We are dedicating this page to the friends and families of
those killed or injured during the cowardly attack on an innocent American
civilian population on 9/11/01; also to the rescue workers and volunteers who
have given so much of themselves to help during this tragedy - some have given
all.
From Cher at JazzlTubes
There is nothing wrong in having nothing to say,
unless you insist on saying it.
From Cher at JazzlTubes
-----Original Message-----
From: Dew
Sent: Saturday, September 15, 2001 3:37 AM
Subject: Perspective on Afghanistan
I send this as a bit of information I feel many are unaware of. Also because some terrible things have happened to people in this small town that were fortunate to leave Afghanistan years ago and are being threatened today, they operate my favorite grocery store down the road and some "American" is terrorizing their lives. Read if you will, a friend sent it to me today.
In the wake of Tuesday’s events, I’ve heard a lot of individuals speak angrily of bombing Afghanistan into oblivion. I’m afraid that most Americans aren’t aware of the Taliban pseudo-government in Afghanistan or its stranglehold on its citizens – which is understandable, considering most Americans don’t find goings on in Afghanistan to be integral to their daily lives. Perhaps some of you received the repeatedly forwarded e-mail in the last three years asking people to sign a petition to encourage the American government to oust the Taliban from power (I take this opportunity to also encourage you to notice the ineffectiveness of e-mail petitions). The e-mail described the plight of women, in particular, in Afghanistan who are now prohibited from driving, working or having an inch of their flesh exposed. Relief workers describe women who are starving, overcome by depression, committing suicide in droves, or being stoned to death for transgressions. I’m not aware of the specific sources of the descriptions, but they are nonetheless riveting. I received my first copy of the e-mail in 1998, which goes to show that vivid illustrations of the Taliban’s effect upon Afghanistan have been available for some time.
Sometime this summer by a fluke, I started frequenting the website of techno-pop musician, Moby. I’m somewhat indifferent to his music, but I’ve been impressed by the individual. He writes daily diary entries, that I read regularly. He lives in Manhattan, and September 11th was his birthday. He awoke to the sound of the first tower being hit, witnessed the tragedy unfold firsthand, and now knows people who are missing. In spite of the personal nature of the attack, he is currently struggling to demonstrate control and balance and disseminate information that will engender empathy rather than blind rage (though, as even admirable humans do, he did pay homage to the inevitable grief stage of anger). I believe that a good dose of empathy for the citizens of Afghanistan could do us all some good, and so I’m forwarding this letter that Moby posted in his diary. Do with it what you will.
With love, and striving for well-directed compassion,
September 14, 2001 – New York City
This letter was forwarded to me. It's from an Afghanistani man who lives here in the U.S. In my opinion it's worth reading.
-Moby
Dear Friends,
I am from Afghanistan, and even though I've lived here for 35 years I've never lost track of what's been going on over there. So I want to share a few thoughts with anyone who will listen.
I speak as one who hates the Taliban and Osama Bin Laden. There is no doubt in my mind that these people were responsible for the atrocity in New York. I fervently wish to see those monsters punished. But the Taliban and Bin Laden are not Afghanistan. They're not even the government of Afghanistan. The Taliban are a cult of ignorant psychotics who captured Afghanistan in 1997 and have been holding the country in bondage ever since. Bin Laden is a political criminal with a master plan. When you think Taliban, think Nazis. When you think Bin Laden, think Hitler. And when you think "the people of Afghanistan" think "the Jews in the concentration camps." It's not only that the Afghan people had nothing to do with this atrocity. They were the first victims of the perpetrators. They would love for someone to eliminate the Taliban and clear out the rats nest of international thugs holed up in their country. I guarantee it. Some say, if that's the case, why don't the Afghans rise up and overthrow the Taliban themselves? The answer is, they're starved, exhausted, damaged, and incapacitated.
A few years ago, the United Nations estimated that there are 500,000 disabled orphans in Afghanistan-a country with no economy, no food. Millions of Afghans are widows of the approximately two million men killed during the war with the Soviets. And the Taliban has been executing these women for being women and has buried some of their opponents alive in mass graves.
The soil of Afghanistan is littered with land mines and almost all the farms have been destroyed . The Afghan people have tried to overthrow the Taliban. They haven't been able to.
We come now to the question of bombing Afghanistan back to the Stone Age. Trouble with that scheme is, it's already been done. The Soviets took care of it. Make the Afghans suffer? They're already suffering.
Level their houses? Done. Turn their schools into piles of rubble? Done. Eradicate their hospitals? Done. Destroy their infrastructure? There is no infrastructure. Cut them off from medicine and health care? Too late. Someone already did all that.
New bombs would only land in the rubble of earlier bombs. Would they at least get the Taliban? Not likely. In today's Afghanistan, only the Taliban eat, only they have the means to move around. They'd slip away and hide. (They have already, I hear.) Maybe the bombs would get some of those disabled orphans, they don't move too fast, they don't even have wheelchairs.
But flying over Kabul and dropping bombs wouldn't really be a strike against the criminals who did this horrific thing. Actually it would be making common cause with the Taliban - by raping once again the people they've been raping all this time.
I don't have a solution. But I do believe that suffering and poverty are the soil in which terrorism grows. Bin Laden and his cohorts want to bait us into creating more such soil, so they and their kind can flourish. We can't let him do that. That's my humble opinion.
Tamim Ansary
Retrieved from www.moby-online.com
From Shirley of JazzlTubes
Page 14a - 911 Memorial
