« A Streetcar Named Desire | Main | Interesting bloggy stuff »

Wow, this Bhosle chap (ette?) doesn’t pull punches.

The Islamic world hates Israel because it was created by partition. Yet they support Pakistan, which was also created by partition.

Moral: it’s OK to create a Muslim country by partition (or by any other means). It’s not OK to create a non-Muslim country by partition, or, if it within the Muslim world, by any other means.

When I read about the history of Islam in India I can really understand your bitterness. They built some nice buildings but….

And having a nuclear-armed terrorist state right on India’s northern border makes my blood run cold.

Always been pro-Israel exactly because of its many similarities with the Indian problems.

Well,

I’m a long-time supporter of Israel. Among their very many other qualities is PATRIOTISM, which unfortunately has not been imbibed by fellow-Indians as much as it should.

Read “Exodus” and “The Haj” for historically-accurate descriptions of Israel and the politics that created it.

I believe we’ve come a long way, from former PM Gujral’s famous “Saddam hug” to the sale of Falcon defense system. I am sure most Indians will come to terms with this new development.

L.

Diana, she is a pretty outspoken woman - one of our kind ;) I know exactly what you mean about having a terrorist-supporting, nuclear-armed neighbor next door (no thanks to China and N.Korea for supplying the tech).

Sameer, exactly - it reminds me a lot of the Kashmiri problem - I can’t help but sympathize with the Israeli cause.

Sandeep, thanks for the recommendations. Will tryo find the books.

L, I agree it is a different India now - hopefully we will change more, for the better.

Man, these pinkos won’t leave without a fight. Just when Sharon made the landmark announcement of giving up territories in return for peace, Bidwai comes up with another feather in his crap:

http://www.rediff.com/news/2003/may/27praful.htm

In particular, referring to Indians, “For them, Yasser Arafat of the pre-Oslo period was something of a hero.”

This one is a must-read blockbuster!

L.

My admiration for this man is growing by leaps and bounds.
How can anyone make an “argument” using only scare quotes?
Notice the scare quotes around “Islamic” state of Pakistan.
And: “It’s a safe bet that a majority of Indians will oppose a Sharon visit and the anti-terrorism “axis” proposal as immoral and unwise.”
Just as it is a safe bet that there is only love and mutual affection between the peoples of India and Pakistan.

Righto Ravikiran. It looks to me that he hurriedly scribbled off something just to counter Bhosle’s article. You can juxtapose every sentence of this piece and it will still be as good as the original!

L.

Haha… I read Praful Bidwai’s article and the first thing that came to my mind was… “Oh dear! he’s toast!!” ;)

Whew, what a dumb-ass column to end all the dumb-ass columns! The idiot calls AJC an out and out Zionist entity - that is like saying CAIR (Council of American and Islamic Relations, I think) is an out and out Islamist entity. So what?

Indians think Palestinian struggles are heroic? Why don’t you ask a few regular (not p-sec morons) if they support suicide bombings and see what they say. Pakistan cannot ally itself with Israel as an Islamic state? Why not? Because the Muslims hate Jews - unfortunately, Bidwai will conveniently leave that part out. So what if India wants to isolate Pakistan? Whose side are you on anyways, Prafool?

Ravi, you are so right about the scare quotes - all of Bidwai’s arguments are basically putting quotes around the oppsition’s actions and words and pretending that somehow invalidates them. This does look like a counter to Varsha’s article only without any actual facts, logic or original thinking involved.

Sameer, he is “Texas” toast! ;)

Hmmmmm….by and large, I agree with Varsha’s article. We can learn a lot of lessons from Isael and the way it has handled the whole issue. Most Indians’ admiration of Israel stems out of the fact that we could not be as assertive as they were…..or are.

Whenever anyone asks me whose side you are on, I always say “India’s side” even if India is not the party directly involved.

On the Palestine issue, if FOR ARGUMENT’S SAKE I were to detach myself from my nationalist thought, then I think both parties are to blame equally. I find the tendency of Muslims to paint Israel as a total villain absolutely childish. Then again, I find the blanket admiration of Israel’s policies and actions and hatred for Palestinians just as churlish. There are a lot of avoidable things Israel has done as well. They haven’t been totally innocent of blunders.

So on the whole issue, I would say, “uss hamaam mein sabhi nangey hain”. But since I am on India’s side, I would root for Israel.

:beam: that was some nice barbecueing of Praful’s ass!

The other issue here is these guys (Praful and his likes) will never quit. He is supposedly a “respected” journalist. But then he did’nt care to come-up with a valid response.

Right now, they are very desparate to somehow push through their agenda (atleast in websphere). I have no idea how they are faring in the mainstream media.

L.

True, Gaurav - there are definitely some bad things about Israel as well - overall, I just find it easier to sympathize with people who are ostensibly defending themselves from terrorism rather than a people who support terrorism however worthy as they allege.

L, thank you - we love it :)

Look guys, all nation-states do crazy things, just look at the USA (Vietnam) but some of ‘em are run by maniacs and some are not. Some have the capacity to self-correct and some do not.

And we know which ones are which.

As Bob Dylan said, “you don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.”

Absolutely, Diana - another interesting thing is how everybody calls Israel a racist state when Israeli parliament has “elected” Arab members - How many Jews do you think would be elected in Palestine if they ever had legitimate elections?

Right on point Shanti, I liked the current Varsha Bhosle article too. Israel elects Arab members and India even has a Muslim President (and numerous other cabinet ministers and buearocrats) which nobody cares to mention.

Oh well, the bus to lahore is once again ready to roll. I wonder how many Jihadis are going to hitch a ride.

Ender, all I hope for is that there isn’t a Kargil waiting to happen this time, considering that it is the season for such things, it being summer and all.

Immortal last words?
“It’s a safe bet that a majority of Indians will oppose a Sharon visit and the anti-terrorism “axis” proposal as immoral and unwise.”
There is 6 pages worth of support from Indians for Bidwai on rediff. Just check it out

12 pages last I looked (thanks for the pointer, Shanti), and something like a grand total of two or three (individual posts, not pages) were in any kind of agreement with the article. I doubt you’d see that even on an Israeli site. Do they edit posts there? Wow.

They do edit posts there, Solomon. But in my experience I have normally seen posts critical of the authors not appearing in the comments. I think that will give you an idea of how many people are pro-Israel.

Ravi, the deluded idiot probably thinks all the 12 pages were filled with people belonging to a Vast Hindu Wing Conspiracy :mad:

19 pages and still going strong!

No Shanti, those pages were filled by the eeeeviiillll NRIs.
You see, according to Praful Bidwai, resident Indians don’t have
1) Internet connections
2) A voice to dissent against his “intelligent” writings
3) Probably don’t know how to read and write
4) Can’t think for themselves. Also see (3).
It has to be an evil NRI consipracy.

Of course, Ashwini - it is an eeevil machine that keeps spouting anti-Bidwai comments at regular intervals and submits them to Rediff! Bwahahaha! :evil: