Saturday, September 18, 2010
THE REAL REASON WHY WE NEED PEACE!
The real differences around the world today are not between Jews and Arabs; Protestants and Catholics; Muslims, Croats, and Serbs. The real differences are between those who embrace peace and those who would destroy it; between those who look to the future and those who cling to the past; between those who open their arms and those who are determined to clench their fists. Every day millions of women and girls worldwide experience physical, sexual and psychological violence. According to the United Nations, one in three women around the world are likely to be victims of gender-based violence (GBV) in their lifetime, including sexual abuse, rape, genital mutilation, trafficking and forced prostitution. Increasingly, rape has been used as a weapon of war against civilian populations in such countries as Liberia, Rwanda and Somalia. In the DRC and Sudan, systematic rape campaigns are another form of “ethnic cleansing.” In such situations, armed groups use systematic and brutal rape as a means of terrorizing entire communities and forcing submission to their power. This actions that often irreparably break the body, mind and spirit. Even after the physical wounds have healed, survivors face enormous stigma and shame, and both women and their families live in a constant state of fear of additional attacks. Children in war zones have to cope with very difficult circumstances. Not only do children suffer horrible physical wounds, hunger and malnutrition. Children have problems with recurring nightmares, sleep disorders, incontinence, depressions, explosions of anger or anguish, concentration problems, and many more symptoms. Many are very somber about their future.
Friday, May 7, 2010
THE ISREALI VS PALESTINIAN CONFLICT
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict centres on conflicting, often mutually exclusive claims to the area called Palestine by the Palestinians and the Land of Israel by Israelis. The conflict between Palestinian Arabs and Jews is a modern phenomenon, which began around the turn of the 20Th century. These two groups have different religions (Palestinians include Muslims, Christians and Druze). There was a struggle over land Until 1948, the area that both groups claimed was known internationally as Palestine. But following the war of 1948-49, this land was divided into three parts: the state of Israel, the West Bank (of the Jordan River) and the Gaza Strip. This is a small area: approximately 10,000 square miles, or about the size of the state of Maryland. The competing claims are not reconcilable if one group exercises exclusive political control over the total territory.
Jewish claims to this land are based on the biblical promise to Abraham and his descendants, on the fact that this was the historical site of the Jewish kingdom of Israel (which was destroyed by the Roman Empire), and on Jews' need for a haven from European anti-Semitism. Palestinian Arabs' claims to the land are based on continuous residence in the country for hundreds of years and the fact that they represented the demographic majority. They reject the notion that a biblical-era kingdom constitutes the basis for a valid modern claim. If Arabs engage the biblical argument at all, they maintain that since Abraham's son Ishmael is the forefather of the Arabs, then God's promise of the land to the children of Abraham includes Arabs as well. They do not believe that they should forfeit their land to compensate Jews for Europe's crimes against them.
Until the beginning of the 20Th century, most Jews living in Palestine were concentrated in four cities with religious significance: Jerusalem, Hebron, Safad and Tiberias. Most of them observed traditional, orthodox religious practises. Many spent their time studying religious texts and depended on the charity of world Jewry for survival. Their attachment to the land was religious rather than national, and they were not involved in or supportive of the Zionist movement which began in Europe and was brought to Palestine by immigrants.
Arab Riots and Jewish immigration - In the spring of 1920, spring of 1921 and summer of 1929, Arab nationalists opposed to the Balfour declaration, the mandate and the Jewish National Home, instigated riots and pogroms against Jews in Jerusalem, Hebron, Jaffa and Haifa. The violence led to the formation of the Haganah Jewish self-defence organisation in 1920. The riots were also fuelled by false rumours that the Jews intended to build a synagogue at the wailing wall, or otherwise encroach upon the Muslim rule over the Temple Mount compound, including the Al-Aqsa mosque. The pogroms led to evacuation of most of the Jewish community of Hebron. . The British responded with the Pass field White Paper. The white paper attempted to stop immigration to Palestine based on the recommendations of the Hope Simpson report.
The Arab Invasion - The governments of neighbouring Arab states were more reluctant than is generally assumed to enter the war against Israel, despite bellicose declarations. However, fear of popular pressure combined with fear that other Arab states would gain an advantage over them by fighting in Palestine, helped sway Syria, Jordan and Egypt to go to war. While officially they were fighting according to one plan, in fact there was little coordination between them.
The 1967 6-Day War - Tension began developing between Israel and Arab countries in the 1960s. Israel began to implement its National Water Carrier plan, which pumps water from the Sea of Galilee to irrigate south and central Israel. The project was in accordance with a plan proposed by US envoy Eric Johnston in 1955, and agreed to by Arab engineers. Arab governments refused to participate however, because of the implied recognition of Israel. In secret meetings, Israel and Jordan agreed to abide by the water quotas set by the plan.
THE CAVE OF THE PATRIARCHS MASSACRE:
The Cave of the Patriarchs massacre occurred when Baruch Goldstein, an Israeli settler and member of the far-right Israeli Kach movement, opened fire on unarmed Palestinian Muslims praying inside the Ibrahim Mosque (or Mosque of Abraham) at the Cave of the Patriarchs site in Hebron in the West Bank. It took place on February 25, 1994, during the overlapping religious holidays of Purim and Ramadan.29 worshippers were killed and 125 wounded.The attack ended when Goldstein was subdued and beaten to death by survivors.
The attack set off riots and protests throughout the West Bank, and an additional 19 Palestinians were killed by the Israeli Defence Forces within 48 hours of the massacre.
Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin condemned the attack, describing Goldstein as a "degenerate murderer", "a shame on Zionism and an embarrassment to Judaism". Goldstein has been seen as a martyr by Jewish extremists in Hebron since the attack and his grave became a site of pilgrimage for his supporters.
The Israeli government divided the Cave of the Patriarchs into two sections, one for Jewish worshippers and the other for Muslim worshippers. At 05:00 a.m. on 25 February, 800 Palestinian Muslims passed through the east gate of the cave to participate in Fajr, the first of the five daily Islamic prayers.The cave was under Israeli Army guard, but of the nine soldiers supposed to have been on duty, four were late turning up, and only one officer was there.
Shortly afterwards, Goldstein entered the Isaac Hall of the cave. He was dressed in his army uniform and carried an IMI Galil assault rifle and four magazines of ammunition, which held 35 rounds each. He was not stopped by the guards, who assumed that he was an officer entering the tomb to pray in an adjacent chamber reserved for Jews. Standing in front of the only exit from the cave and positioned to the rear of the Muslim worshippers, he opened fire with the weapon, killing 29 people and injuring another 125.
Reports after the massacre were often contradictory or ambiguous. There was initial uncertainty about whether Goldstein had acted alone; it was reported that eyewitnesses had seen "another man, also dressed as a soldier, handing him ammunition." There were also reports that he had thrown grenades into the worshippers.Yasser Arafat suggested that the attack was the work of up to 12 men, including Israeli troops.[citation needed] There were also various questions as to the Israeli guards outside the cave having opened fire; while Israeli military officials claim that no Israeli troops fired on the Palestinian worshippers, the New York Times reported that over 40 different Palestinian eyewitnesses, many of them confined to hospital beds with gunshot wounds and thus "unable to compare notes", all corroborated that three Israeli guards opened fire in confusion as the Muslims fled the shrine, with one firing into the crowd.
As an act of revenge to the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre, in April 1994, Hamas launched suicide bomber attacks targeting Israeli civilian population in many locations throughout Israel, however, once the Hamas started to the use these means it became a regular pattern of action against Israel.
Jewish claims to this land are based on the biblical promise to Abraham and his descendants, on the fact that this was the historical site of the Jewish kingdom of Israel (which was destroyed by the Roman Empire), and on Jews' need for a haven from European anti-Semitism. Palestinian Arabs' claims to the land are based on continuous residence in the country for hundreds of years and the fact that they represented the demographic majority. They reject the notion that a biblical-era kingdom constitutes the basis for a valid modern claim. If Arabs engage the biblical argument at all, they maintain that since Abraham's son Ishmael is the forefather of the Arabs, then God's promise of the land to the children of Abraham includes Arabs as well. They do not believe that they should forfeit their land to compensate Jews for Europe's crimes against them.
Until the beginning of the 20Th century, most Jews living in Palestine were concentrated in four cities with religious significance: Jerusalem, Hebron, Safad and Tiberias. Most of them observed traditional, orthodox religious practises. Many spent their time studying religious texts and depended on the charity of world Jewry for survival. Their attachment to the land was religious rather than national, and they were not involved in or supportive of the Zionist movement which began in Europe and was brought to Palestine by immigrants.
Arab Riots and Jewish immigration - In the spring of 1920, spring of 1921 and summer of 1929, Arab nationalists opposed to the Balfour declaration, the mandate and the Jewish National Home, instigated riots and pogroms against Jews in Jerusalem, Hebron, Jaffa and Haifa. The violence led to the formation of the Haganah Jewish self-defence organisation in 1920. The riots were also fuelled by false rumours that the Jews intended to build a synagogue at the wailing wall, or otherwise encroach upon the Muslim rule over the Temple Mount compound, including the Al-Aqsa mosque. The pogroms led to evacuation of most of the Jewish community of Hebron. . The British responded with the Pass field White Paper. The white paper attempted to stop immigration to Palestine based on the recommendations of the Hope Simpson report.
The Arab Invasion - The governments of neighbouring Arab states were more reluctant than is generally assumed to enter the war against Israel, despite bellicose declarations. However, fear of popular pressure combined with fear that other Arab states would gain an advantage over them by fighting in Palestine, helped sway Syria, Jordan and Egypt to go to war. While officially they were fighting according to one plan, in fact there was little coordination between them.
The 1967 6-Day War - Tension began developing between Israel and Arab countries in the 1960s. Israel began to implement its National Water Carrier plan, which pumps water from the Sea of Galilee to irrigate south and central Israel. The project was in accordance with a plan proposed by US envoy Eric Johnston in 1955, and agreed to by Arab engineers. Arab governments refused to participate however, because of the implied recognition of Israel. In secret meetings, Israel and Jordan agreed to abide by the water quotas set by the plan.
THE CAVE OF THE PATRIARCHS MASSACRE:
The Cave of the Patriarchs massacre occurred when Baruch Goldstein, an Israeli settler and member of the far-right Israeli Kach movement, opened fire on unarmed Palestinian Muslims praying inside the Ibrahim Mosque (or Mosque of Abraham) at the Cave of the Patriarchs site in Hebron in the West Bank. It took place on February 25, 1994, during the overlapping religious holidays of Purim and Ramadan.29 worshippers were killed and 125 wounded.The attack ended when Goldstein was subdued and beaten to death by survivors.
The attack set off riots and protests throughout the West Bank, and an additional 19 Palestinians were killed by the Israeli Defence Forces within 48 hours of the massacre.
Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin condemned the attack, describing Goldstein as a "degenerate murderer", "a shame on Zionism and an embarrassment to Judaism". Goldstein has been seen as a martyr by Jewish extremists in Hebron since the attack and his grave became a site of pilgrimage for his supporters.
The Israeli government divided the Cave of the Patriarchs into two sections, one for Jewish worshippers and the other for Muslim worshippers. At 05:00 a.m. on 25 February, 800 Palestinian Muslims passed through the east gate of the cave to participate in Fajr, the first of the five daily Islamic prayers.The cave was under Israeli Army guard, but of the nine soldiers supposed to have been on duty, four were late turning up, and only one officer was there.
Shortly afterwards, Goldstein entered the Isaac Hall of the cave. He was dressed in his army uniform and carried an IMI Galil assault rifle and four magazines of ammunition, which held 35 rounds each. He was not stopped by the guards, who assumed that he was an officer entering the tomb to pray in an adjacent chamber reserved for Jews. Standing in front of the only exit from the cave and positioned to the rear of the Muslim worshippers, he opened fire with the weapon, killing 29 people and injuring another 125.
Reports after the massacre were often contradictory or ambiguous. There was initial uncertainty about whether Goldstein had acted alone; it was reported that eyewitnesses had seen "another man, also dressed as a soldier, handing him ammunition." There were also reports that he had thrown grenades into the worshippers.Yasser Arafat suggested that the attack was the work of up to 12 men, including Israeli troops.[citation needed] There were also various questions as to the Israeli guards outside the cave having opened fire; while Israeli military officials claim that no Israeli troops fired on the Palestinian worshippers, the New York Times reported that over 40 different Palestinian eyewitnesses, many of them confined to hospital beds with gunshot wounds and thus "unable to compare notes", all corroborated that three Israeli guards opened fire in confusion as the Muslims fled the shrine, with one firing into the crowd.
As an act of revenge to the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre, in April 1994, Hamas launched suicide bomber attacks targeting Israeli civilian population in many locations throughout Israel, however, once the Hamas started to the use these means it became a regular pattern of action against Israel.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
NIGERIA: A TYPICAL EXAMPLE.
In Nigeria, the two dominant religion are Christianity and Islam and both religious group have both had their share of violence and riot based on religious affiliation and religious policies the worst such being the two confrontations that took place in Kaduna between February and May 2000 in which so many people lost their lives.
After colonization, a number of the minorities, including the Gbagyi, who are the indigenes of the area where Kaduna city developed, converted to Catholicism and various Protestant sects. The situation in Kano is both simpler and more complex than that in other locations in northern Nigeria. Although the vast majority of the population is Muslim (perhaps as much as 90–95 %), many different Islamic sects coexist in the city.
In Kano new ethnic categories “southerner,” “northerner” arose when southerners, particularly Igbo, began to threaten economic interests of the far-flung Hausa commercial empire based in Kano. The policy of northernization, adopted by northern elites during the late 1950s, sought to open jobs for Hausa in commercial firms in Kano; gain greater access to government contracts, civil service posts, and financial services; and reassert control over produce export. The fear of losing out economically heightened the sense among northern indigenes of marginalization. Northernization established the predominance of politics over economics, which made political competition at the national level a matter of primary concern.
Despite these differences, Muslims in Nigeria’s North can act together in a disciplined manner when they consider it politically necessary. But groups and leaders in each state also pursue their own agendas, Part of the resentment felt for “settlers” (members of southern tribes, as opposed to “indigenes”) residing (and often born in) Kano stems from indigenes’ feeling that settlers are simply in Kano to make money. Settlers are perceived to be unwilling to adapt to the culture of Kano and to reject the values of Kano’s indigenous population. Indigenes see settlers as failing to commit or contribute to the community in either material or nonmaterial senses. Indigenes believe settlers look down on the indigenous Kano population. To some extent, Muslims feel marginalized, which fuels their sense of grievance against the southern Christian settlers in their midst.
In May 1999 violence erupted in Kaduna State over the succession of an Emir resulting in more than 100 deaths. In Kaduna in February-May 2000 over 1,000 people died in rioting over the introduction of criminal Shar'ia in the State. Hundreds of ethnic Hausa were killed in reprisal attacks in southeastern Nigeria. In September 2001, over 2,000 people were killed in inter-religious rioting in Jos. In October 2001, hundred were killed and thousands displaced in communal violence that spread across the Middle-Belt states of Benue, Taraba, and Nasarawa. Plateau State has the highest number of displaced people as a result of clashes between Christians and Muslim communities there. The predominantly Christian Tarok farmers consider the mostly Muslim Hausa cattle herders as outsiders, and accuse them of stealing land and trying to usurp political power. These had led to the burning down of 72 villages over between 2002 and the end of 2003. More than 1,000 people were killed in sectarian clashes between Christians and Muslims in Jos, the Plateau State capital, in September 2001.
By 27 April 2004 at least twenty people had died in three days of clashes between rival ethnic militias in central Plateau State. The clashes were between ethnic Tarok fighters and their Fulani rivals at Bakin Chiyawa in the Shendam district of the state. The fighting was intense, with both sides using guns, bows and arrows and machetes. The fighting was caused by a dispute over use of an area of land designated for cultivation by the agrarian Tarok and for grazing by the nomadic Fulani. Hausa fighters burned churches and killed nearly 100 people in a Tarok village. In early May 2004 Nigerian security forces restored order in remote areas of central Plateau State, where sectarian violence had left scores of people dead. Calm returned to the highlands town of Telwa, as hundreds of police reinforcements arrived to quash revenge attacks by Christian ethnic-Tarok fighters against the mainly Muslim-ethnic Hausa community.
Police said the death toll of eighty announced on 04 May 2004 underestimates the number of casualties. Muslim Nigerian leaders said they believe more than 200 people were killed in the violence on 01-02 May 2004, and more than 100 others were missing. They called it mass murder, and accused local authorities of organizing militia fighters, while withdrawing police from the area before they stormed the town. The Red Cross estimated as many as 600 people may have been killed in attacks on the town of Yelwa by Christian tribe militias in the first week of May 2004.
About thirty people were killed in Kano, the largest city in northern Nigeria with a population of eight million people. Religious violence erupted with Muslim protest demonstration on 10 May 2004 against the killing of several hundred Muslims in the small town of Yelwa in Plateau State in central Nigeria on 02 May 2004. A further 45 had been arrested and 40 had been injured after mobs of youths armed with clubs, machetes and jerry cans of petrol roamed the streets on predominantly Muslim Kano, attacking suspected Christians. An estimated 10,000 Kano residents, mostly Christians fleeing from their homes in troubled parts of the city, took refuge at the main military and police barracks on 11 May 2004. Recently around 200 people lost their lives to a fresh communal/ religious violence in Northern Nigeria. With the deaths and killings, it will be very difficult for the bereaved and people affected one way or the other, to forget the past and leave in peace and harmony, with suspected communities, individual or groups who partook in the various massacre.
After colonization, a number of the minorities, including the Gbagyi, who are the indigenes of the area where Kaduna city developed, converted to Catholicism and various Protestant sects. The situation in Kano is both simpler and more complex than that in other locations in northern Nigeria. Although the vast majority of the population is Muslim (perhaps as much as 90–95 %), many different Islamic sects coexist in the city.
In Kano new ethnic categories “southerner,” “northerner” arose when southerners, particularly Igbo, began to threaten economic interests of the far-flung Hausa commercial empire based in Kano. The policy of northernization, adopted by northern elites during the late 1950s, sought to open jobs for Hausa in commercial firms in Kano; gain greater access to government contracts, civil service posts, and financial services; and reassert control over produce export. The fear of losing out economically heightened the sense among northern indigenes of marginalization. Northernization established the predominance of politics over economics, which made political competition at the national level a matter of primary concern.
Despite these differences, Muslims in Nigeria’s North can act together in a disciplined manner when they consider it politically necessary. But groups and leaders in each state also pursue their own agendas, Part of the resentment felt for “settlers” (members of southern tribes, as opposed to “indigenes”) residing (and often born in) Kano stems from indigenes’ feeling that settlers are simply in Kano to make money. Settlers are perceived to be unwilling to adapt to the culture of Kano and to reject the values of Kano’s indigenous population. Indigenes see settlers as failing to commit or contribute to the community in either material or nonmaterial senses. Indigenes believe settlers look down on the indigenous Kano population. To some extent, Muslims feel marginalized, which fuels their sense of grievance against the southern Christian settlers in their midst.
In May 1999 violence erupted in Kaduna State over the succession of an Emir resulting in more than 100 deaths. In Kaduna in February-May 2000 over 1,000 people died in rioting over the introduction of criminal Shar'ia in the State. Hundreds of ethnic Hausa were killed in reprisal attacks in southeastern Nigeria. In September 2001, over 2,000 people were killed in inter-religious rioting in Jos. In October 2001, hundred were killed and thousands displaced in communal violence that spread across the Middle-Belt states of Benue, Taraba, and Nasarawa. Plateau State has the highest number of displaced people as a result of clashes between Christians and Muslim communities there. The predominantly Christian Tarok farmers consider the mostly Muslim Hausa cattle herders as outsiders, and accuse them of stealing land and trying to usurp political power. These had led to the burning down of 72 villages over between 2002 and the end of 2003. More than 1,000 people were killed in sectarian clashes between Christians and Muslims in Jos, the Plateau State capital, in September 2001.
By 27 April 2004 at least twenty people had died in three days of clashes between rival ethnic militias in central Plateau State. The clashes were between ethnic Tarok fighters and their Fulani rivals at Bakin Chiyawa in the Shendam district of the state. The fighting was intense, with both sides using guns, bows and arrows and machetes. The fighting was caused by a dispute over use of an area of land designated for cultivation by the agrarian Tarok and for grazing by the nomadic Fulani. Hausa fighters burned churches and killed nearly 100 people in a Tarok village. In early May 2004 Nigerian security forces restored order in remote areas of central Plateau State, where sectarian violence had left scores of people dead. Calm returned to the highlands town of Telwa, as hundreds of police reinforcements arrived to quash revenge attacks by Christian ethnic-Tarok fighters against the mainly Muslim-ethnic Hausa community.
Police said the death toll of eighty announced on 04 May 2004 underestimates the number of casualties. Muslim Nigerian leaders said they believe more than 200 people were killed in the violence on 01-02 May 2004, and more than 100 others were missing. They called it mass murder, and accused local authorities of organizing militia fighters, while withdrawing police from the area before they stormed the town. The Red Cross estimated as many as 600 people may have been killed in attacks on the town of Yelwa by Christian tribe militias in the first week of May 2004.
About thirty people were killed in Kano, the largest city in northern Nigeria with a population of eight million people. Religious violence erupted with Muslim protest demonstration on 10 May 2004 against the killing of several hundred Muslims in the small town of Yelwa in Plateau State in central Nigeria on 02 May 2004. A further 45 had been arrested and 40 had been injured after mobs of youths armed with clubs, machetes and jerry cans of petrol roamed the streets on predominantly Muslim Kano, attacking suspected Christians. An estimated 10,000 Kano residents, mostly Christians fleeing from their homes in troubled parts of the city, took refuge at the main military and police barracks on 11 May 2004. Recently around 200 people lost their lives to a fresh communal/ religious violence in Northern Nigeria. With the deaths and killings, it will be very difficult for the bereaved and people affected one way or the other, to forget the past and leave in peace and harmony, with suspected communities, individual or groups who partook in the various massacre.
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