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Showing posts from January 25, 2015

Australia's Jihadis

Bassima El Baf is inconsolable. Her four sons have left the safety of their Australian home for the violent chaos of a war that seems a world away from Sydney. I feel sick, I can't speak any more, I can't eat… Every day I go and hug their bed and their clothes … I cry, cry, cry. Bassima El Baf, mother of four sons who went to fight in Syria The brothers, who told their parents they were going to Thailand, sent a text message saying "see you in paradise". The El Baf boys are believed to be among the latest young Australians to travel to Syria to fight, and their parents can not understand why. Australia contributes one of the largest number of foreign fighters per capita from any country outside of the Middle East to the conflicts in Syria and Iraq.  They are taking up arms for known terrorist groups like ISIL. Many of them are young, second-generation immigrants who grew up in Australia, far from the war-torn countries that their parents fled. The Australian governmen

Yuval Noah Harari: the theatre of terror

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Yuval Noah Harari Saturday 31 January 2015  08.00 GMT As the literal meaning of the word indicates, terror is a military strategy that hopes to change the political situation by spreading fear rather than by causing material damage. This strategy is almost always adopted by very weak parties, who are unable to inflict much material damage on their enemies. Of course, every military action spreads fear. But in conventional warfare, fear is a byproduct of material losses, and is usually proportional to the force inflicting the losses. In terrorism, fear is the whole story, and there is an astounding disproportion between the actual strength of the terrorists and the fear they manage to inspire. It is not easy to change the political situation through violence. On the first day of the battle of the Somme, 1 July 1916, 19,000 members of the British army were killed and another 40,000 wounded. By the time the battle ended in November, both sides together had suffered more than a million cas

Sisi vows to defend Egypt's Sinai in 'face of terror'

Egypt's president promises to defend region, two days after a string of attacks left dozens dead. Egypt's president has vowed to defend the Sinai peninsula in the 'face of terror' after an armed group linked to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) claimed responsibility for killing dozens of soldiers and civilians. President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi made the declaration of Saturday two days after a string of attacks left 45 people dead. "We will never leave Sinai," Sisi said. "Sinai is ours. Sinai will not seperate from Egypt unless all of us are killed." In a veiled reference to the Muslim Brotherhood, Sisi blamed the now outlawed group for the fighting. "I’ve said it before and I will say it again, we are fighting the strongest secret organisation of the last two centuries," he added. The 'Sinai Province,' previously known as Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, claimed responsibility for Thursday's attack, saying it was retaliating a

Canada announces new anti-terror law

The new law will allow anyone suspected of being involved in a terror plot to be detained without charge for up to seven days. Canada announced a new anti-terror law that will allow anyone suspected of being involved in a terror plot to be detained without charge for up to seven days. The law announced Friday will also make it a crime for people to call for a terrorist attack, even if they don’t make a specific threat, and empower Canada’s spy agency to thwart attacks directly in a significant expansion of their powers. Work on the law began in October after a gunman killed a soldier at Canada’s national war memorial and then stormed Parliament. The attack in Ottawa came two days after a man, said to be inspired by the Islamic State group, ran over two soldiers in a parking lot in Quebec, killing one and injuring the other before being shot to death. The new law still has to be passed in Parliament but Harper’s Conservative government has a majority of the seats so passage is all but e

2 held on charge of spreading Maoist thought

The police on Friday arrested two persons on the charge of sympathising with Maoists and spreading their ideology. Activist Jaison C. Cooper was detained from his house at Mattancherry, whereas lawyer and human rights activist Thushar Sarathy was arrested from Kozhikode where he was attending a public protest meeting. Jaison Cooper was produced in court and remanded in police custody. Thushar Sarathy is expected to be produced in court on Saturday. Both have been charged under various sections of the law, including Section 13(b) of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act for abetting unlawful activities. Source http://m.thehindu.com/news/national/kerala/2-held-on-charge-of-spreading-maoist-thought/article6841145.ece/

Maoist threat halts train movement through Bihar

Thousands of passengers had a harrowing time after the movement of trains running between Howrah and Sealdah and various parts of north India, including New Delhi, came to a standstill for over 8 hours following a Maoist threat, officials said on Saturday. Top railway officials said about two dozen trains were stranded at various stations or re-routed between Friday night and early morning Saturday after the cabin man of Bhaluhi railway halt on the Danapur-Howrah section was threatened and forced by group of Maoists not to give the green signal required to facilitate train movement. East central railway zone's chief public relations officer Arvind Rajak said a group of 10 Maoists accosted the cabin man, identified as Dinesh Arya, around 10:30pm on Friday and forced him to cease signalling. The railway halt is in Jamui district of southeastern Bihar, which has for long been a hotbed of violent Maoist activity. In June 2012 nearly 100 suspected Maoists had attacked the Dhanbad-Patna

Maoist group spotted in Kerala border

Kochi: In a major breakthrough in the hunt for Maoist trace, visuals of the ultras proving their presence in the Kerala-Tamil Nadu border is out. Manorama News obtained the visuals of a five-member group of Maoists, which included a woman, resting in the Bankithapal forest region near Silent Valley. The Forest officials had recorded the visuals on January 25 and it has been transferred to the Tamil Nadu authorities. Notorious Maoist leaders, Jayesh, Kanyakumari and Mahalingam have been identified in the visuals. It is the first time that visuals clearly showing Maoists have been obtained. Meanwhile, the police have prepared a list of people who provide assistance to the Maoists. The list carries names of 17 extremists including Jaison Cooper, who has been arrested with charges of anti-national activities. Intelligence inputs revealed that the Maoist sympathisers in Kochi were planning to hold a meeting on February 6 to call for stiff resistance against police. The Maoists are said to b

Britain’s Sky News TV Portrays Ukraine’s “Far Right” Neo-Nazis as “Heroes

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On January 22nd, Rupert Murdoch’s Sky News (Murdoch founded it, his son James headed it for a while, and their 21st Century Fox owns  “a controlling stake”  in it) telecast a puff-piece for Ukraine’s right-wing extremists, several times calling them “heroes” to “patriotic” Ukrainians. This segment of their documentary series “Ross Kemp: Extreme World,” was titled “Ukraine: The Rise of The Right.”  In it, Ukraine’s “far right” are described as being patriots who are protecting all of Ukraine from a Russian invasion, and who are therefore being increasingly admired by Ukrainians. It  says : “The ultras [ultra-rightists] are actually patriotic young people who are ready to fight — not only on the Maidan, but also at the war for our land. … These men — seen now by many as heroes — are fighting for the Azov Battalion in Mariupol, Maryinka and Iliovaisk.” The message is that whereas these far-rightists were previously despised, they now are widely respected: “Just a few years ago they were o

Heil Kitty: weaponising cuteness to shame neo-Nazis

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You can’t help but wonder what  Astrid Lindgren  – the social democrat and creator of feminist hero  Pippi Longstocking  – would make of Herr Nilsson. Not her Herr Nilsson (Pippi’s monkey companion), but the anonymous Swedish street artist who recently painted a scene of swastika-raising cartoon characters on the wall of an old glue factory. Then again, the artist Herr Nilsson has always combined the childish and the controversial – from his  gun- and knife-wielding Disney princesses  on the street corners of Stockholm, to a mural of Mickey Mouse raising the peace sign at Osama bin Laden, and the latest paintings of Hello Kitty characters raising a swastika and burning a heart-printed flag, sugar-coated shock is Herr’s stock in trade. Cinderella, by Herr Nilsson “I’m always looking for strong symbols and iconic images from history and popular culture,” says Herr. “Then I put them together to give them new meaning.” In the case of Burning Love and Hell Kitty, the political meaning is al