by B. R. GOWANI

A quote, wrongly attributed to Abraham Lincoln, reads:

You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

Well, that may be true but what is also true is that you can fool most of the people (followers of politicians, political parties, religions, celebrities, stars, social media influencers, businesspersons, and so on) most of the time because followers place blind trust in their heroes, heroines, religious leaders, influencers, etc.

This was visible during the quadrennial spectacles called Republican National Convention (July 15 to July 18, 2024, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin) and Democratic National Convention (August 19 to August 22, 2024, in Chicago, Illinois).

Of course, there is a difference between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party: the Republicans are overtly hostile and will screw you unashamedly in broad day light without any kind of lubrication or apology.

The Democrats are, in that respect, a bit less rough. They’ll beg your pardon; would plead with you to understand the criticality of the situation; but will screw you, nonetheless — of course, in a dim light with a bit of lubricant.

Both the conventions took place during the ongoing Israeli slaughter, displacements, starvation of the Palestinians in Gaza since October 12, 2023. Both parties have supported the Israeli carnage. There is a division in the Democratic Party about supporting Israel, but the strong voices are few and many a times become victims of the Israel Lobby. One of the powerful group AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) has spent more than $100 million in the 2024 election campaign: $15 million was spent to defeat US House Representatives Jamal Bowman who was critical of Israeli genocide of Gazans and $9 million to oust Cori Bush, another critic of Israeli war.

Danaka Katovich, National Co-Director CodePink, describes how a woman outside the convention center calling out the names of the children killed in Gaza was ignored and laughed at.

“There was a young woman that sat outside the exit of the Democratic National Convention on its third night reading the names of the children Israel has killed in the last ten months. She did it for hours, until her speaker battery died. She did it alone, taking care to pronounce every child’s name correctly and to say their age at the time of their murder. Without her, many of the DNC guests wouldn’t necessarily be confronted with the carnage members of their party is carrying out.

“Outside the gates of the DNC I saw a young woman making sure the children of Palestine weren’t just numbers, and I saw people laughing at her for doing so. They laughed loudly and mocked her voice. They mocked the names of the dead babies. They yelled at her to leave them alone. They left the coronation ceremony livid that they had to even hear about Gaza.”

Things were not too different inside the convention center, either.

The DNC allowed the parents of one of the hostages held by Hamas to speak and highlight their plight but no Palestinian was permitted to talk about the killing of over 41,000 <1> Palestinians (33% of them children and 18.4% women) and about ceasefire. Even a speech which included support for Kamala Harris was disallowed.

The speakers who did talk about Gaza and Palestine knew very well that their speeches were not going to make any difference.

AOC (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez):

“She [Vice President Kamala Harris] is working tirelessly to secure a ceasefire in Gaza and bringing hostages home.”

After five and a half years in the US Congress and as an active member of the Democratic Party, progressive AOC <2> knows damn well that no efforts on part of Kamala or Biden administration is needed to secure a ceasefire — the US just has to stop money and arms flow to Israel and that’s it.

On August 21, AOC posted on X:

“Just as we must honor the humanity of hostages, so too must we center the humanity of the 40,000 Palestinians killed under Israeli bombardment. To deny that story is to participate in the dehumanization of Palestinians. The @DNC must change course and affirm our shared humanity.

Bernie Sanders:

“We must end this horrific war in Gaza. Bring home the hostages and demand an immediate ceasefire.”

Two progressive members devoted a total of 31 words to the more than 10 month old continuing tragedy without mentioning the over 41,000 Palestinians killed!

Senator Raphael Warnock (Georgia) talked about children’s (including Gaza’s) safety.

“I need all of my neighbors’ children to be okay — poor inner-city children in Atlanta and poor children in Appalachia.” “I need the poor children of Israel and the poor children of Gaza, I need Israelis and Palestinians, I need those in the Congo, those in Haiti, those in Ukraine. I need American children on both sides of the tracks to be OK. Because we are all God’s children.”

The speakers, including (Barack Obama), touched on various topics, but as Lorraine Ali in Los Angeles Times observed,

“But little was said about Gaza or Israel, and the silence spoke volumes. Let’s talk about everything but that war.”

When hawkish Harris opened her mouth she roared about defending the security of the most powerful and technologically advanced country, Israel, against the broken Palestinians.

“With respect to the war in Gaza, President Biden and I are working around the clock because now is the time to get a hostage deal and cease-fire done.

“Let me be clear: I will always stand up for Israel’s right to defend itself and I will always ensure Israel has the ability to defend itself because the people of Israel must never again face the horror that the terrorist organization Hamas caused on Oct. 7.

“Including unspeakable sexual violence and the massacre of young people at a music festival. At the same time, what has happened in Gaza over the past 10 months is devastating. So many innocent lives lost. Desperate, hungry people fleeing for safety, over and over again.

“The scale of suffering is heartbreaking. President Biden and I are working to end this war such that – Israel is secure – the hostages are released – the suffering in Gaza ends – and the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity.”

Hamas of the Israeli occupied Gaza is a “terrorist organization” but there is no mention of who caused the loss of “so many innocent lives” or who is making “desperate, hungry people” flee for “safety, over and over again.”
No mention of Israel. This, from one who is the would-be next President of the US.

She said she and Biden are “working around the clock.” The clock must be out of order. The war will only stop when the US decides to halt its support.

Back in July, Netanyahu addressed the US Congress. Many Democrats abstained, Harris included. But then the very next day, she met Netanyahu in private. Her facial expressions didn’t show she was angry in any manner. Now look at Obama’s picture with Netanyahu where Obama’s displeasure is visible. Netanyahu was trying to undermine Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran.

The statement by Harris after her meeting with Netanyahu was the same diplomatic bullshit. <3>

The conventions are basically a feel good exercise to create excitement and hope among supporters and to denigrate and make fun of the opposition. The Democrats did exactly that; made fun of former president and the current Republican Party presidential candidate, Donald Trump and frightened, rightly so, their followers/die hard supporters with fascism replacing “democracy” if Trump gets reelected.

The Democrats, however, didn’t remind their supporters that they (the Democrats), when in power, do act in a fascist manner overseas with their wars, sanctions, embargoes, blockades, seizing money and gold belonging to countries they don’t like.

On domestic issues the Democrats and Republicans differ on certain issues but both support capitalism and get plenty of money from the corporations. The hands of both parties are drenched with blood of foreigners, including children and women. Even within the US, the Democrats are cruel with many segments of the society. Republicans are openly cruel.

Notes

<1> After every Israeli deadly crime, the usual statement, actually a warning, from its major supporter, the United States, is,

“We are engaged in intense diplomacy pretty much around the clock, with a very simple message: All parties must refrain from escalation.”

That is, Israel’s murderous act should remain unpunished or else we’ll jump in to defend Israel. The above warning was for Iran to refrain from any retaliation against Israel which had assassinated Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh on Iranian soil. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had also ordered killing of Lebanese militia group Hezbollah’s commander Fuad Shukr.

<2> The Democratic leadership was using one of their presidents’ tactic by inviting AOC to speak and thus mainstreaming her but also blunting her voice. President Lyndon B. Johnson (1908 – 1973) said the following about FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover.

“It’s probably better to have him inside the tent pissing out, than outside the tent pissing in.”

<3> A couple of paragraphs from Harris’ statement;

“I also expressed with the prime minister my serious concern about the scale of human suffering in Gaza, including the death of far too many innocent civilians.  And I made clear my serious concern about the dire humanitarian situation there, with over 2 million people facing high levels of food insecurity and half a million people facing catastrophic levels of acute food insecurity.

“What has happened in Gaza over the past nine months is devastating — the images of dead children and desperate, hungry people fleeing for safety, sometimes displaced for the second, third, or fourth time.  We cannot look away in the face of these tragedies.  We cannot allow ourselves to become numb to the suffering.  And I will not be silent.”

Lip service completed, let the one-sided hostilities continue …

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

by SCOTT FOSTER

Geopolitics trump peace politics as G7 diplomats eschew Nagasaki atomic bomb commemoration to protest Israel’s exclusion

Ambassadors to Japan from the other G7 nations – the US, UK, Canada, Germany, France and Italy – refused to attend Friday’s (August 9) peace ceremony in Nagasaki because the Israeli ambassador had not been invited. The only other countries not invited were Russia and Belarus.

According to the US Embassy in Tokyo, Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel decided against attending because the event had been “politicized.” By making front-page news around the world, he ensured that it was.

British Ambassador to Japan Julia Longbottom said that leaving out Israel created “an unfortunate and misleading equivalency with Russia and Belarus.”

This was not unexpected. On July 19, the ambassadors of the six countries and the European Union sent a letter to Nagasaki Mayor Shiro Suzuki stating that it would be difficult for them “to have high-level participation” at the event if Israel was excluded.

Mayor Suzuki told the press that “It was not due to political reasons that we did not invite the Israeli ambassador. We wanted to conduct the ceremony smoothly in a peaceful and solemn manner. It was a difficult decision.”

According to media reports, Ambassador Emanuel wrote Suzuki a letter in which he stated that “I believe your decision is a political one and has nothing to do with the security and safety of the event, especially in light of the caliber of attendees.”

The G7 ambassadors did attend the peace ceremony held in Hiroshima last Tuesday, to which Israel was, but Russia and Belarus were not, invited. Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, who represents a district in Hiroshima, addressed both events.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi told the news media that the Japanese government is “not in a position to make any comments” on Mayor Suzuki’s decision because the event was hosted by the city of Nagasaki.

Asia Times for more

DAWN

(“Aurat” on Rekhta. “Aurat”‘s english translation on Kaifi Azmi. )

“Aise dastoor ko subh-e-be-nur ko main nahi manta main nahi janta (This constitution, this morning bereft of light, I refuse to accept, I refuse to acknowledge),” Habib Jalib wrote in his 1962 firebrand poem ‘Dastoor’. The opening verse is aimed straight at a flawed “system”, and as it goes on, the poem soon transitions into the voice of a politically frustrated people.

Defiant and demanding, rhythmic and resistant, harmonising and hopeful — ‘Dastoor’ has echoed in streets and theatres beyond colonial boundaries as a rebel anthem over the years — whether it is at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi or during the lawyers’ movement here.

Although regarded as a cornerstone, ‘Dastoor’ was neither the first nor the last protest song that Pakistan produced in its 77-year-long history.

What is resistance music?

By definition, resistance music traditionally expresses feelings of protest about some social or political injustice or an international event that aroused strong emotions.

An essential form of political expression in the country, it has, in times of turmoil and unrest, provided a safe haven to both artists — as a release for their and society’s frustrations — and listeners in need of a rallying cry. From scathing critique to satire, the layered history of these songs shows how they have evolved in recent years.

In Pakistan, protest music and lyrics have been around since before its birth. We churn music out of anything and then hold on to it for life. From load shedding to military dictatorship and beyond; as long as the awaam has been fed up, it has been singing about it.

But in a country where artists are jailed and someone, in all likelihood, is eavesdropping on your phone conversations, how does one define resistance music? Dawn.com spoke to over a dozen artists and cultural experts about it and the majority opinion says that it can be described as opposing the state narrative, speaking up against oppression, and providing an alternate opinion.

This special report by no means covers all the resistance music that has been produced over the years in Pakistan or songs/lyrics that the society adopted as rebel anthems. Resistance is also personal; as individuals, our causes can differ and so can our attachments to different forms of art. This report mainly covers mainstream music, and songs and poetry that the experts we spoke to felt deserved a mention.

“Resistance music uses poetry which speaks against injustices, disparity and the pressing issues of society or just questions, makes fun of or ridicules the status quo and power structures to bring about some sort of a rooted and grounded version of the people’s opinion,” says musician Arieb Azhar, whose sentiment was echoed by several others. Singer Haroon Rashid simply calls it a responsibility to positively impact society.

Beyond what it can and should achieve, resistance music, as highlighted by some, is almost perpetually in a state of metamorphosis.

Salima Hashmi, daughter of timeless poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz, believes rebel anthems rarely ever start as being resistant. Instead, what makes them defiant are the circumstances.

“For example, the poetry of Bulleh Shah has always been revolutionary, but when Abida Perveen sings it during General Ziaul Haq’s martial law, it translates into resistance. With art like that, it reinvents itself as time goes by and the context changes the meaning of the poetry,” she says.

Otherwise grand and loud in stature, there are also times when these protest songs seep into the mundane. As composer and record producer Rohail Hyatt puts it: “Normal becomes the antidote in abnormal situations.” When one lives in a melting pot of different norms, a seemingly normal act too becomes resistance.

For the purpose of this report, resistance music is defined as

• rebellious
• having the ability to not be affected by something adverse
• expressing pain and hardship
• bringing about a positive change or providing an alternate opinion

From rebel anthems and satire to poetry that has moved generations, this is an ode to Pakistan’s resistance music, one decade at a time.

Music played a pivotal role in the rich history of the subcontinent, whether it was to please the kings and queens or rouse soldiers in battlefields. Protest music at that time was grounded in simple verses with one purpose: to draw people around a central mission.

Sitar maestro and singer Ustad Nafees Ahmed recalls that during the Pakistan Movement (1940-47), the Muslim League had started calling on people to join the party, for which a qawwali titled ‘Muslim Hay tou Muslim League Main Aa’ was sung by veteran qawwals Fateh Ali Khan and Mubarak Ali Khan. The qawwali went on to become an enormous hit across the pre-partition India and a slogan for the Muslim League.

More than music though, it was poetry that reigned supreme then and for several years to come until pop, rock and reggae entered the scene. Progressive writers such as Faiz, Saadat Hassan Manto, Habib Jalib and Ismat Chughtai produced some of the finest pieces of fiction and poetry, becoming trendsetters for the upcoming generations.

Among them was also Kaifi Azmi, who, in the 1940s wrote ‘Aurat’.

“Uth meri jaan, mere saath hi chalna hay tujhe (Rise, my beloved! With me you must walk along),” says the first verse of the poem — that stands out as a significant modern feminist text even today.

While Azmi and his likes were ideological and optimistic in their approach, Josh Malihabadi used searing words in his poetry that stung the colonial masters. Also popularly known as Shair-e-Inqilab [The Poet of Revolution], he wrote ‘East India Company Farzandon se Khitab’ during World War II. The poem lambasted British hypocrisy and recounted their crimes, from the battle of Plassey in 1757 to the hanging of the revolutionary Bhagat Singh in 1931.

“Mujrimon ke waastay zeba nahin ye shor-o-shain?kal Yazeed-o-Shimr thhey aur aaj bantay ho Hussain! (This hue and cry does not suit the defence of criminals/ You who were Yazeed and Shimr yesterday pretend today to be Hussain!)”

“There is no better piece of literature than this,” actor and musician Khaled Anam says.

Tabassum Akhlaq, the granddaughter of Malihabadi, tells Dawn.com that his poems against the British regime were chanted and read by the masses in their houses and streets.

“Kaam mera taghayyur, naam hay mera shabaab mera na’ara: inqilaab-o-inqilaab-o-inqilaab (My task is change, my name is youth! My slogan: revolution and revolution and revolution!)”

Similarly, poetry also played a crucial role in the Pakistan Movement. The work of Allama Iqbal comes foremost here. Although written earlier on, his momentous and unforgettable poetry became a reflection of the ideology of Pakistan.

“Khudi ko kar buland itna ki har taqdir se pahle khuda bande se khud puche bata teri raza kya hai (Rise to such heights, that before destiny is written, the Lord asks man himself, ‘Tell me, what is your will?’)”

There were also other literary geniuses like Maulana Zafar Ali Khan whose poetry became a mode of social-political resistance. His collection of poems include Baharistan, Nigaristan and Chamanistan.

Dawn for more

Fact check on Algerian fighter Imane Khelif, DSDs, biology and Olympic boxing

by KINSEY CROWLEY

Despite outcries from anti-trans celebrities and politicians, the International Olympic Committee confirmed Imane Khelif is eligible to compete in women’s boxing at the Paris Games.

Khelif went viral on social media after winning her opening bout Thursday against Italy’s Angela Carini, who stopped fighting after 46 seconds. Khelif, along with Taiwanese boxer Lin Yu-ting, were both disqualified from their championships in 2023 after the International Boxing Association said they failed gender eligibility testing, a move that the IOC has called a “sudden and arbitrary decision.”

The two boxers also competed in the 2021 Tokyo Games, but did not medal.

“The IOC is committed to protecting the human rights of all athletes participating in the Olympic Games,” the organization said in a statement. “The IOC is saddened by the abuse that the two athletes are currently receiving.”

More: As gender eligibility issue unfolds, Olympic boxer Lin Yu-Ting dominates fight

Fact check: Imane Khelif is a woman

Khelif is a woman, who is not transgender, nor identifies as intersex, according to GLAAD and InterACT.

Khelif reportedly has differences of sexual development, known as DSDs, the organizations said in a Fact Sheet released Friday. Having DSD is not the same as being transgender.

What is DSDs?

Differences in sex development is a set of rare conditions involving genes, hormones and reproductive organs that can cause the sexual development of a person to be different than others, according to the NHS.

Sometimes, this can lead to a person having XY chromosomes but develop otherwise female.

Paris Games has full gender parity, IBA stripped of its governing rights

The IBA, long mired with scandal and controversy, oversaw Olympic boxing before being stripped of its right before the Tokyo Games and is no longer recognized of the international federation of boxing.

In the face of backlash over Khelif’s 2024 win, the IBA stood by its decision to disqualify the boxers over two “trustworthy” and “independent” tests, though they did not disclose what the tests were. The Washington Post reported IBA president claimed they were disqualified over finding XY chromosomes.

The IOC said the gender and age for the athletes is based on their passports.

The Paris Games is the first in history to reach gender parity. Transgender inclusion has had no negative effect on gender parity at the Olympics, according to GLAAD and InterACT. Also, IOC guidelines state athletes should not be excluded from competing due to alleged unfair advantage based on sex variations, according to GLAAD.

Conservatives seize on boxing to spread anti-trans rhetoric

As part of a large wave of anti-LGBTQ laws in the U.S., transgender women in sports has become a key rallying call for conservatives. In the last five years, 25 states have passed laws banning transgender students from participating in sports that match their gender identity, according to data compiled by MAP, despite research from the Human Rights Campaign showing transgender youth are a small part of the population and not all of them are interested in playing sports.

USA Today for more

Imane Khelif is not trans and the drama around her gender is a classic case of weaponising white tears

by MASHAEL SHAH

With a cocktail of bigotry — racism, transphobia and misogyny — the Algerian boxer has faced intense hatred for doing absolutely nothing.

Within 46 seconds, Algerian boxer Imane Khelif defeated her Italian opponent Angela Carini during the Olympic Games. Khelif’s victory sparked huge controversy in Paris — this year’s host city — and online for the strangest of reasons.

Khelif had been disqualified at the 2023 World Championships after failing International Boxing Association (IBA) eligibility rules that prevent athletes with male XY chromosomes from competing in women’s events. However, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) stripped the IBA of its recognition last year over governance and finance issues, with the Olympic body running the boxing competition in Paris, Reuters reported.

The IOC said the IBA decision to disqualify the boxers last year was arbitrary and the main cause for the furore that has seen people like British author JK Rowling and billionaire Elon Musk voice their opposition to them competing in the Games.

“These two athletes were the victims of a sudden and arbitrary decision by the IBA,” the IOC said in a statement. “Towards the end of the IBA World Championships in 2023, they were suddenly disqualified without any due process.”

The chief spokesperson for the IOC also clarified in a press conference that Khelif was born a woman, raised a woman and was assigned female on her passport.

Dawn for more

by VIKRAM VISANA

The results are in for India’s general election. The country’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, has won enough seats to stay in charge for a third consecutive term. But his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has suffered big setbacks, and is gearing up for coalition talks having failed to win an outright majority for the first time in ten years.

The BJP is premised on Hindutva, a Hindu nationalist ideology. Devised in the early 20th century, the politics of Hindutva insist that the country’s national identity be built around those who consider only India’s geography sacred. Muslims and Christians, whose holy sites lay in the Middle East, were therefore considered second-class citizens.

Modi foregrounded Hindutva in his election campaign. He falsely accused the main opposition party, the Indian National Congress, of basing their manifesto on the ideology of the Muslim League, the party that championed the partition of India in 1947. And he weaponised demographic anxieties around marginally higher Muslim fertility rates to claim that the opposition planned to redistribute wealth to “infiltrators” who “have more children”.

But Hindutva doesn’t stop at India’s borders. Hindu nationalists have used the ongoing conflict in Gaza to vilify other Muslims globally. BJP troll farms have spread disinformation and anti-Palestinian hatred online, and Hindu nationalist groups in India have organised pro-Israel marches.

Where does this curious Hindutva-Zionist solidarity spring from? One origin is from the earliest Hindu nationalists who modelled their Hindu state on Zionism.

Hindutva’s founder, Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, supported majoritarian nationalism and the rooting out of all disintegrating forces. These included Muslims who supported electoral quotas for their community and left-wing internationalists.

As a result, he even condoned the Nazis’ antisemitic legislation in two speeches in 1938 because, as he saw it: “a nation is formed by a majority living therein”. Yet Savarkar was not antisemitic himself. He often spoke favourably of the tiny Jewish-Indian minority because he considered it too insignificant to threaten Hindu cohesion.

In fact, Savarkar praised Zionism as the perfection of ethno-nationalist thinking. The way Zionism seamlessly blended ethnic attachment to a motherland and religious attachment to a holy land was precisely what Savarkar wanted for the Hindus. This double attachment was far more powerful to his mind than the European model of “blood and soil” nationalism without sacred space.

Today, Hindu nationalists perpetuate this legacy and still look to Zionism as a uniquely attractive political ideology. To Hindu nationalists, some Zionists were engaged in a project to reclaim their holy land from a Muslim population whose religious roots in the region were not as ancient as their own.

In a similar way, Hindutva’s supporters saw it as engaged with a Muslim population that it vastly outnumbered, but which had significant cultural power. This power came through the Mughal dynasty that ruled much of India from 1526 to the establishment of the British Raj in the 19th century.

This idea was further popularised by Savarkar’s ideological successor, Madhav Sadashivrao Golwalkar. In 1947, Golwalkar wrote that Zionism was the “attempt at rehabilitating Palestine with its ancient population of the Jews … to reconstruct the broken edifice and revitalise the practically dead Hebrew national life”.

Delegitimising Muslim citizens

Just as the Palestinians had to make way for those whose claims of ancient sacred space took primacy, so too, in Golwalkar’s view, did “non-Hindu people of Hindusthan” have to be “wholly subordinated to the Hindu nation”. Part of this process today has been redefining citizenship.

The Conversation for more

by LESLEY KENNEDY

A secret war-time meeting. Fear of an oil shortage. An exchange of gifts (including a wheelchair) and a budding friendship. When Franklin D. Roosevelt met with Abdul Aziz ibn Saud on February 14, 1945 aboard a U.S. Navy destroyer in the Suez Canal, it was the first time a U.S. president had ever met with a Saudi Arabian king, and the encounter laid a foundation for U.S.-Saudi relations that would continue for generations—and ensure U.S. access to Saudi oil reserves.

The principal reason for the meeting, which lasted several hours, according to Scott Montgomery, author and affiliate faculty member in the Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington, had to do with the prospect of a Jewish homeland in the Middle East, with Roosevelt trying to persuade the king to accept 10,000 Jews in Palestine.

Montgomery says Abdul Aziz was internationally considered a key Arab leader, heroic warrior and legendary figure. Their meeting was secret, he says, because the war was still going on and FDR had pledged to England’s Winston Churchill that the United States would not intervene in territory controlled by the British. Just a few weeks before, Stalin’s armies had liberated Auschwitz, exposing its horrors to the world.

“FDR seems to have taken the plight of the Jews as a personal mission, as the leader of the new free world,” Montgomery says. “Roosevelt was famous for his charm and conversational wit and warmth and had confidence in his own powers of persuasion. He strongly believed in the value of personal diplomacy—frank and intimate meetings between powerful leaders—to solve weighty and pressing issues.”

Another key reason for the meeting: oil.

“In the late 1930s, two U.S. oil companies in partnership, Chevron and Texaco, had discovered enormous volumes of oil in the eastern part of the kingdom,” Montgomery says. “Subsequent geologic analyses showed that the entire center of gravity in world oil production and supply would soon shift to the Persian Gulf, to Saudi Arabia in particular.”

Moreover, he adds, the Roosevelt administration and oil industry leaders had deep concerns that a major oil shortage was imminent.

“Secretary of the Interior, Harold Ickes, saw Saudi oil and the national security/welfare of the U.S. as umbilically linked and even proposed that the federal government establish direct control over all oil resources owned by American companies in Saudi Arabia,” Montgomery says.

There were also signs that the British were trying to take control over Chevron-Texaco, so part of Roosevelt’s goal in meeting the Saudi king was strategic. As Montgomery says, FDR knew it “would serve U.S. national interests in oil security long-term.”

It turns out, the two leaders hit it off so well that Roosevelt, who would die just eight weeks after the meeting, gifted the king with one of his wheelchairs (as well as a DC-3 passenger plane). The king, in turn, gave the president gifts, including a diamond-encrusted dagger, perfumes, pearl jewelry, belts of woven gold thread and embroidered harem costumes, Montgomery says.

“Roosevelt seems to have been in top form and the king was warm in return,” he adds. “He famously said that he and FDR were ‘twins’ of a sort—roughly the same age, both heads of state with grave responsibilities, both farmers at heart and both stricken with physical infirmities, as FDR was in a wheelchair and the king walked with much pain and difficulty due to wounds in his legs from many battles when he was younger.”

William Eddy, Roosevelt’s translator who was present at the meeting, would later report that whenever Abdul Aziz took friends through his palace, he would say, “This chair is my most precious possession. It is the gift of my great and good friend, President Roosevelt, on whom Allah has had mercy.”

Despite the personal good will, however, Roosevelt failed in persuading Abdul Aziz that Palestine should be a Jewish homeland, according to Montgomery.

“Based on accounts by Roosevelt and his translator, FDR was persistent in returning to this subject, but to no avail,” he says. “The king’s position was firm: The Germans should be made to give up territory for this purpose. They were the aggressors and had committed the crimes and oppressions against the Jews.”

As for the topic of oil, Montgomery says a major victory for the United States was that the relationship formed between the two leaders helped ensure Great Britain would not gain control over Saudi Arabia and its oil, “and that the country would remain within America’s sphere of influence instead.”

By 1949, according to Montgomery, Abdul Aziz had authorized a pipeline to the Mediterranean, allowing the flow of Saudi oil to U.S. allies, a U.S. Air Force-operated base near the oil fields and a military training program. “None of this, nor the concession given the American oil companies (later, in combination with Saudi Arabia’s own Arab Oil Co., named Aramco) was undone by the 1948 war in Palestine,” he adds.

History for more

by EMAN ABDELHADI

Chicago, we all know why we are here.

We are drowning, and our hearts are broken.

We are drowning in debt. In medical bills. In rising rents. In inflation.

We are under attack in this country. The Right has declared war on people of color, on trans people, on women. They are trying to dismantle our systems of education, trying to criminalize teaching Black history and the realities of racism, oppression and exploitation in this country. 

They openly call for mass deportations and want to strip Black people of voter rights.

Every year, the climate crisis kills more people of heat, of floods, of fires. Every year, the number of climate refugees at home and abroad climbs and climbs.

And in this moment of absolute disaster, of absolute crisis.

The American ruling class —the people descending on this city for the Democratic National Convention?—?have seen fit to spend our money on killing children in Gaza. 

They have provided an infinite supply of bombs to destroy Gaza’s homes, its schools, its hospitals, its playgrounds, its mosques, its churches, its croplands, its infrastructure. 

As the most powerful country on earth, they have bullied the rest of the world in the name of protecting a far-right government openly committing a genocide.

And now …

Now they want our votes.

They say they have earned them by showing a little more empathy towards those poor Palestinians they happened to kill.

Vice President Harris, we hear your shift in tone.

But …

Your tone will not resurrect the dead.

Your tone will not shelter the living.

Your tone will not pull bombs out of the sky.

Your tone is not enough.

Genocide Joe would still be on the ticket if it were not for this movement, for all of us. Our movement is one of the main reasons that you are now the Democratic candidate for President in the most powerful country on the planet.

You, Vice President Harris, get to run for office because we ousted your predecessor right here in these streets. But it was never just about him. It was about the 40,000 Palestinians he helped kill.

And now we are telling you that ?“Not the other guy” is not a platform.

We are telling you that you actually have to earn our votes.

And we are telling you exactly how to earn them.

We are telling you we want a weapons embargo.

We are telling you we want a permanent ceasefire.

And we are telling you that we want them NOW.

You keep telling us that democracy itself is on the line.

You keep telling us that fascism is knocking at the door.

You keep telling us that Trump would be worse.

But the majority of Americans, in poll after poll, say they disapprove of Israel’s actions in Gaza. Study after study shows that a weapons embargo would earn you more votes, would secure you this election.

Vice President Harris, why are you risking the end of democracy, the rise of fascism, the return of Trump to protect Netenyahu’s war on children?

You are not the protector of democracy.

Weare the protectors of democracy.

If you want to see democracy, look to Chicago’s streets this week. We are democracy speaking back to power, saying we will not be ignored.

In These Times for more

by FARID PANJWANI

‘I do not care what career it is, as long as I can make a lot of money.’ This was the gist of the responses by a significant number of students in recent research conducted by our university.

Preparing students for careers is one of the aims of education — the economic aim. Education, of course, has other worthwhile aims too: inspiring the pursuit of truth, nurturing emotional and moral maturity, boosting creative expression and creating an informed sense of belonging. In recent decades, in Pakistan and elsewhere, the economic aim has come to dominate other educational goals, with significantly harmful consequences.

Though building one’s earning capacity has always been an aim of education, it has become prominent in modern education systems, which were created explicitly to meet society’s industrial and bureaucratic needs. Over the past 40 years, the pecuniary focus has become all-embracing, much like the boat being flooded with water rather than floating on top of it. This is due to the deliberate dismantling of public services, the encouragement of market-based approaches and privatisation in all walks of life, and the resulting growing inequities in wealth distribution — an era known as neoliberal. Like much else, education is seen as an investment for future higher returns.

There are many manifestations of the overshadowing of education by economics. One is the strongly held assumption that the job market is a given and that education must adapt to it; there is the perennial complaint that the graduates weren’t fit for the jobs. The economic focus also leads to grade obsession in schools, with teachers attributing exam-centric teaching to parental demands. Parents, in turn, argue that they are not being materialistic but rather reasonable, given the shrinking quality of public services and the need for individuals and families to fund education, healthcare needs, retirement living and emergencies. Perhaps that same reasoning underpinned the student responses noted above.

Economics dictating education has also led to the growth of adjunct faculty in universities, the closure of humanities departments, and revenue generation becoming an exceedingly important criterion in faculty promotion. Furthermore, research priorities are driven by funding agencies rather than the professional interests of scholars. Finally, most government reform projects focus on economically attractive subjects like science, math and English.

One would have been fine with the lengthening economic shadow over education had our present system led to a fair distribution of wealth and an excellent quality of life for all or at least the vast majority. But this is not the case, and we have, instead, escalating concentration of wealth in fewer and fewer hands, with dangerous social and political consequences. Today, over 75 per cent of global wealth is possessed by 10pc of the wealthiest people; 22pc of the wealth is with the next 40pc wealthy people, leaving the bottom 50pc with only 2pc.

As fewer and fewer resources are sought by more and more people, competition — a potentially healthy wellspring of achievements — mutates into a constant source of stress, precarity and feelings of being inadequate. Competition is glorified to promote the idea that individuals are solely responsible for their fate and that the structures of society, such as the skewed distribution of wealth and moral luck, have nothing to do with it. Writers such as Gabor Maté, Shoshana Zuboff, Jonathan Haidt and Michael Sandel, among others, have persuasively shown the disastrous social, psychological and political impacts of unchecked capitalism and the resulting wealth inequities.

Can education reclaim its right to focus on multiple aims by cutting economic goals to size? I propose three ideas focused on the individual, institutional and structural levels.

Dawn for more

(Thanks to reader)

by ATIYYAH KHAN

The results of South Africa’s seventh democratic election on May 29 revealed a stark reality. Out of 42 million eligible South African voters, only 16 million voted. This is significant because until 1994, many in the country were not allowed to vote. The election results shocked many and unveiled a massive fracture in public opinion: as South Africa reaches its 30th year of democracy, for the first time since independence, the African National Congress (ANC) failed to win the majority of the votes needed to form a government.

This is something to consider deeply while listening to the new album by bassist and composer Benjamin Jephta. Born Coloured, Not Born-Free was released a year ago, but it is even more relevant now. It is Jephta’s fourth album in an ongoing project. Earlier this year, he presented a version of this project at the Cape Town International Jazz Festival. At the performance, Jephta spent time introducing the ideas he interrogates on the album to the audience, many of whom were from the community the album addresses.

To break down the title: the word “coloured” is a racial classification created by the apartheid government under the Population Registration Act of 1950 to describe the Creole population of South Africa. It was a classification forced on a people who are one of the most racially diverse populations in the world, and who endured much violence under apartheid rule. This community has been plagued by negative racial stereotypes of gangsterism, drugs, violence, and more. 

The term “coloured” is still in use today and has been adopted by many as an identity, but is also contested and rejected by others as a vestige of apartheid and colonization. The term “born-free” refers to those born after apartheid ended, which includes Jephta’s generation. He explains that these are all terms he inherited, and not by choice. 

Jephta is adamant that this album offers no answers. He is merely suggesting something to consider, a way to begin conversations, and process his personal experiences.

Africa Is A Countrys for more

by JOE KOBUTHI

Reflections on the philosophical underpinnings of social accountability in Kenya.

The fall of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989 was a pivotal event in world history. The Wall, which until then had symbolised the ideological divisions of the Communist East and the Capitalist West, could no longer hold back the ideological change that had been spreading in Eastern Europe and across the world.

The political, social and economic changes that ensued seemed to confirm political theorist Francis Fukuyama’s pronouncement that history had ended. He opined that the “flow of events over the past decade made it difficult to avoid the feeling that something very fundamental has happened in world history”, and that the ideological evolution of humanity was complete, with Western liberal democracy prevailing as the ultimate form of human government.

By Western liberal democracy, Fukuyama meant government in which people consent to their rulers, and rulers, in turn, are constitutionally constrained to respect the people’s rights. It emphasises the separation of powers, an independent judiciary, and systematic checks and balances between branches of government. It provides a foundation for multiparty elections, political and human rights, free media, a market economy, and a robust civil society. Fukuyama proclaimed the triumph of this political paradigm at the moment it was primed to spread across the globe.

Many of the West’s allies embraced the liberal democratic form of governance. The Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet was ousted from power and Patricio Aylwin was democratically elected as president. South Africa’s Apartheid system ended in 1994 and Nelson Mandela became the president of the newly formed “rainbow nation”. In Kenya, this wind of change triggered the process of political reform in 1991 with the repeal of section 2A of the constitution, returning Kenya to a multiparty state. The changes set in motion culminated in the promulgation of a new democratic constitution on 27 August 2010. 

Argued to be one of the most progressive in the world, the Constitution of Kenya (2010) enshrines many values and principles that have the potential to transform Kenya into an equitable, just and fair society. However, a governance dividend facilitated by a constitutional framework only occurs in a society where citizens have high public trust because their leaders are accountable to their aspirations and desires. At the centre of democratic societies lies the idea of accountability whereby a social contract exists between a responsive and accountable state and responsible and active citizens, which also takes into account the interests of the marginalised, alienated, and dispossessed.

Social Accountability – A philosophical reflection 

This form of civic initiative that fosters accountability through the organised collective action of citizens and other non-state actors to hold power to account for their responsibilities and obligations has been broadly defined as “social accountability”. Indeed, social accountability processes create different avenues for citizens and non-state actors to participate directly in political processes by providing them with leading roles in the process of constructing more inclusive and just democratic societies by catalysing their engagement with state actors in an informed, systematic and constructive way.

The Elephant for more