Archive
Who is Aafia Siddiqui’s husband? Majid Khan or Ammar al-Baluchi? –> More US media lies and deceptions on the issue.
Just read a news on reuters about aafia siddiqui, 5 feet week lady, allegedly linked with al-qaida and serving 86 years imprisonment for snatching a gun from 3 strong marines in prison and in the process getting herself shot without having any finger prints on the gun (according to trial reports and testimony of fbi agent in the court). First USA media was saying Ammar Al-Baluchi is Aafia’s husband and now they are saying Majid Khan is her husband? We also need an open trial in Pakistan to see who is her husband? It seems they are not consistent in their 9/11 lies and deception.
Even the bogus wikipedia entry on her still says Al-baluchi as her husband and many US media sources of that time (though her family denies any of these reports). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aafia_Siddiqui
Justice, humanity and peace loving people in USA should raise their voice on the issue.
Something relevant to current times, written in Nazi days by Pastor Martin Niemoller :
First they came for the communists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.
Update : Reuters have recognized their mistake and have now edited the story with a note at the end : (In para 12, removes incorrect description of Aafia Siddiqui as Khan’s wife; she is not his wife)
British Parliamentarians for public inquiry into Dr. Aafia Siddiqui’s conviction–>APP
Source : http://ftp.app.com.pk/en_/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=96105&Itemid=2
LONDON, Feb 10 (APP): Describing the conviction of Pakistani neuroscientist Dr.Aafia Siddiqui as “miscarriage of justice”, British Parliamentarians have called for withdrawal of case against her and repatriation to Pakistan. At a function organised at the House of Lords on Tuesday evening to raise support for the incarcerated Dr. Siddiqui, Lord Nazir Ahmed together with other speakers said her trial in New York was full of flaws and not based on facts.
They sought the intervention of the US leadership and demanded a fair trial based on real facts and not assumptions. Lord Ahmed said he would be writing a letter to the US President Barack Obama carrying signatures of other British MPs calling for Dr.Siddiqui’s repatriation to Pakistan and withdrawal of case.
The Labour Peer further said he would also raise this question in the Parliament to ascertain how the British Government could help in this regard.
According to Lord Nazir, the conviction of Dr.Siddiqui has been received with great dismay in Pakistan which would further fuel anti-American feeling in the south Asian country.
“If US wants to create a good impression of itself in Pakistan, it should release Dr.Siddiqui and send her back to Pakistan,” he asserted.
He said no credible independent evidence was presented at the New York court and in the words of defence lawyers the decision of the jury was based on fear rather than facts.
Lord Altaf Sheikh, MP Muhammad Sarwar, Muhammad Saghir, a representative of Caged Prisoners which represent the inmates of Guantanamo Bay, Rabia Zia of UK Chapter of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, journalist Yvonne Ridley, who witnessed the trial and Barrister Abid Hussain also spoke on the occasion.
The thrust of their speeches was to mobilise public opinion against Dr.Siddiqui’s conviction and call on Pakistani authorities to demand her repatriation as well making efforts to find the whereabouts of her two missing children.
Sarwar said Pakistani authorities must hold inquiry at their end to know the circumstances of her disappearance from Karachi in 2003 and her appearance in Kabul five years later.
Ridley said it was now up to the people of Pakistan to organise regular rallies in support of Dr.Siddiqui and send strong message of their resentment to the USA on this trial.
Barrister Abid Hussain urged the British Pakistanis to lobby their respective MPs and sign on-line petition in support of the neuroscientist for exerting maximum pressure on the US Government.
Just A Cause, Not A War–> Howard Zinn
Howard Zinn wrote it in 2001 after 9/11 and USA invasion of Afghanistan.
The article is important for those who find it liberal to support the current war and consider anti-war voices as Taliban. I hope Zinn will not be named as “Taliban Zinn”.
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Just A Cause, Not A War
It Seems to Me by Howard Zinn
December 2001 Issue
Source : http://www.progressive.org/0901/zinn1101.html
A Just Cause, Not a Just War
I believe two moral judgments can be made about the present “war”: The September 11 attack constitutes a crime against humanity and cannot be justified, and the bombing of Afghanistan is also a crime, which cannot be justified.
And yet, voices across the political spectrum, including many on the left, have described this as a “just war.” One longtime advocate of peace, Richard Falk, wrote in The Nation that this is “the first truly just war since World War II.” Robert Kuttner, another consistent supporter of social justice, declared in The American Prospect that only people on the extreme left could believe this is not a just war.
I have puzzled over this. How can a war be truly just when it involves the daily killing of civilians, when it causes hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children to leave their homes to escape the bombs, when it may not find those who planned the September 11 attacks, and when it will multiply the ranks of people who are angry enough at this country to become terrorists themselves?
This war amounts to a gross violation of human rights, and it will produce the exact opposite of what is wanted: It will not end terrorism; it will proliferate terrorism.
I believe that the progressive supporters of the war have confused a “just cause” with a “just war.” There are unjust causes, such as the attempt of the United States to establish its power in Vietnam, or to dominate Panama or Grenada, or to subvert the government of Nicaragua. And a cause may be just–getting North Korea to withdraw from South Korea, getting Saddam Hussein to withdraw from Kuwait, or ending terrorism–but it does not follow that going to war on behalf of that cause, with the inevitable mayhem that follows, is just.
The stories of the effects of our bombing are beginning to come through, in bits and pieces. Just eighteen days into the bombing, The New York Times reported: “American forces have mistakenly hit a residential area in Kabul.” Twice, U.S. planes bombed Red Cross warehouses, and a Red Cross spokesman said: “Now we’ve got 55,000 people without that food or blankets, with nothing at all.”
An Afghan elementary school-teacher told a Washington Post reporter at the Pakistan border: “When the bombs fell near my house and my babies started crying, I had no choice but to run away.”
A New York Times report: “The Pentagon acknowledged that a Navy F/A-18 dropped a 1,000-pound bomb on Sunday near what officials called a center for the elderly. . . . The United Nations said the building was a military hospital. . . . Several hours later, a Navy F-14 dropped two 500-pound bombs on a residential area northwest of Kabul.” A U.N. official told a New York Times reporter that an American bombing raid on the city of Herat had used cluster bombs, which spread deadly “bomblets” over an area of twenty football fields. This, the Times reporter wrote,”was the latest of a growing number of accounts of American bombs going astray and causing civilian casualties.”
An A.P. reporter was brought to Karam, a small mountain village hit by American bombs, and saw houses reduced to rubble. “In the hospital in Jalalabad, twenty-five miles to the east, doctors treated what they said were twenty-three victims of bombing at Karam, one a child barely two months old, swathed in bloody bandages,” according to the account. “Another child, neighbors said, was in the hospital because the bombing raid had killed her entire family. At least eighteen fresh graves were scattered around the village.”
The city of Kandahar, attacked for seventeen straight days, was reported to be a ghost town, with more than half of its 500,000 people fleeing the bombs. The city’s electrical grid had been knocked out. The city was deprived of water, since the electrical pumps could not operate. A sixty-year-old farmer told the A.P. reporter, “We left in fear of our lives. Every day and every night, we hear the roaring and roaring of planes, we see the smoke, the fire. . . . I curse them both–the Taliban and America.”
A New York Times report from Pakistan two weeks into the bombing campaign told of wounded civilians coming across the border. “Every half-hour or so throughout the day, someone was brought across on a stretcher. . . . Most were bomb victims, missing limbs or punctured by shrapnel. . . . A young boy, his head and one leg wrapped in bloodied bandages, clung to his father’s back as the old man trudged back to Afghanistan.”
That was only a few weeks into the bombing, and the result had already been to frighten hundreds of thousands of Afghans into abandoning their homes and taking to the dangerous, mine-strewn roads. The “war against terrorism” has become a war against innocent men, women, and children, who are in no way responsible for the terrorist attack on New York.
And yet there are those who say this is a “just war.”
Terrorism and war have something in common. They both involve the killing of innocent people to achieve what the killers believe is a good end. I can see an immediate objection to this equation: They (the terrorists) deliberately kill innocent people; we (the war makers) aim at “military targets,” and civilians are killed by accident, as “collateral damage.”
Is it really an accident when civilians die under our bombs? Even if you grant that the intention is not to kill civilians, if they nevertheless become victims, again and again and again, can that be called an accident? If the deaths of civilians are inevitable in bombing, it may not be deliberate, but it is not an accident, and the bombers cannot be considered innocent. They are committing murder as surely as are the terrorists.
The absurdity of claiming innocence in such cases becomes apparent when the death tolls from “collateral damage” reach figures far greater than the lists of the dead from even the most awful act of terrorism. Thus, the “collateral damage” in the Gulf War caused more people to die–hundreds of thousands, if you include the victims of our sanctions policy–than the very deliberate terrorist attack of September 11. The total of those who have died in Israel from Palestinian terrorist bombs is somewhere under 1,000. The number of dead from “collateral damage” in the bombing of Beirut during Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982 was roughly 6,000.
We must not match the death lists–it is an ugly exercise–as if one atrocity is worse than another. No killing of innocents, whether deliberate or “accidental,” can be justified. My argument is that when children die at the hands of terrorists, or–whether intended or not–as a result of bombs dropped from airplanes, terrorism and war become equally unpardonable.
Let’s talk about “military targets.” The phrase is so loose that President Truman, after the nuclear bomb obliterated the population of Hiroshima, could say: “The world will note that the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, a military base. That was because we wished in this first attack to avoid, insofar as possible, the killing of civilians.”
What we are hearing now from our political leaders is, “We are targeting military objectives. We are trying to avoid killing civilians. But that will happen, and we regret it.” Shall the American people take moral comfort from the thought that we are bombing only “military targets”?
The reality is that the term “military” covers all sorts of targets that include civilian populations. When our bombers deliberately destroy, as they did in the war against Iraq, the electrical infrastructure, thus making water purification and sewage treatment plants inoperable and leading to epidemic waterborne diseases, the deaths of children and other civilians cannot be called accidental.
Recall that in the midst of the Gulf War, the U.S. military bombed an air raid shelter, killing 400 to 500 men, women, and children who were huddled to escape bombs. The claim was that it was a military target, housing a communications center, but reporters going through the ruins immediately afterward said there was no sign of anything like that.
I suggest that the history of bombing–and no one has bombed more than this nation–is a history of endless atrocities, all calmly explained by deceptive and deadly language like “accident,” “military targets,” and “collateral damage.”
Indeed, in both World War II and in Vietnam, the historical record shows that there was a deliberate decision to target civilians in order to destroy the morale of the enemy–hence the firebombing of Dresden, Hamburg, Tokyo, the B-52s over Hanoi, the jet bombers over peaceful villages in the Vietnam countryside. When some argue that we can engage in “limited military action” without “an excessive use of force,” they are ignoring the history of bombing. The momentum of war rides roughshod over limits.
The moral equation in Afghanistan is clear. Civilian casualties are certain. The outcome is uncertain. No one knows what this bombing will accomplish–whether it will lead to the capture of Osama Bin Laden (perhaps), or the end of the Taliban (possibly), or a democratic Afghanistan (very unlikely), or an end to terrorism (almost certainly not).
And meanwhile, we are terrorizing the population (not the terrorists, they are not easily terrorized). Hundreds of thousands are packing their belongings and their children onto carts and leaving their homes to make dangerous journeys to places they think might be more safe.
Not one human life should be expended in this reckless violence called a “war against terrorism.”
We might examine the idea of pacifism in the light of what is going on right now. I have never used the word “pacifist” to describe myself, because it suggests something absolute, and I am suspicious of absolutes. I want to leave openings for unpredictable possibilities. There might be situations (and even such strong pacifists as Gandhi and Martin Luther King believed this) when a small, focused act of violence against a monstrous, immediate evil would be justified.
In war, however, the proportion of means to ends is very, very different. War, by its nature, is unfocused, indiscriminate, and especially in our time when the technology is so murderous, inevitably involves the deaths of large numbers of people and the suffering of even more. Even in the “small wars” (Iran vs. Iraq, the Nigerian war, the Afghan war), a million people die. Even in a “tiny” war like the one we waged in Panama, a thousand or more die.
Scott Simon of NPR wrote a commentary in The Wall Street Journal on October 11 entitled, “Even Pacifists Must Support This War.” He tried to use the pacifist acceptance of self-defense, which approves a focused resistance to an immediate attacker, to justify this war, which he claims is “self-defense.” But the term “self-defense” does not apply when you drop bombs all over a country and kill lots of people other than your attacker. And it doesn’t apply when there is no likelihood that it will achieve its desired end.
Pacifism, which I define as a rejection of war, rests on a very powerful logic. In war, the means–indiscriminate killing–are immediate and certain; the ends, however desirable, are distant and uncertain.
Pacifism does not mean “appeasement.” That word is often hurled at those who condemn the present war on Afghanistan, and it is accompanied by references to Churchill, Chamberlain, Munich. World War II analogies are conveniently summoned forth when there is a need to justify a war, however irrelevant to a particular situation. At the suggestion that we withdraw from Vietnam, or not make war on Iraq, the word “appeasement” was bandied about. The glow of the “good war” has repeatedly been used to obscure the nature of all the bad wars we have fought since 1945.
Let’s examine that analogy. Czechoslovakia was handed to the voracious Hitler to “appease” him. Germany was an aggressive nation expanding its power, and to help it in its expansion was not wise. But today we do not face an expansionist power that demands to be appeased. We ourselves are the expansionist power–troops in Saudi Arabia, bombings of Iraq, military bases all over the world, naval vessels on every sea–and that, along with Israel’s expansion into the West Bank and Gaza Strip, has aroused anger.
It was wrong to give up Czechoslovakia to appease Hitler. It is not wrong to withdraw our military from the Middle East, or for Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories, because there is no right to be there. That is not appeasement. That is justice.
Opposing the bombing of Afghanistan does not constitute “giving in to terrorism” or “appeasement.” It asks that other means be found than war to solve the problems that confront us. King and Gandhi both believed in action–nonviolent direct action, which is more powerful and certainly more morally defensible than war.
To reject war is not to “turn the other cheek,” as pacifism has been caricatured. It is, in the present instance, to act in ways that do not imitate the terrorists.
The United States could have treated the September 11 attack as a horrific criminal act that calls for apprehending the culprits, using every device of intelligence and investigation possible. It could have gone to the United Nations to enlist the aid of other countries in the pursuit and apprehension of the terrorists.
There was also the avenue of negotiations. (And let’s not hear: “What? Negotiate with those monsters?” The United States negotiated with–indeed, brought into power and kept in power–some of the most monstrous governments in the world.) Before Bush ordered in the bombers, the Taliban offered to put bin Laden on trial. This was ignored. After ten days of air attacks, when the Taliban called for a halt to the bombing and said they would be willing to talk about handing bin Laden to a third country for trial, the headline the next day in The New York Times read: “President Rejects Offer by Taliban for Negotiations,” and Bush was quoted as saying: “When I said no negotiations, I meant no negotiations.”
That is the behavior of someone hellbent on war. There were similar rejections of negotiating possibilities at the start of the Korean War, the war in Vietnam, the Gulf War, and the bombing of Yugoslavia. The result was an immense loss of life and incalculable human suffering.
International police work and negotiations were–still are–alternatives to war. But let’s not deceive ourselves; even if we succeeded in apprehending bin Laden or, as is unlikely, destroying the entire Al Qaeda network, that would not end the threat of terrorism, which has potential recruits far beyond Al Qaeda.
To get at the roots of terrorism is complicated. Dropping bombs is simple. It is an old response to what everyone acknowledges is a very new situation. At the core of unspeakable and unjustifiable acts of terrorism are justified grievances felt by millions of people who would not themselves engage in terrorism but from whose ranks terrorists spring.
Those grievances are of two kinds: the existence of profound misery– hunger, illness–in much of the world, contrasted to the wealth and luxury of the West, especially the United States; and the presence of American military power everywhere in the world, propping up oppressive regimes and repeatedly intervening with force to maintain U.S. hegemony.
This suggests actions that not only deal with the long-term problem of terrorism but are in themselves just.
Instead of using two planes a day to drop food on Afghanistan and 100 planes to drop bombs (which have been making it difficult for the trucks of the international agencies to bring in food), use 102 planes to bring food.
Take the money allocated for our huge military machine and use it to combat starvation and disease around the world. One-third of our military budget would annually provide clean water and sanitation facilities for the billion people in the world who have none.
Withdraw troops from Saudi Arabia, because their presence near the holy shrines of Mecca and Medina angers not just bin Laden (we need not care about angering him) but huge numbers of Arabs who are not terrorists.
Stop the cruel sanctions on Iraq, which are killing more than a thousand children every week without doing anything to weaken Saddam Hussein’s tyrannical hold over the country.
Insist that Israel withdraw from the occupied territories, something that many Israelis also think is right, and which will make Israel more secure than it is now.
In short, let us pull back from being a military superpower, and become a humanitarian superpower.
Let us be a more modest nation. We will then be more secure. The modest nations of the world don’t face the threat of terrorism.
Such a fundamental change in foreign policy is hardly to be expected. It would threaten too many interests: the power of political leaders, the ambitions of the military, the corporations that profit from the nation’s enormous military commitments.
Change will come, as at other times in our history, only when American citizens– becoming better informed, having second thoughts after the first instinctive support for official policy–demand it. That change in citizen opinion, especially if it coincides with a pragmatic decision by the government that its violence isn’t working, could bring about a retreat from the military solution.
It might also be a first step in the rethinking of our nation’s role in the world. Such a rethinking contains the promise, for Americans, of genuine security, and for people elsewhere, the beginning of hope.
Vigil in New York for Fahad Hashmi and Dr. Aafia Siddiqui on January 18 2010
Vigil in New York for Fahad Hashmi and Dr. Aafia Siddiqui on January 18 2010
Dr. Aafia Siddiqui’s Disappearance–>Letters Published in DAWN in 2004
Below is a summary of news items published in local newspapers regarding her abduction. They are part of letters published in DAWN Newspaper written by Aafia’s Uncle.
This should be enough for those who still think that Aafia was arrested in 2008 from Afghanistan.
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Source : http://www.draafia.org/wap/index-wap2.php?p=324
Publisher: DAWN – daily English newspaper – Karachi, Pakistan:
Dr. Aafia Siddiqui’s Disappearance
(DAWN.com) – In the first week of April 2003, several news items were published in [Pakistan's] national dailies and broadcast from private TV channel regarding the sudden disappearance of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui from Karachi as of other Pakistanis who have been [illegally] handed over to the Americans. The following is a chronological account of Dr. Siddiqui’s disappearance and the current status of the situation:
(1) Dr. [Aafia] Siddiqui, who studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology [MIT], U.S., for about 10 years and did her PhD in genetics, returned to Pakistan in 2002. Having failed to get a suitable job, she again visited the U.S. on a valid visa in February 2003 to search for a job and to submit an application to the U.S.
Immigration authorities. She moved there freely and came back to Karachi by the end of February 2003 after renting a post office box in her name in Maryland for the receipt of her mail. It has been claimed by the FBI, June 23, 2003, issue) that the box was hired for one Mr. Majid Khan, an alleged member of Al-Qaeda residing in Baltimore [Maryland, USA].
(2) Throughout March 2003, flashes of the particulars of Dr. [Aafia] Siddiqui were telecast/relayed, with her photo on American TV channels and radios, painting her as a dangerous [imaginary] Al-Qaeda person needed by the FBI for interrogation.
(3) On learning of the above [illegal] campaign of the FBI about her, she went underground in Karachi and remained so till her [unlawful] kidnapping, apparently by FBI-hired intelligence personnel, at the end of March [2003].
(4) Between March 25 and March 31 [2003], she rang up her mother from some location in Karachi informing her about her intention to go to Rawalpindi. The following day an Urdu daily published the news of her [illegal] arrest by the police while she was on her way to Karachi airport. At the time of her [unlawful] kidnapping she was accompanied by her three children, aged three-and-a-half months to seven years.
(5) On April 1, 2003, a small news item was published in an Urdu daily with reference to a press conference of Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat when, in reply to a question regarding the arrest of Dr. [Aafia] Siddiqui, he said: “She has not been arrested.”
(6) There was another news item in an Urdu daily on April 2 [2003] regarding another press conference when the Interior Minister said Dr. Siddiqui was connected to Al-Qaeda and that she had not been arrested as she was absconding. He added: “You will be astonished to know about the activities of Dr. Aafia (Siddiqui).”
(7) A motorcyclist in plainclothes knocked at the door of the mother of Dr. [Aafia] Siddiqui (Mrs. Ismat Siddiqui) and told her: “We know that you are connected to higher-ups. But it would be better for you if you keep quiet regarding your daughter. She and her children are OK with us.”
( 8 ) The June 23, 2003 issue of Newsweek International has been exclusively devoted to the so-called Al-Qaeda. The core of the issue is an [idiotic and illegitimate] article “Al Qaeda’s Network in America”. The [false and fraudulent] article has three photographs of so-called Al-Qaeda members – Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, Dr. Aafia Siddiqui and Ali S. Al Marri of Qatar who has studied in the U.S. like Dr. Siddiqui and had long gone back to his homeland. In this article, which has been authored by eight journalists who had access to FBI records, the only charge leveled against Dr. Aafia Siddiqui is that “she rented a post-office box to help a former resident of Baltimore named Majid Khan (alleged Al-Qaeda suspect) to help establish his U.S. identity. She was also ’supposed’ to support other Al-Qaeda operatives as they entered the United States.”
(9) The article states that Dr. [Aafia] Siddiqui was arrested in Pakistan contrary to the repeated statements of our Interior Minister.
(10) On 30-12-2003, Dr. Fawzia Siddiqui, elder sister of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, saw Mr. Faisal Saleh Hayat at Islamabad with Mr. Ejaz ul Haq, MNA, regarding the whereabouts of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui. Dr. Fawzia Siddiqui is a neurologist, studied at and did her doctorate in the U.S. She was head of the neurology department at Johns Hopkins.
Mr. Faisal Saleh Hayat told Dr. Fawzia and Mr. Ejaz ul Haq that according to his information, Dr. Aafia Siddiqui had already been released and that Dr. Fawzia Siddiqui should go home and wait for some phone call from her sister. But, alas, that phone call has not yet come (third week of March [2004]) and the whole family of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, including the author of these lines, are in a state of severe mental torture.
S.H. FARUQI
Tuesday, 30 March 2004
Islamabad, Pakistan
Dr. Aafia Siddiqui’s Disappearance
(DAWN.com) – This is with reference to my earlier letter under the above caption (March 30 [2004]). I had written in the earnest expectation that something positive would come out and there would be some progress towards ending the miseries of my family related to the disappearance of my niece, Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, more than a year ago.
But instead of arranging for the release of the illegally detained doctor, the [Pakistan] authorities have apparently opted to punish the remaining members (Dr. Aafia’s mother and elder sister Dr. Fawzia Siddiqui with her two children) for protesting against the injustice.
After the publication of my March 30 [2004] letter, Dr. Aafia Siddiqui’s mother and sister (along with her two children) have apparently been put under [illegal] house-arrest and are not allowed to have any physical or telephonic contact even with their family members. After failing to talk to my younger sister (mother of Dr.
Aafia Siddiqui) on the phone from Islamabad since March 30 till April 20 [2004], I rushed to Karachi and visited her house (140-E, Block-7, Gulshan-i-Iqbal) on April 22 [2004] only to find a big lock on the main gate of the house. I knocked on the gate for quite some time, first mildly, then strongly but there was no response.
Then I contacted my sister’s next-door neighbour, who happens to be the younger brother of [Pakistan Army's ex-Chief] Gen. Mirza Aslam Beg. The lady (Mrs. Beg) was kind enough to tell me that Mrs. Ismat Siddiqui and her daughter Dr. Fawzia were inside the house, but for some time they had not been coming out or responding to the doorbell.
After trying to see my sister in vain from April 22 to 25 [2004], I returned to Islamabad. With this state of affairs, I doubt we are free citizens of a free country.
S.H. FARUQI
Sunday, 2 May 2004
Islamabad, Pakistan
Witnesses’ accounts differ at Dr. Aafia’s trial –>DAWN
KARACHI: The trial of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui has taken a bizarre turn when a witness’s testimony came out to be different from the one given by American official Captain Schnieder, reports DawnNews.
Furthermore, an FBI agent testified that they did not find Dr. Aafia’s finger-prints on the rifle.
The US federal court in Manhattan heard Aafia Siddiqui and 5 other witnesses. Dr. Aafia told the court that she is being misrepresented by the prosecutor’s statement regarding the things she has said about America, that only negative thoughts are being portrayed.
According to DawnNews’ correspondent in New York, Masood Haider, the court heard witnesses who saw the incident including an Afghan interpreter, Ahmed Gul who became a green card holder in 2009 and was processed by the American government and now lives in New York. Abdul previously claimed that he saw Dr. Aafia shoot at the US soldiers.
There was also a cross examination of witnesses and forensic experts and FBI. On the second day of the trial, four witnesses came under cross-questioning.
In the previous hearing, Captain Schnieder told the court that Dr. Aafia shot at him while she was on her knees.
But on the second day of the trial, Ahmed Gul told the court that Dr. Aafia was standing when she fired the gun and the gun was pointing at some other official.
The Afghan interpreter also told the court that he has been granted a green card and has been settled in America by the officials who brought him to testify in the trial.
During the hearing, one FBI official told the court that they found Dr. Aafia’s fingerprints on the documents but not on the gun, Masood Haider said.
The neocons were planning a world war even before 9-11–>The Last Crusade
The neocons were planning a world war even before 9-11 . Read the article below and date:
http://www.thetrumpet.com/index.php?q=507.0.35.0
The Last Crusade
From the August 2001 Trumpet Print Edition »
Most people think the crusades are a thing of the past—over forever. But they are wrong. Preparations are being made for a final crusade, and it will be the bloodiest of all! By Gerald Flurry
Most people think the crusades are a thing of the past— over forever. But they are wrong. Preparations are being made for a final crusade, and it will be the bloodiest of all!
The Crusades were a series of Roman Catholic “holy” wars to wrest control of the Holy Land from Muslims. They produced some of the bloodiest battles in history.
Did you ever wonder how the Catholics reconcile that “holy” slaughter with the Bible, which states, “Thou shalt not kill”? Or how they can read the Sermon on the Mount and still lead the religious world in spilling rivers of blood?
They are called the Christian Crusades. That label itself is a deception. They were primarily Catholic Crusades. Other Christian religions have their problems, but let’s not blame them for what the Catholics did—and will do. Some background will help us understand.
Pope Urban II
In a.d. 622, Catholics fought and were defeated in a crusade against the Persians and the Jews. Some 60,000 Catholics were killed, and 35,000 enslaved. The fall of Jerusalem left the Catholic world shocked and mourning.
This war left Catholics bitter against the Jews for the role they played in the war. Much anti-Semitism began because of it.
Some historians consider this the First Crusade. But the Crusades we best remember came later, beginning in the 11th century.
Pope Urban ii unleashed a savage Catholic army and started these later Crusades. This “righteous” army marched 3,000 miles to conquer the Holy Land.
Here is an excerpt from the book Crusades, by Terry Jones and Alan Ereira, which became a bbc television series (emphasis mine here and throughout): “By summoning an army under the banner of the Cross, the pope was extending the church’s mantle over all Christendom. This was the idea at the very heart of the revolutionary papacy; in place of separate local churches at the center of discreet communities, there was to be one overarching church, ruled by one overarching pope. The Crusade was to be its expression and its instrument.”
They state that this thinking was at the heart of the papacy. The popes wanted to rule any church called Christian. Through the Holy Roman Empire, they also tried repeatedly to rule the entire world. They have succeeded six times and are about to succeed again, for the last time, according to Bible prophecy. (Write for our free booklet Germany and the Holy Roman Empire.)
The Protestant churches are prophesied to be brought back into the Catholic Church (Isa. 47). Mostly this will be done through bloodshed. Remember, this wish to rule all Christianity is at “the very heart of the revolutionary papacy.” That means this philosophy has motivated them for nearly 2,000 years. And they still believe violent and bloody crusades are righteous. Have they ever truly repented of this condemning history? The answer is no. The best they have managed is some recent vague apologies.
History proves the Catholic Church to be one of the most militant institutions ever created. They do not believe in a democratic philosophy. They have often “converted” people by the sword. And yet, this world seems unwilling to hold them accountable for their war crimes.
Modern historians have shown how closely they worked with the Nazis. It was through the Catholic Church that most of the leading Nazis escaped after World War ii. We have shown in past articles how well documented that history is. No one should doubt it. (Read The Unholy Trinity by Mark Aarons and John Loftus, available at bookstores.)
And doesn’t that crime reveal that the Catholics were deeply involved with the Nazi war machine?
This subject is too important to let our emotions stand in the way, because the worst is yet to come!
The last crusade will be the supreme inquisition of all history. It is time we understood the bloody history of the Crusades and let it be a warning!
The world seems almost unaware of these monstrous crimes.
The Jones and Ereira book continues, “Urban’s army would also rescue Jerusalem, the spiritual (and therefore the physical) center of the universe. He hoped that the redeemed Jerusalem would be directly ruled by the church.
“Every man who enrolled for the struggle must mark himself out by wearing a cross and, most important, vow to continue on his way until he reached Jerusalem.
“Urban’s method of raising this army was completely original; as well as pay, he could offer paradise—anyone who took part had all their sins forgiven. ‘Whoever for devotion alone, not to gain honor or money, goes to Jerusalem to liberate the Church of God can substitute this journey for all penance.’”
Any Bible student ought to know that only God can offer paradise and forgive sins. But that is the big problem with most Christians: They don’t believe and obey the Bible!
The whole world, including the religious world, is deceived (Rev. 12:9). Enormous problems like the Crusades will continue until we confront our own deception.
Jones and Ereira conclude, “By
saying that carrying out a military/political enterprise would make you a better person, wiping out past sins, Urban had invented a way by which every person could internalize papal policy. Fighting in the pope’s cause was not only an obligation, it made you righteous. With that one idea, mass political action was launched. With that one idea, ideology was born. With that one idea, the Crusade was set in motion. Urban did not understand what he had done.”
This pope certainly did not know what he had done. What he began led to a number of indescribably brutal wars between Catholics and Muslims.
The real tragedy is that the world, like Pope Urban, still doesn’t understand what he did, and what the Catholic Church continues to do. Their real beliefs surface when they gain power. Today, they are building the greatest power they have ever had. If you understand their history, their future is very predictable—far more than most historians believe. Add Bible prophecy to that equation and you will see that this world faces a frightening specter.
Fighting on Both Sides
The Crusades created rivers of blood. And it was all done in the name of God. Of course, the Muslims responded with massive slaughters against the Crusaders, also in the name of God. Does it make any sense for God to be fighting on both sides? Or are these warring factions just giving our God of love a bloody reputation?
Jerusalem is considered a holy place by both religions. It is indeed considered the “center of the universe” to the Catholics. They believe conquering Jerusalem makes them righteous. That has been their ideology from the beginning. It is still true today. The fruits are there to prove it. The Bible says that “by their fruits you shall know them.” They believe in war as an instrument to achieve their religious goals.
“The following morning the Crusaders re-entered the al-Aqsa Mosque and slaughtered every Muslim sheltering there. No one knows how many died; the Muslim chronicler reports 70,000. One of the Crusaders reports picking his way through a mess of blood and bodies more than knee-deep” (ibid.). This is only one episode of many. Many people have seen pictures of this very mosque.
How many Muslims still remember the history of this mosque being knee-deep in Arab blood? And all of this savagery supposedly made Catholics righteous! A warrior who burned Arab babies in the Crusade was considered worthy to gain glory for all eternity! Does this really make sense to a sound mind?
“But killing, the pope now declared, need not be a sin after all. It depended on who you killed. In fact, if you killed the enemies of Christ, killing did not require penance—it was the penance. Holy slaughter could be as effective a devotional activity as prayer, or fasting, or pilgrimage….”
The pope said, “Now we are proposing that you should fight wars which contain the glorious reward of martyrdom, in which you can gain the title of present and eternal glory….”
“The pope had also pointed out the importance of rescuing Jerusalem from the infidel. He seems to have suggested that ‘rescue’ meant ‘seize and keep’” (ibid.)
The pope also said, “Take the road to the Holy Sepulcher, rescue that land from a dreadful race and rule over it yourselves.”
Muslim and Jewish inhabitants of Jerusalem were slaughtered like pigs. And all of this was done by Catholics who presumably became more righteous in the process.
Were these killers true Christians? A true Christian is one who follows Christ. If we look in the gospels, Christ tells us to love our enemies, even die for them—not kill them!
The memory of such horrendous massacres still lives in the minds of many Arabs.
Those memories have provoked Arabs and Jews to massacre Catholics throughout history in a similar manner—all in the name of religion.
King Peter’s Crusade
King Peter launched his crusade from the little Mediterranean island of Cyprus, which was captured by Catholic Crusaders during the Third Crusade. Here is what Steven Runciman wrote about King Peter’s Crusade in A History of the Crusades: “King Peter arrived at Rhodes early in the month, and on the 25th the whole Cypriot fleet sailed into the harbor, 108 vessels in all, galleys, transports, merchant ships and light skiffs. With the great galleys of the Venetians and those provided by the Hospital, the armada numbered 165 ships. They carried a full complement of men, with ample horses, provisions and arms. Not since the Third Crusade had a proportionate expedition set out for the Holy War….
“During the Friday night there was a fierce Muslim counterattack through one of the southern gates, which the Christians in their excitement had burned down. It was beaten off; and by the Saturday afternoon, all Alexandria was in the Crusaders’ hands.
“The victory was celebrated with unparalleled savagery. Two and a half centuries of holy warfare had taught the Crusaders nothing of humanity. The massacres were only equalled by those of Jerusalem in 1099 and Constantinople in 1204. The Muslims had not been so ferocious at Antioch or at Acre. Alexandria’s wealth had been phenomenal; and the victors were maddened at the sight of so much booty. They spared no one. The native Christians and the Jews suffered as much as the Muslims; and even the European merchants settled in the city saw their factories and storehouses ruthlessly looted. Mosques and tombs were raided and their ornaments stolen or destroyed; churches too were sacked, though a gallant crippled Coptic lady managed to save some of the treasures of her sect at the sacrifice of her private fortune. Houses were entered, and householders who did not immediately hand over all their possessions were slaughtered with their families. Some 5,000 prisoners, Christians and Jews as well as Muslims, were taken to be sold as slaves. A long line of horses, asses and camels carried the loot to the ships in the harbor and there having performed their task were killed. The whole city stank with the odor of human and animal corpses.”
This author said, “The Crusades were the pope’s work.” The Crusade philosophy has made Catholic popes the bloodiest religious leaders ever!
Still, most people try to hide from this frightening reality. That is the main reason why the worst Catholic crusade is yet to come. Mankind refuses to believe the truth and believe God.
The world so quickly forgets. And because they do, the massive bloodshed continues. The Catholics did these appalling, despicable deeds before the world. But has anyone heard them repent before the world?
There is good news: Jesus Christ will personally stop the next crusade! Sadly, however, that will only occur after the worst suffering ever on this Earth (Dan. 12:1; Matt. 24:21-22).
Cyprus
More than one crusade has been launched from Cyprus. Will we see the last crusade launched from there as well? Is history about to repeat itself?
Turkey, just north of Cyprus, has been a strong member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (nato) for many years. Yet, a German-led European Union (EU) rejected them from joining the EU—even though they have been applying since 1963, when there were only six members! Nine new countries have joined since then, and 11 more are on the waiting list.
Cyprus is also on the list to join the EU. Their chances look good.
Why has the EUconsistently rejected Turkey? Is it because Turkey is predominantly Islamic?
The EUis prophesied to be ultimately comprised of ten nations, or groups of nations, dominated by Catholicism. Already the EU is being called the Holy Roman Empire. It has traditionally been the enemy of the Muslims.
And why does it look like tiny Cyprus will become a member of the EU? Is the EU already thinking about Cyprus as a launching pad from which to protect its Jerusalem interests?
We don’t know if Cyprus will become a member or not. But you can be certain that the EU is thinking about how to protect the holy places in and around Jerusalem. They have thought like this for almost 2,000 years!
There is a real crisis in Cyprus today. Some people fear a war between Greece and Turkey, who share the rule of this island. Greece became the tenth member state of the EU in 1981, and Russia has already sold missiles to Greece, whose intention is to bully Turkey with them.
At a conference in Cyprus in July, Dr. Osman Metin Ozturk explained that while EU membership of Cyprus would support the interests of Greece and the EU, it would stall U.S. and nato interests.
Here is what Christopher Lockwood, diplomatic editor in Nicosia, wrote in the Daily Telegraph, March 30, 1998: “The EU has maneuvered itself into a position where it may soon have to take a bitterly divided island, with a propensity for violence and even war, into its bosom.
“It has poisoned relations with Turkey, a crucial nato ally; made a solution to the Cyprus problem harder to achieve than ever….”
Why would Europe risk such serious problems, even warfare, over this tiny island?
Even the people building the EU don’t fully understand what is happening. There is a spirit and force behind these events which the world does not see. “And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast. And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him? And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months” (Rev. 13:3-5).
If this world truly understood what is happening in Europe, they would be trembling in fear.
Does this great evil spirit being, Satan the devil, have plans for Cyprus? Is there a final crusade planned to be launched into the Middle East from there? This evil spirit being knows Bible prophecy and what the future holds.
The beast will hold power for three and a half years, and then Christ will destroy that evil empire forever! We are entering the worst times ever, but they will lead into the best news we could ever receive!
Final Crusade Prophesied
One of the main tourist attractions in Jordan is the Crusader castles. The Catholics built most of them to war against the Muslims and control Jerusalem. These castles are stark reminders of the bloody past—and a far more bloody future!
The Jews have Jerusalem now. But not for long. Both Muslims and Catholics have designs for Jerusalem. These two great powers are about to clash again—go head-to-head in the final crusade over Jerusalem!
In 1997, Iran conducted major war games code-named “Road to Jerusalem.” Between 150,000 and 500,000 soldiers participated.
What could be more provocative? They are advertising their strategy to the world. Few people understand this Muslim passion for Jerusalem and its holy sites! They are the kind of passions that cause war!
Iran will undoubtedly lead what the Bible calls “the king of the south” (Dan. 11:40). This power will be comprised of the radical Islamic movement. Iran is working fiercely to lead this radically militant religion.
Iran has virtually destroyed the peace process single-handedly. But still, the world continues to talk about peace. Iran and radical Islam don’t want peace, and words won’t deter them.
Joseph de Courcy once wrote this in the Islamic Affairs Analyst: “Subscribers should be in absolutely no doubt about this. From Iran’s support for subversion in Bahrain, through its improving ties with Egypt, its support for Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Islamist revolutionaries in Khartoum, to its close strategic alliance with Moscow, everything has the same ultimate purpose: the liberation of Jerusalem from under the Zionist yoke.”
The U.S. has tried to isolate Iran. Almost no other nation supports America. This attempt has failed. The U.S. is fighting against Bible prophecy.
Iran has nuclear bombs. They believe America can be neutralized by terrorism—perhaps nuclear terrorism.
Here is what Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat said in 1996: “We know but one word: struggle, struggle. Jihad, jihad, jihad. When we stop our intifada, when we stop our revolution, we go to the greater jihad, the jihad of the independent Palestinian state with its capital Jerusalem.”
Jihad is the Arab cry for holy war. They will get their war. But it will not be holy. It will lead to the worst suffering this planet has ever experienced!
“And at the time of the end shall the king of the south push at him: and the king of the north shall come against him like a whirlwind, with chariots, and with horsemen, and with many ships; and he shall enter into the countries, and shall overflow and pass over” (Dan. 11:40). This king of the south is undoubtedly the Iran-led radical Muslims. They are strong and are pushing others around in the Middle East.
Soon they will push at the king of the north, the so-called Holy Roman Empire—the same religious power that was behind the Crusades. And that push will surely revolve around Jerusalem.
Just 20 years ago, nobody could have even imagined two world powers coming out of the Middle East and Europe. But God knew exactly what would happen. Nobody but God could have inspired these prophecies. Everybody can see these two great powers today.
Just look at what is happening in Europe—and has been for years. The present pope is working feverishly to revive the Holy Roman Empire. Twenty years ago, in Spain, November 9, 1981, he said this: “It can be said that the European identity is not understandable without Christianity and that it is precisely in Christianity that are found those common roots by which the Continent has seen its civilization mature: its culture, its dynamism, its activity, its capacity for constructive expansion in other continents as well; in a word, all that makes up its glory….
“Find yourself again. Be yourself. Discover your origins, revive your roots. Return to those authentic values which made your history a glorious one and your presence so beneficent in the other continents.”
During the Inquisition, over 50 million innocent people were killed in the name of “Christianity”! That’s right—50 million! And you can add many millions more as victims of the Holy Roman Empire. Shouldn’t the whole world fear a pope who would say, “Discover your origins, revive your roots. Return to those authentic values which made your history a glorious one”? Those “origins” and “roots” and that “history” caused many millions of people to die!
In Revelation 17, God paints a vivid picture of a great church as a lavishly dressed harlot, holding sway over the nations. God sees things as they truly are! Let’s look at God’s view: “And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration” (Rev. 17:6). God sees this whore “drunken” on the blood of the saints! Is killing God’s saints “glorious”?
The Holy Roman Empire will come at the king of the south like a whirlwind. Will there be a surprise attack from Cyprus? Will we see the final crusade launched from there? A whirlwind comes suddenly. So it doesn’t appear the attack will be launched from Europe.
We must understand the Holy Roman Empire and the Crusades to understand the Catholic passion for Jerusalem. They have a long history of spilling rivers of blood over Jerusalem.
Notice what their first action is after they are victorious. “He shall enter also into the glorious land, and many countries shall be overthrown: but these shall escape out of his hand, even Edom, and Moab, and the chief of the children of Ammon” (Dan. 11:41). They “enter” into the glorious land, or the Holy Land. The Hebrew indicates this is a peaceful entry—not forced.
The Jews appear to invite them in as peacekeepers. But it leads to a great double-cross, prophesied in Ezekiel chapter 23. (Write for our free booklets The Ezekiel Watchman and Hosea.)
This betrayal will lead to a disaster where no stone is left on top of another stone at the Wailing Wall (Matt. 24:1-3). Those are Christ’s own words!
The Jews should remember the history of the violence and bloodshed by the Crusaders. Then perhaps they would choose differently.
“He shall stretch forth his hand also upon the countries: and the land of Egypt shall not escape. But he shall have power over the treasures of gold and of silver, and over all the precious things of Egypt: and the Libyans and the Ethiopians shall be at his steps” (Dan. 11:42-43). Other countries are going to fall to this great power too.
Twice it mentions that Egypt will not escape. For over two decades, Egypt has been the most moderate nation in the Middle East. Iran has pushed them toward their camp. That is because Egypt fears terrorism and their own radical Muslims. We have seen that happen before our eyes, just as God prophesied it would!
The Good News
At that point in prophecy, the Holy Roman Empire will face disaster. “But tidings out of the east and out of the north shall trouble him: therefore he shall go forth with great fury to destroy, and utterly to make away many” (v. 44). The Russians and Chinese will prepare for war with Europe. The Europeans will see it happening and strike first. They will, however, be defeated.
“And he shall plant the tabernacles of his palace between the seas in the glorious holy mountain; yet he shall come to his end, and none shall help him” (v. 45). Notice, the religious leader will move his headquarters to Jerusalem—and not just for protection. He could go to many other cities that would be safer. But this will be a religious act of faith. Jerusalem is considered to be his most holy place on Earth—the “center of the universe.” Still, he will come to a most ignominious end. Nobody will be there to help him.
There should be no chapter break between Daniel 11 and 12. The story flow continues to illustrate that this religious war will trigger a nuclear World War iii.
“And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book” (Dan. 12:1). There has never before been trouble like this. God promises to protect His people physically. Otherwise, they would perish in a nuclear nightmare.
As bad as this news is, it leads to the best news this world has ever heard! “And from the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away, and the abomination that maketh desolate set up, there shall be a thousand two hundred and ninety days” (v. 11). The daily sacrifice is referring to God’s work. That work will be taken away—removed when God takes His people to a place of safety (Matt. 24:15-16; Luke 21:20-21). That must happen because the abomination of desolation, or the king of the north, is going to conquer America and Britain—unless they repent. But when that happens, you will be able to start counting days to the return of Jesus Christ. He will end these “holy wars” forever.
Any child should understand that the fruits of these “holy wars” have been diabolical! There is no excuse for America and Britain not knowing the truth. God has been sending His message in power for over 60 years! They have rejected it repeatedly. That is why they now must suffer so intensely. Finally, God will get their attention and lead them to peace, full joy and abundance.
