Many in the US Government want every anniversary of 911 to be a display of misguided patriotism--an occasion for the jingoes to reason that grieving people are crying for war, for more bloodshed. But the anti-war elements are claiming back the 911 space. Friend of South Asia's 'Ten Years After 911: A South Asian Reaction' program held on Sunday, September 11, at the Koret Auditorium, San Francisco Public Library was an occasion to remember all the lives lost on and after 9/11.
Audio of the program is here:
http://www.archive.org/details/TenYearsAfter911ASouthAsianReaction
Labels: نو گیارہ کے دس سال
posted by Cemendtaur @ 11:35 PM
4 Comments:
Friends of South Asia, not 'Friend of South Asia'.
Is the tide turning? Are more and more Americans getting convinced that terrorism cannot be uprooted through violence? If you turn off your TV set on September 11 and join peace rallies and events organized by peaceniks, this is exactly the message you would get: Americans are tired of ten years of bloodshed.
San Francisco Bay Area being a haven for peace movements hosted a plethora of anti-war programs on the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. One such event organized by the Friends of South Asia and held at the San Francisco Public Library's Koret Auditorium was dubbed ' Ten Years after 911, A South Asian Reaction.' The program started with a screening of a 15-minute long compilation--put together by Saqib Mausoof--of video excerpts from various films made on the themes of extremism (Kala Pul), entrapment (The FBI's Jihad), drone attacks (Silent Screams), Afghanistan war (Afghans for Peace), and growing anti-American feelings in Pakistan (Wide Angle on Pakistan).
Various aspects of 9/11 and the continuing violence and hatred it has unleashed were discussed by a panel comprising of Veena Dubal (Staff Attorney at the Asian Law Caucus), Roshni Rustomji-Kerns (writer, Professor Emerita, Sonoma State University), Dr. Maheen Mausoof Adamson (Director of Research, War Related Illness and Injury Study Center, VA Palo Alto), Yasmin Qureshi (writer and activist), and Fariba Nawa (Afghan-American journalist). The panel was moderated by Sharon Sobotta (Director, Women’s Resource Center, St Mary’s College).
Dr. Khawaja Ashraf (travelogue writer, Urdu novelist, writing as K Ashraf), Maryam Turab (Urdu columnist), and Roshni Rustomji-Kerns read their writings related to the tenth anniversary of the terrorist attacks.
Dubal: Many community organizations are FBI partners
Speaking to the audience gathered at Friends of South Asia's commemorative program on the tenth anniversary of 9/11 terrorist attacks, eminent Bay Area civil rights activist and lawyer Veena Dubal analyzed in great detail the aggressive role FBI has played in post 9/11 USA.
Commenting on FBI's growing domestic surveillance network, Dubal said going after the crime was no longer a retrospective activity for the FBI. She said that the new laws have changed the orientation of the law enforcement agencies and now everybody wants to be a James Bond.
Ms. Dubal is certainly not the only critic of the FBI. Civil liberties advocates all over the nation have complained of the almost free hand being given to the spy agency. Commenting on the high profile arrests FBI has been making in thwarting potential terrorist attacks a recent BBC report claimed that the FBI does not discover terrorist cells, it creates them. The same report explained FBI's modus operandi in cracking terrorist cells: FBI informants recruit gullible Muslims, buy them fake weapons and explosives, offer financial rewards if they carry out terrorist attacks, and finally arrest them for plotting terrorist operations. FBI critics believe that if the public sentiment was not so saturated with Islamophobia in post 9/11 USA, most courts would throw out these 'terrorist cell' cases as mere entrapments by the FBI.
Veena Dubal claimed the annual review of the FBI agents includes whether or not an agent has been able to recruit informants in the community. People who are interviewed by the FBI are asked if they would like to act as informants and in many cases are threatened if they decline. She narrated one incident in which a person refusing to become an FBI informant was punished by being put on a no-fly list.
Veena Dubal said as an attorney she advises her clients not to talk to the FBI agents because of two reasons. First, the FBI agents have been enabled by guidelines to lie to individuals, and second, any misrepresentation of information given to an agent can be viewed as lying which is punishable by law.
Dubal said the FBI is not happy with civil liberties lawyers like herself. In one encounter with the FBI Dubal was asked to become a partner with the FBI. When Dubal politely refused she was told many community organizations are partners with FBI-- FBI considers Muslim Advocates and the Sikh Coalition to be its partners.
Various aspects of 9/11 and the continuing violence and hatred it has unleashed were discussed by a panel comprising of Veena Dubal (Staff Attorney at the Asian Law Caucus), Roshni Rustomji-Kerns (writer, Professor Emerita, Sonoma State University), Dr. Maheen Mausoof Adamson (Director of Research, War Related Illness and Injury Study Center, VA Palo Alto), Yasmin Qureshi (writer and activist)
eCig Karachi
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