they felt they had to.

If there's anything you can relate to as a patriot of anything especially after 9/11 in the US, it's that feeling of need to react to attack. And the general American amnesia doesn’t take away from what happened between WWII and 9/11 and how it’s influenced people since.

My position on the detainees in Guantanamo is quite simple: either try them of something—let justice or some semblence of it take its course—or let them go back to the lives they had before. I'm against the indefinite detention of any human being without due process.

What I don’t understand is why this is difficult for anyone to understand.

After years of legal gambling and hodge-podge justifications, we discover that people who should never have been in Gitmo in the first place are being let out. Great… except that, now, detainees that were held for nothing in the first place have to re-prove innocence to countries and bureaucracies that already approved their need of refuge or that supported their opposition in the first place. Only now, after being in jail for years, they come out and find that the likes of the Q-man are now allies. People are being sent to their graves because someone was suspicious or was unable to say they were wrong about this person’s involvement with anything. And, now, people who were not may actually be threats—if they’re not completely mentally incapacitated.

What is not frustrating about this situation?

In terms of law, is this military, criminal, or immigration law? Or does it not matter because everything’s been collapsed since 9/11 and is it okay that it’s been collapsed since then? What are the ramifications of immigration law bleeding into criminal law? Does anyone care?

I can’t respond to anything about LIFG because I don’t know enough about them. However, it seems to me that your comments referred to this paragraph:
The man, who has not been identified by the authorities, is accused of being a member of the terrorist Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), which sympathises with Al-Qaeda and has links to extremist groups in Egypt and Algeria. The radical group, formed in 1990, is believed to have planned the Casablanca suicide bombings in May 2003.
Yes, there is an association in that paragraph with Al-Qaeda, which is pretty much a phantom organization with little if any actual organization. Who the hell is Al-Qaeda. And if it really is the problem and Bin Ladin is the head, why have we heard nothing about him for a really long time? Why was the intelligence group devoted to finding him disbanded?

No, the British don’t have to agree with my definitions of terrorists or immigrants or refugees or even what a cat is (unless it’s actually in the UN Charter, which I’ll look up later). Nor do you or Jeames or the US. Detain, deport, or screw whoever you want. Just don’t freak out when people aren’t unsupportive or are belligerent or militant.

And the Islamists don’t have to like what I say either. I’m sure they don’t in other regards anyway.

So what? Does that mean any of the above is just?

The world is made up of people and if we’re so caught up on being ‘right’ than being sincerely just then of course the stupid world is going to be hypocritical. It’s like we’re shooting ourselves in the foot repeatedly. How many toes do we have left anyway?

Welsh terror raid leads to arrest of Libyan

2006-10-09T03:20:00.000-07:00

Oh lord... I don't even know where to begin with this one and I'm simply too tired to write an essay though I kind of feel one coming on soon...if I can ever really find the words to express my frustrations.

"One man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist." I have no idea who uttered or wrote those words first, but the phrase has always stood out to me. And, as time progresses and my political awareness continues, I'm beginning to see the dynamics and actual mechanisms that make it true.

Not so long ago, the Q-man was 'evil' to most Americans. Why? Well, there was the Pan-Am incident, the Berlin disco incident, and he was a cruel military dictator who screwed with the price of oil, was an ally of the USSR, etc, etc. End of story. Nobody really knew why he was evil kind of like no one knows why Castro was either. The thought process ended at Qadaffi=Hitler, thanks to Reagan's gift of oral persuasion and people's acceptance of authority and overall dissinterest in understanding the intricates of politics, especially as they pertain to countries full of brown people that speak funny languages.

Now, the thought process ends with Qadaffi=Victory in the War on Terror. Period. Qadaffi is now a trophy bride--pretty and fresh and unlikely to rock the boat. He's the pay off for the attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq, the sole proof that something worked.

This is of course ignoring the fact that Qadaffi was trying hard to snuggle up to the US during Clinton's administration or quite possibly before, ignoring that Libya is still under dictatorship, ignoring that people are still imprisoned if they voice the dissent that the Western world continues to encourage, exploit, and only to then ignore when interests change.

The voices of dissent--the agents of change--are now being thrown into jails with the enthusiastic help of the US and Europe. The cards have apparently been redealt and, guess what? Guess who wins again?

Not anyone that stood for principles and swallowed the bitter consequences of estrangement from their homes and families or had their homes leveled to set an example. Not anyone who stood for anything other than self interest and opportunism.

Instead, the final laugh seems to be that of the corrupt and powerful. And it seems to get louder by the day.

Omar Deghayes, a Libyan arrested in Pakistan in 2002, is still in Guantanamo. No formal charges were made against him. In the latest Guardian article written by his sister Amani Deghayes, those same non-charges are the reasons the UK is refusing his re-entry upon release from Guantanamo. Alternatively, he's to head back to Libya.

Mr. Ali, in the following article, is in a similar predicament. He's an enemy of the world now that his enemy is a friend to him. And this is not even based on proven evidence--I have no idea of where the man stands on anything.

What I do understand is that the dissent has lost in this case, with the help of the US government (no, I'm not blaming the government but I am pointing out that this is a low level Iraqi uprising situation).

What was it that we wanted again?

Welsh terror raid Osama link
Oct 8 2006
Marc Baker

THE first terror suspect to be arrested in Wales following the London 7/7 bombings is accused of having links with Osama bin Laden.

Twelve months have passed since anti-terror police swooped on a quiet Cardiff street and held a married Libyan man as part of a series of dawn raids across the UK after 52 people died in the July atrocities.

Ever since, the bearded father-of-two, who had been granted asylum in Britain, has been detained under tough immigration laws at the high security Long Lartin Prison in Worcestershire. He has not been charged with any criminal offence.

But last night his lawyers told Wales on Sunday the Home Office has accused the Libyan of being connected to terror chief bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network as the Government seeks to deport him.

The man, who has not been identified by the authorities, is accused of being a member of the terrorist Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), which sympathises with Al-Qaeda and has links to extremist groups in Egypt and Algeria. The radical group, formed in 1990, is believed to have planned the Casablanca suicide bombings in May 2003.

President George Bush placed LIFG on his list of terrorist organisations in 2004. The group was banned from operating in the UK by the Home Office last year. Anyone found to be a member can face a 10-year prison term.

But last night, as they prepare to fight plans to kick their client out of Britain, lawyers acting for the Libyan denied their client is involved with LIFG or Al-Qaeda.

Instead, they claim he is a casualty of the 'climate of fear' stirred up in the wake of the London bombings.

Lawyer Sean McLoughlin, of Birmingham-based TRP Solicitors, said: "This man is being detained under immigration laws. He has not been accused of being involved in any terror plot of any kind but the Home Office wants to deport him to Libya as they say his presence in the UK is not conducive to the public good.

"The Home Office says he is a member of an anti-Colonel Gadaffi organisation (the LIFG) - which he isn't - which the Home Office say is 'involved' with or at least shares the ideology of Al-Qaeda - which is also rubbish."

Known locally as Mr Ali, the Libyan was arrested after cops raided the home he shared with his wife and two young children in Canton at 6am on October 3. He was seized after South Wales Police assisted Scotland Yard's anti-terrorist branch, who executed a search warrant, under the Terrorism Act 2000.

Mr McLoughlin explained: "He is still in detention and has been since last October, pending deportation to Libya. His appeal against deportation will be heard by the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC) this month. No criminal charges have been laid."

Although Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights prevents people from being deported to a regime where they may face torture, Mr McLouglin fears his client will be targeted if he is sent back to Libya.

"The Home Office accepts that Gadaffi's regime tortures political opponents but says that the UK Government and Libya have negotiated a memorandum of understanding between them to have Libya promise not to torture or ill-treat our client.

"A supposedly independent monitoring body has been appointed to check up on our client if he is returned to Libya, to ensure he is not tortured.

"But the body appointed by the Libyans and UK Government to monitor returned individuals is the Gadaffi Foundation which is headed up by Gadaffi's son - Saif Al-Islam Gadaffi.

"Our client is arguing that he will be tortured if returned to Libya and that he should not be deported."

The Welsh Refugee Council insists there is no evidence to suggest the Libyan has any terror links or has preached in support of terror networks.

Last night, the Home Office insisted it was "seeking to deport a number of people whose presence in the UK is not conducive to the public good for reasons of national security".

icWales - Welsh terror raid Osama link

Debate Continues On Qadhafi's Libya

2006-09-22T03:23:00.000-07:00

Apparently, some debate is still 'raging' about "Qadhafi's Libya" and the apparent contradiction in US 'values' & foreign policy. Who knew?

And why am I not surprised?

In return for Gadhafi's agreement to cooperate with the United States and the United Kingdom in fighting terrorism and reneging on his weapons of mass destruction program, the U.S. resumed diplomatic relations with Libya, allowing for the establishment of embassies in Washington and Tripoli on May 31. By June, Libya was officially removed from the State Department's terrorism list.

But debate still rages around the question of how much Gadhafi's Libya has really changed since the reinstatement of relations with the U.S. Gadhafi claims to stand strong against terrorism, but there are those who argue that this is merely a façade.

Okay, well, the debate does not rage with me.

Libya has changed undoubtedly. But that change is purely opportunistic and economic. The country is still under dictatorship and the fact that the US government and media suffer from some form of amnesia/madness does not take away from this fact.

So I'm happy for Pan Am and the American families who are finally being paid off their blood money. I'm glad to know that lives really can be bought off by money (maybe I should pitch this idea to my Palestinian friends). And I will take the notion of 'democracy' with a grain of salt.

Thank you, Mr. Bush & company.

Debate* continues on Gadhafi's Libya
By ANNE DECECCO
UPI Correspondent

WASHINGTON, Sept. 21 (UPI) -- "Although there are 24 security cars surrounding my house, I have no doubt Gadhafi has been weakened. He's a terrorist and he will be brought to justice. Take care of my children. I am standing against this regime and I'll never back down."

Those are the words of Fathi el-Jahmi, as remembered by his brother Mohamed el-Jahmi from the last time they spoke on the phone before Fathi was taken by Libyan security police in March 2004 and imprisoned for a second time.

Fathi el-Jahmi is 65 years old. He remains imprisoned today in an unknown location, having virtually no contact with the outside world, according to David Stamps, a country specialist on Libya for Amnesty International.

Stamps said that el-Jahmi was originally imprisoned in October 2002 because he called for democratic reform in Libya. He was then released in March 2004 and abducted two weeks later by security agents.

To many Americans, it seems that much has changed since 2003, when Libya's leader Moammar Gadhafi surrendered the country's nuclear weapons program and offered compensation for the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 in 1988, and that of UTA flight 772, in 1989.

In return for Gadhafi's agreement to cooperate with the United States and the United Kingdom in fighting terrorism and reneging on his weapons of mass destruction program, the U.S. resumed diplomatic relations with Libya, allowing for the establishment of embassies in Washington and Tripoli on May 31. By June, Libya was officially removed from the State Department's terrorism list.

But debate still rages around the question of how much Gadhafi's Libya has really changed since the reinstatement of relations with the U.S. Gadhafi claims to stand strong against terrorism, but there are those who argue that this is merely a façade.

"He never really took responsibility for the acts of terrorism," said Mohamed el-Jahmi, referring to Gadhafi and the plane bombings. "He merely paid his way off. I don't know what the State Department is doing removing him from the list of terrorists."

According to one State Department official who wished to remain unnamed, Gadhafi "made good on implementing policy change and stopping the nuclear weapons program. He also agreed to pay reparations. In terms of intelligence operations, he has cooperated fully."

This official explained that the U.S. now has a team of CIA agents in Libya gaining access to security information on the Middle East, which is an important benefit for the U.S.

According to Diederik Vandewalle, associate professor of government at Dartmouth College, Libya's formal governmental institutions are fairly new, installed in the last few decades in an effort to transition to modern statehood and to advance its oil industry.

When presenting his new book "Libya: Prospects for Change" at the Middle East Institute Monday, Vandewalle explained that "the true political power in Libya lies in the informal circles of people that work for Gadhafi."

He explained that in the upcoming years we can expect to see some economic reform come out of Libya, but in terms of political reform, the system will remain immobile while Gadhafi is in power.

Hafed Al-Ghwell, a Libyan-American who works for an international organization in Washington, explains the Libyan government this way: "There's the technocratic government. Then there's the shadowy clan of Gadhafi, the security apparatus, the informal side. They're in control. The formal government is subject to their whims."

He said, "Gadhafi is the antithesis of everything the U.S/ is saying it stands for: human rights, anti-terrorism, democracy. Democracy is the anchor of U.S. policy and Gaddafi is a dictator. Seeing him become an ally of the U.S. undermines U.S. credibility in the Arab world."

Al-Ghwell referenced the case of Abdul Rahman al-Amoudi, an American Islamic intellectual who was found to be breaking U.S. law by traveling to Libya without consent and receiving funds from Tripoli, and who later pleaded guilty to a plot to assassinate a Saudi monarch in 2003.

According to Al-Ghwell, this case, as well as the plane bombings, and the fact that there is limited political freedom in Libya, show that Gadhafi is not as staunchly anti-terrorist as he claims to be. "How can the U.S. convince the Arab world it's serious about reform if it does not enforce it in Libya?" He asked.

David Goldwyn, president of the international energy consulting firm Goldwyn International Strategies, LLC, said that Libya has an aggressive economic reform plan in place that will change the economy considerably over the next several years. These changes will include privatization, new investment laws, and increased infrastructure, among other factors.

Goldwyn also said U.S. companies have increased their presence in Libya and that many U.S. companies are now exporting goods and services to Libya, as well. This will increase as more economic reforms are passed.

According to Goldwyn, Gadhafi's regime has changed since U.S.-Libyan relations have increased, and it is evidenced in its efforts towards economic reform.

When asked about the situation of the Libyan population and the need for political reform, Goldwyn said, "Political and economic reform advance together. The more economic space opens the more open to Western business and practices it will become."

*so, what's the debate?

allAfrica.com: Africa: Gaddafi - All Thunder And Anti-Imperialist Rhetoric

2006-09-22T02:20:00.000-07:00

Gaddafi - All Thunder And Anti-Imperialist Rhetoric

Gaddafi is one of the longest-serving heads of state in Africa, after clocking 37 years at the helm in Libya, which has a population of about five million people. The former army colonel's most cherished dream is to see the creation of a United States of Africa. "Africa should build one federal government as soon as possible. We will have one minister of defence, one minister of finance and so on. This will be the birth of a black giant."

But considering how much Africa's rulers -- including Gaddafi himself -- relish power and self-preservation, his brainchild could be stillborn. It is difficult to imagine some old-style dictators who cannot fathom voluntarily passing on the baton to anyone in their own countries accepting the idea of a leader from another country overshadowing them and basking in the limelight as the president of Africa.

I probably shouldn't post this without looking further into the angle of this online publication, but I think it's a good article about the Q-dude in the African (i.e., AU, USA) context anyway.

I admit that I may be harsh as far as Libyan politics are concerned, but I can't help agreeing with Makuni on this African Union crap. While I think the concept itself is beautiful, reality on the ground speaks to its improbability.

Anyway, here's the rest of the article for folks who may not have access to the site:

Africa: Gaddafi - All Thunder And Anti-Imperialist Rhetoric

Financial Gazette (Harare)
September 20, 2006
Posted to the web September 21, 2006

Mavis Makuni

ONE thing that can be said about Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi is that regardless of whether one agrees with his politics or not, he is never boring.

His flamboyance ensures that whatever he says and wherever he is, he always attracts attention. He caused a stir a few years ago when he swept into Zimbabwe in a long motorcade after traversing almost the entire length of Africa by road. A short while later he indeed completed the Cape-to-Cairo adventure when he arrived in Cape Town by road to attend a conference after journeying down the entire length of Africa from Tripoli.

In 1986, Gaddafi was like a fish out of water when he made an impassioned speech in the Zimbabwean capital, Harare, in which he described the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) as an "international falsehood." Last week, Gaddafi is likely to have joined a host of other leaders from the developing world who attended a NAM summit in the Cuban capital, Havana. A few days before, the Libyan leader had been opining on the subject of unity at an African Union meeting in his home town of Sirte.

Gaddafi is one of the longest-serving heads of state in Africa, after clocking 37 years at the helm in Libya, which has a population of about five million people. The former army colonel's most cherished dream is to see the creation of a United States of Africa. "Africa should build one federal government as soon as possible. We will have one minister of defence, one minister of finance and so on. This will be the birth of a black giant."

But considering how much Africa's rulers -- including Gaddafi himself -- relish power and self-preservation, his brainchild could be stillborn. It is difficult to imagine some old-style dictators who cannot fathom voluntarily passing on the baton to anyone in their own countries accepting the idea of a leader from another country overshadowing them and basking in the limelight as the president of Africa.

And taking into consideration the endless political upheavals and civil wars that have been sparked by ethnic and tribal passions within individual countries, the expectation that the concept of one identity, one army, one nationality, one currency and one people can be unanimously embraced in the foreseeable future seems far-fetched. The Libyan leader must be aware of this but he is so passionate about this seemingly unworkable idea, cynics suggest, because he fancies himself as the eventual kingpin.

Sceptics will continue to question the basis of Gaddafi's conviction that the creation of this new entity will transform Africa into a giant capable of tackling problems such as the Darfur crisis without external assistance. They will continue to ask what is stopping African countries from taking such concerted action now under the banner of the African Union if they are genuinely committed to easing the plight of civilians in Darfur. The bickering and dragging of feet that has characterised the AU's response to conflicts in the past suggests that the proposed USA can never be a melting pot in which individual leaders will be prepared to subordinate their egos and idiosyncrasies for the common good.

The 53-member AU has remained impotent in the face of the Sudanese humanitarian catastrophe in which thousands have perished and at least two million peasants have been displaced. In the midst of the continuing carnage, Gaddafi has endorsed Sudanese President Hassan al-Bashir's rejection of plans to deploy a 20 000-strong United Nations peacekeeping force in Darfur. This is despite the fact that the 7 000 AU soldiers, who are hampered by a lack of resources, have failed to quell the turmoil since their deployment about a year ago.

Gaddafi has echoed al-Bashir's red-herring claim that those calling for the replacement of the AU soldiers in Darfur have ulterior motives, including re-colonising Africa. These strongmen would rather see more people dying than admit that international intervention is urgently needed to stop what some observers believe should be classified as genocide. And yet intriguingly, on the same day that Gaddafi made remarks about Africa becoming a giant under a federation, he contradicted himself in the next breath by implying that the continent should rely on its former colonisers to tackle another one of the problems of its own making: the exodus of millions of Africans who are flooding Europe to escape the dire economic conditions or tyrannical governance in their home countries.

Gaddafi said European countries should pay 10 billion Euros annually to enable Africa to stop the flight of its people northwards in search of a better life. The ambivalence and double standards reflected in Gaddafi's thundering anti-imperialist rhetorical grandstanding side by side with a preparedness to go cap in hand to beg for external funding to tackle continental challenges is one factor that is guaranteed to stunt the evolution of the African "giant" he envisions.

African leaders are notorious for pleading poverty when called upon to avail resources for important initiatives as shown by their record of non-payment of dues to the AU and its forerunner, the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) as well as the United Nations. While clinging to these penny-wise-pound-foolish tactics on initiatives with a bigger picture, they do not hesitate to adopt a no-expense spared attitude when it comes to expenditure on prestige projects. These are the same people who have caused widespread disgruntlement for putting their personal interests above those of their countries, thereby ruining once thriving economies and condemning their people to unnecessary poverty.

Neither the availing of billions of Euros nor the setting up of a United States of Africa will solve these fundamental leadership problems. On the contrary, the ramifications of civil wars, rampant official corruption, dictatorship, economic mismanagement and human rights abuses are bound to continue driving desperate Africans into the diaspora.

End Siege of Lebanon and Gaza

2006-08-03T02:48:00.000-07:00

End Siege of Lebanon and Gaza

Sharon wouldn't have done it

2006-08-03T01:39:00.000-07:00

My computer is acting up again--thanks to the newest Microsoft update which I will complain about later, when nations aren't being destroyed and people are no longer being killed. The result is that I can't copy and paste and I don't know why, but am too tired tonight to figure it out.

The last three weeks have hit the local Arab and Arab-American community like a major earth-quake. More similar to the affect of the second Intifada than the invasion of Iraq (more warning, I guess), but the trauma and the stories and the reactions from the community are comparable: People are coming out of the wood-works to voice dissent, to contribute time and money, to be more political than they have been in years because they had hoped that the past would stay there.

Unfortunately, it didn't: Israel invaded Lebanon again and is escalating its attacks.

Unlike the past when I could just support other people's efforts by showing up, this time I'm right smack in the middle of bringing and keeping the community together. Because of decisions I've made regarding associations and organizational affiliations, my responsibilities have exploded between my 9 to 5 (which is also involved) and the evening organizing meetings (which are nightly now). Somewhere in between, I'm supposed to be available to personal relationships and I want to be because it takes me out of the madness of what's happening in Lebanon, Gaza, and now the West Bank, but I have almost 100 emails to keep up with daily and committees and projects to coordinate, meetings to coordinate, media to contact, research to do, and still keeping my eyes on the big picture.

Don't get me wrong--I'm proud to do the work that I do and I'm happy to do it. The logistics, however, are just more strenuous than the theory. I used to say that I didn't pick politics but that it picked me. I still believe that it picked me, but I now realize that I chose to take it up on the offer.

So I apologize for not being available at the moment to people that I care dearly about.

USATODAY.com - Did Israel really need to savage the beauty of Beirut?

Shed no tears for onions

2006-07-28T01:04:00.000-07:00

Thursday, 27 July, 2006: Libya's average per capita consumption of onions is 66.8 pounds (30 kg) per year, which makes it the world leader among onion eaters. [Fredericksburg]

No comment.

Shed no tears for onions

Crisis Chronicle--again

2006-07-20T01:41:00.000-07:00

I thought I was hardened.

9/11 led to the attack of Afghanistan because the US needed to let out its aggression. Somehow, this was tweaked into a long planned invasion of Iraq because something had to be done to secure American petrleum and begin the project of changing the geopolitical map of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). The second Palestinian Intifada came and continued and continued, towns and camps were bombed, seiged into submission until a new election led to results Israelis didn't like much better than the Intifada. Sharon doesn't even know his name and still Gaza is being attacked relentlessly. (And, no, the attacks didn't begin with the kidnapping of the Israeli soldier).

I thought that I could handle whatever came of this by now. And then came the invasion of Lebanon.

I've spent a lot of time researching Lebanese websites for organizations and news sources. After the extensive reading and research, I met and spoke with my Lebanese brothers and sisters. I don't know how to describe it. People that have always acted like the coolest cats on the block are tired--after days on days of trying to reach loved ones, waiting for news, hoping to get a glance of family members on CNN and hoping that this isn't going to turn out as another occupation not long after the last 18 year Israeil occupation of Lebanon, people are exhausted.

Meanwhile, Gaza is still under attack and Palestine is still militarily occupied. I used to think that there was a chance that the world just didn't know or didn't understand. Now, I'm thinking that most people don't care.

Iraq, Palestine, and Lebanon are burning; Afghanistan is hurting; thousands of people all over the world have taken to the streets. This is no time for governments of the MENA to play nice diplomacy.

The last oil embargo was over three decades ago. I think it's high time for another one.

Oil Dependence: A double edged sword?

2006-06-19T00:27:00.000-07:00

I've always been a little uncomfortable with the whole oil dependency discussion. As

Of course I'm against US 'national interests' translating into death and oppression in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and I really don't have a problem with people paying $5/gallon in gas (I've heard this over and over as the final justification for war with Iraq). On the other hand, Libya is an oil producing country--and while, I personally am not benefiting from this, I realize that others are (not just the Q-dude though he & company benefit exponentially more than most).

I was reading Unfettered Swallow's post on Bush's state of the union in February and it got me thinking again.... What would be the best balance for both worlds?

On the one hand, petroleum is tainted--often called black gold or the black curse. And it is a curse of sorts in that it allows for an easy government source of income that really subverts a government's need to establish a healthy relationship with its citizens, far less invasive than a system of broad citizen taxation.

On the other hand, governments are able to use the revenue to subsidize some of the basic needs of people, such as food, housing, or medical treatment. Few things depress me more than seeing so many homeless people on the streets--and, yes, I realize that San Francisco has more than most places, but it depresses me nonetheless that there are SO MANY! I won't even go into health care, except to say I believe that petroleum production revenue does generally translate into a more universal health care system (although I can't say much about access). And it makes me happy to think no one is starving, too.

I know the economic answer would be something about a diverse portfolio or comparative advantage, but if the portfolio benefits a minority and the comparative advantage isn't quite clear, then what?

If oil dependency translates into interference of a political process and freaky politics as we've seen thus far, then that's not desirable.

However, what does oil independence translate into for petroleum producing states like Libya?

Il wsa’a fil galb

2006-06-03T19:44:00.000-07:00

I think my mind has hijacked my heart. I’ve been told that the downfall of women is our hearts so I trust my mind more though my heart is screaming. I hear you, I assure it. My mind tells it to calm down and give the move a chance, to give me a little time to adjust.

But my chest tightens when I walk towards this place and I choke when I walk in. I don’t see myself anywhere here. The walls are so bare and white that I feel like painting for the first time in my life. Even the heater is painted white and I miss the chipped paint and the rust and the dust and the noise of our old one. It clanked when it was turning on as though a miniature handy man was wrenching a bolt and hammering on the inside of the metal walls of the columns fixing something, and then it hissed through the night like he left something loose. The clank, clank, clanking began every night at 6:30 pm to the minute, frustrating me when the weather was cold and the sun was no longer coming through the windows.

Above the heater is where we hung the spatially inaccurate painting of a traditional Libyan tea setting. A blue tea-pot sits steaming on a canoon. A box of red tea--Sha’i Seelan—is painted into the upper left corner and a metallic sugar container on the right. A box of Riyath cigarettes and Libyan produced matches lie in front of the canoon, just below the small tea glass and the awkwardly painted glass of water. And while this not a perfect specimen of artistry, I find my eyes resting on it quite a bit. I’ve always imagined a 60-something year old Libyan man sitting under the shade on a hot afternoon. The peachy-grey background could easily be the outside wall of a store on the bottom floor of a building on Omar Al-Mukhtar Street or on the side-walk of an apartment building on one of the residential streets nearby. Other times I think he’s sitting outside his home on one of the farms outside the city, taking in the serene solitude of rural Libya. Where ever I imagine him, I know that he’s alone and neither expecting nor inviting company because there’s only one tea glass.

I made tea in a blue tea pot like that one, except the lid on ours was unhinged. I had to use a kitchen towel when lifting the lid to see whether the water was boiling. I scooped sugar from a silver tin a little larger than the one in the painting, but of the same design down to the grooves on the lid. I made Sha’i Seelan every afternoon when my mother and grandmother woke up from their naps, again ready to talk and nibble. And I tasted the dusty tobacco of Riyath cigarettes when I stole a couple from whatever box I found laying around. I wouldn’t buy cigarettes because no one could know of my secrete midnight ritual in the corner of our roof under the moon and a sky full of stars. And everyone used those matches to light gas stoves and candles when the electricity went out.

I miss the corner the heater was in and I don’t like this one in this milky corner of this new room. My heater was bigger and warmer.

And the windows aren’t facing the sun either. A view of the private Catholic high-school campus with wealthy urban teenagers replaces my city sky-line and the horridly revamped Oasis hotel across the street. Not that I’ll miss the bright yellow, orange, and purple window frames lined up behind the dimly lit green and white awning of the hotel across the street. O-A-S-I-S: each bubble letter imprinted on a separate green cube. But I will miss looking out at tree-lined Willow alley between the hotel and the well kept brick apartment building that I can enjoy at least until the ‘Big One’ hits. And I will miss the brown and golden dome of City Hall peeking above the building on the southern corner, and seeing the city turn pink in the magic hour.

I have strangely sinister associations with private Catholic high schools and teenagers, but I know these are irrational. Perhaps I’ll learn to like them—or at least render them back-ground noise like I have the daily sirens of ambulances and fire engines driving through to yet another emergency.

The noise never bothered me, but the new silence is daunting. My ears are accustomed to the humming of car engines driving by and the blaring talk radio. I would lie on the couch at noon-time on Saturdays, listening to This American Life and the back-ground music of motors and the not so occasional Harley cruising by. Sometimes, I would drown out the traffic with Arabic music and dance like people do when they’re alone.

Now, listening to the radio will be my new secret ritual. The new sound of my life will be cool calmness, rustling in the kitchen, and creative fingers typing away at stories and poems that I will read and re-read until I dream of letters and words. The new back-ground music is the bickering between my heart and my mind.

And though we’ve hardly moved in, the space feels cluttered and tight. I can hardly imagine two people living here without going at least slightly mad. I laugh when I think of having lived for years in an even smaller space with Dia and of the family visits that turned the apartment into a mini-refugee camp with sleeping bodies and pillows covering the entire floor. And I cry when I realize how natural and easy it felt in comparison.

Most of all, missing from these white walls and the heater and the corner is my best friend and brother. It’s always been us against the world and the world never had a chance because we laughed or charmed it out of existence. We would comment about nothing and everything and never tire of each other. Our sense of humor was branded in childhood when his room was the safe haven we camped in while the grown ups quarreled in a tension-filled living room. He let me look over his shoulder while he was doing Algebra homework and met my curiosity about the tiny x’s and y’s with clear explanations that I was still too young to understand.

He could tickle me from across the room. He was my sanity when chaos broke out and my breath of air when the world was suffocating me. His was the only shoulder I cried on when baba’s soul left his body and his voice was the only one my heart listened to. I trust him when he tells me things will be okay because they will be—not because anything in particular will happen but because he is there and as long as he is there, I can stand anything.

I don’t see him in the ceiling either when I lie down and don’t expect him to walk in with another strange trinket that will take up space on one of the counters or someone’s extra furniture that he thinks we might use one day when we buy the castle we would need to fit everything in. No more piles of wrinkled receipts pulled from his pockets and forgotten on the coffee table until I make mention of them. No singing in the mornings and no stumbling over gym bags and tennis shoes or staying up until 4am talking because time stopped mattering and waking up tired was worth the chat.

Il was’a fil galb means space is in your heart. When your heart is happy, a jail cell can seem gigantic. With time, I hope my heart will grow to accept this new arrangement that my mind decided on. And I hope my mind will learn to listen to my heart more, too.

LiveFromPalestine

2006-05-27T13:31:00.000-07:00

Noura's blog... and the latest issue. Okay, maybe not so current as Israel has generally been known to use visas and entry as a source of control. And, no, it's not just Israel that uses these strategies. Anyone that's applied for a visa to Libya in the last 20-30 years may have similar stories, for example. But one thing I've learned is that a country that refuses entry to internationals is one that has something to hide.

More on this topic, especially in regards to Israel, will come soon so pay attention.

LiveFromPalestine

Frustrations of an Angry Iraqi-- May 17

2006-05-27T13:15:00.000-07:00

Frustrations of an Angry Iraqi
Monday May 15, 2006 at 11:20 PM

I'm in a very bad mood tonight. I just got home from a protest in Dearborn, Michigan, largest home to Arabs outside the Middle East. My throat is a bit sore, but not as sore as my spirits. I was one of six people who protested outside the Arab-American Museum this evening. You see, the museum, unwittingly of her crimes, I'd like to think, granted the Arab-American Institute venue to host Madeline Albright. The Clinton administration's Secretary of State was to speak about her new book 'The Mighty and the Almighty: Reflections on America, God, and World Affairs.'

I was there with one other Arab, two other protesters were Caucasian, one was Jewish, and one cute baby whose delightful smile made the rainy weather easier to protest in. We stood at each of the museum's two entrances with our signs. 'Madeline Albright, 500,000 kids' lives do matter,' 'The 'price' is not worth it,' 'Uncle Scum kills kids,' 'Remember the Nakba.'

We called her out for her war crimes of supporting sanctions on Iraq and unconditionally supporting Israel's violent occupation of Palestine. Those few people going into the building who answered us on why they were attending responded that they were there for 'dialogue', a word I grew to despise on this rainy night.

Cops kept a close eye on us the entire two hours we were there. Museum personnel took pictures of us as they nervously whispered to s"

UK: 500 police officers carried out raids targeting Libyans in Britain

2006-05-26T21:15:00.000-07:00

How many days had it been since Libya was taken off the list before 500 British police were raiding Libyans in England? Not many at the time I flagged this article for posting. And, as far as I'm concerned, al Qaeda is now being used for whatever organization is subversive. In the context of many countries in the Middle East and North Africa, subversive means that you stand up for anything different than the government stance (even if you are a part of the government).

Independent Online Edition > Crime

Libya: Change is in the air but happens slowly on the ground

2006-04-23T15:30:00.000-07:00

Libya | Change is in the air but happens slowly on the ground | Economist.com

Under its still-eccentric leader, could Libya ever loosen up?

THREE years ago, Libya stunned the world. Its famously erratic leader, Muammar Qaddafi, announced a series of dramatic policy reversals. Bullied and beguiled by the British and American intelligence services, he gave up research into chemical and nuclear weapons, paid generous compensation to the relatives of passengers in an American airliner blown up over Lockerbie in 1988, and championed economic reform. Liberalisation was the key to prosperity, he declared in one speech, and stable institutions were vital for Libya's credibility in the world.

Mr Qaddafi has delivered on many of these scores. Not only did he scrap an extensive and secret nuclear-weapons programme, he squealed on its shady suppliers. His intelligence services, long better-known for skulduggery, became useful allies in the global campaign against radical Islamist groups. They lightened their hand at home a little, too, most recently by freeing some 130 of the country's 500 or so political prisoners, most of them Islamists. From 2003 until his removal this week, a respected American-trained economist, Shukri Ghanem strove, as prime minister, to shift policy towards free trade, privatisation and greater openness.

As a result of all this, shoppers in Tripoli, the capital, no longer queue for rations in state-owned stores, but choose what they like from well-stocked private markets. Since the end of UN sanctions, imposed in 1992 over the Lockerbie affair, they can fly abroad on holiday. They can even visit the United States, now that diplomatic ties have been partially restored after a 23-year break.

Americans are swarming the other way. Along with a clutch of congressmen, oilmen have been sniffing around a country whose huge energy resources remain largely unexploited. President Bush has boosted trade prospects by unblocking export credits. The Libyan police have bought Ford cars. European businessmen are coming in too. Italians are selling helicopters. France was poised this week to sign a deal to co-operate over nuclear power for civil purposes.

Yet despite having accumulated a foreign-exchange hoard worth $45 billion on annual oil sales now running at $20 billion, Libya has much the same drab, shambolic air as when diplomatic isolation, trade sanctions and centrally planned socialism prevailed. With 5.7m people, it has just one world-class hotel and only 20 cashpoint machines. No road signs, even in Arabic, show the way to Leptis Magna, a ruined Roman seaport that is but one of many ancient sites whose scale and magnificence point to a past more glorious than the present. “I met a guy who spent 15 years abroad, and he said he recognised the same potholes as when he left,” chuckles a Tripoli taxi driver, snarled in one of the rubbish-strewn capital's daily jams.

Money in, muddle out
State wages, the main income for two-thirds of the workforce, have been frozen since 1981. They average $3,000 a year, in a country with a purported GDP per head (at purchasing-power parity) of $12,000. Subsidies make up part of the shortfall: water is sold for 5% of what it costs to pipe it, petrol at 11 cents a litre, and 40% of Libyans don't bother to pay for their state-supplied electricity at all. But the meagre wages crimp disposable incomes and kill incentives to work harder. “My father never got a raise in 30 years,” claims a café waiter. “Now he's retired, he gets the same pension as his former salary.”

Huddles of Egyptian and black African labourers lurk at roadsides, hoping for clients who pay $10 a day. Yet while some 2m foreigners toil here, a fifth of the native workforce is jobless. Underemployment is an even bigger problem. A top official has reckoned that the state would function better if it shed two-thirds of its payroll.

This lack of activity hampers even the crucial energy sector. Oil production is now 1.7m barrels a day, little more than half the peak reached a year after Mr Qaddafi seized power, in 1969. The plan is to crank this up to 3m within ten years. Perfectly possible, say oil experts, except that not enough is being invested to maintain old fields, and decisions on the new ones are being taken too slowly.

Recent bidding rounds have attracted lucrative offers from scores of foreign firms, not surprising since Libyan oil tends to be high-grade and cheap to produce, and only a quarter of the country has been explored. But some firms are still haggling over details of contracts signed five years ago. In spite of huge gas reserves, Libya's power plants mostly run on diesel fuel.

In fact, it is hard to identify any institution that works well, aside from the ubiquitous security services, which have handily blocked at least a dozen coup attempts. The peculiar structure of the state lends itself to bumbling. Officials declare that their form of government is unique, reflecting the theory of direct but non-representative democracy expressed in Mr Qaddafi's 120-page “Green Book”. Every citizen is expected to join in taking decisions via “popular committees” at local, regional and national level, with powers over such things as business and building permits. But these compete with a raft of other bodies, such as “revolutionary committees” and multiple shadowy security agencies.

An annual general congress of people's committees is meant to exercise oversight. Among other things, it hires and fires both the prime minister and his cabinet, as Mr Ghanem has just found to his cost. But this proto-parliament meets for only a week a year, issuing abrupt decrees that reflect its underlying role as a sort of trade union representing entrenched bureaucratic interests. Favouritism towards Mr Qaddafi's own family, clan and tribe also complicates things. Given that laws and policies must negotiate this thicket, it is no surprise that so few get made, let alone carried out.

There are darker stories, too, of rampant corruption and other abuses. A well-known case is that of five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor sentenced to death on the monstrous charge of deliberately injecting hundreds of children with the HIV virus. They have now been reprieved, and appear likely to be freed under a complicated face-saving deal. Hundreds of Libyan dissidents have got less foreign attention, and remain in prison or exile. Last month, police in Benghazi killed a dozen protesters whose march against cartoons mocking the Prophet (an issue deliberately stoked by inflammatory coverage in the state press) turned into a riot targeting government property. Draconian laws still bar Libyans from speaking openly with foreigners, criticising the leader or setting up political parties. All foreign publications are effectively banned. But the isolation that lasted for two decades has begun to crack. Satellite dishes and the internet open windows on the world. Mr Qaddafi's second-eldest son, Seif-ul-Islam, provides a further impetus for change. Among other liberalising moves, he has hired a team of international consultants, led by Michael Porter, an economist from America's Harvard University, to detect symptoms and suggest cures. The group's hard-hitting preliminary report, out last month, got an encouragingly warm welcome.

Yet reform remains an uphill battle. It struck a new obstacle this week, when the just-concluded people's congress not only replaced Mr Ghanem with his more timid deputy but also elevated a team of grey apparatchiks to other ministries. Mr Ghanem may be happier, however, in his new post as energy boss. Even Mr Qaddafi, with all his dangerous capriciousness, must know it is only because of oil that Libya has been able to afford decades of damaging social experimentation.

A mother's voice

2006-04-07T21:08:00.000-07:00

"the so-called free world is afraid of the Muslim womb."

No, these words were not spoken by a Muslim. Nurit Peled-Elhanan is an Israeli woman whose child was killed at the age of 13 by a suicide bomber in Jerusalem (September 1997). She spoke these words to the European Parliament on International Women's Day in Strasbourg on March 18, 2006--International Women's Day.

She speaks as a mother to the world and to mothers world-wide...and she speaks like only a mother could. Taking the opportunity to speak on her own grievances, she instead drew attention to the plight of those who were not invited--Muslim women.

WOMEN
by Nurit Peled-Elhanan; March 27, 2005

Thank you for inviting me to this day.

It is always an honour and a pleasure to be here, among you.

However, I must admit I believe you should have invited a Palestinian woman at my stead, because the women who suffer most from violence in my county are the Palestinian women.

And I would like to dedicate my speech to Miriam R'aban and her husband Kamal, from Bet Lahiya in the Gaza strip, whose five small children were killed by Israeli soldiers while picking strawberries at the family's strawberry field.

No one will ever stand trial for this murder.

When I asked the people who invited me here why wouldn’t they invite a Palestinian woman the answer was that it would make the discussion too localized.

I don’t know what is non-localized violence. Racism and discrimination may be theoretical concepts and universal phenomena but their impact is always local, and real. Pain is local, humiliation, sexual abuse, torture and death, are all very local, and so are the scars.

It is true unfortunately, that the local violence inflicted on Palestinian women by the government of Israel and the Israeli army, has expanded around the globe. In fact state violence and army violence, individual and collective violence, are the lot of Muslim women today, not only in Palestine but wherever the enlightened western world is setting its big imperialistic foot.

It is violence which is hardly ever addressed and which is halfheartedly condoned by most people in Europe and in the USA.

This is because the so-called free world is afraid of the Muslim womb.

Great France of la liberte l'egalite et la fraternite is scared of little girls with head scarfs, Great Jewish Israel is afraid of the Muslim womb which its ministers call a demographic threat. Almighty America and Great Britain are infecting their respective citizens with blind fear of the Muslims, who are depicted as vile, primitive and blood-thirsty, apart from their being non-democratic, chauvinistic and mass producers of future terrorists. This in spite of the fact that the people who are destroying the world today are not muslim. One of themis a devout Christian, one is Anglican and one is a non devout Jew.

I have never experienced the suffering Palestinian women undergo every day, every hour. I don’t know the kind of violence that turn a woman's life into constant hell. This daily physical and mental torture of women who are deprived of their basic human rights and needs of privacy and dignity, women whose homes are broken in at any moment of day and night, who are ordered at a gun-point to strip naked in front of strangers and their own children, whose houses are demolished , who are deprived of their livelihood and of any normal family life. This is not part of my personal ordeal. But I am a victim of violence against women insofar as violence against children is actually violence against mothers. Palestinian, Iraqi, Afghan women are my sisters because we are all at the grip of the same unscrupulous criminals who call themselves leaders of the free enlightened world and in the name of this freedom and enlightment rob us of our children. Furthermore, Israeli, American, Italian and British mothers have been for the most part violently blinded and brainwashed to such a degree that they cannot realize their only sisters, their only allies in the world are the muslim

Palestinian, Iraqi or Afghani mothers, whose children are killed by our children or who blow themselves to pieces with our sons and daughters. They are all mind-infected by the same viruses engendered by politicians. And the viruses , though they may have various illustrious names such as Democracy. Patriotism. God. Homeland, are all the same. They are all part of false and fake ideologies that are meant to enrich the rich and to empower the powerful.

We are all the victims of mental, psychological and cultural violence that turn us to one homogenic group of bereaved or potentially bereaved mothers. Western mothers who are taught to believe their uterus is a national asset just like they are taught to believe that the Muslim uterus is an international threat. They are educated not to cry out: "I gave him birth, I breast fed him, he is mine, and I will not let him be the one whose life is cheaper than oil, whose future is less worthy than a piece of land."

All of us are terrorized by mind-infecting education to believe all we can do is either pray for our sons to come back home or be proud of their dead bodies.

And all of us were brought up to bear all this silently, to contain our fear and frustration, to take prozac for anxiety, but never hail Mama Courage in public. Never be real Jewish or Italian or Irish mothers.

I am a victim of state violence. My natural and civil rights as a mother have been violated and are violated because I have to fear the day my son would reach his 18th birthday and be taken away from me to be the game tool of criminals such as Sharon, Bush, Blair and their clan of blood-thirsty, oil-thirsty, land thirsty generals.

Living in the world I live in, in the state I live in, in the regime I live in, I don’t dare to offer Muslim women any ideas how to change their lives. I don’t want them to take off their scarves, or educate their children differently, and I will not urge them to constitute Democracies in the image of Western democracies that despise them and their kind. I just want to ask them humbly to be my sisters, to express my admiration for their perseverance and for their courage to carry on, to have children and to maintain a dignified family life in spite of the impossible conditions my world is putting them in. I want to tell them we are all bonded by the same pain, we all the victims of the same sort of violence even though they suffer much more, for they are the ones who are mistreated by my government and its army, sponsored by my taxes.

Islam in itself, like Judaism in itself and Christianity in itself, is not a threat to me or to anyone. American imperialism is, European indifference and co-operation is and Israeli racist and cruel regime of occupation is. It is racism, educational propaganda and inculcated xenophobia that convince Israeli soldiers to order Palestinian women at gun-point to strip in front of their children for security reasons, it is the deepest disrespect for the other that allow American soldiers to rape Iraqi women, that give license to Israeli jailers to keep young women in inhuman conditions, without necessary hygienic aids, without electricity in the winter, without clean water or clean mattresses and to separate them from their breast-fed babies and toddlers. To bar their way to hospitals, to block their way to education, to confiscate their lands, to uproot their trees and prevent them from cultivating their fields.

I cannot completely understand Palestinian women or their suffering. I don’t know how I would have survived such humiliation, such disrespect from the whole world. All I know is that the voice of mothers has been suffocated for too long in this war-stricken planet.

Mothers' cry is not heard because mothers are not invited to international forums such as this one. This I know and it is very little. But it is enough for me to remember these women are my sisters, and that they deserve that I should cry for them, and fight for them. And when they lose their children in strawberry fields or in on filthy roads by the checkpoints , when their children are shot on their way to school by Israeli children who were educated to believe that love and compassion are race and religion dependent, the only thing I can do is stand by them and their betrayed babies, and ask what Anna Akhmatova, another mother who lived in a regime of violence against women and children, had asked:

Why does that streak of blood, rip the petal of you cheek?

Mood down, weight up? Blame rain

2006-04-04T13:33:00.000-07:00

"More rain? We can't take any more rain."

Just a glimpse into what's been effecting my life lately:

This is what the last month has been like: rain in the morning, rain at lunch, rain at night, rain in the middle of the night, and in the early morning--you guessed it--more freakin' rain.

Colds are going around the third time, some people have more of a flu, and people are generally grumpy lately. It's been raining everyday for the last 31 days in the Bay Area, from the beginning to the end of March and starting out April with even heavier drops.

Thank goodness this article gives us an actual excuse to be SAD!

Today the sun came out from behind the clouds and I wasn't quite sure how to respond. I'm sure I got no tan, but I think I managed to get a little Vitamin D!

The local weather report is turning into a Russian novel -- endless, dark and depressing. When a recent headline in our paper read, "Two More Weeks of Rain,'' the mood of the entire Bay Area sagged.

More rain? We can't take any more rain.

This isn't rain -- the sky has sprung a slow leak. We saw at least 22 lousy days in March -- some places saw 25 -- and April's been just as lousy.

Not only has all that rain canceled sporting events, ruined outdoor wedding plans and generally made it impossible to enjoy doing anything at all outdoors, it's turned nearly everyone cranky and irritable. I called Steve Schroeder, general manager of Harding Park Golf Course to see whether the regulars were getting grumpy.

"We don't have any grumpy golfers,'' Schroeder said.

Just as I suspected. True golfers will tee off in monsoons that would have ducks wearing life vests. I was about to tell Schroeder that it would take more than a little rain to stop dedicated hackers, when he continued, "We don't have any golfers at all.''

"I was born and bred on the Peninsula," he said Monday. "I've been in the area since 1960, and I have never seen anything like this. When I got here this morning, I was almost in shock. There are always a few cars in the parking lot, but today it was just employees. I thought, 'You know what? We ought to be closed today.' ''

Because, well, what's the point? We could probably go do something, slog through a few holes of golf or break out the tire chains and drive up into the mountains, but that would take so much effort. Maybe we'll just sit here, look out the window and sigh for a while.

"Oh my God,'' Oakland's Andy Hess said in an e-mail. "The weather is making me crazy and depressed and I want to drink too much. I'm not feeling cozy at all in my fleeces and blankets and dog. I'm just cold.''

We hear you, Andy. And not just here in the Bay Area. Spring has been put on hold across the country, from floods in the Midwest to tornadoes in Tennessee. Things aren't that bad around here, but it has been no day at the beach -- unless you want to wear your rain slicker while looking for seashells.

The locals are well aware of the long, wet run. Evie Groch of El Cerrito insists she's "becoming scaly and my fingers and toes are starting to web. I notice friends of mine are going stir-crazy as well.''

Well no wonder. This steady drip, drip, drip could give a Zen master cabin fever. And here's the real news: You know that little dip in your mood? It isn't just your imagination. The rain really is getting you down.

Dr. Michael Terman, director of the Winter Depression Program at the New York State Psychiatric Institute, says there are psychological reasons for why sustained bad weather makes some people blue. He's been studying the phenomenon for 25 years and is a top expert in his field.

"To one degree or another,'' he says, "half of the population is affected by seasonal change.''

Three percent of the population will actually develop a major depressive disorder, Terman says. It's called "seasonal affective disorder," or SAD -- and boy isn't that an appropriate acronym. Although medical researchers scoffed at SAD at first, it has become a legitimate diagnosis in psychiatric circles.

Another 12 percent of the population will fight the winter doldrums, a general malaise that makes it hard to get anything done, encourages overeating and leaves people listless.

And then there is what Terman calls "the largest faction,'' the 35 percent of us who may gain five pounds during the winter and need an extra jolt of coffee to get our work done.

The culprit, Terman says, is a lack of sunlight. Our bodies are set up to calibrate our inner clock with a dose of morning sunshine.

"The brain needs this signal to be well,'' says Terman.

To keep SAD from making you sad, Terman recommends an early morning walk. Another option is light-source therapy, in which a patient is exposed to fluorescent light meant to simulate what you'd find during "a walk on the beach 40 minutes after sunrise,'' he said.

You say you aren't worried about rain on the brain? OK, how about your finances?

Two finance professors, David Hirshleifer of Ohio State and Tyler Shumway at the University of Michigan, studied 26 stock exchanges around the world in 2001. Studies have shown that suicide rates go down and tips for waiters go up on sunny days, so they wondered what effect sunshine had on stocks, Hirshleifer says.

"Our evidence suggests that when it is sunnier, the stock market will go up,'' Hirshleifer says. "In fact, on sunny days, the mean return is 25 percent. On overcast days, it is 9 percent.''

So, do we have to draw you a picture? We need some sun. But what are the chances?

"Well the 10-day outlook is very, very wet,'' says KTVU weatherman Steve Paulson. "But you know, things can turn in a day, and it can suddenly be bright and sunny.''

And what are the chances of that?

"We have nothing that shows that,'' Paulson says. "Zero.''

C.W. Nevius' column appears Tuesday and Saturday in the Bay Area section. His blog, C.W. Nevius.blog, runs daily on SFGate.com. E-mail him at cwnevius@sfchronicle.com.

Female Detention Centers in Libya .... and me

2006-03-14T23:12:00.000-08:00

It could have been me in one of these female detention centers. No, really, it could have. Not because I did anything 'wrong' but because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time and my minimal deviance was enough to land me there.

My deviance, in this instance, was asking my cousin to stop by shore at sun-set before dropping me off at home (literally 4 blocks away). He did me a favor and I almost landed us in jail. I'm thankful for getting home and I'm thankful for the experience as well.

I can never think of women in these facilities as distant from me. So I guess we are a threat to the society afterall and it wasn't all in my head.

Libya: A Threat to Society?
Arbitrary Detention of Women and Girls for “Social Rehabilitation

PDF of the full report: http://hrw.org/reports/2006/libya0206/libya0206web.pdf

Detainee 063

2006-03-08T01:49:00.000-08:00

Thanks to MB, who forwarded this article to me. I still firmly believe that Guantanamo will forever be the shame of the US and, at the same time, the best recruitment for any organization affiliated with al-Qaida.

The Torture of Detainee 063 | ReasonableReflection.net

Submitted by Charles Miller on Fri, 24 Jun 2005

Inside the Interrogation of Detainee 063
EXCLUSIVE: TO GET THE “20TH HIJACKER” TO TALK, THE U.S. USED A WIDE RANGE OF TACTICS. A SECRET LOG REVEALS THE FIRST DOCUMENTED VIEW OF HOW GITMO REALLY WORKS
By ADAM ZAGORIN, MICHAEL DUFFY FOR TIME MAGAZINE

The prisoner known around the U.S. naval station at Guantànamo Bay as Detainee 063 was a hard man to break. Defiant from the start, he told his captors that he had been in Afghanistan to pursue his love of falconry. But the young Saudi prisoner who wouldn’t talk was not just any detainee. He was Mohammed al-Qahtani, a follower of Osama bin Laden’s and the man believed by many to be the so-called 20th hijacker. He had tried to enter the U.S. in August 2001, allegedly to take part in the Sept. 11 attacks. But while Mohammed Atta, the eventual leader of the hijackers, was waiting outside in the Orlando, Fla., airport parking lot, al-Qahtani was detained inside—and then deported—by an alert immigration officer who didn’t buy his story.

More than a year later, after al-Qahtani had been captured in Afghanistan and transferred to Gitmo’s Camp X-Ray, his interrogation was going nowhere. So in late November 2002, according to an 84-page secret interrogation log obtained by TIME, al-Qahtani’s questioners switched gears. They suggested to their captive that he had been spared by Allah in order to reveal the true meaning of the Koran and help bring down bin Laden.

During a routine check of his medical condition, a sergeant approached al-Qahtani and whispered in his ear, “What is God telling you right now? Your 19 friends died in a fireball and you weren’t with them. Was that God’s choice? Is it God’s will that you stay alive to tell us about his message?” At that point, the log states, al-Qahtani threw his head back and butted the sergeant in the eye. Two MPs wrestled al-Qahtani to the ground. The sergeant crouched down next to the thrashing terrorist, who tried to spit on him. The sergeant’s response: “Go ahead and spit on me. It won’t change anything. You’re still here. I’m still talking to you and you won’t leave until you’ve given God’s message.”

The interrogation log of Detainee 063 provides the first internal look at the highly classified realm of Gitmo interrogations since the detention camp opened four years ago. Chief Pentagon spokesman Larry DiRita tells TIME that the log was compiled by various uniformed interrogators and observers on the Pentagon’s Joint Task Force at Gitmo as the interrogation proceeded. It is stamped SECRET ORCON, a military acronym for a document that is supposed to remain with the organization that created it. A Pentagon official who has seen the log describes it as the “kind of document that was never meant to leave Gitmo.”

The log reads like a night watchman’s diary. It is a sometimes shocking and often mundane hour-by-hour, even minute-by-minute account of a campaign to extract information. The log records every time al-Qahtani eats, sleeps, exercises or goes to the bathroom and every time he complies with or refuses his interrogators’ requests. The detainee’s physical condition is frequently checked by medical corpsmen—sometimes as often as three times a day— which indicates either spectacular concern about al-Qahtani’s health or persistent worry about just how much stress he can take. Although the log does not appear obviously censored, it is also plainly incomplete: there are numerous gaps in the notes about what is said and what is happening in the interrogation booth beyond details like “Detainee taken to bathroom and walked for 10 minutes.”

Despite the information gaps, the log offers a rare glimpse into the darker reaches of intelligence gathering, in which teams that specialize in extracting information by almost any means match wits and wills with men who are trained to keep quiet at almost any cost. It spans 50 days in the winter of 2002-03, from November to early January, a critical period at Gitmo, during which 16 additional interrogation techniques were approved by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld for use on a select few detainees, including al-Qahtani.

By itself, the log doesn’t make clear how effective the interrogations were. The Pentagon contends that al-Qahtani has been a valuable source of information: providing details of meetings with bin Laden, naming people and financial contacts in several Arab countries, describing terrorist training camps where bin Laden lives and explaining how he may have escaped from Tora Bora in December 2001.

Pentagon officials tell TIME that most of the intelligence gleaned from those sessions was recorded in other documents. But the interrogation log gives a rare window into the techniques used by the U.S. military, suggesting at least in this case that disclosures were sometimes obtained not when al-Qahtani was under duress but when his handlers eased up on him.

The case of Detainee 063 is sure to add fire to the superheated debate about the use of American power in the age of terrorism. The U.S. has been criticized for mistreating Gitmo prisoners and denying their rights at a facility Amnesty International has controversially called the “gulag of our time.” Along with lawmakers and human-rights groups, former President Jimmy Carter has called on Washington officials to shut the camp down. Even President George W. Bush told Fox News last week that his Administration was exploring alternatives to the detention center.

How should a democratic nation proceed when it captures a high-value prisoner like al-Qahtani, when unlocking a mind might save lives? Experts acknowledge that brute torture generally doesn’t work because a person will say anything to stop the pain. So what, exactly, is effective? And when do the ends justify the means?

From the moment Mohammed al-Qahtani stepped off a Virgin Atlantic flight in Orlando back in August 2001, immigration officials noticed something troubling about him. He had arrived on a one-way ticket yet carried only $2,800 in cash, barely enough to buy his return. When an official pressed him for details about his destination, al-Qahtani was hostile and evasive. With an interpreter’s help, the immigration agent questioned al-Qahtani for 90 min. and then sent him packing. Al-Qahtani’s parting words: “I’ll be back.”

From London, al-Qahtani made his way to the United Arab Emirates and then to Afghanistan to fight against the U.S. He was captured fleeing Tora Bora in December 2001. When he was shipped to GuantÃ¡namo two months later, officials had not yet realized he was the presumed 20th hijacker. For weeks, he refused to give his name. But in July 2002, the feds matched his fingerprints to those of the man who had been deported from Orlando and marked him for intensive interrogation. Al-Qahtani, explains Pentagon spokesman DiRita, was “a particularly well-placed, well-connected terrorist who was believed capable of unlocking an enormous amount of specific and general insights into 9/11, al-Qaeda operations and ongoing planning for future attacks.” But the initial questioning by the FBI went poorly. “We were getting nothing from him,” a senior Pentagon official says. “He had been trained to resist direct questioning. And what works in a Chicago police precinct doesn’t work in war.”

That’s where things stood in late November 2002, when the log obtained by TIME begins. At that point, tag teams of interrogators are putting al-Qahtani through a daily routine designed to drain the detainee of his autonomy. They wake him every morning at 4 and sometimes question him until midnight. Each day—and sometimes every hour—is shaped around standard Army interrogation techniques, with code names like Fear Up/Harsh, Pride/Ego Down, the Futility Approach and the Circumstantial Evidence Theme. Each day, the interrogators seem to be trying to find those that work best. They promise better treatment; they show him pictures of 9/11 victims, particularly children and the elderly. They talk about God’s will and al-Qahtani’s guilt. They tell him that he failed on his mission and hint that other comrades have been captured and are talking about his role in the plot. They play on his emotions, saying he should talk if he ever wants to see his family or friends or homeland again.

For days, al-Qahtani stonewalls his handlers and maintains that he went to the U.S. to get into the used-car business. “You are working with the devil,” he tells his captors. The interrogators respond by forcing him to stand or sit immobile on a metal chair. He tries to deflect questions about where he went in Afghanistan with answers apparently drawn directly from an al-Qaeda handbook, given to terrorists, about how to resist interrogations. When al-Qahtani resorts to a handbook answer, his handlers reply that it amounts to another admission of guilt.

Yet in other ways, al-Qahtani emerges as an innocent abroad—uneducated, almost from another era. He asks whether the sun revolves around the earth. He wonders about dinosaurs and is told of their history and demise. He confides that he would like to marry someday—apparently not realizing how unlikely that goal now is.

The first break in al-Qahtani ‘s facade comes with a long-delayed call of nature. When a hunger strike he has launched fizzles, he starts refusing water. That becomes a battle of wills—and teeth. Al-Qahtani quickly becomes so dehydrated that medical corpsmen forcibly administer fluids by IV drip. He tries to fight them off with his hands and is restrained. Another time, al-Qahtani tries to rip the IV needle out; when he is cuffed to his chair, he turns his head and bites the IV line completely in two. He is then strapped down and given an undisclosed amount of fluids. An hour or so later, around 9:40 a.m., al-Qahtani tells his guards that he would be willing to talk if he is allowed to urinate. The log notes he is given 3 1/2 bags of IV fluid. He starts to moan and asks again to be allowed to relieve himself. Yes, but first he must answer questions:

Interrogator: Who do you work for?

Al-Qahtani: Al-Qaeda

Interrogator: Who was your leader?

Al-Qahtani: Osama bin Laden

Interrogator: Why did you go to Orlando?

Al-Qahtani: I wasn’t told the mission

Interrogator: Who was with you on the plane?

Al-Qahtani: I was by myself

That answer frustrates the interrogator—You’re wasting my time, he says—and when al-Qahtani requests his promised bathroom break, he is told to go in his pants. Humiliatingly, he does. The log notes 30 minutes later, “He is beginning to understand the futility of his situation . . . He is much closer to compliance and cooperation than at the beginning of the operation.”

But things appear to move slowly after that. It is not clear from the log’s terse entries that increased pressure is leading to new disclosures. The interrogators keep juggling techniques—giving extra sleep some days, offering a home-cooked Arab meal on another (al-Qahtani refuses it). Later that day, when a video of the destruction of the Twin Towers is played, al-Qahtani becomes so violent, he has to be restrained. “We can’t say, Because we did this, we got that,” a senior Pentagon official says. “If we did know what worked, we’d know exactly which pressure points to apply and when.” Even al-Qahtani seems to understand that: “If you interrogate me in the right way and the right position,” he taunts his questioners, “you might find some answers.”

A secondary battle appears to be under way over Ramadan. At various points during the Muslim holy month, al-Qahtani claims to be either on a hunger strike, refusing all food and water, or fasting during daylight hours, as Ramadan requires. According to the log, the interrogators tell al-Qahtani he cannot pray—a religious obligation—unless he disregards another by accepting water. So he declines to pray.

Al-Qahtani’s resilience under pressure in the fall of 2002 led top officials at Gitmo to petition Washington for more muscular “counter resistance strategies.” On Dec. 2, Rumsfeld approved 16 of 19 stronger coercive methods. Now the interrogators could use stress strategies like standing for prolonged periods, isolation for as long as 30 days, removal of clothing, forced shaving of facial hair, playing on “individual phobias” (such as dogs) and “mild, non-injurious physical contact such as grabbing, poking in the chest with the finger and light pushing.” According to the log, al-Qahtani experienced several of those over the next five weeks. The techniques Rumsfeld balked at included “use of a wet towel or dripping water to induce the misperception of suffocation.” “Our Armed Forces are trained,” a Pentagon memo on the changes read, “to a standard of interrogation that reflects a tradition of restraint.” Nevertheless, the log shows that interrogators poured bottles of water on al-Qahtani’s head when he refused to drink. Interrogators called this game “Drink Water or Wear It.”

After the new measures are approved, the mood in al-Qahtani’s interrogation booth changes dramatically. The interrogation sessions lengthen. The quizzing now starts at midnight, and when Detainee 063 dozes off, interrogators rouse him by dripping water on his head or playing Christina Aguilera music. According to the log, his handlers at one point perform a puppet show “satirizing the detainee’s involvement with al-Qaeda.” He is taken to a new interrogation booth, which is decorated with pictures of 9/11 victims, American flags and red lights. He has to stand for the playing of the U.S. national anthem. His head and beard are shaved. He is returned to his original interrogation booth. A picture of a 9/11 victim is taped to his trousers. Al-Qahtani repeats that he will “not talk until he is interrogated the proper way.” At 7 a.m. on Dec. 4, after a 12-hour, all-night session, he is put to bed for a four-hour nap.

Over the next few days, al-Qahtani is subjected to a drill known as Invasion of Space by a Female, and he becomes especially agitated by the close physical presence of a woman. Then, around 2 p.m. on Dec. 6, comes another small breakthrough. He asks his handlers for some paper. “I will tell the truth,” he says. “I am doing this to get out of here.” He finally explains how he got to Afghanistan in the first place and how he met with bin Laden. In return, the interrogators honor requests from him to have a blanket and to turn off the air conditioner. Soon enough, the pressure ratchets up again. Various strategies of intimidation are employed anew. The log reveals that a dog is present, but no details are given beyond a hazy reference to a disagreement between the military police and the dog handler. Agitated, al-Qahtani takes back the story he told the day before about meeting bin Laden.

But a much more serious problem develops on Dec. 7: a medical corpsman reports that al-Qahtani is becoming seriously dehydrated, the result of his refusal to take water regularly. He is given an IV drip, and a doctor is summoned. An unprecedented 24-hour time out is called, but even as al-Qahtani is put under a doctor’s care, music is played to “prevent detainee from sleeping.” Nine hours later, a medical corpsman checks al-Qahtani’s pulse and finds it “unusually slow.” An electrocardiogram is administered by a doctor, and after al-Qahtani is transferred to a hospital, a CT scan is performed. A second doctor is consulted. Al-Qahtani’s heartbeat is regular but slow: 35 beats a minute. He is placed in isolation and hooked up to a heart monitor.

The next day, a radiologist is flown in from Roosevelt Roads Naval Air Station in Puerto Rico, 600 miles away, to read the CT scan. The log reports, “No anomalies were found.” Nonetheless, al-Qahtani is given an ultrasound for blood clots. For the first time since the log began, al-Qahtani is given an entire day to sleep. The next evening, the log reports that his medical “checks are all good.” Al-Qahtani is “hooded, shackled and restrained in a litter” and transported back to Camp X-Ray in an ambulance.

Over the next month, the interrogators experiment with other tactics. They strip-search him and briefly make him stand nude. They tell him to bark like a dog and growl at pictures of terrorists. They hang pictures of scantily clad women around his neck. A female interrogator so annoys al-Qahtani that he tells his captors he wants to commit suicide and asks for a crayon to write a will. At one stage, an Arabic-speaking serviceman, posing as a fellow detainee, is brought to Camp X-Ray for a short stay in an effort to gain al-Qahtani’s confidence. The log reports that al-Qahtani makes several comments to interrogators that imply he has a big story to tell, but interrogators report that he seems either too scared or simply unwilling, to tell it. On Jan. 10, 2003, al-Qahtani says he knows nothing of terrorists but volunteers to return to the gulf states and act as a double agent for the U.S. in exchange for his freedom. Five days later, Rumsfeld’s harsher measures are revoked after military lawyers in Washington raised questions about their use and efficacy.

It’s unclear how al-Qhatani’s interrogation proceeded from that point and whether it is still continuing. Senior Pentagon officials told TIME that some of his most valuable confessions came not during the period covered in the log or as a result of any particular technique but when al-Qahtani was presented with evidence coughed up by others in detention, especially Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, or KSM, the alleged mastermind of 9/11. The intelligence take was more cumulative than anything else, says a Pentagon official. Once al-Qahtani realized KSM was talking, the official speculates, al-Qahtani may have felt he had the green light to follow suit.

Al-Qahtani has never been charged with a crime, has no lawyer and remains in detention at Guantanamo. But his case is already the subject of several probes in Washington. A year ago, a senior FBI counterterrorism official wrote the Pentagon complaining of abuses that FBI agents said they witnessed at the naval base. The agents reported seeing or hearing of “highly aggressive interrogation techniques.” The letter singles out the treatment of al-Qahtani in September and October of 2002—before the log obtained by TIME begins—saying a dog was used “in an aggressive manner to intimidate Detainee #63.” The FBI letter said al-Qahtani had been “subjected to intense isolation for over three months” and “was evidencing behavior consistent with extreme psychological trauma (talking to non existent people, reporting hearing voices, crouching in a cell covered with a sheet for hours on end).” The Justice Department and the Pentagon have opened separate investigations into the charges. A Pentagon official tells TIME he expects that many of those charges will prove to be unfounded.

Interrogators eventually compelled al-Qahtani to focus on his fellow detainees at Guantanamo. In that process, he implicated more than 20 other Gitmo prisoners as members of al-Qaeda or associates of bin Laden’s, according to the Los Angeles Times. A military board has since used al-Qahtani’s identification as a factor in prolonging the detention of some of them. Whether he has won more favorable treatment in return for his cooperation is unknown. But at least one of those he named, a Yemeni, is now claiming in a U.S. federal court that al-Qahtani’s statements about him are unreliable because they “appear to have been obtained by the use of torture.”

President Bush has said the U.S. would apply principals consistent with the Geneva Conventions to “unlawful combatants,” subject to military necessity, at Guantanamo and elsewhere. The Pentagon argues that al-Qahtani’s treatment was always “humane.” But the Geneva Conventions forbid any “outrage on personal dignity.” Eric Freedman, a constitutional-law expert and consultant in some of the growing number of federal lawsuits challenging U.S. treatment of these detainees, says, “If the techniques described in this interrogation log are not outrages to personal dignity, then words have no meaning.” Then again, in the war on terrorism, the personal dignity of a fanatic trained for mass murder may be an inevitable casualty. —With reporting by Brian Bennett, Timothy J. Burger, Sally B. Donnelly and Viveca Novak/Washington

The Geopolitics of Sexual Frustration

2006-03-07T01:41:00.000-08:00

Gender imbalance experiment ala Asia. sexist birthing practices apparently have even worse consequences than women looking for love elsewhere. Se la vie, as they say.

So while many were all too focused on Taliban style oppression of women (a focus I do NOT disagree with except for its sensationalism), female infanticide went right under most of our radars with hardly a word. Interesting. Very Interesting.

“In 2020 it may seem to China that it would be worth it to have a very bloody battle in which a lot of their young men could die in some glorious cause.”

"More likely, the organized crime networks that traffic in women will shift their deliveries toward Asia and build a brothel culture large enough to satisfy millions of sexually frustrated young men."

So what will it be? War, crime, or prostitution that will solve this problem? Read the rest for the full story.

The Geopolitics of Sexual Frustration

By Martin Walker

March/April 2006

Asia has too many boys. They can’t find wives, but they just might find extreme nationalism instead. It’s a dangerous imbalance for a region already on edge.

The lost boys of Prof. Albert Macovski are upon us. Twenty years ago, the ultrasound scanning machine came into widespread use in Asia. The invention of Macovski, a Stanford University researcher, the device quickly gave pregnant women a cheap and readily available means to determine the sex of their unborn children. The results, by the million, are now coming to maturity in Bangladesh, China, India, and Taiwan. By choosing to give birth to males—and to abort females—millions of Asian parents have propelled the region into an extraordinary experiment in the social effects of gender imbalance.

Back in 1990, Nobel Prize-winning Indian economist Amartya Sen was one of the first to call attention to the phenomenon of an estimated 100 million “missing women” in Asia. Nearly everywhere else, women outnumber men, in Europe by 7 percent, and in North America by 3.4 percent. Concern now is shifting to the boys for whom these missing females might have provided mates as they reach the age that Shakespeare described as nothing but stealing and fighting and “getting of wenches with child.”

Now there are too few wenches. Thanks in large part to the introduction of the ultrasound machine, Mother Nature’s usual preference for about 105 males to 100 females has grown to around 120 male births for every 100 female births in China. The imbalance is even higher in some locales—136 males to 100 females on the island of Hainan, an increasingly prosperous tourist resort, and 135 males to 100 females in central China’s Hubei Province. Similar patterns can be found in Taiwan, with 119 boys to 100 girls; Singapore, 118 boys to 100 girls; South Korea, 112 boys to 100 girls; and parts of India, 120 boys to 100 girls.

China, India, and other nations have outlawed the use of prenatal diagnostic techniques to select the sex of an unborn child. But bribery and human ingenuity have made it easy for prospective parents to skirt the law; a suitably compensated ultrasound technician need only smile or frown at the expectant mother.

Many of the excess boys will be poor and rootless, a lumpenproletariat without the consolations of sexual partners and family. Prostitution, sex tourism, and homosexuality may ease their immediate urges, but Asian societies are witnessing far more dramatic solutions. Women now risk being kidnapped and forced not only into prostitution but wedlock. Chinese police statistics recorded 65,236 arrests for female trafficking in 1990–91 alone. Updated numbers are hard to come by, but it’s apparent that the problem remains severe. In September 2002, a Guangxi farmer was executed for abducting and selling more than 100 women for $120 to $360 each. Mass sexual frustration is thus adding a potent ingredient to an increasingly volatile regional cocktail of problems that include surging economic growth, urbanization, drug abuse, and environmental degradation.

Understanding the effect of the testosterone overload may be most important in China, the rising Asian superpower. Prompted by expert warnings, the Chinese authorities are already groping for answers. In 2004, President Hu Jintao asked 250 of the country’s senior demographers to study whether the country’s one-child policy—which sharply accentuates the preference for males—should be revised. Beijing expects that it may have as many as 40 million frustrated bachelors by 2020. The regime, always nervous about social control, fears that they might generate social and political instability.

Brigham Young University political scientist Valerie Hudson—the leading scholar on the phenomenon of male overpopulation in Asia—sees historical evidence for these concerns. In 19th-century northern China, drought, famine, and locust invasions apparently provoked a rash of female infanticide. According to Hudson, the region reached a ratio of 129 men to every 100 women. Roving young men organized themselves into bandit gangs, built forts, and eventually came to rule an area of some 6 million people in what was known as the Nien Rebellion. No modern-day rebellion appears to be on the horizon, but China watchers are already seeing signs of growing criminality.

The state’s response to crime and social unrest could prove to be a defining factor for China’s political future. The CIA asked Hudson to discuss her dramatic suggestion that “in 2020 it may seem to China that it would be worth it to have a very bloody battle in which a lot of their young men could die in some glorious cause.” Other experts aren’t so alarmed. Military observers point out that China is moving from a conscription army to a leaner, professional military. And other scholars contend that China’s population is now aging so fast that the elderly may well balance the surge of frustrated young males to form a calmer and more peaceful nation.

It would be reassuring to assume that China’s economic growth will itself solve the problem, as prosperity removes the traditional economic incentives for poor peasants to have sons who can work the land rather than daughters who might require costly dowries. But the numbers don’t support that theory. Indeed, the steepest imbalance between male and female infants is found in more prosperous regions, such as Hainan Island. And census data from India suggest that slum-dwellers and the very poor tend to raise a higher proportion of female children than more prosperous families.

The long-term implications of the gender imbalance are largely guesswork because there is no real precedent for imbalances on such a scale. Some Chinese experts speculate, off the record, that there might be a connection between the shortage of women and the spread of open gay life since 2001, when homosexuality was deleted from the official Classification of Mental Disorders. It is possible to dream up all kinds of scenarios: Mumbai and Shanghai may soon rival San Francisco as gay capitals. A Beijing power struggle between cautious old technocrats and aggressive young nationalists may be decided by mobs of rootless young men, demanding uniforms, rifles, and a chance to liberate Taiwan. More likely, the organized crime networks that traffic in women will shift their deliveries toward Asia and build a brothel culture large enough to satisfy millions of sexually frustrated young men.

Whatever the outcome, the consequences of Albert Macovski’s useful invention will be with us for some time. When they called him “the most inventive person at Stanford,” they didn’t know the half of it.
-----
Martin Walker is editor of United Press International, and senior fellow of the World Policy Institute at the New School University in New York.

Cartoon Reason

2006-03-05T23:36:00.000-08:00

I was hoping that if I ignored it long enough, this controversy over the Danish cartoons would go away—or at least not get so annoying. Sad to say, I was wrong. The topic creeps into conversations with Muslims and non-Muslims alike and seems to be the latest installment to the inflammatory and pathetically small minded ‘Why do they hate us?’ paradigm for both sides.

And it works in this argument…. It’s ammunition for both sides that’d rather simply antagonize the other. For some Muslims, it typifies and in fact proves the non-Muslim West’s indignation of Islam (I say non-Muslim because the Muslim Civilization is in fact a western civilization contrary to common perceptions); for some non-Muslims, the response of small groups in various countries and those governments’ appeasement proves beyond a reasonable doubt the intolerance of Muslims throughout the world—indeed it’s actually Islam that is now justifiably seen as intolerant (Sullivan article in TIME). For media opportunists, it makes for great media and self-promotion (again, on all sides).

But let’s just be honest about what’s going on here. Let’s call a spade a spade: This has turned into an over masculinized school yard fight where those fanning the flames don’t want to hear the voice of reason—let’s just agree that this is no longer about the freedom of speech or the blasphemy of depicting the prophet. It’s about something else at this point and frankly I’m sick of trying to figure it out on a case to case basis because not all the motives of fueling the flame are the same here. The voices in the middle of this mess—you know, the ones that actually just want peace of mind that includes peace in the world—are hardly sought after and then not really amplified. Let’s face it; the kid that tries to break up the fight in the school yard is likely to get hurt. Why? Because everyone likes a fight and because he/she is ruining the fun. Fine, but let’s be conscious of this.

One thing that is clear to me is that this is a test to the core. The test is for the mindful and those searching for some kind of worldly peace. It’s about whether, when shit hits the fan, you can still sincerely take the tougher route of understanding and even better reach out when everything tells you not to. Yes, this is an opportunity—but it’s also an opportunity to discover what we really stand for and believe. It’s an opportunity to stare fear in the face and call it for what it is rather than projecting this onto other people elsewhere to make ourselves feel better.

Yes, there are fundamentalists who have taken this opportunity to call for deaths. It’s nothing new, given the cases of Naguib Mahfouz (shot, but lived), Nawal El Saadawi (fatwa), Rushdie (fatwa), Van Gough (killed), and others. What is new is that now non-Arab, non-Muslim media is paying attention. What’s also new is that governments of Muslim countries are now a little more sensitive to the outrage of their citizens, and rightfully so. Now, their citizens have an idea of what kind of hell could be made of their countries if the US and allies felt so inclined to invade—and the response is an adamant rejection.

In fact, I kind of think the response to the Muslim response has been ideologically fundamentalist, but that’s a side thought. It’s primarily been provocative, for reasons I don’t yet fully understand. I think media sensationalism and solidarity are two major reason—if you can create a story by re-publishing a cartoon in support of a tenet of your own profession (whether or not you actually act on that tenet), then why not do it? But if freedom of expression is really at the bottom of this, where’s the outrage about the war on media and media complacency since 9/11?

The voice of reason I’ve found as someone raised Muslim in the US is Hamza Yusuf of the Zaytuna Institute. He’s an American convert to Islam with a powerful voice, refreshing insight, and an ability to articulate his experience and opinion clearly. He’s the kid that’s likely to get hurt, but has the courage to speak truth no matter how disinterested the world is. Below is a video to his interview on Deadline (a Danish TV news program)

Hamza Yusuf of the Zaytuna Institute:

I hope that this issue can be put to rest soon. In my opinion, there are more important things to pay attention to, but as someone who values democracy, the people have definitely spoken to this issue. The raw nerve has been exposed, and I'm not intersted in burying it... but let's really understand. What the hell is going on?

China's Muslims

2006-02-19T21:04:00.000-08:00

Attempt 3 to post!

Thanks to Programmer Craig's comment to a previous post, I was pressed to do a little research on Muslims in China. In the past, I'd been curious about Sino-Arabic/Muslim relations, but hadn't done much research on the subject until tonight.

I remember that when I lived in Libya, there was a movement of young men going to China to buy products to sell in Libya. I believe this is called suit-case trade and, aside from the alure of inexpensive Chinese products, is one of the black markets created under both sanctions and Libya's previously tightly controlled economic policies. I also remember the suit-case merchants saying that all they could eat was tuna because they were disgusted with Chinese food...a statement which confused me quite a bit. Who doesn't like Chinese food?

Flipansy aside, I also know that about two years ago, the League of Arab States indicated that they were beginning to look eastward. This is expected given that economic trends are moving east, especially as the petrolium trade is concerned. However, I'd always looked at it from an international relations point of view, as an outsider considering state relations without looking into the internal linkages.

So I thank PC for leading me to look into this further because I've discovered quite a few interesting facts about the internal linkages of in terms of the Chinese Muslim (or Muslim Chinese) population and status.

First off, apparently Islam reached China in the 7th century BC. And while China's infamous Cultural Revolution and its anti-religion policies lead most of us to believe that religious identities are likely to be obsolete in China, China technically liberalized religiously (usually an oxy-moron) in 1978.

Never mainstream

"Historically, Islam has been in China since the Tang Dynasty (618-907CE) but it was never mainstream. There was never a Muslim emperor and Confucian thought was the dominant cultural force," Feng Jinyuan, an Islamic specialist with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said.

Jonathon Lipman, author of several works on China's Muslims, says: "Conversions to Islam have been few and far between." In part this appears to be because when people are looking for religion, they are looking for wider cultural associations.

The provinces of western China where Islam is prevalent also happen to be the nation's poorest, while Christianity, which is now being practised in various forms by a wide range of social classes, is linked to the West.

"At present Christianity is far more appealing because of its association with modernity, Europe and America," says Lipman.

According to the New York Times February 19, 2006 article, Chinese Muslims number at 21 million—that’s about 1.6% of a 1.3 billion population—approximately the number of Europe’s Muslim population and comparable to Iraq’s entire population. And they have their own internal fighting, though the offensive of the cartoons found a common factor:

Dru C. Gladney, a leading Western scholar on Chinese Muslims, said the country's 10 Muslim nationalities usually find common cause only when they feel an issue denigrates Islam, as was the case with the cartoons. Sometimes, disputes between different factions can end in violence. Mr. Gladney said the largest group, the Hui, regard some Uighurs as unpatriotic separatists who give other Chinese Muslims a bad name. The Hui, he said, have blended fairly well into society by placing pragmatism over religious zeal and adopting the low profile of an immigrant group living in a foreign land — despite their presence in China for more than 1,300 years.

While they are marginalized as well as other ideologies that compete with the government’s, they do seem to make themselves heard. This is most likely helped in part by the Chinese government’s formal recognition of Islam as a major religion in China:

"They don't tend to get too involved in international Islamic conflict," said Mr. Gladney, a professor of Asian studies at the University of Hawaii. "They don't want to be branded as radical Muslims."

Yet Chinese Muslims should not be considered completely housebroken by authoritarian rule. Since the seventh century, when Islam began arriving in China along trading routes, there have been periodic Muslim revolts. Under the Communist Party, Muslim rage, if mostly contained on international issues, has erupted over localized affronts.

Large protests broke out in 1989. Muslims took to the streets to denounce a book that described minarets as phallic symbols and compared pilgrimages to Mecca with orgies. Government officials, who allowed the protests, quickly banned the book and even held a book burning.

A few years ago, thousands of Muslims protested in various cities after a pig's head was nailed to the door of a mosque in Henan Province. And last year, riots erupted after Hui from all over central China rushed to the aid of a Muslim involved in a traffic dispute.

Final analysis is this so far:
Yes, Muslims do exist in China—a whole lot of ‘em too. They are an extreme minority and politically marginalized as would be expected under any super centralized regime. According to one of the articles (I tried to look for which but am worried that my computer will shut down again—I can find it again in the future), there have been more Chinese Muslims going to the mosque than prior to 9/11. There is definitely a reaching out to Middle Eastern Muslims by Chinese Muslims, a trend which I believe will be interesting in the future.

Economic trends lead eastward as Asian nations industrialize (have industrialized and continue to do so) and make up more of the petroleum consuming market. If economic power is as fungible as it has proved to be in the past, then it seems important to me, as one interested in Middle Eastern politics, to pay attention to a region that is already a major player and will likely grow. Petroleum producing nations gained power in the last 50 years due to the west’s industrial needs and were influenced by western ideals as a result of such tight relations. So what now? What direction will this take us?

Light at the End of the Tunnel ala Justic Collins

2006-02-19T18:38:00.000-08:00

America's idea of what constitutes torture "doesn't appear to coincide with that of most civilized countries"
--UK Justice Collins

For anyone following the Deghayes case, Justice Collins has recently given the three British residents held in Guantanamo approval to seek the intervention of the British Foreign Secretary on their behalf. Allegations of torture factored into his decision, he claims.

Justice Collins warns that his decision is no guarantee for the prisoners. I say his decision is a guarantee that reason and human compassion can see take us beyond propaganda and that sometimes the right decision, no matter how difficult or un-PC, can be made.

Guardian Unlimited
Thursday February 16, 2006

Three British residents detained at Guantánamo Bay were today given the go-ahead to seek a high court order requiring the foreign secretary, Jack Straw, to press the US for their release.

The three detainees involved in the case are not British citizens but were long-term residents in the UK before their detention at the US naval base in Cuba.

Mr Justice Collins, a high court judge in London, said that a factor in his ruling today was that there were allegations of torture at the detention facility.

The judge's decision came after a day-long hearing during which he commented that America's idea of what constituted torture "is not the same as ours and doesn't appear to coincide with that of most civilised countries".

Mr Justice Collins has a reputation for making controversial remarks and his pronouncements from the treatment of Gypsies to laws on terrorism and immigration have brought howls of disapproval from both Conservative and Labour politicians.

He said the men and their families living in the UK had an arguable case that the British government was under an obligation to act on their behalf.

However, the judge stressed his decision was "no guarantee" that the three men, Bisher al-Rawi, Jamil el-Banna and Omar Deghayes, and their families, would win their case. There were formidable arguments against them, the judge said.

His remarks today coincided with a UN report which urged that the Guantánamo facility should be shut down and called on the US government to refrain from any practice "amounting to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment".

After the judge's decision today, the full case against Mr Straw is expected to be heard in mid-March.

Nine British citizens who had been detained at Guantánamo Bay have all been flown back to the UK and released without charge. The British government pushed Washington to secure the release of the Britons - and human rights groups have called for the same pressure to be exerted by the UK over long term UK residents.

Gareth Peirce, the solicitor for the three men, said after today's hearing: "After so many years of such bitter disappointment, this is the first ray of light that we have had - the first ability to hope that this might be the beginning of the end for the ordeal of these three families."

Earlier, Rabinder Singh QC, for the men and their families, had told the judge the case arose out of what had been described by a law lord as the "utter lawlessness at Guantánamo Bay", where people were being detained indefinitely without trial.

Mr Rawi, 37, an Iraqi national who had lived in Britain since 1985, and his Jordanian business partner Mr Banna, who was granted refugee status in 2000, were detained three years ago in Gambia - "far from any theatre of war", said Mr Singh.

They were alleged to have been associated with al-Qaida through their connection with the radical Muslim cleric Abu Qatada.

Mr Singh said Mr Rawi's contact with Qatada was "expressly approved and encouraged by British intelligence" to whom he supplied information about the cleric.

The judge was told that intelligence operatives assured Mr Rawi that, should he run into trouble, they would intervene and assist him. But the British government was subsequently unwilling to make material available to him when a hearing on his case was held at Guantánamo Bay, the QC said.

Mr Banna was said to have been in possession of "a homemade electronic device" at the time of his arrest. It was, in fact, a battery charger bought from Argos and cleared by the UK authorities before he went to Gambia.

Mr Deghayes was detained in Pakistan. His name was said to be on the FBI's "most wanted" list. But the photograph in his file was of a "totally different individual", said Mr Singh.

Mr Justice Collins was told that Mr Deghayes had been rendered virtually blind in one eye by the use of pepper spray and the gouging of his eye during his detention, yet was still being constantly subjected to high light levels.

The government's counsel, Philip Sales, said the foreign secretary had already decided to reconsider Mr Rawi's case because of its particular circumstances. His argument that permission should not be granted in the other cases because the detainees did not have British nationality was rejected by Mr Justice Collins.

Ten die in Libya--cartoon clash

2006-02-18T21:12:00.000-08:00

Not much time to comment now, but I will say that I'm curious about this. Libya doesn't protect the right to assembly so I'm not sure how this BBC NEWS | World | Africa | Ten die in Libya cartoon clash">rioting happened, who was behind this, okayed it or what. This whole thing has gotten much bigger than I could ever have expected... strange thing is that everyone I talk to says that. One of my brothers at least is joining in the boycott, but I haven't heard of anyone here protesting yet.

Last I read, Denmark has lost about $5 million in exports to the Middle East. By now, this is probably old news in the blogosphere, but I'm still stuck in the moment of surprise.

And now with the new pictures coming out from Abu Ghraib, where does the rioting go? Or is it more safe politically to riot and protest about cartoons than it is about reality? I don't recall any riots breaking out involving the killing of Muslims by Muslims when the Iraq was invaded.... so what gives?

(Then again, why is Australia releasing the photos now and why am I hearing rumors about China enforcing their child-birth limitations laws on Muslims suddenly)

I'm still trying to make sense of it. My spidey-sense so far is telling me that something fishy is going on--and not in the yummy hut miggly (fried fish) kind of way.

Lone Highlander has a great post on this that everyone should check out.

More on this later...

Traveling

2006-02-05T10:13:00.000-08:00

I'll be traveling until Wednesday... and then I'll just be jet lagged. I came out to New York for a conference so I decided to visit family in DC as well. Can you believe that the weather is better here than in California?

Anyways, I don't know if I'll have internet access (or time) when I get back to NY so I'll update a bit later. Since I'm not at all familiar with NY, please feel free to suggest places to go and things to see. And wish me luck!

ss

Danish Cartoons

2006-01-31T00:23:00.000-08:00

Wow...All hell broke loose in a couple of days! I spent a bit of time searching online for the comics that caused the mayhem and finally found--guess what--a BLOG with the cartoons (link is at the bottom of this post).

I won't go into analysis at this point because I'm just beginning to discover the problem. However, I will say that so far, I do have a glimpse of both sides. KW's depiction of any Muslim, whether it was supposed to be Mohammed or otherwise, is very much reminiscent of Orientalist depictions of bushy haired Muslim/Arab men...the type that old movies portray. The fact of the Shahada (declaration of belief) on the front of canon ball with a lit stem isn't good. Aside from the image itself being out-dated as an attack on Arabs (unless this is actually the point), it is a provocative image.

BUT as a proponent of free speech and free dialogue, I'm at a loss as to how to react to the reaction. Maybe I don't get it. I just don't think that one obviously negative representation of the Prophet is worth a death warrant or several. I have a feeling (can't know since I can't translate the comics) that more than that particular cartoon are the source of the outrage.

We Muslims, whether culturally or belief based, might want to take a careful look at these depictions to really learn how people see us and our beliefs--and really, this is no defense of DW. Denmark is the only country I know of that actually has social programs, directed by Muslims, that actually assist second generation Muslims in negotiating with where their families come from and where they are. I don't see this as docile, as many seem to be describing the Danish. I think it's fierce.

The Cartoons:
PBS Watch: Farenheit 451 Alert

Blog Pestering Pop-ups

2006-01-28T17:35:00.000-08:00

Is anyone else experiencing an excess of pop-ups when visiting my blog or is it just me? It began ever since I hit one of those nasty poster id's on my tag board... but it happens on any computer I check my blog from.

If you've had this problem or know of it at all, PLEASE share here.

ss

getting hot in Palestine...

2006-01-27T10:06:00.000-08:00

Alright, most readers of this blog probably already know the results of the Palestinian elections. But then I walked into our studios this morning to find a television screen showing a Fatah rally in Gaza, of all places! ay-ay-ay!

This raises so many things for me: the dynamics between countries in international relations; the right-ward political shift that seems to be taking hold and spreading throughout Europe, the US, and the Middle East; the slow chipping away of a universal secular political dialogue and its replacement by one more divisive, more rigid, and much easier to co-opt.

I really hope I'm over reacting on this. I just fear I'm not. I have that feeling in my gut again and it's creeping into my throat. (Then again, the throat constriction could be a result of meeting James Yee this morning--the former Muslim Chaplin at Guantanamo).

The last thing I want to see is fragmentation among Palestinians, but then Political Islamic parties also make me a bit nervous--quite nervous actually. I apologize if I offend any readers' sensibilities about that, but I can't lie about it. I'll discuss if anyone is interested. Finally, I do have faith in Palestinians' solidarity. That, at least, I can hold onto.

Hamas to talk 'partnership'
Friday 27 January 2006, 15:58 Makka Time, 12:58 GMT

A senior member of Hamas says he will meet Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian President, in the coming days to discuss forming a "political partnership".

Ismail Haniya, who led Hamas to its surprise win in Wednesday's parliamentary election, made the announcement as Abbas himself said he would be asking Hamas to form a new Palestinian government.

"I have not asked anybody so far to form the government but we are leading towards contacts and consultations with all the blocs in parliament," Abbas told reporters on Friday.

"Of course, I am going to ask the majority party to form the government," he added.

Clashes

His comments came amid reports of clashes between supporters of Hamas and followers of Abbas's Fatah party, the former ruling power which was dramatically swept out in Wednesday's poll.

According to reports, the rival gangs exchanged gunfire in the town of Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, leaving at least two people injured.

Amid worries that such clashes may escalate, Haniya's call for a partnership has been seen by some as an effort to heal rifts after Hamas's shock victory by building a government of national unity.

Hamas won 76 out of the 132 seats in parliament in Wednesday's election, thrashing Abbas's previously dominant Fatah faction which won only 43 seats.

With Middle East peace diplomacy in limbo, Israel has ruled out negotiations, frozen since 2000, with any Palestinian administration involving Hamas.

The group is sworn to Israel's destruction and has been behind dozens of suicide bombings.

Calling on Fatah members to join the new government Moussa Abu Marzouk, a senior Hamas official, said in Damascus the party had "a clear vision for a government of unity," describing it as "one in which everyone joins".

However, Fatah leaders, speaking after the party's crushing defeat, have said they wanted no part in such a coalition.

'Wake-up call'

Hamas's capture of 76 seats in the 132-member parliament against 43 for Fatah has been widely portrayed as nothing short of a political earthquake in the Middle East, triggered by voter disenchantment with corruption and the failure of peace efforts.

"The people have punished Fatah for its mistakes and for internal divisions," said Nabil Shaath, a senior Fatah official and a former cabinet minister.

In Washington George Bush, the US President, also acknowledged that Hamas's electoral sweep represented a "wake-up call" for the Palestinian leadership, but said the United States would have no dealings with a Hamas-led government while the group continued to advocate violence.

"I have made it very clear ... that a political party that articulates the destruction of Israel as part of a platform is a party with which we will not deal," he told a White House news conference on Thursday.

Acting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has also said he will refuse to negotiate with a Palestinian government that includes Hamas.

"If a government is led by or includes Hamas, the Palestinian Authority will turn into a terror organisation," he said.

The suprise outcome of the Palestinian vote is now certain to be a key issue in Israel's own election scheduled for March 28.

Commenting on the outcome of the vote, Bush urged Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to stay in office so the United States could keep open a diplomatic channel with the Palestinian government.

Democracy drive

The Bush administration, which has made promoting democracy in the Middle East a priority for its second term, had pressed Abbas to hold Wednesday's parliamentary election despite polls showing Hamas would do well.

Analysts have said Hamas' shock victory, giving it 76 seats in the 132-seat parliament, could bury any hope of reviving peace talks with Israel and stop Bush from achieving his goal of a settlement creating two states within the next few years.

However, Bush rejected susggestions that the Hamas win had finally killed off the stalled peace process.

"Peace is never dead, because people want peace," he said.

Observers say Hamas' win, bringing an end to four decades of rule by the Fatah Party, stunned even Hamas leaders, who mounted a well-organized campaign but have no experience in government.

Fatah chief Mahmoud Abbas, who was elected last year to a four-year term as president of the Palestinian Authority, has yet to decide how closely to work with the group.

He has said he may go around the new government to talk peace with Israel.

"I am committed to implementing the program on which you elected me a year ago," he said in a televised speech after the election result was announced.

"It is a program based on negotiations and peaceful settlement with Israel."

Nonetheless the cabinet and legislature must approve any major initiative by the Palestinian president, giving Hamas tremendous influence over peace moves.

Aljazeera.Net - Hamas to talk 'partnership'

From the Ground Up: Race and the Left Response to Katrina

2006-01-08T22:11:00.000-08:00

I'm posting an article sent to me by our friend Jordan in New Orleans. This time the article was written by Walidah Imarisha, a poet and an independent journalist who works with The Human Rights Coalition (the Philly-based prisoner family organizing group), AWOL Magazine, and is part of the poetry duo Good Sista/Bad Sista . Walidah's compadre in Good Sista/Bad Sista is Turiyah Autry.

Jordan and Walidah's articles are also available in the new feature of Left Turn Magazine, along with other excellent coverage of New Orleans, the environment justice moevement, social movements in the Arab world, and much more.

From the Ground Up: Race and the Left Response to Katrina
By Walidah Imarisha

In the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, thousands of progressives, radicals, anarchists, activists, hippies and college students — the majority of them white — have gone down south to aid in relief and rebuilding efforts, and white organizations across the country have dedicated time and resources. But in their rush to help, are they recreating the racist dynamics we have seen from the government?

Is the white left racist? Sakura Koné would answer this question, for the most part with a “no.” “I’ve been impressed with the response of the white left, liberals, progressive and radicals who have joined us out here.” Kone’ works as the media coordinator for Common Ground Collective, Common Ground Relief and Rebuild Green, three different arms of a New Orleans grassroots organization started after the hurricanes to provide relief and focus on alternative energy/sustainable rebuilding. “They are not just coming down here and telling us what to do, but they are listening to what we have to say. They do it our way. They are not coming like missionaries. We welcome the white left to our communities here.”

“Our church is full of white volunteers right now,” Victoria Cintra of Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance (MIRA) says. “We have hundreds of volunteers from the North Carolina Baptist Men Disaster Relief. They were here before FEMA, before Red Cross, when no one was helping out, and they’ve committed to being here for two years.”

Others, however, have had serious problems with white volunteers’ behavior and attitude throughout the south. Curtis Muhammad, of Community Labor United and the People’s Hurricane Relief Fund, would answer the question of whether the white left is racist with a qualified “yes.” “Every white person who shows up has the disease called white supremacy, and if they don’t confront it and work on it, they are going to continue to have it. That’s just the reality of racism.”

Tamika Middleton, southern regional coordinator for Critical Resistance — a national prison abolitionist organization with an office in New Orleans — applauds people’s willingness to come down and do work, but wants white people coming to acknowledge the privilege inherent in that. “For a lot of people, people of color from New Orleans and the south, we’re all trying to put our lives together. If we had the means, if we had the same privilege, we would be here too, we would be organizing and fighting for our community. It’s important for people to realize the privilege they have and others don’t have.”

Au Hyunh, who is working in Vietnamese communities throughout the south, says that there are different cultural standards people are not aware of. “When I was at Common Ground, the volunteers would be really disrespectful. They are serving a historically disadvantaged community, but they’re not bathing or showering and they’re serving people food, and they don’t see that. A lot of white activists are appropriating poor culture when they have a lot of class privilege.”

White supremacy

Muhammad says that PHRF is working to counter that disease of white supremacy. “We are talking about doing trainings, we are asking some groups down here who specialize in this to help train volunteers about their white supremacy. Some of them are taking it and some are not. Some are running around acting like slave masters.”

Kone’ says Common Ground provides that kind of orientation. “We tell them, ‘Look, you’re not from here, listen up, this is what’s happening. This is what the community is about, this is the history of the community, this is what’s been going on since Katrina. You’ve got a good heart, because you’re here. You have to take the leadership from the community.’”

“White people are going to have to learn to obey and follow directions. They are not runaway slaves. They aren’t now and they weren’t during the Underground Railroad days. They can help us, feed us, house us, but they are not the slaves. They can’t lead us,” Muhammad finishes.

It’s not just individuals who are having race issues. Organizations are also bringing their own assumptions and agenda to the table. “Some white organizations are trying. But white folks don’t like to chastise themselves. The left does that too, it will not punish white people for their white supremacy, they won’t hold white folks accountable and as long as they can do this stuff without punishment, they’re going to keep doing it.”

Tamika Middleton says the white left has wasted a lot of time and energy focusing on debating whether the issues in the gulf are the result of class or race. “It’s impossible to separate race from class, especially in the south, because historically, culturally, it is one and the same.”

Untold stories

Many populations are just being ignored both by the mainstream and the white left. John Zippert is the director of program operations for the Federation of Southern Cooperatives in Alabama, and works primarily with poor black farmers, a population he says has been greatly overlooked by government, media and nonprofits alike. “Our experience is that the Department of Agriculture takes care of the largest farmers first, rather than the smallest and poorest, which is generally where black farmers are… So the government isn’t there for people. We have gotten some assistance from organizations, but it’s been limited.”

Big corporations are getting huge contracts to do construction, and many of them are using immigrant labor to do so. MIRA says many people they work with — the majority of whom are Latino — are either not being paid the wages they were promised or not being paid at all, are working under unsafe conditions, and are not given any accommodations and forced to sleep in tents in the cold.

Workers are being recruited to the south to do this rebuilding work. When the job is done, they are fired and then arrested by the INS, often by the prompting of their former employers, according to Cintra. “That’s sad and sick. They are rebuilding our coast and we are treating them like animals,” she says.

In New Orleans East, the Mary Queen of Vietnam Roman Catholic Church is seeing first hand that the city’s rebuilding plan is quite literally built on top of people of color. The church, which is in the heart of a thriving Vietnamese community and has served as a distribution center and gathering place for people coming back to the community, is serving 1500 people a week. It is also right in the middle of an area that the city wants to build an airport and business industrial complex on. “They
are going to take our community away; they are going to dismiss us,” says Father Luke, one of the priests at the church. “We come back here as an action to say to them that we are here, we are back here to rebuild the community, to rebuild New Orleans.”

History class

New Orleans and the south are what they are because of the input of people of color, and people have to be aware of the culture they are coming into. “Why do people aspire to come to New Orleans? The music, the culture, the food, and what is the origin of those? Black people!” Kone’ intones.

All of the people interviewed for this article spoke of the history of slavery, immigration issues, labor rights, gentrification, police brutality, governmental misconduct, a history of neglect and racism, and the need for white organizations and individuals to understand that. It’s vital that people understand the roots of the poverty and deprivation. “The problems that are happening now are not happening because of Katrina. They didn’t just arrive; they didn’t come out of smoke. These things are historical,” says Middleton.

“You have the compounded issue of race and poverty together, a concentration of people who are poor and black and have been that way since slavery, even in the urban areas,” Zippert explains.

“You can see the intersection of race, class and gender by who was left behind in New Orleans. Most of the images you saw of people who were left behind, who were stranded, are poor single black mothers. That’s the fall out in a culture that is racist and patriarchal,” Malcolm Woodland of the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement says.

Salvation army

While this is the largest fundraising effort in the history of the US, with hundreds of millions of dollars pouring into groups like the Red Cross and Salvation Army, people on the ground are skeptical as to how effective those organizations are.

Cintra summed up the sentiment when she said, “I wouldn’t give a penny to Red Cross, and I would encourage others not to.”

The problem is the way major non-profits have operated in communities of color globally, says Woodland. “The fact that people continue to give to organizations that have historically not operated in the best issues of people of African descent suggests that people aren’t fully aware of the history of these organizations, and what they are doing now, and not aware of alternative methods of being able to give directly to the people affected.”

Several people interviewed for this article talked of the ways in which the Red Cross gives preferential treatment to areas that are predominately white and was much slower to react in communities of color.

Middleton says her biggest problem is the criminal background checks that keep out people who were formerly incarcerated, and that this is a race issue as well.

Hyunh spoke of the language and access barriers that aren’t being addressed. Hyunh, an activist who moved just outside of New Orleans after Katrina, offered her services as a professionally licensed Vietnamese translator to both Red Cross and FEMA. “They both turned me down, they said they didn’t need any interpreters.” Hyunh went down to the south to see for herself, and found a complete lack of translation.

“The police were trying to evict a single Vietnamese mother living in a housing project in Biloxi. The entire projects were flooded. The police tried to arrest her for remaining there, but there was nowhere for her to go, and she didn’t speak English. She couldn’t even find out where the Red Cross shelter was,” Hyunh explains.

Cintra said it is even worse than ignorance or benign neglect on Red Cross’ part. “Red Cross is evicting people from shelters because of the color of their skin. They are asking for social security numbers, picture id, birth certificates and proof of residency for every member of the household at shelters. That’s alienating a large group of people.”

Middleton says the issue is really about giving funds to organizations that can build for the future. “Red Cross and other big non-profits create a different kind of problem. It’s like, ‘I’m going to deliver all this food to you, but not create sustainable options for you to grow food.’ There is no long term plan; there are no ways for people to be part of rebuilding their communities.”

The People’s Hurricane Relief Fund (PHRF) was started to provide an apparatus for survivors, local grassroots organizations and displaced people to have control over funds coming in. “We demand resources to rebuild our community under our control,” Muhammad says.

Leadership position

That’s why it’s important, organizers say, for people of color to have a leadership position in the relief and rebuilding efforts.

James Rucker, who helped found Color of Change (colorofchange.org) after Katrina as an online mobilization tool to enhance black people’s political voice, says black people have to mobilize to lobby politicians and hold them accountable. Color of Change grew to over 10,000 members in the first month and had thousands of people sign different petitions.

Rucker says it’s so important for organizations of color to speak up because it can push white organizations. “Race is just not a focal point for liberal white America… When groups like ours are out there, we can embolden other white organizations to talk about race more. They will do better than if there weren’t any organizations of folks of color speaking in terms of race.”

While Color of Change is working to build up political pressure, others feel the way to change lies in grassroots organizing.

Malcolm X Grassroots Movement (mxgm.org), a national black human rights rganization, put out a call on Sept. 13, 2005 that framed the issue again in terms of race and class. It was a framing of the issue around race that had historical memory and was not often being articulated. The demands included a right of return, the right to organize, the right to an income, the right to living wages, the right to access, the right to education and health care, and the right to self-determination.

Woodland, one of the coordinators for MXGM’s Katrina Relief program, says it’s really about the black community relying on itself. “My inclination is not to worry about what white folks are doing, because they’re going to do what they have done historically. Every once in a while they will surprise you and I’ll take it as a surprise, but my concern has been with how folks in our community have really stepped up, and I’m particularly proud of the response of black organizations.”

Long term

It is not enough, though for organizations of color to lead the rebuilding efforts, but for those organizations to be made up of people most directly affected by the disaster. “Many of our black leadership, non-profits and all, are from the middle class. Our coalition said upfront, we are listening to the voices of the poor,” Muhammad says.

MXGM says they are working to provide resources and training to displaced people. “Here in New York we’re already seeing this develop so that people who have been displaced are beginning to say, ‘Hold on, we don’t need people to speak for us, we can speak for ourselves,’” Woodland explains.

Woodland hopes that other organizations will support those affected, as well to take the lead. “I think you will see MXGM move to the periphery in terms of being visible and really be a back up and provide support for those individuals as needed and requested,” he finishes.

Most of the organizations interviewed are working on long term plans and goals that would empower the communities affected while furthering the rebuilding efforts.

Zippert says the Federation of Southern Cooperatives is encouraging people to use cooperatives and credit unions as tools poor people can use to rebuild. “We want to help people create worker owned cooperatives to do certain jobs created by the storm that went to Halliburton and these other companies. We can help poor people get the training and assistance to best deal with this post Katrina situation.”

Common Ground wants to rehabilitate the 9th ward, which was the most heavily damaged section of New Orleans, “to show people and the powers that be that contrary to their observations, the 9th ward is salvageable,” Koné asserts.

Everyone I spoke with agreed that if changes are going to happen, it will happen only by people on the ground pushing for those changes, and that as we move forward, race will continue to play an intricate part in the south, as it has since this country’s inception.

“We all have to get on ground, roll up our sleeves and go to work. I do not believe FEMA or the American government...is capable of rebuilding our city; they have no intention of helping poor black people return. We are going to have to demand it,” Muhammad declares.

Details of Palestinian Dispossesion

2006-01-03T14:44:00.000-08:00

Here's a note from our other friend Noura, writing from Palestine. For those not familiar, Amira Hass is an Israeli journalist who has devoted herself to writing from a Palestinian perspective. She lives and works from Ramallah, where Noura is currently living, and is published in the Israeli Haaretz daily paper which I can only assume is a liberal newspaper for publishing her work. She's magnificent...really.
ss

From Noura:

I recently passed through the administrative detention border
crossing that was erected in Qalandiya last week. The checkpoint is
critical because it effectively severs [isolates] Jerusalem from
Ramallah with the wall and as a border crossing, miles within the
green line.

Equipped with 24 automated turnstiles which are controlled by
soldiers behind a glass wall barking orders, from speakers above -
it is difficult to put into words. It has all happened with almost
no other media coverage, and yet another step in the 'details of
dispossession' as Amira Hass has elequently reported below.

It's not all in the details
By Amira Hass

Each detail described here, every shred of reality, is liable to be
considered as a whole, which would dim its severity. Detail:
hundreds of people gather each morning at three narrow steel
revolving doors, and the gates do not turn because some unseen
person has blocked them by pushing a button. The number of people
crammed behind them grows and grows, and they wait for an hour, and
the anger at another day being late for work or for school is piled
on top of previous residual tensions brought on by anger, bitterness
and helplessness.

However, it is not the crowdedness and waiting and anger that define
the checkpoints and roadblocks, or in this specific instance, the
new Qalandiyah checkpoint. Nor is it the crowdedness and compressed
atmosphere of the rest of the inspection route, before the
magnometers and the closed rooms in which the soldiers sit and
inspect documents, or the other revolving doors. Or even the
other "details": the cameras that make the soldiers and commanders
seeing and unseen, the snarling voice in the speaker that issues
commands in Hebrew, the terrifying concrete wall above and around,
and the devastation left by Israeli bulldozers and planners outside
the cage that Israel calls a "border terminal," in what was once,
and no longer is, a continuous stretch of residential neighborhoods,
soft hillsides and the Jerusalem-Ramallah road.

Nor are the 11 "detainees" at the inspection route's exit an
adequate detail: nine teenage boys aged 18 and under, one adult, and
a 23-year-old university student, all of whom committed a serious
crime on Monday: After waiting in vain for the steel gates to turn,
which would lead them to the inspection route, on their way to
classes and work, they decided to jump over the fence - one hoping
to get to an English test on time, the other fearful of being fired
if he again arrived late to the printing press where he works. But
they were caught. The student was handcuffed from behind, and was
sat down next to a guard booth in the closed military compound. The
other ten were placed outside the compound, in the mud that became
thicker with every drop of rain. And the soldiers demanded that they
sit down. They could not sit, because of the mud, and only went into
a kneeling position. After half an hour, the bent knees begin to
hurt more and more, and the pants are soaked with water and grow
tight over the knee. The hands turn cold, but the soldiers don't
change their tune: "Sit, I told you. Sit."

But the cold and the rain are not the story, nor is the soldier
eating his combat rations and watching the detainees apathetically,
nor the telephone calls by this writer until after two hours they
are permitted, how compassionately, to stand up, nor their release -
including that of one individual whose frozen hands are imprinted by
deep red cracks from the handcuffs, nor the fact that the 14-year-
old in the group had to wait another 20 minutes after his release
until the soldier who took his birth certificate (after all, he does
not yet have an identity card) could be found. The question of
whether the detention would have continued longer had the writer not
been present is also marginal.

Also of secondary importance is the decision to open
the "humanitarian gate" (which is intended for the passage of those
in wheelchairs, parents with baby strollers, and Palestinian
cleaning workers employed by a contracting firm), in the morning to
women and men above the age of 60. Another detail that in itself
diverts one's attention from what is important.

What is important is that the army and the Israeli citizens who
design all of the details of dispossession - and the roadblocks are
an inseparable part of this dispossession - have transformed the
term "humanitarian" into a despicable lie.

Through the checkpoints, road closures, movement ban, and traffic
restrictions, through the concrete walls and barbed wire fences,
through the land expropriations (solely for the purpose of security,
as the High Court of Justice, which is part and parcel of the
Israeli people, likes to believe), through the disconnecting of
villages from their lands and from a connecting road, through the
construction of a wall in a residential neighborhood and in the
backyards of homes, and through the transformation of the West Bank
into a cluster of "territorial cells," in the military jargon,
between the expanding settlements - we Israelis have created and
continue to create an economic, social, emotional, employment and
environmental crisis on the scale of a never-ending tsunami.

And then we offer a little turnstile in a cage, an officer who is
briefed to see an old man, a bathroom and a water cooler - and this
is described as "humanitarian." In other words, we push an entire
people into impossible situations, blatantly inhumane situations, in
order to steal its land and time and future and freedom of choice,
and then the plantation owner appears and relaxes the iron fist a
bit, and is proud of his sense of compassion.

However, even the important matter - that is, the humanitarian
deception - is only one detail in a full set of details in which no
single detail is representative in itself. Isolated fragments of the
reality are read as being tolerable, or understandable (security,
security), or may make one angry for a moment and then subside. And
among all the details, the reality of colonialism intensifies,
without letup or remission, inventing yet more methods of torture of
the individual and community; creating more ways to violate
international law, robbing land behind the legal camouflage, and
encouraging collaboration out of agreement, neglect or torpor.

Hunger Strike in Abu Sleim Prison in Libya

2006-01-02T15:34:00.000-08:00

Libya: News and Views: Hunger Strike in Abu Sleim Prison

Unfortunately for non-Arabic readers, this article is in Arabic. I can give a jist of what's up with my slower than dial up Arabic reading skills though.If non-Arabic readers are interested, please let me know so I or someone else can try to translate a little more for you. If Arabic readers feel inclined to translate, please do so or let me know that you are interested and we can work together.

Brief synopsis: About 131 political prisoners, among them Muslim Bretherens, have begun the new 2006 year with a hunger strike. They claim to have attempted to negotiate through traditional channels but that this has not shown results.

It was posted on the Libya News and Views with a Libya Watch logo, but I couldn't even find it on the Arabic version of the Libya Watch site and the last posting on the English version of Libya Watch is 2004. So, either the Arabic version is more updated but takes longer to post on the official site or something else is up. I also couldn't figure out a way to copy and past the article so I could post it. I'm not in the mood to speculate at the moment, but I would appreciate any information whether languistic or technical from any readers out there.

Salamat ya'll!

Happy 2006 & Eid Mubarak

2006-01-02T02:49:00.000-08:00

Dear fellow bloggers, friends, and both-

I actually wrote another post for the new year that was lost...I'm sure that's nothing new to bloggers. I'll try to repeat as much of that post as possible.

I miss blogging and I miss you all, there's no doubt of that--I just haven't been able to for a while. My last postings were writings that I'd saved for editing. Then the new year came along and the need to tie up loose ends led me to publish without the editing. No baggage this year... or so I hope to carry none along.

2005 has been by far one of the most tumultuous and growth filled years of my life. The long in-betweens of my posts generally represent much heart-ache accompanied by head-aches. Growing pains, I guess is what they're called. I'm sure I'm not done growing, but I hope it's somewhat easier in the future since some of the basic road blocks have been removed. In this next year, I hope to find the best way to address some of the issues I've encountered and to open sincere discussion on these issues.

I wish everyone the best for 2006 and forever for that matter.

Salamat
ss

Omar Campaign

2005-11-09T01:22:00.000-08:00

Justice for Omar

UK accused of legal lapse over detainee
by Miriam Wells The Argus 18 oct 2005

The Government has been accused of breaking the law by remaining silent over Guantanamo detainee Omar Deghayes.

Asim Qureshi, a specialist in international law who advised human rights organisation Cage Prisoners, has produced a report detailing the legal obligations he says the UK has towards Mr Deghayes and is failing to uphold.

Ministers say they are unable to help Mr Deghayes and the other UK detainees because they were refugees rather than citizens before their capture.

Britain granted Mr Deghayes asylum from Libya, the country of his birth, after accepting he may be in danger following the assasination of his father, a political dissident.

But the Home Office says it is now up to Libya to help him. Mr Qureshi's report points out that although Mr Deghayes does not have a British passport, which would entitle him to UK consular help, he was travelling under British identity documents when he was taken to Guantanamo.

Because the UK is signed up to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, it is obliged to make sure any person under its sovereignty has their human rights protected.

The lawyer also claims that by failing to make representations on Mr Deghayes' behalf, the Government has destined him to be sent back to Libya - a scenario which the US has put forward.

This would break an international legal treaty, the Convention Against Torture and other Cruel, Unusual or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, which forbids states from sending people back to countries where they will probably be tortured.

Mr Qureshi said: "International conventions go a very long way in establishing strong norms of international law binding states to act in the best interests of refugees.

"The Government has so far failed to uphold the international rule of law in protesting against the conditions in which these men are being held. "They are not merely foreigners to whom the Government holds no responsibility.

"They are individuals who, having faced oppression and injustice, fled to the UK in order to gain safety, and have indeed been granted it.

"The actions of the Government are based solely on political considerations to simply ignore those people."

Mr Qureshi's report will be presented at an international human rights conference at the European Parliament next week.

Jackie Chase, who is campaigning for justice for Mr Deghayes, is speaking at the conference and it is hoped three others will accompany her to speak to MEPs, although the group is short of funds.

She said: "This is a unique opportunity to speak to some of the best brains in human rights about the case and in particular, get the European Parliament to intervene.

Noura - More Notes from Palestine

2005-11-09T01:15:00.000-08:00

The Walls are Closing in

The situation is relatively quiet here in Palestine. Yet it is a
strange kind of quiet and calm that surrounds us. While there are no
daily incursions, and rarely do we see the Israeli military presence
during the day - other than while crossing checkpoints - we know the
building of the wall continues at a frighteningly rapid pace.
Simultaneously, at least hundreds of men have disappeared in the
night in the run up to Palestinian elections, jailed indefinitely
because of their political affiliations in conditions some of which
were recently described as "unfit for cattle" by previous justice
minister Yossi Beilin (about Damoun prison which was recently re-
opened after he ordered it closed).

With few visible signs of the occupation, we discuss and debate:
weather the "pull-out" was valuable or not, who was responsible for
seven more viscous days of shelling in Gaza which is still
recovering from "a state of panic. Children are restless, crying,
frightened and many are wetting their beds. Some children are afraid
to leave home and refuse to go to school. Many are dazed, pale,
insomniac and have a poor appetite. Some pregnant women reported
colics and some were admitted to hospital with precipitated labour.
Many people complain of ear pressure. All are stunned. Israel's new
method of creating intentional sonic booms in our skies was never
used before the disengagement, so as not to alarm or hurt the
Israeli settlers and their children says Dr. Eyad El-Sarraj, the
founder and director of the Gaza Community Mental Health Program. It
seems our biggest nightmare in Gaza is coming true, awakening us
from any dreams of liberation.

While we ponder the Palestinian elections and who has won what
seats, what we are essentially questioning is who will be the
warden's of the prison that has become Palestine. Who will
administer the key, to whom the locks will not even be held - as 57
years of isolation, imprisonment and occupation continue to grow.

Meanwhile most Palestinians we meet are beating their heads with
frustration wondering when the next time (or if) they will ever see
the ocean again, much less leave their villiges. Before 2000
Palestinians were able to travel to Israel with ease. Collectively
they are ALL paying the heavy price of resisting the occupation of
their homeland, with growing pain and resentment. This is the root
of the injustice, for collective punishment is sure to enrage the
entire society, while turning against it's agressors. We [those
seeking human rights] are left longing for a lasting and just
solution to end the generations of suffering.

Cementing the Occupation

Every time I go through the Kalandia checkpoint, there is new
infrastructure built. Every day, it looks more like an
administrative building complete with a paved parking lot! It is the
strangest sight - amidst the detroyed land, rubble, trash and dirt is the seemingly innocent office center that will no doubt be used to facilitate and administer the occupation. For any of you who were hopeful that 'Gaza first' would not be 'Gaza last', this may be act as an indication. This "center" is where the paperwork will be done to ensure the daily doses of detentions, control of movement, economy, water and society can continue with more beauracratic order and organization.

"It's kind of hard to be optimistic when your homey's lying on the
pavement twisted." Tupac. The lyrics to Tupac's songs regularly go
through my mind. A Palestinian friend we met was so happy to see
that we were here because it expanded her shrinking square of hope
which she said sometimes gets smaller by the day. I can not stress
how hopeless most people are, which I believe is why many don't even
want to talk about the situation any more. Another friend I met was
talking to me about ISM and non-violence, he made a point of telling
me how he recently counted over 200 friends of his that have died
since 2002! What could have done differently? Occupation surely did not enter their lives peacefully...and fifty seven years of struggle to simply live their lives in peace, can not be easily forgetten or ignored.

Critical Self Analysis

I think it is important to talk not only about the political situation - but also the society, when possible. It is also vital to have an open and healthy analysis, debate and discussion about the culture. This does happen regularly *behind closed doors* but because of the encouragement and support by some Palestinian friends here, I think it is also important to get it out into the open. In the future I will begin to share the frustrations and the internal difficulties that come from Palestinian Authority and the culture which has been dramatically effected by 57 years of military occupation and growing isolation.

Please feel free to share any observations, thoughts or comments.

love and solidarity,

noura

New Orleans News

2005-11-09T01:07:00.000-08:00

Dear friends and allies,

The last couple of weeks have seen a continued outpouring of
initiatives, support, contributions and volunteers from across the US and around
the world. Journalists and human rights workers have exposed many of
the abuses of city, state and federal officials, as well as those of
police, miltary, and disaster profiteers.

Organizing continues on the ground from many different individuals,
organizations and coalitions. There have also, unfortunately, been some
very public attacks and infighting.

Below are some upcoming initiatives. The first is a rally called by a
New Orleans/Baton Rouge based coalition called the New Opportunity for
Action and Hope Coalition, and below that is a National Assembly and
March for Human Rights called by the Peoples Hurricane Relief Fund.

Also, here are some resources for information and action:

http://www.katrinaaction.org/
http://www.justiceforneworleans.org/
http://www.leftturn.org/articles/SpecialCollections/katrina.aspx
http://neworleans.indymedia.org/

----------------------------------------------------------
The New Opportunity for Action and Hope Coalition presents

RALLY TO REBUILD LOUISIANA

Featuring Jesse Jackson, Governor Blanco, Congressmen Jefferson and
Melancon, New Orleans City Council President Oliver Thomas and other
faith, labor, and community leaders.
Saturday, October 29, 2005 - 10:00am-1:00pm
Louisiana State Capitol - Baton Rouge

See www.noahcoalition.org for more info.

The New Opportunity for Action and Hope Coalition was formed by
Louisiana-based labor, community and civil rights organizations seeking to
ensure that the reconstruction of the Gulf Coast region is completed in a
way that maximizes its benefits and opportunities to working families
displaced by Hurricane Katrina.

The mission of the NOAH Coalition is three-fold:

• Priority Job Placement and Training for displaced workers in
rebuilding their communities.

• Living Wages for Workers to enable them to support themselves and
their families.

• Access to Immediate Housing in their communities and a plan for
transitioning to long term, affordable housing in that community.

-----------------------------------------------------
The People’s Hurricane Fund Presents

JUSTICE AFTER KATRINA:
The People must decide

Jackson, MS December 9th
Gulf Coast National Assembly

New Orleans, LA December 10th
Day of Return
March for Human Rights
Join survivors and others of goodwill to
take back New Orleans from the real looters

• Support family reunification now. The government must provide funds
for all families to be reunited. The databases of FEMA and the Red
Cross must be made public.
• Demand a Victims Compensation Fund as was done after 9/11 for the
people in the World Trade Center in New York City. The $50 billion
belongs to the victims of Hurricane Katrina.
• Demand representation on all boards that are making decisions on
spending public dollars for relief and reconstruction. We also demand that
those most affected by Hurricane Katrina be part of the planning
process.
• Demand public work jobs for displaced workers and residents of New
Orleans and the Gulf Coast. We must take the lead in rebuilding our
communities. The jobs must be at union wages so that our communities are
no longer characterized by extreme poverty.
• Demand transparency in the entire reconstruction process. Citizens
must know where all the monies are being spent and with whom they are
being spent.

Support grassroots leadership. Be a part of the solution.

The People’s Hurricane Relief Fund - 3565 Wheatley Street Jackson,
Mississippi 39212
For more information: Please call (601) 346-5995 or visit us on the web
www.communitylaborunited.net

Noura- Notes From Palestine

2005-11-09T01:05:00.000-08:00

Palestinians Dying for Relative Calm

I received a few replies to my last email asking me to clarify what I meant by "the situation is relatively quiet here in Palestine.". I
am sorry to say that I am guilty of falling into the same trap as the news media. In my last posting, I failed to mention that from May 1-Sept. 2005, 86 Palestinians lives have been taken; including 15 children*. We should compare it on a humanitarian level, but Palestinians aren't relative - their lives are defined in relation to the well being of their oppressors. And of course there were no Israeli casualties at the hands of Palestinians, so it didn't count.

However, the relative calm that is being experienced here during this time does not come for free, "it is a trade off: the Gaza Strip for the settlement blocks; the Gaza Strip for Palestinian land; the Gaza Strip for unilaterally imposing borders," said Dror Etkes, director of the Israeli organisation Settlement Watch. "They don't know how long they've got. That's why they're building like maniacs." For more in an excellent article explaining the purpose of the building of Qalandyia's administrative center, the ever expanding settlements and the isolation and strangulation of Jerusalem see:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,5311688-117700,00.html

Palestinians can only enjoy the luxury of calm when they are finally offered their freedom in return.

If you have any comments, please add them to my blog I'm just getting started and trying to figure out how to use:
http://dreamingofreedom.blogspot.com/

Jordan

2005-11-09T00:45:00.000-08:00

Crime and New Orleans

by Jordan Flaherty

People from New Orleans were not surprised to see video of police
beating a 64 year old man in the French Quarter. The only surprise is the
increased attention the incident received due to the continued media
focus on New Orleans, although news reports I saw took pains to point out
the “high levels of stress” New Orleans police are under.

Despite the attempts to explain away the officer’s behavior, the
incident fits into a well-defined pattern of police conduct in New Orleans.
In the last year, seven young Black men have been killed by New Orleans
police, and none of the officers involved have been punished.

This year has seen mounting evidence of a police department out of
control. Less than a week before Hurricane Katrina, on Wednesday August
24, Keith Griffin, a New Orleans police officer, was booked with
aggravated rape and kidnapping. According to a Times-Picayune report,
“Griffin is accused of pulling over a bicyclist under the guise of a police
stop in the early morning hours of July 11. The two-year veteran officer
allegedly detained the woman, drove her to a remote spot along the
Industrial Canal near Deslonde Street, then sexually assaulted her.”

This is hardly an isolated incident. Another recent Times-Picayune
article reported, “in April, seven-year veteran officer Corey Johnson was
booked with aggravated rape for allegedly forcing a woman to perform
oral sex, after he identified himself as an officer in order to enter the
woman's Treme home.”

Another article states “Eight officers were arrested during a six-month
stretch last year on charges that ranged from shoplifting to theft to
conspiracy to rob a bank...In April 2004, 16-year veteran James Adams
was booked with aggravated kidnapping, extortion and malfeasance after he
was accused of threatening to arrest a woman unless she agreed to have
sex with him. “

Police misconduct in this notoriously corrupt city goes back decades,
and occasionally it explodes in scandal. In a September 2000 report,
the progressive policy institute reported “a 1994 crackdown on police
corruption led to 200 dismissals and upwards of 60 criminal charges,
including two murder convictions of police officers. Investigators at the
time discovered that for six months in 1994, as many as 29 New Orleans
police officers protected a cocaine supply warehouse containing 286
pounds of cocaine. The FBI indicted ten officers who had been paid nearly
$100,000 by undercover agents. The investigation ended abruptly after
one officer successfully orchestrated the execution of a witness.”

According to one community activist I recently spoke with who is
familiar with the investigations, “That crackdown just scratched the
surface. They didn’t even really begin to address the problems in the New
Orleans police.”

According to a 1998 report from human rights watch “Former Officer Len
Davis, reportedly known in the Desire housing project as ‘Robocop,’
ordered the October 13, 1994 murder of Kim Groves, after he learned she
had filed a brutality complaint against him. Federal agents had Davis
under surveillance for alleged drug-dealing and recorded Davis ordering
the killing, apparently without realizing what they had heard until it
was too late. Davis mumbled to himself about the ‘30’ he would be taking
care of (the police code for homicide) and, in communicating with the
killer, described Groves's standing on the street and demanded he "get
that whore!" Afterward, he confirmed the slaying by saying ‘N.A.T.’
police jargon for ‘necessary action taken.’ Community activists reported a
chilling effect on potential witnesses or victims of brutality
considering coming forward to complain following Groves's murder.”

The white-flight suburbs around New Orleans are in many ways worse.
During the 1980s, Jefferson Parish sheriff Harry Lee famously ordered
special scrutiny for any black people traveling in white sections of the
parish. "It's obvious," Lee said, "that two young blacks driving a
rinky-dink car in a predominantly white neighborhood? They'll be stopped."

The New Orleans Gambit newspaper reported that 1994, “after two black
men died in the Jefferson Parish Correctional Center within one week,
Lee faced protests from the black community and responded by withdrawing
his officers from a predominantly black neighborhood. ‘To hell with
them,’ he'd said. ‘I haven't heard one word of support from one black
person.’”

The Gambit also reported in April of this year that in Jefferson
Parish officers were found to be using as target practice what critics
referred to as “a blatantly racist caricature” of a Black male. Sheriff Lee
laughed when presented with the charges. "I'm looking at this thing
that people say is offensive," he says. "I've looked at it, I don't find
it offensive, and I have no interest in correcting it."

These accusations of “target practice” gained force a few weeks later
with the May 31 killing of 16-year-old Antoine Colbert, who was behind
the wheel of a stolen pickup truck with two other teens. 110 shots
were fired into the truck, killing Colbert and injuring his passengers.
In response to criticism from Black ministers over the incident, Lee
responded “they can kiss my ass.”

As has been widely reported, the town of Gretna, across the Mississippi
from New Orleans and part of Jefferson Parish, stationed officers on
the bridge leading out of New Orleans blocking the main escape route for
the tens of thousands suffering in the Superdome, Convention Center,
and throughout the city.

As the LA Times reported on September 16, “little over a week after
this mostly white suburb became a symbol of callousness for using armed
officers to seal one of the last escape routes from New Orleans —
trapping thousands of mostly black evacuees in the flooded city — the Gretna
City Council passed a resolution supporting the police chief's move.
‘This wasn't just one man's decision,’ Mayor Ronnie C. Harris said
Thursday. ‘The whole community backs it.’”

Arguably, the actions of the Gretna police were one of the biggest
dangers to public safety to arise from this tragedy, perhaps second only to
the criminally-neglected levees. Anyone that wants to focus on relief
for the “victims” needs to focus on what exactly people from New
Orleans are victims of: racism, corruption, deindustrialization,
disinvestment, and neglect. That is why agencies and organizations such as Red
Cross, FEMA, Scientologists, their hundreds of well-meaning volunteers are
not really providing relief - they aren’t addressing the nature of the
problem.

We call hurricanes and earthquakes “natural disasters,” but the
contours of these disasters are manmade. As recent earthquake and
hurricane-related mass deaths in South Asia and Central America demonstrate, who
lives and who dies is intricately related to issues of poverty and
access. Whether the homes are built in safe areas, the soundness of the
structures, the length of time it takes for relief to arrive, all of these
are intricately tied to poverty. And yet the media generally ignores
these issues, and repeats the message that “nature doesn’t
discriminate.” Because of this message, relief is misdirected, and when those
receiving the relief aren’t sufficiently grateful, the givers become
resentful.

An article in this Sunday’s New York Times reports on a community of
displaced New Orleans residents in rural Oklahoma, where local residents
are “glad to see them go.” “With each passing day,” the Times
reported, they “could feel the sympathy draining away.” The problem is the
perception that this is a problem that could be fixed by a place to stay
in another state, some hand-me-down clothes, and a few meals. For many
of us from New Orleans, what hurts the most is the loss of our
community, and charity doesn’t help to heal those wounds at all. Mayaba Benu,
a community activist currently in the city, told me “I miss everyone.
There’s a lot of reporters here, a lot of contractors and FEMA folks,
but not many people from New Orleans.”

While thousands of out-of-state contractors line-up for work,
including hundreds of trash hauling trucks from around the US lined up near
City Park, the people of New Orleans are still being excluded from
opportunities to take part in the reconstruction of their city. In fact, it
seems to many that out-of-state workers are more welcomed than the New
Orleans diaspora.

Jenka Soderberg, an indymedia reporter and volunteer at the Common
Ground Collective reports from her experience at a New Orleans FEMA
compound, “I went to the FEMA base camp for the city of new orleans. It made
me feel sick to my stomach. We walked around this absolutely surreal
scene of hundreds of enormous air-conditioned tents, each one with the
potential of housing 250 people -- whole city blocks of trailers with
hot showers, huge banks of laundry machines, portajohns lined up 50 at a
time, a big recreation tent, air-conditioned, with a big-screen tv, all
of it for contractors and FEMA workers, none of it for the people of
new orleans.”

Inside the FEMA camp, she was told by contractors, “the tents are
pretty empty, not many people staying here.” However, “we don't combine
with the evacuees -- we have our camp here, as workers, and they have
their camps.”

Soderberg comments, “thousands of New Orleans citizens could live there
while they rebuilt and cleaned their homes in the city. But instead,
due to the arrogance of a government bureaucracy that insists they are
separate from the 'evacuees', and cannot possibly see themselves mixing
with them and working side by side on the cleanup, these people are
left homeless, like the poor man I talked to earlier in the day, living
under a tarp with his mother buried under the mud of their house. Why
can't he live in their tents? It makes me so sad and mad to see so much
desperate need, and then just blocks away to see this huge abundance of
resources not being used. I have seen no FEMA center that is actually
providing any aid for people -- I have been to this main FEMA base camp
and three others in new orleans, and each of them have signs saying ‘No
public services available at this site/Authorized personnel only’”

And with poor people out of the city, the developers and corporations
are grabbing what they can - but there are no shoot-to-kill orders on
these well-dressed looters. NPR and other media have portrayed developer
Pres Kabacoff as a liberal visionary out to create a Paris on the
Mississippi. The truth is that Kabacoff represents the worst of New Orleans’
local disaster profiteers. It is Kabacoff who, in 2001, famously
demolished affordable housing in the St Thomas projects in New Orleans’
Lower Garden District and replaced it luxury condos and a Wal Mart. “New
Orleans has never recovered from what Kabacoff did,” one housing
activist told me. “It was a classic bait and switch. He told the city he
was going to revitalize the area, and ended up changing the rules in the
middle of the game and holding the city for ransom. He made a ton of
money, the rich got more housing, and the poor got dispersed around the
city.”

This year, Kabacoff has had his eyes on razing the Iberville housing
projects, a site of low-income housing near the French Quarter. While
Iberville residents were in their homes, they were able to fight
Kabacoff’s plans, and held numerous protests. Now that they are gone, their
homes (which were not flooded) are in serious danger from Kabacoff and
other developers seeking to take advantage of this tragedy to “remake the
city.”

The people of New Orleans need a voice in this reconstruction. But
what would community-controlled reconstruction look like? Organizers are
starting to grapple with these issues.

Dan Etheridge works with the Center for Bioenvironmental Research at
Tulane and Xavier Universities. He is currently organizing to create
collaborations and build partnerships between community organizations and
planning professionals “not because its benevolent but because we will
have a better city if the community has a say in its reconstruction.”

He has organized an upcoming conference at Tulane University to bring
together planners, architects, structural mitigation experts,
geographers and other experts, along with grassroots community leaders from New
Orleans, people such as “the social aid and pleasure clubs, Mardi Gras
Indian representatives, ACORN, building unions, artists, teachers,
public housing resident councils, Peoples Hurricane Fund representatives,”
and other community voices.

He hopes this will be “the starting point for an ongoing program, a
networking and organizing opportunity for autonomous public projects. we
want our vision to be part of the master plan for rebuilding the city,
but we want community groups to have access to the skills and funding
they need for smaller projects towards reestablishing the complicated
fabric of the city. Instead of falling through the cracks, we want
projects to grow up through the cracks.”

In a press conference today outside Orleans Parish Prison Critical
Resistance New Orleans organizer Tamika Middleton said “Katrina’s aftermath
reflects the way we as a nation increasingly deal with social ills:
police and imprison primarily poor Black communities for ‘crimes’ that
are reflections of poverty and desperation. Locking people up in this
crisis is cruel mismanagement of city resources and counters the
outpouring of the world’s support and concern for all survivors of Hurricane
Katrina.”

Middleton is part of a coalition demanding an independent investigation
into the evacuation of OPP and amnesty for those arrested for trying to
feed and clothe themselves post-Katrina, while calling for real public
safety in a rebuilt New Orleans. “Rising from the devastation of
Katrina, we have an amazing opportunity to rebuild a truly new and genuine
system of public safety for New Orleans,” said Xochitl Bervera,
Co-Director of Families and Friends of Louisiana’s Incarcerated Children.

Discussing FEMA and other official “relief” agencies, Jenka Soderberg
says, “its so different from how we are working at the common ground
collective, or at Mama Dee's in the city, or the other community places
that people are starting up -- where neighbors are helping neighbors,
people just helping each other. It's so different when we are all human
together, instead of a militarized, razor-wired, fenced-in compound like
the FEMA camp that keeps out the people in need and keeps the
contractors and workers inside.”

meme response

2005-10-16T21:43:00.000-07:00

Alright... this one is for Hanawee!

1. LAST MOVIE YOU SAW IN A THEATER:
Clay Dolls- a Tunisian film at the Arab Film Festival.

2. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING?
Animal Farm and Pushcart Prize XXIX Best of the Small Presses (a short story anthology)

3. FAVORITE BOARD GAME?
Trivial persuit maybe and monopoly, but generally I SUCK at board games. I'm okay with dominoes.

4. FAVORITE MAGAZINE?
New Yorker

5. FAVORITE SMELL?
Citrus... so fresh!

6. FAVORITE FOOD?
Hmmmmmmm...... I just found a killer sushi place that makes sushi like crack cocaine! I am fighting the urge daily to go back. So it's sushi.

7. FAVORITE SOUND?
My mother's voice.

8. WORST FEELING IN THE WORLD?
I'm with Hana on this one--leaving people behind.

9. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU THINK OF WHEN
YOU WAKE UP?
How many snoozes can I get away with.

10. FAVORITE FAST FOOD PLACE?
My kitchen.

11. FUTURE CHILD'S NAME:
I'll come back to this one... it takes more thought. We already have two little Annusa's named after my mother.

12. FINISH THIS STATEMENT. IF I HAD A LOT OF MONEY:
build a community center somewhere

13. DO YOU DRIVE FAST?
Don't have a car, but I do drive on the fast side when I rent one.

14. DO YOU SLEEP WITH A STUFFED ANIMAL?
I try to lure my cat over to me without much success. She likes her space.

15. STORMS-COOL OR SCARY?
As long as I can stay dry, I love storms.

16. WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST CAR?
Never had one.

17. FAVORITE DRINK?
coffee

18. FINISH THIS STATEMENT, "IF I HAD THE TIME I
WOULD...":
Take a year off to travel.

19. DO YOU EAT THE STEMS ON BROCCOLI?
Of course!

20. IF YOU COULD DYE YOUR HAIR ANY COLOR, WHAT WOULD
BE YOUR CHOICE?
I can and have and am sticking with my dark brown for many years to come.

21. NAME ALL THE DIFFERENT CITIES/TOWNS YOU HAVE
LIVED IN:
Tripoli, London, Alexandria, Cairo, Clarion (PA), St.Louis (MO), Columbia (MO), Sacramento (CA), Sienna (Italy), San Francisco

22. HALF EMPTY OR FULL?
What's the object we're talking about?

23. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH:
Ummmm.... opt out for this one.

24. ONE NICE THING ABOUT THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS!
Fabulous woman

25. MORNING PERSON, OR NIGHT OWL?
Night Owl

26. OVER EASY, OR SUNNY SIDE UP?
Boiled

27. FAVORITE PLACE TO RELAX?
Not that I have time to, but a friend's coffee shop--cup-a-joe's

28. FAVORITE PIE
Hmmmm... Cherry

Highlander, don't be mad. I'll do the others soon habibti!

Jeames, I tag you for now.

Notes from Ramallah-ish

2005-09-25T11:49:00.000-07:00

Here's the set-up/background of what I hope will become another blog, but for now will be posted on here:

The Bay Area is full of Palestinians. While the Yemeni and Lebanese populations are also up there, I tend to be surrounded by Palestinians as a result of my interests and work and the fact that they're so darn active in everything and have been for a long long time. Maybe also because of where I live, I don't know. So I have a lot of Palestinian friends and colleagues--which is great! I've learned a lot from them in so many ways and on so many levels be it politically, personally, or culturally.

One of the consequences of having so many Palestinians in my life is that it's likely that at least a few will go back to their homeland. And go back, they do. My half-joking motto is 'Palestinians--you fall in love with 'em and then they leave you for their first love.'

The first that left was Amjad, now happily married in Ramallah and expecting his first baby. Amjad was literally a part of my family. When he lived here, not a day went by that we didn't see each other usually over dinner since he figured out when I'd be cooking and call right then saying 'Ana Ja'an!' and of course I'd invite him over to have dinner with my brother and I since I was preparing it anyway and he was hungry. Then he'd knit pick about the Asian-ness of my cooking (hey, I'm a vegetarian--need I say more?) saying things like 'If you made this back home, no one would eat it' or what-not. But he still came back for the dinner... or maybe the company.

In his defence, he did make the world's best hummus though, hands down, and took me out to dinner plenty of times. On top of that, he amused me for hours with stories about what it's like to grow up in Palestine. I know, 'amused' seems the wrong word, but he would literally crack me up with his dramatic re-enactments! And he always had an Arabic saying to share with me and everyone else, right Amjad?

I trust my life with Amjad--that's what kind of person he is.

A couple of months ago, two other close Palestinian friends of mine left for home: Noura & Khalil. Seems like the names don't belong seperately and I hope they don't ever unless it's some accomplishment by one or the other. These two are a super dynamic couple with hearts of gold, sharp minds, spines of steal, and a warmness that would make anyone melt. Acceptance, tolerance, and understanding are just some of the parting gifts they left behind for me to work with. Not to forget having a ball no matter what's going on and laughing laughing laughing at the absurd while still calling a spade a spade. They live what they believe and don't back down when others don't agree. They're that solid. In a world of smoke and mirrors, that's a rarity. I spent my last birthday just roaming around the city in their car, stopping by at their friends' houses, chatting the day away with one or the other or someone else who loved them. It was my day to peak into what I call the 'Noura-Khalil world'. It was warm, safe, and happy. One of my best birthdays ever.

Noura will start a blog when they get settled and have easier access to internet venues. For now, I'm posting updates on their new life in Palestine (thanks to her for permission). Hopefully, Amjad will get a hint and start writing too! Noura, next time you meet, encourage him to do it. Yeah, he'll come up with some excuse--just keep at it.

(Drum roll) And now, presenting Noura:

Friday Sept. 23
Just thought I'd share (purge) a snipit of our time here with you. Up until now, mixed with a lot of fun and relaxation, thankfully the situation on the ground has remained relatively calm. Many (W.B.) Palestinians say they are just waiting to see what is going to happen to them next..now that Israel has more soldiers, and time on their hands.

LESSONS IN PATIENCE
Day from Hell.
So, today we were stuck in purgatory, somewhere in between Birzeit and the city of Ramallah. As a result of the "flying checkpoint" there were taxi's and cars lined up for miles, and we barely moved a foot every 10 minutes. All that our Western/American patience would allow us to wait in the wretched heat for absolutely no reason is about 25 minutes. Then instead of watching Khaleel prowl up and down the street trying to understand the non-sensical daily reality of life in Palestine we decided to turn around and head back. Although I could possibly have waited a bit longer in the scorching sun, it wouldn't have taken long for my patience to combust as well.

Instead of the 5 minutes that nature would allow normal human beings to get from Beitin to Ramallah, and again rejected from the "normal" miserable 40 minute re-route, we decided to go around and take the scenic 1 hour ride instead. Looking (difficultly) at the bright side, at least we have the American passports to allow us the privilege of passing through more checkpoints. So we drove rarely enjoying the wind blowing through our hair more until; we arrived at the Calandia checkpoint. At which point we only had to wait another forty five minutes to get back into Ramallah.

All the time, the American half of my brain was asking, myself (and of course the soldiers too; with no reason given) "Excuse Me Mr. Soldier, what the hell is going on here?? Why all the waiting and random check points?" My Palestinian brain was saying this is the first in the range of daily difficulties in life under occupation.

For now, it is just another lesson in never ending patience of life in Palestine. I swear, I just do not understand how Palestinians endure it.

Thanks for listening.

Noura

Rita

2005-09-23T01:12:00.000-07:00

'Ya Allah' (Oh Lord) is all I know to say right now--what else is left?

For personal accounts, check out Tareq's blog. Hoping he's okay. He just recently moved to Houston.

An LA Times article on Rita: As Rita Nears, Chaos Spreads

Yahoo updates on Rita are pretty good as well. They're mostly AP direct reporting.

This Week-end in San Francisco

2005-09-23T00:41:00.000-07:00

I was about to give up on this whole post after I lost the original. This will be a quicky as it's time sensitive.

As mentioned in my previous post, the Arab Film Festival is here! Between San Francisco, San Jose, and Berkeley, you can watch some of the best Arab-flavored feature films and some documentaries. I'm definitely not the only one super excited by it as evidenced by the rave review in the San Francisco Chronicle.

The only one I've seen so far is Sabah, which has been compared to My Big Fat Greek Wedding. I know I'm biased, but I honestly think it's better than that. The writer and director, Ruba Nadda, is a young Syrian-Canadian woman with a lot of potential. Keep an eye out.

Yesterday, San Francisco's activist organizations participated in yet another global anti-War demo. The call this time was a most definite 'Bring the troops back'. I didn't march this time--just tabled. How else do I get a break?

The DC, yesterday's rally kicked off a whole United for Peace: Saturday, September 24 Massive March, Rally & Festival coordinated by the United for Peace and Justice Coalition. Looking good over there, guys. More info on the festival here.

Also yesterday in SF was the Love Parade... I'm not advertizing it, but I know it was big. Apparently hundreds of DJs from around the world are spinning their techno (which I'm no fan of) in the city this weekend.

And today is the Folsom Street Fair. I decided not to post the actual home-page, but rather a link to SF history on this and other Street Fairs. It gives an idea of SF's legacy of activism.

California -- the next disaster on the list?

2005-09-22T21:13:00.000-07:00

A commentary from the San Francisco Chronicle warning of the implications of FEMA's seeming inability to respond to the situation in New Orleans... which should also include Houston at this point. Garcia, the writer thinks California was next on the list--a major earthquake in California was the third of FEMA's 2001 warnings of major disasters in the US. Then again, who knew of Rita at the time. Talk about plagues, eh?

How might it hit us here?

New Orleans Update

2005-09-17T19:26:00.000-07:00

Below is the last update from Jordan. Sorry for the delay in posting--I've been splitting my time between working, outreach coordinating for ADC-SF, a new gig producing a radio program on KALW, and have just taken on helping coordinate the closing night of San Francisco's 9th Annual Arab Film Festival (and attending some of the great featured films). Other local events (only one with which I'm involved) will be posted hereafter.

How's that for condensed promotion?

Back Inside New Orleans
by Jordan Flaherty

September 12, 2005

What actually happened in New Orleans these past two weeks? We need to sort through the rumors and distortions. Perhaps we need our version of South Africa’s Truth
And Reconciliation Commission. Some way to sort through the many narratives and find a truth, and to find justice.

I spent yesterday inside the city of New Orleans, speaking to a few of the last holdouts in the 9th ward/bywater neighborhood. Their stories paint a very different picture from what we’ve heard in the media. Instead of stories of gangs of criminals and police and soldiers keeping order, there were stories of collective action, everyone looking out for each other, communal responses.

The first few nights there was a large, free community barbecue at a neighborhood bar called The Country Club. People brought food and cooked and cooked and drank and went swimming (yes, there's a pool in the bar).

Emily Harris and Richie Kay, from Desire Street, traveled out on their boat and brought supplies and gave rides. They have been doing this almost every day since the hurricane struck. They estimate that they have rescued at least a hundred people. Emily doesn’t want to leave. She is a carpenter and builder, and says, “I want to stay and rebuild. I love New Orleans.”

Emily describes a community working together in the first days after the hurricane. She also describes a scene of abandonment and disappointment. “A lot of people
came to the high ground at St. Claude Avenue. They really thought someone would come and rescue them, and they waited all day for something - a boat, a helicopter, anything. There were helicopters in the sky, but none coming down.”

So people started walking as a mass uptown to Canal Street. Along the way, youths would break into grocery stores, take the food and distribute it evenly among houses in the community.

“Then they reached Canal Street, and saw that there was still no one that wanted to rescue them. That's when people broke into the stores on Canal Street.”

I asked Okra, in his house off of Piety Street, what the biggest problem has been. He said, “It’s been the police - they’ve lost the last restraints on their behavior they had, and gotten a license to go wild. They can do anything they want. I saw one cop beat a guy so hard that he almost took his ear off. And this was someone just trying to walk home.”

Walking through the streets, I witnessed hundreds of soldiers patrolling the streets. Everyone I spoke to said that soldiers were coming to their house at least once a day, trying to convince them to leave, bringing stories of disease and quarantine and violence. I didn’t see or speak to any soldiers involved in any clean up or rebuilding.

There are surely reasons to leave - I would not be living in the city at this point. I’m too attached to electricity and phone lines. But I can attest that those holdouts I spoke to are doing fine. They have enough food and water and have been very careful to avoid exposing themselves to the many health risks in the city.

I saw more city busses rolling through poor areas of town than I ever saw pre-hurricane. Unfortunately, these buses were filled with patrols of soldiers. What
if the massive effort placed into patrolling this city and chasing everyone out were placed into beginning the rebuilding process?

Some neighborhoods are underwater still, and the water has turned into a sticky sludge of sewage and death that turns the stomach and breaks my heart. However, some neighborhoods are barely damaged at all, and if a large-scale effort were put into bringing back electricity and clearing the streets of debris, people could begin to move back in now.

Certainly some people do not want to move back, but many of us do. We want to rebuild our city that we love. The People’s Hurricane Fund - a grassroots, community based group made up of New Orleans community organizers and allies from around the US - has already made one of their first demands a “right of return” for the displaced of New Orleans.

In the last week, I’ve traveled between Houston, Baton Rouge, Covington, Jackson and New Orleans and spoken to many of my former friends and neighbors. We feel shell
shocked. It used to be we would see each other in a coffee shop or a bar or on the street and talk and find out what we’re doing. Those of us who were working for social justice felt a community. We could share stories, combine efforts, and we never felt alone. Now we’re alone and dispersed and we miss our homes and our
communities and we still don’t know where so many of our loved ones even are.

It may be months before we start to get a clear picture of what happened in New Orleans. As people are dispersed around the US reconstructing that story becomes even harder than reconstructing the city. Certain sites, like the Convention Center and Superdome, have become legendary, but despite the thousands of people who were there, it still is hard to find out exactly what did happen.

According to a report that’s been circulated, Denise Young, one of those trapped in the convention center told family members, “yes, there were young men with guns there, but they organized the crowd. They went to Canal Street and ‘looted,’ and brought back food and water for the old people and the babies, because nobody had eaten in days. When the police rolled down windows and yelled out ‘the buses are coming,’ the young men with guns organized the crowd in order: old people in front, women and children next, men in the back,just so that when the buses came, there would be priorities of who got out first.” But the buses never came. “Lots of
people being dropped off, nobody being picked up. Cops passing by, speeding off. We thought we were being left to die.”

Larry Bradshaw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky, paramedics from Service Employees International Union Local 790 reported on their experience downtown, after leaving a hotel they were staying at for a convention. “We walked to the police command center at Harrah's on Canal Street and were told...that we were on our own, and no they did not have water to give us.

We now numbered several hundred. We held a mass meeting to decide a course of action. We agreed to camp outside the police command post. We would be plainly visible to the media and would constitute a highly visible embarrassment to the City officials. The police told us that we could not stay. Regardless, we began to settle in and set up camp. In short order, the police commander came across the street to address our group. He told us he had a solution: we should walk to the Pontchartrain Expressway and cross the greater New Orleans Bridge where the police had buses lined up to take us out of the City...

“We organized ourselves and the 200 of us set off for the bridge with great excitement and hope. ...As we approached the bridge, armed Gretna sheriffs formed a line across the foot of the bridge. Before we were close enough to speak, they began firing their weapons over our heads. This sent the crowd fleeing in various directions...

“Our small group retreated back down Highway 90 to seek shelter from the rain under an overpass. We debated our options and in the end decided to build an encampment in
the middle of the Ponchartrain Expressway on the center divide, between the O'Keefe and Tchoupitoulas exits. We reasoned we would be visible to everyone, we would have some security being on an elevated freeway and we could wait and watch for the arrival of the yet to be seen buses.

“All day long, we saw other families, individuals and groups make the same trip up the incline in an attempt to cross the bridge, only to be turned away. Some chased away with gunfire, others simply told no, others to be verbally berated and humiliated. Thousands of New Orleanians were prevented and prohibited from self-evacuating the City on foot. Meanwhile, the only two City shelters sank further into squalor and disrepair. The only way across the bridge was by vehicle. We saw workers
stealing trucks, buses, moving vans, semi-trucks and any car that could be hot wired. All were packed with people trying to escape the misery New Orleans had become.”

Media reports of armed gangs focused on black youth, but New Orleans community activist, Black Panther, and former Green Party candidate for City Council Malik Rahim reported from the West Bank of New Orleans, “There are gangs of white vigilantes near here riding around in pickup trucks, all of them armed.” I also heard similar reports from two of my neighbors - a white gay couple - who i visited on Esplanade Avenue.

The reconstruction of New Orleans starts now. We need to reconstruct the truth, we need to reconstruct families, who are still separated, we need to reconstruct the lives and community of the people of New Orleans, and, finally, we need to reconstruct the city.

Since I moved to New Orleans, I’ve been inspired and educated by the grassroots community organizing that is an integral part of the life of the city. It is this community infrastructure that is needed to step forward and fight for restructuring with justice.

In 1970, when hundreds of New Orleans police came to kick the Black Panthers out of the Desire Housing Projects, the entire community stood between the police and the
Panthers, and the police were forced to retreat.

The grassroots infrastructure of New Orleans is the infrastructure of secondlines and Black Mardi Gras: true community support. The Social Aid and Pleasure Clubs
organize New Orleans’ legendary secondline parades - roving street parties that happen almost every weekend. These societies were formed to provide insurance to the Black community because Black people could not buy insurance legally, and to this day the “social aid” is as important as the pleasure.

The only way that New Orleans will be reconstructed as even a shadow of its former self is if the people of New Orleans have direct control over that reconstruction.
But, our community dislocation is only increasing. Every day, we are spread out further. People leave Houston for Oregon and Chicago. We are losing contact with each other, losing our community that has nurtured us.

Already, the usual forces of corporate restructuring are lining up. Halliburton's Kellogg Brown & Root subsidiary has begun work on a $500 million US Navy contract for emergency repairs at Gulf Coast naval and marine facilities damaged by Hurricane Katrina. Blackwell Security - the folks that brought you Abu Ghraib - are patrolling the streets of our city.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the rich white elite is already planning their vision of New Orleans’ reconstruction, from the super-rich gated compounds of Audubon Place Uptown, where they have set up a heliport and brought in a heavily-armed Israeli security company. “The new city must be something very different,” one of these city leaders was quoted as saying, “with better services and fewer poor people. Those who want to see this city rebuilt want to see it done in a completely different way: demographically, geographically and politically.”

While the world’s attention is focused on New Orleans, in a time when its clear to most of the world that the federal government’s greed and heartlessness has caused this tragedy, we have an opportunity to make a case for a people’s restructuring, rather than a Halliburton restructuring.

The people of New Orleans have the will. Today, I met up with Andrea Garland, a community activist with Get Your Act On who is planning a bold direct action; she and several of her friends are moving back in to their homes. They have generators and supplies, and they invite anyone who is willing to fight for New Orleans to move back in with them. Malik Rahim, in New Orleans’ West Bank, is refusing to leave and is inviting others to join him. Community organizer Shana Sassoon, exiled in Houston, is planning a community mapping project to map out where our diaspora is being sent, to aid in our coming back together. Abram Himmelstein and Rachel Breulin
of The Neighborhood Story Project are beginning the long task of documenting oral histories of our exile.

Please join us in this fight. This is not just about New Orleans. This is about community and collaboration versus corporate profiteering. The struggle for New
Orleans lives on.

-----------------------------------------------
Jordan Flaherty is a union organizer and an editor of Left Turn
Magazine (www.leftturn.org). He is not
planning on moving out of New Orleans.

Guantanamo Diary

2005-09-11T12:11:00.000-07:00

Another diary posting—this time from Omar in Guantanamo. It was written during the time of the first hunger strike and has apparently been censored when the current hunger strike began.

It’s heart breaking.

I made no edits. The note in the end (regarding censorship) was included in the email I received. I would like to point out that Clive refers to Clive Stafford Smith, the British Human Rights attorney representing many Gitmo prisoners. To learn more about him and Omar's status, read Barbara Slaughter's May article.

British refugee Omar Deghayes’ Diary of the Hunger Strike
(Written from Guantanamo Bay, Camp V, unclassified Sept. 7, 2005)

Sunday 3 [July, 2005]
Jafallah Mari the only Qatari prisoner has fallen in the hunger strike. He was taken to hospital. His weight was 120 pounds now reduced to 103 pounds.

Tuesday 5
Khalid Hatair [Kuwaiti] was found unconscious in his cell when MP’s wanted to give diner food. He was ill because of the hunger strike. He was taken to hospital.

3pm Shammrani was taken to Investigation and asked why the hunger strike. He told her disrespect to all religious rituals and this is the fourth year in prison without any charges or clear decision etc.

Wednesday 6
2pm detainee in cell number A2 started to bleed from hunger strike. He is in the third week of hunger strike. Also the Qatari Jafallah is very sick again they entered his cell with the ERF team to check his blood and pressure.

Friday 8
Many people started to fall from hunger and in Block D in our block etc..

6.05 pm A Doctor and a translator threatening people and shoving them. He says we will force people to take food. Many detainees would want to take some to give them some strength for the days to come instead of trying to solve the problems.

Saturday 9
In the morning before 11am several times Doctor cam around and asked questions. Some show concern. This is a new approach unseen in all previous strikes. Whatever the reason their kinder human attitudes is to be encouraged. And should mend the lost trust between detainees and officials here in the camp.

Monday 11
The Qatari Jafallah is in hospital since last Friday.

5pm I heared that the strike had spread everywhere in Camp I and Camp II and forty detainees in Camp IV, the softest Camp. Camp V still very determined even though we are in the fourth dangerous week. A very good and powerful message to all these arrogant people in charge.

Tuesday 12
The strikers number in our Block has increased greatly I am assured that the strike has certainly spread in all other camps. Many people are in hospital. Qarnain in a serious ill state. I [worried about the] conditions of all detainees. But I found morale [is] very high and everyone is steadfast, they want to go on and just continue whatever the costs, if the Authorities here don’t do something fast to improve things, I think things are getting worse and it will go out of control.

Wednesday 13

3pm many more people have fallen unconscious. Some in Block D others in our Block. Ruhan is taken to hospital.

Thursday 14
More are taken to hospital. From our Block Jamma. In Block C Jihad the Syrian stopped drinking water for 6 days now. Ruhani came back from H. He said it was very busy and the other large hospital is to take the overload.

Tuesday 19

(I am back alive) J
I was very sick [and unable] to write anything last few days in much pain and like dead. Today I heard that [there are] even bigger numbers in Delta Camp. In (Camp 4) 50 refused to go back to their prison in protest. They were all removed to back to Camp Delta. When some U.S. heads asked what they demanded to stop the strike, they said ‘Go and ask Camp V’. Those poor detainees are angry for our treatment and forgotten their own.

Eisa Marbali is taken to hospital, and Ghasan Atabi, in Block A.

In [Block] A (Kazami) in a total refusal of anything (civil strike). They decided to take him away, I don’t know where.

Wednesday 20
Omar Khadr [the Canadian juvenile] is very sick in our Block. He is throwing [up] blood. They gave him cyrum [serum] when they found him on the floor in his cell. Galib Fiyhani also.

11.43 am. Ghasan came back from hospital. He also heard that Camp 4 were given (unusually) nuts and sweets etc... they refused it and said give it to our brothers in Camp V.

Tuesday 19
Supper. We held [a meeting] and talked between us about the dangerous condition of Atabi in front of us, and Sami [Al Laithi] in the wheelchair downstairs. We spoke to the SOG [Sergeant of the Guard] about their treatment. Our concern is that he relays the message. We asked them to take Sami out from Camp V to where he was Camp IV. He needs help and keeping him in this Camp was killing him though they said he was not a danger to U.S.A.

Atabi was given 4 tablets of Motrin daily for more than 2 weeks. He was not given any [real] medicine. Many Doctors who came about to see the strike promised him medicine but nothing came. He was brought from an operation to his cell and we asked them to treat him and keep him in hospital. This drug is a poison if taken in such quantity with all its side effects.

Wednesday 20
1.43 pm Atabi collapsed while he was walking with Guards to the shower.

4.35 pm I tidied my blanket and realised the dirt bad state it is in. Several months, if not a year, since I had a change. No facilities to wash it. Nor the sun – after the hunger strike I started to realise how bad the water smells and tastes. I am very thirsty all the time. I wait for the cup that comes with meals to drink.
- All lessons we had before the strike stopped. Lessons prepared by detainees for each other. I lost my work and revision. No songs or poetry on Friday night anymore. Just, many are falling, and sounds of illnesses. The Block is dead quiet most of the time.

Thursday 21
About 11am a guard moved the Quran of Suhai (Yemeni) in Block B. In protest Rida (Tunisian) was in the rec yard and refused to go in, in protest. They brought him in with the ERF hulligans [hooligans]. Cayous [chaos] in Block B, C and A. Qahatani broke the camera in his cell. ERF moved him to another cell. Other trying to break the little glass on the door. Atmosphere of cayous in the Camp.

- more people are starting tomorrow in the hunger strike.

- from 9 pm to now (10.20 pm) grand consultation (‘Mashura’).

- Abashi who can hardly speak decided alone to hold [accept] his plate against all advice. They refused to give him medicine. He is adding to our sorrow. We said to him, tomorrow they will not give you food. He said he wanted to be in the strike. He only ate [before] because we said if you enter the strike many of us in the Block will eat. So for now he is saying they refuse to give me food, and I have no choice, I am with you in the strike. We are still trying to convince him to [take] his plate. He is refusing. Just more to our sadness and misery to see him suffer.

Sunday 24 July
Wrote the notes about democracy and a long letter to my family. I was up all night. Today tired and strike is even bigger. Many Afghan in Camp Delta joined in. Another Block in Camp Delta of level one joined the strike. I got soap today. I will wash my clothes. Sami lay then under my cell, tried shout and speak to me. But I could not hear him. I shouted he did not hear me either. Yesterday I started revision again.

Monday 25 July
Stopped revision because I am very tired again from the strike. 10.20pm got soap so I washed my shirt. Atabi is gone to meet the lawyer. Omar Ramah is taken to hospital. Shammrani also collapsed at lunch time. Gubran said that they released Jatar, Oshan, and Mohammed Sudani. Good news. I am fed up with the strike. I cannot do my revision and other work. However I am at the last pages of Paxman’s book. Very good book and provokes thoughts and reflection. Though I do disagree on things. But very good book. I think that’s how research on subjects should be done. I wonder if his other books are as good as this. Clive, the Americans did not give me the other books you brought. [My 4 year old] Sulaiman’s pictures: He has not changed a lot. The letters the Americans gave me, only some of them.

Tuesday 26 July
I received four parcels of mail from Clive. Great news in them. Gave the summary to everyone in Block. Another sitting for the details. Clive, I think you still think I don’t trust you, you are completely wrong. I trust you now very much. I noticed that you intended good, done, really, a Great Job. But I think you are wounded deeply. You must forgive me for all the accusations before. You must realise the bad, suspicious conditions we are under, and psychological warfare we are under. This strike is the longest strike of all previous four strikes in these camps. Prisoners are still determined.

[Wednesday 27 July] 9.30 pm – we all decided to end the strike – for one month. Because the General and offiver promised to fulfill many conditions. Shakir [Aamer] is going round the camps and Blocks to relay this message with Colonel. My counting is 26th of July but someone said it is the 27th.

11pm
Reading the news Clive has done so much even for Libya. The conference in London of opposition parties. I think he has [done] a lot to cause it and move the media and ground for such move. He really deserves lots of credit. I hope I can repay you one day. First you move Amnesty later to make a report on Libya. Then brought the media attention and scholars (simply Great work).

Wednesday 27 July
The strike has stoped for one month, to give the General the time he required to implement all conditions he agreed and promised. If demands were not implemented we will (Insh’Allah) return again to hunger strike. We had detainees entering the strike in turns, in groups. One group after another, after a period of time passes. More than 250 striked because there turn has come but there are others who were in there waiting and did not even get the chance to enter yet. The General conditioned that we throw nothing on Guards during this month. He promised treatment under Geneva convention, respect of Qur’an and rituals, religious book and others, better food and conditions and many other things, he said. We will see.

Thursday 28 July
About 4 am I received early morning food before dawn for fast. It was very good. They changed it. It may cost the same price as before. But it was made this time for human beings. It had the same amount of eggs, but this time boiled. The same piece of bread etc… Also, last night sapper was very good though it had the same lentils and same tomato and bread. But was cooked for humans this time. This shows what they were doing before. They intended to make detainees’ life miserable. It was not the cost of food or amount we were complaining about . But exactly what they [have] now done and rectified. Cooked properly for human consumption. We never touched on the problem or articulated specifically this, But they rectified it when things were serious. They knew since [General] Miller changed it to this what the real problem was -- it was [a] deliberate act to cause irritation.

We have no media access. No one knew when we started the strike that the US Government and its cronies where making a big Probagand [Propaganda] about the food and what it costs. Senators reading menus in the Senate!! Etc. The strike and Allah’s will coincided with all the lies making them now, I am sure, look very stupid.

Thursday 28 July [cont’d[
Yesterday [****] came back from meeting his attorney. He said that 3 bombs hit London city. I am thinking who will put such bombs in London in this time!! To whose benefit?? The British people have supported the cause and plight of those mistreated in Gitmo. The media, politicians and human rights lawyers and organizations are in the forefront in talking against Bushes’ policy / who put those bombs and why now? If Iraq was the reason it would have been long ago. *** I do not see how such bombings in London can enhance any Islamic cause. Britain is the best country in the world in treating its Muslim minorities and provides refuge to many others persecuted in their own countries. The relatively fair justice and protection of rights, freedom and religious practice / tolerance that exist is one of the best in world today. Even the Government’s decision to join the war in Iraq, which is a very unwise one, can be changed through media and public awareness. I am sure the majority of British public are against any war, regardless of [the] Bush crusades. Because of this I would conclude no [true] Islamic group would want to bomb London.

Friday 29
After dawn prayer. They brought me some items saying I was Level One as is everyone in the Camp. They gave me is comb. I brushed my hair and beard for the first time since April 2002. We are in July 2005.

9am – I wrote the Blocks’ demands to send them to the detainee the General appointed as a leader of Camp V, because he was to sit with the military soon to give them all demands. The Block sergeant told me he knew about this new arrangement (of official representatives of Detainees and the possibility to send letters to him through heads of Blocks). But he said only the SOG can handle the letters. I asked to see the SOG at 10 am to give him the letter. Then at 10 am he came and said the mechanism to process their exchange of letter has not been implemented yet! And he can not take the letter.

Monday August 1
About 8 o clock. Things are not going good. The food, they went back to previous food all the last days. They changed the food for two days and gave pepper and chili sauce etc. Then they made sure now everyone has ended the strike they then went back as usual. Qhatani down stairs was not given level one clothes. I spoke to the SOG he said the General made so. Because he pulled the hand of a Guard after the agreement I told him that I think he should not have done so. But he did not keep his promise because he was present when the General came in with Shakir and promised that food will change, clean water will be given with meals. International laws would apply to everyone in detention and he asked only for 15 days etc.

When everyone next day ended the strike because to give time to him (General) as he asked to implement these conditions he went back on everything or many things. Qhatani might of felt betrayed as has all his friends have been, then felt wronged and done what he has done. The SOG said I cannot do anything because it is the General’s decision. I told him tell the Colonel that this is how we see it, and we will all stand with him, if he is not given clothes like everybody else.

Then I sent to Quatani asking what exactly has happened with the Guard. I admit I am annoyed with him because he did not tell me in the beginning about it and told me only that they refused to give him clothes.

It does seem very likely that the strike will restart again. I am very frustrated with these cunning officers and worthless men of no word. In Arabia we look down on such people.

Wednesday 3 August 11 pm
Things have improved a lot. This morning, good food. Change of clothes for everyone. New internment clothes. Good T shirts and boxer shorts. Official meeting of all heads of Blocks with pen and paper and cold water was supplied! Heads of camps meet with the General to finalise agreements. Things are very good. J. Relations with the guard improved. All troubles are stopped by an order from head of camps and head of Blocks (detainees of course!).

THE REST OF THE DIARY HAS BEEN CENSORED AS IT RELATES TO WHY THE PRISONERS WENT BACK ON STRIKE, AND APPARENTLY INVOLVES ACTIONS TAKEN AGAINST PRISONERS THAT ARE ‘UNDER INVESTIGATION’.

Hunger strike in Guantanamo

2005-09-10T15:48:00.000-07:00

Here's another little update on the prisoners at Guantanamo, including Omar Deghayes. About 200 are on a hunger strike in protest of abuse, unlawful imprisonment, and the condition of the prison. Hit the link to watch the report for more information and interviews.
channel4.com - News - special report: Hunger strike

Does anyone else feel like there are simply too many fires to put out in the world?

Mourning for New Orleans

2005-09-10T01:58:00.000-07:00

Another email from Jordan Flaherty. Ironically, he also discusses the
use of the term 'refugee' for the victims of Katrina. I swear that I
had not read this before I wrote my response to Jeames. I guess
Suheir Hamad and I just have similar thoughts.

Anyways, here goes Jordan:

September 9, 2005

Its been six days since I left New Orleans, and I miss my home so much. I’m still in a daze, its hard to hold a conversation or to think straight. People ask if everyone I know is ok, and I don’t know what to say. There are so many stories, so many rumors, so many people dispersed around the US. So many of us may never see each other again. I don’t think any of us are ok right now.

One friend, a teacher, was searching the Astrodome while holding up a sign, looking for his former students. Another friend says she fears she’ll never see New Orleans or her friends from there again. Another friend found temporary comfort with family in Houston and then got kicked out. A lot of friends are working in shelters, providing assistance, medical care, whatever they can. We are already spread across so many states, trying to pick up the pieces of our lives.

I can think of at least thirty people that I have no idea where they are. In some cities it seems like when people meet they give out their email address or weblog or friendster or whatever. In New Orleans, a lot of us only know each other only by first names. There are so many people I would see at least once a week that I
don’t know how to get in touch with at all. Even cell phones from the New Orleans area code have been nonfunctioning for most of the last two weeks.

New Orleans is a word of mouth town. The way you would find out about parties, secondlines, jazz funerals and other events is from hearing about it from friends. I always liked that about New Orleans. In an increasingly disconnected world, New Orleans felt different, more real and concrete. Now that we aren’t seeing each other regularly, our elaborate communication network has broken down.

But when people ask I just say, yes, as far as I know everyone is ok. I can’t really bring myself to think about it further than that.

Those with the least to begin with are the ones we worry about most now. Families and Friends of Louisiana’s Incarcerated Children is a grassroots organization with a long history of fighting for New Orleans’ most vulnerable. Since hurricane Katrina, they have been on the front lines of relief, spending time in the shelters, helping advocate for the refugees of New Orleans, and trying to find out what happened to
both adults and children who were locked up while New Orleans flooded.

There has been a lot of media hysteria regarding those who were locked in New Orleans’ prisons during the hurricane, stories that make it sound like a Hollywood action film where murderers use a disaster to escape and wreck havoc.

This is dramatic, and probably good for ratings. Its also exactly wrong. The truth is that tales from the imprisoned population of New Orleans are among the most heartbreaking stories of the past week. Families are still looking for loved ones lost in the system. According to organizers with FFLIC, of approximately 240 kids in state custody, as of a couple of days ago only 6 or 7 parents had been able to track down their children.

According to statistics compiled by the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana, at least 78% of New Orleans’ incarcerated youth were locked up for nonviolent offenses. The detention center in Jefferson Parish reports that 96% of the youth held there in 2000 were for nonviolent offenses. At least a third of youth in prison have been
sentenced to three or more years for nonviolent offenses. In New Orleans, 95% of the detained youth in 1999 were African-American. Louisiana taxpayers spend $96,713 to incarcerate a single child, and $4,724 to educate a child in the public schools.

According to a report by Human Rights Watch, “the state of Louisiana has one of the highest rates in the country of children living in poverty and children not in school or working. Large numbers of children, especially black children, are
suspended from school each year, sometimes for the whole year. Approximately 1,500 Louisiana children are confined in secure correctional facilities each year...In response to the question,"what would you most like to change here?", virtually every child at all of the facilities responded that they would like the guards to stop
hitting them and that they would like more food. Children consistently told us that they were hungry.”

Some people have been hurt to hear people of New Orleans called refugees. This hurts me too, but it hurts me more to feel that we have been treated as refugees. In a way, the people of New Orleans were refugees before hurricane Katrina ever came. We were abandoned by a country that never needed us, unless they needed a cheap vacation of strip clubs and binge drinking and cheap live music.

One of the things I love about New Orleans is that it always feels like another country. Now we see that in the eyes of the federal government we truly are residents of another country. A poor, black country. Instead of insisting that the displaced of New Orleans are not refugees, we should use this as an opportunity to look at why the idea of US refugees is so discomforting.

The transformation of the people of New Orleans into refugees is a large part of what has captured the imagination of people from around the world, especially those who are refugees themselves. I’ve received emails from Ghana and Cuba and Peru and Lebanon and Palestine.

In New York City tonight, a group of artists, initiated by Def Poetry Jam star and Palestinian poet Suheir Hammad, organized a benefit called Refugees For Refugees. That title beautifully and poignantly captures the feelings this man-made tragedy has generated around the world.

In her most recent poem, On Refuge and Language, Suheir writes:

I do not wish
To place words in living mouths
Or bury the dead dishonorably

I am not deaf to cries escaping shelters
That citizens are not refugees
Refugees are not Americans

I will not use language
One way or another
To accommodate my comfort

I will not look away

All I know is this

No peoples ever choose to claim status of dispossessed
No peoples want pity above compassion
No enslaved peoples ever called themselves slaves

What do we pledge allegiance to?

A government that leaves its old
To die of thirst surrounded by water
Is a foreign government

People who are streaming
Illiterate into paperwork
Have long ago been abandoned

I think of coded language
And all that words carry on their backs

I think of how it is always the poor
Who are tagged and boxed with labels
Not of their own choosing

I think of my grandparents
And how some called them refugees
Others called them non-existent
They called themselves landless
Which means homeless

Before the hurricane
No tents were prepared for the fleeing
Because Americans do not live in tents
Tents are for Haiti for Bosnia for Rwanda

Refugees are the rest of the world

Those left to defend their human decency
Against conditions the rich keep their animals from
Those who have too many children
Those who always have open hands and empty bellies
Those whose numbers are massive
Those who seek refuge
From nature’s currents and man's resources

Those who are forgotten in the mean times

Those who remember

Ahmad from Guinea makes my falafel sandwich and says
So this is your country

Yes Amadou this my country
And these my people

Evacuated as if criminal
Rescued by neighbors
Shot by soldiers

Adamant they belong

The rest of the world can now see
What I have seen

Do not look away

The rest of the world lives here too
In America.

Jordan Flaherty is an organizer with the Service Employees
International Union and an editor of Left Turn Magazine.
His other articles from New Orleans can be seen online
at www.leftturn.org.

Of course! Disaster becomes photo op

2005-09-09T00:28:00.000-07:00

YUCK!!!!! EWWWWW!!!! EKKKHHHH!

Isn't it bad enough that Barbara Bush thinks that the Astrodome is 'working very well' for the refugees and that they are 'so overwhelmed by the hospitality' and finds it 'sort of scary' that they want to stay? Must we really add onto this Bush senior, Governor Perry, and Obama making a photo op of their visit? I mean, I understand the need to multi-task, but is this really necessary?

If Bush senior is 'anxious to roll up [their] sleeves and get to work' then maybe he should quit the chatting and get to work. Same applies to the rest of 'em. Surely there's a food line down the way they can help serve.

I'm not sure if I'm more disgusted about the content or the coverage in this CNN article.

What You Can Do for New Orleans

2005-09-05T13:46:00.000-07:00

And here's the final post (for now) for New Orleans. This is a call out for help from community organizers. It's pretty angry, but understandably so.

Displaced New Orleans Community Demands Action, Accountability and
Initiates A People’s Hurricane Fund

Not until the fifth day of the federal government’s inept and inadequate emergency response to the New Orleans’ disaster did George Bush even acknowledge it was
‘unacceptable.’ ‘Unacceptable’ doesn’t begin to describe the depth of the neglect, racism and classism shown to the people of New Orleans. The government’s actions and inactions were criminal. New Orleans, a city whose population is almost 70% percent black, 40% illiterate, and many are poor, was left day after day to drown, to starve and to die of disease and thirst.

The people of New Orleans will not go quietly into the night, scattering across this country to become homeless in countless other cities while federal relief funds are
funneled into rebuilding casinos, hotels, chemical plants and the wealthy white districts of New Orleans like the French Quarter and the Garden District. We will not stand idly by while this disaster is used as an opportunity to replace our homes with newly built mansions and condos in a gentrified New Orleans.

Community Labor United (CLU), a coalition of the progressive organizations throughout New Orleans, has brought community members together for eight years to discuss socio-economic issues. We have been communicating with people from The Quality Education as a Civil Right Campaign, the Algebra Project, the Young People’s Project and the Louisiana Research Institute for Community Empowerment. We are preparing a press release and framing document that will be out as a draft later today for comments.

Here is what we are calling for:

We are calling for all New Orleanians remaining in the city to be evacuated immediately.
We are calling for information about where every evacuee was taken. We are calling for black and progressive leadership to come together to meet in Baton Rouge to initiate the formation of a Community Oversight Committee of evacuees from all the sites. This
committee will demand to oversee FEMA, the Red Cross and other organizations collecting resources on behalf of our people.

We are calling for volunteers to enter the shelters where our people are and to assist parents with housing, food, water, health care and access to aid. We are calling for teachers and educators to carve out some time to come to evacuation sites and teach our children. We are calling for city schools and universities near evacuation sites to open their doors for our children to go to school. We are calling for health care workers and mental health workers to come to evacuation sites to volunteer. We are calling for lawyers to investigate the wrongful death of those who died, to protect the land of the displaced, to investigate whether the levies broke due to natural and other related matters.

We are calling for evacuees from our community to actively participate in the rebuilding of New Orleans. We are calling for the addresses of all the relevant list serves and press contacts to send our information. We are in the process of setting up a central command post in Jackson, MS, where we will have phone lines, fax, email and a web page to centralize information. We will need volunteers to staff this office.

We have set up a People’s Hurricane Fund that will be directed and administered by New Orleanian evacuees. The Young People’s Project, a 501(c)3 organization formed by graduates of the Algebra Project, has agreed to accept donations on behalf of this fund.

Donations can be mailed to:

The People’s Hurricane Fund
c/o The Young People’s Project
99 Bishop Allen Drive
Cambridge, MA 02139

If you have comments of how to proceed or need more information, please
email them to Curtis Muhammad (muhammadcurtis@bellsouth.net) and Becky Belcore(bbelcore@hotmail.com).

Thank you.

Notes From Inside New Orleans

2005-09-05T13:26:00.000-07:00

Here's the essay from Jordan. Again, at the bottom, there is a listing of organizations and resources. Jordan is a union organizer and a writer/editor for Left Turn Magazine. He's been in New Orleans for a while now and is pretty familiar with the political dynamics that have led to the neglect of New Orleans.

It's all Jordan's writing and a few minor edits on my part.

Notes From Inside New Orleans
by Jordan Flaherty

Friday, September 2, 2005

I just left New Orleans a couple hours ago. I traveled from the apartment I was staying in by boat to a helicopter to a refugee camp. If anyone wants to examine the attitude of federal and state officials towards the victims of hurricane Katrina, I advise you to visit one of the refugee camps.

In the refugee camp I just left, on the I-10 freeway near Causeway,
thousands of people (at least 90% black and poor) stood and squatted in mud and trash behind metal barricades, under an unforgiving sun, with heavily armed soldiers standing guard over them. When a bus would come through, it would stop at a random spot, state police would open a gap in one of the barricades, and people would rush for the bus, with no information given about where the bus was going. Once inside (we were told) evacuees would be told where the bus was taking them - Baton
Rouge, Houston,Arkansas, Dallas, or other locations. I was told that if you boarded a bus bound for Arkansas (for example), even people with family and a place to stay in Baton Rouge would not be allowed to get out of the bus as it passed through Baton Rouge. You had no choice but to go to the shelter in Arkansas. If you had people willing to come to New Orleans to pick you up, they could not come within 17 miles of the camp.

I traveled throughout the camp and spoke to Red Cross workers, Salvation Army workers, National Guard, and state police, and although they were friendly, no one could give me any details on when buses would arrive, how many, where they would go to, or any other information. I spoke to the several teams of journalists nearby, and asked if any of them had been able to get any information from any federal or state officials on any of these questions, and all of them, from Australian tv to local Fox affiliates complained of an unorganized, non-communicative, mess. One cameraman told me “as
someone who’s been here in this camp for two days, the only information
I can give you is this: get out by nightfall. You don’t want to be here at night.”

There was also no visible attempt by any of those running the camp to set up any sort of transparent and consistent system, for instance a line to get on buses, a way to register contact information or find family members, special needs services for children and infirm, phone services, treatment for possible disease exposure, nor even a single trash can.

To understand the dimensions of this tragedy, it’s important to look at
New Orleans itself. For those who have not lived in New Orleans, you have missed a incredible, glorious, vital, city. A place with a culture and energy unlike anywhere else in the world. A 70% African-American city where resistance to white supremacy has supported a generous, subversive and unique culture of vivid beauty. From jazz, blues and hiphop, to secondlines, Mardi Gras Indians, Parades, Beads, Jazz
Funerals, and red beans and rice on Monday nights, New Orleans is a
place of art and music and dance and sexuality and liberation unlike anywhere else in the world.

It is a city of kindness and hospitality, where walking down the block
can take two hours because you stop and talk to someone on every porch, and where a community pulls together when someone is in need. It is a city of extended families and social networks filling the gaps left by city, state and federal governments that have abdicated their responsibility for the public welfare. It is a city where someone you walk past on the street not only asks how you are, they wait for an answer.

It is also a city of exploitation and segregation and fear. The city of New Orleans has a population of just over 500,000 and was expecting 300 murders this year, most of them centered on just a few, overwhelmingly black, neighborhoods. Police have been quoted as saying
that they don’t need to search out the perpetrators, because usually a few days after a shooting, the attacker is shot in revenge.

There is an atmosphere of intense hostility and distrust between much
of Black New Orleans and the N.O. Police Department. In recent months, officers have been accused of everything from drug running to corruption to theft. In separate incidents, two New Orleans police officers were recently charged with rape (while in uniform), and there have been several high profile police killings of unarmed youth, including the murder of Jenard Thomas, which has inspired ongoing weekly protests for several months.

The city has a 40% illiteracy rate, and over 50% of black ninth graders
will not graduate in four years. Louisiana spends on average $4,724 per child’s education and ranks 48th in the country for lowest teacher salaries. The equivalent of more than two classrooms of young people drop out of Louisiana schools every day and about 50,000 students are absent from school on any given day. Far too many young black men from New Orleans end up enslaved in Angola Prison, a former slave plantation where inmates still do manual farm labor, and over 90% of inmates eventually die in the prison. It is a city where industry has left and most remaining jobs are low-paying, transient, insecure jobs in the service economy.

Race has always been the undercurrent of Louisiana politics. This
disaster is one that was constructed out of racism, neglect and incompetence. Hurricane Katrina was the inevitable spark igniting the gasoline of cruelty and corruption. From the neighborhoods left most at risk, to the treatment of the refugees to the the media portrayal of the victims, this disaster is shaped by race.

Louisiana politics is famously corrupt, but with the tragedies of this
week our political leaders have defined a new level of incompetence. As hurricane Katrina approached, our Governor urged us to “Pray the hurricane down” to a level two. Trapped in a building two days after the hurricane, we tuned our battery-operated radio into local radio and tv stations, hoping for vital news, and were told that our governor had called for a day of prayer. As rumors and panic began to rule, there was no source of solid dependable information. Tuesday night, politicians and reporters said the water level would rise another 12 feet - instead it stabilized. Rumors spread like wildfire, and the politicians and media only made it worse.

While the rich escaped New Orleans, those with nowhere to go and no way
to get there were left behind. Adding salt to the wound, the local and national media have spent the last week demonizing those left behind. As someone that loves New Orleans and the people in it, this is the part of this tragedy that hurts me the most, and it hurts me deeply.

No sane person should classify someone who takes food from indefinitely
closed stores in a desperate, starving city as a “looter,” but that's just what the media did over and over again. Sheriffs and politicians talked of having troops protect stores instead of perform rescue operations.

Images of New Orleans’ hurricane-ravaged population were transformed into black, out-of-control, criminals. As if taking a stereo from a store that will clearly be insured against loss is a greater crime than the governmental neglect and incompetence that did billions of dollars of damage and destroyed a city. This media focus is a tactic, just as the eighties focus on “welfare queens” and “super-predators” obscured the simultaneous and much larger crimes of the Savings and Loan scams and mass layoffs, the hyper-exploited people of New Orleans are being used as a scapegoat to cover up much larger crimes.

City, state and national politicians are the real criminals here.
Since at least the mid-1800s, it’s been widely known the danger faced by flooding to New Orleans. The flood of 1927, which, like this
week’s events, was more about politics and racism than any kind of
natural disaster, illustrated exactly the danger faced. Yet government officials have consistently refused to spend the money to protect this poor, overwhelmingly black, city. While FEMA and others warned of the urgent impending danger to New Orleans and put forward proposals for funding to reinforce and protect the city, the Bush administration, in every year since 2001, has cut or refused to fund New Orleans flood control, and ignored scientists warnings of increased hurricanes as a result of global warming. And, as the dangers rose with the floodlines, the lack of coordinated response dramatized vividly the callous disregard of our elected leaders. The aftermath from the 1927 flood helped shape the elections of both a US President and a Governor, and ushered in the southern populist politics of Huey Long.

In the coming months, billions of dollars will likely flood into New
Orleans. This money can either be spent to usher in a “New Deal” for the city, with public investment, creation of stable union jobs, new schools, cultural programs and housing restoration, or the city can be “rebuilt and revitalized” to a shell of its former self, with newer hotels, more casinos, and with chain stores and theme parks replacing the former neighborhoods, cultural centers and corner jazz clubs.

Long before Katrina, New Orleans was hit by a hurricane of poverty, racism, disinvestment, deindustrialization and corruption. Simply the damage from this pre-Katrina hurricane will take billions to repair.

Now that the money is flowing in, and the world’s eyes are focused on
Katrina, it’s vital that progressive-minded people take this opportunity to fight for a rebuilding with justice. New Orleans is a special place, and we need to fight for its rebirth.

Jordan Flaherty is a union organizer and an editor of Left Turn Magazine (www.leftturn.org). He is not planning on moving out of New Orleans.

Below are some small, grassroots and New Orleans-based resources, organizations and institutions that will need your support in the coming months.

Social Justice:
JJPL
If They Can Learn
NOLA Palestine Solidarity
The People's Institute
Critical Resistance

Cultural Resources:
Backstreet Cultural Museum
Ashe Cultural Arts Center
New Orleans International Human Rights Film Festival
The Iron Rail
Girl Gang Productions

Current Info and Resources:
Craigslist's has a listing dedicated to helping New Orleans as well

New Orleans

2005-09-05T13:16:00.000-07:00

I'm posting below a chronicle of events from a friend of mine, Jordan, who has been living and working in New Orleans. I'm relieved for his safety, but horrified by some of the accounts of the situation.

We've all been watching the devestation in New Orleans, but personal accounts give a little more clarity than the media frenzy.

At the end, there are some ideas of what you can do to help if you're willing and able. I will also be posting another essay and a call for help from the New Orleanian progressive community.

And I will respond to the comments from before. Highlander and others, please forgive me for being MIA. It's been a long year and an even longer summer. I'm still playing catch up, so please bear with me.

Salamat

Hurricane Diary

Many people have asked for more information about my experience in the
past week. I was one of the fortunate ones. I had food and water and a solid home. Below are notes from my week in the disaster that was constructed out of greed, corruption and neglect.

Saturday, August 27

I’m in New Orleans, and there’s word of a hurricane approaching. I don’t consider leaving.

Why?

Because I don’t have a car, and all the airlines and car rental companies are sold out. Because the last two hurricanes were false alarms, despite the shrill and vacuous media alarms. Because I have
a sturdy, second floor apartment, food, water, flashlights, and supplies. Because there is not much of an evacuation plan. Friends of mine who evacuated last time sat in their cars, moving 50 miles in 12 hours.

Sunday, August 28

As the storm approaches and grows larger, everyone I know is calling.
“Are you staying or going? where are you staying? Are you bringing your pets? What should I do?” Governor Blanco urges us to “pray the hurricane down” to a level 2.

I relent to pressure somewhat and relocate to a more sturdy location, an apartment complex built out of an old can factory in the mid-city neighborhood. The building is five stories high, built of concrete and brick. There are seven of us in the apartment, with four cats.

Monday, August 29

Its morning, the storm is over, and we survey the streets outside.
There has been some flooding. A few of us explore the neighborhood in boats, and we see extensive damage, but overall we feel as if New Orleans has once again escaped fate.

Later in the day, we hear some reports of much greater flooding in destruction in the ninth ward and lower ninth ward neighborhoods, New Orleans’ most overexploited communities.

Tomorrow, we decide, the water will lower and we’ll walk home. We
expect power will start coming on in a week or so.

There are many relaxed and friendly conversations, especially on the roof. With all of the lights in the city out, the night sky is beautiful. We lie on our backs and watch shooting stars.

Tuesday, August 30

We wake up to discover that the water level has risen several feet.
Panic begins to set in among
some. We inventory our food and find that, if we ration it tightly, we
have enough for five days. As we
discuss it, we repeatedly say, “not that we’ll be here that long, but
if we had to...”

We continue to explore the area by boat, helping people when possible.
The atmosphere outside is a sort of post-apocalyptic, threatening world of obscure danger, where the streets are empty and the future seems cloudy. The water is a repellent mix of sewage, gas, oil, trash and worse.

We meet some of our neighbors. Most of the building is empty. Of at least 250 apartments, there are maybe 200 people in the building, about half white and half Black. Many people, like us, are crowded 7 or 10 to an apartment. Like us, many people came here for safety from the storm. Some have no food and water. A few folks break open the building candy machine and distribute the contents. We talk about breaking into the cafe attached to the building and distributing the food.

We turn on a battery-powered tv and radio, and then turn it off in disgust. No solid information, just rumor and conjecture and fear. Throughout this time, there is no reliable source of information, compounding and multiplying the crisis.

The reporters and politicians talk 80% about looting and 20% about flooding. I can’t understand how anyone could blame someone for “looting” when they just had their home destroyed by the neglect and corruption of a country that doesn’t care about them and never did.

Tomorrow, the news announces, the water level will continue to rise, perhaps 12-15 feet. Governor Blanco calls for a day of prayer.

Wednesday, August 31

White people in the building start whispering about their fears of “them.” One woman complains of people in the building “from the projects and hoarding food.” There is talk of gangs in the streets, shooting, robbing, and lawless anarchy. I feel like there is a struggle in people’s minds between compassion and panic, between empathy and fear. However, we witness many folks traveling around in boats, bringing food or giving lifts or sharing information.

But the overwhelming atmosphere is one of fear. People fear they won’t
be able to leave, they fear disease, hunger, and crime. There is talk of a soldier shot in the head by looters, of bodies floating in the ninth ward, flooding in Charity Hospital, and huge masses (including police) emptying Wal-Mart and the electronic stores on Canal street. There are fires visible in the distance. A particularly large fire seems to be nearby - we think it’s at the projects at Orleans and Claiborne. Helicopters drop army MREs (Meal Ready to Eat) and water, and people rush forward to grab as many as they can.

After the third air drop, people in the building start organizing a distribution system.

Across the street is a spot of land and helicopters begin landing there and loading people aboard. Hundreds of people from the nearby hospital make their way there, many wearing only flimsy gowns, waiting in the sun. As more helicopters come, people start arriving from every direction, straggling in, swimming or coming by boat.

A helicopter hovers over our roof, and a soldier comes down and announces that tomorrow everyone in the building will be evacuated.

Across the street, at least two hundred people spend the night huddled
on a tiny patch of land, waiting for evacuation.

Thursday, September 1

People in the building want out. They are lining up on the roof to be picked up by helicopters - three copters come early in the morning and take a total of nine people. Seventy-five people spend the next several hours waiting on the roof, but no more come.

Down in the parking garage, flooded with sewage, a steady stream of boats takes people to various locations, mostly to a nearby helicopter pickup point.

We hear stories of hundreds of people waiting for evacuation nearby at
Xavier University, a historically Black college, and at other locations.

Our group fractures, people leaving at various times.

Two of us take a boat to a helicopter to a refugee camp. If you ever
wondered if the US government would treat US refugees the same way they treat Haitian refugees or Somali refugees, the answer is, yes, if those refugees are poor, black, and from the South.

The individual soldiers and police are friendly and polite - at least
to me - but nobody seems to know what's going on. As wave after wave of refugees arrives, they are ushered behind the barricades onto mud and dirt and sewage, while heavily armed soldiers look on.

Many people sit on the side, not even trying to get on a bus. Children, people in wheelchairs, and everyone else sit in the sun by the side of the highway.

Everyone has a story to tell, of a home destroyed, of swimming across
town, of bodies and fights and gunshots and looting and fear. The worst stories come from the Superdome. I speak to one young man who describes having to escape and swim up to mid-city.

I‘m reminded of a moment I read about in the book “Rising Tide,” about
the Mississippi river flood of 1927. After the 1927 evacuation, a boatload of poor black refugees is refused permission to get on land “until they sing negro spirituals.” As a bus arrives and a mass swarms forward and state police and national guard do nothing to help, I feel like I’m witnessing the modern equivalent of this dehumanizing spectacle.

More refugees are arriving than are leaving. Three of us walk out of the camp, considering trying to hitchhike a ride from relief workers or press. We get a ride from an Australian tv team who drive us to
Baton Rouge where we sit on the street and wait until a relative arrives and gives us a ride to Houston.

While we sit on the street, everyone we meet is a refugee from somewhere - Bay St Louis, Gulfport, Slidell, Covington. It’s after midnight, but the roads are crowded. Everyone is going somewhere.

Friday, September 2

In Houston, I can’t sleep, although we drove through the night.
Governor Blanco announces that she’s sending in more national guard troops:

“These troops are fresh back from Iraq, well trained, experienced, battle tested and under my orders to restore order in the streets. They have M-16s and they are locked and loaded. These troops know how to shoot and kill and they are more than willing to do so if necessary and I expect they will.”

Many people have called and written to ask what they can do. I don’t really have answers. I’m still tired and angry and I don’t know if my home survived.

But, here are some thoughts:

1) Hold the politicians accountable. Hold the media accountable.
Defend Kanye West.

2) Support grassroots aid. A friend has compiled a list at
http://www.sparkplugfoundation.org/katrinarelief.html

3) Volunteer: The following is a call for volunteers from Families
and friends of Louisiana’s Incarcerated Children, an excellent
grassroots group: “Come and help us walk through the shelters,
find people, help folks apply for FEMA assistance, figure out what
needs they have, match folks up with other members willing to take
people in. We especially need Black folks to help us as the racial
divide between relief workers and evacuees is stark. Email us ASAP
if you would like to help with this work. kdhiggs@hotmail.com,
familiescantwait@yahoo.com, deenv_2000@yahoo.com,
xochitl@mediajumpstart.org"

4) Organize in your own community.

5) Add your apartment to the housing board at www.hurricanehousing.org.

6) Support grassroots, community control of redevelopment. Don’t let
New Orleans die.

============================================================

Jordan Flaherty is a union organizer and an editor of Left Turn
Magazine (www.leftturn.org).

meme tagged...

2005-08-15T23:45:00.000-07:00

I've been tagged for a while now. In retrospect, I should have been able to respond sooner than now, but life sometimes takes us on unplanned twists. Sometimes they're expected and can be easily included in the general agenda of life, and sometimes they catch us off guard. I was caught off guard.

But let's say that now I'm somewhere near where I'd like to be in a number of ways...I'm still in a confused situation, but more willing to work with it.

Anyways, back to the meme thing.

Total number of books owned: Too many... and I have a problem with letting them go. About 200 are easily countable, and then there are stashes hidden in scarce closet space and archived at home in Libya. Something I'm not proud of, but is related, is that I have been known to steal books from family, friends, and even the public library. I had to force myself to return a book that is out of print and could only do it because I knew some poor student would be searching for it like I did. I know that this is wrong and am working on this problem, but we all have our weaknesses, don't we?

Last book bought: I bought a stack from a street vendor that included a Malcolm X reader By Any Means Necessary and Aaron Cometbus's Double Duce among some others. The last book I bought from a store was Khaled Mattawa's book of poems called Zodiac of Echoes. Most of my books are either hand-me-downs (yes, this may mean I just never returned them to their owners), presents, or bought on the street. It's good that Bay Area people read so much.

Last book read: Hmmm...I guess that would have to be Arab Women, an anthology of essays written by none other than Arab women. Not sure if I would really recommend it though. It left me wondering who the Arab women they were seeking out to speak on behalf of the others were.

Five books that mean a lot to you:
1- The Question of Palestine--Edward Said;
2- The Cairo Trilogy--Naguib Mahfouz;
3- Ismailia Eclipse--Khaled Mattawa
4- The Watchers--Tahar Djaout
5- Woman at Point Zero--Nawal El Saadawi.

Tag five people to continue this meme:

I can't tag anyone at this point. I've been gone for so long... I'll do it though. Slowly but surely.

Did I do this meme thing right? Is there something else I should include?

The Daily Star - Business Articles - Libyan reforms exceed expectations

2005-08-06T16:51:00.000-07:00

I've included the article in the post as in case the link isn't open to all.

I post this glowing review of the Q-man as yet another example of the hypocricy of international policy makers. Democratic reform and rights apparently refer to the freeing of money, not humans. The message I'm getting is that as long as money can be made in your country at whatever cost, everything's fine and dandy and all is forgiven. As long as the West gets its share, all is well, and the grievances of thousands and millions is forgotten.

Nothing new, I realize, but remains frustrating.

Consider this posting a concession in the spirit of objectivity, but don't expect too many like this.

Libyan reforms exceed expectations

By Daniel Epps
Special to The Daily Star
Friday, August 05, 2005

For nearly 36 years, Libya's fate has been inextricably linked with that of its enigmatic leader, Colonel Moammar Gadhafi. While for much of that time that fate has been isolation from the rest of the world and domination by socialism, something new is brewing in Tripoli. After decades opposing the West and maintaining a policy of nonalignment as part of his "Third Universal Theory," Gadhafi has recently worked to restore Libya's standing in the international community and modernize his nation's outdated economy. While the self-styled "leader of the revolution" is anything but predictable, his stunning about-face could mark the beginning of a Libyan renaissance.

A few years ago, few would have thought change for the better in Libya was likely in the short term. The country's involvement in international terrorism, including the infamous 1988 Lockerbie plane bombing that killed 270 people, had destroyed diplomatic relations with the West and resulted in heavy economic sanctions. Libya's economic policies - according to Gadhafi an alternative to both capitalism and communism - were decidedly socialist, characterized by state ownership. And while supposedly a "direct democracy" with rule by committees of the people, the "Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriyya," as it is officially known, is a dictatorship controlled by a leader one might charitably call eccentric. Libya's future was not looking very bright.

But suddenly things are looking up. Gadhafi has gone out of his way to make amends for Lockerbie and other incidents. Libya formally accepted responsibility for the killings and provided compensation for victims in 2003. Later that year, Gadhafi publicly abandoned all weapons of mass destruction programs. By 2004, all sanctions had been lifted and Libya had restored diplomatic ties with the U.S. The change in fortunes could not have been more dramatic or swift. In 2002, U.S. President George W. Bush added Libya to his "axis of evil"; this year he praised the country, calling on North Korea's Kim Jong Il to emulate Gadhafi.

While turning a rogue nation into a lauded paragon of international cooperation quickly was an extraordinary feat, Gadhafi's ambitions are greater. Despite his long allegiance to socialism, Gadhafi is now moving his country toward a Western-style free market system. Libya recently announced it would lift virtually all tariffs on imports later this year and is preparing a bid for membership in the World Trade Organization. Other barriers to foreign investment have been or will be eased, and there are plans to privatize many state-owned concerns soon - an unthinkable suggestion a decade ago.

If Gadhafi succeeds in fully liberalizing Libya's trade relations, next he will need to work to bring in foreign investors and create new industries. Currently, Libya's economy is largely based on the country's oil reserves. Manufacturing and construction from about 20 percent of GDP, a figure that will need to rise as oil production inevitably drops. Unemployment is high - 30 percent - and jobs for the growing number of young, educated Libyans are needed. Perhaps tourism is the solution; although Libya is not currently viewed as a prime vacation spot, Gadhafi has recently voiced interest in developing hotels on the country's long coastline. Perhaps, as Libya becomes increasingly viewed as a mainstream, Western-friendly nation, more tourists will choose to spend their holidays there.

There are still many unanswered questions. Will the sometimes fickle Gadhafi change course yet again, setting back recent progress? Even if not, what will the country look like after he is gone? Some say Gadhafi has chosen as his successor his son, Saif, who many believe is encouraging his father's new pro-Western policies. But as Libya becomes more economically and politically connected to the rest of the world, Libyans could become increasingly unwilling to live in an undemocratic country. While in some ways Libya's current autocratic system has actually made reform easier - government policies in democracies can rarely be changed so drastically, so quickly - it will increasingly become an impediment. Political destabilization is never good for business; hopefully Libya will eventually be able to make a smooth transition to a more stable form of government.

While many may remain skeptical about Gadhafi's motives and intentions, his recent reforms are by no means superficial and have put Libya on the fast track to a better way of life. Free-trade policies don't guarantee and new jobs and more money, but they certainly make them more of a possibility. Libyans may soon be grateful that their leader has exchanged the idiosyncratic philosophy laid out in his "Green Book" for plain, old-fashioned pro-business values.

TV Debate Between Regime and Opposition

2005-07-12T18:42:00.000-07:00

Well, well, well... the Libyan regime feels compelled to acknowledge and debate the Libyan Opposition movement. And it only took 36 years!

The link leads to a transcript of a 'debate' between the Rjab Budabuss, former Minister of Propaganda and current Chief Ideologist of the Revolutionary Committees, and Mohammed Buisier, former reformist and cofounder of various Libyan opposition groups. The former represents the Libyan regime and the latter an advocate of democracy (I would say, by default, he represents Libyan dissidents in general).

The debate was aired on 'Aldemocratia'--a satellite TV channel--and moderated by Mohammed Alhashmy, the channel's founder (and a new research topic for me).

My cynical side says 'too little too late' while my optimistic side wants to read some positive into the poorly disguised double-speak espoused by Budabuss. By the time Rumsfled's image floated into my mind, I knew cynicism was winning.

I'll add my comments as an update after I nap off my travel exhaustion. Peace out.

Libya: News and Views

Negotiating...

2005-06-20T22:08:00.000-07:00

What's up with that smokeyspice, huh? She brings up a hot topic like marriage and then gives no follow up... pretty damn inconsiderate, isn't it?

Well, folks, I haven't written anything for this long because... well, because I'm speechless. It's not that there's nothing of importance to say because there is. Not because I don't want to write because I do. It's just that I've found myself in one of those situations that I never envisioned I would allow myself to be in, and I did this all on my own. If I was back home in Libya, someone may suggest the witch-craft we like to blame so much on. But I'm neither in Libya nor much of a mystic myself so my conscience gets to bear the full brunt of responsibility for what I do.

I've come to realize that I spent much time over the years tip-toeing around so as to not awaken those sleeping around me. I can honestly say that I've been walking on egg-shells for about two decades now. What began as environmental conditioning became self-imposed repression as I lost sight of what power is in my own hands by concentrating on that which is out of them. I sat on the fence for so long that I forgot that there was a decision to make until the fence began rocking, threatening to throw me off if I didn't climb down myself.

I've walked and walked and discovered that I've been either on a tread-mill or that the path I chose was nothing more than a loop at the end of which I'm at the same intersection that I began at, only with a few more lessons learned under my belt. The question is which path I choose this time and how it meshes with what I've learned in this world.

I know, we're all dealt a different deck of cards in this world--but we're not all playing the same game. Some are playing Blackjack, some playing Poker; some playing Blackjack at Poker tables while others hold coins at the Roulette wheel. Some of us are playing and slowly but surely learning the tricks. Some of us aren't playing at all and some of those not playing actually think they're playing. Hell, some of the dealers don't even know they're dealing while others are revelling in it.

And then there are those of us that seem to have been dealt 2 cards from one source, and a die from another, and sent to the Craps table to make do while subjected to flourescent interogation lights and surrounded by tight-lipped ladies and gentlemen subtly uttering their grand words of wisdom to be heard through a thunderous roar of cackling drunks and bustling crowds.

This seems to be the table I'm at and that's what I'm negotiating.

My first instinct is to run so fast and hard that the roar turns to a murmur that begins to sound more like my heart beat than something outside my body, until I forget what I'm running from, until...when?

And after running for so long, how do I learn to stop and stand firm?

In an ideal world, the only person that has to be okay with my actions is myself and perhaps a partner. In an ideal world, my partner would trust my conscience. In an ideal world, logic and human understanding would beat sensless dogmas and the irrational fear of different paths through this world. But it's neither an ideal world nor should I maneuver around as though it were.

I'm learning, the hard way, to pick my battles wisely. I'm learning ownership for my own actions. I'm also learning that bitter and sweet are inextricably intertwined and that negotiating for one means tasting the other.

I know this is all pretty vague... It's all I can say at the moment. I will say that I may be swallowing some of my most recent words very soon, and that I would be happy to do so.

More later.

Arranging marriages

2005-05-02T03:51:00.000-07:00

My life has turned into a stage for an absurdly surreal play in which the first two acts have me in utter confusion. Act three, in which the heroine (me) figures out the solution to her situation, remains in the making.

Act I: Growing Pains

This heroine will have successfully made it to smack in the middle of my late 20s in a couple of months. I will turn 28 this July and am relatively content with what I have to show for my years.

However, as the scene unfolds, additional elements make the seemingly appropriate progression of age suddenly inappropriate-—elements rooted in culture and identity.

In itself, reaching 28 would not be an issue...were I not ALSO Libyan, Muslim, and unmarried. While none of these particular facts of my life have alarmed me, they seem to be the source of much nervous tension in my family. While I am concerned with the next step in my career, the voices on the other end of the cursed ‘reach me anytime’ cell phone speak to other issues—-namely, to whether am I open to ‘meeting’ Mr. X and/or Mr. Y and/or Mr. Z for the purpose of determining whether we would like to spend the rest of our lives together. HUH?

Am I what? Speak with whom? And he is relevant to me how????

Act II: Slightly more intense Growing Pains

[The heroine realizes that she no longer has the old faithful excuse of 'finishing school' handy to her. She could use it, but she'd be lying. Then again, perhaps she's been hasty in her rejection of these kinds of arrangements. She's not married afterall. Also, the news that she's actually speaking with someone would be thrilling to her mother back home...and mother always wants what's best for her, doesn't she? It worked for others, why not give it a shot?]

And thus does reality turn surreal brinking on the absurd:

The questions preceding the introduction of this shadow man seem to have been informally standardized. The following is a translation of these questions, roughly in the order I have heard them.

- Is there someone in your life?
- Are you in a relationship?
- Is there someone you have in mind to marry?
- Are you open to the idea of marriage?
- What qualities in a man are you looking for? What conditions do you have?
- There’s this man Mr. X, Y, Z… related to or known by A, B, or C… who is looking to get married. Are you open to speaking with him? (Tada!)

Tweek out a couple of these questions, and you get one of those dating hotline commercials.

Keeping in mind my cultural background, each of these seemingly innocent questions is, in fact, a bit tricky. For example, if I did have someone in my life, could I really be so honest about it with my immediate or distant family without opening the flood gates of hell into my ear or my living room? If I say ‘Well, yes, there is someone in my life’, then I would probably have a lot of explaining to do since relationships outside the family ordained formal ‘engagement’ are still socially unacceptable.

To dig or not to dig… that is the real question here, my friends.

Are you open to the idea of marriage?

Oh boy.

How does one say ‘Well, in theory, yes; but in reality, I'm not done being single quite yet’ and get away with it in the midst of a community that explicitly rejects the idea of a satisfied single woman? There are few ways around this question, folks.

Note the wording of the question itself-—are they asking a broad theoretical question or do they really mean to ask whether one wants to get married at a given particular time—like, namely NOW? I’m pretty sure they don’t want to hear me pontificating on the institution of marriage and how it’s evolved throughout human history, so the latter is more likely the accurate answer.

The phrasing of the question is in fact a trap. If you actually don’t want to be married as soon as possible, you’re either up to no good or are viewed with the same recognition as a space alien landing in one’s back-yard. After all, no decent woman would want to live without a man by her side, right? If the lady in question does in fact state that she's not interested in marriage quite yet, then the logical next question would be roughly along the lines of ‘what exactly are you doing with your life that you can’t get married?’ Essentially, this hints that you better be really committed and/or close to discovering that cure for cancer for this to be acceptable.

Right… cure for cancer coming up, right after I pull off that world peace project I’ve been working on.

What qualities in a man are you looking for? What are your conditions? How to answer these? Is it sufficient to include a credit and a background check along with a brief description of physical traits that I find attractive?

I suppose I could say that I’m looking for a down-to-earth creative intellectual who is willing to move to my city rather than the other way around, but then I’m likely to get that stern look of disapproval. This is no laughing matter. Right…who’s laughing?

It’s not that I’m making fun of anyone or anything so much as it is my naturally sarcastic response to senselessness. I just don’t have a list of conditions prepared. Apparently, the memo to compile one has been misfiled or is buried under the other stacks of paper on my desk.

Or perhaps I was hoping, just hoping, to meet someone with qualities I both like and dislike but am willing to work it out with rather than stating 'conditions'.

And if I were to state a description or conditions that the person in question is unable to live up to, will the proposition be nipped in the butt? Will the family member really cease to ask me whether I would be ‘open to speaking with’ Mr. X, Y, or Z?

I kinda doubt it. They want me married…sooner better than later. After all, they tell me, other girls my age have been popping out babies for years and they just can’t wait to see my non-existent babies.

It’s true—most of my childhood friends and family are in fact married with children. Each time I visit home, I find at least two more babies and a couple more pregnancies in the family…oh yeah, and the five weddings I missed. And, yes, it’s also true that I am not a biologist studying the composition of human blood cells and DNA to find the cure for cancer nor am I doing anything worthy of such world-wide recognition. They win on those counts.

Act III: Slightly Horrifying Growing Pains followed by Reality Check followed by More Growing Pains

So I conceded and gave them all the right answers:

No, I’m not involved with anyone;
No, I have no one in particular in mind;
Yes, I’m open to the idea of marriage;
Sure, I’ll talk to Mr. Random variable…I’m sure he’s a wonderful chap;
I’ll give it a shot.

In the first place, hearing these words come out of my mouth was like experiencing mini-explosions in various parts of my mind and body. Who was this woman that took over my body and made me agree to things I would never agree to??? I should have called it quits when the first panic attack subsided. If it was the right thing to do, it probably shouldn't have felt so wrong.

Instead, I continued to be agreeable and ‘open’ to possibilities. I figured, hey, I can make this fun. I’ll approach it anthropologically. I might as well discover what actually happens in these arrangements before I completely write them off.

Suddenly, I found myself scheduling blocks of time to get to know someone over the phone, answering questions about what I look like, the things I do, when I do them and for how long and why, whether I pray, what I cook or eat, how I dress, and an endless barrage of others. Oh, and some of the questions (e.g. those pertaining to past relationships) are repeated in various ways at different times just to check on the consistency of the responses.

How fun. So much fun that I have begun to question my sanity.

Truth is that when it comes to romantic commitments, I’m flighty. I know this about myself. This natural tendency seems to be aggravated when comic bubbles appear over my head depicting the Libyan version of marriage hell in which I learn to get what I want using devious 'feminine' manipulation in order to NOT insult my imaginary husband’s masculinity. (I kid you not; someone actually told me that this is his preference).

As a result of this flightiness on top of my not knowing how to just call it quits appropriately, I am guilt tripped (by people I haven’t actually met) when I don’t call or when I become busy with what had previously been my real life. Apparently, I’m supposed to be attentive when I thought we were just getting to know each other. Oops.

And in between these periods of completely suspended belief, I receive endless phone calls from at least two members of my family asking for updates. Esh sar, they ask; masar shai, I respond. [What happened; nothing happened] But the same question asked day in and day out takes on a different slightly impatient tone to which I feel ‘masar shai’ becomes inadequate as a response. Am I supposed to be packing my bags and heading over to my new home or what?

I won’t even get into the over 50 phone calls from my sister in the last week—all ‘checking in’ on the latest and last time I am ‘open’ to anything of this sort.

It’s just difficult for me to get excited about vague individuals I’ve never actually encountered, especially when the information given of these individuals is scant. They tell me the bare essentials—age/location/occupation (it would be a/l/o were it used in chat rooms)—as if these should be enticement enough. Personality traits are apparently as unimportant as any realistic notions of compatibility.

For example, anyone that knows me should know that I’m not particularly religious. What leap of faith does it take to try to introduce me to someone who prays in a mosque at least three times a day? I know my family desires that I be more religious, but how far is it likely to go with someone who is actually looking for a nice Muslim girl? Even if on some level I feel guilty for not being her, I’m certainly not interested in justifying myself or my views to someone on the other end of the ideological spectrum and/or the globe, for that matter.

Where is the ‘me’ in all of these set ups?

No more conceding to conversations with faceless figures for the sake of making anyone happy; no more ignoring my instinct and second guessing who I know myself to be; no more Mr. Xs, Ys, or Zs.

No disrespect intended, but I just can’t play this role. God knows I tried.

I’m still unmarried and still am nowhere near a cure for cancer. However, I also haven’t been loafing around my apartment waiting for the phone-call that will guide me to my future-—not that call anyway. Frankly, I just feel awkward mustering up something appropriate to say in conversation with elusive personalities living other lives in other places.

In theory, I’m not against arranged marriages. I understand the logic of ‘arrangements’ in a culture wherein men and women don’t freely mix and therefore have limited opportunities to meet Mister or Misses Apple of My Eye/Vision of My Dreams. I do believe that the butterflies in the stomach are generally temporary, so why not base marriage on the more solid foundation of commitment and understanding? I am my mother’s daughter, and as she always said ‘The person that loves you will marry you,’ thereby emphasizing the merits of commitment and loyalty over romantic renderings of marriage. I get it.

However, as always, there’s a bit of a gap between theory and reality—and the gap sometimes widens as the theory applies to oneself.

In theory, I have no problem with being set up; in reality, I’m not so keen on scheduling time in my day for telephone conversations with faceless figures that seem to think I should be thrilled for the opportunity to speak with them. In theory, I could be set up with the most amazing individual I’ve ever met and would immediately feel in my heart of hearts the overwhelming desire to spend eternity with him.

In reality, the only overwhelmingly discovery I have made is how bizarre the situation in its entirety is in the context of my life and the facade of interest I can muster in a few phone conversations before my flightiness becomes clear to the various Misters.

Now, how I tell this to my family, come out intact, and not bring my mother to tears by single handedly destroying her hopes and dreams for me is a completely different post.

Still up...

2005-04-21T04:22:00.000-07:00

at 4:23 am.
I'll be up at 8 am to prep for the closing night.

Can someone remind me why I'm not doing this for the Libyan cause?

Made In Palestine

2005-04-20T19:46:00.000-07:00

First, Happy Meloud to everyone that it applies to.

Second, my home computer is up and running and so it my internet!

Third, I'll have plenty to talk about after I sleep off the last month of madness.

Fourth, click here to see what's been sucking up most of my time and thrilling me to no end.

The Made In Palestine exhibit is in town (brought by the Justice in Palestine Coalition). This exhibit is the first all Palestinian gallery quality contemporary art exhibit to come to the US.

It was actually brought to The Station in Houston, Texas, in 2003. The art has literally been sitting in storage for the last two years as 90-plus galleries throughout the country rejected it.

The exhibit is one of the most powerful and inspiring I've ever seen and we're honored that a local Cultural Community Center has agreed to host it here. Thousands of people--all kinds of people--have come out to see this exhibit and been touched in profound ways.

The artists do a remarkable job of universalizing the Palestinian experience--something I think only art can do. They take the discussion and the viewer outside of the political realm. Using creativity and mixed media, they remind you with every glimpse what so many have forgotten in the midst of political tug-of-war--that this is about people. The theories and religions and justifications of this or that are besides the point.

As an activist, they remind me that being angry is meaningless without creative transformation.

And it's nice to take a moment to marvel at the beauty and resiliance of the human spirit...I'm sniffing the flowers as I type.

Spring Fever?

2005-03-18T16:40:00.000-08:00

What is it about spring that makes everyone want to do everything all at the same time? My next couple of months look scary on a calendar...yet strangely exciting & full of intreague. I get a certain feeling in my belly when metaphysical doors and windows are opening, and I'm finally having that feeling again. I will say, I'm trying to learn to pick my battles and priorities...but it's a process.

I miss blogging, but I've simply got too much going on right now to get my computer fixed--ironic since much of my work is on the computer. For now, I'm staying late after work for as long as I can handle it (when I'm not supposed to be in some meeting or another). Anyways, I hope after my cyber haietus and personal growth period, I'll have some more interesting things to report back.

Finally, I would like everyone to welcome Hantuly. You've graced my blog and you're welcome to make any comments you wish.

Documentary Films

2005-03-05T03:27:00.000-08:00

I've seen two films in the last week... if you know me personally, then you would know that this is remarkable. I hardly see a film a month or even a year.

The film I saw tonight, Born into Brothels, was absolutely amazing. I'll tell you the theme... a female photographer plants herself in a Calcutta red light district for a few years. She holds a photography class for some of the children living in the district, and then the children take over the story. The photographer herself, Zana Briski, almost falls into the background as the children's story unintentionally occupies her and the viewer's attention. Add to this the magnificent medium of photography to express each child's unique perspective--what images capture their attention in their daily lives. In the end you find that children will remain children, under all circumstances, and that there is beauty even amidst misfortune.

Somehow the smiles on these children's faces make you a little happier than most, but only because you don't expect them.

Pay attention to the unexpected; life's lessons are learned there.

When did Human Rights lose importance?

2005-02-26T15:11:00.000-08:00

Since I've been on the Human Rights schtick lately, I began wondering when it was that promoting democracy lost the principle of human rights.

In an article from the LA Times, Sonni Efron informs us that Bush has 'made good' on his promise to promote 'democracy around the world'.

By publicly prodding Russian President Vladimir V. Putin to respect political liberties and a free press, President Bush made good Thursday on his inaugural vow to push for democracy around the world.

Oh come on!!! I imagine the conversation went something like this:

Bush: yeah, and err that democracy thing. You remember that, right? Condi told me that people are complaining about how you're running things. It's just a rumor, right?

Putin: Blasphamous rumors.

Bush: That's what I said. I don't trust the media either, but you know, we should..uhh.. pretend, a little.

Putin: Of course.

Bush: Good. Look world, I've made good on my promise.

And what constitutes 'prodding' in this sense anyway? Did he jab him with his elbow in a "democratize now dammit" kind of way or poke him with an index finger on his back while whispering something about democracy and the media?

Anyway, my real intention for today's post was to update anyone reading on the Libyan human rights situation. A couple of posts ago, I mentioned a man named Fathi El-Jahmi, yet another prisoner of consciencience in prison in Libya. He's one of the ones that Qadhafi claims isn't there... or has no conscience (we haven't fully deciphered the statement yet). El-Jahmi's case, as I understand it, was that he was making public calls for democratizing Libya and communicating with foreign media by cell phone. First, they cut off all his phone connections. One day, his entire family disappeared. He, along with his wife and son, had been taken into custody. Eventually, the wife and son were released. El-Jahmi should be so fortunate.

El-Jahmi was also mentioned by the LA Times article, albeit way down at the very bottom. Thanks Efron.

Administration officials say they have only begun to grapple with the specifics of how and where to try to turn Bush's principled rhetoric into a credible foreign policy ... Regarding Libya, State Department's spokesman Boucher urged the government to free dissident Fathi el-Jahmi (photo), who has been in prison for 10 months without charges. The call came even though the Bush administration acknowledges its top priority with Libya is to ensure the country's continued cooperation on dismantling its nuclear program. [Los Angeles Times]

but taken from here on a Feb.25th posting.

Good luck with the credible foreign policy boys if your primary concern is dismantling what I refer to as a high school chemistry lab. Yeah, it was a real threat. Read my Sept.20th post if you want to know more about what I think on the whole WMD tip.

For those unfamiliar with the Q-man's rhetoric, here's a sample. These are the last of 10 Questions For Muammar Gaddafi asked by Scott Macleod and Amany Radwan (don't know who they are actually):

Q:Given foreign and local skepticism, is Libya Really reforming itself?

A:About the economy, quite possible. We have begun to apply the Green Book. It's what we call popular socialism and what Thatcher calls popular capitalism. Elections? What for? We have surpassed that stage you are presently in. All the people are in power now. Do you want them to regress and elect somebody to replace them?

Q:What do Libyans tell you?

A:If you put them in paradise, they will still complain. [Laughs.] Libyans are in paradise.

I chose these questions because they stood out to me as the most aggregiously offensive to us Libyans. "All the people are in power?" Uh-huh. Maybe I'm just missing something (like a pathological neurosis).

Then again.. isn't there that saying about too many cooks in the kitchen? Maybe we do want to regress and elect our own replacement. Hell, I think it's worth a shot.

And Libya as paradise? No comment. (f*%#ing f%#&)

Truce???

2005-02-25T20:38:00.000-08:00

Bear with me folks... I'm still learning how to do the link thing manually.

I heard a snippet of something occuring in Palestine on the radio while I was busy working... made a note to look it up. On yahoo, I found these articles posted. On Google, I found this.

So three or four have been killed as a result of the suicide bombing. (CNN originally reported three dead, then changed it to four).

Condi Rice condemns the Tel Aviv disco bombing in the 'strongest terms' according to the AFP.

The New York Times tells us that the bombing has shattered the Palestinian-Israeli Truce. Reuters repeats the sentiment.

As for resistance groups, Reuters tells us that "Militant groups have followed several weeks of calm while they considered whether to formalize the cease-fire, but had said they were not bound by Abbas's agreement."

And while Abbas Calls a meeting of his Security Chiefs , and the Israelis and Americans call for the 'dismantling' of certain organizations, and Islamic Jihad claims responsibility for the atteck, one must wonder why a story of 6,000 new Israeli homes in the West Bank (including 120 new unauthorized outposts) is at the very bottom of the list. Hmmmm.

Are we really surprised that the truce was short lived?

Omar Deghayes & Libyan Human Rights

2005-02-19T21:21:00.000-08:00

Omar Deghayes & Libyan Human Rights
Update: (Now the links are functional...so embarassed. Sorry)

A few days ago, I came home after a long yet ultimately satisfying day of work to find an emotional blow in the form of an email in my inbox. The BBC featured an interview with a Libyan family living in the UK, discussing the status of their son, a Gitmo detainee. There was a video available Wednesday and Thursday, but now all I find is this article. He’s also mentioned by the BBC in this article & the Scotsman.

Why does he matter, right? Several reasons, some of which I will highlight. First, let me introduce the case.

Omar Deghayes was captured in Pakistan in 2002, and imprisoned in Guantanamo after a brief period at a British base. He was granted political asylum by the UK in the late 80s when his family fled Libya due to their political circumstances. What’s exceptional about Omar’s case is that the British government uses his legal status as a political refugee—rather than a citizen or national—against him. They are simply washing their hands of his case, claiming no responsibility to negotiate with the US for his release on behalf of his human rights or his family (who are British nationals).

On the other hand, the Libyan government has taken great interest in Omar’s capture and is eager to receive him. If the US determines that there is no case against him, which is likely, he may be released to the Libyan government. Thus far, the Libyan government has been diplomatically ‘responsible’ for Omar. (That should sound strange) Omar’s attorney, Clive Stafford Smith, has stated that the Libyan delegations sent to Omar have threatened his life. (No, really?)

Now, some background I’m privy to.

Omar’s family fled Libya after his father, Amer Deghayes, a respected attorney & Notary Public, was executed by the Libyan regime for refusing to support them. I do not know the government’s version of what happened, but Amer Deghayes was one of the victims of the ‘revolutionary’ government’s squashing of domestic opposition in the late 70s. This is not an allegation—it is fact. (The link will take you to a rough time line of Libya’s political history…scroll down to the late 70s)

So what does this mean?

One, Omar is not the only person in this situation. There are a number of people that were captured in Afghanistan and Pakistan (and God knows where else) who have already been sent to secret internment camps all over the world in countries known to use torture. There are plenty of people that are currently at risk of the same fate or of eternal imprisonment without due process or even a semblance of fair trial, as a post on Émigré’s blog highlights here.

Moreover, Omar’s case tests two claims that have been repeatedly thrown around in the last 5 years. The first claim is that the US or UK has respect for human rights, or that they act on the principle of human rights at all. The second one is the supposed changing of tides by the Libyan regime.

First we have the celebratory announcements of productive talks, normalized relations, and cooperation with ‘rehabilitated terrorists’ like:

The top U.S. diplomat for the Middle East had "productive" talks with Libyan officials in Tripoli this week as the two nations continue to work to improve relations, the U.S. State Department said on Thursday. Assistant Secretary of State William Burns met Libyan leader Mu'ammar al-Qadhafi (photo) and other officials on Wednesday and Thursday. "Burns held productive and thorough discussions in Tripoli ... continuing the step-by-step process of improvement in U.S.-Libyan relations," the department said in a statement. "He reaffirmed the goal of fully normalized relations, as the U.S. and Libya build cooperation on counter-terrorism, the peaceful resolution of regional conflicts, and economic and political modernization," it added. [Reuters: 11 Feb 2005].

and

The United States said Friday that Libyan diplomats can travel freely in the country, a latest sign of improving relations between the two longtime antagonists. …"These steps will ease our ability to conduct normal diplomatic functions in Libya and Libya's ability to do the same here," Boucher said. [Xinhua: 12 Feb 2005] (same source)

and tea and scones with Downer in Australia (same site).

And then we have a not so pleasant reality shaping up for Libyan dissidents or suspected dissidents and their supporters.

The status of human rights in Libya is reiterated in Amnesty International’s 2004 report. Libya Watch even has a list for your perusing convenience.

Some more recent victims are Ali Sadegh Alhuni and Fathi al-Jahmi.

Predictably, Qadhafi tells us that what we see is in fact NOT really what we see:

Libyan leader Mu'ammar al-Qadhafi said that there were no prisoners of conscience in the country and that he was open to any calls for an international investigation. "Those who accuse us of holding prisoners of conscience are wrong. Those (countries) in the world that wish to come and check, may come," he told the Peoples Congress, or parliament in Syrte. "We are holding only heretics, those who use religion to foment * coups d'etat and attack societies and the entire world," he added, a reference to Islamic extremists. In a report published in April 2004, Amnesty International reported that the Libyan authorities had released nearly 300 prisoners between 2001 and 2002. However Amnesty also said that Libya continued to violate basic human rights and that a "climate of fear" persisted in the country. [AFP: 12 Jan 2005]

Uhuh…I guess he would know about ‘fomenting’ coups, wouldn’t he?

To be fair, I’ll include this: Libyan League for Human Rights January 2005 letter on the Qadhafi’s recent move to abolish the “People’s Court”…though what will replace it remains unknown.

Then again, I wonder if these guys were escaping the positive developments in Libyan politics:

They didn't want to go back to Libya, to put it mildly. It took 36 Norwegian police guards to escort 19 Libyans out of the country, after their attempts to win asylum in Norway were turned down. Here's one of the Libyans who didn't want to board the flight out of Norway … The would-be Libyan refugees were denied asylum after Libya started cooperating with western nations. A consul at the Libyan embassy in Copenhagen, which has responsibility for Norway, said none of the men sent back to Libya last month faced political problems, and claimed all were now home living with their families. [Aftenpolten: 15 Feb 2005].

Perhaps they didn’t get the memo. Perhaps Omar didn’t either.

Or perhaps it’s all smoke and mirrors, covering up for a clearly anti-democratic anti-human rights government in exchange for economic gain. Sound familiar?

Let’s get real: Given Omar’s political standing in Libya, his release to the government would essentially be a death sentence. There is no doubt in my mind that he would never again be seen. Cynical or honest?

I will say that I view positively even the minutest opening of access to Libya since this allows some information exchange rather than the black hole effect we’ve had for decades. Moreover, I do recognize it would not have been possible without conscious shifts within the regime.

However, I retain the right to remain skeptical of what the Bush administration champions as a victory when my reality speaks to something different. If economic liberalization is even related to human rights, as proponents of politically scientific liberalism claim, what’s occurring now under the guise of the ‘War on Terror’ is the antithesis.

I worry for us.

If you read this, please do not ‘congratulate’ any Libyan you meet on the changing of our country’s status in relation to the West. Congratulate yourselves on your economic victory, but keep in mind our human cost. As far as I can see, the situation for Libyan political refugees and dissidents has worsened.

I love my country, but, in my mind, that means that I love my people. The government is irrelevant to my sense of loyalty. I agree with the concepts of populism and even socialism (in theory), but I know too much of what’s been done in their name to entertain any excuses for governments that claim to represent either.

For those interested in the human side of Guantanamo prisoners, check out Cageprisoners.com where they have been tracking as many prisoners as they can.

Back to politics

2005-02-13T17:22:00.000-08:00

As some may have noticed, I've kind of layed off the political talk for a while.
On numerous fronts, I've taken the ostriche approach lately.

You'd think it would be natural for a desert person like myself to keep the tactic going. Then again, we did shift from the nomadic life to a sedentary one a long time ago... and for good reason. You see, sand just doesn't feel all that good lodged in your ears or throat. And frankly, you begin to crave water to quench your thirst and to wash down those pesky little particles of sand.

Now I'm back for some commentary. I think this is partly inspired by the film I saw last night--last interview with Edward Said. If anyone can inspire me from the grave, it would be him, wouldn't it?

There's another reason I've been quite about politics: I was beginning to feel that it was a bit arrogant to say anything about what's going on. So much of what's
happening now is transitional, and I couldn't quite tell where it was going. Still
can't, but there are notable trends at this point.

So let's get started.

On the local and national front:

Board members of various Arab or Muslim related organizations are being hit up for 'voluntary interviews' by the Feds. This is seperate from the other round of interviewing individual Muslims that was actually announced. Now things are
moving behind the curtain.

Locally, an Islamic Center got targeted by the Feds and contacted by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). Double whammy! This Center is the largest one I know of in our area, with about eight to nine hundred members, and growing. Some unknown person working with the Freedom something or other snuck into the mosque and picked up some literature from the Saudi embassy. Now they're accusing them of teaching hatred (mainly anti-semitism) to their children. Sound familiar?

If it wasn't almost exactly the rhetoric used by Israel to accuse Palestinians of hate (all the while not noticing the damn tanks and bulldozers making new refugees everyday), I may not be raising a brow right now.

It's important to note that this literature was essentially just lying around--anyone could have dropped it off or picked it up--and no one was tracking the whereabouts of these books or pamphlets. Moreover, the classes they hold for the
children use other texts that were NOT picked up in this infiltration.

At the risk of sounding unreasonably suspicious, the question of why the ADL and the Feds are targeting the same places must be considered. In what direction is information flowing? Are the feds letting NGOs do the dirty work of infiltrating and attacking the Muslim community for them? There are simply too many questions NOT to be alarmed.

The same has occurred in mosques throughout the country as a part of 'project' to uncover Saudi/Wahabi spreading of hate ideology in American mosques. They then pick through the stolen literature to find messages that are considered to instill hatred towards non-Muslim people, ways, and practices (and women).

What?! You mean, the fundamentalist Wahabi ideology hasn't gone to PC University? Unacceptable. Perhaps they were skipping classes along with their Christian, Jewish, Hindu and what-not fundamentalist counterparts?

Let me put aside my unending sarcasm to say that every text of the Abrahamic religions--from the Torah to the Bible to the Quran--contains messages of hate towards one group or another. Furthermore, what some of us now view as 'sexism'
can inarguably be found in all of them.

From "Gentile Dogs", an interesting and objective analysis of racism from the Torah to the Bible:

"You must utterly destroy them; you shall make no covenant with them, and show no mercy to them. You shall not make marriages with them, giving your daughters to their sons or taking their daughters for your sons."
(Deuteronomy Chapter 7 verse 2)

From the not-so-objective (but amusing)
"The Dark Bible: Women's Inferior Status":

"Of the woman came the beginning of sin, and through her we all die." (Eccles. 25:22)

"The whoredom of a woman may be known in her haughty looks and eyelids. If thy daughter be shameless, keep her in straitly, lest she abuse herself through overmuch liberty." (Eccles. 26:9-10)

"For from garments cometh a moth, and from women wickedness. Better is the churlishness of a man than a courteous woman, a woman, I say, which bringeth shame and reproach." (Eccles. 42:13-14)

And from "The Bible & Religious Tolerance", on the more objective side again:

"But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table, and of the table of devils." Here, Paul writes that the Gods and Goddesses of other religions are actually demons. Christians are to completely isolate themselves from non-Christians.

1 Corinthians 10:20-21

For the sake of being thorough, let's investigate them all! No, really. It's about time Pat Robertson is called in for a voluntary interview about his political and religious beliefs considering the shit he spews on national television. Or does
calling Muslims devil worshipers somehow NOT qualify as spreading hate in the 'New Normal' environment?

My point in posting the above quotes isn't to fling dirt at anyone of any faith. Rather, I'm attempting to expose the sheer hypocrisy of focusing on religious texts to incriminate believers of any one faith.

The way in which a religion is practiced is not merely based on executing what may found in the text. It's also about which parts are emphasized over others--which parts of the 'message' are adopted by a people with a history and culture that
preceded the text. Religious practice and belief is subject to change based on the historical moment and the circumstances of followers.

What's ridiculous about the ADL's or Fed's strategies is that they are apparently unable or unwilling to grant Muslims the same humanity and independent thought they would grant to others. The view of Muslims as mindless followers of texts and leaders reaks of a resurgence of Orientalism in its truest form--state sanctioned and utilized to solidify the notion of the inhuman 'other'.

There is little doubt in my mind that Muslim individuals and organizations in the US are being targeted, and that intimidation tactics are being used by the Bush administration's Homeland Security aparatus. Last October, they minced no words when they announced plans to actively and visibly keep tabs on Muslims in order to dissuade groups from disrupting the elections. They did not state that their policy would continue after the elections, but I think it's safe to say it has.

We are apparently guilty by association. In the next years, we may find ourselves further from the breath of fresh air than in the last term.

Palestine Related:

Truce...yeah right. I find myself thinking more along the lines of Robert Fisk in this article entitled "There will be no Middle East peace without justice". Just heard a little while ago that Israel freed a few hundred prisoners. I just wonder
which ones. Barghuti?
Fisk: At no point yesterday did anyone mention occupation. Like sex, it had to be censored out 09 February 2005.

Iraq Related:

No comment. I just don't know anymore. I find it note-worthy that the Sunnis, who theoretically were the most worried about losing political clout, were also the most prevented from participating in the election. Really, rationally speaking, would it make any sense for Sunni groups to prevent Sunnis from voting in order to...what?...make sure the group maintained a political voice? Or would it be more logical that non-Sunni groups would prevent Sunni participation?

I'm fine!

2005-02-08T14:50:00.000-08:00

I know I've been a bit quite and distant lately, but I want you to know that I'm fine. I've been a bit busy over the last couple of weeks--both work and personal business requiring my time and attention. Some of it is growing pains, some of it uneccesary drama that I apparently create when I have too much time on my hands.

Oy vey.

That and my brother, with all good intentions, took this little computer of ours to his office to have the computer engineer there work on it...and now, I amazingly have back all the frustrating pop-ups, crashes, and freezes that took me a week to get rid of. There's some kind of virus/worm/program from hell out there that keeps hijacking my tool bar, so I can't blog this or that and google disappears frequently. Bare with me folks.

On the brighter side...I am very excited right this second. I'm supposed to be working on my bio right now, and I'll tell you why. Your's truly will be an honored candle lighter on the 19th of February for the Japanese American Day of Remembrance Candle Lighting ceremony. I can't tell you how honored I feel right now.

I'm lighting the candle on behalf of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC-SF) and, if I can be so presumptuous, the Arab and Arab-American communities that are finding themselves in a similar situation here in post 9/11 US as they were in their home countries.

I'll add more to the post later. I have to go see about that bio now.
Check out the site of the DOR at dayofremembrance.org (I'll make it link later).

Peace

Where's the Voice of the Mediterranean?

2005-01-30T16:01:00.000-08:00

This posting is both a story I found amusing involving Maltese-Libyan relations and a missing radio station (VOM) as well as an introduction to a new Mediterranean blogger who has graced our presence. Welcome to Wired Temples from Malta, a lovely island between Sicily and Tunisia that has been a stopping point for many Libyans traveling to or from Libya.

I was reminded to make the introduction by Highlander's last post on her own blog. Bad timing? Eh...isn't imitation the highest form of flattery? ;)

Salamat.

WIRED TEMPLES - Malta on the Web: Government inefficiency Part 1

In Loving Memory...

2005-01-29T16:20:00.000-08:00

Throughout a person's life, there are but few moments that we can pin point exactly that live with us every day after. Likewise, it is rare to encounter, in person or writing, a fellow human being whose words resonate so powerfully, so beautifully, that we can identify the sincerity even in the pauses between the words on paper or in speech. For me, Edward Said was such a person.

I stumbled upon his book "The Question of Palestine" when I was a sophmore in a hellish Sacramento high school. I'd never heard of him, and knew roughly of the history of the Palestinian cause, so I'm still not quite sure what drew me to it. I read that book like my life depended on it, searching every line, paragraph, and page for something I might have missed. I sat down and hand wrote a 20 page extra credit paper for my history class that I still keep in my stacks of paper hidden in various corners of my apartment. Edward Said was like my street lamp installed in a dark ally.

He lit many dark allies, drawing attention to the academy's Orientalist tradition and forcing the public and intelligencia to see, really see, the truth of the rights of Palestinians. He demanded the recognition of the human being and the universality of rights and dignity. He spoke of literature and poetry, war and peace, thought and transcendence, and, in the end, always spoke to the heart and mind of the human and the notion of universality. I haven't heard or read the word 'universality' since.

I was studying in Italy when my in-box was flooded with emails notifying me of his death. It must have been late afternoon or early evening when I sat down at the internet cafe, signed into my email account, and instantly broke down into tears. No one around me knew of him. I wore my kafiya that day, and was glad I took it with me. I should have hung a huge Palestinian flag out on top of the tower in the Piazza Del Campo.

Anyways, below is an homage to Edward Said (allah yar7ma)*, originally written in French in Le Monde. Overall, it's a lovely portrayal, but the last line is a little cheezy as first and last lines can be.

If there was a Said for every one of our countries, would the world be any different?

Salamat.

*God have mercy on him; Muslims say this when we state the name of someone who has passed away.

January 2005

HOMAGE TO EDWARD SAID

Counterpoint

by Mahmoud Darwish

NEW YORK. NOVEMBER. 5TH AVENUE.

Shards of light in a leaden sky.

In the shadows, I asked my foreign soul: is this city Babylon
or Sodom?

There, at the edge of an electric chasm sky high, I met
Edward thirty years ago.

The times were less impetuous.

Each said to the other:

If your past is your experience, make the future sense and
vision!

Let us move forward, towards our future, confident in
imagination's sincerity and the miracle of the grass.

I no longer remember whether we went to the cinema that
evening, but I heard old Indian braves call out to me: trust
neither the horse nor modernity.

No. No victim asks his executioner: if I were you and my
sword greater than my rose . . . would I have acted as you
have done?

That kind of question arouses the curiosity of the novelist
who sits behind the glass walls of his study overlooking the
lily garden . . . Here the hypothesis is lily-white, clear as
the author's conscience if he closes his accounts with human
nature . . . No future behind us, so let us move forward!

Progress could be the bridge back to barbarity . . .

New York. Edward awakes while dawn slumbers on. He plays an
air by Mozart. Tennis on the university court. He reflects on
thought's ability to transcend borders and barriers. Thumbs
through the New York Times. Writes his spirited column.
Curses an orientalist who guides a general to the weak spot
in an eastern woman's heart. Showers. Drinks his white
coffee. Picks out a suit with a dandy's elegance and calls on
the dawn to stop dawdling!

He walks on the wind. And, in the wind, he knows himself. No
four walls hem in the wind. And the wind is a compass for the
north in a foreign land.

He says: I come from that place. I come from here, and I am
neither here nor there. I have two names that come together
but pull apart. I have two languages, but I have forgotten
which is the language of my dreams. I have the English
language with its accommodating vocabulary to write in. And
another tongue drawn from celestial conversations with
Jerusalem. It has a silvery resonance, but rebels against my
imagination.

And your identity? Said I.

His response: Self-defence . . . Conferred on us at birth, in
the end it is we who fashion our identity, it is not
hereditary. I am manifold . . . Within me, my outer self
renewed. But I belong to the victim's interrogation.

Were I not from that place, I would have trained my heart to
raise metonymy's gazelle there . . .

So take your birthplace along wherever you go and be a
narcissist if need be.

- Exile, the outside world. Exile, the hidden world. Who
then are you between them?

- I do not introduce myself lest I lose myself. I am what I
am.

I am my other in harmonious duality between word and geste.

Were I a poet, I should have written:

I am two in one, like the swallow's wings.

And if spring is late coming, I am content to be its
harbinger!

He loves countries and leaves them. (Is the impossible
remote?) He loves to migrate towards everything. Travelling
freely between cultures, there is room for all who seek the
essence of man.

A margin moves forward and a centre retreats. The East is not
completely the East, nor the West, the West. Identity is
multifaceted.

It is neither a citadel nor is it absolute.

The metaphor slumbered on one bank of the river. Had it not
been for the pollution,

It would have embraced the other.

- Have you written your novel?

- I have tried . . . sought to find my image reflected in
distant women. But they have retreated into their fortified
night. And they have said: our universe does not depend on
words. No man will capture in words the woman, an enigma and
a dream. No woman will capture the man, symbol and star. No
love is like another; no night like another. Let us list
men's virtues and laugh!

- And what did you do?

- I laughed at my own absurdity and threw my novel away.

The thinker restrains the novelist's tale, while the
philosopher deconstructs the singer's roses.

He loves countries and leaves them: I am who I shall be and
become. I shall construct myself and choose my exile. My
exile is the background of the epic landscape. I defend the
need for poets of glory and reminiscence; I defend trees that
clothe the birds of home and exile, a moon still fit for a
love song, an idea shattered by its proponents' fragility and
a country borne off by legends.

- Is there anything you could return to?

- What awaits me draws me on and urges me . . . I have no
time to draw lines in the sand. But I can revisit the past
like strangers listening to the pastoral poem in the gloom of
the evening:

At the fountain, a young girl fills her jar with clouds'
tears. And she weeps and laughs at a bee that stung her heart
when it was time to leave.

Is love pain in the water or malady in the mist . . .'

(And so on, till the song draws to a close.)

- So you could suffer from nostalgia?

- Nostalgia for times to come. More distant, more elevated,
more distant still. My dream guides my steps and my vision
cradles my dream, curled like a cat, on my lap. It is reality
imagined, born of the will: we can change the chasm's
inevitability!

- And nostalgia for the past?

- That is only for the thinker who is anxious to understand
the fascination a foreigner feels for the medium of absence.
My own nostalgia is a struggle for a present that clings to
the future.

- Did you penetrate the past the day you visited the house,
your house, in Jerusalem's Talibiya district?

- Like a child afraid of his father, I was ready to hide in
my mother's bed. I tried to relive my birth, to follow the
trail of childhood across the roof of my old home, to run my
fingers over the skin of absence, to smell the perfume of
summer in the jasmine of the garden. But truth's hyena drove
me from a nostalgia that lurked, behind me, like a thief in
the shadows.

- Were you afraid, and of what?

- I cannot meet loss head on. Like the beggar, I stayed at
the door. Am I going to ask strangers who sleep in my bed for
permission to spend five minutes in my own home? Will I bow
respectfully to the people that occupy my dream of childhood?
Will they ask: who is this stranger who lacks discretion?
Will I be able just to speak of peace and war among victims
and the victims of victims, avoiding superfluous words and
asides? Will they tell me that two dreams cannot share a bed?

Neither he nor I could have done that.

But he is a reader who reflects on what poetry has to tell us
in times of disaster.

Blood

and blood

and blood

in your homeland

In my name and in yours, in the almond blossom, in the banana
skin, in the baby's milk, in the light and in the shade, in
the grain of wheat, in the salt jar. Consummate snipers reach
their targets.

Blood

blood

blood

This land is smaller than the blood of its children,
offerings placed on resurrection's doorstep. Is this land
blessed or baptised

In blood,

blood,

the blood

That neither prayers nor the sand can assuage? There is not
enough justice in the pages of the Holy Book to give the
martyrs the joy of walking freely across the clouds. Blood,
by day. Blood, by night. Blood in the words!

He says: the poem could embrace loss, a shaft of light
glinting from a guitar or a Christ mounted on a mare and
blood- spattered with elegant metaphors. What is beauty if
not the presence of truth in the form?

In a skyless world, the earth becomes a chasm. And the poem
is one of consolation's gifts, a quality of the winds, from
both south and north. Do not describe your wounds as the
camera sees them.

Cry out to make yourself heard and to know that you are still
alive and living, that life on this earth is still possible.
Invent hope for words. Create a cardinal point or a mirage
that prolongs hope and sing, for beauty is freedom.

I say: life defined by its antithesis, death . . . is no life
at all!

He replies: we shall live, even if life abandons us to our
fate. Let us be the wordsmiths whose words make their readers
eternal, as your extraordinary friend Ritsos might have said
. . .

He says: If I die before you, I shall leave you the
impossible task!

I ask: Is it a long way off?

He replies: A generation away.

I say: And if I die before you?

He replies: I shall console the mounts of Galilee and I shall
write: Beauty is merely the attainment of adequacy.' All
right! But don't forget that if I die before you, I shall
leave you the impossible task!

When I visited the new Sodom in the year 2002, he was
opposing the war of Sodom against the people of Babylon and
fighting cancer. The last epic hero, he defended Troy's right
to its share in the story.

Eagle on high,

Soaring,

Taking leave of the mountain tops,

For residing above Olympus

And the summits,

Brings ennui,

Farewell

Farewell, poetry of pain!

Translated from the French version of the original by Julie
Stoker

Where is the US going, legally?

2005-01-24T04:59:00.000-08:00

Actually, this post was actually written two weeks ago. As it is, the story remains the same. I was going to revise it to make it more comprehensive analysis of the US legal system and how it relates to military practices and what-not. I might still do that in the future, but I'm going to go ahead and post this now.

=========== =============== ===============
They used to teach that the American judicial system is the means of protecting our civil rights and liberties; that due process was a right, and that its violation is a violation against justice; and, that because you are judged by your peers, judgement will be fair.

Well...not so much anymore, I guess. Yeah, I know. We're in a state of war (where, exactly?). Civil liberties (of certain groups) are not more important than national security, yadda, yadda, yadda.

I'm not buying it. The legal system is an institution that embodies the fundamental principles of the constitution and the system of governance. The precedents set in the past affect how decisions are made today; the precedents we set today will influence how law is approached tomorrow.

Yes, a time of war is a time of trial, but let's be real about this. If at the most critical times we cannot stick to what we claim to value, then what/who are we? The principle of liberty and justice, embodied by the legal system and symbolized by the Statue of Liberty and her legacy, are under threat, from the inside. People who respect military power and martial law over civil liberties are using the notion of national security to undermine constitutionally protected rights.

'National security' has throughout history been used to justify some of the most agregious crimes against human rights and demonized individuals and groups. Years later, when we study the affects of such decisions and actions, we are left wondering how a nation wide hysteria was unleashed.

Now, I'm not saying that the US is going to follow in the footsteps of psychopathic leaders in a lot of other countries, but there is reason to be alarmed. A policy of keeping your hands clean while transfering prisoners of war to other countries known to use torture is not a good sign.

Terrorism suspects may be detained forever - Global Terrorism - www.smh.com.au

Travel

2005-01-24T03:53:00.000-08:00

I found myself at another airport today and wondered why it is that I've never gotten used to them. On the road from Columbia, Missouri to Kansas City, I wondered why the eye will never tire from the beauty of nature, too. And I wondered why it is that the journey to the airport is always so full of ambiguity and irrational remorse. No matter where I am, or where I'm going, I always want to turn back. Why? Perhaps some sense of uncertaintly about the next place is at play.

I think there's some sense of peace to be found in the in-between. The second hand on the clock slows down and the car moves in slow motion, even at 80 miles per hour, when you're in the in-between. Beauty becomes daunting...almost painful to the body and soul. A state of suspension in which beauty and meaning recreate themselves--it's what I call the third space.

The other of the other of the other. Labels lose meaning here, in the margins of the margin. When you lose your shape and worldly exterior, what are you? Where are you? One foot here, one there, one hand in this corner, and the other somewhere else--and still they ask you, "Where are you?"

When you find yourself in the place where all you are taught to believe and all you thought and hoped existed fall apart, you are in the third space. When you begin seeing the threads that hold together the small pieces of fabric that compose the quilt of reality, and when you begin questioning whether you can undo the pieces, one by one, and what that would look like, you are in the third space. Something different is created here--something both beautiful and grotesque.

The third space is where the rational and irrational make friends; where making sense is independent of common sensibility; where apparent enemies learn to make eye-contact. The third space is where beauty molds and shapes itself as it wishes, without regard to the observer. It is as unconsciously aware of its power of persuasion as a rose garden in spring: it is as it knows itself to be, and no other way will do.

Old One...

2005-01-18T03:05:00.000-08:00

Just as I was checking out my index, I found this drafted posted that I'd forgotten to publish.
It's a link to an old(ish) article from the New Yorker. No, the subject is not pleasant, but this is the most thorough research into the Abu Ghraib scandal that is still alive and kicking in my mind. I don't care if they're no longer reporting about it. I feel it.

The New Yorker: Fact
The New Yorker: Fact

Out for the night.

Still alive

2005-01-18T02:52:00.000-08:00

Yes, I know...it's been hard for us to be apart like this. But it's not in our hands. The demons that have taken over my computer just aren't letting go quite yet.

And, really, that's not a good thing. If I can just hint at the strange drama of my life right now...In the last week, I have met (in person) four Turks, 2 Israelis, 2 Iraqis, 1 Libyan, and 2 Moroccans. Among them, there are maybe two romantic opportunities...not that I'm looking, but I can't help but notice.

Not far from my home, a little Mediterranean community seems to be in the making.

I also finished reading Persepolis II (Satrapi) and Children of the Alley (Mahfouz). Fantastic publications that everyone should check out. Persepolis is like candy; Children of the Alley is for the philosopher in you.

If my connection is still on in the morning, I'll really post something then.

Ciao and Salamat.

Missing Blogger?

2005-01-13T18:26:00.000-08:00

No, missing internet connection at home. Sorry guys, after a brief stint of super posting, my home system is undermining me. I'll be back online soon. Thanks to the kind words.

Aljazeera.Net - Abbas wins election

2005-01-10T13:57:00.000-08:00

Democracy in action... I guess we're supposed to thank Israel for letting people get to the elections. Bush is 'heartened'; Sharon wants a date ASAP; Anon is thrilled; even Vladimir Putin is chiming in with words of hope.

Sarcasm aside, I'm linking to two articles relating to this because I noticed a discrepency in aljazeera's reporting of the total figures and most of the others I'd seen. Aljazeera's site says he won 95% of the votes, while other sites place the percentage in the range of 61 to about 63.

Aljazeera.Net - Abbas wins election

vs

OutLookIndia.com-Abbas wins Palestinian election: Official results ...because, well, why not use Indian media?

Iraqi Witness

2005-01-10T13:16:00.000-08:00

New blog discovery, but you have to have a strong heart for this site. Purgator is apparently an Iraqi blogger living in the Netherlands. And a fabulous one at that. Check out both blogs.

Iraqi Witness

Iraqi Comments

I do have a couple of unpublished posts, but I still need to edit my analysis of the current legal state of affairs in the US--i.e., the fabulous Bush admin is looking into transfering prisoners of war to countries known to use torture; and how that relates to human rights and civil liberties.

2005 isn't looking so great just yet. But if we've hit rock bottom, maybe just by fact of pure physics, the only direction we can move is up. Is this rock bottom? Are we there yet?

Rustling in the ivory tower...

2005-01-08T13:58:00.000-08:00

For those who don't know him, Daniel Pipes has been a pretty influential talking head as an expert on the Middle East and Islam (another thing I blame on the al-Qaeda crew) since 9/11. His main schbeel is that individual Muslims in the US should be seen as a potential threat, and Muslim circles and mosques should be the focus of Homeland Security's intelligence gathering (as if they're not); and that Muslim groups, associations, and mosques should be infiltrated and bugged or whatever his James Bond instincts deem appropriate. In fact, if you noticed my post about the Cornell study, I can add that Pipes is happy that 44% of Americans agree with him, but UNhappy that the percentage is so low. His last project was arguing that the internment of the Japanese in the US in WWII was actually a national security necessity, given the intelligence of the time and the supposed actions of 2 Japanese Americans in Hawaii who aided the Japanese military. Currently, he's working on a 'study' for the Bush administration about that...or at least I think he is.

Whether you know Pipes or not, the links will take you to an interesting academic debate between Daniel Pipes and Irfan Khawaja, a Professor of Philosophy at the College of New Jersey. It's notable for two reasons:

1. Rarely have I seen such an objective and thorough analysis of Pipes' claims and rhetoric. Usually it's more of a shouting match between the far right American-Israeli coalition kids who back him against the 'leftist' civil rights groups and Arabs (and Americans and Jewish people, and anyone with a brain).

2. Pipes is actually compelled to respond to the criticisms, which he never does (as he even states in his response to Khawaja). Who would have thought?

The beginning...Daniel Pipes: Both Right and Wrong

Khawaja's rebuttal & the end...Irfan Khawaja - Response to Daniel Pipes.

Enjoy.

Welcome 2005

2004-12-31T19:13:00.000-08:00

In California, we're still a few hours away from 2005. Happy New Year to those who have already entered the new year.

Every new year, I have this wierd feeling of loss. Kind of like the feeling you get when you read the last page of a good book. This year is no different, except that I'm looking forward to change. It's all I have hope in at this point. My hopes for next year are grand, but grandness is not impossible.

I hope this year brings more kindness and humanity than the last. I hope we learn from our mistakes and recognize our accomplishments. I hope everyone hears at least one good thing everyday; I hope that everyone gives or does at least one good thing everyday. I hope we can relearn how to smile and to laugh so hard that we cry.

Someone told me the other day that the energy of the world has shifted from Yang to Yin, which is supposed to mean that empowerment and achievement is no longer individually driven, but collaboratively. So let's toast to collaboration, cooperation, mercy, and holding ourselves and others up through the times.

It's also my mother's birthday today. Happy Birthday Mamma.

Happy New Year to everyone.

Results of Fear Based Politics

2004-12-26T13:40:00.000-08:00

Cornell University Study on Civil Liberties, views of Islam and Muslims in the US

This report actually came out last week sometime, Friday I think. The link below takes you to the summary of the most recent survey conducted regarding the restriction of Civil Liberties, views of Islam, and Muslim Americans. The results are overwhelmingly depressing. Almost half of those questioned agree that there should be restrictions on the civil liberties of Muslims in the US, and about a quarter agree that Muslims should be made to register their names and whereabouts to the federal government.

It should be mentioned that this survey only measured opinions of people who identify as Christian, Agnostic, or Athiest though party affiliation is more comprehensive. I'm not clear on why the only religion they focused on Christianity, but I do understand that that is the predominant religion in the US.

Now, I'm not one to bring up the Holocaust when it's inappropriate, but I do think this survey gives a part of the answer to those who wondered how things got such out of hand. It all begins in stages, and this is the stage we're in now. What next, I wonder.

My questions were answered in the last week, after the release of this survey I might add.

1. This was a letter written to a Muslim school in Texas that was seeking membership in an association of Private and Parachial Schools. Read the questions they ask the school to respond to. Now, I understand that associations can deny membership to anyone they want. I just would hope that the reasons make sense and aren't based in hatred or fear. What do you think the relationship between that Muslim school and this collective of others will be from now on?

Letter from TAPPS to local Muslim school seeking membership

2- A pregnant Muslim woman in New Orleans was brutally stabbed 33 times in her home. She's a known Muslim leader and teacher in her community, and nothing was taken from her home, leading some to wonder whether this is a hate crime. I think it's highly possible.

New Orleans Muslim Teacher stabbed

3-I was going to put another recent story (a bloody murder), but I can't find it anywhere online. And I don't report word of mouth rumors.

Oh, yeah.... happy new year folks.