Egypt’s al-Azhar says strikes un-Islamic ahead of general campaign

Joseph Mayton 8 February 2012
Bikya Masr

Left: Mubarak's stooge Ahmed el-Tayyab.

"CAIRO: Egypt and the Sunni Islamic world’s most prestigious institute, al-Azhar, has said general strikes and civil disobedience are “un-Islamic” and called on Egyptians not to participate in the massive campaign currently underway to launch a nationwide strike on February 11 by activists.

Al-Azhar’s deputy chief Ismail Shaheen urged Egyptians to maintain work during the day, saying that to stop working, “even for one hour” was un-Islamic and against Shariah, or Islamic law.

Shaheen said that Egyptians who participate in the civil disobedience campaign are “un-patriotic,” calling for other means of protesting, although he did not say what these are specifically, in comments published by state-run al-Ahram newspaper.

Al-Azhar’s Grand Sheikh Ahmed el-Tayyab [the stooge who was appointed by Mubarak!] also said that the strike should not be following, urging Egyptian Muslims to follow the “three duties” required on Earth: “Worship God, take responsibility for their families and work to build this world.”

Ahram said he went on to say that Egyptians should not stop work out of respect “towards themselves, their family, their nation and God.”

However, this has not stopped the campaign from gaining much steam ahead of Saturday’s beginning of the civil disobedience. At least 120 labor groups, student unions and activist movements have stated publicly their willingness to join the countrywide effort to bring the military junta to its knees."

Syria: rockets rain down on Homs as violence escalates

More than 200 rockets fall in space of three hours on opposition-controlled suburb of Baba Amr, according to residents

Julian Borger, Luke Harding and Chris McGreal in Washington
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 8 February 2012

"The Assad government escalated its military onslaught on the Syrian opposition with the most intense bombardment of rebel-held areas so far, as the west and the Arab world scrambled to find a new diplomatic strategy without Russian and Chinese help.

Tanks and heavy artillery were used on an unprecedented scale, according to witnesses. More than 200 rockets fell in the space of three hours on just one part of Homs, the opposition-controlled suburb of Baba Amr, residents said.

One activist, Raji, speaking from a basement inside Baba Amr, said Syrian forces were now using a heavier artillery round with devastating effect. In addition to the 27 people killed , he said many people were lying dead under the rubble of their houses. There were also reports that 18 premature babies had died in hospital after power cuts caused their incubators to fail, according to the BBC....."

جرائم ضد الإنسانية في سوريا

"وصفت منظمات حقوقية دولية ما تقترفه القوات النظامية السورية من جرائم بحق المدنيين بأنها قد تمثل جرائم ضد الإنسانية.
ودعت مفوضة الامم المتحدة السامية لحقوق الانسان نافي بيلاي إلى تحرك دولي عاجل لحماية المدنيين في سوريا.
تقرير/ ناصر آيت طاهر
"

Al-Jazeera Video: Al Jazeera exclusive: Homs under siege

Israel: Cancel plan to forcibly displace Jahalin Bedouin communities

Amnesty International
8 February 2012

"Israeli defence minister Ehud Barak should cancel military plans to forcibly displace around 2,300 Bedouin residents of the West Bank to an area beside the Jerusalem municipal garbage dump, Amnesty International said today in a new briefing paper.

In Stop the Transfer: Israel about to expel Bedouin from homes to expand settlements, the organization calls on the Israeli military to order an immediate halt to all demolitions in the 20 communities affected by the plan.

Amnesty International said that verbal promises made by Israeli military officials last week not to implement pending demolition orders in Khan al-Ahmar, one of the Bedouin communities targeted for displacement in the Jerusalem district of the occupied West Bank, are insufficient.

“Thousands of Bedouin living in some of the most vulnerable communities in the West Bank are facing the destruction of their homes and livelihoods under this Israeli military plan. Many are registered refugees and some have been displaced multiple times since 1948,” said Ann Harrison, Deputy Director for Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Programme....."

Syria: Medicine as a Weapon of Persecution

Doctors Without Borders (MSF)

"Paris, February 8, 2012 – The Syrian regime is conducting a campaign of unrelenting repression against people wounded in demonstrations and the medical workers trying to treat them, the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said today.

While MSF cannot work directly in Syria, it has collected testimonies from wounded patients treated outside the country and from doctors inside Syria. The testimonies, collected from several people from various parts of the country, point to a crackdown on the provision of urgent medical care for people wounded in the ongoing violence in Syria.

"In Syria today, wounded patients and doctors are pursued, and risk torture and arrest at the hands of the security services," said Marie-Pierre Allié, MSF president. "Medicine is being used as a weapon of persecution."

Most of the wounded do not go to public hospitals for fear of being arrested or tortured. When a wounded person is admitted to a hospital, a false name is sometimes provided to hide his or her identity. Doctors will provide false diagnoses to help patients elude security forces, which search for patients with wounds consistent with those sustained in protests and demonstrations......

Under the current circumstances, MSF’s assistance to Syrians requiring medical care is limited. For months, MSF has been seeking official authorization to aid the wounded in Syria, so far without success. The organization is treating patients outside Syria and is supporting doctors' networks inside the country, through the provision of medicine, medical supplies, and surgical and transfusion kits. "

Al-Jazeera Video: Syrians say Lebanon blocking escape

"Activists accuse Lebanese army of preventing wounded Syrians to cross the border for treatment in nearby Tripoli."

Al-Jazeera Video: 'Besieged' Homs endures tank assault

Al-Jazeera Video: Revolution through Arab Eyes - Manufacturing the truth

A VERY GOOD SEGMENT



"Egypt's revolution was not televised - at least not on Egyptian state television, which preferred fabrication to truth."

Al-Jazeera Video: An activist in Homs speaks to Al Jazeera

Real News Video: US, Saudis and Russia Vie for Influence in Post-Assad Syria

Hamid Dabashi: Russian position more reasoned but share US interest in maintaining Syrian military dictatorship without Assad

AN EXCELLENT VIDEO!
DON'T MISS IT

Real News Video with Transcript: US Arms Deal with Bahrain as Crackdown Continues

Robert Naiman: US plans $53 million arms sale as suppression of democracy movement gets a "seal of approval"

Syrian Repression, the Chinese-Russian Veto, and U.S. Hypocrisy

by Stephen Zunes
Common Dreams

"As the Syrian regime continues to slaughter unarmed civilians, the major powers at the United Nations continue to put their narrow geopolitical agenda ahead of international humanitarian law. Just as France shields Morocco from accountability for its ongoing occupation and repression in Western Sahara and just as the United States shields Israel from having to live up to its obligations under international humanitarian law, Russia and China have used their permanent seats on the UN Security Council to protect the Syrian regime from accountability for its savage repression against its own citizens.

On Saturday, Russia and China vetoed an otherwise unanimous UN Security Council resolution condemning the ongoing repression in Syria and calling for a halt to violence on all sides, unfettered access for Arab League monitors, and “a Syrian-led political transition to a democratic, plural political system, in which citizens are equal regardless of their affiliations or ethnicities or beliefs.”

Although the joint Russian and Chinese veto of the resolution is inexcusable, the self-righteous reaction by U.S. officials betrays hypocrisy on a grand scale......

Although foreign military intervention is not the answer, the international community needs to take decisive steps to stop the repression in Syria and support a transition to democracy. The Russian and Chinese veto of the moderate and reasonable UN Security Council resolution was unconscionable. Unfortunately, the policies of the United States and its allies have made it all the more difficult for the UN and peoples of the world to oppose Syrian government repression and defend the Syrian people."

كتاب فلسطينيون يتضامنون مع السوريين

تحت عنوان "ليس باسمنا ترتكب الجرائم"

"تقدم أكثر من مائة كاتب وشاعر فلسطيني الأربعاء بطلب انتساب جماعي لرابطة الكتاب السوريين التي أسستها المعارضة السورية، تعبيرا عن تضامنهم مع الشعب السوري تحت عنوان "ليس باسمنا، ليس باسم فلسطين ترتكب الجرائم أيها القتلة".

وجاء في بيان صادر عنهم "يشرفنا نحن الكتاب الفلسطينيين الموقعين على هذا البيان أن نتقدم بطلب انضمام جماعي إلى رابطة الكتاب السوريين التي أعلن عن تأسيسها مؤخرا من قبل كتاب ومثقفي سوريا الأحرار".

واعتبر البيان تأسيس هذه الرابطة "رافعة أساسية في ثورة سوريا تضع المثقف الحقيقي في موقعه إلى جانب شعبه كشريك فاعل في بناء سوريا الجديدة والخلاص من استبداد حكم العائلة نحو نظام مدني تعددي ديمقراطي قائم على حق المواطنة".

واعتبر أن ذلك "يفتح المجال أمام حرية التعبير والإبداع ويحرم النظام من تزييف إرادة المثقف السوري الحر عبر أطر فارغة وخاوية استولت على مقدرات الثقافة وصادرت دوره وزيفت إرادته وكانت دائما أداة بيد الطاغية وأجهزته".

وأشار البيان إلى كلمة ممثل سوريا في مجلس الأمن معتبرا أنه "استعمل القضية الفلسطينية ومسيرتها المؤلمة والمشرفة للتغطية على جرائمه المروعة في سوريا، ونحن نقول للنظام السوري وممثليه ليس باسمنا، ليس باسم فلسطين ترتكب الجرائم في سوريا الحبيبة أيها القتلة لا تجعلوا من قضيتنا العادلة قناعا لجرائمكم اللاإنسانية بحق إخوتنا السوريين".

وأكد البيان على أن "الشعب السوري هو من تبنى القضية الفلسطينية تاريخيا وقدم لأجلها الشهداء وليس سياسات نظام الأسد التي نحتفظ منها بذكريات مؤلمة ولن ننسى أدوارها في مجازر تل الزعتر في 1976 والعدوان الرهيب على مخيم نهر البارد في طرابلس في 1983 وحصار المخيمات في بيروت العام 1985 وغيرها من أعمال تسببت مرارا بضرب الوحدة الوطنية الفلسطينية".

ومن أبرز الموقعين على البيان الشعراء الفلسطينيون مريد البرغوثي وطاهر رياض وغسان زقطان وزهير أبو شايب، ومن الكتاب والروائيين عزمي بشارة ومحمود الريماوي ومعن البياري ويوسف أبو لوز وربعي المدهون وعادل بشتاوي وأنطوان شلحت وفخري صالح وموسى برهومة وآخرين.
"

The siege of Homs: scores killed in fifth day of shelling

Opposition activists say tanks are pushing deeper into residential areas before feared final ground assault

Luke Harding, Mona Mahmood, Matthew Weaver and James Meikle
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 8 February 2012

"Scores of people have been killed in the fifth straight day of shelling in the beseiged Syrian city of Homs, according to opponents of Bashar al-Assad's regime.

The continuing bombardments of the districts of Bayadah, Baba Amr, al-Khaldiyeh and Karm el-Zeytoun caused many deaths, according to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Omar Shaker, an activist in Baba Amr, said the district was under "very intense shelling" by tanks, mortars, artilleries and heavy machine guns. He said he had counted five bodies.

Other reports suggest 47 civilians died early on Wednesday in the government's continuing attempts to subdue opposition areas. At least 150 people have died in the last two days, activists and oppostion sources have told Reuters.

One activist, Muhammad Hassan, said by satellite phone: "Electricity returned briefly and we were able to contact various neighbourhoods because activists there managed to recharge their phones. We counted 47 killed since midnight." Hassan said the bombardment had intensified in Sunni Muslim neighbourhoods that have risen up against Assad......

Activists said opposition fighters from the Free Syrian Army (FSA) were no match for their well-armed government adversaries, equipped with tanks, fighter planes and Russian heavy weapons. "The soldiers who defected from the army only have Kalashnikovs. How can you face a battalion with a Kalashnikov?" Sufian asked. Amid the horror, activists expressed optimism. They said that despite the continuing massacre, in which Homs has become Syria's bloody counterpart to Misrata in Libya, they still expected Assad's regime to crumble. Rabea said that after this weekend's failure to find a diplomatic settlement, the only way the world could stop the slaughter in Syria was to arm the FSA.

"The international community needs to give the FSA money," Rabea said. "And weapons. We need the Red Cross here, we need a no-fly zone, and we need safe havens so that people can flee.
"We blame Russia and China mainly for all the killing happening in the city now. Our crime is that we wanted freedom.""

Egypt: Stop holding NGOs hostage

7 February 2012

"The Egyptian authorities should scrap a Mubarak-era law used to prosecute civil society and ensure its planned replacement upholds the right to freedom of association, Amnesty International said today.

The call follows yesterday’s announcement that 43 people have been referred to a criminal court for trial as part of an investigation into the funding and registration of NGOs.

Amnesty International has called for the charges against them, based on Egypt’s repressive laws on civil society registration and foreign funding, to be dropped.

“These international associations have become the latest scapegoats as the authorities desperately spin their story of foreign conspiracies,” said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Deputy Director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Programme.

“Egyptian human rights organizations have been left to wait in fear for their turn to come.”....."

Egypt bloggers, journalists come under fire in recent clashes

By Joseph Mayton
Bikya Masr

"CAIRO: Journalists and bloggers have come under fire in Egypt, the most recent spate of media directed violence and attacks carried out by the country’s security forces.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) condemned the attacks on media personnel attempting to cover the recent clashes between police and protesters in Egypt, which began last Thursday.

Their report said one journalist and one blogger were shot during the violence and a third was arrested and assaulted by police.

“Egyptian authorities have an obligation to enforce the law and should demonstrate that attacks on journalists will not go unpunished,” said Mohamed Abdel Dayem, CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa program coordinator, in a press statement.

“These attacks show how tenuous the situation is for journalists in Egypt. Authorities must ensure journalists are able to carry out their work unharmed.”...."

Football prohibited in Islam, fans not martyrs, says Egypt sheikh

By Joseph Mayton
Bikya Masr

"CAIRO: A popular ultra-conservative Salafist sheikh in Egypt has said that the victims at a match in Port Said last week were not “martyrs” and had died in sin because football is forbidden in Islam.

Spokesman of the Salafi Preaching Movement in the country, Sheikh Abdul Moneim al-Shahat, who lost an attempt to enter parliament, said in a speech on Monday that those who were killed in Port Said stadium, did not sacrifice their lives for God.

“They were not in a war fighting for God, they were just having fun. This fun distracts Muslims from worshipping God,” he said in the sermon he gave at a mosque in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria.

Shahat added that the “fun” which victims sought when they went to the stadium is “forbidden in Islam.”......"

Partners with the Military Junta: Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood calls civil disobedience “disruptive”

Bikya Masr

"CAIRO: Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood announced on Tuesday that it rejects calls for a civil disobedience campaign being launched by a number of revolutionary youth movements, political parties and trade unions. Scheduled to begin on February 11, which marks the anniversary of former president Hosni Mubarak’s ouster, the campaign is gaining steam across social and political lines.

Mahmoud Hussein, Secretary General of the Muslim Brotherhood, stated that the call for civil disobedience on February 11 is a very “destructive” call and “can harm the interests of Egypt and its future.”

He continued: “This call means a general strike in the sense to disrupt the railway, transportation, and delay in the work of factories, companies, universities, schools, and refraining from paying money owed to the government (taxes, electricity, water and gas bills), and all this would exacerbate the bad economic, social and services situation leading to the dismantling of the state institutions.”

He added in the statement that the Brotherhood “rejects such calls,” and called on Egyptians “to double their efforts to build the state, and not demolish it.”

The Islamic group also called for upholding “reason, wisdom and logic to maintain the public interest and refrain from personal and partisan interests” and advised Egyptians to ignore these “destructive calls for civil disobedience.”"

Inside Homs with the Free Syrian Army

A reporter spends several days in the opposition stronghold of Bab Amr with the Free Syrian Army.

Jane Ferguson
Al-Jazeera

"....
Civilian and FSA

Civilians were desperate to show me everything, often grabbing my arm and taking me to see their houses, sniper positions, evidence of shelling, and bandaged wounds.

As the conflict turns into Guerilla warfare, the line between civilian and FSA is to some extent unclear. Activists and their cameramen mingle freely with the defected soldiers, knowing many of their commanders and men on outposts by name.

But the sheer number of civilians to FSA is clear...."