BetweenTheLines

  Sameer Arshad Khatlani Follow  on Facebook D eposed Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi had been on the run for two months after the fall of Tripoli when rebels found him in a stormwater pipe near Sirte on October 20, 2011. He cowered as they held him by his arms, curly hair and frog-marched him out of the stinky pipe soaked in blood. Gaddafi, 69, was tortured before he was summarily executed. The ignominious end of the dictator, who had ruled Libya since 1969 and given himself lofty titles like “King of Kings of Africa’’, came months after Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali’s fall encouraged pro-democracy protests (Arab Spring) in the region. The protests threatened to uproot autocrats across the region as Yemen’s Ali Abdullah Saleh was forced to quit while Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak was toppled. ALSO READ: Why Years Before Taliban Takeover, Afghan Diplomat Khalili Saw It Coming  In Syria, the challenge to  Bashir al-Assad’s rule coincided with that of Gaddafi’s when protests erupted

Sameer Arshad Khatlani Follow  on Facebook A fghan diplomat Masood Khalili had just enrolled for PhD after finishing his master’s degree from Delhi University when communists seized power in Kabul in April 1978. His father, the iconic poet and academic Khalilullah, called him from Baghdad, where he was the Afghan ambassador, to break the news. He warned Khalili that the communists had come and Russians will follow. 'Go get your PhD from the mountains of Afghanistan,' Khalilullah told his 28-year-old son. Khalili immediately left Delhi to join Afghan rebels as a political officer in Peshawar, before entering Afghanistan. ALSO READ: West's post-1979 Afghan Misadventure Continues To Cast Long Shadow Khalilullah’s fears came true the following year when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in December 1979. Khalili responded by crisscrossing the country, mostly on his donkey, for the next nine years to mobilise Afghans against the occupiers. In between dodging bullets, the red army,

Sameer Arshad Khatlani Follow  on Facebook A significant section of the Indian media have been among the most formidable allies of ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). They have over the years amplified and focussed on issues that boost the BJP’s main election-winning strategy of projecting India’s Muslim minority as the threatening other and fifth columnists that only the governing party is capable of dealing with. The prime-time debates on Indian television channels mostly focus on the Hindu-Muslim binary. Issues are often twisted and distorted to keep the focus on demonising the beleaguered minority.  ALSO READ: Ignorance About It Is Biggest Crisis Islam Faces The Taliban take over in Afghanistan was just another excuse for the media to continue vilifying Indian Muslims. While the Indian media were busy doing what they do best, they were also egging on a potential resistance against the Taliban in Panjshir Valley, the only Afghan province that did not immediately

Sameer Arshad Khatlani Follow  on Facebook W hen the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, the West mobilised massive military and monetary support for the Afghan resistance to drive the Soviets out of the country. A significant chunk of the funds pumped in was spent on school textbooks that justified violence in the name of religion with a short-term goal of drawing recruits for the anti-Soviet resistance. The textbooks featured weapons and soldiers and served as the core curriculum in Afghan schools until the US invaded Afghanistan in 2011 to oust the Taliban from power for harbouring the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks. The Taliban also continued the use of the books during its six-year rule from 1996 to 2001 before the Americans replaced the primers in the noughties but not before, as The Washington Post noted, steeping ‘a generation in violence’. Why Taliban Need To Be Called Out Forcefully The Soviets were defeated in the strategically important country in less than a decade

Sameer Arshad Khatlani Follow  on Facebook T he Taliban claim to have retaken 85% of Afghanistan as they threaten to recapture power in Kabul two decades after being ousted from power following the 9/11 attacks. The Afghan government has disputed the Taliban's claims that are in any case unlikely to be verified independently. With the exit of the western forces, the Afghan army is putting up a valiant fight to prevent the Taliban from overrunning Afghanistan again, turning the clock back to the 1990s and reversing the gains such as a degree of women empowerment achieved over the last two decades. The Taliban may well be unable to take power again. But the usual suspects have found a fresh handle in their imminent return to power to stoke Islamophobia by emphasising the Taliban's obsession with their form of “Sharia”.  ALSO READ: Seven-Decade Arab-Israel Schism Is A Historical Aberration Afghanistan is a deeply religious country and can clearly do without the Taliban's brand

Sameer Arshad Khatlani Follow  on Facebook I t was perhaps no coincidence that on September 4, 2020, an imam at Mecca’s Grand Mosque dwelt on Prophet Mohammed’s kindness to a Jewish neighbour. The reference, days before the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain signed agreements on September 15, 2020, to normalise ties with Israel, was seen as part of the groundwork for other Arab nations such as Saudi Arabia to follow suit. The thaw in Arab-Israel relations is a culmination of years of behind-the-scenes work that Arab leaders have been hinting at. Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, in 2018, backed the Israelis’ 'right to have their own land'. Bahrain defended Israeli airstrikes in Syria the same year, saying Israel ' has the right to defend itself .' A year later, Bahraini foreign minister Khalid bin Ahmed Al Khalifa called Israel a part of the region’s heritage . ALSO READ: Hardline-Reformist Binary Ignores Core Of Iranian Political System Bin Salman

Sameer Arshad Khatlani Follow  on Facebook I  am no stranger to lockdowns. They were the norm while I was growing up in Kashmir. I was seven when I experienced the first set of sweeping restrictions put on our movement. The curbs were imposed in January 1990 to stem further protests after scores protesting against overnight house-to-house searches were hemmed in and shot dead on a bridge over the Jhelum. It was the first of the many massacres that year, which fuelled the ongoing insurrection. We were confined to our houses in its aftermath for three weeks. Shoot-at-sight orders were in place and our neighbourhoods were suddenly swarmed by men in khaki from all over India. A cousin had a narrow escape when he was fired upon for stepping out during the lockdown. No one dared to venture out thereafter to even get essentials. We fell back on our winter stocks and were forced to survive for the longest time in recent memory on lentils. ALSO READ: Farooq Abdullah, A Man For All Seasons We th