by B. R. GOWANI

US/Israel attack Iran

On February 27, 2026, talking with a friend, I mentioned that the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, asked embassy staff to leave Israel. Also, the Reuters report on February 24 stating that Iran will buy Chinese-made CM-302 anti-ship cruise missiles point towards an Israel-pushed-US probable strike on Iran that weekend. His response was: Iranians are mostly Shia Muslims who, with the tragedy of Karbala <1> as motivation, would rather die than accept US and Israeli hegemony.

Next day, February 28, Israel’s Operation Roaring Lion and United States’ Operation Epic Fury started bombing Iranian cities. They assassinated the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Hosseini Khamenei, and many other top government and military officials.

By eliminating Iran’s top leadership, both the US and Israel (and India, see below), were hoping for a quick victory, and a rapid fall of the government. The ensuing chaos would have permitted the US and Israel to create internal civil strife and an opportunity to select the new leader as Trump spelled out to Axios on February 5:

“They are wasting their time. Khamenei’s son is a lightweight. I have to be involved in the appointment, like with Delcy [Rodriguez] in Venezuela.”

Empire’s juggernaut crippled Venezuela by kidnapping President Nicolas Maduro and appointing Vice President Delcy Rodriguez in his place. Now Trump wants to appoint Iran’s next leader.

Ramon Magsaysay Award winner Ravish Kumar states it’s not a question of whether Iran will win, the important thing is Iran didn’t bend in front of the US but instead is fighting for her dignity.

Things didn’t turn out the way Netanyahu and Trump had anticipated. Today is the seventh day of the war, the US and Israel have killed over 1332 Iranians and injured hundreds, while destroying homes and parks and businesses and schools with children still inside.

Shajareh Tayyebeh, all girls school in Menab, was bombed by the US, killing about 180 girls, ages 7 to 12. (The school bombed was in southern Iran, the area geographically assigned to US in this war.)

Spanish politician Manuela Bergerot condemned the killing of school girls and also the war, itself.

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth proudly declared:

“We’re hitting them surgically, overwhelmingly and unapologetically.”

The US (globally) and Israel (regionally) are very efficient in killing people and devastating countries. The dominant news media support them and rarely miss a chance to report with terminology that causes people to further their passion to incite war.

As author/journalist Belen Fernandez points out:

“And as the New York Times whines retroactively about Trump’s “reckless” behaviour in Iran, western establishment media would do well to reflect on the role that years of preemptive journalistic strikes on the country have played in fuelling this bloody mess.”

Trita Parsi , an Iranian-born Swedish writer, laments that Israel is using AI without any human oversight. A park named “Police Park,” not related in any manner to the police, was termed a government site by AI, and so it was bombed.

Parsi says:

“Similarities between Israel’s bombing of Gaza and Tehran are growing stronger.”

It’s Israel’s war

US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, told reporters:

“We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action.” “We knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.”

In May 2021, Fawaz A. Gerges of the London School of Economics, had observed how Israel sets the agenda in its relationship with the US:

“Given the asymmetry of power between the two, one would expect the US, which furnishes Israel with $3.8 billion a year in military aid, to set the ground rules for their relations. Yet in Israel’s case, the reverse is true — it is the tail that wags the dog.”

As has been the case historically, Israel uses the US to achieve its own geopolitical aims. The US has gradually been going down economically and politically, but not in violence. However, it will be Israel, particularly under PM Benjamin Netanyahu, who’ll be responsible for speeding up the US downfall.

There is a line from a couplet from Mahtab Rai Taban:

is ghar ko Ag lag gai ghar ke charAgh se

this house got burned down by the house lamp

(That is, my son, heir, or my own destroyed my house.)

Netanyahu

According to the New York Times analysis, Netanyahu was constantly after Trump for two months trying to persuade him to join the war. Eventually, he succeeded.

That may be true. However, it’s not that simple, there is more to it.

Middle East Eye‘s editor-in-chief David Hearst reminds us that Netanyahu had for a long time, even when not in power, talked about bombing Iran.

On March 1, 2026, Netanyahu bragged:

“This combined [Israeli and US] effort allows us to do what I have hoped to achieve for 40 years: to crush the regime of terror completely. That’s my promise and this is what is going to happen.”

This genocidal maniac has the nerve to talk about Iran’s terror, whereas, he has the blood of innocent Lebanese, Syrians, Iraqis, Iranians, and the genocide of Palestinians on his hands.

India

Modi, Netanyahu, and Trump make up the trinity of Islamophobes.

Jeffrey Epstein, a US financier and child sex offender, was an Israeli agent who had contacts at high levels with politicians, celebrities, academics, religious leaders, corporations, and rich businesspersons, including Indian billionaire and Modi’s friend, Anil Ambani, etc., all over the world.

Epstein wrote an email on July 9, 2017, to Jabor Y <2> (Jabor Yousef Jassim Al Thani), a Qatari businessman who belonged to the Qatari royal family:

“The Indian Prime Minister Modi took advice and danced and sang in Israel for the benefit of the US President. They had met a few weeks ago. IT WORKED!”

Modi met then US President Donald Trump in Washington during his June 25-26, 2017 visit. On July 4, Modi went to Israel — the first ever visit by an Indian prime minister to a country whose illegal creation was opposed by the famous Indian leader: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi <3>.

Partho Sarothi Ray, writing in The Wire, throws light on what Modi gained by singing and dancing:

“Modi came back with a defence deal with Israel, and the Pegasus spyware, which was promptly used to target his domestic critics and opponents, this author included.”

Again, on February 25, 2026, Modi paid a two day visit to Israel. He was granted the newly invented, “Knesset Medal,” for his contribution to Jews and Israelis. No one had heard about that award or seen it until the Knesset speaker Amir Ohana announced and conferred it to Modi.

Two days later, Iran was attacked and within hours its Supreme Leader was assassinated. Modi has neither condoled his death, nor, has he condemned the vicious US and Israel bombing of Iran <4>.

Both the Indian subcontinent and Iran are ancient civilizations and had contacts for thousands of years. Before 1947, they both shared common borders. Now Iran and Pakistan share a common border.

Why is Modi dead silent?

India’s main opposition Congress Party spokesperson Pawan Khera said:

“The silence of the Modi Govt on the targeted assassination of Ayatollah Khameini and other Iranian leaders demonstrates its abdication of moral leadership and its reluctance to say anything remotely critical of the US and Israel. It is a complete betrayal of all that India has stood for. India has never before looked this weak.”

Not only that, Indian ambassadors were instructed around the world to not sign the condolence book at Iranian embassies.

After five days, on March 5, 2026, finally, the foreign secretary Vikram Misri visited the Iranian embassy in New Delhi, and signed the condolence book!

However, on March 1, 2026, the second day of US-Israeli brutal war, Modi called Netanyahu and also the UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan to strongly condemn the Iranian attacks on Emirates territory and express solidarity with their countries.

Why didn’t Modi condole the Iranian Supreme Leader’s death?

One reason Modi could be that he knew of the intensity with which Israel and the US were going to bomb Iran resulting in sudden collapse of the regime.

Modi probably thought if the Iranian government fell, he wouldn’t have to express sorrow for Khamenei’s death or the bombing and thus, save himself from Trump and Netanyahu’s anger.

Modi hasn’t expressed condolence for the murder, yet. However, if Iran’s government survives this assault, then Modi will have real trouble dealing with Iran.

On March 6, Modi got his reward for maintaining the silence. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced:

“The world is very well supplied in oil. Yesterday, the Treasury (Department) agreed to let our allies in India start buying Russian oil that was already on the water.”

“The Indians had been very good actors. We had asked them to stop buying sanctioned Russian oil this fall. They did. They were going to substitute it with US oil. But to ease the temporary gap of oil around the world, we have given them permission to accept the Russian oil. We may unsanction other Russian oil.”

It is shameful and humiliating for the leader <5> of the most populous country, and the fifth largest economy in the world, to ask permission to buy oil from Russia.

In October 2025, Modi told the Indian navy:

“The Indian Navy is the guardian of the Indian Ocean.”

On March 4, an Iranian frigate off the coast of Sri Lanka in the Indian Ocean was torpedoed and sank by the US nuclear attack submarine. Three Australian naval personnel were abroad too. 140 lives were lost, “a monstrous war crime.”

The Indian government is silent on the above atrocity that took place in Indian Ocean. Where was the Indian Ocean’s “guardian”?

UAE

UAE has very good relations with Israel and the US. The war has impacted UAE the most among the Gulf Cooperation Council countries as its airports, luxury hotels, oil facilities, and US bases have been hit by Iran. The very rich are spending upto $200,000 for private evacuation flights to get out of the Gulf countries.

The UAE expressed its anger against the US through Khalaf al-Habtoor, a billionaire close to the ruling circles who openly questioned Trump on X:

“His Excellency President Donald Trump” “A direct question: Who gave you the authority to drag our region into a war with #Iran? And on what basis did you make this dangerous decision?”

“Did you calculate the collateral damage before pulling the trigger? And did you consider that the first to suffer from this escalation will be the countries of the region itself!”

“The peoples of this region have the right to ask as well: Was this your decision alone? Or did it come as a result of pressures from Netanyahu and his government?”

“You have placed the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council and the Arab countries at the heart of a danger they did not choose.”

The UAE rulers must be pissed off with Trump and Netanyahu. They should show guts and pullout of the Abraham Accords that normalizes Israel, the occupier of Palestine and the menace to the Middle East.

China

US and many European countries don’t like China, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia, and Venezuela because they try to carve their own path rather than obey US command.

China has disappointed many by only condemning the attack and not openly supporting Iran. Most people know one thing: every US war weakens the US a bit more, which is in China’s interest. But is that a good strategy? To ditch your friends in need? No. Venezuela is gone, Cuba is being starved through deadly sanctions, and Iran is fighting for its life. From the above countries, only North Korea and Russia are left; and, Russia is at war!

If Iran dissolves, Pakistan will be the next target because it’s a nuclear power and capable of providing nuclear cover to Saudi Arabia, and other Gulf countries, against Israel’s nuclear weapons. If that happens, China will have chaos at its border.

China should wake up and instead of waiting for further weakening of the US, it should form a group of countries with some kind of a defense treaty — becuase that is the only way to counter the Empire’s juggernaut. This could afford some security to the smaller global south countries and let them breathe freely.

Russia

It’s understandable that since Russia is involved in a war with Ukraine from February 2022, she may be reluctant to help Iran, but could still help Iran but that is not the case. There are reports in the US news media, which is not very reliable, that Russia is providing intelligence to Iran in targeting US aircraft, etc. But that is doubtful, unless confirmed from reliable sources.

The dominant white world

Canada: on January 20, 2026, Prime Minister Mark Carney spoke to the World Economic Forum (WEF) about the “rupture in the world order” led by the US since the end of the Second World War in 1945. He acknowledged that the order was flawed, but most of us played along but now “the rules based order is fading, that the strong can do what they can, and the weak must suffer what they must.”

Threatened by the US, Canada suddenly realized that they could be affected too.

Carney also noted:

“… the middle powers must act together, because if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu.”

When the US was bullying and bombing countries, many times Canada joined their table to eat from the White menu.

Now when brown Iran is on the White menu, Carney forgot the “rupture” from the US world order, and is fully supporting the US and Israel, in the deadly and destructive bombing of Iran, to be on the US table to eat Iran:

“Canada supports the United States acting to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon and to prevent its regime from further threatening international peace and security.”

Carney has the nerve to accuse Iran of not discontinuing its nuclear program, that is under attack by the US and Israel, BOTH NUCLEAR POWERS. Iran does not have a single nuclear weapon. Israel possesses 90 and the US has 5,277 nuclear weapons.

Carney also blames Iran for supporting terrorist proxy groups. The reality is that Iran is under attack by two strong violent powers.

Britain is allowing the US to use its bases. HMS Prince of Wales, Britain’s £3-billion supercarrier and one of the most powerful warships ever built in the UK, is also being prepared for possible deployment.

France has deployed its aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle to the Middle East.

Germany was one of the biggest supporters of Israel in its war against Gaza’s Palestinians. Germany was harsh with the supporters of Palestinians. Chancellor Friedrich Merz as usual said the expected thing:

“We share the interest of the United States and Israel in seeing an end to this regime’s terror and its dangerous nuclear and ballistic weapons program.”

Back in June 2025, when Israel was bombing Iran, Merz said:

“This is the dirty work that Israel is doing for all of us. I can only say that I have the utmost respect for the Israeli army and the Israeli leadership for having had the courage to do this.”

So killing of people in Gaza and elsewhere on a mass scale, earns his “respect” for Israel. It’s just that these dominant white countries love to kick brown and blacks ass.

Spain is the exception

Among the major European powers such as Britain, France, Germany, and Spain, only Spain has shown guts and principles. It asked the US to not use Spanish territory in a war against Iran. So the US removed 15 aircrafts, including refueling tankers, from the Rota and Moron military bases in southern Spain.

Trump showed his true self in revenge action:

“We’re going to cut off all trade with Spain. We don’t want anything to do with Spain.”

Spanish MEP Irene Montero asked her country to leave NATO:

“Just to remind everyone that we are in a critical situation, that the government itself is acknowledging that being allies of the United States puts us in serious danger, because the United States and Israel are currently the main threats to the security and stability of humanity.” “They are bombing countries as they please for oil, for control of trade routes, for control of geostrategic military positions, and therefore we tell the public that, in our opinion, it remains urgent to leave NATO.”

Earth’s fate

War Law Institute’s director Ayesha Malik states what will determine a win in this war:

“As it is with most asymmetric conflicts, Iran wins if it doesn’t lose, and the US loses if it doesn’t win.”

That is, if Iran survives the lethal force of the most violent force in human history, the US, that will be a victory for Iran. If the US, after killing thousands of Iranians and destroying town and cities, fails to subdue the leadership, than it will be a defeat for the US.

US is spending carelessly the taxpayer money, billions of dollars on this war. “US$4 million missile is used to destroy $20,000 drones” of Iran.

If Iran has enough missiles to outlive the US and Israeli missiles, it will put a stop to the rapidly rising war power and inflated egos. However, if Trump wins the Iran war, his increased appetite, boldness, and carelessness will aim for bigger targets and could endanger the entire planet.

Notes

<1> Prophet Muhammad’s grandson (through Muhammad’s daughter Fatima and his cousin Ali), Husayn and 72 or so of his supporters and family members, were mercilessly murdered by Yazid’s much larger force in a battle fought at Karbala, Iraq on October 2, 680 CE. This tragedy is remembered every year.

How the US/Israel war will end is difficult to predict. But one could say, in advanced technology and superior weapons, US and Israel are as Yazids, whereas, the Iranians have the guts and the willpower of Husayn. One could say it’s sheer madness. But when it’s a matter of principle, and you don’t want to bow your head, madness is the only path open to some.

<2> In 2017, Saudi Arabia and some other countries broke off relations with Qatar and was restored in 2021. In July 2017, Epstein advised Qatar should follow Modi’s example. Qatari leaders should visit Israel and make the colonial state of Israel a normal entity. Qatar would benefit a lot.

<3> In 1938, Gandhi had opposed the seizure of Palestinian land to make Israel:

“Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English or France to the French. It is wrong and inhuman to impose the Jews on the Arabs. What is going on in Palestine today cannot be justified by any moral code of conduct. The mandates have no sanction but that of the last war. Surely it would be a crime against humanity to reduce the proud Arabs so that Pa-lestine can be restored to the Jews partly or wholly as their national home.”

<4> Not many people know this, but Modi suffers from a dangerous disease called TMAS (Temporary Muteness Attack Syndrome) where the person goes dumb due to fear. In case of Modi: fear of displeasing Master Trump.

<5> Modi‘s power is only in not letting Pakistani artists work in Indian films and to stop Indian players from shaking hands with Pakistani players. Playing is allowed because big money is involved but no handshake allowed!

B. R. Gowani can be reached at brgowani@hotmail.com

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-justice-iran-war-boosts-fears-rogue_n_69a38e00e4b0213c06763495

https://asiatimes.com/2026/03/a-strike-is-not-a-strategy-iran-will-prove-it/

https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/how-iran-war-may-accelerate-fall-us-empire

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-justice-iran-war-boosts-fears-rogue_n_69a38e00e4b0213c06763495

https://theconversation.com/neither-preemptive-nor-legal-us-israeli-strikes-on-iran-have-blown-up-international-law-277173

https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/khamenei-death-means-russia-china-183743224.html

https://www.democracynow.org/2026/3/2/iran_war_israel

https://www.newsclick.in/israel-us-bomb-iran-war-cannot-be-won

https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/world-war-iii-is-about-to-begin/

https://www.geopoliticaleconomy.report/p/us-israel-war-iran-nuclear-weapons-imperialism

https://www.blackagendareport.com/standing-iran

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2026/03/02/ulqw-m02.html

https://thecradle.co/articles/comprehensive-hegemony-or-deterrence-balance-war-scenarios-after-the-assault-on-iran

https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/how-new-york-times-paved-way-apocalyptic-war

https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/iran-war-will-show-israel-and-us-why-colonial-era-ended

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/brics-missing-in-action-israel-war-permanent-member-iran-spirals

https://thecradle.co/articles/chinas-satellites-over-west-asia-a-silent-shield-for-iran

https://asiatimes.com/2026/03/khameneis-killing-is-neocolonialisms-final-gambit/

https://asiatimes.com/2026/03/modis-silence-on-iran-lost-indias-voice-in-the-middle-east/

https://www.ndtv.com/opinion/iran-israel-war-how-iran-is-outsmarting-us-israel-with-its-cheap-but-countless-missiles-11166995?pfrom=home-ndtv_topstories

by NADEEM F. PARACHA

A recent video showing a Quran that survived the devastating fire at Karachi’s Gul Plaza has reignited a centuries-old conversation. Throughout history, accounts of Bibles, Qurans or Buddhist sutras emerging unscathed from catastrophic floods and fires have been celebrated as Divine interventions. While these events offer profound spiritual solace, a closer look reveals a fascinating intersection of material physics and psychological bias.

From a physical standpoint, Dougal Drysdale, Professor Emeritus at the University of Edinburgh, suggests that a hardbound book’s survival is often due to the ‘Closed Book Effect.’ When shut, a book functions as a dense, oxygen-starved block of cellulose. Because fire requires a steady flow of oxygen to consume fuel, the tightly packed pages resist ignition by preventing airflow from reaching the interior.

In the event of a flood, the surface tension of water against tightly pressed pages creates a natural barrier. This prevents deep seepage for a significant period, often leaving the heart of the book perfectly dry.

American psychologist Thomas Gilovich explains that when a sacred text survives a disaster, it often becomes more than just a book. It is elevated to a sacred relic. This transformation, according to Gilovich, can significantly redefine a community’s cultural path. In the aftermath of the 2011 Joplin tornado in Missouri, US, survivors and news outlets frequently highlighted the ‘miraculous’ discovery of intact Bibles among the rubble of flattened homes.

The survival of holy texts in the aftermath of natural catastrophes is often termed ‘Divine protection’, revealing the cultural and spiritual narratives people love to attach to such instances

While hardbound dictionaries and cookbooks likely survived in the same ruins due to their similar physical construction, these secular items were ignored by the media as mere debris. The surviving Bibles were immediately elevated from functional reading material to sacred relics, often being framed and displayed as symbols of Divine protection.

By focusing on these specific books, the media triggered a cognitive bias that led people to view the event through a supernatural lens rather than recognising the simple physical durability of bound paper.

British scholar Susan Whitfield, in her 2004 work The Silk Road: Trade, Travel, War and Faith, details the discovery of the Mogao Caves in China. In that instance, the sealing of the Buddhist text the Diamond Sutra (868 CE) within a dry, walled-up chamber created a “natural vault” that protected the world’s oldest-dated printed book from the degrading effects of humidity and oxygen for nearly a millennium. The perception of such objects often shifts from the literary to the ‘miraculous’.

During World War I, pocket Bibles carried by soldiers occasionally stopped shrapnel due to the high density of their compressed paper. This led many soldiers to treat the Bibles as protective talismans.

Dawn for more

RAWADARI

Introduction

This report is about the human rights situation of the Muslim Ismaili Shia religious minority in Afghanistan following the Taliban’s return to power in August 2021. The report covers restrictions and discrimination by the Taliban, the de-facto authorities (DFA), against the Ismaili community on their right to public and social participation and freedom of religion and worship, including limitations on worship, exercise of religious rituals and attempts at forced conversion. The report is based on 25 interviews with victims and survivors, their family members, civil society activists, and human rights defenders from the Ismaili community, both inside and outside Afghanistan. The primary objective of this report is to document prominent patterns of human rights violations against the Ismaili community in Afghanistan, raise public awareness, and support advocacy efforts to address the grievances experienced by this community.

The findings indicate that since returning to power, the Taliban have imposed widespread and discriminatory restrictions on the lives of this religious minority, resulting in systematic religious persecution. Over the past four years, Afghan Ismailis have been completely excluded from political, administrative, and social participation. Furthermore, the DFA have taken steps to weaken and suppress Ismaili religious and cultural identity, directly threatening their security, human dignity, and fundamental rights.

While discrimination against the Ismaili community is not new and has historical roots in Afghanistan, this research demonstrates that under the Taliban, these practices have become more organized and have expanded into every area of life. The restrictions and attempts to conversion affect all Ismailis, including Ismaili children who are being forcibly educated in Sunni, Taliban-run madrassas. Our findings indicate that in certain areas of Badakhshan, individuals who refused to transfer their children to Taliban religious schools (madrasas) faced fines, torture, death threats, and the burning of their homes and property.

Through public takfir (accusations of apostasy), intimidation, death threats, detention, and torture, the Taliban have coerced members of this community to abandon their faith and convert to Sunni sect of Islam.

Through public takfir (accusations of apostasy), intimidation, death threats, detention, and torture, the Taliban have coerced members of this community to abandon their faith and convert to Sunni sect of Islam.

The testimonies included in the report show a significant increase in the fear of expressing religious identity due to rising negative propaganda, takfir and hate speech. Other serious violations documented include:

• Strict restrictions on the freedom to perform religious rituals.
• Coercion to attend the religious ceremonies of other sects.
• Dismissal from government offices and deprivation of jobs due to religious identity.
• Prohibition of marriage and kinship ties with Ismaili families.
• Restrictions on educational centres and places of worship of Ismailis.
• Threats, extrajudicial killings, forced displacement, and the usurpation of Ismaili properties.

The findings illustrate that the Ismaili community is being subjected to systematic religious persecution that may be considered an instance of crimes against humanity. The report calls for prompt immediate, effective, and targeted measures from the de facto authorities and relevant international bodies to protect the existence and fundamental rights of this religious minority in Afghanistan.

Research Methodology

This research involved online interviews with 25 individuals (including five women), ranging from victims and their families to human rights defenders. The participants represent a wide geographical, social, and age diversity. Some were identified by the Rawadari research team, while others were introduced through a snowball method by the interviewees.

Rawadari for more

Manto – Selected Short Stories (MSSS) translated by Aatish Taseer is a good collection covering some of the author’s famous stories. He wrote over 250 in his short life of 42 years, the last seven of which were spent in Lahore, after emigrating to Pakistan in Jan 1948.

Manto considered himself a Bombay writer, living and writing in close association with the city’s film industry for which he wrote stories and scripts. He had many close friends among film actors, and became a good friend of Ismat Chugtai, the woman short story writer for whom he had a high regard. She, like him, doubled as a screenplay writer for Bombay films. The amazing talent that the Bombay film industry drew at that time (and still draws) from all over India is the principal reason for its vitality.

Manto wrote about everything and was not afraid to describe the seamy side of life, which he saw as intertwined with the normal surface respectability on the outside. He was a wonderful writer of women characters for whom he had a special empathy; in his public life he upheld the tenet of equality for women. The translator, Aatish Taseer, who learned Urdu in order to translate Manto, makes a significant point about the culture in which Manto was at home:

India must now reclaim men like Manto. In Pakistan, Manto’s world, crowded with Hindus, Sikhs, and Muslims, would feel very foreign. It is only in India, still plural, still symmetrically Hindu, that it continues to have relevance. His eye could only have been an Indian eye, sensitive to surprising detail, compulsively aware of Indian plurality, sympathetic to people trapped in their circumstances, here pointing to a particular Hindu festival, there imitating Bombay street dialect.

Many have considered it a tragedy that Manto went to Pakistan after Partition. His wife Safia explains the perplexity at the time that led to his decision, in the biographical notes below. The real tragedy was that he went to a country that did not appreciate his gifts, that tormented him with obscenity charges (on one occasion the use of the word ‘breasts’ was cited as obscene). Magazine publishers in Lahore routinely paid him on the cheap with bootlegged liquor. For decades he was persona non grata, until on the centenary of his birth the Government of Pakistan decided it was time to bestow an honour, the Nishan-e-Imtiaz medal.

Kochiread for more

AL JAZEERA

Disgruntled TikTok users are flocking to the platform which is promising a ‘transparent tech’ experience.

UpScrolled, a social media application created by Palestinian-Jordanian-Australian entrepreneur Issam Hijazi, has surged in popularity across several countries, including the United States, as many users looked for an alternative to TikTok, which was formally taken over by US-backed investors and companies last week.

With Larry Ellison, the owner of Oracle, who is a staunch supporter of Israel and a friend of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, acquiring a stake in TikTok’s US-based entity, social media users have expressed concerns about censorship of pro-Palestine posts on the popular app. TikTok’s global operation will still be run by its Chinese owner, ByteDance.

On Wednesday, TikTok permanently banned Emmy Award-winning journalist and Al Jazeera contributor from Gaza, Bisan Owda, sparking outrage and boycott calls from her supporters. The app has also been accused of content censorship around unprecedented ICE violence in the US.

UpScrolled, which was founded only a year ago, surprisingly climbed to the top spot of US app downloads this week, ranking number one in the “social networking” category of Apple’s App Store free apps by Wednesday. It was also among the top apps downloaded by Apple users in the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia.

The app, meanwhile, is gaining thousands of new downloads as disgruntled TikTok users flock to the platform, pulled by its promise of “transparent tech”. The flood of new users momentarily crashed the platform’s servers over the weekend, UpScrolled reported.

Al Jazeera for more

DEMOCRACY NOW

A new ProPublica investigation reveals new details about a sprawling ICE detention complex where families describe horrific conditions inside, such as being served contaminated food, with children and parents at times finding worms in their meals. Lights are reportedly left on for 24 hours a day. South Texas Family Residential Center, in the town of Dilley a few dozen miles from the southern border with Mexico, detains an estimated 3,500 people, more than half of them children. “I have never felt so much fear to go to a place as I feel here. … Once I go back to Honduras, a lot of dangerous things could happen to my mom and I,” a 14-year-old detained at Dilley, Ariana Velasquez, told ProPublica. There are also mounting reports of psychological abuse by guards, some of whom have allegedly threatened families with separation. “Many of the children who are now being sent there are being arrested by ICE around the country, and some of them, like Ariana, have been living [in the U.S.] for years,” says Mica Rosenberg, investigative reporter at ProPublica.

Transcript

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org. I’m Nermeen Shaikh, with Amy Goodman.

“The Children of Dilley.” That’s the title of a new ProPublica investigation into the South Texas Family Residential Center, a sprawling ICE detention complex in the town of Dilley, a few dozen miles from the southern border with Mexico. It’s run by the private prison company CoreCivic. Dilley was first opened by the Obama administration in 2014.

In a moment, we’ll be joined by a ProPublica investigative reporter who went inside Dilley. But first we turn to the voices of two children held inside. This is a 9-year-old girl from Venezuela, Susej Fernández, speaking to ProPublica, describing what life is like for her at Dilley, where she’s been held for over 50 days.

SUSEJ FERNÁNDEZ:

hhHonestly, honestly, I don’t feel good, because there’s always, always an officer around, like, bothering me. I can’t go anywhere. And if I need to go to the bathroom, they won’t let me, because I have to go with my mom. So it’s annoying, and I just have to stay in my room.

AMY GOODMAN: And this is 14-year-old Ariana Velasquez reading a letter she wrote while detained at Dilley. She’s a high school student from Honduras who’s lived in the United States with her mom for seven years.

ARIANA VELASQUEZ: Hello. My name is Ariana V. I’m 14 years old, and I’m from Honduras. I’ve been detained for 45 days, and I have never felt so much fear to go to a place as I feel here. Every time I remind myself that once I go back to Honduras, a lot of dangerous things could happen to my mom and I. My younger siblings haven’t been able to see their mom in more than a month. They’re very young, and you need both of your parents when you’re growing up. Since I got to this center, all you will feel is sadness and mostly depression.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Those were the words of Ariana Velasquez, a 14-year-old girl from Honduras detained at Dilley.

We’re joined now by ProPublica investigative reporter Mica Rosenberg.

Welcome to Democracy Now!, Mica. Tell us more about Ariana’s story and the children detained at Dilley whom you spoke to.

MICA ROSENBERG: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me.

And I think one of the main takeaways here is that children who are at this center — in the past, the center had mainly been used to hold families who were recently crossing the border, many who — since the Obama administration, it’s been open, and families were coming there in the hopes of coming into the United States for the first time. But now there’s been a real shift, because border crossings have dropped to record lows, and many of the children who are now being sent there are being arrested by ICE around the country. And some of them, like Ariana, have been living here for years. You know, they speak perfect English, as you heard. They were detained sometimes in the middle of their school years. And in some cases, they’re now entrenched American lives. In the case of Ariana, she has two younger U.S. citizen brothers and — a brother and sister, a kindergartner and a toddler, who were not sent to the detention center. So, she was — she and her mother were separated from them.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk, Mica, about CoreCivic running Dilley? And talk about who is profiting financially from the locking up of children.

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Pepe Escobar is a Brazilian geopolitical journalist and author with decades of experience covering global power shifts, energy politics, and Eurasian integration. A seasoned foreign correspondent, he has reported from across Asia and Europe. He is a permanent columnist at The Cradle.

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by DEAN BAKER

Before I go further here, let me qualify everything I’m saying here with a warning: I have no crystal ball from which to give people investment advice. However, I do know logic and arithmetic, apparently unlike Donald Trump, so I can draw out some hypothetical situations, which is what I do below.

There has been much discussion, both here and around the world, of the possibility of a flight from the dollar. This has always been a serious risk since Donald Trump took office, but the risk increased enormously from his deranged rant at the World Economic Forum in Davos last week. 

Virtually everyone who was not on Trump’s payroll acknowledged that the speech was both scary and incoherent. He made threats to our allies, boasted about imposing tariffs based on personal whims, and displayed an extraordinary ignorance of major world events. With Trump commanding extraordinary powers as president as a result of a docile Republican Congress and servile Supreme Court the United States does not look like a good place to park your money.

There have already been some prominent instances of pension funds pulling their holdings out of Treasury bonds and other US assets, but this is the less important part of the story. Most of the money at risk of leaving the United States is not held by public pension funds which may announce their decision to make a political point. 

Rather, most of the money at risk of fleeing is held by private corporations and banks, and wealthy individuals, who would pull their money out of the United States because they think that Donald Trump’s America is a bad investment. There are literally trillions of dollars that could be leaving.

To correct one of the silly things often said by people who should know better: No individual, bank, or corporation is asking where to park one, two, or three trillion dollars. This scenario is supposed to leave them paralyzed in any effort to leave dollar assets, because there is no good alternative country where they can park $4 trillion.

But that is not how the financial system works. The big investors are asking where they can park $10 billion, $50 billion, or $200 billion, and the answer is there are plenty of places where this sort of money can be placed with reasonable safety, including the European Union, Brazil, China, India, the United Kingdom and Canada. A flight from the dollar running into the trillions would be the result of tens of thousands of decisions to pull millions or billions of dollars out of dollar denominated assets.

I don’t know if we are seeing the beginning of this sort of flight, but if we are, we can say with some degree of confidence that the dollar, along with the US stock and bond markets, are headed lower. If that is the case, there is an obvious strategy for people in the United States: join the flight

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