It’s hard to believe that we still perpetuate the hyped propaganda of peace forums and platforms! None of the so-called world leaders have shown any urgency for a ceasefire or even for truce talks. by Humra Quraishi
Once again, we are focusing on the human tragedies unfolding in the Middle East. With Lebanon now on the hit list of Israel’s military might, one is left asking: Where are the superpowers? Why don’t we see a united world front, taking on the violence and killings? Where are the political rulers? Can’t they hear human cries! Can’t they see dead forms of babies and adults and the elderly? Can’t they see buildings and homes and hearths destroyed? Can’t they visualize the offshoots? Can’t they grasp the far reaching consequences of the ongoing killings?
The havoc and destruction continue in and around Gaza, with killings devastating the Palestinian population and ongoing tragedies unfolding. When all they want is to live on their own homeland, which was robbed off them and with that they were made to sit like hapless refugees on their own land. Today even that basic right to survive seems ripped off, snatched from them, as hundreds are dying, if not already dead!
It gets difficult to even describe its impact on psyches…that is, of those left alive, destined to witness the mass killings! And if one were to see shots and videos of hundreds of the Palestinian children killed in Gaza, then words cannot describe the turmoil and pain hitting the very soul.
It’s hard to believe that we humans, living in a supposedly developed and civilised world, still perpetuate the hyped propaganda of peace forums and platforms! None of the so-called world leaders showed any urgency for a ceasefire or even for truce talks. Tell me, how many more will perish in targeted attacks before the ongoing killings can be halted. Though most of the political rulers of the world are fathers and grandfathers, they seem little bothered about the ongoing killings and deaths in Gaza. Is this the so-called developed world? Is this the world that talks of peace? Is this world fit enough for humans to survive in, where even infants and new-born children are not spared?
As fears and apprehensions grow of Palestinians getting hounded from their very own homeland, it is absolutely urgent that there ought to be an immediate halt to these killings and targeted onslaughts on the hapless civilian population in and around Gaza and Lebanon and along the borders. An immediate ceasefire and truce talks are urgently needed.
Today, it is shocking to see the balancing acts of the rulers of the day. Several heads of State have rather openly and blatantly even sided with Israel; perhaps, because of the rather too obvious expansionist plans. But in their synthetic speeches these rulers should confine their preferences to themselves and to their governments. Why drag the masses? After all, the masses are not naïve and are mature enough to see the brutalities and killings spreading out. They are also well aware of the just and legitimate demand of the Palestinians.
Each time I see shots and videos of hundreds killed in explosions, homes and buildings bombarded, dying children and fleeing families, entire settlements razed to the ground, one can’t help but wonder: who all are behind these mass scale killings… annihilating humanity in every possible way?
And as Noam Chomsky detailed during the course of an interview with me – “In the Reagan years alone, the US-sponsored state terrorists in Central America left hundreds of thousands of tortured and mutilated corpses, millions orphaned and four countries in ruins. In the same year, western-backed South African depredations killed 1.5 million people. I need not speak of West Asia or much else…All of this, however, is barred from the annals of terrorism by a simple device, the term ‘terrorism’ like most terms of political discourse has two meanings – a literal one and a propagandistic one. Needless to add that the propagandistic version is preferred and pursued by the US. Terrorism is terrorism that is directed against the US and its friends and allies.” Chomsky also drew parallels between the US and the Nazis, “The Nazis, for example, bitterly condemned terrorism and conducted what they called counter-terrorism against terrorist partisans. The US basically agreed and it organized and conducted similar counter terrorism in the post war years.”
And during the course of an earlier interview with me, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan’s grandson, Asfandyar Wali Khan, had come up with this rather simplistic and uncomplicated explanation to the growing turmoil in today’s world: “ If you have two badmashes (bad guys! ) in a village it’s okay, because the two will be busy settling scores with each other. But there will be chaos and confusion if there is only one badmash left! That’s the trouble in today’s world. There is only one badmash left! Also, where’s the leadership of calibre in today’s Muslim world…” He had also detailed that religion was used by Americans in Afghanistan to create their base, otherwise Afghan struggles had been based on nationalism and not religion. “Also, the ongoing atrocities against the Palestinians are hurting the Muslims the world over. Post 9/11, the situations in Iraq and Afghanistan are being looked at as if they are similar, which is not the case. The true essence and meaning of Islam is being overshadowed in this chaos which is unfortunate, for Islam stands for justice and peace.… it’s a known fact that way back in early 90s, madrasas and other religious institutions had been set up along the Afghan- Pakistan borders, by the CIA under the various camouflages.”
And if one were to focus on Latin American countries, it’s best to grasp what the well-known Mexican writer and columnist Juan Miguel De Mora had to tell me during the course of an interview whilst he was visiting New Delhi in 2004. When I had queried about the US, he began by quoting two former Mexican presidents: “Mexican president General Porfirio Diaz had said way back (he was president till 1910) ‘Poor Mexico so far from God and so close to the US.’ Then, another Mexican President – Adolfo Lopez Mateos had said that the biggest problem faced by Mexico is ‘the US.’ Together with that, Mora came up with his own comments: “But in my opinion both Mexican presidents were too diplomatic. President’s Bush‘s democracy is like Stalin’s and I have been writing in my columns that Bush’s policies are a danger to humanity.”
And in 2001, I asked Libya’s erstwhile ruler, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s son, Saif al-Islam, to comment on the ‘terror tags’ heaped by the western powers on his father and on his government, along the strain that they are funding terror groups. He had told me, “It all depends on your perception. Many liberation leaders were viewed as being terrorists but later, they became heroes. In the sense, when Nelson Mandela was in trouble we helped him out, when Mugabe was having problems we helped him too, so does that mean we helped terrorist outfits! Mind you, both these men fought liberation wars and later emerged as heroes. In fact, in my own country’s war for liberation from the Italians, we lost about three-quarters of our population, so realize the problems involved …it’s all a matter of perception and image.”
Who all are lacing or equipping Israel with arms is another of the factors we don’t wish to dwell on.
In this context, let’s try to focus on these two very significant and revealing news reports! In May 2024, news reports hit: the Spanish Foreign Minister said that the country had refused permission to a ship carrying arms from Chennai to Israel to dock at one of its ports. According to Spanish media, the Denmark-flagged cargo ship Marianne Danica which sailed from Chennai on April 8 and was headed to the port of Haifa in Israel. To quote from news reports – A second cargo ship that had departed India was denied entry on May 21 to the port of Cartagena. A Spanish newspaper, El Pais reported that the Marianne Danica left from India’s port of Chennai and was en route to Israel’s port of Haifa with a cargo of 27 tonnes of explosives. Minister of Foreign Affairs Jose Manuel Albares confirmed in a news conference that the vessel was denied entry on the grounds that it was shipping military cargo to Israel.
And in June 2024, several news reports surfaced which more than indicate that on June 6, in the aftermath of Israel’s bombing of a United Nations shelter at the Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza, the Quds News Network released a video of the remains of a missile dropped by Israeli warplanes – with ‘Made in India’ labels on it!
*****
Leaving you with verse of the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish:
“The war will end/
The leaders will shake hands/
The old woman will keep waiting for her martyred/son/
The girl will wait for her beloved husband/
And those children will wait for their hero father/
I don’t know who sold our homeland/
But I saw who paid the price.”
“He is quiet and so am I./
He is quiet and so am I./
He sips tea with lemon, while I drink coffee./
That’s the difference between us./”
“I think: Maybe he’s a killer…/
or maybe a passerby who thinks/
I am a killer./
He’s afraid…and so am I./”
