12/01/2015
By Johan Galtung*, TRANSCEND Media Service
12 January 2015 – What happened–known all over the world–is totally unacceptable and inexcusable. As inexcusable as 9/11, the coming Western attack and the Islamist retaliation, wherever. As inexcusable as the Western coups and mega-violence on Muslim lands since Iran 1953, massacring people as endowed with personality and identity as French cartoonists. But to the West they are not even statistics; “military secrets”.
Johan Galtung
However, the unacceptable is not unexplainable.
In this tragic saga of West-Islam violence, spiraling downwards, the way out is to identify the conflict, what is this violence about, and search for solutions.
I wonder how many now pontificating on Paris–a city so deep in our hearts–have taken the trouble to sit down with someone identified with Al Qaeda, simply asking, “what does the world look like where you would like to live?” I always get the same answer: “a world where Islam is not trampled upon but respected.”
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12/01/2015
By Nafeez Ahmed – Middle East Eye*
12 January 2015 – Recognising that the Paris atrocity is predictable blowback, does not absolve the perpetrators of responsibility for their terrible crimes; but it might help us find a path to safety.
Source: Middle East Eye
At least 12 people were killed in the shocking terrorist murders in Paris, among them 10 staff at Charlie Hebdo, the satirical French magazine whose offices were targeted, and two police officers.
The Kalashnikov-wielding gunmen, who were also armed with pump-action shotguns, shouted “Allahu Akbar” as they entered the magazine’s office to embark on their killing spree, proclaiming “The Prophet is avenged” after the massacre.
These are the worst attacks France has endured in decades – perhaps the worst in Europe since the 2011 Norway attacks by Anders Breivik. In 1995, a Paris commuter train was bombed by Algerian terrorists, killing eight and wounding 119.
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12/01/2015
12 January 2015 (RT)* — A union of Turkish imams has announced that it will organize demonstrations in front of various media organizations across Germany in solidarity with France after the deadly attack at Charlie Hebdo’s office in Paris.
**Central Berlin. Unter den Linden in foreground and skyscrapers of Potsdamer Platz up to the right.| Author: Bleppo : Wikimedia Commons.
The Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs (DİTİB), alongside other immigrant organizations in Germany recently announced that on January 16 it will hold solidarity protests outside publishing houses and TV studios after Friday prayers, with precise times and locations to be announced later this week.
“We condemn the act in the strongest possible terms, but at the same time urge people not to be intimidated or become divided,” the organization said in a statement.
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12/01/2015
Appalled by the escalating bloodshed at the hands of Boko Haram in northern Nigeria over the past week, capped by reports that suspected child suicide bombers attacked a crowded market in war-torn Borno state, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Anthony Lake, head of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), have both strongly condemned the terrorist group’s “depraved act.”
A man stands outside his destroyed home in Baga, Borno State, Nigeria, following heavy fighting between military forces from Nigeria, Niger and Chad, and Boko Haram. Photo: IRIN/Aminu Abubakar
A statement issued on 11 January 2015 by his spokesperson in New York said that Mr. Ban is appalled by reports that hundreds of civilians have been killed around the town of Baga, Borno state, near Nigeria’s border with Chad in the past week.
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12/01/2015
Growing radicalization, fundamentalism and extremism demand a renewed emphasis of Mahatma Gandhi’s ideals – both spiritual and political, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moonon 11 January 2015 said in Gujarat, pledging the ongoing commitment of the United Nations to promote tolerance, and ensure justice and dignity for all.*
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (centre), Madame Ban Soon-taek (left) examine Gandhi’s original writings during visit to Sbarmati Gandhi Ashram. Gujarat, India. January 2015. UN Photo/Mark Garten.
“Divisive politics and sectarian incitement have no place in our modern world. As Gandhi reminded us, ‘There will be no lasting peace on earth unless we learn not merely to tolerate but even to respect the other faiths as our own,’” said Ban in remarks at Sbarmati Gandhi Ashram, which houses a library and museum chronicling the life, work, and teachings of the legendary leader of India’s independence movement and pioneer of the philosophy and strategy of non-violence.
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12/01/2015
Outraged in the wake of an attack by Jahbat Al-Nusra which caused numerous deaths and injuries in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli, the United Nations Security Council has strongly condemned the incident and expressed its determination to combat terrorism on all fronts.
Wide view of the Security Council Chamber. UN Photo/Loey Felipe (file)
In a press statement issued on 11 January in New York, Council members expressed their condolences to the families of the victims, as well as to the people and Government of Lebanon. They also wished a speedy recovery to those injured in the incident.*
According to news reports, a suicide bomb attack on a cafe in the Lebanese city of Tripoli killed at least nine people and wounded dozens of others on Saturday. The Nusra Front, an Al-Qaida-affiliated terrorist group, claimed responsibility for the attack.
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11/01/2015
By Uri Avnery*
10 January 2015 — THE SHAS party has split into two. Opinion polls show that both parts are hovering around the 3.12% threshold which is now necessary for entering the Knesset, after the minimum was raised by the last Knesset.
**Political poster for Shas, featuring Eli Yishai. | Published by the Free Software Foundation | Wikimedia Commons
Many people in Israel would be glad if both parts do not make it, and Shas would disappear once and for all from our political landscape.
Not I.
SHAS IS the party of oriental orthodox Jewish Israelis. It is debatable whether it is foremost orthodox or foremost oriental. I believe that the oriental part of its outlook is far more important.
(The term “oriental” needs some explanation. Jews from Muslim countries used to be called “sepharadi”, but that is a misnomer. Sepharad is the Hebrew name of Spain, and the terms applies properly only to the Jews who were expelled from Spain by the Catholic Majesties Ferdinand and Isabella in 1492. They were welcomed by the Ottoman Muslim empire and spread from Morocco to Bulgaria and Iran. However, most Jews from Muslim countries are not Sepharadim. My magazine, Haolam Hazeh, started to call them Mizrahim, Orientals, and this term is now generally accepted.)
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11/01/2015
11 January 2015 (RT)* — Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has invited Jews from France and the rest of Europe to immigrate to the state of Israel, referring to what he sees as a “rising tide of anti-Semitism” there. The statement comes in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo attacks.
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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel addresses the General Assembly. UN Photo/J Carrier
“To all the Jews of France, all the Jews of Europe, I would like to say that Israel is not just the place in whose direction you pray, the state of Israel is your home,” Prime Minister Netanyahu said in a televised statement on Saturday [10 Jan. 2015], referencing the Jewish tradition of facing Jerusalem when praying.
Netanyahu called on lawmakers to alter the existing immigration laws to make it easier for Jews to permanently move to Israel.
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10/01/2015
Human Wrongs Watch
Nador, Morocco, 9 January 2015 (IRIN)* – Late last year an image went viral. In it two golfers, dressed in white on lush green fairways, appear oblivious as in the background around a dozen migrants try to scale a border fence in an attempt to enter Europe.
**Photo: José Palazón (Reprinted with photographer’s permission) | The image of two golfers playing as migrants scale a fence in the Spanish enclave of Melilla, inside Morocco, went viral late last year. Source: IRIN.
The migrants were climbing from the sleepy and conservative coastal north Moroccan town of Nador, trying to enter Melilla, one of two Spanish territories inside the North African country. It shone a light on Morocco’s struggles to manage its migrant population and attempts by Spain to further seal its borders.
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10/01/2015
All of Syria’s neighbours have tightened their restrictions on the entry of refugees in recent months as they have suffered under the strain of hosting hundreds of thousands of people. While rights groups call for open borders, governments argue they need more support to continue supporting such high numbers of refugees. In the meantime, fleeing Syrians have dwindling options.
Photo source: IRIN
9 January, 2015 (IRIN)* – Lebanon’s decision on 5 January 2015 to tighten restrictions on the entry of Syrian refugees is the latest in a series of measures across the Middle East. In each of the neighbouring countries that accept refugees – Iraq, Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey – the past six months have seen higher barriers to entry for those fleeing the civil war.
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HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 