NOVANEWS
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Operation Enduring Failure: Ten years of war on Afghanistan
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Kol Nidre in Cairo. Not
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The Jewish-Palestinian book of life
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The Boomerang Comes Home: Obama’s ‘death panel’ and the war on terror
Operation Enduring Failure: Ten years of war on Afghanistan
Oct 07, 2011
Lizzy Ratner
Today is the tenth anniversary of the US war on Afghanistan. Ten years. A decade. The longest war in US history*. Nearly 1700 US troops dead and more than 1000 “coalition partners” dead. Thousands of soldiers wounded, thousands traumatized. Billions of dollars spent.
And the number of Afghans dead? No one knows. No one knows. But the estimates, most likely too low, are soul-rattling. 12,000-14,000? 40,000? Tens and tens of thousands of civilians, and the numbers just keep getting uglier, as Brian Katulis of the Center for American Progress told Democracy Now! this morning. In fact this year, 2011, is on track to be the deadliest year for Afghan civilians since the war began, proving that a decade after the US invasion, life is more treacherous than ever for the men, women, and children we so altruistically went to bomb — er, save.
Meanwhile, this country’s much-vaunted nation-building efforts remain as crumbly as sand castles. The Taliban is resurgent — or “resilient” as a new White House reportphrases it. The US-installed Karzai government is a corrupt sham. Civil war is a distinct possibility. And just this week, retired-fired general Stanley McChrystal toldan audience at the Council on Foreign Relations that the US and NATO are only “50% of the way” toward realizing their goals in Afghanistan. Whatever that means anyway.
“We didn’t know enough and we still don’t know enough,” he said, stating what had become baldly obvious to many of us civilian observers years ago. “Most of us, me included, had a very superficial understanding of the situation and history, and we had a frighteningly simplistic view of recent history, the last 50 years.”
But don’t just listen to McChrystal and the other experts who claim to know so much after knowing so little. Listen to the people on the receiving end of this country’s precision bombs, cluster bombs, and depleted uranium-laced bombs. Listen to the men, the children, and the women — especially the women who were the feel-good excuse for all the F-15s and Warthogs.
Here’s “Reena,” a 19-year-old member of the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan,describing post-invasion life for Afghan women:
“These claims [that the war would improve life for women] were all extremely false. If they have brought to power the misogynists, the brothers in creed of the Taliban to power, who are the exact copies of Taliban mentally and have just been physically changed, then I don’t think the women’s situation can improve.
Today there are slight improvements in women’s lives in urban areas, but again, if we look at statistics, Afghanistan remains the most dangerous place for women. Self-immolation, suicide rates are extremely high, it has never been this high before. Domestic violence is widespread. Women are poor, they don’t have health care. It has the highest maternal mortality rate in the world. There are, as I said, some improvements, and in some aspects it might have gotten a little better for a handful of women, but it has definitely gotten worse for others.
There is insecurity, there is threat, they always say that there are 6 million girls in schools, or the schools have opened, but nobody looks at the dropout rates, nobody looks at the attacks or the threats that the Taliban make to girls and they don’t dare to go out again, nobody looks at the quality of the schools. I mean, there have been slight changes, and it has been very widely used, and they just highlight a few positive things. But overall the situation of women has gotten worse.”
Heck of a job, Bushie. (And Bambi.)
* There’s an important caveat to the claim that the Afghan war is the longest in US history and that is the fact that the US was unofficially mucking around in Vietnam for many years before it officially sent in ground troops. If you add all the official and unofficial years together, Vietnam is still the longer war (as were several of the American-Indian wars of the 19th Century).
Kol Nidre in Cairo. Not
Oct 07, 2011
Philip Weiss
At sundown tonight, I walked down the five flights of my hotel and into the streets of central Cairo. The muezzin was calling people to prayer, and I was going to pray– walking the one block from my hotel to the Adly street synagogue, the large gray art-deco building that is at all times barricaded and protected by soldiers, protecting a Jewish structure. I was going to observe Kol Nidre, the evening service of Yom Kippur, in Cairo.
The last time I was in Cairo I visited the Adly synagogue and met three Jews there. A caretaker sold me a book about Jewish life in Cairo, and a brass bookmark. And this trip I planned so that I could have Yom Kippur in Cairo. I brought a suit and a yarmulke I’d gotten in the Great Synagogue in Jerusalem. Today a Cairo friend said that I would see Carmen Weinstein in shul. Her family still owns a printing business in town. You can see their name carved into a facade of a store near here. Weinstein.
But when I got to the synagogue tonight, the soldiers waved me away. The lamps were on outside the synagogue but the soldiers said it was empty, locked. An officer in white uniform was eating his dinner on a table on the sidewalk. Bukra, he kept saying. Tomorrow. I tried to explain to him that right now is the solemnest hour of the Jewish year– when we renounce all vows. Men in dark khaki with rifles stood by watching.
A man who speaks English came up with his prayer mat folded at his side. He said the synagogue will be open tomorrow, 9-3. So I will try again.
Still it is painful to reflect on the end of Mizrahi Jewish existence. In Palestine and Jordan and Egypt, Muslims always say to me, We lived for a thousand years with the Jews without any problem, until Zionism. I guess they are right, but those chapters of coexistence are now over–for whatever reason.
Yesterday the Egyptians celebrated their October 6 victory over Israel in the Yom Kippur war. You saw children with their faces painted white, black and red. And in Tahrir Square today, I heard Israel condemned over and over in speeches. People carried posters with the Jewish star on them, a symbol of Israel, sometimes with a red circle around it and a line crossing through it. And a man carried a sign covered in Arabic but with a few English words. “I hate Israel, Israel is behind it,” it said.
At one of the grandstands around Tahrir that the various movements use to rally their bases, they had a huge weatherproof sign with a photograph of a boy killed in Gaza during Cast Lead, two years before. I know; these people have their reasons to be angry at Jews.
But I’m not talking about politics. We’re cousins, Muslims like to say to Jews, and Jews like to say back. We’re both sons of Abraham. And now we’re not. There’s utter separation, and mistrust. It’s a great cultural breach. It feels like it will be longlasting. Yes, Jews have returned to Berlin, but how long before the Arab Jews come back to Cairo?
Hope springs eternal; this is the season of revolution, after all. I’ll try the Adly synagogue tomorrow. I’d really like to meet Carmen Weinstein.
The Jewish-Palestinian book of life
Oct 07, 2011
Marc H. Ellis
An American Jew in India. On Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement. The day Jews confess sins. The day God judges sins. The day God decides our fate.
Tradition tells us that on Yom Kippur, God writes our name in the Book of Life. Or not. No one knows in advance. Shall we be alive tomorrow?
Not to worry. We don’t really confess our sins. Not the real ones anyway. And we still seem to live. Is God fooling us? Biding his time?
Today, I sit in my hotel room in silence rather than in my synagogue at home or in New Delhi. I can’t go near the ritual of confession without confessing. Can’t do it. Can you?
Why India? I’m not here to cash in on India’s new global prominence. Nor will I see the suffering entailed in that “development.”
My time here is advertised as a lecture tour. If you want to know the truth, I’m in India confessing.
Development is necessary. The suffering it causes is catalogued by historians. After.
But, then, as an American, what have I to say to India about the costs of development? America rides the crest of development’s wave. For now.
Every Yom Kippur, I confess the sins of my people. Wherever I am. Wherever I can.
I have spoken and written this confession for 25 years – without any success.
Here is my confession:
What we, as Jews, have done to the Palestinian people is wrong.
What we, as Jews, are doing to the Palestinian people is wrong.
Past. Present. No equivocation. No end in sight.
Some Jews view my confession as out of place. How dare I confess the suffering of the Palestinian people at our hands? But there are many Jews who hold the same point of view. Most won’t be in synagogue on Yom Kippur either.
You see, as with any people or nation, there are Jews who think empire will save us. And, as with any people or nation, there are Jews who think we are bound to others for the greater good.
Empire Jews seek power over others. Jews of Conscience seek life with others.
Empire Jews versus Jews of Conscience. A Jewish civil war.
This civil war is hardly confined to Jews. Is there a civil war in India between those who want empire and those who exercise conscience?
Some say that Kashmir is another Palestine. I lack the knowledge to make a comparison.
South Africans I know say what is happening in Palestine is worse than the apartheid they suffered. They should know.
President Jimmy Carter believes that the Jewish colonization of Jerusalem and the West Bank is apartheid. When I visited him at his library in Atlanta, he spoke about Palestinian suffering. During his remarks, he wept.
So much suffering in the world. So much violence in the world. So many forms of violence.
I read about the next generation of American Drone aircraft. “Development” continues. Our brave new world. If India doesn’t have this latest military “advance,” you will. If India wants empire.
So much to confess historically. Today. For the future.
But on Yom Kippur, as a Jew, I think of the Palestinian people.
I write of Palestinian sufferings and their desire to be free. I write of Jews oppressing the Palestinian people.
Yes, we Jews. In Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza I see it with my own eyes. More and more Jews of Conscience see it. We are powerless. Will America help? Will India?
Without justice, Jewish history loses its foundation. Without conscience, there is only empire. Without a religious “no” to empire, why religion?
On Yom Kippur, Jews all over the world, take a deep breath. Confess.
Now exhale. Reach our hands out toward our neighbors, the Palestinians.
Don’t Palestinians have a right to be free in their own homeland?
If Palestinians are free, perhaps we could become free. Of our own oppression.
Yes, today, on Yom Kippur, let us confess our oppression. Of another people.
God, if on this Yom Kippur you find me worthy of being written into the Book of Life, I ask you to place my name on the same page as the Palestinian people.
Right there. With other Jews and Palestinians who want a future of justice and equality.
Book of Life. Same page.
Marc H. Ellis is University Professor of Jewish Studies, Professor of History and Director of the Center for Jewish Studies at Baylor University. He is the author of many books, most recently Encountering the Jewish Future: with Wiesel, Buber, Heschel, Arendt, Levinas.
The Boomerang Comes Home: Obama’s ‘death panel’ and the war on terror
Oct 07, 2011
Jimmy Johnson
It should never be forgotten that while colonization, with its techniques and its political and juridical weapons, obviously transported European models to other continents, it also had a considerable boomerang effect on the mechanisms of power in the West, and on the apparatuses, institutions, and techniques of power. A whole series of colonial models was brought back to the West, and the result was that the West could practice something resembling colonization, or an internal colonialism, on itself. – Michel Foucault, Society Must Be Defended
The United States, on orders from the Obama Administration, killed Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan and in Yemen on Friday, September 30, 2011. Mark Hosenball for Reuters revealed on 6 October that the decision to kill U.S. citizens like al-Awlaki and Khan was made by “a secretive panel of senior government officials” reporting to U.S. President Barack Obama. The criticism leveled at Obama by the U.S. Right-wing about his health care program creating “death panels” for citizens remains completely unfounded, but it turns out that he did create a death panel for another effort, the Global War on Terror. This represents an example of Foucault’s Boomerang Effect, the U.S. Empire importing its own colonial policies. A look at how executions are carried out will help to illustrate the point.
Both al-Awlaki and Khan were conservative, militant, Islamist activists and both were part of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), though not very high up on the ladder. According to Gregory Johnsen in the New York Times, al-Awlaki was “a midlevel religious functionary” who was “not even particularly good at what he [did].” Khan too, was a minor figure, known mostly for his editing of the English-language magazine Inspire. Thomas Hegghammer of the Norwegian Defense Research Establishment characterized Inspire as “a sloppy magazine”. It’s heavy reliance on “recycled material” contrasted with Sada al-Malahim, AQAP’s Arabic-language magazine, “suggestive of much closer links between editors and operatives.” For several reasons Hegghammer said he “would be surprised if the AQAP connection [to Inspire] is very strong.”
This more sober framework, one where al-Awlaki and Khan played no significant role in AQAP, stands in stark contrast withPresident Obama’s claim that the “death of Awlaki is a major blow to al-Qaida’s most active operational affiliate.” Rather than a “significant milestone in the broader effort to defeat al-Qaida and its affiliates,” the extra-judicial execution of two midlevel AQAP figures seems like a run-of-the-mill operation for the U.S., which has carried out hundreds of such operations against figures from al-Qaida, the Taliban, and various other groups.
To admonish the previous paragraph, it’s problematic to use “extra-judicial” as a qualifier when talking about executions carried out by the United States. According to the New America Foundation, the U.S. has now executed at least 1,368 (perhaps as many as 2,130) accused militants in Pakistan alone. All drone strikes in Somalia and Yemen and numerous strikes in Afghanistan and Iraq should be added but the lack of collected data makes a reasonable estimate impossible. Even using the limited number, the U.S. has still executed at least 982 (perhaps as many as 1,744) more people extra-judicially than it has judicially. The 386 judicial executions carried out during the same time period (2004-present) are well under one quarter of the total number of executions. When extra-judicial executions are overwhelmingly the norm, they should be called simply ‘executions’ while that minority conducted through the court system should carry the qualifier of ‘judicial’ to clarify them from normal, extra-judicial executions. To do otherwise pretends that the ‘nation of laws’ paradigm of guaranteed rights and due process is the everyday norm, when it clearly is not (Though the judicial executions of Troy Davis and Cameron Willingham, the former quite possibly and the latter almost certainly innocent, during this period suggest undue value is attributed to the ‘nation of laws’ and ‘due process’ anyway.).
The modest amount of critical coverage of the executions to date has focused only on the issue of Awlaki and Khan being U.S. citizens (here a stellar column by Glenn Greenwald on Salon.com stands out) and the problematic question of a country executing its own citizen without any semblance of due process; the horror that what We do to Them, We might also do to Us. There is a kind of newness to this as the U.S. execution of its citizens – no matter their location at the time of execution – without due process is exceedingly rare in recent decades. But this distinction doesn’t really hold up upon scrutiny.
The question is one of citizenship and executions. The overwhelming majority of both normal executions and judicial executions since the U.S. began its active drone strike campaign in 2004 fits into a framework whereby citizens are executed judicially, and foreign nationals are executed normally. But nine of the 386 judicial executions since 2004 have been foreign nationals and as of July 28, 2010, 131 foreign nationals from 34 countries were on death row in the United States, all of whose crimes were committed in the U.S. At least five more foreign nationals are potentially facing judicial executions in prosecutions to be conducted by the Department of Defense, none of the alleged crimes being committed in the U.S. (though some of the defendants are accused of conspiracy actions taking place outside the U.S. related to the September 11, 2001 attacks inside the U.S. making the geographic question slightly less important).
When combined with the “secretive [death] panel” making the decision to add al-Awlaki and Khan to the “capture or kill” lists, the conclusion is that actual existing policy says foreign nationals can be executed through due process of law and U.S. citizens cannot be executed without it. To clarify, with the executions of Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan, the U.S. through its actions has declared as acceptable the following:
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The execution of U.S. citizens through due process of law when the alleged crimes are committed in the United States.
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The execution of U.S. citizens without due process no matter where the alleged crimes are committed.
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The execution of foreign nationals through due process of law no matter where the alleged crimes are committed.
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The execution of foreign nationals without due process no matter where the alleged crimes are committed.