Mustafa Qadri

The US-led occupation of Afghanistan has transformed the once-reviled Taliban into freedom fighters for the Pashtun people

Mustafa Qadri
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 16 May 2010 13:00 BST

They may be repressive fanatics who enslave women and give sanctuary to al-Qaida, but the US-led occupation of Afghanistan has transformed the Taliban into Pashtun freedom fighters. There are two principal reasons for this.

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It’s unlikely Richard Goldstone’s report into the Gaza bombings will result in ICC prosecutions but it may mark a turning point in the conflict, writes Mustafa Qadri

This week the United Nations released an explosive report on Israel’s invasion of the Gaza Strip in late December last year. It finds both Israel and armed Palestinian groups guilty of war crimes and, potentially, of crimes against humanity. Over 1400 mostly civilian Palestinians (including over 300 children) and 13 Israeli (including nine soldiers) were killed during Israel’s massive invasion of the Gaza Strip, the most densely populated region on the planet.

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The following report for The Guardian, published today, looks at the recent meetings between the Presidents of the United States, Afghanistan and Pakistan in Washington D.C. and the risks to civilians caught up in the war with the Taliban:

‘Collateral damage’ in AfPak hurts the US too

The bombardment of civilians in Afghanistan undermines the security credentials of western forces in the region

o Mustafa Qadri
o guardian.co.uk, Friday 8 May 2009 16.30 BST

The timing may have been a disaster for Washington, but for villagers in Afghanistan’s south it was far worse. A day after a US bombing killed up to 120 civilians in Afghanistan’s southern Farah province, President Obama asked the visiting presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan, Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari, to step up their attacks on Taliban and al-Qaida militants.

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So we have, at present, between 800,000 and 1.3 million “excess deaths” as we approach the six-year anniversary of this war.

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The United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories has said Israel’s military offensive on Gaza “would seem to constitute a war crime of the greatest magnitude under international law”.

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“That’s the beauty of Gaza. You see a man walking, he doesn’t have to have a weapon, and you can shoot him,” one soldier told Danny Zamir, the head of the Rabin pre-military academy, who asked him why a company commander ordered an elderly woman to be shot.

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“Hamas has to change its policies,” Mr. Kerry said at the ruins of the American International School in Gaza, which was destroyed by an Israeli air attack in early January. “There is no change in our policy.” I can’t think of any other conflict on earth where the aggressor (the US, by supplying Israel with [...]

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Israel temporarily eased its blockade of the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip on Thursday to allow Palestinian flower growers to export 25,000 blooms to Europe ahead of Valentine’s Day. The amount of carnations allowed out of the Gaza Strip was only a fraction of what farmers produce. Many farmers say they have no choice but to feed [...]

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But in its ruling, the Tribunal said: “We have decided that the public interest in maintaining the confidentiality of the formal minutes of two Cabinet meetings at which ministers decided to commit forces to military action in Iraq did not… outweigh the public interest in disclosure.” The Tribunal said its decision to rule in such [...]

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Remotely piloted Predator drones operated by the Central Intelligence Agency have carried out 28 missile attacks in Fata since last summer, killing at least 132 people. The NYT, quoting Pakistani officials, reported that as many as 100 of them were civilians.

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The mental anguish of the civilians who suffered the assault is so great that the entire population of Gaza could be seen as casualties, said Falk, UN special rapporteur on human rights in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.

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“the Israeli Army has always struck civilian populations, purposely and consciously…the Army, he said, has never distinguished civilian [from military] targets…[but] purposely attacked civilian targets.” The reasons were explained by the distinguished statesman Abba Eban: “there was a rational prospect, ultimately fulfilled, that affected populations would exert pressure for the cessation of hostilities.” The effect, [...]

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The World Bank and UNICEF have reported that despite repeated requests Israel has forbidden the importation by any means — sea, air, or by land across the Egyptian border — of consignments of pumps, metal pipes, air and oil filters, and other goods that need to be obtained from outside Gaza; while allowing only a [...]

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The scale of Israel’s attack on the Gaza Strip, and the almost daily reports of war crimes over the last three weeks, has drawn criticism from even longstanding friends and sympathisers. Despite the Israeli government’s long-planned and comprehensive PR campaign, hundreds of dead children is a hard sell. As a former Israeli government press adviser [...]

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A prominent Jewish MP has compared the actions of Israeli troops with Nazis who forced his family to flee Poland.

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Three members of UN staff were injured when three Israeli shells hit the headquarters, setting it on fire. Thousands of tonnes of desperately needed food and humanitarian supplies were destroyed and about 700 refugees given shelter in the building had to be evacuated. UN officials said the shells were white phosphorus, believed to have been [...]

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According to a joint Tel Aviv University-European University study, this fits a larger pattern in which Israeli violence has been responsible for ending 79 per cent of all lulls in violence since the outbreak of the second intifada, compared with only 8 per cent for Hamas and other Palestinian factions.

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Will Obama be more hardnosed with the Israelis? I doubt it. Why would he? You’re not supposed to say out loud that there’s a big rich Israeli lobby, but everybody knows there is. And more to the point, what’s their counterweight? Who cares about the Palestinians, even in the Arab world, never mind DC? So [...]

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The International Committee of the Red Cross said Thursday that it had found at least 15 bodies and several children — emaciated but alive — in a row of shattered houses in the Gaza Strip and accused the Israeli military of preventing ambulances from reaching the site for four days.

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The following article, on Israel’s continued invasion of the Gaza Strip, was published in NewMatilda.com today:

The World Gives Israel The Green Light

Israel has attacked Gaza with unprecedented barbarity — largely because it has a virtual blank cheque from its powerful allies, writes Mustafa Qadri

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There are other pictures that haunt me. The Israeli army issued a video of the bombing of the Hamas-run government compound, which it posted on YouTube. In it, I also can see my home being destroyed, and I watch it obsessively.

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Dr. Mads Gilbert, a member of a Norwegian triage medical team working in Gaza, has documented Israel’s use of Dense Inert Metal Explosive (DIME), which cuts its victims to pieces and reportedly causes cancer in survivors. Gilbert, who has worked in several conflict zones, said the situation in Gaza is the worst he has ever [...]

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“There is a growing number of Jews around the world, tens of thousands if not more in the last week, [who] if nothing else have spoken out forcefully against Israel,” he said.

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The young in Gaza have nothing to do. There are no jobs. They have nowhere to escape to. They cannot marry because they cannot afford housing. They cannot leave Gaza, even for Israel. They sleep, sometimes 10 to a room, and live on less than $2 a day, surviving on United Nations or Hamas charities [...]

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It has never been like this before. The assault is coming from the sky, the sea and the ground. The explosion of shells, the gunfire from the tanks and the missiles from planes and helicopters are incessant. The sky is laced with smoke, grey here, black there, as the array of weaponry leaves its distinctive [...]

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Ultimately, what is most notable about the “debate” in the U.S. over Israel-Gaza is that virtually all of it occurs from the perspective of Israeli interests but almost none of it is conducted from the perspective of American interests.

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Israeli officials have also enjoyed a clear edge with coverage. An Israeli foreign ministry assessment of eight hours of coverage across international broadcast media reported that Israeli representatives got 58 minutes of airtime while the Palestinians got only 19 minutes. Speaking for the Israeli military, Major Avital Leibovich said: “Quite a few outlets are very [...]

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The first 187 names of those murdered in the ongoing Gaza massacre were released today.

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But Hamas officials and analysts said Monday that the organization would actually like Israel to launch a ground operation; it hopes this would let it inflict such heavy losses on Israeli tanks and infantry that Israel would flee with its tail between its legs. (Thanks Antony)

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That is why Gaza exists: because the Palestinians who lived in Ashkelon and the fields around it – Askalaan in Arabic – were dispossessed from their lands in 1948 when Israel was created and ended up on the beaches of Gaza.

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The death toll by last night had climbed to nearly 290, with more than 700 wounded. This in reply to hundreds of rockets from Hamas militants which killed one Israeli in six months. But the equation is always like this. We also know that to have chosen to strike on a Saturday morning, when the [...]

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I can’t bear to think what will happen if the bombing continues. There are not enough beds in the hospitals and they are severely short of equipment, including x-ray machines.

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The following piece, on Israel’s bombardment of Gaza that commenced on Saturday December 27, was published in Foreign Policy in Focus today:

GAZA ATTACKS: MURDER WITH IMPUNITY

Mustafa Qadri

It was about midnight last Sunday when my phone rang. “I’m not sure I will survive tonight, the Israelis are bombing us everywhere.” It was Mahmoud, a young resident of Rafah, a city in the Gaza Strip on the border with Egypt. We first met when I visited the troubled coastal territory after Israel dismantled its settlements there in September 2005. On December 27, just before midday, Israel’s powerful air force, the fourth largest in the world, commenced a deadly air assault on over 40 separate locations in the Gaza Strip. The strikes were as calculated as they were cold – the targets were almost entirely people and facilities vital to the Hamas government. In one of the areas hit, where police officers had gathered for a parade, body parts were strewn along a courtyard.

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One can travel from the farthest right fringe of the GOP to the heart of the Democratic Party leadership and hear exactly the same thing:  Israel is always right.  Israel must not be criticized.  Israel never bears any blame.  Any action taken by Israel is justified.  No matter the situation, that just gets repeated over and over [...]

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Sources in the defense establishment said Defense Minister Ehud Barak instructed the Israel Defense Forces to prepare for the operation over six months ago, even as Israel was beginning to negotiate a ceasefire agreement with Hamas.

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The following article, on the recommencement of hostilities in the Gaza Strip and Israel’s blockade, was published in NewMatilda.com today:

Out Of The Spotlight, Gazans Continue to Suffer

Despite fewer deaths from hostilities since the June ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, the situation on the ground in Gaza remains dire, writes Mustafa Qadri

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Ambassador to Britain Ron Prosor said earlier this year that the law was detrimental to relations between Israel and the UK and that officials were working to amend the law.

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The following review of ‘Torture Team’ was published in The Australian newspaper on 23 August 2008:

Torture Team: Deception, Cruelty and the Compromise of Law
By Philippe Sands
Allen Lane, 272pp, $49.94

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HINDI MESLEH: Actually, I’m right now stuck in a house, because the Israeli army has invaded the village, because we had the Friday pray at the land. Israeli—Israel army—more than 100 soldiers now are invading the village, shooting tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets at houses. The demonstrations, as usual, they are not violent and [...]

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“A nationa imprisoned” Dawn Newspaper 20 June 2008
(On the 41st anniversary of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. Includes interviews with fighters from Fatah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine)

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