[Reader-list] reader-list Digest, Vol 66, Issue 12(Israel)

[atreyee majumder]

On Israel, the memory and perpetrator of holocausts, I thought this was
moving-

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/bruce-anderson/bruce-anderson-israel-is-in-danger-of-fighting-the-last-war-not-the-next-one-1225816.html

Atreyee


On Mon, Jan 5, 2009 at 10:50 PM, <reader-list-request at sarai.net> wrote:

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> Today's Topics:
>
>   1. The News Story on Sindh Tenancy Act (Zulfiqar Shah)
>   2. Wish some Jews lived in Kashmir too (Aditya Raj Kaul)
>   3. India signs biggest ever defence deal with US (Taha Mehmood)
>   4. News Items posted on the net on Multipurpose National
>      Identity Cards-34 (Taha Mehmood)
>   5. News Items posted on the net on Multipurpose National
>      Identity Cards-35 (Taha Mehmood)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Mon, 5 Jan 2009 07:23:42 -0800 (PST)
> From: Zulfiqar Shah <shahzulf at yahoo.com>
> Subject: [Reader-list] The News Story on Sindh Tenancy Act
> To: Cab Net <cabnet at yahoogroups.com>, Sindh Media
>        <sindhmedia at yahoogroups.com>,   Sindh org <sindhorg at yahoogroups.com
> >,
>        Reader-List <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Message-ID: <498374.9937.qm at web38804.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8
>
> Law supporting Sindh peasants lies defunct
>
> By By Shahid Shah
>
> KARACHI: According to the Sindh Tenancy Act (STA) 1950, a landlord is
> required to pay a fine worth Rs500 if found abusing a tenant, but since its
> inception, this law has never been implemented.
>
> "Peasants have no political and social freedom," lamented Taju Bheel,
> President Hari Mazdoor Mahaz Sindh, and suggested that hari (farmer) courts
> be formed to resolve the issue.
>
> The STA was an attempt to address issues faced by tenants who are peasants,
> such as the duration of their residence and their share of agricultural
> produce. However, according to a draft prepared by the Asian Development
> Bank, "the Act no longer reflects contemporary circumstances and needs and
> the level of compliance is low."
>
> One of the issues tenants face today is that landowners take loans worth
> millions of rupees from banks in tenants' names.
>
> "The government is providing billions of rupees to rescue the rich
> (shareholders) from the sinking stock exchange," said a social activist.
> "Instead, it should come forward to pay back peasants' loans."
>
> Currently, there is no tribunal in place to deal with matters related to
> peasants. Moreover, they cannot afford to go to civil courts, where cases
> can drag on for several years. Under the STA, every tenant must be
> registered, but according to Zulfiqar Shah, provincial head of South Asia
> Partnership (SAP), a civil society organisation, this has never happened. In
> addition, none of the tenants have a permanent address, as they are often
> forced by their landlords to relocate.
>
> "Such displacement affects education," said Bheel. "These children should
> be treated equally and provided a quota in universities and colleges."
>
> According to Zulfiqar Shah, Pakistanshould follow India's example and form
> an agricultural policy for its farmers. As a mark of protest, tenants
> residing in Sindh, united under the SAP, have planned a march from
> Hyderabadto the Sindh Assembly building on March 15. The march is expected
> to end by the close of month.
>
> Sindh is home to over a million peasants, none of whom have access to
> education or health services. Before the partition of the sub-continent, the
> STA ensured that peasants in all provinces of Indiawould receive their
> rights. By contrast, the traditional system allowed the landlord to impose
> his own rules.
>
> Rochi Ram, a lawyer and social activist, explained that in the majority of
> India, each piece of land was in the hands of three parties; the government,
> the landowner and the peasant, but just the feudal lord and landowner in
> Sindh.
>
> In 1930, things looked to be changing for the peasants when the Sindh Hari
> Committee was formed. At the same time, however, the landof Sindhat Sukkur
> Barrage and JamraoCanalwas distributed among people from Punjab, resulting
> in widespread protests in Sindh.
>
> With the help of the Sindh Hari Committee and the leadership of Comrade
> Hyder Bux Jatoi and Qadir Khokhar, the peasants succeeded in getting the STA
> enforced in 1950, which was meant to ensure interaction between the tenant
> and landowner.
>
> According to the STA, all disputes between the peasant and landowner were
> to be resolved by the Mukhtiarkar, then a first-class magistrate.
> However, when landowners entered politics and became ministers, the
> Mukhtiarkar became a servant of the feudal lord. The STA also stated that
> the tenant had to pay the cost of the plough, but ever since the mode of
> production switched from ox ploughs to tractors and other machinery, the
> cost has increased manifold.
>
> "They (peasants) were in a better condition before the partition," said
> Ram. He believes that the current political system, where the majority of
> the politicians are from the families of feudal lords, has done nothing for
> the protection of peasants' rights. "They have no way of getting justice."
>
> Source: The News, KarachiSaturday, January 03, 2009
>
>
>      New Email names for you!
> Get the Email name you&#39;ve always wanted on the new @ymail and
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> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Mon, 5 Jan 2009 21:07:21 +0530
> From: "Aditya Raj Kaul" <kauladityaraj at gmail.com>
> Subject: [Reader-list] Wish some Jews lived in Kashmir too
> To: "sarai list" <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Message-ID:
>        <6353c690901050737t45eae053hdbc58209422b248b at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=WINDOWS-1252
>
> December 30, 2008 Op-Ed Contributor
> Why Israel Feels Threatened By BENNY MORRIS
>
> Li-On, Israel
>
> MANY Israelis feel that the walls — and history — are closing in on their
> 60-year-old state, much as they felt in early June 1967, just before Israel
> launched the Six-Day War and destroyed the Egyptian, Jordanian and Syrian
> armies in Sinai, the West Bank and the Golan Heights.
>
> More than 40 years ago, the Egyptians had driven a United Nations
> peacekeeping force from the Sinai-Israel border, had closed the Straits of
> Tiran to Israeli shipping and air traffic and had deployed the equivalent
> of
> seven armored and infantry divisions on Israel's doorstep. Egypt had signed
> a series of military pacts with Syria and Jordan and placed troops in the
> West Bank. Arab radio stations blared messages about the coming destruction
> of Israel.
>
> Israelis, or rather, Israeli Jews, are beginning to feel much the way their
> parents did in those apocalyptic days. Israel is a much more powerful and
> prosperous state today. In 1967 there were only some 2 million Jews in the
> country — today there are about 5.5 million — and the military did not have
> nuclear weapons. But the bulk of the population looks to the future with
> deep foreboding.
>
> The foreboding has two general sources and four specific causes. The
> general
> problems are simple. First, the Arab and wider Islamic worlds, despite
> Israeli hopes since 1948 and notwithstanding the peace treaties signed by
> Egypt and Jordan in 1979 and 1994, have never truly accepted the legitimacy
> of Israel's creation and continue to oppose its existence.
>
> Second, public opinion in the West (and in democracies, governments can't
> be
> far behind) is gradually reducing its support for Israel as the West looks
> askance at the Jewish state's treatment of its Palestinian neighbors and
> wards. The Holocaust is increasingly becoming a faint and ineffectual
> memory
> and the Arab states are increasingly powerful and assertive.
>
> More specifically, Israel faces a combination of dire threats. To the east,
> Iran is frantically advancing its nuclear project, which most Israelis and
> most of the world's intelligence agencies believe is designed to produce
> nuclear weapons. This, coupled with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad's
> public threats to destroy Israel — and his denials of the Holocaust and of
> any homosexuality in Iran, which underscore his irrationality — has
> Israel's
> political and military leaders on tenterhooks.
>
> To the north, the Lebanese fundamentalist organization Hezbollah, which
> also
> vows to destroy Israel and functions as an Iranian proxy, has thoroughly
> rearmed since its war with Israel in 2006. According to Israeli
> intelligence
> estimates, Hezbollah now has an arsenal of 30,000 to 40,000 Russian-made
> rockets, supplied by Syria and Iran — twice the number it possessed in
> 2006.
> Some of the rockets can reach Tel Aviv and Dimona, where Israel's nuclear
> production facility is located. If there is war between Israel and Iran,
> Hezbollah can be expected to join in. (It may well join in the renewed
> Israeli-Palestinian conflict, too.)
>
> To the south, Israel faces the Islamist Hamas movement, which controls the
> Gaza Strip and whose charter promises to destroy Israel and bring every
> inch
> of Palestine under Islamic rule and law. Hamas today has an army of
> thousands. It also has a large arsenal of rockets — home-made Qassams and
> Russian-made, Iranian-financed Katyushas and Grads smuggled, with the
> Egyptians largely turning a blind eye, through tunnels from Sinai.
>
> Last June, Israel and Hamas agreed to a six-month truce. This unsteady calm
> was periodically violated by armed factions in Gaza that lobbed rockets
> into
> Israel's border settlements. Israel responded by periodically suspending
> shipments of supplies into Gaza.
>
> In November and early December, Hamas stepped up the rocket attacks and
> then, unilaterally, formally announced the end of the truce. The Israeli
> public and government then gave Defense Minister Ehud Barak a free hand.
> Israel's highly efficient air assault on Hamas, which began on Saturday,
> was
> his first move. Most of Hamas's security and governmental compounds were
> turned into rubble and several hundred Hamas fighters were killed.
>
> But the attack will not solve the basic problem posed by a Gaza Strip
> populated by 1.5 million impoverished, desperate Palestinians who are ruled
> by a fanatic regime and are tightly hemmed in by fences and by border
> crossings controlled by Israel and Egypt.
>
> An enormous Israeli ground operation aimed at conquering the Gaza Strip and
> destroying Hamas would probably bog down in the alleyways of refugee camps
> before achieving its goal. (And even if these goals were somehow achieved,
> renewed and indefinite Israeli rule over Gaza would prove unpalatable to
> all
> concerned.)
>
> More likely are small, limited armored incursions, intended to curtail
> missile launches and kill Hamas fighters. But these are also unlikely to
> bring the organization to heel — though they may exercise sufficient
> pressure eventually to achieve, with the mediation of Turkey or Egypt, a
> renewed temporary truce. That seems to be the most that can be hoped for,
> though a renewal of rocket attacks on southern Israel, once Hamas recovers,
> is as certain as day follows night.
>
> The fourth immediate threat to Israel's existence is internal. It is posed
> by the country's Arab minority. Over the past two decades, Israel's 1.3
> million Arab citizens have been radicalized, with many openly avowing a
> Palestinian identity and embracing Palestinian national aims. Their
> spokesmen say that their loyalty lies with their people rather than with
> their state, Israel. Many of the community's leaders, who benefit from
> Israeli democracy, more or less publicly supported Hezbollah in 2006 and
> continue to call for "autonomy" (of one sort or another) and for the
> dissolution of the Jewish state.
>
> Demography, if not Arab victory in battle, offers the recipe for such a
> dissolution. The birth rates for Israeli Arabs are among the highest in the
> world, with 4 or 5 children per family (as opposed to the 2 or 3 children
> per family among Israeli Jews).
>
> If present trends persist, Arabs could constitute the majority of Israel's
> citizens by 2040 or 2050. Already, within five to 10 years, Palestinians
> (Israeli Arabs coupled with those who live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip)
> will form the majority population of Palestine (the land lying between the
> Jordan River and the Mediterranean).
>
> Friction between Israeli Arabs and Jews is already a cogent political
> factor. In 2000, at the start of the second intifada, thousands of Arab
> youngsters, in sympathy with their brethren in the territories, rioted
> along
> Israel's major highways and in Israel's ethnically mixed cities.
>
> The past fortnight has seen a recurrence, albeit on a smaller scale, of
> such
> rioting. Down the road, Israel's Jews fear more violence and terrorism by
> Israeli Arabs. Most Jews see the Arab minority as a potential fifth column.
>
> What is common to these specific threats is their unconventionality.
> Between
> 1948 and 1982 Israel coped relatively well with the threat from
> conventional
> Arab armies. Indeed, it repeatedly trounced them. But Iran's nuclear
> threat,
> the rise of organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah that operate from across
> international borders and from the midst of dense civilian populations, and
> Israeli Arabs' growing disaffection with the state and their identification
> with its enemies, offer a completely different set of challenges. And they
> are challenges that Israel's leaders and public, bound by Western
> democratic
> and liberal norms of behavior, appear to find particularly difficult to
> counter.
>
> Israel's sense of the walls closing in on it has this past week led to one
> violent reaction. Given the new realities, it would not be surprising if
> more powerful explosions were to follow.
>
> Benny Morris, a professor of Middle Eastern history at Ben-Gurion
> University, is the author, most recently, of "1948: A History of the First
> Arab-Israeli War."
>
>
> --
>
> --
> Aditya Raj Kaul
>
> Freelance Correspondent, The Times of India
> Cell -  +91-9873297834
>
> Campaign Blog: http://kashmiris-in-exile.blogspot.com/
> Personal Blog: http://activistsdiary.blogspot.com/
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 3
> Date: Mon, 5 Jan 2009 16:17:49 +0000
> From: "Taha Mehmood" <2tahamehmood at googlemail.com>
> Subject: [Reader-list] India signs biggest ever defence deal with US
> To: "reader-list at sarai.net" <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Message-ID:
>        <65be9bf40901050817x44201e7bmf0c5cb725b2785a4 at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> Dear All,
>
> Even as we debate and discuss economic depression and as some would argue,
> its obvious correlation with terror. It seems that in some sectors terror
> and economics go hand in hand and rightly so, for in order to protect our
> great country we need few sticks.
>
> Please read the story below which indicates that how even in these times of
> rather grave economic crisis the Indian Government is giving its two
> pennies
> to the cause of generating employment.
>
> Kind regards
>
> Taha
>
>
>
>
> India signs biggest ever defence deal with US
> Font Size
> Agencies Posted: Jan 05, 2009 at 1651 hrs IST
> AddThis
> Print Email Feedback Discuss
> India has signed a deal to buy eight maritime aircraft from aerospace major
> Boeing.India has signed a deal to buy eight maritime aircraft from
> aerospace
> major Boeing.
>
> India has signed a deal to buy eight maritime aircraft from aerospace major
> Boeing.
> Related Stories: US site rank Indian commandos as 'top Desis'Indian
> Americans organise 'Washington Lobby Day'Shift focus of US military aid to
> Pak: Indo-AmericansUS envoy meets ChidambaramIndian Americans ask UN to
> declare Pak a terrorist state
> New Delhi: In its largest defence purchase ever from the US, India has
> signed a deal to buy eight maritime aircraft from aerospace major Boeing to
> strengthen the Navy's intelligence gathering capabilities.
>
> The USD 2.1 billion contract for eight Boeing P-8I long-range maritime
> reconnaissance (LRMR) aircraft was signed between a Defence Ministry
> official and Boeing's country head Vivek Lall here on January 1, Navy and
> industry sources said in New Delhi on Monday.
>
> The Government had approved the deal in its last Cabinet Committee on
> Security (CCS) meeting in 2008 after protracted talks.
>
> The deal with Boeing, sources said, was through a direct commercial
> contract
> and issues such as end-user verification agreement between India and US for
> these defence products were still pending, sources said.
>
> The Navy will get its first aircraft under the deal by 2012-13 and the rest
> of the aircraft would be delivered in phases by 2015-16, sources said.
>
> The contract also provided for the Navy to place follow-on orders for about
> eight more of these aircraft, being purchased to replace the existing fleet
> of eight ageing Tupolev-142M turboprops.
>
> The P-8I is armed with torpedoes, depth bombs and Harpoon anti-ship
> missiles
> and is capable of anti-submarine warfare and anti-surface warfare.
>
> Expected to help in plugging the existing gaps in Navy's maritime
> reconnaissance capabilities, the aircraft has an operating range of over
> 600
> nautical miles.
>
> Customised to meet Indian Navy's needs and based on the Boeing 737
> commercial airliner, the P-8I aircraft is a variant of the P-8A Poseidon
> multi-mission maritime aircraft under development for the US Navy to
> replace
> its P-3C Orion fleet.
>
> Interestingly, the P8I deal would be the largest deal India signed with the
> US, after the USD 962 million deal signed in 2007 for six Lockheed Martin's
> C-130J 'Super Hercules' transport aicraft for its special forces.
>
> Its purchase would greatly help inter-operability and supportability
> objectives of both the Indian and US Navies, according to a Boeing official
> in New Delhi.
>
> Apart from the Tu-142Ms, the Indian Navy currently uses IL-38SDs and
> Dorniers for surveillance operations in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR).
>
> It was also looking for six advanced medium-range maritime reconnaissance
> aircraft at a budget of Rs 1,600 crore to further boost its patrol and
> intelligence gathering capabilities in the IOR.
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 4
> Date: Mon, 5 Jan 2009 17:18:44 +0000
> From: "Taha Mehmood" <2tahamehmood at googlemail.com>
> Subject: [Reader-list] News Items posted on the net on Multipurpose
>        National        Identity Cards-34
> To: "reader-list at sarai.net" <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Message-ID:
>        <65be9bf40901050918k6083934eg422d22c2c647fcc9 at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> http://www.telegraphindia.com/1050331/asp/northeast/story_4554083.asp
>
> The Telegraph
> |  Thursday, March 31, 2005 |
>
> Delhi skirts IMDT debate
> - Court?s queries on migration barely answered
> R. VENKATARAMAN
>
> New Delhi, March 30: Delhi today informed the Supreme Court that ?four
> data entry operators? had been assigned the task of computerising
> citizenship records as part of the process of identifying and
> deporting illegal migrants, provoking a caustic reaction from those
> demanding the repeal of the allegedly ineffective Illegal Migrants
> (Determination by Tribunals) Act.
>
> The government was responding to the apex court?s directive to file an
> affidavit on the subject of issuing multi-purpose national identity
> cards, the creation of a national citizenship register and a former
> Assam governor?s report on illegal migration.
>
> ?The government of India has agreed to provide funds for the purchase
> of computers required for computerisation of the (national
> citizenship) register,? Delhi stated in its affidavit.
>
> But Manish Goswami, one of the lawyers arguing for abrogation of the
> IMDT Act, was clearly not impressed. ?The way things are described in
> this response, it might take 40 more years to even prepare the
> register and identify the Bangladeshi illegal immigrants, by which
> time the demography of Assam, West Bengal and even Delhi and
> Maharashtra would have further changed because immigrants have
> infiltrated all these areas,? he said.
>
> Delhi touted the continuity of the process of fencing the border,
> preparing a databank of citizens, strengthening the BSF, registering
> countryboats and intensifying surveillance of the riverine sector of
> the Indo-Bangladesh order as ?action taken? on the report compiled by
> former governor Lt Gen. (retd) S.K. Sinha. The governor had warned of
> catastrophic demographic changes in Assam if illegal migration
> continued. The apex court will resume its hearing on the case
> tomorrow.
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 5
> Date: Mon, 5 Jan 2009 17:20:41 +0000
> From: "Taha Mehmood" <2tahamehmood at googlemail.com>
> Subject: [Reader-list] News Items posted on the net on Multipurpose
>        National        Identity Cards-35
> To: "reader-list at sarai.net" <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Message-ID:
>        <65be9bf40901050920w7420ce75m9a617f9c2f823c4d at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=WINDOWS-1252
>
> http://www.tribuneindia.com/2006/20060319/spectrum/book4.htm
>
> Tribune
> Spectum
>
> Sunday, March 19, 2006
>
>
>
> Mission technology
> Rajesh Kumar Aggarwal
>
> The State, IT and Development
> eds. R.K. Bagga, Kenneth Keniston and Rohit Raj Mathur. Sage
> Publications. Pages 325. Rs 380.
>
> Information technology (IT) and IT-enabled services (ITES) have
> achieved record growth in recent years. While the number of telephone
> and Internet users have increased manifold, software development and
> earnings too have increased to a new high. However, the digital divide
> between the rural and urban sectors, public and private sectors
> continues.
>
> The book has been divided into four sections—The Route to Development,
> Challenges Before the State, ICT Initiatives in Developing India and
> The Road Ahead.
>
> The first section focuses intensively on good governance. It says that
> governments are now gearing up to appear SMART (simple, moral,
> accountable, responsive and transparent) and ICT (information and
> communication technology) has an indispensable role in social,
> economic and political development of the state. At the same time, the
> book argues that ICT is not a substitute for good governance but it
> can be an enabler of good governance.
>
> President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam in his paper, Vision of Citizen-Centric
> E-Governance for India, visualises e-governance as "a transparent
> smart e-governance with seamless access, secure and authentic flow of
> information crossing the inter-departmental barrier and providing a
> fair and unbiased service to the citizens". He says the primary data
> requirement for effective e-governance is a national citizen ID card,
> which should be a multi-purpose, secure and authentic, similar to the
> photocopy of an individual, with multifactor authentication such as
> photograph and biometrics-fingerprints, iris-based systems and digital
> signatures.
>
> The papers by Jayaprakash Narayan, E.A.S. Sarna and Sameer Sachdeva
> and Rohit Raj Mathur advocate investment in ICT but cautions that such
> investments should only be made rationally. It would be detrimental to
> invest on computers in schools and hospitals, if these institutions
> lack basic facilities such as proper buildings, blackboards, toilets
> in schools and medicines, doctors and para-medicals in hospitals.
>
> Even though ICT revolution is being perceived as the new engine of
> growth, the second section of the book points that there are many
> challenges before the state such as bridging the digital divide,
> regulating framework to facilitate universal connectivity in India,
> implementation of cyber laws, organising process documentation and
> integration of e-governance. Moreover, there are challenges before the
> state to combat corruption in public life. N. Vittal, former Central
> Vigilance Commissioner, recounting his experiences, says ICT can act
> as a powerful administrative tool that can bring corrupt acts of
> individuals to the notice of the society at large with a much greater
> impact.
>
> R.K. Bagga highlights some of the critical messages for digitising
> governments, which are important for government to business,
> government to citizen, government to employee and government to
> government (G2B, G2C, G2E and G2G) decisions.
>
> The section three lists some of the ICT e-governance initiatives in
> rural and urban India. These are eSeva and Saukaryam (meaning facility
> in Telugu) in Andhra Pradesh and FRIENDS (Fast, Reliable, Instant,
> Efficient Network for Distribution of Services), IKM (Information
> Kerala Mission), and Akshaya (a project to spread mass computer
> literacy at grassroots level) in Kerala.
>
> The Road Ahead, suggests a bigger role for e-governance in overall
> development of the nation. It advocates the creation of
> micro-enterprises around technology, promoting public-private
> partnership. The last paper by R.K. Bagga and Rohit Raj Mathur
> summarises some very important recommendations based on the three ASCI
> (Administrative staff College of India) workshops for G2B, G2C, G2E
> and G2G groups, and records the suggested future action agenda.
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
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>
> End of reader-list Digest, Vol 66, Issue 12
> *******************************************
>