China warns US strategic bomber in East China Sea

Peter Symonds

In another sign of continuing high regional tensions, the Chinese military issued a warning on Wednesday to a US strategic B-1B bomber flying over the East China Sea. The bomber was one of two B-1Bs deployed from Guam to take part in massive joint military exercises—Foal Eagle and Key Resolve—underway in South Korea.

US Pacific Air Forces spokesman Major Phil Ventura told CNN the bomber entered an Air Defence Identification Zone (ADIZ) proclaimed by Beijing in 2013 but not recognised by the US and its allies. Ventura claimed that Chinese officials told the B-1 pilots the plane was operating illegally in Chinese airspace and ordered it to leave. The pilots responded by saying they were conducting routine operations in international airspace and did not deviate.

While described as “routine” by US officials, the presence of an American strategic bomber off the Chinese mainland is an obvious cause for concern to the Chinese military. According to CNN, the aircraft was flying about 130 kilometres southwest of South Korea’s Jeju Island, which is approximately 500 kilometres from Shanghai.

The B1-B was designed as a nuclear strategic bomber but, as of 1995, is no longer equipped to carry nuclear weapons, according to the US military. It is, however, a long-range, super-sonic bomber capable of carrying a huge payload of 34 tonnes of bombs, precision-guided munitions, missiles or naval mines. The B1-B is an integral component of the Pentagon’s AirSea Battle strategy for war with China that envisages massive air and missile attacks on Chinese military and communications.

South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported that two B1-Bs flew in formation with South Korean fighter jets and took part in simulated bombing missions at the Kunsan Air Base. A South Korean official told the media the deployment was of “great significance” and the joint operations “improved interoperability of US-South Korean fighting power.” The bomber also participated in joint training with the Japanese air force.

The deployment took place amid a tense standoff on the Korean Peninsula as more than 320,000 South Korea and American military personnel continued two months of war games that are a thinly-disguised rehearsal for conflict with North Korea. Since 2015, US and South Korean forces have adopted a new strategy for fighting war against North Korea, known as OPLAN 5015. It includes “pre-emptive” attacks on the north’s nuclear, military and industrial facilities and “decapitation raids” to kill its leadership.

Newsweek reported that US and South Korean soldiers this week staged a two-day exercise to simulate an attack on a North Korean chemical weapons laboratory. The “Warrior Strike 6” drill involved the insertion of infantry and armoured units via Black Hawk and Chinook helicopters to storm an imitation village.

The Foal Eagle war games also involve the US aircraft carrier, the USS Carl Vinson, and other naval warships. The anti-ballistic missile destroyer, the USS Stethem, arrived in South Korea last week and today is due to become the first American warship to dock in South Korea’s newly-constructed civilian-military complex on Jeju Island. While built by South Korea, the complex is part of the Pentagon’s restructuring of its basing arrangements in Asia in preparation for war with China.

The annual joint military exercises have always provoked opposition from North Korea, which has responded this year with a series of ballistic missile tests. The Trump administration, which is currently engaged in a review of US strategy toward North Korea, has seized on the missile launches to justify the US military build-up in Asia, including the deployment of a Terminal High Altitude Area Defence anti-ballistic missile system in South Korea, and to make menacing threats toward Pyongyang.

During his trip to Asia last week, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson declared in South Korea that “all options” were on the table to counter North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs. The American media has reported that pre-emptive military strikes on North Korea, as well as “regime-change,” were among the options being considered. While in Beijing, Tillerson undoubtedly used these threats to try to bully the Chinese government into taking tougher measures against North Korea, its neighbour and ally.

US and South Korean officials are speculating that North Korea could be on the brink of a sixth nuclear test. Two unnamed US officials told CNN yesterday that “specific intelligence indicators” based on satellite imagery show Pyongyang is ready to carry out another test at its Punggye-ri underground test site. Weeks of extensive surface activity, involving vehicles, personnel and equipment, have stopped.

The North Korean nuclear program, which has been accompanied by spine-chilling threats against the US and its allies, will do nothing to defend the North Korean people. Instead, it sows divisions in the international working class. Another nuclear test would play straight into the hands of the Trump administration and feed the clamour in Washington for reckless and provocative US action against Pyongyang.

Last week, Tillerson said Trump would not continue the Obama administration’s policy of “strategic patience”—that is, the imposition of tougher and tougher sanctions, accompanied by a refusal to talk to Pyongyang unless it ended its nuclear and missile programs. The US secretary of state also ruled out negotiations with North Korea, leading to the conclusion that Trump and his cabinet of generals, billionaires and fascists are contemplating actions that could lead to war on the Korean peninsula.

The death toll in Korean War between 1950 and 1953 was in the millions. One estimate put the number of soldiers and civilians killed or missing for South Korea at 1.2 million and for North Korea at 1.1 million. In addition, China suffered 600,000 soldiers killed or missing and the United States 36,000.

The Pentagon is now preparing for a war, with far more devastating weapons, that would likely draw in other major powers. CNN reported: “Privately, US commanders have said any pre-emptive strikes by the US would likely result in a North Korean attack on Seoul, leading to disastrous consequences.” Yet that is exactly what US and South Korean forces are currently rehearsing for—including with the deployment of B1-B bombers.

The freeing of Hosni Mubarak and the lessons of the Egyptian Revolution

Johannes Stern

Former Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak was officially released from prison yesterday. His lawyer provocatively informed the public that the 88-year-old had left the military hospital in the Cairo district of Maadi and had breakfast at his family’s home in the east of the Egyptian capital with some friends.

The ruling of the court of appeals is final. In early March, Egypt’s supreme court cleared Mubarak of any responsibility in the deaths of 800 demonstrators who were killed by his security forces in the first days of the Egyptian revolution. Before Mubarak was ousted on February 11, 2011, after 18 days of mass protests, he had ruled the country with an iron fist with the full support of the imperialist powers for thirty years.

The freeing of Mubarak is symbolic of the counterrevolution that has developed since the bloody military coup of July 3, 2013 against Islamist president Mohammed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood. Less than four years later, the new military rulers in Cairo, with the encouragement of the Western powers, have fully rehabilitated their former leader and are suppressing the Egyptian masses with even more brutal methods.

The junta led by the US-trained General Abdel Fatah al-Sisi has incarcerated more than 40,000 opponents of the regime and condemned more than 1,000 to death. Shortly after the coup, according to Human Rights Watch, the “worst incident of extrajudicial mass killings in Egypt’s modern history” took place. The army and police stormed two protest camps set up by regime opponents and killed over 1,000 people, including women and children.

How is it possible that six years after the Egyptian revolution nothing appears left of it, and Mubarak, the ugly face of the old regime, is once again free to show himself in public? Who bears political responsibility for this, and what are the political lessons for the coming class conflicts?

The key to answering these decisive questions, which confront the working class in Egypt and internationally, is to be found in a study of the Russian revolution. In his lecture “Why study the Russian Revolution?,” David North, chairman of the World Socialist Web Site International Editorial Board, explained the decisive precondition for the victory of the working class:

“The movement of the Russian working class, supported by a revolutionary uprising of the peasantry, assumed gigantic dimensions in 1917. But no realistic reading of the events of that year permits the conclusion that the working class would have come to power without the leadership provided by the Bolshevik Party. Drawing the essential lesson of this experience, Trotsky later insisted: ‘The role and the responsibility of the leadership [of the working class] in a revolutionary epoch is colossal.’ This conclusion remains as valid in the present historical situation as it was in 1917.”

The Egyptian revolution was without doubt a gigantic uprising, and the working class was its driving force. On January 25, 2011, tens of thousands of people flooded the streets of Cairo and other major industrial cities. On January 28, the “Friday of anger,” ever-growing numbers of demonstrators beat back Mubarak’s notorious security forces in street battles. In the days that followed, millions demonstrated throughout Egypt. On February 7 and 8, a wave of strikes and factory occupations, which broke out across the entire country, delivered the decisive blow to Mubarak.

The working class continued to develop as the decisive revolutionary force after February 11. In the days immediately following Mubarak’s overthrow, there were between 40 and 60 strikes per day. More strikes occurred in February than in all of 2010. Strikes and social protests continued to increase during 2012 and 2013. However, what was missing in Egypt, unlike Russia, was a political leadership with a revolutionary program.

The WSWS warned workers from the outset of the revolution against any illusions in the democratic character of the bourgeoisie. David North wrote in a February 1, 2011, perspective: “As always in the opening stages of a revolutionary convulsion, the slogans that predominate are of a generally democratic character. The ruling elites, fearing the approach of the abyss, seek desperately to maintain what they can of the old order. Promises of ‘reform’ slip easily from their lips…

“However, the sort of democratic unity proposed […] will offer nothing of substance to the working class, the rural poor and broad sections of the youth who have come out into the streets. The vital needs of the broad masses of Egyptian society cannot be realized without the most far-reaching overturn of existing property relations and the transfer of political power to the working class.”

The strategic perspective that guided the Russian working class’s seizure of power in October 1917 was the Theory of Permanent Revolution developed by Leon Trotsky. It stated that in countries with a belated capitalist development, the democratic revolution could only be realized through the conquest of power by the working class and as a product of the socialist revolution. And it further stated that the victory of a revolution in one country was only possible based on an international strategy to unite workers around the globe.

The Egyptian revolution confirmed the perspective of permanent revolution in the negative. Every section of the bourgeoisie proved itself to be a counterrevolutionary force at every stage of the revolution by collaborating with imperialism and defending the same essential class interests as the military. This applies equally to the now outlawed Muslim Brotherhood as well as “liberal” bourgeois parties. Examples of this are Mohammed El Baradei’s National Association for Change or the Nasserite Popular Current of Hamdeen Sabahi.

The most treacherous role was played by petty-bourgeois pseudo-left groups like the Revolutionary Socialists (RS), which is aligned internationally with the International Socialist Organization in the United States, the Socialist Workers Party in Britain and sections of the German Left Party. In every phase of the revolution, they worked to subordinate the working class to one or another faction of the bourgeoisie.

Immediately following Mubarak’s overthrow, they boosted illusions in his generals and claimed that the military, under the leadership of Mohamed Tantawi, would implement social and democratic reforms. As mass opposition to the military increased, they backed the Muslim Brotherhood. RS proclaimed the Islamists to be the “right-wing of the revolution” and called for the election of Mursi in the presidential election. When Mursi won, they celebrated this as a “victory for the revolution” and a “great success against the counterrevolution.”

When mass protests then broke out against Mursi in 2013, the RS swung back behind the military. They described the Tamarod alliance, which was financed by the military and intelligence services, as the “road to the accomplishment of the revolution.” The military coup, which was the basis for al-Sisi’s counterrevolutionary regime of terror, was described initially by them as a “second revolution.”

RS now fears that the junta’s repression and the mounting social catastrophe could provoke a new revolutionary upsurge of the workers. In a recent statement, RS declares, “We need to rebuild the social and political opposition to the regime and its policies, through political organizations, workers’ unions, youth and student organizations and political fronts that can unite the forces of the 25 January revolution.”

In other words, they are persisting with their disastrous policies, subordinating the working class to “unity” with the parties and organizations of the bourgeoisie.

The key question of the Egyptian revolution remains the construction of an Egyptian section of the International Committee of the Fourth International and the anchoring of the perspective of permanent revolution in the Egyptian working class. The study of the Russian Revolution must serve as the preparation of revolutionary struggles by the working class in Egypt and around the world.

Zunde Africa Fund for Student-Led Startups 2017

Application Deadline: 1st May 2017.

Eligible Countries: African countries

About the Award: ZAF was founded by Yale University alumni who share a common vision and passion for African development. Its mission is to enable and accelerate growth of promising African startups while helping them fulfill their stated economic and social goals.

Type: Entrepreneurship

Eligibility:  

• Are you an ambitious, smart, dedicated and passionate youth entrepreneur?
• Do you have a business that you’ve successfully launched or that you are thinking of launching? Do you need additional investors for your business? Do you want to be connected to mentors and work to grow your business? Do you have what it takes?
• Zunde Africa Ventures (ZAV) is looking for passionate student-entrepreneurs across Africa who are ready to take their businesses to the next level. ZAV has just opened up applications to businesses to invest in between March 20th and May 1st 2017.

Value of Program: Not specific

Duration/Timeline of Program: 

1. Our team will evaluate each application and request for more information from each team as needed by June 5th 2017.
2. On or before June 20th 2017, we will let teams know if they qualify for the final round.
3. Qualifying teams will be invited to meet (in person or via Skype) with ZAV reps from July 15th 2017.
4. The winning team(s) will be selected by August 5th 2017.

How to Apply: See link below

Visit Program Webpage for details

Award Provider: Zunde Africa Fund

Government of Russia Scholarships for South African Students 2017/2018

Application Deadline: 1st April 2017.

Eligible Countries: South Africa

To be taken at (country): Russia

Fields of Study: Applications from all qualified candidates in any field will be accepted, but priority will be given to applications for postgraduate studies, previously disadvantaged applicants and applicants in the following fields:

• – Biotechnology
• – Climate change
• – Economics and management
• – Engineering sciences
• – Maritime studies
• – Natural and physical sciences
• – Nuclear and renewable energy
• – Space science and technology

Applicants are required to do their own research into available programmes, institutions and programme-specific entrance criteria. The programmes and institutions available under this scholarship are listed at www.russia.study

The final decision on admittance to institutions is made by the Russian institution and the Russian Government. Scholarships may therefore be awarded to study at institutions outside of an individual’s preference.

About the Award: Most programmes are instructed in the Russian language and applicants with no command of Russian are required to take the college preparatory courses for one year before pursuing major studies. Only after passing the examinations of the college preparatory course can they start their degree studies.

Type: undergraduate (Bachelors) or postgraduate (Masters or PhD)

Eligibility: 

• South African citizens in good health with a strong academic record.
• Available to study in Russia from September 2017
• Demonstrated interest in Russia and commitment to the development of South Africa.
• Applicants must have a minimum average of 60%
• All students must meet the minimum academic requirements for entry into a similar programme at a South African university.

Selection Criteria: The Department of Higher Education and Training is facilitating the scholarship application process. It is the responsibility of each applicant to do research into available programmes, institutions and programme-specific entrance criteria.

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Scholarship: The Russian Government provides the following:

• – Tuition,
• – Basic monthly allowance

The South African Government provides the following (subject to the availability of funds):

• – One return economy airfare
• – Monthly living allowance
• – Annual medical insurance

Successful scholarship applicants will be required to sign a contract and return to South Africa upon completion of studies.

How to Apply: The application process is two-fold:

1. Complete the DHET application form and email it with all supporting documents to Internationalscholarships@dhet.gov.za by 01 April 2017.
2. Shortlisted candidate will be required to complete the Russian Scholarship application online at www.russia.study and submit a completed medical examination form (medical tests to be done at applicants own cost). Only candidates who are notified that they are shortlisted need to complete the online application and undergo a medical test.

By email: Subject: Russia Scholarship Application, [Your surname]
Internationalscholarships@dhet.gov.za

If attachments exceed 3MB, they will not be received. Please contact us regarding an alternative means to submit.

Enquiries: email: internationalscholarships@dhet.gov.za

 Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: Government of Russia, South African Government

Important Notes: 

• Do not submit any other documents not requested.
• Incomplete applications will not be considered.
• Medical examination documents are not required with your initial application. Only recommended candidates will be requested to submit medical examination documents including HIV/AIDs test results after interviews have been conducted.

ASC Leiden Visiting Fellowship Programme for African Researchers 2017

Application Deadline: 1st July 2017.

Eligible Countries: African countries

To be taken at (country): The Netherlands

About the Award:  Visiting research fellows use their time in Leiden for data analysis and/or writing, often on a joint project with one or more ASCL staff members and with Africanists at other institutes or faculties of Leiden University. Apart from the regular visiting research fellowship programme, the ASCL also offers a joint fellowship programme with the IIAS (International Institute for Asian Studies). Read more about the fellowship programme with IIAS (See in link below).

Type: Fellowship, Research

Eligibility: 

• At the time of applying, the applicant must hold a PhD with a focus on Africa.
• The applicant has to be fluent in English and/or French.
• The applicant must have an active academic career.
• The applicant must have recently published books and/or articles that meet international standards (at least three published articles in the past five years).
• The research fellowship must contribute to interfaculty collaboration at Leiden University.
• Preference is given to candidates employed by an African research institute with which Leiden University already has an MoU or aspires to have an MoU in the framework of the Leiden African Studies Assembly.
• In accordance with visa regulations, applicants must be able to return to their country of origin after their fellowship.

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Fellowship: A research fellowship includes:

• A return ticket (economy class).
• A daily stipend to cover living expenses.
• Accommodation in Leiden: a fellow is provided with his/her own bed/sitting room (suitable for one person only). Kitchen and bathroom are to be shared with a maximum of two other fellows (male/female). If the offered accommodation is unaccaptable for the fellow he/she is requested to look for alternative accommodation him/herself. Alternative accommodation will not be paid for by the fellowship.
• A medical/liability insurance (please note that this insurance does not cover the cost of treatment of a pre-existing medical condition).
• The use of (shared) office facilities and of library facilities.

Duration of Fellowship: A visiting research fellowship is for a maximum of 90 days.

How to Apply: You can apply for a 90 day visiting fellowship by completing the application_form and returning it, with the requested attachments, to: LeidenASA@asc.leidenuniv.nl

Visit Fellowship Webpage for details

Award Provider: Leiden University, The Netherlands

Gbowee Peace Foundation Africa Scholarship for Women in Liberia, Nigeria and Ghana 2018 – University of Dundee

Application Deadline: 13th November 2017

Eligible Countries: Liberia, Nigeria or Ghana

To be taken at (country): Scotland, UK

Eligible Fields of Study: All

About Scholarship: The candidate should be aware that this scholarship is the University’s investment in the sustained growth of an individual and the betterment of a community at large. The candidate should indicate how she will use the studying abroad experience and the postgraduate qualification to locally or globally promote holistic transformation, facilitate equal access to opportunities for all, and encourage a peaceful, reconciled and empowered population in her home country.

Type: Taught Year Masters

Eligibility: Criteria for awarding the scholarship is as follows:

• The applicant must be a Liberian, Nigerian, Ghanaian country national citizen
• The applicant must be permanently resident in Liberia, Nigeria or Ghana at the time of application
• The applicant must be female
• Applicants will be selected on the basis of their merit and potential evidenced by their personal statement.

The awards will be given to students who are undertaking a one year taught masters programme at the University of Dundee, in the academic year 2016-17 (January 2017 entry).

Applicants should already have been offered a place at the University of Dundee and should have firmly accepted that offer or be intending to do so. We have a full list of our postgraduate courses, including details of how to apply, online.

Selection Criteria: 

• Preference will be given to a candidate who has shown evidence of upholding the ethos of the Gbowee Peace Foundation Africa through sustained personal growth, involvement in community development, and a strong commitment to the advancement and education of women and youth in her home country.
• It is recommended that the candidate provide examples or a personal narrative that highlight leadership qualities, personal fortitude, and active participation in developing meaningful opportunities which lead to the social, educational, and/or spiritual advancement of the disadvantaged.
• The successful candidate should be prepared to use the scholarship not only as an educational experience but also as a chance to become immersed in another culture, while fostering understanding of her own country and culture amongst students and the local community of Dundee.
• The applying candidate should address how she hopes to become involved in University or local societies, activities, and/or organisations, and how she will support discourse about issues women face globally.

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Scholarship: up to a total of £20,000 for Tuition and living expenses

Duration of Scholarship: 1 year

How to Apply: Download the Gbowee Peace Foundation Africa Scholarship Application Form

1. Complete the application form above
2. To complete the application process you must complete the form and submit all relevant documentation and return by email to Gillian Sharp at the University of Dundee contactus@dundee.ac.uk
3. Please type Leymah Gbowee Scholarship in the subject area of the email.

(Applicants will also be required to provide proof of their African citizenship and permanent residence)

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: University of Dundee and Gbowee Peace Foundation

Ghana, Kenya & Nigeria – University of Stirling International Masters Awards 2017/2018 – Scotland

Application Deadline: 31st August 2017

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries in Africa: Ghana, Kenya and Nigeria

Other countries: Canada, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Malaysia, Norway, Oman, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, Singapore, Thailand, USA

To be taken at (country): Scotland, UK

Eligible Field of Study: Courses offered at the University

About the Award: As part of the University’s ongoing commitment to supporting academic achievement and encouraging student diversity, the University of Stirling is pleased to offer an awards scheme for international postgraduate students.

The University will not make multiple awards to an individual student. In cases where a student qualifies for more than one University scholarship or award, the award of the highest financial value will be confirmed.

Type: Masters  taught

Eligibility: 

• Candidates who are self-funded and liable to pay tuition fees at the overseas rate.
• Awards are available for students domiciled in, or nationals of these countries, subject to meeting country-specific academic criteria as outlined below:
  • Ghana – minimum Second Class Honours (Upper Division)
  • Nigeria – minimum Second Class Honours (Upper Division)
  • Kenya – minimum Second Class Honours (Upper Division)

Number of Awardees: Unlimited

Value of Scholarship: £3,000 reduction in the overall tuition fee payable

Duration of Scholarship: Duration of course

How to Apply: Students from eligible countries will automatically be assessed for an International Postgraduate Award as part of the admissions process; there is no separate application required for this award. Students who qualify for award will be notified by Admissions, once academic offer conditions have been met.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: University of Stirling, UK

US Government Teaching Excellence and Achievement (TEA) Program 2017 for International Teachers

Application Deadline: Each country sets its own application deadlines. Please inquire from the US Embassy or Fulbright commission in your country or territory for deadline information.

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: See list of countries below

To be taken at (country): USA

About the Award: TEA is a six-week customized academic program that includes seminars on curriculum development, lesson planning, instructional technology, and new teaching methodologies. Fellows participate in a practicum in a US secondary school, working closely with US teachers and students. The program provides cultural enrichment, mentoring, and support.

Type: Short courses/Training

Eligibility: Details for this program may vary by country. In general, applicants must meet the following criteria:

• Current secondary school-level,* full-time teacher in an institution serving primarily a local population;
• A bachelor’s degree or equivalent;
• Five or more years of classroom experience as a teacher of English, English as a foreign language (EFL), mathematics, science, or social studies, including special education teachers in those subject areas;
• Proficient in written and spoken English with a TOEFL score of 450 on the paper-based TOEFL or an equivalent English-language examination;**
• Demonstrated commitment to continue teaching after completion of the program; and
• A complete application.

*Secondary-level teachers include both middle and high school teachers working with students between approximately 12 and 18 years of age. Teachers responsible for teaching additional grade levels must teach middle school or high school students more than 50% of their work time in order to be eligible for the program.

**A limited number of participants with TOEFL scores between 425 and 450, or equivalent, will be accepted for the program in a special cohort that will include additional English-language training as part of the professional development program.

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Scholarship: The Teaching Excellence and Achievement Program is fully funded pending availability of funds

Duration of Scholarship: 6 weeks

Eligible Countries: Algeria, Argentina, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Belarus, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Burma, Cambodia, Cameroon, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cote d’Ivoire, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt,  El Salvador, Estonia, Georgia, Ghana, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, India, Iraq, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Malawi, Mali, Moldova, Mongolia, Mozambique, Nepal, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Panama, Peru, Russia, Rwanda, Senegal, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, Uruguay, Venezuela, Vietnam, West Bank/Gaza, Zambia, Zimbabwe. 

How to Apply: APPLY NOW

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider:  Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) of the US Department of State.

The Mosque That Disappeared

Robert Koehler

We committed a quiet little war crime the other day. Forty-plus people are dead, taken out with Hellfire missiles while they were praying.

Or maybe not. Maybe they were just insurgents. The women and children, if there were any, were . . . come on, you know the lingo, collateral damage. The Pentagon is going to “look into” allegations that what happened last March 16 in the village of al-Jinah in northern Syria was something more serious than a terrorist takeout operation, which, if you read the official commentary, seems like the geopolitical equivalent of rodent control.

The target was “assessed to be a meeting place for al-Qaeda, and we took the strike,” a spokesman for the U.S. Central Command explained. The strike involved two Reaper (as in Grim Reaper) drones and their payload of Hellfire missiles, plus a 500-pound bomb.

The target, at least according to human rights organizations and civilians on the ground, was a mosque during prayer hour.

“U.S. officials said the strikes . . . had killed ‘dozens’ of militants at a meeting of the terrorist group,” according to the Washington Post. “But local activists and a monitoring group reported that at least 46 people died, and more were trapped under rubble, when the attack struck a mosque during a religious gathering. . . . Photos from the area showed rescue workers pulling mangled bodies from a mound of rubble.”

One local resident told AgenceFrance-Presse: “I saw 15 bodies and lots of body parts in the debris when I arrived. We couldn’t even recognize some of the bodies.”

During the 30 seconds of attention the story garnered, the controversy was whether it was a mosque that was hit or a building across the street from a mosque. The Pentagon even declassified a photo of the bombing aftermath, showing that a small building near the ghastly bomb crater was still standing. However, according to The Intercept: “Activists and first responders say the building that was targeted was a part of the mosque complex — and that the charred rubble shown in the photo was where 300 people were praying when the bombs began to hit.”

Anyway, the news cycle moved on. My initial thought, as I read about the bombing, which was not described as a massacre or slaughter in the mainstream headlines, but remained an “incident,” is that the media have a default agreement on morality: Killing’s OK as long as it’s emotionless, coldly rational and strategic (even if mistakenly so). This is the American way. Coldly strategic murder can be reported in such a way that it fits into the global infrastructure of safety and the control of evil.

But killing is bad if there’s passion involved. Passion is easily linked to “extremism” and wrongthink. The man killed this month by police at Paris’ Orly Airport, for instance, had cried, “I am here to die for Allah — there will be deaths.”

This fits neatly into the moral certainty of the Western world. Compare this to military PR talk, also reported in The Intercept: “The area,” according to a U.S. Navy spokesperson, “was extensively surveilled prior to the strike in order to minimize civilian casualties.”

In both cases, the perpetrators foresaw dead bodies left in the wake of their action. Nevertheless, the American military machine carefully avoided the public’s, or the media’s, moral disapproval. And geopolitics remains a game of good vs. evil: as morally complex as 10-year-old boys playing cowboys and Indians.

What I had not foreseen was how quickly the story would disappear from the news cycle. It simply couldn’t compete with the Trump cacophony of tweets and lies and whatever else passes for the news that America consumes. This adds a whole new dimension of media indifference to the actual cost of war, but I guess no nation could wage endless war if its official media made a big deal out of every mosque or hospital it (mistakenly) bombed, or put human faces on all its collateral damage.

I write this with sarcasm and irony, but what I feel is a troubled despair too deep to fathom. Global humanity, led by the United States of America, the planet’s primo superpower, is devolving into a state of perpetual war. It has caged itself into unending self-hatred.

“The way in which U.S. militarism is taken for granted,” Maya Schenwar writes at Truthout, “mirrors the ways in which other forms of mass violence are deemed inevitable — policing, deportation, the genocide and erasure of Indigenous peoples, the exploitative market-driven health care system, the vastly inequitable education system and disastrous environmental policies. The generally accepted logic tells us that these things will remain with us: The best we can hope for, according to this narrative, is modest reform amid monstrous violence.

“We have to choose,” she says, “life-giving priorities over violent ones. We have to stop granting legitimacy to all forms of state violence.”

Yes, yes, but how? The necessity of war has not been challenged at official levels of power in this country in more than four decades. The corporate media grants legitimacy to state violence more by what it doesn’t say than by what it does. Bombed mosques simply disappear from the news and, voila, they never happened. Liars had a global forum to promote the invasion of Iraq, while those who questioned it had to loose their outrage from street corners. “Collateral damage” is a linguistic blur, a magician’s cape, hiding mass murder.

And Donald Trump is under the control of the militarized far right as well as his own clueless immaturity. Of course his new budget, released, as Schenwar points out, on the anniversary of the My Lai Massacre, ups the military allotment by $54 billion and gouges social spending. As we protest and write letters to Congress and express our shock and awe at what is happening, let us keep in mind that Trump merely puts a face on America’s out-of-control militarism. He didn’t create it.

For the protests against his budget cuts to be effective, for the roiling turmoil to matter, a new country must be in formation.

The Headscarf is Not an Islamic Compulsion

Ayesha Khan

As the relationship between growing migrant Muslim populations and the western nations that host them grows increasingly complex, the controversy over the dress code for Muslim women has taken on an alarmingly central role.  The recent European Court of Justice (ECJ) decision, which has ruled that bans on headscarves (and other religious symbols) in the workplace can be legal, is only one in a series of judgements on this controversial matter.

While the ECJ has leaned towards religious neutrality and against the display of religious symbols in the workplace (including, for instance, the Christian cross), the United States Supreme Court, recently ruled to the contrary.  In the case of Equal Employment Opportunity Commission v Abercrombie & Fitch (2015), the US Supreme Court ruled 8-1 in favour of the hijab-clad employee, despite the employer’s claims that her headscarf clashed with the company’s dress policy.  Only the dissenting judge, Justice Thomas reasoned as the ECJ has, that the dress code was a neutral policy and could not be the basis for a discrimination lawsuit.  Even in the United States, however, the outcome of such cases is not always clear.  In 2012, for example, a hijab-wearing employee who had sued Disneyland, did not succeed against her employer.

Legal decisions aside, the issue of the hijab seems to have become a bone of contention between those in the West who see the increasing number of headscarves around them as a cultural invasion and those among the often young Muslim population who see it as a symbol of resistance.  Instead of an essential religious dictate, however, the hijab is more of a desperate attempt to forge an identity that has largely been displaced as a result of migration.

Women in Muslim-majority countries who veil or cover their hair often do so because of familial, or in the case of Saudi Arabia and Iran, state pressure.  Ironically, women who wear the hijab in the West often choose to do so.  While women in the Middle East may be wrapping themselves in additional garments to ward off the prying eyes of men dominating the bazaars and workplaces, some Muslim women in the West have told me that they find the hijab liberating and empowering.

As someone who grew up partially in Saudi Arabia and witnessed firsthand the oppression of women that comes through forcing the veil upon them, that is indeed a strange concept for me to digest.  The constant conflation of Muslim women and the headscarf in the western media is therefore something that I find quite disturbing.  There are countless observant and pious Muslim women who do not cover their hair.  On the other hand, there are also those who wear the hijab but aren’t particularly interested in following some of the more fundamental dictates of Islam.

For generations we have learned that in order to be true to the Muslim faith one must affirm that there is one God and that Muhammad is his messenger.  The Quran repeatedly stresses the importance of being steadfast in prayer and of giving alms to the poor, to feed the needy and to take care of orphans.  Not once does the Quran mention the hijab, or headscarf, explicitly as an Islamic necessity.

There are a few verses in the Quran that advise a modest dress code but to borrow a line from the renowned Pakistani film, Khuda ke liye(For God’s sake), “How can a religion that is meant for all time and all peoples insist on  one particular uniform?”

Certain Islamic scholars from countries as diverse as Pakistan, Egypt and Morocco have affirmed the view that what is modest is subject to interpretation and discretion and does not necessarily include a head-covering.

Paradoxically, at a time when significant numbers in the West are growing resentful of headscarves and most unfortunately some of this intolerance has manifested itself in the form of hostile Islamophobic attacks on hijab-clad women, the fashion industry is rushing to embrace the hijab.  Realising the monetary potential of marketing to brand-conscious hijabi millennials, Nike Pro Hijab, priced at $80, is the latest addition to jump on the “modest fashion” bandwagon.  Dolce and Gabbana have gone several steps further, with their ostentatious daisy print hijab and abaya collection, aimed undoubtedly at the residents of the oil-rich Gulf Arab states, they accessorise with statement handbags and sunglasses that could set you back thousands of dollars.  Modesty anyone?

Keeping the controversy alive, a few months ago, Playboy magazine featured its first hijab-wearing Muslim woman.  For her supporters, this was a “bold case for modesty” and perhaps another milestone in breaking barriers for those wearing headscarves.  But to me, this was akin to turning the entire concept of hijab on its head.  Though the Quran does not dictate a precise form of dress for men or women, it does ask both to be discreet and modest and not to draw unnecessary attention to oneself.  An often-quoted verse asks both men and women “to lower their gaze and guard their private parts”.  Playboy of course has historically been associated with the exact opposite of this philosophy.

The concept of Islamic modesty therefore is not meant to test boundaries or provoke identity clashes with a wider society but simply to maintain decorum, respect and harmony between men and women.  As Muslims in the West, we would be better off focusing on the more basic and uncontested tenets of our religion and finding common ground with other Abrahamic faiths based on shared principles, such as providing for the needy and helping the downtrodden.

Slaughtered Arabs Don’t Count

Bruce Mastron

From the Guardian on Wednesday:

“An airstrike by the US-led coalition against Islamic State on a school west of the Syrian city of Raqqa has killed at least 33 people, many of whom had fled nearby fighting, sparking further concerns that new rules of engagements may be causing an increase in civilian casualties.

“The attack follows a separate US strike on a mosque complex in the north-west of the country last Saturday that killed at least 52 people. The incident triggered fears that a White House-ordered review of rules governing the use of drones had already given military planners more flexibility on ordering strikes.”

A thank you to the Guardian for covering this extraordinary story.

But the reaction by most of the Western media, including the New York Times?

Meh.

The reaction to the London attack Wednesday in which, not counting the attacker, left three people dead?

Banner headlines and constant updates.

The death of civilians is a crime which should never be tolerated.

But apparently more for some than others.

I’ve spent 30 years in journalism, so I know the closer a story gets  — and “closer” includes the same type of people as opposed to foreigners in a supposedly distant land — the greater and longer the treatment.

And some may say that because the London attack happened outside Parliament, it merits even more outrage.

But why is Parliament more sacred than a haven for refugees or a mosque?

And where are all the world leaders offering condolences to the dead Syrian children and other civilians killed by their very own governments?

Sadly, as we all know, this is really nothing new.

But this disproportionate coverage of Europeans versus Arabs — pretty much inversely proportional to the actual death counts — hides a crucial lesson that we just can’t seem to learn.

These attacks are not unrelated.

I have no idea — and I suspect the Western experts don’t either yet — if the London attack was a direct response to the recent civilian slaughters by the West in its battle against the Islamic State.

But regardless of the direct motivation, the mass murders of innocents in the Middle East by the West go at least as far back as the first “Gulf War.”

(They go much further back, but let’s start with the battle against an Iraqi dictator we helped put in and then keep in power.)

Would there have been this most recent attack in London — or even an Islamic State for that matter — without all the endless Western war crimes against Muslims for almost three decades?

Until we — and that includes the media we in the West rely upon — mourn the deaths of the innocents our governments kill as much as the deaths of innocents killed by our enemies, the bloodshed will never end.

And all too likely only get worse.