Leading To Barbarity

Imagine a poll with questions deliberately designed to obtain a specific result. Such polls do exist. So how much credence can be placed in what results from them? With questions that skirt an issue, but make skewed references to that issue in the most ambiguous manner to elicit a particular response certain to gladden the hearts of those whose purpose in parsing those responses to obtain a designed outcome has been a roaring success.

The Canadian-Ukrainian community and the Canadian-German community, for their own reasons, have been decidedly uncomfortable with the initiative originally undertaken by the Jewish owner of a news conglomerate, to make plans to engage the public and receive government support in the building of a Holocaust Museum. Those ethnic communities have been outspoken and vociferous in their rejection of a Museum to commemorate the Holocaust though the concept of that museum was altered to reflect a presence as a Museum of Human Rights.

That museum would of necessity reflect the issue of genocide, and the single most extreme example of an ethnic-religious-cultural group of people singled out for systematic social isolation, mass incarceration and finally annihilation on a carefully calibrated and designed scale that would see success in the extinguishing of six million lives of men, women, children of all ages would be front and centre. What united the victims as victims was their Jewishness.

Others suffered a similar fate under the Nazis during World War Two; political prisoners, the mentally and physically impaired, gypsies, homosexuals and many clerics who defied the fascists. But it was for Europe's Jews that special attention in weeding them out of the general population, removing their human rights entitlements, slandering them, pauperizing them, and systematically murdering them that makes this attempt at eradicating Jews from the face of the Earth special.

There were others who suffered grievously throughout modern history; the Russians, Chinese, Poles, Ukraines, Rwandans, Cambodians; the list is long and dreadful. Many still suffer, in North Korea, Burma, Sudan and elsewhere in the world as they are exploited and torn from their land, maimed and slaughtered. They will have their place in The Canadian Museum for Human Rights which is also designed to offer a special place to commemorate the Holocaust and the Aboriginal experience in Canada.

This afflicts its critics with the angst of having their particular dreadful political, social, existential experiences take second place. All the other miseries and dread occurrences experienced by other people in other times and other places are meant to have their place in the Museum. Its critics demand that all be given equal space and equal place; that there be no special memorial for any one dire event.

Ignoring the reality that many other countries of the world consider the Holocaust to represent a unique and dreadful event in human history, needful of its own memorial as a remembrance to what human beings are capable of descending to. So in their need to succeed in turning public opinion to their support, the poll was designed to elicit a desired response. The poll, undertaken by NANOS Research, commissioned by Canadians for Genocide Education.

Canadians for Genocide Education describes itself as a coalition of 50 associations representing 27 different ethno-cultural communities. There is no Internet presence, and its volunteer chairman is an Ontario lawyer who was once head of the Canadian Arab Federation, James Kafieh. The 44-member group he claims to represent is a peculiar one. Some when contacted claim never to have heard of him or the coalition.

Others could not be contacted as the contacts were 27 years stale, others had no working telephones or contact information. But Mr. Kafieh is adamant that the focus of the Museum is quite wrong, and represents the result "of politicians pandering to a special interest group". Of course Mr. Kafieh would be intimately familiar with the considerations and agendas of 'special interest groups'.

Lybomyr Luciuk, director of research for the Ukrainian Civil Liberties Association, another staunch detractor of the main focus of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, and which aided in the funding of the poll, insists the results of the poll confirms that a museum funded by taxpayers must not give 'preference' to one group's suffering over that of another's.

"I know this will sound harsh, but there is fundamental ignorance [on the museum board] of history and a preoccupation with their own community's suffering", Mr. Luciuk explained, neatly summing up his own and his partners-in-adversarial denial of the original purpose of the Museum's own singular, self-involved agenda.

"This is not a genocide museum", clarified Angela Cassie, director of communications for the Museum. "It's a museum about human rights. And, she points out, the Holocaust is the most meticulously documented genocide in history, and as such is eminently capable in its presentation of teaching in the most absolute manner how abuse of human rights leads to dreadful barbarity.

So let's hear it like it is. The Winnipeg museum, a federally-funded institution, which will also be funded by private and corporate subscriptions is meant to have an area dedicated to the carefully planned and executed murder of six million Jews. It is intended that atrocities committed against Canadian Aboriginals will receive similar treatment. Other atrocities will be housed collectively in an adjacent area of the Museum.

This is not a display of the hierarchy of suffering, it is an object lesson in the degradation of humankind, using as its focal point the most singular descent into the black hole of nihilistic destruction through meticulous state and ideological planning ever documented. The poll that asked a few relatively innocuous questions about preferences, never once referencing the Museum itself, resulted in 60.3% of Canadians polled expressing a preference for "one exhibit which covers all genocides equally".

More than adequately reflecting the Canadian spirit of egalitarian compassion. Without informing those whose opinion was being solicited any of the inconvenient details. Which leads one to the indelible and damning impression that a rather nasty, hidden agenda to have a conclusion reached that would reflect the demands of a disparate, grudging group afflicted with anti-Semitism will stoop to any means to validate their point of view.

Recruits For Al-Shabab

Canada's immigrant quotient from Muslim countries has placed us in a rather uncomfortable position. Where radicalized elements from abroad regularly obtain visitors' visas to come to this country to spread their vicious messages of hatred. Finding a ready enough audience among the disaffected young, like those from Somalia whose parents fled the chaos and unrest to find safe haven in Canada. It would appear that many young men of Somalia extraction are fascinated by Islamism.

They have become Canadian citizens, but have obviously not found a comfortable place for themselves within Canadian society. It's estimated that Canada now has between 150,000 and 200,00 ethnic Somalis making this country their home. For the older Somalis, it meant making a new life for themselves very far from their origins. It means living among a pluralist population in large part made up of immigrants like themselves.

Not necessarily like themselves as far as culture, geographic heritage and religion was concerned. Making it desirable for older immigrants to sequester themselves, to live within enclaves where they found comfort in the presence of those who did share their heritage and their religion. Their children, however, may find that same comfort eluding them.

They are 'different' than the prevailing indigenous population with whom they do not share a cultural affinity nor the religion most familiar to them through daily exposure at home. They find interest in the darker, seamier areas of city life, where the petty crime, clubs and taverns offer another, forbidden attraction. And they run afoul of the law in greater numbers than their demographic percentage might warrant.

"There are people in the community who are openly cheerleading for this nonsense", claims Ahmed Hussen, president of the Canadian Somali Congress, referencing the issue of Somali youth being recruited through the Internet blog postings of American-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, inciting young Muslims to join the global jihad and become martyrdom material in the name of Islam. And the messages of visiting clerics.

Obviously the cheerleading community people are those who agree with the messages that al-Awlaki and al-Qaeda and its affiliates feed in a steady stream of encouraging jihad among Muslim youth conflicted about their loyalties. The choice to join the jihadists and go abroad for weapons training with Al-Shabab, speaks to the end of the inner conflict and the decision to join the violent jihad.

Which addresses the ongoing problem Canada is experiencing with jihadist radicalization and successful recruitment of Muslim youth living in Canada. A handful of Somalians have left North America to travel to Somalia to take up the Islamist cause, and now Canadian security agents have interdicted a young Somalian-Canadian, arresting him on suspicion of terrorism support en route to Somalia.

This is cultural dissonance at a lethal level, threatening a back-lash against Canada and Canadians as those in terror training join their jihadist brethren on the battlefield abroad, and there is always the prospect of their returning to continue trading on what they have become skilled at, right here in the country that gave their parents safe haven.

News Worthy

• Israel is studying plans to create an artificial island along the Gaza Strip with sea and air ports to be controlled by the Palestinian Authority. The project, under development for three months by Yaakov Katz, the Transport Minister, proposes building a man-made island four kilometres long and two km wide, Israel's Channel 2 television reported. Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister, backs the plan for the island, which would also contain a tourist area, a marina, hotels and a desalinization plant for sea water. It would be linked to Gaza by a 4-km bridge. The project is estimated to cost $5-billion to $10-billion and take six to 10 years to complete. The project's backers in the government would like to see the island managed by Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority, freezing out the Islamist movement Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip. Agence France-Presse
• 
  
• Iraq: At least 53 people were killed Tuesday when gunmen took hostages at a provincial council headquarters in Saddam Hussein's hometown, precipitating a battle with security forces. It was one of the deadliest attacks in Tikrit since a suicide bombing killed up to 60 police recruits in January and was the first hostage incident since 52 people were killed in a Baghdad church raid by al-Qaeda-linked gunmen in October. The assailants set off car bombs, explosive belts and hand grenades as they stormed the building and grabbed hostages. Those who did not die as a result of explosions were executed by the gunmen. Sabah al-Bazee, a freelance Iraqi journalist, and three council members were among those killed. Reuters
• 
  
• Ivory Coast appeared to have succumbed to full-scale civil war on Tuesday after six key towns fell to forces opposed to the sitting president. Fighting that has already killed 460 people and forced one million from their homes had been contained to the country's far west and some suburbs of the main city Abidjan. But on Tuesday armed groups swept south of the ceasefire line drawn after the end of the last civil war in 2004, taking several towns in succession. Those fighters support Alassane Ouattara, the former World Bank executive internationally recognized as the winner of November's elections. But his rival, Laurent Gbagbo, the incumbent president, has refused to step down. The Daily Telegraph
• 
  
• Brussels: Guards blocked the sealed offices Tuesday of disgraced MEPs after a fresh resignation in a string of corruption scandals engulfing the European Parliament. Hella Ranner, an Austrian conservative, became the latest to quit after a newspaper report alleged she planned to clear a $9.8-million business debt using expenses meant for staff and office running costs. Three other lawmakers are already facing probes after a sting by Britain's Sunday Times newspaper showed them agreeing to take bribes of up to $140,000 to draft new laws. Last week, the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg ordered Dan Dover, a veteran British Conservative MEP, to repay $540,000 in unjustified expenses. Agence France-Presse
• 
  
• Pakistan has agreed to establish a counter-terrorism hotline and allow Indian detectives investigating the 2008 Mumbai terror plot to visit the country, in the most significant confidence-building measures since the massacre. After two days of talks in New Delhi, India's home secretary and Pakistan's interior secretary said Tuesday the hotline would help "facilitate real-time information sharing with respect to terrorist threats". Security analysts said the moves were a major concession by Pakistan, aimed at persuading India of its sincerity in tackling terrorism and preventing any further attacks being plotted from its territory, like the Mumbai attacks, which were planned by the hardline Islamist Lashkar-e-Taiba. The Daily Telegraph
• 
  
• Italy: A woman was paid to say she was a victim of Italy's 2009 earthquake and praise the government's reconstruction efforts. Marina Villa, 50, appeared Friday on a popular television program on Canale 5, one of the television channels owned by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. "L'Aquilla is going back to what it was before [the earthquake]. I'd like to thank, if I can, the Prime Minister", she said. "Those who are still staying in hotels, it's convenient for them. They eat, they drink and they don't do anything". Messages left by acquaintances on social networking sites revealed she was not from L'Aquila, but from a small town in the Abruzzo region. The woman admitted Monday she had been paid $420 to appear and read a statement. Reuters
• 
  
• United States: Three inmates and their loved ones have been charged with attempting to smuggle drugs into a New Jersey jail on the pages of a children's colouring book. Subozone, which is used to treat heroin addiction and classified as a controlled dangerous substance, was dissolved into a paste, then painted into the colouring book, Sheriff Gary Schaffer of Cape May county, Philadelphia said Tuesday. Pages with "To Daddy", scribbled on top were sent to the prisoners. The New Jersey drug bust was the second this month involving Suboxone smuggling behind bars. Authorities at a prison in Pennsylvania arrested 11 people in what they said was a scheme to hide the drug beneath postage stamps on letters to prisoners. Reuters
• 
  
• Tokyo: France and the United States are to help Japan in its battle to contain radiation from a crippled nuclear complex where plutonium finds have raised public alarm over the world's worst atomic crisis since Chernobyl in 1986. The high-stakes operation at the Fukushima plant has added to Japan's unprecedented humanitarian disaster, with 27,500 people dead or missing from a March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
• 
  
• Syria may be in the throes of a major power struggle as the country's Cabinet stepped down Tuesday in a last desperate bid to curb nearly two weeks of increasing unrest. The resignation of the 32-member Cabinet led by Naji al-Otari, may clear the way for President Bashar al-Assad to lift a state of emergency that has been in place since 1963 in order to introduce some of the reforms demanded by increasingly restive Syrians. For the last two weeks, while security forces gunned down anti-government demonstrators, state-owned news media have blamed the killings on "armed gangs" who have been sending and receiving more than 1 million text messages "mostly from Israel". National Post
• 
  
• A Canadian government's Integrated Threat Assessment Centre stated that "several Islamist insurgent groups" were based in eastern Libya and mosques in Benghazi were urging followers to fight in Iraq. The intelligence report, written in late 2009, called the anti-Gadhafi stronghold of eastern Libya an "epicentre of Islamist extremism", and said "extremist cells" operated in the region, now being defended by a Canadian-led NATO coalition. National Post
• 
  
• Canada: A Parti Quebecois government would not hesitate to use public funds to promote sovereignty, party leader Pauline Marois said Tuesday. Ms. Marois said a PQ government would use public money to achieve sovereignty, once in power, notably by commissioning studies on the impact of an independent Quebec. Ms. Marois also noted she would adopt a tougher language law, a citizenship law and a Quebec constitution in preparation for sovereignty before a referendum. Postmedia News
• 
  
• China is reinforcing fences and has stepped up patrols along its border with North Korea as fears mount of a catastrophic famine in the secretive state. Fences more than four metres high, topped with barbed wire, are now being erected along a 12-kilometre stretch of the Yalu river around Dandong, a popular entry point for North Korea refugees. "It's the first time such strong border fences are being erected here. It looks like it is related to the unstable situation in North Korea", a resident said of the work, which began in November. The Daily Telegraph

Blazing Cat Fur: March 30- Buy Israeli Goods Day!

Blazing Cat Fur: March 30- Buy Israeli Goods Day!

Much Ado

Semantics, timing and deliberate misinterpretation. Mischief. An attempt to make a scandal out of a story that should have had no legs. A simple observation that made eminently good sense given a sinister spin. The result being that seniors everywhere sat up to take notice and definitely did not appreciate what they heard. What they heard is not what was said, nor intended.

Inconvenient details have a habit of getting in the way of a good story that has ongoing repercussions.

An interview with a political rival, making a simple observation. That, in her opinion an incumbent running for re-election in the next riding to hers was coasting along, not really doing her job of representation. Global news reporter Nelly Gonzalez interviewed Winnipeg MP (Conservative) Shelly Glover. Prompting Ms. Glover to her opinion on MP (Liberal) Anita Neville.

Plainspoken and direct:

"I think Anita Neville is in trouble. I've only been in Parliament for two-and-a-half years, Nelly, and I'll tell ya, there are a lot of shenanigans going on in Parliament. We need some fresh blood, we need some new people who have some new ideas and who are willing to stand up for their constituents. And I'm afraid Ms. Neville has passed her expiry date. Her constituents are constantly coming to my office because they can't receive service in French, because they can't get a call back. I think Ms. Neville is going to be defeated."

Clear enough: ..."Her constituents are constantly coming to my office because they can't receive service in French, because they can't get a call back." In office far too long, due diligence evaporated, time for a change.

But ripe for being deliberately misconstrued because that's where the story is. It shouldn't be there, it should be in the statement that constituents were clearly dissatisfied with the lack of service on their behalf by someone whom they had elected to represent their interests. The quote by MP Glover was taken from a transcript based on raw video.

But then Nelly Gonzalez, four hours later, appears to talk about a story about an insulting ageist 'gaffe'. Ms. Gonzalez is introduced by Anchor Peter Chura on Global Winnipeg Evening News with the statement: "A high-profile Tory suggested that a Liberal MP is just too old for the job". The transcript of the aired segment is far different from the original:

"We need some fresh blood, we need some new people who have some new ideas and who are willing to stand up for their constituents. And I'm afraid Ms. Neville has passed her expiry date."

A damning little excision there. It's what you call taking something out of the context of its original explicating content. And the response from MP Neville upon hearing the truncated version of the interview?

"It's typical of the Conservative party when they don't have anything real or substantive to say to resort to name-calling and personal attacks, it's typical of the party and Shelly."

Now who is being objectionable? It's like reacting to hearsay. Someone feels they've been spurned and denigrated and they respond acerbically. Unfairly too, as the instance indicates. But that's not all. The segment is posted to YouTube. And elder hysteria erupts, with CARP demanding a retraction, characterizing MP Glover and the Conservative Party as ageist.

Another opportunity for MP Neville to express her indignation: "I am not so much offended for myself as I am outraged on behalf of all seniors - especially senior women - whom the Conservatives seem to think are past their 'expiry' dates." And so, she does not feel obligated to respond to her constituents' dissatisfaction, but she does feel justified in rousing public opinion on her side.

It's called political opportunism. And it seems to work. Despite Ms. Glover's assertion of innocence of sinister intent in further clarifying her statement: "My remarks were clear: I was referring to Ms. Neville's performance as an MP, and only that."

Not good enough for the Liberal Party, issuing another statement to the trial-by-media: Which claims that Ms. Glover launched a "personal, ageist attack" on Ms. Neville, proffering a "weak attempt to cover up her gaffe", in insisting on claiming she referred to an unsatisfactory long-time tenure.

Balderdash and unholy crap!

Political Interpretation

The NDP scorns the Conservatives' determination to lower corporate tax rates as "corporate hand-outs". The Liberals, who before they lost power, incrementally lowered the federal corporate tax rate under the Chretien government from a high of 30% to 23%. They were lowered subsequently, and when the Conservatives came to power they stood at 19.5%.

Under a Conservative plan to continue lowering the corporate tax rate to make Canada more competitive, the rate was steadily lowered to its current 16.5% which became effective at the turn of 2011. The Liberals now claim that if they win the election they'll raise the corporate tax rate back to 18%. Which will give them enough revenue to pay for some of their expensive electoral promises.

The Conservatives promise that if returned to power they'll further reduce the rate to 15% by 2012. The Ignatieff-led Liberals consider this to be absolutely revenue-ruinous. When Stephane Dion led the federal Liberals he pledged to cut corporate taxes below the then-proposed Conservative rate of 18.5%, arguing that lower rates represented powerful incentives for investing and job creation.

It would seem that leading economists believe that Canada is heading in absolutely the right direction lowering corporate tax rates. The co-ordinated plan between the federal and most provincial governments is to have a much reduced total corporate tax rate; combined to 25%, which would render this country an impressive investment opportunity.

The plan is considered to be revenue-neutral in its result of expanding the tax base. Some experts appear to estimate that $50-billion in new investment would be attracted in the space of seven years, helping enormously to grow the Canadian economy. Which means more employment opportunities and more Canadians back to work.

What is really paradoxical is the polarizing opinions of the Ontario provincial Liberal government and that of the federal Liberals. These are considered to be "competitive business taxes" by the Ontario Liberals, not "handouts for Canada's wealthiest corporations", as the federal Liberals characterize them.

The federal Liberals contend that cutting the corporate tax rate while the country is in deep deficit is insane. Contrarily, the provincial Liberals, while carrying a multi-billion deficit consider slashing the corporate tax rate, good business sense. "A more competitive business climate is creating more jobs and higher incomes for people", claimed the just-presented Ontario budget.

Which also adds that the improved business climate has directly led to a 7.4% increase in private-sector investments in infrastructure, machinery and equipment from 2009 to 2010. More than validating the Ontario government's decision to reduce general corporate income-tax rate to 12%, scheduled to be cut to 10% by 2013.

A move, claims Ontario's Finance Minister, that "will position Ontario as one of the most attractive jurisdictions in the industrialized world for new investment. Increased business investment will lead to more jobs and higher incomes for Ontarians."

So which is it then, great fiscal management into the future, or "corporate tax giveaways"?

What If?

It's not all that far a stretch of probability. It happened in Afghanistan with the U.S. and Pakistan conspiring to aid the mujahadeen, training and arming them to confront Soviet forces in the invasion of Afghanistan. And those mujahadeen formed the core of the Taliban which then ruled Afghanistan when the Soviet troops left.

And from among the mujahadeen another corps was formed, that of al-Qaeda. The alliance between the Taliban and al-Qaeda was a natural one.

And the flaming enmity of al-Qaeda toward the West and specifically the United States became the most evident turning point of the Islamist revival. Which has since spread incorrigibly throughout the Muslim world. The Islamists have succeeded in overturning moderate Islam to reflect a fundamentalist, fanatic version of Islam which conducted its own internal war within the ummah.

Islamists who fought in Afghanistan were recruited from all over the Muslim and Arab world. Many of them returned to their source, and one of those sources was eastern Libya. In 2009 a Canadian intelligence report described eastern Libya as an "epicentre of Islamist extremism", where "extremist cells" were well represented.

Canada's Integrated Threat Assessment Centre identified "several Islamist insurgent groups" based in mosques in Benghazi, urging its members to fight in Iraq. They are suspected of having infiltrated the ranks of the rebel forces now battling Moammar Gadhafi's forces. And, like a nightmare recurring, the United States, Britain , France and Qatar are considering arming the rebels.

A recently-convened conference of 40 governments and international bodies reached agreement to continue the NATO-led aerial bombing of Libyan forces, hoping to force Gadhafi to comply with the United Nations resolution to end its violence against its civilians. The conflict in Libya is between the West and the East of the country; a tribal conflict.

In many of the cities that rebound from government control to rebel occupation and then back again, there are citizens who battle on the government side, against the rebel forces. This is a country that has been riven by clan warfare and tribal antipathies, a reflection of what exists in every Arab and Muslim country globally.

It is into this melee that the West has intervened, focusing on the presence of a maniacal tyrant determined to continue his personal ownership of a country, violating the human rights of his own exploited people, celebrating his ownership of the proceeds of the country's natural resources. In the West this is considered moral anathema; in the Middle East it reflects tradition.

International aid agencies are on the scene, concerned that the conflict has cut off medical supplies, water, electricity and food to countless civilians. The focus of concern from within the international community and the reason for their involvement has been the security and safety of the civilian population. But the civilian population appears fractionated by loyalties, further complicating matters.

And through all of this, while the West and their Arab and African state allies remain anxious to have Western powers involved and commit to what they will not, Moammar Gadhafi keeps insisting that he is concerned for his peoples' welfare: "Stop your brutal and unjust attack on our country ... Hundreds of Libyans are being killed because of this bombardment. Massacres are being mercilessly committed against the Libyan people."

And on their part, the spokesmen for the rebels deny al-Qaeda links, despite damning admissions seen elsewhere. And the head of the U.S. European Command informs the U.S. Senate that American intelligence on rebel forces, while demonstrating some involvement of al-Qaeda or Hezbollah, they are lacking "detail sufficient to say there is a significant al-Qaeda presence."

Student Prerogatives

A vociferous, outraged group of sanctimonious students dedicated to their vision of social justice on the international scene busy on campus at Carleton University to highlight their disgust with Israel through their committed action as Students Against Israeli Apartheid. Wholly focused on one small country encircled by other, hostile countries.

Where, since its birth 60 years ago, it has had to contend with wars of conquest and obliteration which all failed, and then violent and bloody terrorist attacks on its citizens. The State has distinguished itself by insisting on its universal right to existence, and upon its major focus, that of a homeland and a haven for the world's Jewish populations.

To protect itself and its people it has been forced by circumstances it cannot control to police its borders. And to mount a protective ring of its military around the Palestinian Territories from whence violent opposition to its existence emanates from various terrorist militias. While at the same time attempting to reach a peace agreement with the Palestinian Authority.

These students have no interest in protesting the situation in Zimbabwe, in Sudan, in Somalia, in Democratic Republic of Congo, in Ivory Coast, in Kenya, where dictatorial regimes violate their peoples' rights and those of their neighbours. They evince no interest in the tyrannical autocracies of the Middle East. China's internal affairs, and Burma's and North Korea hold no interest for them.

They are entirely invested in expressing their passionate hatred for Zionist Israel, the Jewish homeland. And they insist that it is their right to zealously confront Carleton's executive administration, to debate with them their demand that the university divest all money from companies they claim to be doing business with Israel; a total boycott and nothing less.

The university's administrators had little option but to cancel a scheduled meeting of their board of governors because 200 unruly students yelled, chanted and shouted slogans about democracy in the process of blocking access to the meeting site. They were outraged that the administration invited them to select representatives from among their numbers to attend the meeting, that the chamber designated could not accommodate all of them.

"Unfortunately, the student demonstrators would not allow a number of the board members to get through [the crowd] to attend the meeting", explained a university spokesman. Which effectively forced the cancellation of the meeting. A spokesman for the SAIA student group claimed the meeting represented an "illegitimate process", since all the students were unable to attend the meeting due to fire code regulations.

The university's offer to permit a self-selected representative number of the student group was rejected. And as they rejected the conciliatory offer, the group threatened that if not every student who wished to attend the meeting was enabled to, then "hundreds" would gather to "disrupt" the meeting. Which was what occurred.

"There is no way we can allow the university to be run by threats. When you get to the point where you have groups of students telling the administration, 'We intend to disrupt your operations', that's frustrating because it interferes with people's efforts to focus their energies on making Carleton the best place it can be for students" explained an administration spokesperson.

How's that for understatement, for mealy-mouthed convention? An administration fearful of once again facing an inconvenient confrontation by obstreperous and bullying students, certain of their entitlement as progressive social arbiters of justice in their ideological war to position the university's affairs to suit their political agenda.

Mayerthorpe Report

All aggregate places of residence have their good people and their bad. There are sociopaths and psychopaths and those whose simmering anger against the world and their rejection of societal values render them amenable to psychotic outbreaks. They become petty criminals, they prey on the society around them.

And they resent and hate authority and those tasked with the security of society.

In Mayerthorpe, Alberta, James Roszko was generally recognized as someone who lived on the outskirts of polite society just as he lived on his farm outside Mayerthorpe. He had a criminal record ranging from shoplifting to harassment and threats, and sexual assault. Of the six convictions on his record 4 dated back 26 years, 1 was 14 years old, the last 9 years old.

No reason to continue considering him a real threat to society. He had served his time for his offences, and legally he had the right of any other free citizen in a free society. But the RCMP were investigating stolen vehicles, and entered his property for the purpose of looking around. While there they also discovered a marijuana grow operation.

They secured the property, awaiting the man's arrival back from wherever he had fled to. At nightfall, assisted by two friends who lived in Mayerthorpe, who dropped him off at his farm where four RCMP officers had settled in for the night to wait for his eventual appearance, he entered his Quonset hut to retrieve the semi-automatic markman's rifle he wanted.

And then he shot all four constables to death. And to finalize the violently bloody drama he shot himself. The gruesome discovery of the slaughter sunk the RCMP into a deep depression of self-doubt. How might they have prevented this horrible event from occurring? Four Mounties dead, in one fell swoop by a psychotic petty criminal.

Who might ever have suspected such a dreadful occurrence might happen? No one.

And finally a report issued by Judge Daniel Pahl released to Alberta's Justice Minister and Attorney-General clarified the situation in terms of its unavoidability. That a criminal mind could outfox the best-trained law-and-security officers through the sheer inability of normal minds to apprehend a psychotic break with reality.

Grudge-driven satisfaction in murdering police constables before taking his own life, a final revenge, withdrawing the possibility of closure for a stunned and grieving community.

Capricious Fate

Patrick Chareka, a quiet man, not much like his ebullient wife. They were both scholarly individuals, well educated and employed at St.Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, Nova Scotia. They were both originally from Zimbabwe. Otillia Chareka was a village girl determined to become educated. From a poverty-stricken family and village she stubbornly did receive an education.

First of her small village's clan to finish high school, first to attend university, obtaining a master's then a doctorate. When she arrived in Canada in early 1990 her teaching credentials were not recognized, so she furthered her education at the University of New Brunswick, paying her way through work as a hotel maid.

She thought of Canada as a country full of opportunities. She had a dynamic personality. "She was always laughing. In any type of situation she laughed. She entered a room with light." And she exited life with the darkness of an evil act.

For her husband, Patrick Chereka, father of the five daughters that Ottilia Chareka brought into the world, murdered his wife. He was an instructor at St.Francis Xavier's math department until his arrest on a charge of first-degree murder. No previous records of domestic violence in the home were on the books.

Professor Chereka was described by some of his students as "entertaining", "passionate", a "stylish dresser" and hard to "understand". To the entire town and the many people who knew and admired Ottilia Chareka, "understanding" Patrick Chereka and what drove him to murder his wife is a true dilemma.

Their daughters, all five of them, Praymore 23, Patience 18, Patricia 16, Primrose 14, and Prisca 3, will miss their mother dreadfully. Doubtless they will also miss their father. They are now, effectively, orphans. Their mother, who lectured as an associate professor of education, sent funding to a small village in Zimbabwe for medication and clothing for the indigent.

The girls have been left a legacy of unparalleled virtue. The town has been left to care for five young women instilled with the promise of their mother's character and the memory of their father's failure.

The Human Dimension

Canadians have no wish to welcome refugees or immigrants who will not respect officially sanctioned processes whereby this country is able to vet new prospects for landed immigrant status. We have no interest in reluctantly welcoming people whose desperation may be real and may be feigned, but which compels them to strike illegal bargains with the devils who live handsomely over the avails of human smuggling.

This country's official complaints to Thailand, the country that has been used as a transit point for Tamils seeking to escape Sri Lanka and enter Canada, a country where thousands of their compatriots have long since escaped to for the purpose of finding a welcoming berth, has resulted in that country becoming alert to the necessity to halt the traffic. Not by detaining the smugglers who are too crafty and self-preserving, but those who fall prey to their smuggling offers.

Who take thousands of dollars from desperate people, pack them into cargo ships and transport them over a long and dangerously arduous ocean voyage to the shores of Canada. That voyage is a real risk to the lives of those who choose to hazard the vicissitudes of a treacherous ocean voyage. Little realizing what they submit themselves to. And, on arriving in Canada, are sequestered in an incarceration setting until they have been cleared for discharge into the general public.

The result being that hundreds of Tamil Sri Lankans now languish in bare and miserably crowded holding cells before being eventually dispatched in some manner back to Sri Lanka from whence they fled. Men, women and children. Somehow managing to endure the confines of incarceration in dreadfully confined spaces; subsistence endurance. Not quite resembling the more humane circumstances encountered on arrival in Canada.

Sri Lankans well established in Canada have sent descriptions of their lives in this country back to their yearning relatives in Sri Lanka, anxious to escape a country and a government that has violated their human rights. They were helped not one iota in their plight by the viciously brutal Tamil Tigers who fought for a Tamil homeland. And whom a brutal civil-war-like conflict finally vanquished.

The Canadian Tamil Congress deplores the situation and the conditions under which their fellow Tamils live, anxious to have them come to Canada. It urges Canada to resettle those fleeing Sri Lanka. Among whom, indubitably, are former Tamil Tigers, members of a terrorist group. Whom no country will take for fear of their past agitating the present into the future.

One of whom in an interview begged for the mercy of kindness: "Please understand our difficult situation and please create a way for us to live peacefully and freely in whatever country it might be. Except Sri Lanka."

UN Effectiveness

"There is rarely a vision beyond fundraising, and rarely an organizing narrative that draws together disparate capacities. What is needed is a complete overhaul of strategic and operational leadership in the UN. Regrettably, the leadership, management and co-ordination of the international community's efforts have not risen even to the challenges we currently face. Unless we radically improve the quality of the leadership of the international effort in humanitarian crises, we will not succeed in dealing with what is ahead. In all but one of the case studies for this review, UN leadership was poor. This was especially true in the larger disasters." Paddy Ashdown, Humanitarian Emergency Response Review

So much for the salvation of the world at the dedicated and faithful hands of the experts assembled by that great world body, the United Nations. Acquiring the required operating funds to launch humanitarian missions all around the Globe on behalf of global citizenry, those who live in countries who are advantaged by good governance and wealth, transferring funding to the world body on behalf of the disadvantaged has not resulted in needed resource delivery.

Raising funding is evidently no problem; those member countries who can afford the tariff cough it up, leaving it to the expert panels working on behalf of humanity under the auspices of the United Nations, to spend it wisely. Spending the funding raised by UN appeals to its membership to ameliorate natural disasters, bringing medical and food aid and shelter where it is required; operating refugee camps; diplomatically intervening in calamitous conflicts.

The world depends on the work of the United Nations. That august body was organized, established and is trusted to launch missions to rescue humanity from nature's disasters, and more tellingly from humanity's own folly. The study just concluded on the effectiveness of the UN's various humanitarian missions studied responses to recent humanitarian disasters; famine in Niger, flooding in Pakistan, earthquake in Haiti.

The conclusion reached is dispiriting and most definitely unflattering to the purported professionalism of the world body. While governments regard the United Nations as the "only legitimate authority" in grave and desperate situations where a specific government of a country affected by some kind of disaster proves incapable of mounting its own humanitarian response, the result of the study indicates the authority's effectiveness is sadly lacking.

Only the UN's World Food Program is exonerated for the extent and value of its effectiveness in its ability to "rapidly deliver[ing] food to seven million people in flood-hit Pakistan". And UNICEF is pointed out as another success story, supplying infant food throughout Niger. But the failure of the UN seen in its "inability to treat and contain" Haiti's cholera outbreak does not reflect well on its capabilities and dedication.

The report points out the communication dysfunctionality of the various UN agencies, commenting on their need to work together "more collegially". Critics of the United Nations - and there are many, mostly those drawing their conclusions from the political sphere of diplomatic influence and ingrained corruption - will not be surprised that this aspect of the world body's vital work is also horribly impaired by incompetence.

The United Nations has become a lobby emporium for some of the world's most human-rights-abusing nations; its effectiveness is stifled by bureaucratic ennui and moral corruption. Its submission to the ideological dictates of member-countries outnumbering democratic, forward-looking countries of the world merely reflect its unforgivable inadequacies.

Canada's Shame

A responsible, progressive, civilized country like Canada - exporting death to socially under-developed, less concerned countries of the world. For whom the use of asbestos in building represents a convenient, low-cost and useful product. Canada is concerned about the welfare of its own citizens to the extent that the use of asbestos in this country is not permitted, and costly work to carefully remove asbestos from public buildings is seen as a responsible antidote to having people affected by it.

The Government of Canada authorized an expert panel to look into the matter and to produce a report on the use of asbestos and its safety. It was concerned with the mining of Canada's special kind of natural resource, chrysotile asbestos which those who support the ongoing mining and export of insist it is unlike other asbestos and perfectly safe when used properly.

Proper use and workplace handling of chrysotile asbestos is not a concern, however, to the importing countries which have no record of investing in worker safety.

In 2009 at their annual meeting the Canadian Medical Association along with the Canadian Public Health Association and the National Specialty Society of Community Medicine recommended that the Canadian government ban the mining and export of asbestos

"It's inconceivable that we would restrict the use of asbestos in our own country, but continue to export this hazardous product around the world." CMA President Anne Doig

It's not that asbestos mining represents big business. But it is in the Quebec towns of Thetford Mines and Asbestos that the mining still takes place, despite that 52 countries around the world have outlawed it. China and India are two countries where it is still used, and where the health of workers has never been much of a concern to the governments of those vast populations.

Only four hundred workers in Quebec are involved in asbestos mining. The critical health risks of working with asbestos are asbestosis, lung cancer, representing a premature and painful sentence of death. Asbestos mining and construction use are responsible for dreadfully impacting the health and longevity of workers; those who mine it and those who install it.

Finally, the Confederation of National Trade Unions in Canada voted its disapproval for a loan from the Government of Quebec to assist a consortium determined to revive asbestos production by opening a new mine in Thetford Mines. But the governments of Quebec and Canada remain mute on the dread effects of asbestos and its export.

That report that the federal government commissioned was not released to the public. The government sat on it. The report pointed out the "strong relationship" between lung cancer and chrysotile asbestos. The MP representing Thetford Mines is none other than Natural Resources Minister Christian Paradis.

Who spoke to the media declaring that the government has "adopted a clear position and there have been no new facts since then. Our position remains the same, that of promoting the safe use of asbestos. We have done our homework in this area. We assembled a panel of international experts and we came to this conclusion."

Which has occasioned one of those experts, Leslie Stayner of the University of Illinois's school of public health, to complain in a letter to Paradis that his statement on the report was a misleading one, for the expert panel was not tasked to reach a conclusion about whether chrysotile asbestos could be safely used.

"Had we been asked this question, I would certainly not have supported the argument that the continued production and use of asbestos in any form, including chrysotile, is safe."

MEMRI on Pakistan's Anti-Semitism

Antisemitism Documentation Project

March 13, 2011 Inquiry & Analysis Series Report No.676 Pakistan's Jewish Problem By: Tufail Ahmad* A Jewish family in Karachi, circa: unknown (Image courtesy: Dawn.com) Table of Contents Introduction I. Brief Historical Background: The Jews and Pakistan II. Main Characteristics of Antisemitism in Pakistan a) Antisemitism in Pakistan is Interconnected with Pakistan's Other Perceived Enemies: The "Three Satans" – India, the U.S. and Israel (i.e. Hindus, Christians and Jews) b) Antisemitism is Used Instrumentally by the Pakistani Military c) Antisemitism is Used to Designate Threats to Pakistan, Such As the Taliban III. Range of Motifs in Antisemitic Attacks a) Sports – Jews and Indians Lobby against Pakistani Cricketers b) Polio Vaccination Campaign – A Dangerous Jewish Conspiracy c) Pakistan-India Water Dispute – Israel's Hand d) The U.N. – A Jewish Conspiracy e) Pakistani Interests Abroad Harmed by Jews/Israel f) Valentine's Day and April's Fool Day – Used by Jews and Hindus against Muslims g) Ahmadi Muslims – Agents of Israel/India h) Video of Taliban Flogging Woman – Made by Jews to Smear Pakistan i) Facebook – A Jewish/Israeli Conspiracy j) Pakistan's Nuclear Weapons – Targeted by Jews/Israel k) Faisal Shehzad's Times Square Attack – A CIA/Mossad Plot to Implicate Pakistan IV. The Jews and the West Undermine the Identity of Pakistan Conclusion Introduction This paper examines: a) the history of Jews in Pakistan; b) violence against Jews and their synagogues following the creation of the Islamic nation of Pakistan in 1947; c) contemporary protests by Pakistani Muslims against Jews and Israel; and d) Pakistani political and religious leaders' penchant for blaming most problems facing Pakistan on a U.S.-India-Israel axis. Looking at Pakistani media reports over the past few years, this paper outlines how Pakistani opinion makers – barring a small segment of liberal intelligentsia – are deepening the anti-Jewish mindset that is typical across the Islamic world. For the purposes of this analysis, this paper does not include statements, protests, editorials, cartoons or viewpoints of Pakistani leaders and the government that are deemed to be justified criticism of Israel over its policies regarding the Palestinian problem and the occupied territories. This paper does discuss the narrative of antisemitism in Pakistani society, examining how Israel is seen by Islamic scholars and political leaders in Pakistan as representing the Jews rather than the state and government of Israel in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. In the context of this paper, a definition of antisemitism means political/religious/cultural attacks on Jews and Israel that are not related to the Palestinian problem but over supposed Jewish-Israeli involvement in international conspiracies. I. Brief Historical Background: The Jews and Pakistan There is a long-held view that the Pashtun tribes, who inhabit the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region, are one of the 10 lost tribes of Israel. Navraas Aafreedi, a Pashtun academic at Lucknow University in northern India, told a newspaper in January 2010: "Pathans, or Pashtuns, are the only people in the world whose probable descent from the lost tribes of Israel finds mention in a number of texts from the 10th century to the present day, written by Jewish, Christian and Muslim scholars alike, both religious as well as secularists."[1] However, attempts by anthropologists to establish a definitive Jewish link to the Pashtun tribes have been unsuccessful. Nevertheless, historical records indicate that Jews, with no connection to the Pashtuns, have lived in Pakistan and the wider South Asian region over the past several centuries. A 2007 report in the Pakistani daily Dawn noted: "The earliest graves... [of Jews in Karachi] are from 1812 and 1814, with a vast majority from the 1950s."[2] The report also cited Aitken's Gazetteer of the Province of Sind, a British-era government document which was published from Karachi in 1907, as recording that "there were only 428 Jews enumerated in the census of 1901, and these were really all in Karachi. Many belonged to the Bene Israel community who observed Sephardic Jewish rites and are believed to have settled in India [which included Pakistan] shortly after the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus [the Roman Emperor in 69 AD]."[3] The Dawn report added: "Other research documents record about 2,500 Jews in Karachi, with about 100 in Peshawar at the beginning of the 20th century. At the time of [Pakistan's] independence [in 1947], many Jews migrated to India, but about 2,000 stayed in Pakistan. Their first real exodus occurred soon after the creation of Israel, which triggered many incidents of violence against Jews, and the Karachi synagogue became a site of anti-Israel demonstrations."[4] In the late 19th century, one of Karachi's notables was Soloman David, who died in March 1902. He was a surveyor of the Karachi municipality and built the Magain Shalom synagogue in Karachi. His gravestone reads: "The widely known and highly respected Soloman David always sought the welfare of the Jewish community and through his liberality erected at his own expense a handsome synagogue, Magain Shalome [sic]."[5] Another report estimated the Jewish population of Karachi at 2,500 prior to August 14-15, 1947 when Pakistan was created.[6] After Pakistan's creation as an Islamic nation, relations between the Jews and their Muslims neighbors began to deteriorate. This strain in Jewish-Muslim relations also resulted from Muslim protests in Pakistan against the newly created State of Israel. Some Pakistani Jews migrated to India and the U.K., and others to Israel. In early 2010, a Pakistani daily carried this first-person observation of anti-Jewish violence in the newly created Islamic nation of Pakistan: "The synagogue in Karachi was set on fire, and several Jews were attacked. The frequency of attacks increased after each of the Arab-Israeli wars, i.e. 1948, 1956 and 1967."[7] In 2008, a Karachi resident reminisced about the Jews of Karachi in a conversation with Pakistani journalist Syed Intikhab Ali: "[The Jews] were peaceful people having limited relations with local people and used to keep a distance from political activities. When [the] Arab-Israel war broke out in late sixties, they were isolated and started migrating silently and only a few Jewish people [were] left in the city."[8] From various accounts, it appears that some Jews might be living in Pakistan even now, possibly by hiding their religious identity lest it may not be possible for them to move to Israel due to absence of diplomatic ties between the two countries. Although there is no notable Jewish presence in Pakistan now, the anti-Jewish and anti-Israel protests in Pakistan have taken on an ideological nature, with religious and political leaders blaming Jews/Israel, Christians/the West/U.S., and Hindus/India as the cause of almost all of their problems. By 2010, it could be said that not a week passed in Pakistan without a religious leader, a columnist, or a politician issuing a statement against Israel and the Jewish people, blaming them as well as the United States and India for one or another of the problems facing Pakistan. Although not all criticism of Israel can be described as antisemitic, it does not appear that the Pakistani leaders in their own minds see subtle differences between their hateful ideological sloganeering against the Jews and possibly justified criticism of Israel's policies. II. Main Characteristics of Antisemitism in Pakistan The new generations of Pakistani youth are being taught by the influential Urdu-language press that all major problems facing the society and state of Pakistan are created by Israel, the U.S., and India – or Jews, Christians, and Hindus respectively. Such thinking originates from deep-rooted antisemitism that has become part of the collective conviction in the Islamic world in contemporary times and has become solidly rooted in the Pakistani public consciousness, with Jews and Israel blamed for almost every problem even when they are not remotely connected to an issue. With India strengthening its ties to Israel since the mid-1990s, and the United States enhancing its relations with India rapidly in recent years, Pakistani religious leaders view these developments in international relations of the early 21st century as a tripartite "alliance" that threatens the Pakistani state and its Islamic identity. Such an ideological pattern informs the conspiracy-theory narrative that runs through the collective Pakistani psyche and public debate in Pakistan. a) Antisemitism in Pakistan is Interconnected with Pakistan's Other Perceived Enemies: The "Three Satans" – India, the U.S. and Israel (i.e. Hindus, Christians and Jews) India, the United States, and Israel are seen in Pakistani public consciousness as three Satans acting against the Islamic nuclear state of Pakistan. This view is illustrated in various statements of Pakistani opinion makers. A sample of such statements is given below as representative of a sustained ideological campaign against the three countries. In 2009, Liaqat Baloch, secretary-general of Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, the country's largest religious-political party and a mobilizer of mass public opinion, accused India, Israel and the U.S. of pursuing "a single agenda" against Pakistan, stating: "The U.S., Israel and India are pursuing a single agenda [of weakening Pakistan]. The U.S. aims to weaken Pakistan on the economic and military fronts, while India wants to weaken Pakistan internally."[9] Syed Munawwar Hassan, emir of Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, has criticized the Pakistani Army operations against the Taliban, arguing that Pakistan faces threats not from the militants but from the "three enemies, in the form of the U.S., Israel and India, which are the center of evils."[10] In July 2010, the Taliban suicide bombers, who enjoy theological support from Deobandi clerics, bombed the shrine of 11th century Sufi mystic Syed Ali Hajveri in Lahore. The Sufi shrines in South Asia get their theological justification from Barelvi clerics, a school of Sunni Islam disapproved of by Deobandi clerics. Soon after the attack, clerics of Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan accused "U.S. Marines, Jews, and Blackwater" (the private U.S. security firm now known as Xe Worldwide Services) of planning and executing the shrine bombing.[11] Syed Munawwar Hasan, emir of Jamaat-e-Islami, said that the Pakistani government was accusing religious organizations of attacking the shrine in order to divert public attention from the U.S.'s role in the shrine bombing, and added: "No Muslim can do what happened in the tomb of Data Sahab [aka Syed Ali Hajveri]. American Marines and Blackwater are responsible for it."[12] Former Jamaat-e-Islami Emir Qazi Hussain Ahmed claimed that India and Israel were involved in the bombings, and stated: "[Indian intelligence] RAW and [Israel's] Mossad are responsible for attacks on the tombs of Sufi mystics. They want to spread sectarian strife in Pakistan."[13] Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri, secretary-general of the religious organization Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, blamed India, American agents such as Blackwater, and the Jews for the terror attacks in Pakistan, stating: "Blaming the Taliban for every terrorist activity serves the purpose of the United States. The fact that Blackwater and Jewish elements are involved in terrorism gets ignored. It's not that the Taliban are not involved – yet blaming them for everything is not right."[14] A few weeks before the July 2010 Lahore shrine bombing, Hafiz Ibtisam Elahi Zaheer, general secretary of the puritan Islamic group Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith, accused India and Israel of fomenting terrorism in Pakistan, stating: "The government of Pakistan needs to check the involvement of India and Israel in the current stream of terror attacks in Pakistan. India and Israel... are patronizing the terrorist activities in Pakistan."[15] The Lahore shrine bombing led to the emergence of anti-Deobandi, anti-Taliban alliance called Sunni Ittehad Council, which has pressed ahead with its demand that the government act against the Sunni militant organizations. To counter this group led by Barelvi clerics, the rival Deobandi scholars organized a conference in the first week of July at the Jamia Naeemia madrassa of Karachi, where prominent cleric Mufti Mohammad Naeem slammed the terrorists for attacking the shrine but in the same breath also criticized the Sunni Ittehad Council for demanding action against pro-militant religious organizations as well as the Tablighi Jamaat's congregations. Mufti Mohammad Naeem told the press conference: "The demand for a ban on Tablighi congregations by the Sunni Ittihad Council is like reiterating demands by the Jews and Christians. The demands for a ban on Lashkar-e-Taiba and Tablighi Jamaat are being put forward at the behest of India and other anti-Islam forces."[16] Tablighi Jamaat is a revivalist Islamic movement while Lashkar-e-Taiba is a jihadist organization, with both the organizations having their bases in Muridke, near Lahore. In October 2010, a joint statement on the issue of the emerging Deobandi-Barelvi dispute was signed by clerics of various Islamic schools, among them: Maulana Abdul Malik, the Emir of Jamiat-e-Ittehadul Ulema Pakistan (JIUP); Maulana Abdur Rauf Malik, the chief of Muttahida Ulema Council; JIUP Secretary General Allama Ghulam Rasool Rashidi and his deputy Maulana Abdul Jalail Naqshbandi; JIUP's Punjab chief Maulana Ataur Rehman; and prominent clerics Maulana Abdul Akbar Chitrali and Hafiz Muhammad Idrees of Idara Ma'raf-e-Islami Mansoorah. The statement accused what it called the "U.S.-India-Israel troika" of hatching a conspiracy to foment Deobandi-Barelvi clashes, and expressed concern that "a conspiracy is being implemented by the U.S.-India-Israel troika to cause Deobandi-Barelvi clashes to further divide and weaken the Muslim Ummah."[17] Addressing young students on the 23rd day of an ideological summer school in Lahore in July 2009, Majeed Nizami, editor-in-chief of the influential Urdu-language Roznama Nawa-i-Waqt, stated: "The trinity of satanic alliance [U.S., Israel, and India] is opposed to Pakistan..."[18] This is one point on which Nizami has consistently campaigned to create mass public opinion, especially among young students from schools across Pakistan. In October 2010, Nizami stated that the "real target" of the U.S.-led war on terror is Pakistan, adding: "The U.S. has currently launched a Crusade against the world of Islam... Instead of ending the drone attacks [in Pakistan], the U.S. has increased them. It will not desist until we reply to them [i.e. to the drone attacks]."[19] He also accused India of being on a mission to "undo Pakistan."[20] Nizami has regularly described India, the U.S. and Israel as "three Satans" out to destroy Pakistan.[21] In mid-2009, Colonel Imam, a prominent and widely interviewed former Pakistani spy who is credited for raising the Taliban and whose real name is Amir Sultan, was speaking about the U.S. military operation in Afghanistan's Helmand province. He went on to speak about Israel, stating that six intelligence international agencies are active against the state of Pakistan, though he named only three – RAW of India, the CIA and Israel's Mossad, and also alleged that Mossad has opened an office in Kabul to eliminate Pakistan.[22] Over the past few years, the Jang Group, the largest media conglomerate in Pakistan, has carried out a concerted campaign to unseat the elected government of President Asif Zardari. Late in 2009, several senior journalists writing in the Urdu-language daily Roznama Jang were dubbed "Israeli agents" by Gul Muhammad Jakhrani, a lawmaker of the ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP).[23] Jakhrani said: "[Journalists] Kamran Khan, Shaheen Sehbai, Shahid Masood, Ansar Abbasi and Saleh Zaffir are Israeli agents and they were assigned the task of creating instability in Pakistan and pitting the institutions of the country against one another so that the Israeli desire to keep Pakistan unstable might be fulfilled."[24] It can be said that the lawmaker was probably not serious about his statement that these journalists are Israeli agents; nevertheless, his statement illustrates how Pakistani leaders blame Jews and Israel for every issue that is not even remotely connected to Jews. b) Antisemitism is Used Instrumentally by the Pakistani Military Such conspiracy theories against Jews and Israel have also penetrated the Pakistani military establishment, which is strengthened by the day-to-day arguments forwarded by a large number of Pakistani religious organizations. In early 2009, Pakistan's secular leaders signed a shari'a-for-peace deal with Taliban leader Maulana Fazlullah; soon after the deal, the Taliban imposed a total ban on girls' education in Swat district. Later, an international outcry against the Taliban forced Pakistan to carry out a military operation in Swat, leading to arrests of hundreds of militants and seizure of arms and ammunition. The Urdu-language daily Roznama Express alleged in a report that Pakistani "security officials have also confirmed that the weapons seized [from militants in Swat] were Russian-, Indian- and U.S.-made, while Israel provided them modern technology. Evidences have also been secured regarding the use of such technology in the installation of FM radio by Maulana Fazlullah."[25] The reference to FM radio means a radio channel that was run by Maulana Fazlullah to advocate his mission of jihad and the need to enforce Islamic shari'a in Pakistan. In June 2009, the mass-circulation Urdu-language newspaper Roznama Jang quoted senior Pakistani military and national security officials as saying that there is "irrefutable evidence" that Israel and India are fomenting trouble in Pakistan's Baluchistan and Waziristan region.[26] The military and security officials were unidentified in the report, as is the norm. Another report in the Urdu-language newspaper Roznama Express alleged that there is evidence that Taliban commanders Maulana Fazlullah and Baitullah Mehsud (who was killed later in August 2009) conducted meetings with officials of India's external intelligence Research & Analysis Wing (RAW).[27] Throughout 2010, Pakistan Army was under pressure from the U.S. to carry out a military operation in North Waziristan, a safe haven for terrorists belonging to the Taliban, the Haqqani Network and Al-Qaeda. In early 2010, the Pakistan Army dropped pamphlets in North Waziristan, linking the Taliban with Israel, India and Al-Qaeda.[28]According to a report in the Lahore-based newspaper Daily Times, the pamphlet gave a detailed account of how the Taliban derives its power from its connections with "[the] anti-Islamic (Indian) RAW and (the Israeli) Mossad intelligence agencies and Indian consulates in Afghanistan."[29] Urging the tribes to support the government, the two-page pamphlet "informed the tribal people about the Taliban's source of income, which is mainly generated from drug smugglers and 'contacts' (India and Israel)."[30] According to another report in The News daily, the military's pamphlet, which was titled "Correct Decision and First Step Towards Right Direction," accused the Taliban of acquiring funds from India, Israel and Al-Qaeda to buy heavy weapons and brainwash innocent youth.[31] Earlier, in October 2009, when the Pakistan Army launched an operation against the Taliban in South Waziristan, former Jamaat-e-Islami chief Qazi Hussain Ahmed described the military offensive to be the "result of an Indian and Israeli conspiracy to create distance between jihadi organizations and the Pakistan Army."[32] He also said that the "tribesmen" – a reference to Taliban militants belonging to the Mehsud tribe – of South Waziristan who were considered the Pakistan Army's hands, and the U.S. and India were afraid of, are now being pitched against the Pakistan Army.[33] c) Antisemitism in Pakistan Used to Designate Threats to Pakistan, Such As the Taliban Pakistan has seen a wave of suicide attacks in recent years. There is a trend of explaining such threats to Pakistan as emanating from outside Pakistan. For example, the Pakistani leaders generally accuse the Taliban militants of being agents of the United States, India and Israel. In November 2009, a Peshawar-based daily, The Post quoted what it called "reliable sources" as saying that India and Israel had in 2008 agreed on a plan "to start a deadly episode from July 2009 in which regular suicide attacks will be a permanent feature in Pakistan, and no one knows how long this episode will take."[34] The newspaper accused the two countries of setting up what it called the Indo-Israel Intelligence (Triple III) agency to carry out this plan, adding: "The trained commandos of the said agency have been given the tasks to attack security forces, foreign donor agencies offices, communication lines and public places [in Pakistan]... Sources also disclosed that the Mumbai terrorist attack [of November 2008] was actually a conspiracy against Pakistan, planned by the Triple III Agency, to defame Pakistan."[35] In December 2009, lawyers belonging to the Islamabad Bar Association did not attend court proceedings in order to protest against what they called "the unreasonable interference of the U.S. in Pakistan and the presence of Blackwater (Xe) in the country."[36] Riast Ali Azad, general secretary of the Islamabad Bar Association, told the protesters at a public rally, "Besides the Taliban, Blackwater is also involved in the current incidents of terrorism in the country. Blackwater, Mossad and RAW have teamed up against Pakistan and are supporting miscreants to destabilize our country."[37] Addressing a meeting in Sialkot town of Punjab province in April 2010, Syed Salahuddin, chairman of the Pakistan-based terrorist organizations alliance Muttahida Jihad Council, accused the Zardari government of describing "heroes of jihad" as terrorists, adding: "Declaring heroes [of jihad] as terrorists is the worst dishonesty this government could do with history under the pressure of Jews and Hindus."[38] General Mirza Aslam Baig, former Pakistan Army chief, , has accused Indian, U.S. and Israeli secret agencies of supporting the militant organization Jundallah – a Sunni militant organization formed by two Pakistan military officers and that has carried out attacks against Shi'ite Muslims in Iran and Pakistan.[39] General Baig said, "The Indian secret agency RAW, the CIA, and Israel's Mossad are supporting Jundallah. Unfortunately, all this is being carried out from [the Jundallah base in] Baluchistan."[40] In March 2010, Professor Sajid Mir, emir of the Jamiat Ahle Hadith, said that the United States, India and Israel are carrying out acts of terrorism in Pakistan while the Pakistani rulers are wrongly holding the Taliban responsible for terrorism. He stated: "The policy to put terrorism on the account of the Taliban is baseless and has failed, and needs to be reviewed."[41] Syed Munawwar Hasan, emir of the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, has accused India of sending suicide bombers into Pakistan, stating: "India is engaged in destabilizing Pakistan under Israeli and U.S. patronage... India is engaged in hatching conspiracies against the ideological and geographical borders of Pakistan and is creating unrest in the country... India is sending suicide bombers to our country and is also involved in terrorism [in Baluchistan]."[42] In mid-2009, Sahibzada Abul Khair Muhammad Zubair, the chief of Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan, criticized the Taliban for attacks on Sufi shrines in Pakistan, describing the militants as agents of Jews and Christians. According to a report in the Urdu-language newspaper Roznama Jasarat, Zubair said that the Taliban attacks are part of a conspiracy aimed at creating sectarian conflict in Pakistan, calling for confronting the "agents of Jews and Christians who are attacking the shrines of Sufis (mystics) and are killing the Sunni scholars and mystics."[43] At a Defense of Pakistan conference in Lahore in June 2009, several clerics, including Dr. Sarfraz Naeemi (who later that month was killed by a Taliban suicide bomber) and Pir Sajid-ur-Rehman, asked the Pakistani government to stop fighting in the U.S.-led war on terror and "instead to wage the war to save Pakistan from external and internal enemies, by cutting off the Taliban's supply line of funds from U.S., India, Israel, UAE, and Saudi Arabia."[44] Pir Sajid-ur-Rehman, who called for the enforcement of Nizam-e-Mustafa (the rule of the Prophet) in Pakistan, also accused Washington and New Delhi of running over 50 training centers in Pakistan's tribal areas to prepare Taliban fighters and suicide bombers.[45] III. Range of Motifs Used in Antisemitic Attacks The antisemitic thinking of Pakistani leaders spills over into many issues, from sports, the polio vaccination campaign, the Pakistan-India water dispute, Valentine's Day, and April's Fool Day to the United Nations, the Taliban, Islam, and many more. Some, given below, illustrate the extensive scale of antisemitism in Pakistan. a) Sports – Jews and Indians Lobby against Pakistani Cricketers In August 2010, Pakistani cricketers were allegedly involved in a match-fixing scandal in England, which was revealed in a sting operation by the British tabloid News of the World. Although the cricket scandal was not even distantly linked to Israel or to Jews, the Urdu-language Pakistani newspaper Roznama Khabrain carried a report alleging that "Indian and Jewish lobbies" in the United Kingdom were responsible for trapping the Pakistani cricket team in order to defame Pakistan and to get rising Pakistani cricketers banned from international cricket.[46] The Roznama Khabrain report also stated that Jews, through the Indian lobby and Indian bookmakers, paid cash to the match fixers who had Indian wives.[47] b) The Polio Vaccination Campaign – A Dangerous Jewish Conspiracy In October 2009, Mahnama Banat-e-Aisha, an Urdu-language monthly magazine which is part of the Haftroza Al-Qalam group of publications belonging to the militant group Jaish-e-Muhammad, alleged in a lengthy article that the international polio eradication campaign was a "dangerous Jewish conspiracy."[48] The article, "Polio: Disease or Dangerous Jewish Conspiracy," read in part: "The Jews, who dream of ruling the world, have invented different types of vaccines, drugs, and injections in an organized way to weaken Muslims in their beliefs on spiritual, practical, and moral levels, and make their bodies contaminated. "The oral polio vaccine campaign is being run under a worldwide conspiracy – except in the Zionist countries. Its total focus is now on South Asian countries – India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. The U.S. has already marked this area as an extremely strategic region..."[49] "Have we ever thought why these greedy Jews and Christians are spending millions of dollars on this campaign...? An analysis of how the polio vaccination is prepared is sufficient in order to understand how the viruses of haram [forbidden] and unpious animals... are being injected into our [Muslim] bodies..."[50] c) Pakistan-India Water Dispute – Israel's Hand The dispute between India and Pakistan over the issue of sharing the waters of the rivers that flow from India into Pakistani territory is a purely bilateral matter between the two neighbors. Nevertheless, while articulating their grievances against India, Pakistani leaders make it a point to drag Jews and Israel into the dispute. In October 2008, Majeed Nizami, editor-in-chief of Roznama Nawa-i-Waqt, wrote an article about the water dispute in which he also described Israel, the U.S. and India as "three Satans" – accusing them of being united against "nuclear-capable Pakistan" and warning: "If, in order to resolve our [water and other] problems, we have to wage a nuclear war with India, we will."[51] At a seminar on the water issue held by the Nazaria-e-Pakistan Trust in April 2008, Lt.-Gen. Hamid Gul, the former chief of Pakistan's powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), spoke about the water issue but also added: "Two states came into existence in 1947 and 1948: one, Pakistan; two, Israel. The two are threats to each other. Ultimately, only one of them will survive... Pakistan can be saved by making a role model of the Prophet [Muhammad]."[52] The former ISI chief also alluded to Samuel P. Huntington's clash-of-civilizations thesis, stating: "At this point, the matter is not of a war between civilizations, but that of a clash between systems. Islam is a humanity-loving religion. The West is fighting the last battle for its survival."[53] Hafiz Zahoorul Hassan Dahir, a prominent anti-India Pakistani activist who works with Hamid Gul and Majeed Nizami, has repeatedly argued the following point about the water dispute: "With the cooperation of the Jewish lobby, India has opened a battlefront of a water war aimed at making Pakistan's fertile lands barren."[54] d) The UN – A Jewish Conspiracy In 2008, the British government expressed support for India's bid for the permanent membership of the UN Security Council (UNSC). This move was declared by Raja Basharat Khan, convener of the Jamaat-e-Islami (South Zone-UK), to be a result of the West's "enmity with Islam," and warned that if India became a permanent UNSC member, there would be a new campaign against the interests of Pakistan and other Islamic nations.[55] Islamic clerics of Pakistani origin in the UK such as Raja Basharat Khan and those visiting regularly from Pakistan make similar allegations routinely. In November 2010, when U.S. President Barack Obama expressed support for India's bid for permanent UNSC membership, former Pakistan Army Chief General (retired) Mirza Aslam Baig criticized Obama and added: "After India, the U.S. will make Israel a member of the Security Council."[56] In June 2010, when the UNSC approved a new set of sanctions against Iran, former ISI chief Lt.-General Hamid Gul said that the move was part of a plot hatched by the U.S. and Israel against Islam and Iran.[57] Gul added: "The U.S. and the Zionist regime (of Israel) are plotting against Islam, and Iran in particular... 'The enemies of Islam do not know that Iran's nation and government will stand against these sanctions as they stood up to the previous sanctions..."[58] Jamaat-e-Islami chief Syed Munawwar Hasan commented on the UN sanctions on Iran, stating that they had been "clamped [due to] the plea that Tehran was continuing its nuclear programme despite UN warnings and was not cooperating with the world body – a complaint levelled against Tel Aviv with higher intensity... The Zionists and the Hindus are united against the Muslims, but the Muslim rulers are acting as the U.S. stooges... Israel also rejected the UN resolutions on Palestine, but no sanctions were imposed against it."[59] Speaking on the issue of Israel's May 2010 commando action against the Gaza flotilla, Mian Mehboob Ahmed, retired chief justice of Pakistan's Federal Shariat Court, said in June 2010: "Muslim countries should quit the United Nations Organization (UNO) and strengthen the Organization of Islamic Countries (OIC) to contest the conspiracies by the Jews and the Christians."[60] The former chief justice went on to describe the United Nations as "an extension of the power of Jews and nothing else."[61] e) Pakistani Interests Abroad – Harmed by Jews/Israel In Pakistani consciousness, nurtured by the religious organizations over the past six decades, Pakistan is seen as an Islamic nation, leading the likely emergence of a global Islamic caliphate. Dr. Rafiq Ahmed, a right-wing thinker and motivational speaker, said in June 2010 that Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, was not secular, and described the Pakistan movement that had led to the creation of the country as an Islamic movement. Addressing a congregation of madrassa students in Lahore, Ahmed said, "The Pakistan movement was an Islamic movement which aimed at establishing and reviving the Caliphate after achieving a separate state for Muslims."[62] Issues related to Pakistanis abroad as well as to Islam are also explained in Pakistan in terms of antisemitic references to Israel and Jews, as Pakistan is viewed as defender of Islamic interests internationally. UK Prime Minister David Cameron appointed Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, who is of Pakistani origin, as the chair of his Conservative Party. Warsi's rise to prominence in British politics has been celebrated in Pakistan. In 2010, Baroness Sayeeda Warsi was barred by her party from attending an Islamist conference in London. The Global Peace and Unity conference was organized by the Islam television channel, which has been accused of promoting Islamic extremism. The Urdu-language daily Roznama Nawa-i-Waqt published a report stating that the "Jewish lobby" played a key role in stopping Warsi from taking part in the Islamic conference.[63] The report alleged that UK Home Secretary Theresa May and her advisor Mr. Nick Timothy acted at the behest of the Jewish lobby in Britain to stop Warsi from taking part in the event, stating that Ms. May told Warsi that she could not attend the conference. When, according to the report, Warsi told her that she could not stop her, Ms. May contacted her superiors in the Conservative Party and used her influence to stop Ms. Warsi.[64] The report added that the UK's denial of a visa to former Jamaat-e-Islami chief Qazi Hussain Ahmed to attend the same conference came at the behest of the Jewish lobby.[65] In February 2010, there was a row in India over a newspaper's publication of a sketch of Jesus Christ. It provoked a strong reaction in Pakistan, where Islamic clerics, speaking at an event organized by the Muhammadia Students, a pro-jihadist youth group, alleged an "Israeli hand" in the publication of the "blasphemous" sketch of Jesus and urged the Indian government to take action against such "an old habit of infidels."[66] In mid-May 2010, Mohammad Hussain Mehnati, a Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan cleric, addressed a meeting of religious leaders in Karachi soon after attending the funeral ceremony of a Jamaat-e-Islami militant who was killed in Indian Kashmir. He told them: "The majority of the Kashmiri population wants annexation of Kashmir with Pakistan, but India, with the consent of the U.S. and Israel, is forcefully depriving them of their right to self-determination. The Muslim Ummah is facing the wrath of Allah for it has distanced itself from Jihad. Jamaat-e-Islami supported jihad and the mujahideen yesterday and will always support them."[67] Maulana Javaid Kasoori, a senior militant commander of Hizbul Mujahideen was among those present at the meeting. f) Valentine's Day and April Fools' Day – Used by Jews and Hindus against Muslims Pakistani leaders use almost every occasion to talk negatively about Israel, the U.S. and India. While some religious leaders can be credited for terming events like Valentine's Day and April Fools' Day in purely scholarly terms, as bid'a (innovation in Islam), and therefore lacking sanction in Islam, a large number of them make Jews, Hindus, and Christians targets in their public speeches. In February 2008, Samia Raheel Qazi, the daughter of Jamaat-e-Islami leader Qazi Hussein Ahmed, described Valentine's Day as an irreligious event and criticized the Pakistani media for presenting it in a positive manner. In the same breath, she added: "Jews and Hindus have specially designed this occasion in order to weaken the beliefs and traditions of Muslims."[68] Any event that might have originated in the West is seen by Pakistani leaders as anti-Islam and therefore as anti-Pakistan. Prominent Pakistani cleric Allama Qazi Ahmad Noorani Siddiqui, a leader of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan, stated in 2010 that events like April Fools' Day or Valentine's Day are bid'ah (innovation or digression), blind imitations of the West, and have no connection to Islam.[69] He noted that April Fools' Day marks the large-scale killings of Muslims in Islamic Granada (Spain) on April 1, 1492 by the armies of Christian ruler Ferdinand II, and the defeat of the Muslims in Spain. g) Ahmadi Muslims – Israeli/Indian Agents Ahmadi Muslims, whom Islamic clerics accuse of not believing that the Prophet Muhammad is God's final prophet, have been declared to be non-Muslims in Pakistan, are barred from calling themselves Muslims, may not use Islamic symbols, and may not call their places of worship mosques. They are simply called Ahmadis, even by fair-minded Pakistani nationals, due to legal reasons, or pejoratively dismissed as Qadianis, after the Indian town of Qadian where the Ahmadiyya movement began in the late 19th century. Haftroza Al-Qalam, an Urdu-language weekly published by jihadist organization Jaish-e-Muhammad, published an article accusing "the U.S., Israel and India" of trying to divide Pakistan into pieces.[70] The article alleged that India has sent 10,000 troops to Afghanistan, adding: "The U.S. and NATO forces based in Afghanistan have also deployed 40,000 personnel along Pakistan's border... The U.S. also plans to establish a Qadiani state, consisting of Kashmir and northern areas; Greater Pashtunistan; Greater Baluchistan; Punjab; and Karachi Free Port."[71] Maulana Allahyar Arshad, the leader of the International Tehreek-e-Tahaffuz-e-Khatm-e-Nabuwat, an anti-Ahmadi Muslim movement, accused Qadianis (Ahmadi Muslims) of utilizing their pilgrimages to Qadian in India to connect with Israeli spy agencies and Israeli Qadianis, and added: "The Qadianis [Ahmadi Muslims] are spying on Pakistan and reveal Pakistani secrets during their visit to Qadian for pilgrimage... The Qadianis were traitors yesterday and are so also today; trusting them means playing with the stability of Pakistan."[72] In March 2010, Liaqat Baloch, general secretary of Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, accused Ahmadi Muslims and the Israeli Mossad of trying to jointly destabilize religious institutions, adding: "Anti-Islam and anti-Pakistan forces want to destabilize religious institutions by igniting violence between the Deobandi and Barelvi [sects of Sunni Islam]. The Mossad and Qadiani lobby are involved in this wicked conspiracy..."[73] In April 2010, Islamic clerics from the International Khatm-e-Nabuwat Movement, which campaigns against Ahmadi Muslims, accused the "Qadiani lobby" of engaging in activities to eliminate Islam from Pakistan, adding: "Qadianis [i.e. Ahmadi Muslims] have always been trying to achieve the status in Pakistan that Jews have in America."[74] The statement was made at a conference in Lahore where Maulana Abdul Hafeez Makki, a leading cleric of the anti-Ahmadi Muslims movement, was among the speakers. h) Video of Taliban Flogging Woman – Made by Jews to Smear Pakistan In early 2009, a video emerged showing Pakistani Taliban militants flogging a girl in Pakistan's Swat district, as she lay sobbing in pain. There has been some debate in Pakistan about the authenticity of the video. Senator Azam Khan Swati, Pakistan's U.S.-educated science and technology minister, blamed the Jews for the video, stating: "The flogging of the 17-year-old girl in Swat was a Jewish conspiracy aimed at destroying peace in Swat and [at] distorting the image of Islamists who sport beards and wear turbans."[75] i) Facebook – A Jewish/Israeli Conspiracy In 2010, the social networking site Facebook was the focus of an international controversy, after one of its millions of users launched a Draw Muhammad Day page asking people to post sketches of Islam's Prophet Muhammad. Facebook was condemned widely in Pakistan and was, along with YouTube and hundreds of other websites, blocked by the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority (PTA) for publishing content blaspheming against the Prophet Muhammad. However, the PTA did not block any of the numerous websites of Pakistani religious organizations that publish hateful materials. Maulana Ilyas Chinioti, a prominent Pakistani cleric from the International Khatm-e-Nabuwat Movement, which campaigns to enforce the Islamic doctrinal principle that Islam's Prophet Muhammad was the last prophet of god, commented on the Facebook campaign, urging Muslims worldwide to boycott all products marketed or made by companies that are owned by Jews.[76] Addressing a public protest meeting against Facebook, Chinioti blamed the Jews for organizing the drawing contest, and added: "We will foil all conspiracies against the sanctity of the prophet; and I have submitted a proposition to condemn this shameful act in the Punjab legislative assembly... I appeal to all the Muslims to stop buying products made by Jews. They earn from us and spend the money on heretic activities against our religion. We are indirectly supporting them in heresy by paying thousands of dollars to them daily."[77] In July 2010, a report in the pro-Taliban Urdu-language daily Roznama Islam described Facebook as anti-Islam, noting that Facebook is owned by a Zionist Jew, that Israel is using Facebook to recruit spies from Muslim countries, and that after collecting information about people from the website, they are trapped or blackmailed into spying for Israel.[78] j) Pakistan's Nuclear Weapons – Targeted by Jews/Israel Over the past few years, there has been an ongoing international concern over the security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons amid the Taliban terror attacks. Pakistani leaders think that there is an international game plan to destroy the Islamic nuclear identity of Pakistan. In November 2009, in the town of Wana, the headquarters of Pakistan's tribal district of South Waziristan, Pakistani tribesmen held a protest rally against a report in the U.S. magazine The New Yorker that Pakistan and the U.S. were in talks about ways to secure Pakistan's nuclear weapons. According to a report in the Pashtu-language newspaper Wrazpanra Wahdat, thousands of weapons-brandishing tribesmen took part in a jirga, a meeting of tribal elders, which passed a resolution stating: "Pakistan's nuclear command and control system is active. Patriotic tribesmen are always ready for the defense of the motherland."[79] The same resolution inserted an argument about Israel, asking the Afghan government to stop international intelligence agencies' anti-Pakistan activities on Afghan soil, and added: "Israel's secret agency Mossad and the Indian secret agency RAW are using Afghan soil against Pakistan."[80] According to an Urdu-language daily, Major-General (Retired) Rahat, a former military officer, has said: "The U.S., India and Israel have been trying to capture our nuclear assets or to get the nuclear program rolled back. For this purpose, they have been hatching conspiracies to weaken the two strong institutions of Pakistan, the army and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI)."[81] Muhammad Ibrahim Khan, the emir of Jamaat-e-Islami for Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province (formerly North West Frontier Province), has urged the Pakistani government to quit its role in the war on terror, stating: "The U.S.-India-Israel nexus is against Pakistan, and is busy hatching conspiracies against Pakistan's nuclear power."[82] Lt.-Gen. Talat Masood, a retired military officer and well-known political commentator, has accused India, Israel and U.S. non-proliferation lobbies of demonizing Pakistan. In an article that urged the Pakistan Army to stop supporting militant organizations, Masood accused the U.S., India, Israel, and non-proliferation groups worldwide of demonizing Pakistan. He said: "Indian, Israeli and non-proliferation lobbies are... active in demonizing Pakistan and trying to block, delay and reduce U.S. assistance. And these detractors are working overtime to keep reminding the Obama administration of Pakistan's history of proliferation and its support of the Taliban and jihadi groups – not realizing that all of these policies were adopted in a certain historical and geostrategic context. The situation now is indeed very different, as Pakistan is locked in a survival struggle fighting the Taliban and militants on a broad front..."[83] Majeed Nizami, the veteran editor, told a seminar: "The United States has drawn up a plan to hand over Pakistan to India, and Iran to Israel, because Pakistan is an atomic power and Iran is heading to be an atomic power."[84] The Urdu-language newspaper Roznama Khabrain wrote in late 2008 that there was "confirmed information about a [likely] Indian attack on Pakistan's nuclear installations" and added: "In order to attack Pakistan's nuclear installations and the installations of [Pakistan] air force with the help of Israel, the Indian Air Force painted the Indian flag on Israeli fighters planes."[85] Criticizing the deployment of additional U.S. troops in Afghanistan, Lt.-Gen. Hamid Gul, the former chief of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), said: "India and Israel have placed stress upon the U.S. to destroy Pakistan's nuclear assets before leaving Afghanistan... India and Israel will not be safe if the U.S. withdraws from Afghanistan and Pakistan's nuclear assets, ISI, and Pakistan Army remain intact."[86] In early 2009, Roznama Jasarat, an Urdu-language newspaper of the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, alleged that Israel is spying on Pakistani nuclear program via Fatah, the organization of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud 'Abbas. It added: "Israel is directly monitoring Pakistan's nuclear program through the Fatah network in Pakistan..."[87] The Urdu daily added that Israel has stations in Afghanistan and India to monitor the Pakistani nuclear program.[88] Jamaat-e-Islami leader Liaqat Baloch, arguing that the Americans are now suffering defeat in Afghanistan, said: "The U.S. and Israel want to capture the nuclear installations of Pakistan and gain access to the water and air of Pakistan to reach Iran and China."[89] Abdul Basit, the spokesman of Pakistan's Foreign Office, has also officially described what he called "India-Israel nexus" as a threat to regional security in South Asia, adding: "We are concerned over the domination of India in traditional and nuclear arms. However, minimum nuclear deterrence would be maintained [by Pakistan] in the region for lasting peace in the region."[90] k) Faisal Shehzad's Times Square Attack – A CIA/Mossad Plot to Implicate Pakistan On the evening of May 1, 2010, Faisal Shehzad, a U.S. citizen of Pakistani origin, carried out a failed car bombing in New York's Times Square. A video that emerged of Faisal Shehzad afterward showed him embracing Hakimullah Mehsud, the emir of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP or the Movement of Pakistani Taliban). However, Sajid Ansari, a columnist with The Frontier Post, a Peshawar-based daily, alleged that the Times Square terror attack was plotted by the CIA and the Israeli Mossad. He wrote: "It may be true, in the wake of 'Times Square Bomb,' possibly a 'set-up' plan [has been] made by CIA and Mossad, to create pleas and justifications to attack and invade Pakistan, as a last resort after failing to achieve the 'desired objectives' to denuclearize Pakistan, exactly as they did with Iraq on a fake CIA report of the presence of WMDs in Iraq... However, in the case of Pakistan, after miserably failing to lay hands on Pakistani nuclear sites and arsenals, through the... Pakistani Taliban and Indian army infiltrators in the cities of the... [Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of] Pakistan, the U.S./CIA and the Mossad have now possibly 'set up' a plan to attack Pakistan [using the pretext provided by the] 'Times Square bomb.' And they will, as they are out of time, because President Barack Obama has asked them to 'finish the job' by July 2011... I foresee a possible pre-emptive (nuclear) attack by U.S. and NATO on Pakistan, in collaboration with India..."[91] Soon, Faisal Shehzad was arrested by the U.S. authorities as he tried to flee the U.S. A report in the Urdu-language Pakistani daily Roznama Nawa-i-Waqt underlined the fear of an international conspiracy in the arrest of Faisal Shehzad, stating: "The fact that [U.S.] federal attorney [Preet Bharara] is a Hindu with a Jewish wife gives the story an air of a conspiracy against Pakistan, jointly hatched by Indian and Israeli lobbies in the U.S."[92] The report also alleged that a number of Pakistani-American citizens are working as American agents and that Faisal Shahzad could be one of them.[93] IV. The Jews and the West Undermine the Identity of Pakistan In the intellectual world of Pakistani leaders, Israel, India and the U.S. are out to wipe out the identity and existence of Pakistan. Much of the antisemitism that is being witnessed in Pakistan is rooted in perceived threats seen by Pakistani leaders as emanating from a range of national and international issues, including from statements on the human rights situation in Pakistan by various nongovernmental organizations. Even the internal struggle between secularists and religious groups to shape the identity of Pakistan – a struggle that has been ongoing since the creation of the Islamic nation in 1947 – is described in terms of antisemitic references to Jews and Israel, Hindus and India, Christians and the U.S.-led Western world. In 2008, Jamaat-e-Islami leader Qazi Hussain Ahmed accused "the United States and the Jews" of trying to make Pakistan a secular country.[94] He went on to state that the U.S.-led war on terror is a pretext for secularizing Pakistan, and called U.S. aid a dangerous conspiracy against Pakistan.[95] In late 2010, a move by liberal politicians of the ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP) to press for amendment in Pakistan's controversial blasphemy law invited strong opposition from all religious organizations in Pakistan. Jamaat-e-Islami chief Syed Munawwar Hasan called for foiling "secular conspiracies" against Pakistan.[96] A number of religious organizations joined hands against what they called a "conspiracy of the secular lobby in Pakistan at the behest of the West to repeal the blasphemy laws."[97] During the August 2010 floods that devastated most of Pakistan, Qari Hanif Jalandhari, secretary general of the Wafaqul Madaris Al-Arabia (which controls thousands of Deobandi madrassas in Pakistan), condemned the secular nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) for their flood relief work, stating that the NGOs are anti-Islam and are advancing a Western agenda through their relief work.[98] Madrassas – i.e. the Islamic seminaries responsible for training Taliban militants – are seen as fortresses of Islam and as essential to the identity of Pakistan. Commenting on the role of Pakistani madrassas, Pakistani women's rights activist Dr. Fouzia Saeed remarked in early 2010: "All Madrassa students are not suicide bombers, but every suicide bomber hails from a madrassa... The ideology of militancy uses Madaris [Islamic seminaries] as breeding grounds for extremists, militants and suicide bombers."[99] However, demands by Pakistani social reformers and the Western countries for eradicating extremist influence from madrassas are seen as a Western and Jewish plot to attack at the roots of Pakistan. An attempt in April 2008 to organize a cricket competition – a sport widely popular in South Asia – among students of various madrassas was opposed by the clerics of Jamiat Ahle Sunnat and Wafaqul Madaris Al-Arabia, who said: "None of our madrassas will take part in the cricket tournament, and if anyone does, we will take action against it as per the rules."[100] These views were expressed during a press conference by the deputy secretary of Wafaqul Madaris Al-Arabia, Maulana Qazi Abdur Rashid, and other Islamic scholars. Pakistan's Minister of Education Khwaja Asif Ahmed Ali said in November 2010 that the madrassa system of education in Pakistan cannot be abandoned just because the Western countries do not like it.[101] In January 2010, the executive council of Wafaqul Madaris Al-Arabia, which controls more than 10,000 madrassas in Pakistan, adopted a resolution criticizing negative media propaganda against madrassas. The resolution said that linking religious seminaries to lawlessness, insecurity and terrorism is the "biggest lie of history" and "part of Jewish and Christian propaganda."[102] The executive council which adopted the resolution included Maulana Fazlur Rehman, Maulana Samiul Haq, Salimullah Khan, Mufti Rafi Usmani and others. On another occasion, Qari Muhammad Hanif Jalandhari, chief of Wafaqul Madaris Al-Arabia, said that the "baseless propaganda campaign" against the madrassas was launched under "a Jewish plan to defame them."[103] Views about Jews and Israel are also defined by a conception held by numerous ideologues in Pakistan – that out of the two states of Pakistan and Israel, only Pakistan should exist. This viewpoint has been singularly articulated by Lt.-Gen. Hamid Gul who, as noted above, has said: "Two states came into existence in 1947 and 1948: one, Pakistan; two, Israel. The two are threats to each other. Ultimately, only one of them will survive."[104] In 2010, a pro-Palestinian Pakistani website published an article stating: "All Pakistanis who support the just cause of Palestine and like-minded people across the world are on the same page. Our supporters across the world are our natural allies. Our opponents are on wrong side of history. They cannot be our friends or allies without siding with us against Zionist Israel. Factually speaking, founder of Pakistan, Quaid-e-Azam [Great Leader] Mohammad Ali Jinnah always demanded a just and honorable solution to the Palestine problem. A just solution means one Palestine, and not the Zionist state of Israel. The supporters of Israel are not qualified to influence Pakistan's foreign policy. The United States must choose between support for Israel and friendship with the Pakistani nation. We Pakistanis must ask the U.S. and other allies of Israel in Europe and other continents who they choose: the Pakistani nation or the Zionist regime of Israel. It is high time to tell everyone that Pakistan and supporters of Israel cannot go together..."[105] In 2010, the WikiLeaks website published classified Pentagon documents and diplomatic cables from U.S. embassies worldwide, causing an international controversy. Some of the WikiLeaks revelations exposed Pakistani military and political leaders' private opinions of each other and Arab leaders' opinions of Pakistani leaders, thereby straining relationships and ties among Islamic nations. The Pakistani Defense Committee of the Cabinet (DCC), which held a meeting under the chairmanship of Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani in Islamabad, described the WikiLeaks revelations as "an attempt to damage the tashakkhus [identity/image] of Pakistan."[106] Speaking about the Pentagon documents, which referred to Pakistan's continued support of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, former ISI chief Hamid Gul blamed Israel and India for the leaks, stating that India and Israel want to use the U.S. against the ISI.[107] A report in the Roznama Nawa-i-Waqt daily also quoted Gul as saying that the documents were leaked by WikiLeaks to create a charge sheet against Pakistan Army Chief General Ashfaq Kayani and Lt.-Gen. Shuja Pasha, the current chief of ISI and Kayani's successor, over the issue of support to the militants in Afghanistan.[108] Former Pakistani minister Azam Khan Hoti described the release of U.S. diplomatic cables as part of "the CIA's game plan" to create differences between Islamic nations and to defame all those who refuse to toe the U.S. line on international relations.[109] Jamaat-e-Islami chief Syed Munawwar Hasan said: "The U.S. is behind the WikiLeaks revelations, the purpose of which is to cause turmoil in Pakistan and conflicts among Islamic nations."[110] Pakistani columnist Matloob Ahmad Warraich penned a lengthy article in the Urdu language, alleging a Jewish/Christian/Indian conspiracy behind the WikiLeaks revelations. Given that his article summarizes many arguments at one place which otherwise are articulated by Pakistani leaders in bits and pieces, detailed excerpts from the lengthy article are worth stating here: "The facts are something like this: the owners of the WikiLeaks website are purely Americans and Jews, who from time to time achieve their objectives by causing havoc to international peace..."[111] "In the U.S., the fast growing and prospering religion of Islam was giving trouble to the orthodox Christians and Jews. And according to a survey, by 2010 an added seven percent of Americans would have converted to Islam if there had been no 9/11, and by 2050 Islam would have become the largest religion followed in the U.S... After the Twin Towers incident in America, we find a wave of transformation and hatred there, the brunt of which was borne only by the Muslim community there..."[112] "After the tragedy of 9/11, which was in fact a tragedy for Muslims, the alliance between our eternal enemy India and Israel has prospered so much that Israel, which used to fear us [i.e. Pakistan], now together with our enemy is grinning at us. And we keep quiet at times due to the allegations [against us] in the [2008] Mumbai attacks and at times for the allegation of the [2001] attack on the Indian parliament... If the present WikiLeaks revelations are seen in an international context, it comes near to the possibility that Israel and the international organization of Jews [WikiLeaks, probably] have once again tried to hatch a conspiracy to cause instability in the Islamic world by making Muslims fight against each other..."[113] "On the one hand, there is an attempt to pit Saudi ruler Shah Abdullah against Iran. The world knows that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, once declared Hitler by WikiLeaks, is not only fighting valiantly against the international conspiracy of the U.S., but was also successful in briefing world opinion about the truth, in his last UN address. The U.S. would not dare to attack Iran... despite all efforts, while in the past it has achieved its goal by bringing Iran and Iraq to the battlefield. The two big Muslim forces were weakened not only in their defense and economy by the Iraq-Iran War [of the 1980s], but over two million people were killed in this war, which lasted for more than 10 years. "Even then the thirst of these white wolves [i.e. Western nations] was not quenched. And the U.S. unleashed a reign of barbarism on the defeated Iraqis, and trampled the remaining Iraqis under its defiled feet. The American and the Jewish lobbies, whose mouths have tasted human blood – these wolves now want to create confrontation between Saudi Arabia and Iran... According to WikiLeaks, the Saudi ruler has suggested to the U.S. to attack Iran's nuclear program. "And on the other hand, India is engaged in its unpious game plan [against Pakistan], and the world knows that Indians residing in the U.S. make the second largest community and these Indian-born Hindus are occupying major posts and positions in the U.S., including in the daily life there. "On the other hand, Pakistan, which is trapped in its internal trouble and economic instability, has been getting monetary benefits from its friendly country Saudi Arabia. In every difficult situation – be it the wars of 1965 and 1971 or be it the Pakistani nuclear program or the earthquake of 2006 [sic] or the flood of 2010 – the Saudi government has always stood by Pakistan; it has never left the Pakistani people alone in a difficult time. There might be some truth in this fact [revealed by WikiLeaks] that Saudi Arabia may have had differences of opinion on the issue of the woman ruler [i.e. Benazir Bhutto being the prime minister of Pakistan] or due to personal dislike of [her widower] President Asif Ali Zardari; but when it comes to the people of Pakistan, the Saudi people have always been ready to give free oil and blood to Pakistan. "Through WikiLeaks, Jewish and Indian lobbies have tried to kill many birds with one stone... WikiLeaks and the Jewish and Christian lobbies should note that no rescue operation can save them if the jungle catches fire. India and Israel go unmentioned in WikiLeaks, and this is what [leads] us to wonder."[114] Conclusion In addition to the thousands of Islamic clerics in small towns whose opinions fail to appear in the major newspapers for want of space, some of the prominent Pakistani personalities and ideologues who are engendering anti-Jewish and anti-Israel prejudices and conspiracy theories in Pakistani society are senior editor Majeed Nizami, former Pakistani Army officer Lieutenant-General Hamid Gul, jihadist demagogue Zaid Hamid, Jamaat-e-Islami chief Syed Munawwar Hasan and his predecessor Qazi Hussain Ahmed. While it can be argued that the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan cannot, for example, win an election on its own, it is nevertheless the largest mass organization in the country. Like other religious organizations, its role in shaping public opinion in Pakistan is thorough. Retired Lt.-Gen. Hamid Gul, the former chief of the Pakistani military's all-powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), has assumed the role of a spokesman for the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in recent years. On numerous occasions and in media interviews, he analyzes various Pakistani and international issues of the day in terms of a presumed unified role played by the U.S., India and Israel internationally. Zaid Hamid is a political campaigner who has been leading the mass movement in Pakistan in favor of jihad and has been strengthening antisemitism in the country. Majeed Nizami is not an average Pakistani journalist trying to shape public opinion in Pakistani society. He enjoys a greater role in influencing a generation of Pakistani journalists. Nizami heads the Nazaria-e-Pakistan Trust, or the Ideology of Pakistan Trust – a think tank created under a legislation passed by the legislative assembly of Punjab, the most influential province in Pakistani politics, armed forces and governance. In October 2010, Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani lauded Nizami for his 50 years of journalism and for keeping alive "in all circumstances" the Two-Nation Theory – the idea that Hindus and Muslims cannot live together, which led to the creation of Pakistan.[115] The use of antisemitism is prevalent among all sections of Pakistani society, including leaders of a large number of religious organizations which have mass followings, military officers who cannot be identified, former military leaders who can be quoted by name in the media, politicians and lawmakers, columnists and journalists, and others. There is a small liberal class of political commentators, members of non-governmental organizations, columnists and journalists whose views are limited to mainly English-language media, especially the Dawn and Daily Times newspapers. However, in Pakistan it is the Urdu-language newspapers and magazines, not the English-language media, which exercise massive influence on mass public opinion. It is also pertinent here to note that in Pakistan, the right-wing is the mainstream, which means that the public space for expression of views by the secular commentariat is indeed small. * Tufail Ahmad is Director of MEMRI's South Asia Studies Project.