Paramilitary training in kindergarten

It happens in Bangladesh. And this man, Shoaib Choudhury, is begging people in the West to speak up against it, to kick up a stink, to tell one more person.

Regular readers of this blog might recall me talking about Choudhury about a year ago, when he was in prison in Bangladesh, having dared suggest that his country should recognize Israel. He is now free in the West because of political pressure but amazingly has every intention of returning to his country to face trial.

"Islam is not a bad religion," Choudhury said, "but it is now in the hands of criminals and terrorists." And silence, he said -- silence from the West -- is what they want. Silence about the 9,000 kindergarten Madrassas in Bangladesh that include paramilitary training in their curriculum. About the 64,000 Koranic madrassas, heavily funded by Saudi Arabia, that are not accountable to authorities, where hatred for Israel, Jews and Christians is built into the school day; about the way the most beautiful young women are selected, educated, trained, given every advantage -- then sent to the West, as terrorists, to await their orders to act.

Read about his recent meeting with high school students to motivate them to become activists at True Ancestor (hat tip to Amba at Ambivablog). Further references are provided there.

Tell one more person.

Technorati tags: Shoiab Choudhury, Bangladesh, Islam

Good news chronicles, Oct. 19

Spending too much time thinking about politicians, world leaders, and various international problems can get depressing.

So here is my good news antidote.

A Jewish youth organization in Israel, the Kavod Foundation, feeds needy Muslims at Eid, Christians at Christmas and Jews at Rosh Hashanah and Sukkot. They work all year round to provide food at religious holidays. Hat tip to City of Brass.


Kazakhstan discovers a sense of humour and invites Borat to come see the real Kazakhstan.

Rakhat Aliyev said in an interview with Kazakhstan Today that while he understands the anger he thinks the country "must have a sense of humor and respect other people's freedom of creativity."

"I'd like to invite Cohen here," he said. "He can discover a lot of things. Women drive cars, wine is made of grapes and Jews are free to go to synagogues."

Got good news you want to tell the world about? Email it to me at thewalrussaid(at)gmail(dot)com.

Technorati tags: Kavod Foundation, Borat

Gleanings from the blogosphere, Oct. 14

Islamic scholars are taking up the Pope's challenge and engaging in interfaith dialogue, reports Ed Morrissey at Captain's Quarters. Their response to the Pope will be delivered Sunday, but it is already available online. It's a small start, but it's a start. As you can read in the Bible, "Do not despise the day of small beginnings."

Continuing the Islamic theme, John Burgess at Crossroads Arabia tells us the Saudi government has set up an English/Arabic website with the express purpose of combatting Muslim extremism.

A moderate Muslim journalist, Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury, is literally running for his life in Bangladesh. Reader_iam at Done With Mirrors brings us up-to-date on his situation, with more than a note of despair.

Technorati tags: Salah Choudhury

North Korea by night

Rumsfeld's second favourite photo or no, this picture was too striking not to pass on. North Korea shuts off the lights - and all electricity - at 9:00 pm. That one little dot of light is Pyongyang where the Beloved Leader lives. From the Daily Mail.


Great place to be an amateur astronomer, presuming any of them can afford telescopes.

North Korea's nuclear explosion in doubt

No airborne radioactive particles have been found by either American or Chinese monitors.

The U.S. government remains uncertain of the nature of the underground explosion, although the air sampling tends to reinforce earlier doubts about whether the test blast was entirely successful, officials said. Data from seismic sensors indicated the explosion was smaller than expected.

This makes it highly unlikely that North Korea actually carried out a successful nuclear detonation. (Hat tip to my friends at Stubborn Facts.)

Although I have posted briefly on the North Korean nuclear situation here and here, I have been unable to really get into panic mode over the whole affair, in large part because the smallness of the seismic signature of the detonation inspired doubt from the very start. Those doubts now seem to be vindicated.

The world has been given a grace period to do something about North Korea before it starts selling nuclear technology to every terrorist group with sufficient financial backing. This was the clear danger from the very start, as not even Kim Jong Il is crazy enough to provoke a nuclear war with either its neighbours or the US. There are disheartening signs, such as Russia and China's pressure in the UN to keep reaction low-key in favour of diplomatic solutions, which has too often been UN-speak for accomplishing nothing whatsoever and giving tyrants a free hand.

On the other hand, Shinzo Abe, Japan's new right-wing, nationalist prime minister made his first foreign visit to China last week, just before the test and got along famously with his hosts (remember the saying: Only Nixon could go to China?) with one of their main points of agreement being the necessity of keeping North Korea in line. I find it encouraging that the first impulse has not been to start an antagonistic military build-up in the Far East between the two great regional powers.

So while the situation in North Korea is still a subject of grave concern, there is not yet any need to panic. Indeed, Kim may have done us all a favour by making it very difficult to ignore his shenanigans and galvanizing world opinion enough to accomplish something before critical mass is obtained. That's a bit optimistic on my part, I know.

[Read the comments.]

Technorati tags: Kim Jong Il, Shinzo Abe, Nuclear test

Gleanings from the blogosphere, Oct. 12

Both Spook86 and Steve Janke are explaining why Japan's trading sanctions against North Korea are a much more devastating move than is generally known.

It sounds like education is getting a profound and welcome makeover in Saudi Arabia. John Burgess tells us about it at Crossroads Arabia and warns it will not be without controversy.

Ed Morrissey is singing the same tune as I am when it comes to Palestine:

The Palestinians can't blame Israel for this. Shootings such as the one that took Rafiq Siam have their origins in a divide that war alone can address now. In the end, neither side can win, because both are essentially nihilistic and will not stop. The Palestinians have created a death cult in two different flavors, and both sides value martyrdom so much that both will fight until everyone is dead in order to keep power in their own hands, once the fighting starts.

Eventually the Palestinian people will have to demand an end to their misery and jettison both factions from their polity. An all-out civil war might wake them from their political coma and shock some sense into them. Siam's father tells the Guardian that he's "sick of both sides because they can't control the situation." This realization that they have failed to produce a rational ruling class might finally force the Palestinians to generate one before the terrorists kill them all.

I got a bit of a surprise from this article by Larry Elder, in which he trots out economic and ethical statistics in favour of the Republicans over the Democrats. It almost sounds too good to be true. It certainly isn't the whole story, but interesting nonetheless. Hat tip Booker Rising.

Pressuring North Korea

The absolute best post on how to handle North Korea, and I've read quite a few, trust me. In From the Cold is a blog written by a former spy who drips expertise in every post.

Technorati tags: North Korea, Nuclear test