June 2009

Say hello to today’s vomit-inducing video. Watching this depraved garbage boiled my blood, because I know firsthand the serious damage it can do.

I still remember singing similar crap during my primary school days in Qatar. Only years later did I come to realize the negative effects it had on my thinking.

The video has over a million views on YouTube, and the show is apparently becoming very popular in the Arab world.

For all of you non-Arabic speakers, the girl is singing:

When we seek martyrdom, we go to heaven.

You tell us we’re small, but from this way of life we have become big.

Without Palestine, what does childhood mean?

I’m glad many Arab writers have written articles condemning the sickening dangerous nature of this show.

The people responsible for producing it and broadcasting it should be exposed and condemned. Shame on them. Shame on all of them.

It’s disgusting.

And it reinforces the notion that the Palestinian issue (while an important and worthy cause) is somehow the main source of the many problems of the Muslim world, when it’s clearly not.

I mean seriously, how the hell are we supposed to build healthy functioning societies, when we teach our children to value death more than life? Heck, why study? Why become entrepreneurs and create employment? Why engage in something constructive?

Naaa, too hard. It’s too much work. Might as well just blow up ourselves, skip judgment day, and go straight to heaven. Lots of candy. So much of it there in paradise, it’s actually better than Disney Land.

Screw life. Yeah, screw it.

Death baby, oh yeah.

Here I come, wooohoooo!

Rabbi Manis Friedman is certainly one hell of a lovely nut. To all you American Islamophobic super right-wing nuts reading this right now, let this be a reminder that the cherry picking of verses from sacred texts happens on all sides.

Here’s a wonderful example from the American Jewish magazine, Moment, highlighted nicely by Avveroes Press.

Moment is an American Jewish magazine “dedicated to serious, highly-literate, intellectual journalism.” Unfortunately, its current issue carries a contribution that seriously tarnishes the magazine’s claim to an intellectual discourse.

The magazine posed a question to several Rabbis ranging from Humanist to Conservative and Reform to  Reconstructionist.

The question was “How Should Jews Treat Their Arab Neighbours?” and the answers ranged from deep empathy towards Palestinians to philosophical and theological.

Rabbi Fred Schindler Dodd  wrote:

“…what about “love your neighbor as yourself” (Lev. 19:18)? Arabs and Jews are by necessity neighbors and will be in any ethical scenario. By tradition (Torah and Quran alike) we’re more than neighbors, we’re kin?and though cousins fight, they’re still family.”

Nice, high five Rabbi Fred. I can respect the values and morals of your interpretation. Okay, now we come to the not so nice part.

Rabbi Manis Friedman of the Bais Chana Institute of Jewish Studies answered:

I don’t believe in western morality, i.e. don’t kill civilians or children, don’t destroy holy sites, don’t fight during holiday seasons, don’t bomb cemeteries, don’t shoot until they shoot first because it is immoral.

The only way to fight a moral war is the Jewish way: Destroy their holy sites. Kill men, women and children (and cattle).

… Zero tolerance for stone throwing, for rockets, for kidnapping will mean that the state has achieved sovereignty. Living by Torah values will make us a light unto the nations who suffer defeat because of a disastrous morality of human invention.

Yikes!

I’d love to see Rabbi Manis thrown together with some fanatic Talibani nut for a special episode of… The Holy Room. They’d make really good friends.

Asshole.

The suspects in the murder of John Granville, who worked for USAID, have been found guilty and sentenced to death.

KHARTOUM (AFP) – A Khartoum court condemned four Islamists to death on Wednesday for the 2008 killing of a US diplomat and his Sudanese driver, as the US embassy warned of possible retaliation over the verdict.

Judge Said Ahmed al-Badri sentenced the four to be hanged for the murders.

A fifth man, who had provided the other defendants with the weapon but did not take part in the murder, was sentenced to two years in prison.

… Federal Bureau of Investigation officers from the United States had helped to investigate the killings which sent shockwaves through the sizeable Western community in Khartoum, a city usually considered one of the safest in Africa.

Again, I must stress that when this murder occured, the vast majority of Sudanese were vocal in their condemnation. Nobody wants crimes like this to be come a trend, except for the jihadists types of course who are a tiny minority.

Here’s to justice being served in elsewhere.

*Cough* Darfur *cough, cough* … Hey, I can dream, can’t I?

The drama continues unabated in Iran, and Twitter has now become an active battleground apparently getting infiltrated even by the Iranian security apparatus.

To get a sense of what’s happening, watch this video.

To understand how Twitter and new media are such a central part of the psychological warfare getting waged by both sides, read this and watch this video.

More on leveraging Twitter to help Iranian activists here.

Yay to cyberwar.

Yours truly will update this post shortly with his reaction to the speech. Let’s just say I was pleased it didn’t excessively venture into La La Land territory, which is nice. Plus, many parts of it were surprisingly candid and straight forward.

Anyways, me will be back with more.

Meanwhile, you can dive in and drop your reaction. Good thing Mr. President mentioned Darfur once.

UPDATE: Been crazy busy, but had time to drop a quick comment here. If you’re curious about where Obama got some of his ideas for the speech especially in regards to which Quranic veses to use, then find out here. Meanwhile, me is keeping track of the situation in Iran.

Virtually all my Iranian friends (at least those who are not apathetic and who voted, the majority), are pretty pissed off at what happened, and rightly so. If one word can describe their fight both online and offline at protests, then it’s this.

Inspiring.

According to them, this time it’s different, and unlike any unrest before since the revolution took place. So, let’s see what happens, and how Obama will respond.

Here’s to hoping that filthy bitch called Ahmadinejad gets kicked out. While the lovely Mullahs and supreme leader will remain, it will still be a positive outcome.