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Tag Archives: Je suis Charlie

“Je suis Raif:” an Appeal to King Abdullah

14 Wednesday Jan 2015

Posted by michelinewalker in Extremism, Political Philosophy, The Middle East

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Contradictions, Freedom of Speech, Je suis Charlie, Je suis Raif, possible death, Raif Badawi, violation of Human Rights, violation of Internation Law

images

El Tres de mayo 1808, Francisco Goya, 1814 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Contradictions

Saudi Arabia has condemned last week’s Paris massacre, but it is authorizing the probable murder of Raif Badawi who ran a blog named: Free Saudi Liberals. Mr Badawi was originally sentenced to 7 years in prison and 600 lashes (2013). Following an appeal (2014), Mr Badawi’s sentence was increased to a 10-year prison term, a fine of approximately $266,000 and 1,000 lashes (flagellation) to be inflicted weekly for a period of 20 weeks. Mr Badawi is unlikely to survive.

Torture

According to Dr Marc Dauphin (Sherbrooke, Quebec), 1,000 lashes will probably kill Raif Badawi. An infection could set in or there could be some other medical problem leading to death. Raif Badawi was flogged last Friday, 9 January, and is scheduled to be flogged a second time on Friday 16, 2015. (Luc Larochelle, La Tribune, 13 January 2015, p. 2.) After a week, his wounds will still be fresh.

British military historian Sir Charles Oman wrote that:

“In the Napoleonic Wars, the maximum number of lashes that could be inflicted on soldiers in the British Army reached 1,200. This many lashes could permanently disable or kill a man.” (See Flagellation Wikipedia.)

Flagellation is torture, a violation of l’ONU/ the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is also a violation of International Law. On that basis, torture should not be tolerated.

Moreover, if flogging Mr Badawi at the rate of 50 lashes over a 20-week period is likely to cause his death, his sentence is a miscarriage of justice.

Raif Badawi has not been sentenced to death, so his life should not be threatened by virtue of his sentence.

The Right to a Fair Trial

Why has Mr Badawi been sentenced to 10 years in jail, a very heavy fine and 1,000 lashes? I wonder if Mr Badawi spoke against Islam or against intolerance. If he spoke against intolerance and loses his life, was his trial a fair trial? First, free speech is protected under the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Second, under the same legislation, Mr Badawi has a right to a fair trial.

In a first trial, 2013, Mr Badawi was sentenced to 7 years of imprisonment and 600 lashes. When he appealed, he received a harsher sentence. May I repeat that under l’ONU, the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Mr Badawi has/ had a right to a fair trial.

“Je suis Raif”

Last week, people all over the world carried signs that read “Je suis Charlie.” The current slogan in Sherbrooke, Quebec and elsewhere is: “Je suis Raif” (I am Raif). Sherbrooke, Canada is mobilised and mobilisation is spreading. Protest must spread as quickly as possible so Mr Badawi is spared the flogging session scheduled for 16 January 2015. I hope he will be joining his wife and three children a few days from now. Protest is most effective when worded in polite language. There is no absolute free speech.

Mr Badawi is protected under l’ONU/ the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights. As noted above, torture is also prohibited by International Law.

—ooo—

I would prefer to ask that Mr Badawi be freed because he is a fellow human being. Twenty human lives were taken in Paris last week. Those lives were precious and so is Mr Badawi’s. To his wife and children, he is everything. In both cases, Paris and Jedda, the crime was speaking out: legitimate freedom of speech was attacked.

RELATED ARTICLES

  • Paris Besieged: an Assault on Reason (12 January 2015)
  • The Arnolfini Portrait: mise en abyme (3 December 2014)

Sources and Resources

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/
La Déclaration universelle des droits de l’homme
http://www.un.org/fr/documents/udhr/

Francisco Goya

In the video inserted below, we see the paintings and prints by Francisco Goya (1746–1828). According to a French video, a news cast, Goya was the first photo-journalist. He could also be described as one of many generations of war artists. He “covered” the atrocities committed in Spain by Napoléon’s grande armée. There is a more relevant video, but I can’t locate it.

Goya had been painting portraits (retratos) of members of ruling families. But at the age of 63, he started to paint and engrave Los Desastres de la Guerra (the Disasters of War).

Goya painted Las Meninas, a mise en abyme.

“The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters.”
“El Sueño de la razón produce monstrous.”
“Le Sommeil de la raison produit des monstres.”

The flogging of Raif Badawi can be stopped. We cannot use language to defame, libel, incite to violence, etc. But free speech is otherwise a human right. (See Freedom of Speech, Wikipedia). Someone should speak to King Abdullah. He is a human being and, in theory, endowed with reason.

No, I did not see any video on Francisco Goya before choosing the image featured at the top of my last post, 12 January 2015, and the top of this post. It’s a coincidence.

—ooo—

Francisco Goya

Francisco Goya

Francisco Goya, from Los Caprichos (Photo credit: WikiArt)

© Micheline Walker
14 January 2015
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Paris Besieged: an “Assault on Reason”

12 Monday Jan 2015

Posted by michelinewalker in Extremism, Paris, Terrorism, The Middle East

≈ 10 Comments

Tags

assault on reason, Charlie Hebdo, Dammartin-en-Goële, freedom of expression, Hyper Cacher, Je suis Charlie, Jeddah, Paris, Raif Bawani, the Kouachi brothers, The Middle East

Francisco Goya

Francisco Goya, El sueño de la razón produce monstruos (The Sleep of Reason produces monsters), 1799, print N°43 of the Caprichos series (Museo nacional del Prado, Madrid). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I am using the above image for the third time, by choice. I cannot find a better picture than Goya’s 43rd print in his series of 80 prints entitled Los Caprichos. It is a fine illustration of what happened this past week in Paris and Jeddah.

A Tale of Two Cities

—Paris and Jeddah (Saudi Arabia)

It seems a tale of two cities.

This past week, Paris was besieged by Islamic extremists. Twenty persons are dead. The weekly Charlie Hebdo lost essential members of its staff. The paper will publish a survivors’ issue, a million copies, but it could be the last issue. Whatever the fate of Charlie Hebdo, the attack will remain an indelible page in the history of France.

But on 9 January 2015, two days after the Paris tragedy, in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, former blogger Raif, or Raïf, Bawani was flogged publicly for having expressed, in his blog, a wish for more religious tolerance and individual freedom. Mr Bawani’s wife and three children are now living in Sherbrooke, Quebec. The massacre in Paris is by far the greater tragedy, but Mr Bawani’s family are refugees in Canada who live in my community.

“Je suis Charlie”

— I am Charlie; Dammartin-en Goële; and the Hyper Cacher

However, let us first look at the killings that shocked France and turned millions of individuals around the world into Charlie: Je suis Charlie (I am Charlie.)

Extremists Chérif and Saïd Kouachi first killed 12 persons in Paris. They got away temporarily and hid in a printing business, at Dammartin-en-Goële. Lilian Lepère, a 27-year-old graphic designer, was ordered to hide by the owner of the printing business, Michel Catalano.

However, hidden in a cardboard box under a sink, Lilian was texting information to the police and continued doing so after Michel Catalano left the building. Chérif and Saïd Kouachi were shot by the police at Dammartin-en-Goële. The police drove an armoured car into the building to free Lilian, still hiding in his cardboard box.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/10/lilian-lepere-hidden-under-sink-printworks

Meanwhile, in Vincennes, Amédy Coulibaly entered a kosher grocery store, the Hyper Cacher, took hostages, and killed four men, all Jewish, before the police could storm the grocery store. Amédy Coulibaly was killed.

The Flag of Jihad

The Flag of Jihad (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Extremism numbing “Reason”

It was a 54-hour ordeal the French will not forget. Their and our revered “liberty” had been attacked and innocent lives taken from the centre of Paris to Vincennes, just east of Paris. The French took to the streets holding up signs bearing a powerful slogan: Je suis Charlie (I am Charlie). The French were identifying with the victims. But suddenly, the slogan was repeated around the world. It was very cold in Quebec, but everywhere people were standing vigil. The world had been mobilised and there cannot be a greater indictment of extremism.

Extremists cannot think beyond a built-in ideology, which means that they cannot think. I heard the Kouachi brothers say that they were not killers, that the killers were the French and others who kill people in the Middle East. This is a quotation and a translation. Therefore, it is not a word for word quotation, but it is mostly accurate and it reveals that extremists and all haters cannot use reason. These men could not see the harm they had inflicted.

I don’t like the drone strikes, but according to the Canadian military, they are mostly targeted. However, it would be my opinion that the enemy is no longer an “ugly” American. It is extremism carried to the point of fanaticism and murder. Extremists are of one mind, a mind that numbs the mind and conscience. Consequently, the Paris killers are very poor candidates for martyrdom. Their status is the same as “Jihadi John,” or “Jailer John” who is “presumed” to have beheaded James Foley (19 August 2014), Steven Sotlov (2 September 2014), David Haines (13 September 2014), and Alan Henning (3 October 2014). Jihadi John is a cold-blooded assassin who makes his victims blame their country of origin: the US, Great Britain, and now: France, a symbol of liberty.

Al-Qaeda has claimed responsibility for the attacks in Paris, but the terrorists could have been the Taliban or IS. The United Nations has not defined “racism” per se, but it has defined racial discrimination, and it seems we are looking at naked “racial discrimination.”

“The United Nations use the definition of racial discrimination laid out in the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, adopted in 1966: any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, color, descent, or national or ethnic origin that has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life.” (Part 1 of Article 1 of the U.N. International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. (See Racism, Wikipedia)

“Je suis Raif ”

— I am Raif

Last week, the wife of Raif Badawi, 31, was living a nightmare she could not share with her children. She was hoping her husband would be spared part of his ten-year sentence. He was to be flogged beginning 9 January 2015, and he was flogged.

As I wrote above, events in Paris dwarf Raif Badawi’s demise. He is a Muslim who had a weblog and, as I wrote above, advocated greater religious and personal freedom. He was arrested in 2012 on the grounds that he had insulted Islam and was sentenced to a ten-year term in jail, a fine of $266,000, and was to be flogged publicly 1,000 times, 50 blows at a time for a period of 20 weeks. The first whipping session took place on Friday, 9 January, and the second is scheduled for next Friday. So people were outdoors in the bitter cold holding up signs with the slogan: “Je suis Raif.”

http://www.lapresse.ca/la-tribune/actualites/201501/09/01-4833686-raif-badawi-a-recu-ses-premiers-coups-de-fouet.php?utm_categorieinterne=trafficdrivers&utm_contenuinterne=cyberpresse_B13b_sherbrooke_378_section_P

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-30744693

What is Bashar al-Assad doing?

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/charlie-hebdo-attack-a-ceasefire-with-syrias-president-assad-may-help-to-turn-the-jihadi-tide-9963863.html

http://www.bbc.com/news/10338256

Conclusion

There are cultural differences between certain countries of the Middle East and the rest of the world, but these should stop where inhumanity begins. The events of the past week, cold-blooded killings in Paris and flogging in Jeddah are the epitome of what Al Gore called an “assault on reason.”

“El sueño de la razón produce monstruos”

My computer seems to be dying. The screen is grey. It was repaired, but to no avail. I hope this post will be published. I started writing it on 8 January.

My kindest regards to all of you.

—ooo—

Philippe Jarousski, countertenor, sings Henry Purcell‘s “O let me weep,” from The  Fairy-Queen

Tombeau du chanoine Luc Gillain, cathédrale d'Amiens

The Weeping Angel of Amiens (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

© Micheline Walker
10 January 2015
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