Michael Roberts
The information and interpretations present in this Thuppahi website by “A Observer in a Black Sea Resort” (see refs at end) have been challenged by several Academic friends of mine located in the West (A and B quoted below within this text). However, another friend located in USA …. a Sri Lankan as it happens …. has chipped in with a counterpunch (see C below); while another Sri Lankan has also added a note of significance.
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An Observer in a Black Sea town
” The American Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) assert Russia has no evidence to claim Ukraine was involved in the terrorist attack on Crocus City Hall on 22 March 2024.”
Actually, the Russians do have evidence and they have shared some of it with the world including,
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Nishkula Suntharalingam, presenting a book review in Asian Affairs 2023 ….. https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/raaf20 …. of the book by Moyukh Chatterjee. Composing Violence: The Limits of Exposure and the Making of Minorities. Duke University Press, Durham, 2023. pp. 166. Notes. Bibliog. Index. Ackmts. Hb. $94.95. ISBN 9781478017028. Sb. ………….$24.95. ISBN 9781478019664
Moyukh Chatterjee was an eyewitness to the aftermath of the 2002 riots in the west Indian state of Gujarat; three days of communal violence during which Hindu mobs attacked Muslims, their businesses and homes, leaving over a thousand people dead. This book focuses on how and why, in multi-ethnic, democratic states like India, targeted violence and anti-minority politics persist. In doing so, the author suggests an alternate approach to understanding violence against minorities while raising disquieting questions about the formation of modern states and the ways that ideas of “minorities” and “majorities” are produced and reproduced.
401733 08: Indian state police patrol the streets of Ahmadabad, India after rioting between Muslims and Hindus March 1, 2002 in Ahmadabad, India, two days after a Muslim mob attacked a train, killing 58 people in the Indian state of Gujarat. Indian troops arrived in the riot-torn western state of Gujarat but were unable to quell the Hindu-Muslim violence that has claimed the lives of 251 people. (Photo by Ami Vitale/Getty Images)
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Camel Rider, responding to a general inquiry raised by Thuppahi in his Email Circuit
With regard to the mystery of why Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, I think the reason goes like this. The issue of a Palestinian state has been fading for many years due US foreign policy and the Abraham Accords sought to normalize relations between Israel and Arab states. If left unchecked, that process would have seen the death of Palestine, even among Arab states. Hamas gained an extraordinary strategic victory on October 7th in the sense that the issue of a Palestinian state is back on the table, the Abraham Accords are in tatters, and the majority of the world is demanding a solution.
Journalists take cover behind cars as Israeli soldiers take position during clashes with Palestinian fighters near the Gevim Kibbutz, close to the border with Gaza.
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Thannamurippu, in The Economist, 23 November 2023 where the title runs thus: “Asian Monuments. What’s mine, what’s yours?Disputed monuments are Sri Lanka’s new ethnic flashpoint”
On a wooded hill edged by rice fields in Sri Lanka’s northern Mullaitivu district sit the ruins of an ancient Buddhist monastery. Members of the country’s Sinhalese majority call it “Kurundi Viharaya”. For Tamils, who are mostly Hindus and consider the war-battered north their homeland, it is “Kurunthoor Malai”. Since 2018, when the state archaeological department began excavating the site, Tamil and Sinhalese nationalists have rowed over which community has a greater claim to it.
Kurundi Dagaba
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DICTUM ONE
“Terroristic violence is initiated and undertaken to punish or kill people whom–the believer imagines–do not worship the sacred object the believer worships. It stems from a philosophical theory or moral imperative.
The violence seeks to demonstrate the power of the god worshipped by one’s group–by killing members of nonbelieving groups. Acts of violence give witness to the truth of one’s own god’s omnipotence.” …… Richard Koenigsberg ……. In A NOTE sent to Michael Roberts, early December 2023 Continue reading
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Graham E. Fuller, … in an essay entitled “Israeli Geopolitical goals in Palestine–Final Ethnic Cleansing?” …. 4 December 2023 …. presented here with highlighting added by the Editor, Thuppahi
Winston Churchill reportedly once commented, ”Never let a good crisis go to waste.” This remark takes on unsettling relevance in viewing the present crisis and slaughter in Gaza.
05/09/1934. Adolf Hitler…
Alastair Crooke, the former British diplomat and longtime deeply insightful observer of Middle East geopolitics wrote in a recent commentary that Israel’s strategy under Netanyahu’s ultra-right-wing religious and nationalist cabinet is to maintain whelming public support for the twin goals of the destruction of the “Hamas regime and its capabilities” and the release of all Israeli captives in Gaza. [https://english.almayadeen.net/articles/opinion/netanyahu-and-his-cabinet-are-taking–israel–to-biblical-ar]
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Rohini Hensman: “The Political and Legal Underpinnings of the Palestine-Israel Conflict,” in New Politics, 2023 …. ……………………… https://www.academia.edu/110094670/The_Political_and_Legal_Underpinnings_of_the_Palestine_Israel_Conflict?email_work_card=view-paper
On 7 October 2023, Palestinian militant group Hamas launched a massive attack on Israeli territory, killing 1405 people including over 300 soldiers according to the Israeli state, although a month later the death toll miraculously came down to 1200. The Israeli state has responded by bombing the Gaza Strip, in which Hamas has its headquarters and over 2.3 million civilians have their homes, starving inhabitants of food, water, medicines and fuel. But why did this happen? And what can be done about it? On these questions, there is no agreement whatsoever.
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