Protests over Koran burning in Afghanistan

W.G.Ewald

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ejazr

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The protests are not just about the Quran burning, that was just the trigger. The civilian casualities, the pissing on dead bodies videos e.t.c. all adds up. Otherwise why no protests in Pakistan or even Iran which has a much more active political Islamic parties present? The article is extensively sourced so I suggest people to actually go to the article and click on the sourced links to satisfy their curiosity.

Salon has an excellent article on this for those who want to understand about this

The causes of the protests in Afghanistan - Salon.com

Most American media accounts and commentary about the ongoing violent anti-American protests in Afghanistan depict their principal cause as anger over the burning of Korans (it's just a book: why would people get violent over it?) — except that Afghans themselves keep saying things like this:

Protesters in Kabul interviewed on the road and in front of Parliament said that this was not the first time that Americans had violated Afghan cultural and religious traditions and that an apology was not enough.

"This is not just about dishonoring the Koran, it is about disrespecting our dead and killing our children," said Maruf Hotak, 60, a man who joined the crowd on the outskirts of Kabul, referring to an episode in Helmand Province when American Marines urinated on the dead bodies of men they described as insurgents and to a recent erroneous airstrike on civilians in Kapisa Province that killed eight young Afghans.

"They always admit their mistakes," he said. "They burn our Koran and then they apologize. You can't just disrespect our holy book and kill our innocent children and make a small apology."
And:

Members of Parliament called on Afghans to take up arms against the American military, and Western officials said they feared that conservative mullahs might incite more violence at the weekly Friday Prayer, when a large number of people worship at mosques.

"Americans are invaders, and jihad against Americans is an obligation," said Abdul Sattar Khawasi, a member of Parliament from the Ghorband district in Parwan Province, where at least four demonstrators were killed in confrontations with the police on Wednesday.
The U.S. has violently occupied their country for more than a decade. It has, as Gen. Stanley McChrystal himself explained, killed what he called an "amazing number" of innocent Afghans in checkpoint shootings. It has repeatedly — as in, over and over — killed young Afghan children in air strikes. It continues to imprison their citizens for years at Bagram and other American bases without charges of any kind and with credible reports of torture and other serious abuses. Soldiers deliberately shot Afghan civilians for fun and urinated on their corpses and displayed them as trophies.

Meanwhile, the protesters themselves continue to be shot, although most American media accounts favor sentences like these which whitewash who is doing the killing: "running clashes with the police that claimed the lives of another five Afghan protesters" and "in Nangarhar Province, two Afghans protesting the Koran burning were shot to death outside an American base in Khogyani District" and "protesters angry over the burning of Korans at the largest American base in Afghanistan this week took to the streets in demonstrations in a half-dozen provinces on Wednesday that left at least seven dead and many more injured." Left at least seven dead: as As'ad AbuKhalil observed, "notice that there is no killer in the phrasing."

It's comforting to believe that these violent protests and the obviously intense anti-American rage driving them is primarily about anger over the inadvertent burning of some religious books: that way, we can dismiss the rage as primitive and irrational and see the American targets as victims. But the Afghans themselves are making clear that this latest episode is but the trigger for — the latest symbol of — a pile of long-standing, underlying grievances about a decade-old, extremely violent foreign military presence in their country. It's much more difficult to dismiss those grievances as the by-product of primitive religious fanaticism, so — as usual — they just get ignored.

UPDATE: Beyond all these points, it's perversely fascinating to watch all of this condescension — it's just a book: who cares if it's burned? – pouring forth from a country whose political leaders were eager to enact a federal law or even a Constutional amendment to make it a criminal offense to burn the American flag (which, using this parlance, is "just a piece of cloth"). In fact, before the Supreme Court struck down such statutes as unconstitutional in 1989 by a 5-4 vote, it was a crime in 48 states in the nation to burn the flag. Here is what Chief Justice William Rehnquist wrote in dissent about why the Constitution permits the criminalization of flag burning (emphasis added):

The American flag, then, throughout more than 200 years of our history, has come to be the visible symbol embodying our Nation. It does not represent the views of any particular political party, and it does not represent any particular political philosophy. The flag is not simply another "idea" or "point of view" competing for recognition in the marketplace of ideas. Millions and millions of Americans regard it with an almost mystical reverence, regardless of what sort of social, political, or philosophical beliefs they may have.

Might one say the same for Muslims and the Koran? Along those lines, just imagine what would happen if a Muslim army invaded the U.S., violently occupied the country for more than a decade, in the process continuously killing American children and innocent adults, and then, outside of a prison camp it maintained where thousands of Americans were detained for years without charges and tortured, that Muslim army burned American flags — or a stack of bibles — in a garbage dump. Might we see some extremely angry protests breaking out from Americans against them? Would American pundits be denouncing those protesters as blinkered, primitive fanatics?
 

Ray

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Americans indeed are gung ho when it comes to any military action. It is in their training where they believe in act first and talk thereafter. That is because they feel that an American soldier's life comes first over other issues.

It would be incorrect exaggeration to state that they 'continuously' kill Afghans and Muslims. They kill in combat situation and their way of operating is not designed to minimise collateral damage.

Americans take these symbols as merely representative. That is why their Supreme Court struck down the move to make burning of the Flag as an act that is subversive. It is obvious that there will be disagreement amongst them over the issue since all are not of the same view, the US being a vibrant democracy. Since the US is not dictated by any religious frenzy it appears that they don't hold religious icons in such high esteem as the Orientals.
 

Ray

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I will add that there are many educated and sensitive US military men, but then there are a whole lot of Rednecks and hillbillies, who are rather stupid and illiterate in a world way. They can't think beyond their narrow confines.

It is these stupid Rednecks and hillbillies who mess up issues.

Redneck is a historically derogatory slang term used in reference to poor, uneducated white farmers, especially from the southern United States. It is similar in meaning to cracker (especially regarding Georgia and Florida), hillbilly (especially regarding Appalachia and the Ozarks), and white trash (but without the last term's suggestions of immorality).

In recent decades, the term has expanded its meaning to refer to bigoted, loutish reactionaries who are opposed to modern ways, and has often been used to attack Southern conservatives and racists. At the same time, some Southern whites have reclaimed the word, using it with pride and defiance as a self-identifier.
 
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W.G.Ewald

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I will add that there are many educated and sensitive US military men, but then there are a whole lot of Rednecks and hillbillies, who are rather stupid and illiterate in a world way. They can't think beyond their narrow confines.

It is these stupid Rednecks and hillbillies who mess up issues.
The military addresses these problems with required training in the culture of the country where deployed, but you can't spend all your training time for that , and as you say, the training will never sink in with some of them..
 

nitesh

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NYT: US-Afghan disconnect in reactions to two incidents - World news - The New York Times - msnbc.com

KABUL, Afghanistan — The mullah was astounded and a little angered to be asked why the accidental burning of Korans last month could provoke violence nationwide, while an intentional mass murder that included nine children last Sunday did not.

"How can you compare the dishonoring of the Holy Koran with the martyrdom of innocent civilians?" said an incredulous Mullah Khaliq Dad, a member of the council of religious leaders who investigated the Koran burnings. "The whole goal of our life is religion."

That many Americans are just as surprised that what appears to be the massacre of 16 people at the hands of an American soldier has not led to mass protests or revenge killings speaks volumes about a fundamental disconnect with their Afghan partners, one that has undermined a longstanding objective to win the hearts and minds of the population. After more than 10 years, many deaths and billions of dollars invested, Americans still fail to grasp the Afghans' basic values. Faith is paramount and a death can be compensated with blood money.

"To Muslims, and especially to Afghans, religion is much higher a concern than civilian or human casualties," said Hafez Abdul Qayoom, a member of Afghanistan's highest clerical body, the Ulema Council. "When something happens to their religion, they are much more sensitive and have much stronger reaction to it."

The attack by a still unidentified United States Army soldier near his base in the Panjwai district, in southern Kandahar Province, has certainly infuriated Afghans and added to already strained relations. But the anger has been more polemical than violent — at least so far.

"We have to hold our breath here — people are jumping too fast on this idea that Afghans don't care about 16 people being killed, compared to, say, the Koran-burning episode," said Haseeb Humayoon, a social scientist here who has studied the phenomenon of mass protests.

There have been delayed reactions to past foreign offenses, like when a Florida evangelist deliberately destroyed a Koran last year. And Friday Prayers, which often touch off mass protests, have yet to take place this week. Still, the contrast with the reaction to the Feb. 20 Koran burnings is striking. Within a day of the burnings, violent protests outside NATO bases broke out, and apologies from top officials did little to stem two weeks of violence that took at least 29 lives.

In the case of the massacre in Kandahar, prompt apologies and condemnations from not only Gen. John R. Allen, the commander of the international force, but also President Obama — along with quick action by local leaders — seemed to head off violence and contain the blowback.

In Kandahar, villagers at first wanted to take the bodies of their victims into the city, but elders persuaded them that displaying them to crowds would lead to mass violence, and they desisted. Instead, they expressed their anguish to top officials who rushed there from Kabul, and in phone calls with President Hamid Karzai. In Jalalabad, university students organized a demonstration, burning Mr. Obama and a Christian cross in effigy, but despite strident demands that the Americans leave, the protest remained peaceful and disbanded without incident.

Partly, many observers say, the Americans have had a lot of practice at apologizing for carnage, accidental and otherwise, and have gotten better at doing it quickly and convincingly.

"The statement coming from President Obama, saying the killing of Afghan children felt the same as if they were American children, was reported widely by the local press," Mr. Humayoon said. "Previously you would have a bland apology."

The Ulema Council, which is heavily influenced by the presidential palace, had immediately issued a passionate denunciation, saying of the Americans, "The human rights violators of the 21st century once more committed a wild, inhuman and shameful act and relentlessly martyred innocent children, women and men." But Mullah Qayoom said the quick reaction and prompt apology helped tamp down fury.

Afghan officials helped, too, by quickly paying compensation to the victims' relatives, who are very poor and are part of a culture where "blood money" is regularly paid for even accidental deaths. A high-level delegation brought the money on Tuesday to the village in Panjwai where the massacre happened, drawing an attack by Taliban insurgents.

Still, the speed of the official response does not explain everything. Military officials quickly apologized for the Koran burnings as well, but it seemed to do little to quiet matters.

Mullah Qayoom is surprised that anyone is surprised.

"Humans were sent here to worship and protect religion," he said. "That is what the purpose of a Muslim's life is."

Also, Afghans were very much aware that burning a Koran under American law normally would not be a crime, any more than burning a Bible would be — so those responsible were not going to suffer anything that Afghans would view as appropriate punishment.

In the case of murder, the military does have capital punishment, at least in theory — though no American soldier has ever been sentenced to death for acts committed in Afghanistan, including murders.

"In your laws there is the death penalty, so we are hopeful," Mullah Qayoom said. "With the Koran burning, your people do not even respect your own books, so in the end they will say 'sorry' and the person will be released."

That Afghans find Koran desecration more distressing does not mean they have been indifferent to the murders, particularly of the children. By now, any Afghan with a computer has seen the victims' cherubic but lifeless visages on Facebook, and the images have been passed around on cellphones. Wrapped in blankets, some look as if they had just fallen asleep — the coverings hide gaping forehead wounds. A toddler in a blood-stained pinafore looks alive at first glance.

The Taliban certainly did their best to instigate a reaction to the Kandahar killings, issuing a broadside within hours calling on local residents to pour into the streets and attack NATO bases.

So far, at least, nothing of the sort has happened. Afghans are quick to recall a proverb: "You give your money away for your life, but you give your life away for your religion." Ahmad Nader Nadery, a human rights activist, said that when the heat of the moment settled, many Afghans would be ready to see the Kandahar massacre as the criminal act of a single individual, particularly because it did not come as part of a military operation.

Perhaps most important, however, is that civilian casualties have long since stopped being the particular province of foreign military forces, who were once responsible for 75 percent of them. Now the Taliban commit 75 percent of them, according to figures by the United Nations and Afghan rights groups. As one American military official said, "When have the Taliban ever apologized for killing?"

This story, "Disconnect clear in US bafflement over two Afghan responses", originally appeared in The New York Times.
 

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