April 29, 2019 · 3:42 am

Sheridan’s Concise Overview of Security Failures and the Islamic Extremist Threat in Sri Lanka … and This World

Greg Sheridan, in Weekend Australian, 27/28 April 2019, where the title is “Eternal vigilance is the price of keeping Islamist terror at bay”…. with highlighting emphasis added by The Editor

India’s external intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing, tried for two years to tell its Sri Lankan colleagues they faced a growing threat of Islamist terrorism. But the Colombo authorities weren’t interested. If there was any threat, they believed it came from the remnants of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. But the Tamil Tiger threat ended 10 years ago.

We don’t have a problem with our Muslims, the Sri Lankans insisted. By and large they were right about their Muslims. But out of maybe two million Sri Lankan Muslims, there was a problem with at least a couple of hundred, of whom a dozen or so became hard-boiled terrorists. Nine became suicide bombers, 10 if you count the bomb that one suspect detonated as police approached her home. That was more than enough. A Muslim man prays while perched on the roof of a mosque to spot possible hostile people during Friday prayers in Colombo, Sri Lanka, on April 26. Picture: AP

Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, atrocities, australian media, authoritarian regimes, centre-periphery relations, communal relations, conspiracies, cultural transmission, economic processes, ethnicity, foreign policy, governance, historical interpretation, human rights, Indian Ocean politics, Indian traditions, Islamic fundamentalism, jihad, law of armed conflict, life stories, martyrdom, Middle Eastern Politics, military strategy, Muslims in Lanka, politIcal discourse, power politics, religious nationalism, security, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, suicide bombing, Taliban, terrorism, unusual people, vengeance, world events & processes

April 28, 2019 · 3:34 pm

The Emergence of Salafi Jihadists in the Kattankudy Locality in the Eastern Province

 Ameen Izzadeen and Abdullah Shahnawaz from Kattankudy, in Sunday Times, 28 April 2019, where the title reads “Lightning, thunder and a blast: On the trail of terror leader”

April 17: A man walks into the Kattankudy police station to complain that something unusual had happened on his land at Palamunai.  Police visit the scene and discover a Scooty motorcycle has been blasted using explosives. It had been blasted the previous day, April 16.

April 18: A young Kattankudy woman visits her old parents living in a house in a nearby area to give them lunch. That was the last time she saw them. She assumes the father who was complaining of a leg pain, has gone, accompanied by the mother, to see a native physician in Kinniya. But he never goes anywhere without informing the daughter.  This puzzles her, but on April 21, she pieces the puzzle together and realises her family’s involvement in the worst ever terror attack to shake this country.

              The face of terror: Zahran Cassim

Continue reading →

4 Comments

Filed under accountability, atrocities, communal relations, conspiracies, cultural transmission, education, historical interpretation, Islamic fundamentalism, jihad, landscape wondrous, life stories, Muslims in Lanka, politIcal discourse, power politics, propaganda, religiosity, security, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, terrorism, trauma, unusual people, violence of language, world events & processes

April 28, 2019 · 11:21 am

Double Standards among Liberals in the West: No RAGE from Sri Lankan Horrors in Contrast with Reaction to Christchurch

Brendan O’Neill, in Weekend Australian, 27 April 2019, with this title “Hierarchy of Victimhood: The slaughter of Christians elicits grief not outrage “

Where is the anger over the apocalyptic barbarism visited upon Christians in Sri Lanka? Where is the fury? Where are the tweets and blog posts and viral videos offering solidarity to Christians and slamming the bombers as a members of a global fascistic movement? Such wrath has been notable by its absence, or at least its rarity, in the aftermath of the extremist slaughter that killed at least 253 people, the majority of them Christians marking the resurrection of Christ at Easter Sunday ­services.

Yes, there has been sorrow. And there has been some very strong media coverage. People want to know the stories of those who were killed, and feel the pain of the those they left behind. But rage? There has been very little.

A woman is overcome with grief during a funeral for a victim of the Easter Sunday attack on St Sebastian’s Church in Negombo, Sri Lanka. Picture: Getty Images Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, australian media, communal relations, discrimination, ethnicity, human rights, Islamic fundamentalism, jihad, landscape wondrous, Left politics, life stories, self-reflexivity, slanted reportage, sri lankan society, trauma, truth as casualty of war, world events & processes

April 28, 2019 · 12:31 am

Terrorism in Sri Lanka: Some Threads in Social Media …. with Analytic Reflections

Sanjana Hattotuwa, in Sunday Island, 28 April 2019, where the title is “It doesn’t make sense”
-Naren Hattotuwa – Easter Sunday.” … with highlighting emphasis being the work of The Editor, Thuppahi

A Scene from Christchurch … and Sri Lanka

On Monday, my 12-year-old son learnt his classmate had passed away at the Intensive Care Unit, a victim of one of the blasts in Colombo. My son’s mother and I grew up in the long shadow of the Black July anti-Tamil pogrom and the UNP-JVP violence in the late 80s. For many in our generation and older, there is a normalization of violence. This is often confused with getting used to or accepting violence.

After the Christchurch massacre in March, many Kiwis trying to get to grips with the scale of the violence unthinkingly said that since I came from Sri Lanka, I was far more used to dealing with terrorism. I suppose that’s in a way true. Mundane things done every day have their own logic and reason that no one from outside cycles of violence would understand. In Kabul, a city where so much is wrong and getting worse, I feel completely at home amidst the detours, convoys, checkpoints, occasional explosion, news of imminent attacks and sporadic gunfire – or the sound of an engine back-firing shrugged off as gunfire, obviously the lesser evil there. The assumption that the more time one spends with it, the greater the ease in dealing with terrorism is, however, untrue. Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, Afghanistan, atrocities, communal relations, conspiracies, disparagement, fundamentalism, historical interpretation, human rights, Islamic fundamentalism, landscape wondrous, life stories, LTTE, meditations, Muslims in Lanka, politIcal discourse, power politics, religiosity, security, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, terrorism, the imaginary and the real, trauma, vengeance, world events & processes

April 27, 2019 · 2:19 pm

Jihadist Terrorist Goals in Sri Lanka: Inciting War, Widening Divide

The Spectator as presented in The WEEKEND AUSTRALIAN, 27 April 2009. with this title “Declaring a war was just what the terrorists wanted”

It has become commonplace to describe terror attacks as “senseless”. The horrific Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka make little sense. The only way to understand them is as a symptom of the growing globalisation of terror. The tactics — synchronised bombs on a Christian holy day — are grotesquely familiar. The ­attacks clearly targeted Christians. The culprits are local Islamic extremists. The purpose of the attacks, therefore, was to increase tensions between Muslims and non-Muslims.

A policeman frisks a Muslim devotee as he arrives at a mosque to attend Friday noon prayer in Colombo on April 26. Picture: AFPA policeman frisks a Muslim devotee as he arrives at a mosque to attend Friday noon prayer in Colombo on April 26. Picture: AFP

Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under Uncategorized

April 27, 2019 · 11:01 am

Wakes in Australian Churches for Terror-Victims in Sri Lanka via Lankan-Aussie Initiatives

Sri Lankan Australians in all the cities  have initiated gatherings to grieve and honour those killed in the merciless attacks on Churches and hotels in Sri Lanka on Easter Sunday 2019. I reproduce one notice from Dr. Charitha Perera, Hon. Consul for Sri Lanka in Adelaide. I will be adding illustrative photographs from some of these events in the next few days and request friends to send striking snaps of these sad moments of ANGUISH and REMEMBRANCE (coinciding as they do with the reflections of ANZAC DAY).

Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under Australian culture, Islamic fundamentalism, life stories, religiosity, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, trauma, Uncategorized, world events & processes

April 27, 2019 · 10:26 am

Where End Goal and Zeal produce a Deadly Cocktail

  Chandre Dharmawardena, in Colombo Telegraph, 6 April 2019, where the title is “Why Do “Educated” Youth Join Extremist Terrorist Movements?”

It is often asked  why educated youth “coming from good homes” join extremist organizations. Simple  references to “brain washing”, or the stupidity of the young are no explanations. There is no scientifically recognized   process called “brain washing”. It is also  naive to assume that  educated youth  join the IS (Islamic state)  to go to heaven and get their 21 virgins! Many youth radicalized in British Universities ended up fighting for the ISIS. At least one of the Sri Lankan Muslim Kamikazi had a British training, had four children, a flourishing business and lived in a million dollar home in Colombo. A British education in a narrow subject like “information technology” not touching any  broad scientific or cultural subjects, given in a British “red Brick” university can have no effect on already acquired belief systems. Don’t our “most educated” ministers go to Tirupathi, India,at the drop of a pin?

https://www.doneeractie.nl/moskee-madrassa-in-sri-lanka/-28538

Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, authoritarian regimes, conspiracies, disparagement, fundamentalism, historical interpretation, landscape wondrous, life stories, LTTE, power politics, prabhakaran, religiosity, Sri Lankan scoiety, terrorism, the imaginary and the real, unusual people, vengeance, violence of language, world events & processes, zealotry

April 26, 2019 · 2:31 pm

Kattankudy Muslims reach out in Sri Lankanness … and denounce Zahran Hashim

COMMUNIQUE FROM THE FEDERATION OF CIVIL SOCIETY ORGANIZATIONS, KATTANKUDY – RELEASED ON APRIL 25TH, 2019

At a time when our mother land, Sri Lanka, is grieving at the tragic deaths of our Christian brothers and sisters, and also other innocents from this country and abroad, who have fallen victims to the atrocities of terrorists in certain parts of this country, we release this communiqué with a heavy heart, while expressing our deepest and heartfelt condolences to the families of the deceased and those suffering at hospitals.

Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, atrocities, communal relations, cultural transmission, heritage, life stories, meditations, Muslims in Lanka, politIcal discourse, reconciliation, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, tolerance, unusual people, welfare & philanthophy, world events & processes

April 26, 2019 · 11:24 am

Mother of Satan Explosives and Wellampitiya Copper Factory

News Item Daily News, 25 April 2019,

The explosive triacetone triperoxide, dubbed ‘Mother of Satan’ by Al Qaeda for its destructive power, which was supposedly used in Sunday’s attacks, was allegedly made in a copper factory owned by one of the suicide bombers. The factory in Wellampitiya belonged to ‘calm and devout’ Inshaf Ahamad, who is understood to have blown himself up at the Cinnamon Grand, the UK’s Daily Mail Online reported.

Inshaf’s brother-in-law said the businessman drove a brand-new white Land Cruiser and came from a middle-class background. Speaking to MailOnline, Ashkhan Alamdeen (29) said he had brought shame on their family. “They have ruined our family and taken the lives of hundreds of people from all over the world,” Alamdeen said. “We had no idea what they were planning. If we had, we would have immediately told the police.” Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, cultural transmission, Islamic fundamentalism, jihad, life stories, Muslims in Lanka, politIcal discourse, power politics, religiosity, security, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, suicide bombing, terrorism, trauma, women in ethnic conflcits, world events & processes

April 26, 2019 · 9:01 am

“Eating Bitterness Again” — Captain Elmo’s Lament pinpoints Crass Incompetence at the Top

Capt Elmo Jayawardena

I will make this article short, simply because what I am writing is extremely sad. 350 plus totally innocent people died on Easter Sunday morning due to random bomb explosions. 500 or more were maimed and are fighting for their lives in hospitals. The extremists who are responsible would have had their own reasons for creating this terrible tragedy. Everyone has reasons for everything they do: but does that give them the right to kill innocent people? They planned, they came, they bombed, and the ones who paid the price were people who had gone to church on this Black Easter to pray and those who sat at a table to enjoy a celebrative breakfast.

Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, governance, human rights, life stories, meditations, security, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, taking the piss, trauma, unusual people, world events & processes