May 2019
Some 144 people have been executed since US-client Field Marshal Sisi seized power in 2013
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Some 144 people have been executed since US-client Field Marshall President Abdul Fatah el-Sisi seized power overthrowing the elected President Mohammad Morsi in July 2013, the Times reported on Sunday (May 26). More than 2,440 people have been sentenced to death in Egypt since President Sisi began a crackdown on opposition after coming to power six years ago, according to new figures released by UK-based human rights group Reprieve. Read More
Hate crimes against minorities continue in the aftermath of Modi’s landslide victory
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: While the entire country was seeing a video clip of Muslim youths being thrashed black and blue on the suspicion of carrying beef, Prime Minister Narendra Modi was addressing a meeting of National Democratic Alliance’s newly elected members of Parliament, Times of India reported. On May 22, the day before counting of votes, three Muslims, including a couple, were beaten up by cow vigilantes in Madhya Pradesh. Self-proclaimed gau rakshaks thrashed them after getting a tip-off that a Muslim couple and one other youth, travelling in an auto, were carrying beef in Seoni, Madhya Pradesh. The video of the incident, which went viral on social media, showed goons descending on the youths with sticks as onlookers stood by. They also forced the youth to chant ‘Jai Shree Ram’ slogans while forcing one of the youths to beat the woman who was accompanying them. Read More
It is a Confluence of Civilizations: Beijing Conference refutes Huntington's Clash of Civilizations worldview
By Abdus-Sattar Ghazali: China hosted a two-day Conference on Dialogue of Asian Civilizations (CDAC) to boost exchanges and mutual learning among Asian civilizations. The CDAC theme was "Exchanges and Mutual Learning among Asian Civilizations and A Community with A Shared Future."It brought together more than 2,000 government officials and representatives of various circles from 47 Asian countries and other nations outside the region. Alluding to Huntington argument, Chinese President Xi Jinping told the conference: "No civilization is superior over others. The thought that one's own race and civilization are superior and the inclination to remold or replace other civilizations are just stupid.” Read More
India's "Far Right, Hate Filled" 2019 Election Results Puts 200 Million Muslims in Danger
By Abdus-Sattar Ghazali: Washington Post: Modi's win is a victory for a form of religious nationalism that views India as a fundamentally Hindu nation and seeks to jettison the secularism promoted by the country's founders; The Guardian: Indian politics has likely entered a new era of Hindu nationalist hegemony fuelled by Modi's extraordinary popularity; New York Times: Narendra Modi is one of the most divisive leaders in India. These are some of the headlines of leading newspapers about the landslide victory of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party securing a commanding parliamentary majority in the largest democratic exercise in history. Read More
Undeterred by US sanction threat, Turkey to buy Russian S-400 missiles
By Abdus-Sattar Ghazali: Turkey is preparing for US sanctions after going ahead with the purchase of Russian military hardware, Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said Wednesday (May 22). The White House has threatened sanctions under the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA), which prohibits business activities with Russia's intelligence and defense industry. US Ambassador Tina Kaidanow, who serves as acting assistant secretary of the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs at the State Department, said in July that the White House wants US allies to understand how serious the White House is when it comes to them acquiring Russian military hardware. Read More
Christchurch mosques attacker charged with terrorism
By Abdus-Sattar Ghazali: New Zealand police Tuesday filed a terrorism charge against white supremacist Brenton Tarrant accused with killing 51 worshippers in attacks on two Christchurch mosques in March 2019. The offense carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment. It's a test case for New Zealand's terror law, which was enacted in 2002 following the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States. It is the first time a person has been charged in New Zealand with an act of terror under this law. Read More
Berkeley University study of Islamophobia in India highlights plight of Muslims
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: The last decade has witnesses intensified attacks on Muslim, Christian, Sikh and ‘lower castes’ in India, according to a study released recently by the University of California, Berkeley. This first of its kind report on the status of Islamophobia in India is meant to provide a groundbreaking collection of evidence and provide a reference point for all future work on the subject. “Within the past decade, the level of targeted violence against Muslim, Christian, Sikh and ‘lower castes’ has intensified in India and with the arrival of the BJP into national office facilitating its deployment through all structures of the state against demonized and vulnerable groups,” the report said. Read More
Victim of IMF debt trap, Pakistan compelled to seek new loan
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: After appointing an ex-IMF official as Finance Minister and another ex-IMF official as State Bank of Pakistan Governor, the government of Pakistan has assured the International Monetary Fund (IMF) of increasing electricity and gas prices and to eliminate the subsidy given to the consumers. On May 12, 2019, it was announced that IMF and Pakistan have reached an agreement. Dr. Abdul Hafeez Shaikh, the new Finance Minister, announced that Pakistan would receive $6 billion worth of assistance under the IMF program over a period of three years. Besides the IMF assistance, Pakistan will also receive additional funds worth nearly $2-3 billion from institutions like the World Bank and Asian Development Bank, Dr. Shaikh added. Read More
Making sense of the Sri Lankan Tragedy
By Dr. Habib Siddiqui: Terrorism terrorizes people. Its aims are political and social, even when its methods are violent.There is no denying that terrorism has become an important phenomenon in our time and needs to be eradicated. Nothing can justify or excuse an act of terrorism, whether it is committed by hate groups, religious or ideological fundamentalists, private militia - or whether it is dressed up as a war of retaliation by a recognized government. It is high time for the human race to dig into its wells of collective wisdom, both ancient and modern, to find a way out of this spiraling morass of terror and brutality that threatens us today. Read More
Terrorist attacks in Balochistan: The Indian Factor
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: The restive Balochistan, the largest province of Pakistan, has witnessed two terrorist attacks within three days. For decades, Pakistan has accused India of meddling Balochistan and its separatist insurgency. Tellingly, in February 2014, just three months before he was appointed India’s national security advisor, Ajit Doval tacitly acknowledged this. “You do one more Mumbai, you lose Balochistan,” he said. Doval was referring to Pakistan’s alleged involvement in the 2008 Mumbai attacks, which killed over 172 people and injured over 300. In August 2016, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said : “The time has come when Pakistan shall have to answer to the world for the atrocities committed by it against people in Baluchistan." Not surprisingly, in March 2016 Kulbhushan Sudhir Yadav, an Indian intelligence officer, was arrested from a compound in Mashkel, in Balochistan, in an area not far from Iranian border. It was revealed that Yadav used to visit Pakistan and lure Baloch students to carry out anti-national and other destabilizing activities by offering huge funding. Installations in coastal areas of Gawadar, Pasni, Jevani and other places in Balochistan were the target of Yadav. Read More
After the Christchurch massacre
Gihan Shahine: Many Muslim worshippers living in the West fear that mosques could be attacked this Ramadan as the curtains come down on March’s white supremacist shootings in New Zealand. Prime Minister of New Zealand Jacinda Arden’s message of love was not so much directed to Muslims alone as to all humanity since she said that most of the victims were immigrants who “chose to come” to New Zealand where they “chose to raise their families” as “a haven from hatred, racism, extremism, and that is why they became a target”. There is a consensus that the recent shootings in New Zealand were a violent manifestation of white supremacist ideology and xenophobia that did not occur in a vacuum. The 28-year-old Australian murderer who committed the crimes described himself on social media as representing “Europeans and whites in a battle against immigrants” whom he insisted on calling “invaders”. His posts were widely circulated on social media and expressed his deep “hatred for Islam”. There is also almost a consensus that the rise of extreme right-wing groups in Europe and US President Donald Trump’s anti-Muslim rhetoric have boosted anti-Muslim sentiments that peaked in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. It remains questionable, however, whose voice will ultimately prove louder: that of white supremacy and right-wing extremism, or that of inclusion and the work against hate crimes, xenophobia and Islamophobia. Will the Christchurch tragedy deal a permanent blow to white supremacy and hate crime? Or will hate crime and Islamophobia find more supporters, especially in the light of the recent wave of immigrants, or what extreme right-wing politicians have dubbed “invaders”, who have arrived in Europe seeking refuge but who have been accused of seeking to change the identity of or to “Islamise” Europe? Read More
Erdogan condemns 'Israeli terrorism' for bombing Turkish news agency in Gaza
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has fiercely condemned what he called “Israeli terrorism” after the Gaza office for the Turkish news agency was destroyed during the latest round of hostilities between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants. “We strongly condemn Israel’s attack against Anadolu Agency’s office in Gaza,” Erdoğan said on twitter and added: “Turkey and Anadolu Agency will continue to tell the world about Israeli terrorism and atrocities in Gaza and other parts of Palestine despite such attacks.” Read More
Trump working to designate the Muslim Brotherhood as a 'terror' group
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: After declaring the Iranian Revolutionary Guards as a foreign terrorist organization, the Trump administration is working to designate the Muslim Brotherhood a foreign "terrorist" organization. "The president has consulted with his national security team and leaders in the region who share his concern, and this designation is working its way through the internal process," White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Tuesday (April 30). Tellingly, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps was declared a terrorist organization at the request of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Donald Trump is likely to declare the Muslim Brotherhood a terror group at the suggestion of Egyptian President Field Marshal Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. Read More
Istanbul conference addresses Islamophobia
AMP Report: The second International Conference on Islamophobia, organized by the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA) at Istanbul Sabahattin Zaim University (IZU), was held under the theme Islamophobia: Analyzing its Discourses and Geopolitics, will see world renowned experts on the subject discussing various facets of the growing problem of Islamophobia. Last year’s conference was themed Contextualizing Islamophobia: Its Impact on Culture and Global Politics. The three-day event featured over 20 renowned speakers and scholars. Read More
The dangers of growing Islamophobia
By Dr. Sami Al-Arian: Over the last two centuries, different political actors around the world –including the United States, China, Russia and the Zionist state – have used Islamophobia to expand or consolidate their political power. Indeed, the geopolitics of Islamophobia refer not only to its political-economic dimensions but also its functional use as part of various strategic imperatives and tools employed by regional and global powers to advance colonialist objectives, imperial expansion or narrow self-interest. It is therefore of vital importance to imbue in the public mind, particularly among the young generations, the notion that Islamophobia is not just about religious prejudices or social exclusion but more importantly, an essential feature of the global racial hierarchy that may be adapted in different contexts to assert hegemony or achieve superior power, control and wealth. Read More
The Journal of America Team:
Editor in chief:
Abdus Sattar Ghazali
Senior Editor:
Prof. Arthur Scott
Special Correspondent
Maryam Turab
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