Hamsin

It has not been a real good week in the Islamic world. Syrian tanks surrounded the northern Syrian city of Jisr al-Shughour and after uprooting olive groves, started indiscriminately shelling their own people, killing an estimated 1200 countrymen, including many women and children. On June 5, whole units of the army reportedly defected en masse in Jisr al-Shughour, and used their weapons to defend the unarmed protesters. Over 120 of these soldiers were killed defending their countrymen from the iron fisted Alawite autocracy.

According to this defector's account from Time Magazine, the Army was instructed to leave Homs and "sweep the towns," starting at al-Serminiyye and continuing five kilometers north to Jisr al-Shughour. "We were told that we were doing this to capture armed gangs, but I didn't see any. I saw soldiers indiscriminately shooting people like they were hunting, burning their fields, cutting down their olive trees. There was no resistance in the towns. I saw people fleeing on foot to the hills who were shot in the back."

There have been numerous reports of widespread rape and news that an old Syrian proxy, Hezbollah, is being used by the regime as snipers against the Syrian people, according to various reports. From the Jerusalem Post:

One soldier said the "cleansing" in Rastan in Homs caused him to defect. "We were told that people were armed there. But when we arrived, we saw that they were ordinary civilians. We were ordered to shoot them," he said.
"When we entered the houses, we opened fire on everyone, the young, the old... Women were raped in front of their husbands and children," he said, predicting that there were some 700 deaths, although this has not been verified.
Another soldier, Khalaf, told AFP that in a town near the Turkish border, "a professional soldier pulled out his knife and stabbed a civilian in the head, for no reason."
He said he decided to flee after he saw militiamen open fire on people. "When they started shooting people, I dropped my gun and fled," he said, claiming that around 25 people were killed in a demonstration last week.
Khalaf's brother, Ahmed said after witnessing violence in Homs, "I realized that the regime is prepared to massacre everyone." He said he and other soldiers considered revolting against the army forces, but were too fearful.
Ahmed added that "when the soldiers do not shoot, they shoot the soldiers down," claiming that the Assad regime has deployed snipers from the police or the Hezbollah militia.

Approximately 83 defectors were found beheaded in a mass grave. Over 10,000 refugees have fled the country. This is not the first time that Syria has set its crosshairs on its own people, since they killed between 10,000 and 40,000 in the town of Hama in February of 1982.

Neil Sammonds of Amnesty International says that dozens of children have been killed in the Syrian conflict - nearly 10 percent of the 1,060 known deaths of civilians, more than doubling UNICEF's previous estimate of 30 on June 1. A second teenager was found to have been horribly tortured and disfigured this week.

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In Bahrain, the monarchial regime is trying 47 doctors and nurses of trumped up charges of stealing medicine and stockpiling arms and forbidding the mention of any abuses they may have received while in detention. Dr. Ali al Ekri, an orthopedic surgeon, and Rula al Saffar, the head of the nursing society, said their confessions were extracted after they'd been tortured. They said they had to sign the papers while blindfolded. The Bahrainis have been harassing and imprisoning opposition political figures. The government charged two moderate politicians, Jawad Fairooz and Mattar Ebrahim Mattar, Shiites who quit their seats in parliament to protest the government crackdown, with inciting hatred against the regime and speaking to the news media. A 20-year-old female poet, Ayat AlQurmezi, was sentenced to a year in prison for reciting anti-government verse during the demonstrations.

Of course, much of the crackdown is being performed by our ally the Saudis, their troops went into neighboring Bahrain on March 5th to assist with the repression and brutal beatings and have never left.

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In Iran, on June 12th, Iranian police swinging clubs chased protesters and made arrests on Sunday to disperse hundreds of people who gathered in the capital to mark the second anniversary of President Ahmadinejad's disputed re-election. There are also new reports of the American hikers being tortured in Iranian prison.

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In an effort to restore relations with the Pakistani Intelligence Service, the United States gave up two Pakistani bomb making facilities this week. By the time authorities came to seize the facilities, the perps had been tipped and fled the scene.

In Peshawar, the death toll from the Saturday market twin suicide bombings is now at 34 with 80 injured.

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The new cabinet in Lebanon announced today by new P.M. Najib Mikati is dominated by ministers from Shiite Syrian/Iranian proxy Hezbollah. The same Hezbollah that is now in front of an international tribunal investigating its complicity in the killing of the old Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

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Five people were killed, many injured in a suicide bombing yesterday in the Iranian port of Basra. Today there was a dreadful suicide bombing in Baquba, about 65 kms north from Baghdad, an attack that killed eight, as the forces of jihad start a new intense wave of indiscriminate killing.

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In Jordan, from the New York Times:

Youths clashed with riot police officers during a visit by King Abdullah II to Tafileh, a long-neglected tribal area 125 miles south of the capital, in a rare outburst of anger surrounding a royal event. About 30 riot police officers were hurt and five police cars were burned. Youths in Tafileh had been protesting against corruption and had wanted to meet the king, left, a request that was denied. A government spokesman said the clashes occurred as people rushed to salute the king. In a nod to protesters the king pledged Sunday that in the future the government would be elected, rather than appointed, but he set no timetable for the change. 

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 I could continue on to Egypt or the Sudan very easily, probably get around to the Tajiks and elsewhere. Story of sufi repression in today's Los Angeles Times, the suicide bombers, including a 14 year old kid, blew the mosque up last summer. But I think it unnecessary. It would be quite difficult for one to either name a democracy in the middle east or north africa, or find another society whose citizens have such little regard for human life. Rape, torture, beheadings, honor killings, the killings of innocents because they don't practice the proper version of the Islamist creed, we only tolerate or should I say expect this sort of behavior for one particular group of people. Basques, Tamils and Irish Republicans have been really quiet lately. But people die violently every day in the middle east, unfortunately including American soldiers. Not to mention the tribal fratricide.

Now what I find interesting is that all the normal voices that constantly condemn the actions of that other democracy in the middle east, are so silent when the arabs start killing each other.  Doesn't fit their favorite narrative. The English, the Gaza lift people, J Street, AlterNet, Naomi Klein, the Chomskyheads, Hamasheads, the liberals, where are their voices today? Have you ever heard of a jewish soldier raping? Beheading? Torturing children? I don't recall ever hearing about the citizens of the Warsaw Ghetto suicide bombing, it would be totally contrary to any religious law or law of decency.  Not a lot of women getting stoned in Israel either, except maybe near Uncle Mustache Cafe at Damascus Gate. In fact the catholics and the lutherans haven't been in a shooting war for several hundred years, by my reckoning. Most cultures evolve.

Why is this kind of violence and hatred so endemic in islamic and arabic culture? It surely can't all be Israel's fault. Why have these people accepted totalitarian monarchies and dictatorships in the 21st Century. Of course the Unites States hands are dirty as well, when we support the head and heart and wallet of the Wahabists, Saudi Arabia and turn the other way when she and the neighborhood countries start repressing their citizenry.

Soft headed do gooders make a faulty assumption when they seek to imprint their western prejudices on the world at large. They convince themselves that certain civilizations can be tamed to conform with western standards of decency and human values. If you really can't see any difference between us and them we have very little to talk about. Or you haven't been paying attention.