The problem with the Geneva Communique from the first Geneva round on Syria is that the government of Syria never subscribed to it. It was jointly chaired by the League of Arab States for Syria, whatever that may mean. Another problem is that it is, as so many diplomatic documents are, highly ambiguous. It plainly advocates a power sharing executive formed by some of the current government plus the opposition to oversee a transition to democracy. But it does not state which elements of the current government, and it does not mention which elements of the opposition, nor does it make plain if President Assad himself is eligible to be part of, or to head, the power-sharing executive, and whether he is eligible to be a candidate in future democratic elections.
Doubtless the British, for example, would argue that the term transition implies that he will go. The Russians will argue there is no such implication and the text does not exclude anybody from the process. Doubtless also diplomats on all sides were fully aware of these differing interpretations and the ambiguity is quite deliberate to enable an agreed text. I would say that the text tends much more to the “western” side, and that this reflects the apparently weak military position of the Assad regime at that time and the then extant threat of western military intervention. There has been a radical shift in those factors against the western side in the interim. Expect Russian interpretations now to get more hardline.
Given the extreme ambiguity of the text, Iran has, as it frequently does, shot itself in the foot diplomatically by refusing to accept the communique as the basis of talks and thus getting excluded from Geneva. Iran should have accepted the communique, and then at Geneva issued its own interpretation of it.
But that is a minor point. The farcical thing about the Geneva conference is that it is attempting to promote into power-sharing in Syria “opposition” members who have no democratic credentials and represent a scarcely significant portion of those actually fighting the Assad regime in Syria. What the West are trying to achieve is what the CIA and Mossad have now achieved in Egypt; replacing the head of the Mubarak regime while keeping all its power structures in place. The West don’t really want democracy in Syria, they just want a less pro-Russian leader of the power structures.
The inability of the British left to understand the Middle East is pathetic. I recall arguing with commenters on this blog who supported the overthrow of the elected President of Egypt Morsi on the grounds that his overthrow was supporting secularism, judicial independence (missing the entirely obvious fact the Egyptian judiciary are almost all puppets of the military) and would lead to a left wing revolutionary outcome. Similarly the demonstrations against Erdogan in Istanbul, orchestrated by very similar pro-military forces to those now in charge in Egypt, were also hailed by commenters here. The word “secularist” seems to obviate all sins when it comes to the Middle East.
Qatar will be present at Geneva, and Qatar has just launched a pre-emptive media offensive by launching a dossier on torture and murder of detainees by the Assad regime, which is being given first headline treatment by the BBC all morning
There would be a good dossier to be issued on torture in detention in Qatar, and the lives of slave workers there, but that is another question.
I do not doubt at all that atrocities have been committed and are being committed by the Assad regime. It is a very unpleasant regime indeed. The fact that atrocities are also being committed by various rebel groups does not make Syrian government atrocities any better.
But whether 11,000 people really were murdered in a single detainee camp I am unsure. What I do know is that the BBC presentation of today’s report has been a disgrace. The report was commissioned by the government of Qatar who commissioned Carter Ruck to do it. Both those organisations are infamous suppressors of free speech. What is reprehensible is that the BBC are presenting the report as though it were produced by neutral experts, whereas the opposite is the case. It is produced not by anti torture campaigners or by human rights activists, but by lawyers who are doing it purely and simply because they are being paid to do it.
The BBC are showing enormous deference to Sir Desmond De Silva, who is introduced as a former UN war crimes prosecutor. He is indeed that, but it is not the capacity in which he is now acting. He is acting as a barrister in private practice. Before he was a UN prosecutor, he was for decades a criminal defence lawyer and has defended many murderers. He has since acted to suppress the truth being published about many celebrities, including John Terry.
If the Assad regime and not the government of Qatar had instructed him and paid him, he would now be on our screens arguing the opposite case to that he is putting. That is his job. He probably regards that as not reprehensible. What is reprehensible is that the BBC do not make it plain, but introduce him as a UN war crimes prosecutor as though he were acting in that capacity or out of concern for human rights. I can find no evidence of his having an especial love for human rights in the abstract, when he is not being paid for it. He produced an official UK government report into the murder of Pat Finucane, a murder organised by British authorities, which Pat Finucane’s widow described as a “sham”. He was also put in charge of quietly sweeping the Israeli murders on the Gaza flotilla under the carpet at the UN.
The question any decent journalist should be asking him is “Sir Desmond De Silva, how much did the government of Qatar pay you for your part in preparing this report? How much did it pay the other experts? Does your fee from the Government of Qatar include this TV interview, or are you charging separately for your time in giving this interview? In short how much are you being paid to say this?”
That is what any decent journalist would ask. Which is why you will never hear those questions on the BBC.
John,
Sorry no I can’t give a more direct link as you have to click through “I accept conditions for use etc” to get there. Use the link I gave above. Make sure you unblock popups from the site then click on public data and then zoom in on the map. Click on the station. As I say at most there is a very small ripple above typical range. Don’t have the time to download the data from multiple stations and look for correlations methodically myself just now.
There’s a map of German gamma sensors ups and downs correlated with rain bands at the sensor location kicking about the net somewhere plotted by a German statistician. He suspects Fukushima related and maybe it is but I would like to see the same plots of data from before Fukushima for comparison.
Here’s the Isle of Man data. Note the increase from 100 nano-sieverts/hr to 120 then drop back to 100. Highest 120 at about mid-day today. Btw right click on the map to get tooltip info mode to see data.
begin end nSv/h Remarks Validated
2014-01-31 15:49 2014-01-31 16:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 14:49 2014-01-31 15:49 1.10E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 13:49 2014-01-31 14:49 1.20E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 12:49 2014-01-31 13:49 1.20E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 11:49 2014-01-31 12:49 1.20E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 10:49 2014-01-31 11:49 1.15E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 09:49 2014-01-31 10:49 1.17E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 08:49 2014-01-31 09:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 07:49 2014-01-31 08:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 06:49 2014-01-31 07:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 05:49 2014-01-31 06:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 04:49 2014-01-31 05:49 1.10E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 03:49 2014-01-31 04:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 02:49 2014-01-31 03:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 01:49 2014-01-31 02:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-31 00:49 2014-01-31 01:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-30 23:49 2014-01-31 00:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-30 22:49 2014-01-30 23:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-30 21:49 2014-01-30 22:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
2014-01-30 20:49 2014-01-30 21:49 1.00E+02 “” NV
“What on earth makes you think I was ever for him? (Blair) Like a lot of people, I fell out of love with him some time before the Irak war……”
So, habby, you were never for him, but yet you loved him once?
Seems a bit confused.
The BLiar acolyte and Iraq warmonger Aaronovitch
(Copied to avoid the money grubbing Murdoch’s paywall)
Aaronovitch: ‘We are mopping Syria’s blood with a hanky’
January 30, 2014
The Times
Britain’s decision to take a few hundred refugees is a mere fig leaf given our inaction in the face of growing atrocity
Tuesday night, I’m listening to the radio and a comedian (one that I quite like) is doing a sequence about what a dreadful man Tony Blair is, and look what happened over Iraq, and fancy making him a peace envoy in the Middle East. The audience laughs at this in a dutiful way as they have been laughing at it for half a decade. There’s something missing though, and it’s something that is almost always missing. I have yet to hear a skit on Syria.
Ten days earlier a barman and part-time DJ called Twiggy Garcia attempted a good-natured if desultory citizen’s arrest on Mr Blair in a restaurant in Shoreditch. Over Iraq, of course. But this time the missing word was provided by the former Prime Minister who, according to Mr Garcia, rather than telling him to swivel on his own turntable, “kept changing the subject and talking about Syria”. Mr Garcia interpreted this as another sign of Mr Blair’s moral turpitude.
One part of the context of this week’s little discussion on whether Britain should provide a temporary home for a couple of trainfuls of the most traumatised Syrian refugees, is that Syria is barely debated here at all. News organisations such as The Times and the BBC send correspondents to the border areas, who file brave and agonising reports. Many British people give generously to various appeals, but there are no http://www.demonstrations.No anger is generated because of what is happening. There is in fact no argument about Syria whatsoever.
As of now 130,000 or so people have died in the Syrian civil war. The UN calculates that more than a tenth of the Syrian population – 2.4 million people – are refugees in foreign countries: 860,000 in Lebanon, 576,000 in Jordan, 559,000 in Turkey, 210,000 in Iraq, 132,000 in Egypt; and 6.4 million are displaced internally. Whole city centres and suburbs have been (and are being) destroyed; 80 per cent of schools are disrupted; in many places health services are practically non-existent; in others the population is being starved out by the regime.
There has been no repeat of last summer’s unpunished use of chemical weapons by the Assad forces, but there hasn’t needed to be. The vast majority of deaths and injuries always were caused by conventional weapons. A current regime favourite is the “barrel bomb”, an oil drum or similar container stuffed with bits of metal and explosives that is tipped out of a helicopter on to a suspicious-looking building, market or schoolyard. These, it seems, cross no one’s red lines and certainly don’t exercise the imaginative ire of people like the anti-drone campaigners.
The British Government has put a lot of money into alleviating the plight of Syrian refugees in the surrounding countries. By and large they would rather be closer to their homes and – need I say it? – we would prefer them to be closer to their homes too. Besides countries such as Jordan are seen as being both fragile and strategically vital, so helping them to help the displaced makes good sense.
However, having constructed an “in theatre” strategy, the Government stuck to it too rigidly when the UN asked that the most vulnerable and traumatised refugees (30,000 out of 2.4 million) be taken out of the camps. Labour decided to press the Government to get with the programme, and this week – worried about looking hard-hearted – ministers finally agreed that they would. We will apparently take somewhere between the 90 refugees of Ireland and the 500 of France.
It is good to do a good thing, even if the good thing is – set against the scale of the problem – a small thing indeed. But when this almost token action is paraded as hugely virtuous then it looks like something else – a salve, a sop, the figgiest of leaves. So yesterday, Labour’s Andy Burnham said that recent events meant that Britons could “celebrate the role played by Parliament over the crisis in Syria, first in delaying military action and now over these refugees”.
Rejoice, rejoice. What a good job Parliament (by which Mr Burnham means Ed Miliband) has made of dealing with the Syria crisis. Since the effective scuppering of military action against Assad back in August (remember, we weren’t rushing in because we were awaiting the evidence?) thousands more are dead, but not by chemical weapons. There have been the photographs of 11,000 tortured and executed victims of Assad’s security forces. Bombs are going off in Lebanon. There is famine in Homs and the further strengthening of the jihadi element among the Syrian rebels, as those of us who called for intervention for three years, always predicted.
But of course, we have talks in Montreux. Actually I think we would have had talks in Montreux earlier and on better terms if we had taken out Assad’s air force when, for a short time, there was a _ to allow it to happen.
And what do we expect now? The war cannot realistically end until Assad decides that he will go, and this he cannot do, because, like Macbeth, “I am in blood. Stepped in so far that, should I wade no more, returning were as tedious as go o’er.” In the remote event of his parting with power, an UneasyJet flight to The Hague awaits him. He knows it. Besides, after all this, at the moment he’s winning.
In August we – by which I mean mostly Barack Obama – had the chance (albeit very late) to create some measure of influence over the outcome of the Syrian catastrophe. Mr Burnham’s success, for which he invites celebration, was to surrender that moment and to position us on the edge of a sea of blood, dabbing at the spreading pool with a pocket handkerchief. And Assad got us right. How did we react? Nothing. The 11,000 executed Syrians? http://www.Zip.No demos. The anti-drones didn’t even wonder for a moment whether they shouldn’t be changing the messages on their placards. Certainly no citizen’s arrests. While it went on, Twiggy played guitar.
Two days ago, however, when he’d had time to think it all over, Twiggy decided that Syria had perhaps not been quite the change of subject he’d first thought. Actually that was Mr Blair’s fault too. “The international community”, Twiggy calculated, “is scared to intervene in Syria because of the mess Blair and Bush made of Iraq, [consequently] politicians and the public are not supporting fighting for human rights and peace in the Middle East.”
Maybe that’s the reason, or a bit of it. But, pace Mr Burnham, it’s not exactly an excuse to party.
Herbie (17h11)
Stop playing the fool, you know perfectly well what I meant. 🙂
Russia won the rights to host the 2014 Olympics with the help of one of the world’s biggest heroin traffickers, says former British ambassador to Uzbekistan
Gafur Rakhimov was publicly thanked for help by Sochi Olympic bid chief
Uzbek businessman said to have been key to securing vital Asian votes
But US officials believe he is a mafia boss and international heroin kingpin
Now ex-British ambassador to Uzbekistan calls him a major drug trafficker
Craig Murray has referred to Rakhimov as ‘a very dangerous gangster’
By Tom Leonard In New York
PUBLISHED: 13:15, 31 January 2014 | UPDATED: 16:05, 31 January 2014
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2549408/Russia-won-rights-host-2014-Olympics-help-one-worlds-biggest-heroin-traffickers-says-former-British-ambassador-Uzbekistan.html
Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!
30 Jan, 2014 – 6:55 pm
Says:
“I really don’t know which of them I love more : obsessive Mary, sat in front of her laptop all day or Mr Scourgie with his foolish, pseudo-rational, pseudo-erudite quibblings (cf post at 14h12).”
Habbabkuk, your reply just goes to show, as always, that you and the other Zionist supporters on this blog are completely unable to justify their support for Israel and its policies.
What do you think the best solution would be for the Israel/Palestine peace process?
I asked you that question many moons ago; you have yet to answer.
You can’t answer and neither can your fellow Zionists because your replies would be open to examination and fact checking.
I challenge any of you Israel supporters to put your case forward in an intelligent and logical way.
How long will I have to wait?
“Third Banker, Former Fed Member, “Found Dead” Inside A Week”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-01-31/third-banker-former-fed-member-found-dead-inside-week
“BBVA Posts $1.15 Billion Loss on China Bank Stake Charge”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/print/2014-01-31/bbva-posts-1-15-billion-loss-on-china-bank-stake-charge.html
“Abe Doomsday Risk Prompts Moody’s Warning on JGBs: Japan Credit”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/print/2014-01-31/abe-doomsday-risk-prompts-moody-s-warning-on-jgbs-japan-credit.html
“Rajan: Global Monetary Cooperation Has Broken Down”
http://www.bloomberg.com/video/rajan-global-monetary-cooperation-has-broken-down-9qwdiq6mTnKP5O4m1CHmEw.html
“Ecuador’s Correa wants US military to leave”
http://news.yahoo.com/ecuador-39-correa-wants-us-military-leave-230734947.html
John Goss, 4:31 pm, I agree with the Squonk; yes, the ripples in the public radiation data are likely to be fall-out from Fukushima, brought down by rain. Fukushima emitted lots of airborne radioactive pollution which has had plenty of time to circulate, and rain is the main thing that brings it back down.
If you can handle some fairly heavy-going and technical reading, try Wings of Death by Chris Busby. Differences in radioactive contamination at ground level varying in proportion to rainfall is central to two of his studies. I don’t accept all of Busby’s conclusions and I think he overstates one of his arguments in particular, but he makes a convincing case that the major pro-nuclear establishments maintain a whitewash of the effects of radioactive pollution.
Kempe, 3:18 am:
Usmanov sent his lawyers after multiple publishers; the former hosts of this blog, and various football club Internet forums. In every case it was Craig’s allegations that he made them remove. But he never sued Craig, though (if he could have won) it would have been more efficient and it would have refuted the allegations rather than just partially removing them from view. So maybe your sarcasm was misplaced, eh?
Mr Scourgie
Do grow up.
And don’t be sanctimious – when have you ever advanced a detailed and coherent solution to any of the issues the Eminences evoke with such boring regularity?
Ps to Mr Scourgie, whp, on reflection, deserves a fuller reply:
“Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!
30 Jan, 2014 – 6:55 pm
Says:
“I really don’t know which of them I love more : obsessive Mary, sat in front of her laptop all day or Mr Scourgie with his foolish, pseudo-rational, pseudo-erudite quibblings (cf post at 14h12).”
Habbabkuk, your reply just goes to show, as always, that you and the other Zionist supporters on this blog are completely unable to justify their support for Israel and its policies.”
_______________________
I think my reply shows nothing more, and nothing less, than what I think of Mother Mary and her spiritual Son Dougie.
Here is a great piece by Edward S. Herman…
it’s a stunning put down of all the Gov. and Media war propaganda lies…And outlines many other ( besides Propaganda) Nato and rebel war crimes… i have selected some paragraphs…but the piece is about three times Longer… jam-packed with so much revealing info…a great insight to what really went on in Libya
NATO’s War on Libya – Not a Humanitarian Intervention
Review of Maximilian Forte’s book “Slouching Towards Sirte: NATO’s War on Libya and Africa”
Maximilian Forte’s book on the Libyan war, Slouching Towards Sirte: NATO’s War on Libya and Africa ( Baraka Books, 2012), is another powerful (and hence marginalized) study of the imperial powers in violent action, and with painful results, but supported by the UN, media, NGOs and a significant body of liberals and leftists who had persuaded themselves that this was a humanitarian enterprise. Forte shows compellingly that it wasn’t the least little bit humanitarian, either in the intent of its principals (the United States, France, and Great Britain) or in its results.
As in the earlier cases of “humanitarian intervention” the Libyan program rested intellectually and ideologically on a set of supposedly justifying events and threats that were fabricated, selective, and/or otherwise misleading, but which were quickly institutionalized within the Western propaganda system.
Resolution 1973 [R-1973], passed on March 17, 2011, which authorized member states “to take all necessary measures…to protect civilians and civilian populated areas under threat of attack in the Libyan Arab Jamahirija, including Benghazi, while excluding a foreign occupation force in any form…” Its fraudulently benign and limited character was shown by this exclusion of an occupation force, as presumably any actions under this resolution would be limited to aircraft and missile operations “protecting civilians.” Its deep bias is shown by its attributing the threat to civilians solely to Libyan government forces, not to the rebels as well, who turned out to greatly surpass the government forces as civilian killers, and with a racist twist.
As Forte spells out in detail, the imperial powers violated R-1973 from day one and clearly never intended to abide by its words. That resolution called for the “immediate establishment of a cease-fire and a complete end to violence,”
Both Gaddafi and the African Union called for a cease fire and dialogue, but the rebels and imperial powers were not interested, and the bombing to “protect civilians” began within two days of the war-sanctioning resolution, without the slightest move toward obtaining a cease fire or starting negotiations.
Forte shows that the factual base for Gaddafi’s alleged threat to civilians, his treatment of protesters in mid-February 2011, was more than dubious. The claimed striking at protesters by aerial attacks, and the Viagra-based rape surge, were straightforward disinformation, and the number killed was small—24 protesters in the three days, February 15-17, according to Human Rights Watch—fewer than the number of alleged “black mercenaries” executed by the rebels in Derna in mid-February (50), and fewer than the early protester deaths in Tunis or Egypt that elicited no Security Council effort to “protect civilians.” There were claims of several thousand killed in February 2011, but Forte shows that this also was disinformation supplied by the rebels and their allies, but swallowed by many Western officials, media and other gullibles.
So in this Kafkaesque world the rebels and NATO behaved just as the “international community” claimed Gaddafi would behave, and the civilian casualties that resulted from the rebel-NATO combination vastly exceeded anything done by Gaddafi’s forces, or any probable civilian deaths that would have resulted if NATO had stayed away.
This conclusion is strengthened by the fact that the rebels, from the beginning, pursued a race war. Forte stresses the importance in rebel actions of the hatred flowing from the rebels to Gaddafi forces and those deemed his supporters, which the rebels took to include anybody with a black skin. Many thousands of blacks were picked up by rebel forces, accused without the slightest proof of being mercenaries, and often executed. Among the many cases that Forte describes, in one a hospital was destroyed and dozens of its black patients were massacred. The largely black population of the sizable town of Tawargha was entirely expelled by the rebels. This racism pre-dates the 2011-2012 war, and resulted in part from Gaddafi’s policies reaching out to other African states, his relatively liberal treatment of black immigrants, and his inadequate counter-racist educational and economic-social policies that would alleviate distress at home. But Gaddafi was not a racist, whereas large numbers of the rebel forces (the “democratic opposition” in Western propaganda) were, and their successes, with NATO’s help, allowed them to perform as a lynch mob in many places (as Forte documents).
More on this piece @
http://www.globalresearch.ca/natos-war-on-lybia-not-a-humanitarian-intervention/5366780
BrianFujisan
No one on this blog is interested in the aspect of religion but I don’t think it’s helpful to describe the attacks on Black Africans working in Libya in Western style terms of racism.
The opponents of Gaddafi had embraced the last resort against their brutal apostate dictator, the acidic mix of Qaida and Western neo imperialism. Their grudge against black people was twisted for Western audiences who experience black people from the in Western inner cities clubbing and womenising into accusations of rape by black Africans for Western audiences.
The gripe that the desperate Qaida Libyans more likely had against the Africans was more likely sectarian, ie. they were either normal Sunnis, not in their Jihadist group of Islam, or, also sectarian, they were Sufi, and not in their group of Sunni Islam. And any way they were mercenaries being employed by their enemy Gaddafi. These are sectarian and political motives, such as we see in Syria now.
It is completely impossible to understand the events of the last 20 years without taking into account the sectarian/political divides between Zionist/Christians, Sufis, Muslim Brotherhood/Qiada, Salafis etc. Even Putin is Christian with strong ties to Israel, same as Obama and Cameron.
Geneva 2 was a short gasp for breath for the two sides, ChristianZionist Russia, Christian Zionist USUK, Muslim Zionist Al Qaida on the one side, and the Muslim people of Syria/ atheist dictator Assad on the other. The common element between the enemies of the Syrians is their coalition with Zionism. And that is a sect above everything. The common element of the other side is their nationality.
In the absence of a nuclear bomb on Jerusalem. The battle is about who is going to control Syria’s Islam, Assad’s nationalism or Israel’s neo-Calvin-Zio-spy-ism. Inshallah neither and Syria will choose another plan.
Thanks Alcanon and Clark. Will study further tomorrow (ie today).
Weaponized Malware [Software]
https://b2b-hosteddocs.s3.amazonaws.com/whitepapers/weaponized-malware.mp4
Guano…BrianFujisan
“No one on this blog is interested in the aspect of religion but I don’t think it’s helpful to describe the attacks on Black Africans working in Libya in Western style terms of racism.”
With respect…I can’t speak for the others on Craig’s Blog.. i can assure you however that you are far more interested in Religion than i am… i might have aspects of Spirituality that i can appreciate…. Zen… American First Nations..Buddhism… although i aint so sure i can keep strictly to Tenzin Gyatso’s Peace till you are eradicated policy….
You have Not took the time to read even my post properly… let alone go into the full article in my Link.
And as for “attacks” on Black Africans…I’ve seen images of what Libya’s Western Backed terrorist So called rebels, have done to Black africans…. Gaddafi encouraged Africans from many country’s into Libya…But not to string them up as soon as they got there…. Guano.. Geeez Peace eh …
The YouTube video of Craig in January 2009 is working again:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DkldhMYlRM
I expect YouTube has software that automatically reports videos that fail, and YouTube’s hackers get around to fixing them later. But if no one tries to play them the system doesn’t mark them as needing to be fixed.
Guano, there aren’t very many Sufis, are there? I read something years ago that Sufism is the mystical branch of Islam; is that so? I know you’re not keen on Sufism, but please tell me the Sufist stance on Sufism; you’re welcome to add your own criticism, but I’d like to know which is which.
I’m quite interested in mysticism in general because modern physics and maths have challenged the non-mystical way of thinking.
The difference between mystical and non-mystical thinking can be illustrated by considering the set of propositions which are equivalent to their own negations. The non-mystical view is that this set is empty. The mystical view is that this set is empty if, and only if, it isn’t empty.
Clark
Africa is awash with Sufism, with pilgimages to the graves of famous saints. I witnessed myself at a remote corner inside the mosque of the prophet SAW in Medina a man turning his prayer to his SAW grave, for which the man was lucky not to be beaten if the guards had caught him.
Sufism comes from the Arabic word wool, which does not occur in the Qur’an except for keeping warm. There are countless instructions in the Qur’an about important etiquettes like not lying and not ignoring the feelings of your neighbours. Sufism focusses entirely on the glowing satisfaction of the soul when exercising patience in adversity, and the worship of God, but neglects other important fundamentals such as including consideration of other people’s needs and frailties.
Clark, you always seek fairness on this blog, the fairness of doing to others as you would be done to. But is it fair to God who created the universe and our DNA etc etc to go and worship at the mortal remains of a human in the hope that they can intervene with your Maker? Not fair, not nice, not allowed, ever.
BrianFujisan
“As Forte spells out in detail, the imperial powers violated R-1973 from day one and clearly never intended to abide by its words. That resolution called for the “immediate establishment of a cease-fire and a complete end to violence,”
Both Gaddafi and the African Union called for a cease fire and dialogue, but the rebels and imperial powers were not interested, and the bombing to “protect civilians” began within two days of the war-sanctioning resolution, without the slightest move toward obtaining a cease fire or starting negotiations.”
I have had a very bad week. A Muslim brother tried to blackmail me into remaining silent about some unpleasant deeds of his in exchange for another favour I needed from him. I refused and it has cost me 240 quid. In Libya you had a community mercilessly tortured by the vassal of western imperialism Gaddafi, and a terrified community that had kept the dictator’s violence at bay by compromise, same as in Syria of course.
Why does the West torture? because they want to generate violence in their victims and turn it not against Western leaders but against their own people. Never look at the inflamed violence of the victims of torture without considering who tortured them, and caused them to direct their pain to others.
Blair and Cameron etc etc think they can operate secretly and remotely and stir up hatred amongst people without being noticed.
Has Straw been convicted of signing the requests for Libyan rendition yet????? The vile Cameron posed as a man of peaceful democracy when MPs voted not to support the US against Assad. The fact that he started the war with UK snipers and trains and supplies Qaida in Turkey is totally denied. He is a hung man who will be hung out to dry like the rest of them after the next election, like so many crows on a barbed wire fence.
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2010/9/1/1283364926011/Hands-on-hips-Tony-Blair.-001.jpg
I agree that modern maths and physics entail inconsistencies when pursued to their systematic extremes … but that’s some way short of endorsing the paradigm of “mysticism”.
Logical paradoxes are interesting because they imply our conventional way of understanding the world entails counterintuitive conclusions. They’re known as dialetheisms. By contrast, “mysticism” implies a fundamental ignorance about how the world works, opening the door to explanations in terms of non-physical spiritual intentions. The two should not be conflated. One is epistemological, the other ontological. Paradoxes depend on the categorical way we interpret words, and they imply an arguable mismatch between language and the interactive world of perception and action. But they don’t tear a hole in the fabric of known reality, as some hoopy froods would have you believe.
Doug No offence intended but I would prefer that you didn’t put up any quotes about me by the troll. He only comes back with more and even repeats the quote. I have already refuted his ridiculous assertion about my daily activities. I don’t know why you bother to engage with him. Like that silly BBC1 programme, he is ‘Pointless’.
‘Kerry to meet Ukraine opposition
US Secretary of State John Kerry is due to meet top Ukrainian opposition leaders at a summit in Munich, amid calls for the West to give it more support.’ BBC
What’s new? He is sticking his long fingers into yet another pie. I think he is more dangerous than La Clinton.
From:
Ukraine and the Rebirth of Fascism in Europe
By Eric Draitser
Global Research, January 31, 2014
http://www.globalresearch.ca/ukraine-and-the-rebirth-of-fascism-in-europe/5366852
‘For its part, the United States has strongly come down on the side of the opposition, regardless of its political character. In early December, members of the US ruling establishment such as John McCain and Victoria Nuland were seen at Maidan lending their support to the protesters. However, as the character of the opposition has become apparent in recent days, the US and Western ruling class and its media machine have done little to condemn the fascist upsurge. Instead, their representatives have met with representatives of Right Sector and deemed them to be “no threat.” In other words, the US and its allies have given their tacit approval for the continuation and proliferation of the violence in the name of their ultimate goal:regime change.
In an attempt to pry Ukraine out of the Russian sphere of influence, the US-EU-NATO alliance has, not for the first time, allied itself with fascists. Of course, for decades, millions in Latin America were disappeared or murdered by fascist paramilitary forces armed and supported by the United States. The mujahideen of Afghanistan, which later transmogrified into Al Qaeda, also extreme ideological reactionaries, were created and financed by the United States for the purposes of destabilizing Russia. And of course, there is the painful reality of Libya and, most recently Syria, where the United States and its allies finance and support extremist jihadis against a government that has refused to align with the US and Israel. There is a disturbing pattern here that has never been lost on keen political observers: the United States always makes common cause with right wing extremists and fascists for geopolitical gain.’
After that virtuoso performance on the floor of the Commons shilling for war on Syria, a certain Lithuanian has kept even lower than an envelope !! But the fear of the Day of Judgement is certainly not in the make up of John Kohn, who continues working on Ghouta 2.0, after the earlier version in which 400 alawite children were murdered to serve as props for the gas false flag failed.
Yes the ‘known” realty of the one we profess and interpret.
Which is defined and propogated by the revolutionary and reactionary.
As it should be.
@ BlackJelly
“…, a certain Lithuanian has kept even lower than an envelope..”
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Could this be a reference to Sir Malcolm Rifkind, by any chance?
I admire your self-restraint in not calling him a Lithuanian Jew.
The thought occurs to me that if some one considers Sir Malcolm Rifkind still to be a Lithuanian, then that same someone would presumably consider a Afghan, Iraki or Kurd who has acquired British citizenship – eg through naturalisation – still to be an Afghan, Iraki or Kurd (which implies, inter alia, that revoking his or her British citizenship would not render that person stateless)?
Boris Johnson on the introduction of water cannons:
“When you have something kicking off like that [riots] you do not let it get [out of] control, you get medieval immediately on those people and you come down much harder and you do not allow a mentality to arise of sheer wanton criminality, which is what you saw take place,”
If Viktor Yanukovych said that would our trusted media (and some commenters here) not condemn him as a “beast” or something?