Rias A. Sherzad

At times I run across videos that show horrors of what humans are capable of doing. Many times it’s not clear what’s really happening in those videos and if they’re real or fake but the video below speaks for itself.

Pakistani soldiers enter a building and interrogate the male residents, asking for information on the Taliban. They don’t get the answers they’re looking for so the head of that group orders his subordinates to beat the men. The men are begging for mercy while they get kicked, whipped and hit everywhere but the soldiers are ignoring them and keep on torturing them. One of the brave soldiers shows his female side by pulling his victim’s hair. The most gruesome part comes at the end, when an old man is beaten up while he’s begging for mercy for them to let go of him and screaming “Ya Allah, Ya Allah”.
In war times torturers and those that commit crimes often try to play down their guilt by claiming they were ordered to do what they did but if you have a closer look at the soldiers in this video you will see that some of them really enjoy what they’re doing.

Two of the four beaten men are elderly men that could be your or my grandfather but torturers are not exactly known for their sense of honour so they ignore their pleas for mercy. I’ve been harrassed, blackmailed and chased through Peshawar by the Pakistani police myself so I can tell you one thing: stuff like this is very common over there. In Pakistan, when people speak about the police, they don’t call them “cops” but “dogs”.

Make a right-click here and and choose “Save as…” to download the Video.

Last Saturday I went to the movies and watched Steven Spielberg’s latest movie “München” which depicts the events during and after the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, Germany.

For the historically challenged: in 1972 a group of Palestinian rebels tried to kidnap the Israeli olympic team in order to trade them in for Palestinians arrested in Israeli jails – a deal that was rejected by Golda Meir, the Israeli premier minister back then (who was, in the movie, portrayed as a nice ‘ole lady that in fact she never was). The plot was foiled, all eleven athletes were killed (most of them accidentally by German police forces) and some of the Palestinian rebels as well. Others were jailed and later released or traded in for hostages (some call them “trading goods”) taken elsewhere. It’s sad to see that those Palestinians and Israelis had to die but as I learnt from western media they can be considered “collateral damage“.

A hit-team of five Mossad agents was sent out to hunt down and kill eleven Palestinians suspected of masterminding the Munich-operation. Killing is what they did, but we’ll forget about the historic fact that the Mossad killed people that had nothing or barely anything to do with the happenings in Munich, as proven many, many times in the past years.

What I found strange about the movie was, that everything around the Israelis was nice and clean. Nice cities, clean streets, nice clothes and the hero had a pretty wife and was perfectly shaved. They always had doubts and hesitated before they killed someone and showed a high level of moral maturity.
The villains, here: Palestinians, had moustaches that would have scared the living hell out of Stalin and Saddam Hussain, had dark circles around their eyes, were always unshaved and had the scariest look and the darkest sunglasses I’ve ever seen. Their motto seemed to be “Shoot, then ask” whilst the Israeli murder-squad had philosophical discussions about what they were doing there and if it was right or wrong.
During the movie, only once of course, a Palestinian villain had the opportunity to explain his point of view to the hero – and was killed some five minutes later. Who would stand alone infront of a group of four armed men, unprotected, and take part in a five-against-one shootout? According to Steven Spielberg: stupid Palestinian cannon fodder, duh!

Historically and morally the biggest bs I’ve seen lately but I didn’t expect anything else…

The war against terrorism has led to more dubious arrests throughout Europe.
Apparently it’s sufficient to just know someone that knows someone that was sitting next to an alleged terrorist in a Café, having a drink; and without having engaged in conversation with or giving indication of being acquainted with the alleged terrorist.

I use this far-fetched unrealistic example to illustrate some truly obtuse grounds for arrests.

Exhibit A is an occurrence from my immediate family: my cousin was arrested and interrogated for 4 hours because his Mexican(!) friend had written a report on Bin Ladin – it was his homework – and GOD FORBID that that Mexican friend had said evidence (report) in his possession during the vehicle ride with my (Afghan) cousin…

It took me two days to recover from the U.S. Presidential Elections but at least I outlasted the American from the State Georgia who committed suicide at ground zero over this trauma. I have to admit that I have been speechless about the results and find it intensely difficult to say that: George W. Bush is the old and the new American president.
Even the majority of W’s foreign political enemies were happy with the results of the election. The Democrats would do endeavor the same imperialistic mode, e.g. the attack on Iraq, but would be clever enough to solidify a world-wide alliance seeking “legitimacy”. Mr. Bush will just continue on discrediting the U.S. and manipulate waves of people into the hands of his enemies and America has mandated it.

As Mr. Bush’s campaign was targeting the fears of Americans – namely through the threat of terrorism – the Bin Ladin tape was aired days before the elections and consequently assisted in both escalating those fears and escalating Bush’s numbers. I like to describe this as a classical “win-win situation”. Mr. Bush needs Mr. Bin Ladin to justify his imperialistic policy and Mr. Bin Ladin needs Mr. Bush to rationalize his “holy” (in my opinion, unjustified) war against the U.S. and ultimately confirm the Caliphate title he has been eyeing.

However, as the election results showed, Mr. Bush lost Arab and Jewish support – but as the tape showed, he won the support of at least one Arab: Osama Bin Ladin…