Jews and HIndus: Building A Passage to India

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/11102#.Tw6VhYHU5hw

Jews and HIndus have both been victims of attempted extermination by Islamics. Of course, not all Muslims are terrorists. But today, most terrorists are Muslims. A speech to Hindu youth in Pune.

On January 8, 2012, I delivered a rather passionate speech in Pune, India via skype. I was invited to do so by “Youth 4 Panun Kashmir.” The organizers were especially interested in my drawing parallels between Israel and India, Jews and Hindus both of whom have, historically, been genocidally exterminated and driven out of their holy places.

I was approached to speak partly because I have written about Islamic terrorism in India before and partly because I recently took up the case of Dr. Subramanian Swamy, an Indian political leader and economist, who was wrongfully dismissed by Harvard after twenty years for daring to take a “controversial” stand against Islamic terrorism in India.

 Here is part of what I said. I think it will be of interest to the readers of Israel National News and perhaps to Israeli diplomats who are in touch with their counterparts in India, because Dr. Swamy was the highest ranking Indian leader to first visit Israel in the early 1980s. His visits led to the establishment of an Indian Embassy and an Israeli Embassy in Israel and India.

My speech:

 It is my great pleasure to be with you today. Namaste. There should be an international outcry on behalf of the near-extinction of the Hindus of Kashmir, an outcry at the United Nations about the Hindu refugees who were forced to flee Kashmir to escape horrific Islamic violence.

 The Indian government is also afraid to confront the growing threat of Islamic terrorism. Now, only two-three thousand Hindu Kashmiris dare to remain; they are in a very dangerous situation.

 Why is the world utterly indifferent to this—your—tragedy?

 Because today, there is only one refugee group in the world that matters. It is the utterly imaginary group known as the “Palestinians.” This group is composed of four to five generations of Egyptians, Syrians, Jordanians, Iraqis, Bedu, and tribes who once lived in the Holy Land under the Romans, the Christians, the Turks, and the British but who themselves claimed no nationality until well after World War Two, when their so-called nationality became the justification for a terrorist campaign against the only Jewish state in the world.

This privileged group of refugees has been living on enormous world sympathy and on UN, European, and American funding; rather, their leaders have been living well on UNRWA funding and using the excess monies to wage a ruthless war against Israel.

The UN does not care about your people, the Hindu Kashmiris, who are facing extinction and who wish to return to peacefully practice their religion where their ancestors once lived and flourished. You are not demanding the exile of Muslim Kashmiris. But, like Jews and other infidel groups, you have been terrorized and persecuted by the intolerant practices of Islamic religious apartheid.

 The UN is a morally bankrupt organization of tyrannies. Neither India, nor Israel, nor the United States should be supporting it. As you may know, Western thought has grown exceedingly “politically correct,” but in a way that only George Orwell or Lewis Carroll could fully comprehend. The world is, quite simply, completely upside down and not all “pigs” are equal. The democratic West, Israel, and India all value freedom, a free press, separation of religion and state, and individual rights. This is one of the reasons that free countries are demonized as quintessentially evil. America and Israel are repeatedly accused of imperialism, colonialism, racism, “occupation,” and apartheid.

 University professors at the most distinguished institutions have absolutely no idea about Islam’s long and terrible history of colonialism, imperialism, forced conversion, racism, slavery, and both gender and religious apartheid. Islamic culture practices gender and religious apartheid for which they are never held accountable; Israel is falsely scapegoated as an “apartheid” state when it tries to defend itself from terrorism.

This is something that you in India, especially those of you who are longing to live safely and proudly as Hindus in Kashmir know a good deal about.

We now know that Muslims mass-slaughtered Hindus and buried them in mass graves in the 1990s in Kashmir. As of 1989, Pakistan funded the terrorists to do this. Sixty thousand people died. Kashmiri Hindus fled in droves to India. But they yearn for Kashmir and for Kashmir’s holy temples, many of which have been turned into mosques and masjids.

 When one tries to talk about Islamic religious and gender apartheid or about Islamic terrorism, one is immediately demonized as an “Islamophobe” and a “racist.” One loses one’s reputation as a “good” person. One also loses one’s friends and employment possibilities.

This has just happened to one of India’s true heroes, Dr. Subramanian Swamy at Harvard University. I have recently written about this and will say a few words about this travesty shortly. Today, a person may find herself on trial for committing the crime of “hate speech” by telling the truth about certain Islamic practices. This is happening all over Europe. One is censored. One begins to censor oneself. Cartoons that offend, criticism, however accurate, that offends…Muslim fundamentalists and their western supporters, are simply not published.

The speech, the illustration, is seen as the “provocation.” The violent response is overlooked. Let me be clear. Not all Muslims are terrorists. But today, most terrorists are Muslims. Many Muslims wish to live in peace, yearn for peace. And yet, they do not risk standing up to their Islamist leaders. Those who do are in prison or have already been tortured or murdered.

But let the facts be known. Eighty million Hindus were slaughtered by Muslims in only five centuries. Hindu Temples became mosques and masjids. Even today, Muslims are entering India illegally and carrying along with them both criminals and terrorists.

The Indian government, including the police, is afraid to stop them. The Indian government certainly does not want to fight Muslims and Islamists and terrorists for the sake of Kashmir. They are allowing these illegal immigrants to kidnap, rape, forcibly convert and marry Hindu girls to Muslims. They are also allowing illegal takeovers of land.

Jews—my people—were also persecuted and genocidally exterminated. We lived in exile, mainly suffering, sometimes flourishing, never giving up our longing for the Holy Land. Through religious practices, prayer, and culture, we found the strength to return again and again to our homeland, our roots. We now have the only Jewish state in the world: Israel.

The Muslim Middle East cannot abide an independent Jewish presence, however small, in its midst. Israel has been at war, militarily since its birth in 1948. It is still under existential siege. It is scapegoated for the sins and crimes of the Arab and Muslim aggressors—who are seen as “victims,” noble, pure, innocent.

 Kashmiri Hindus are not welcome in Kashmir, their legendary birthplace. The numbers of Kashmiri Hindus who are willing to live there under dangerous conditions, has dangerously dwindled. Barbarian Islamists have committed atrocities. The United Nations has not weighed in against this. It is a useless organization of tyrannies. Kashmir is the symbol of Muslim genocide and Muslim imperialism.

That is why Dr. Swamy has called for the Indian government to revoke Article #370. It represents a policy of appeasement towards Muslim Pakistan at the time of partition Memories linger, fester. There is no one who is willing to stand up to Islamic aggression on behalf of Hindus who have the same right to live in Kashmir as Muslims may have.

 Dr. Swamy has pointed out the numerous and egregious crimes committed by Muslim fundamentalists in India: terrorism, kidnapping, religious and gender apartheid, colonialism, imperialism, barbarism. Identifying and stating the problem is the first necessary and courageous step in this battle for human justice. We need to retain and develop a collective mindset to stand against the terrible and increasing threat of Islamic terrorism.

 As you may know, the dismissed professor—the shame is entirely Harvard’s to bear—I am talking about Dr. Swamy, is also something of a swashbuckling hero. In 1976, Dr. Swamy exposed and challenged corruption in Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s “emergency authoritarian” rule in India and had to flee the country twice as a result. However, due to his campaign Gandhi allowed long overdue elections. In 1972, Swamy lost his professorship at the Indian Institute of Technology, New Delhi, due to his crusade for both academic freedom and for the union rights of non-teaching Institute employees. After twenty years of litigation, the courts reinstated Swamy with full honors.In 1987, Dr. Swamy undertook a fast unto death to demand an inquiry into the illegal killing of Muslim youth by the police in Hashimpura, Meerut. The government finally yielded to his demand for which Swamy was hailed by India’s minorities.

I am especially glad that Dr. Swamy initiated a normalization of relations between India and Israel. This is an important alliance for many reasons.

I am reminded of a quote by Mahatma Gandhi: “One needs to be slow to form convictions, but once formed they must be defended against the heaviest odds.” Similarly, Ben-Gurion said: “Courage is a special kind of knowledge: the knowledge of how to fear what ought to be feared and how not to fear what ought not to be feared.”

Hindus feel the heat in Pakistan

Riaz Sohail
BBC News, Karachi

Wealthy Hindus like Garish Kumar are targets for kidnappers
The kidnap and murder of a Hindu engineer in Pakistan’s southern province of Sindh has increased the insecurity among fellow Hindus.

Garish Kumar disappeared last month near Hyderabad city, 250 km (160 miles) from the port city of Karachi in Sindh.

His dismembered body parts were later found near a madrassa (Islamic religious school).

Police initially said the crime was committed by an outlawed Muslim militant group. Five people were arrested.

However, Hyderabad’s police chief, Shaukat Shah, the incident now seems to be a simple kidnapping for ransom case.

Minority report

Kumar’s father, Saspal Das, is a trader from Kunri town in Sindh’s central district of Umerkot.

Most Hindus are poor peasants and serve as bonded labour

“No one listens to the Hindu minority,” he complains. “”We have no security.

“We are targeted because we are Hindu. There is no other reason for kidnapping Garish.”

Pakistan is home to some 2.5 million Hindus, 95% of them living in the southern Sindh province.

Most are poor, low-caste peasants.

However there are also some successful upper caste businessmen. In Sindh, they are a hot commodity for bandits.

They lack the protection afforded to local tribal Muslims.

Whole tribes often go to war with one another in rural Sindh over any slight to their members.

That cushion is not available to the Hindu minority.

Protection money

In recent years kidnapping for ransom and armed robberies have multiplied in the area and Hindus have increasingly been the focus of attacks.

Hindus have to pay thousands of pounds to avoid kidnapping

Many pay protection money regularly to local gangs or influential figures. But in spite of this they are still targeted.

Santosh Kumar, a rice trader from Larkana town in upper Sindh, and his two brothers were kidnapped in separate incidents in 2006. They were later released after paying a huge ransom.

Another wealthy trader from the nearby city of Sukkur in Sindh, Sundeep Kumar, was kidnapped in 2005.

He was released after paying a ransom of over a million rupees ($16,000), according to local sources.

The ransom can sometimes go up to five times that amount.

But not all Hindus are as rich as Sundeep Kumar.

Last August, a youth, Ramesh Lal, was kidnapped. His relatives could not afford the ransom, and his body was later found at a police check post.

In the last three years at least five Hindu traders have been killed after being kidnapped or offering resistance.

“Powerful oppress the weak”

Ramesh Lal, a Hindu MP in Pakistan’s parliament says, “The Hindus are not as rich as portrayed.”

“Often the kidnappers ask a huge amount that the families cannot pay. As a result the hostages are killed.”

Even Hindu women and children are not spared by the kidnappers

The President of the Hindu council in Sukkur district, Mukhi Aishwar Lal says, “the powerful always oppress weaker communities… Hindus are weak so they are targeted.”

He relates how a few years back a Hindu family travelling by local bus were kidnapped by local bandits, while rest of the passengers were allowed to go.

Around that time some foreigners were also kidnapped in the same area. The police secured their release without any payment, but the Hindus were released after a huge ransom was doled out.

Such incidents increase the feeling among Hindus that they have no say in power and authority in the country.

Political apartheid

In Pakistan’s political system, the minorities, such as Hindus, Christians and Sikhs, remain outcasts despite represented in every major political party.

After Gen Pervez Musharraf seized power in 1999, he scrapped the controversial separate electorate system introduced former dictator Gen Zia-ul-Haq in 1980s.

Under the separate electorate system, non-Muslims could only vote for candidates of their own religion. Seats were reserved for minorities in the national and provincial assemblies.

Critics said Muslim candidates no longer had any incentive to pay attention to the aspirations of the minorities.

Gen Musharraf hoped to reverse that by the simple step of abolishing the system. But that appears to have failed.

Sudham Chand, a Hindu community leader who led a local campaign to scrap the separate electorate system was killed in broad daylight. His murder conveyed many a message.

The killers were not arrested. His brother later migrated to India.

Ramesh Lal, a member of the National Assembly, says that the restoration of the conventional electoral system is of little use if the minorities have no security.

And still, he complains, no one asks the minorities what problems they are suffering.

Losing faith

Mukhi Aishwar Lal agrees that Hindus in Sindh are still afraid.

Garish Kumar’s grieving father, Saspal, wants justice

They are frightened to move outside freely. Some even put themselves under a self-imposed curfew after 2000 hours a few months ago.

“No-one is targeting the minorities,” argues Kishanchand Parwani, Advisor for Minorities’ Affairs to the Sindh Government.

But he admits that, although the minorities are supposed to be equal citizens according to the constitution, the reality is different. He accepts that they feel like second class citizens.

Garish Kumar’s father, Saspal Das, still retains faith in the system: “I will fight till I get justice for my son.”

But many Hindu families who stayed in Pakistan after partition have already lost faith and migrated to India

Kashmiri Pandits fear dream may turn sour

Seema Sharma
Tribune News Service
Jammu, February 17
Expectation is running high among around 10,000 migrant Kashmiri Pandits, who filled in consent forms to return to their homeland in the Kashmir valley in April last year under the Prime Minister’s package for their return and rehabilitation, amid fear whether conditions are conducive.

The three families, which returned to the valley and tried to live in their homes there, had to return humiliated by people and authorities.

Yogesh Kandhari, who took voluntary retirement from Deccan Aviation to settle down in his home in the Habba Kadal area of Srinagar a year ago, returned to Jammu unhappy and dejected within a year.

His dreams got shattered when he found a part of his house and a shop encroached.

Kandhari says, “Last year, I went back to Habba Kadal with my family in a hope to spend the remaining part of my life at my birth place. But I was shocked to see a large part of my house encroached upon by my neighbour. Somebody also broke open one of my three shops and occupied it. It took me one year running from one office to another to retrieve the rights of my properties. I was able to get my house vacated, but my shop was handed over to the intruder. Aghast over the sickening attitude of people there, I returned to Jammu to find peace of mind.”

Pushkar Razdan, a retired teacher at Pulwama, has not been even that lucky. He saw his house taken over by the state police and farms invaded by local people.

He lamented, “Expensive walnut trees in my orchards were felled and stolen by some people. A 32 feet road was drawn across my fields without my permission. My house was taken over by the state police, which created a police post there after the infamous Vandhama mass killing case. The police even refused to pay me rent. Now, the matter has got stuck with the Home Ministry. Ultimately, I had to leave my home in the valley.”

Equally distraught is Triloki Nath Bhatt, a resident of Monghama, who is physically challenged with a twisted arm by birth, to see that his own people have become estranged to him.

“When I went back this year to reconstruct my ruined home in Monghama to make it worth living, I was restrained by people and the local administration. I was aghast to know that I can’t carry out construction at my place. This shows people who keep an eye on profitable properties never want us to return.” He too returned empty-handed and disheartened.
http://www.tribuneindia.com/2009/20090218/j&k.htm#3

rival kashmiri groups protest outside U.N

Holding placards and banners, rival Kashmiri groups staged protests outside the United Nations on Friday afternoon during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s address to the plenary session of the UN General Assembly.

The two groups — Kashmiri American Council, a predominantly Muslim body that demands the right of Kashmiris to self-determination under the UN Security Resolutions, and the Indo American Kashmir Forum, a predominantly Hindu outfit that highlights the plight of Pandits because of ‘ethnic cleansing’ by Pakistan-aided terrorists in the state — staged the protests side by side, separated only by waist length iron barricades set up by the police.

While the KAC raised slogans against the Indian government for alleged draconian laws that imprison people who ‘resist Indian occupation,’ the IAKF blamed the Pakistani government for allegedly promoting global Islamic terrorism.

Traditionally, KAC has held protest demonstrations outside the world body every year during India’s address to the UNGA, but this was the first time IAKF held the protest as well.

“Every year, the police decline to give permission for any protests during the UNGA because there are always too many protesters during UNGA and only those who had applied early for permission to stage demonstrations, get to hold that. This year, we made it a point to prepare early to get the permission,” Lalit Kaul, president of IAKF, told rediff.com.

Both the groups handed memoranda to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, urging the world body’s intervention in solving the crisis.

KAC said that there must be an immediate and complete cessation of the “military and paramilitary action by Indian forces against the people of Jammu & Kashmir”.

The organisation demanded that all bunkers, watch towers and barricades set up by the military and paramilitary forces in towns and villages must be immediately dismantled and the right of peaceful association, assembly and demonstration should be restored to the people.

The KAC memorandum was signed by Dr. Ghulam  Nabi Fai, Shaheen Bhat, Dr Ghulam Nabi Mir, Raja Muzzaafar, Aftab Shah and Hafiz Muhammad Sabir, among others.

“The Kashmir question is one of the oldest unresolved international problems in the world. The experience of nearly six decades has shown that it will not go away and that an effort is urgently required to resolve it on a durable basis,” Fai said.

In its memorandum, the IAKF stated that even today the abuse of human rights of Kashmiri Hindus by the Islamic terrorists in the valley continues.

It urged the UN Secretary General to direct the Indian government to restore Kashmiri Hindus’ political and economic rights that would give them equal status, rather than a second class citizenship in their native land.

“We would continue our fight for our rights, whether the world body or the Indian government take any action or not. We will keep on fighting,” Kaul told rediff.com.

SOURCE:REDIFF.COM