All posts tagged: Middle East

They Did Not Kill Just Gaddafi…

Published by Saswat Pattanayak

They could not annihilate Africa. So they killed Gaddafi. They could not devastate a collective aspiration for freedom from imperialism. So they killed Gadhafi. They could not forever shatter the promises of internationalism, socialism, Arab nationalism, and third world liberation. So they killed Gaddafi. They could not resolve the capitalistic contradictions in their home states, the Wall Street occupiers and the occupiers in London and Madrid, and in Paris. So they killed Gaddafi. They could not address the sheer crisis of masculinity their elected presidents and prime ministers struggled with, while their democratically elected leaders raped their interns and approved inmates being assaulted in their prison systems. So they killed Gaddafi. They could not justify their political assassinations of numerous heads of states who defied their atrocities, from Patrice Lumumba to Dr. Mohammad Najibullah, or of their murdering former allies that disagreed with them later from Saddam Hussain and Osama bin Laden to Anwar al-Awlaki – among hundreds of thousands others, without any due course of justice or legal recourses. So they killed Gaddafi. They …

Media Lies and Libyan Lives

Published by Saswat Pattanayak

Although corporate western media have been reporting more than 50,000 dead in Libya – from the assaults of Gaddafi’s army – the reality is not even more than a couple of hundred bodies have been found so far. And what is more ironic is that over 49,800 bodies are missing, right under NATO supervision. This leads to critical questions: a) If 50,000 were actually killed, where are the bodies? b) Who must be held responsible for the missing bodies, considering that Gaddafi regime has nothing to do with post-mortem or morgues? c) If indeed less than 200 were allegedly killed by Gaddafi regime, and that the 50,000 number is fictitious, who are responsible for such gimmick? If the reported number of dead in Libya appears to be hundreds of times more than the actual dead, there should be nothing surprising about it. For decades now, western corporate media have been feeding the masses with blatant lies and sheer propaganda in the name of free press and balanced journalism. In due course of repeated slogans heralding …

Free Market War on Gaddafi: Unjust, but Natural

Published by Saswat Pattanayak

By Saswat Pattanayak The war against Libya is a continued assault on part of the imperialist and rogue nations of the First World against the champions of anti-imperialism, anti-colonialism and progressive socialism of the Third World. Contrary to corporate media spins, the war is neither about oil money, nor about installing democracy. It is neither about the rebel uprising in the Arab world, nor about merely ending a dictatorial regime. The war against Libya is an attack on every remnant of collective human aspiration for freedom, peace, justice and equality. The war against Libya is a war against every future possibility that can enable international solidarities among peoples who envision a better world that belongs not to oligarchs and media monopolists, but is shaped up by the ideas of the internationalists, the pan-Africanists. Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s demand for the United States of Africa does not manifest in a Utopia. Quite the opposite: it is a scathing indictment of an unequal world whose mammoth immoralities are deep-rooted in an oppressed Africa. The only way the world’s …

Arab World Witnessing Anarchy, Not Revolutions

Published by Saswat Pattanayak

Events in parts of North Africa and the Middle East have been heralded as ‘revolutions’. The levels of optimisms surrounding political restructuring apparently crafted by the ‘people’ themselves are defining. Some observers have even gone to the extent of declaring these mass movements as byproducts of Facebook and Twitter activists. In a world craving sensationalistic news, these demonstrations have more than provided for the fodder. In times of large-scale global political corruptions, these protests are being characterized as new hopes. In our continued saga of drab and visionless compromises with oppressive status quo, these uprisings are revolutions, romanticized. However, if peoples’ history is any teacher, not everything might be as rosy or revolutionary in the recent events. Of course, two out of 17 countries where people took to the streets, witnessed regime changes within just a couple of months; and there might be even more such upheavals, no doubt. But clubbing all these countries together into one imaginary crisis block whose people are purportedly revolting to break free and that, they are desiring to adopt …

Ahmadinejad is the Leader the World needs Now!

Published by Saswat Pattanayak

By Saswat Pattanayak Obama administration has two vital interests in Iran: continuation of war and imperialistic expansion. And neither of these remotely relate to establishment of a democratic society or any other fanciful distractions that most Americans are being spoon fed to believe in through their reactionary media propaganda. In fact, a democratic society already exists in Iran. It is more vibrant and expressive than many other nations, including that of the United States. Iran’s democracy is so vibrant and strong that it has been able to produce a visionary leader such as Dr Mahmoud Ahmadinejad – a leader who has singularly challenged the capitalistic hegemonic barbarism inflicted upon the world through Wall Street scamsters, whereas on the other hand, as a starkly unfortunate contrast, these are the conmen that President Obama has been sheltering from day one of his taking over the office at White House. Ahmadinejad is a leader of global influence whose stands against American militarism and Israeli occupations have widest reverberation among the majority in the world. Ahmadinejad has also been …