Is war between Israel and Iran inevitable?
War drums are beating for Iran and once again, the drummer is Israel, joined by some occidental powers. The facade started last summer but was postponed due to the elections in the US and Israel. The burning question though remains ‘is war between Israel and Iran looming’? In an attempt to answer this question, we must look at a few different perspectives. Israel and Western points of view Israel sees Iran’s nuclear program as an existential threat that must be stopped by all means, including a military strike. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is convinced that Iran will be able to produce a nuclear bomb by summer ...
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An open letter to Ban Ki Moon
Mr Ban Ki Moon, Secretary General, The United Nations. January 16, 2013. Your Excellency, I am not Hazara – my gene pool is not affiliated with the descendants of the great Mongol Genghis Khan, who now inhabit Quetta. But I am writing this to inform you of a pressing issue that has shaken the international community as protests erupt worldwide regarding Jan 10, 2013 bomb blasts on Alamdar Road. Since the past decade, over 1100 Hazaras have fallen prey to attacks of ethnic cleansing carried out by radical militants claiming to eradicate all those who do not adhere to their brand of Islam. In September 2011, ...
Read Full PostCalls for peace in Palestine but not Syria?
In December 2010, a man in Tunisia self-immolated to protest against the treatment he received from the police. The incident served as a catalyst and what followed was an extraordinary year, which saw pro-democracy rebellions erupting across the Middle East. The wave of popular unrest sweeping the Arab world came late to Syria, but since the first protests in March 2011 in the city of Deraa, at least 40,000 Syrians are thought to have been killed. It is difficult to see a clear winner emerging from the ever-bloodier civil war in Syria. After thousands of casualties, however, the question is, “Is the Arab spring still ...
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Palestine: The audacity to hope
I remember an evening in November, 2011. I was sitting at a meeting of the Model United Nations Society at the University of Westminster on Regent Street in London. While the society had always been my favourite extra-curricular activity at university, as I sat their waiting for the proceedings to start, I was feeling very depressed. In the course of studying International Relations, realism — the notion that world is driven solely on basis of self interest — is one of the first theories taught. But when the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) rejected the Palestinian bid to gain recognition as ...
Read Full PostIt’s Israel who is the real super power, not the US
Within a few days of Israeli air strikes, 130 Palestinians including at least 11 civilians, among them, six children and a pregnant woman were killed. An 11-month-old child, who was the son of a BBC Arabic correspondent, was killed too. Five Israelis also have died since Israel killed Hamas’ military chief on Wednesday. Middle East peace envoy and former British prime minister Tony Blair, without wasting time, showed his allegiance to Israel and called on Hamas on Thursday to stop firing rockets from Gaza into Israel. He said that as long as it continued, the Jewish state would act to defend ...
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Is it time for UN intervention on the missing persons in Balochistan?
Recently, a UN Working Group concluded its 10 day visit to Pakistan. Amid controversy and criticism, the Group on Enforced Disappearances was tasked with mandate of investigating in “humanitarian spirit” the allegations of enforced disappearances or missing persons. As a result of the findings, criminal proceedings cannot be initiated against those found to be guilty; however, a survey of modern history reveals that humanitarian motivations are not apolitical in their intent. UN humanitarian missions have ranged from Somalia and the Balkans in the 1990s, to most recently in Afghanistan and Libya. In most of these cases, the UN invoked its right ...
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TOPICS
G-B massacre: The government is all talk, no action
It was perhaps the first time that an international forum as prestigious as the United Nations took strong exception to sectarian violence, referring to the massacre of passengers belonging to the Shia community at Babusar Top, two days prior to Eidul Fitr. This was not the first incident where passengers were disembarked from a bus, identified and killed on the basis of their religious sect. Such brutal assassinations of innocent commuters in broad daylight, in some cases in front of their families, have occurred on the Karakoram Highway (KKH) and other routes in the country. Secretary General of the United ...
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Criminal silence over genocide of Muslims
Nowadays, on every social media outlet, tales of the ruthless killings of Burmese Muslims at the hands of angry Buddhist mobs and the Burmese Army are visible. Along with these tales, criticism on Muslim countries and international media for observing criminal silence over this genocide is also observed. According to some international news agencies, ten Muslims were killed when a Buddhist mob attacked a bus carrying Muslim passengers in the Rakhine (Arkan) province of Burma. They were blamed for the gang rape of a Buddhist woman, who was later murdered. The incident sparked a widespread protest in the country among Muslim ...
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Why announce a bounty on Hafiz Saeed?
Why now? At a critical moment in the US-Pakistan relationship, with parliamentary debate raging in Pakistan about how to realign relations with Washington, and with the United States desperate to forge some level of cooperation with Islamabad to help move toward the elusive endgame in Afghanistan, why announce a bounty for “information leading to the arrest or conviction” of living-openly-in-Lahore Hafiz Saeed? This is, after all, a man Washington and New Delhi regard as a terrorist, yet whom many in Pakistan regard as a heroic symbol of defiance toward the United States, an essential strategic asset, or both. In short, Washington’s ...
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My dream for Pakistan
A couple of months ago I witnessed an elderly man, approximately 70 years old, being violently shoved off the side of the road by a policeman who was clearing the way for a 10-car protocol of a federal minister. Incidents like these are not rare and it seems as though we have grown accustomed to them. But that doesn’t mean we don’t think they are wrong. You often hear people arguing about ‘which hidden arm’ is behind specific problems in our country; whether it’s the politicians, RAW, or the army - it’s an endless debate. But in truth, the average Pakistani just wants to ...
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