PostGlobal
The Somali Blogosphere
Confused by events in Somalia? We certainly were, so we checked out the website of Somalia's leading blogger, Bashir Goth, and then gave him a call. The bottom line, says Goth, is that the Islamic coalition (known as the Islamic Courts Union) that has taken control of Mogadishu from the warlords isn't all bad. They have brought order to a lawless city and even outspoken anti-Islamists like Goth are holding their fire for the moment.
Bashir Goth was the first Somali blogger and is now at the forefront of a growing Somali blogosphere that often challenges Western opinion. To get a sense of this Somali view, I collaborated with my colleague Tom Isherwood to check out Somali cyberspace. While foreign press largely condemned the rise of the ICU labeling them a new Taliban, these Somalis see some potential.
For 15 years, warring militias have ravaged Mogadishu, making it perhaps the poorest and most dangerous city on earth. At "isbaaro" checkpoints lining the roadways, rival clan militias routinely robbed and murdered civilians. Around 1999, local Shariah courts arose to protect neighborhoods and, as columnist Abi Egal argues, many of them succeeded.
Now the ICU has done what no Somali leader or internationally-brokered government has been able to: It unified the city under one authority and pacified Mogadishu. Though the ascension of radical Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys last week may be a setback, his more "moderate" colleague Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed (see his interview with Goth) has shown initial readiness to talk to U.S. officials and the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) of Somalia.
As Goth says, if the ICU decides to work with the TFG and if international pressures can push aside the more radical clerics (without funding "Anti-terror" warlords), a fragile peace is possible.
By Amar Bakshi | June 28, 2006; 10:41 AM ET
Read comments.
Thursday, June 29, 2006
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Could Mogadishu Islamic Courts be eligible for the Nobel Peace Prize? - June 22, 2006 - 02:04
By Bashir Goth
If impossible is a word to be found only in the dictionary of fools as remarked by Napoleon Bonaparte, the world may see the Somali Islamist fighters of the Union of Islamic Courts in Mogadishu reversing the trend of history by turning tables on advocates of the clash of civilizations, by inventing a new meaning for the concept of Islamism and by becoming alien contenders for the Nobel peace prize.
A bizarre idea you may say and I would agree with you as long as you and I are normal people living under normal circumstances. But imagine if you live 15 years in a state of lawlessness where your day starts with death and ends with death, where your only hope in life is to return safely to your family from the shortest trip to the bakery, where you live in constant fear of an imminent rape for the womenfolk of your household, where an hour without seeing a bullet riddled corpse at your doorstep is heaven's gift, where your children's lullaby is the sound of mortar explosions and their sleeping riddles is to compete with each other on figuring out which sound belonged to which gun. Imagine if you live in a city that has been destroyed beyond recognition, where 90 per cent of your neighborhood have either been killed or have left without any hope of returning, where ruthless warlords coercion you and rob you of anything of value that you own, where your relatives, your friends, your childhood classmates have either been murdered, crippled or have died on the high seas while seeking a safer place. Imagine you live in a city where the only familiar sound you hear, reminding you of the good old days and giving you hope for the future is the prayers' call coming from your neighborhood mosque. Read on Awdalnews, Wardheernews, Somaliland.org also read an updated version in Khaleej Times under title Making Sense of Somalia
By Bashir Goth
If impossible is a word to be found only in the dictionary of fools as remarked by Napoleon Bonaparte, the world may see the Somali Islamist fighters of the Union of Islamic Courts in Mogadishu reversing the trend of history by turning tables on advocates of the clash of civilizations, by inventing a new meaning for the concept of Islamism and by becoming alien contenders for the Nobel peace prize.
A bizarre idea you may say and I would agree with you as long as you and I are normal people living under normal circumstances. But imagine if you live 15 years in a state of lawlessness where your day starts with death and ends with death, where your only hope in life is to return safely to your family from the shortest trip to the bakery, where you live in constant fear of an imminent rape for the womenfolk of your household, where an hour without seeing a bullet riddled corpse at your doorstep is heaven's gift, where your children's lullaby is the sound of mortar explosions and their sleeping riddles is to compete with each other on figuring out which sound belonged to which gun. Imagine if you live in a city that has been destroyed beyond recognition, where 90 per cent of your neighborhood have either been killed or have left without any hope of returning, where ruthless warlords coercion you and rob you of anything of value that you own, where your relatives, your friends, your childhood classmates have either been murdered, crippled or have died on the high seas while seeking a safer place. Imagine you live in a city where the only familiar sound you hear, reminding you of the good old days and giving you hope for the future is the prayers' call coming from your neighborhood mosque. Read on Awdalnews, Wardheernews, Somaliland.org also read an updated version in Khaleej Times under title Making Sense of Somalia
Awdalnews - http://www.awdalnews.com - SomaliNews
Exclusive Interview- Sheikh Sherif welcomes dialogue with Washington - June 09, 2006 - 15:55
Awdalnews Network=
MOGADISHU, 9 June 2006--Sheikh Sherif Sheikh Ahmed, Chairman of the Somali Islamic Courts Union, today welcomed a dialogue with the United States, describing the Bush Administration's willingness to talk to them as Washington's "first step towards the right direction."
"We know that a lot of wrong information has been given to the U.S. They have been fed with lies and Somalia has been portrayed to them as a threat, which is baseless," he said.
In an exclusive telephone interview with Bashir Goth of Awdalnews Network on 9th June 2006, Sheikh Sherif also explained that what happened in Mogadishu was a popular uprising and not an Islamic Courts' conquest of the capital, noting that all fighters on the Islamic Courts side were natives of Mogadishu and there were rarely any other Somalis among their ranks let alone foreign elements.
He denied having called for the establishment of an Islamic State in Somalia and said that the Islamic Courts had no intention of forcing women to adhere to strict Islamic dress code.
"People are Muslims but no one forces them to do anything. It is a personal obligation and the person has to adhere to it by his own," he said.
He expressed his delight at the achievements of the people of Somaliland, saying that their secession was due to mistakes committed against them in the past.
"I congratulate the Somaliland people, they have worked hard. They are people we love; they are Somali people. Somaliland's secession was due to mistakes that happened in the past. For our part, we would like these mistakes to be addressed. We believe they are the first people concerned with this issue because their property, their wealth and their blood are in the soil.," Sheikh Sherif said. Read more and on afrol
Exclusive Interview- Sheikh Sherif welcomes dialogue with Washington - June 09, 2006 - 15:55
Awdalnews Network=
MOGADISHU, 9 June 2006--Sheikh Sherif Sheikh Ahmed, Chairman of the Somali Islamic Courts Union, today welcomed a dialogue with the United States, describing the Bush Administration's willingness to talk to them as Washington's "first step towards the right direction."
"We know that a lot of wrong information has been given to the U.S. They have been fed with lies and Somalia has been portrayed to them as a threat, which is baseless," he said.
In an exclusive telephone interview with Bashir Goth of Awdalnews Network on 9th June 2006, Sheikh Sherif also explained that what happened in Mogadishu was a popular uprising and not an Islamic Courts' conquest of the capital, noting that all fighters on the Islamic Courts side were natives of Mogadishu and there were rarely any other Somalis among their ranks let alone foreign elements.
He denied having called for the establishment of an Islamic State in Somalia and said that the Islamic Courts had no intention of forcing women to adhere to strict Islamic dress code.
"People are Muslims but no one forces them to do anything. It is a personal obligation and the person has to adhere to it by his own," he said.
He expressed his delight at the achievements of the people of Somaliland, saying that their secession was due to mistakes committed against them in the past.
"I congratulate the Somaliland people, they have worked hard. They are people we love; they are Somali people. Somaliland's secession was due to mistakes that happened in the past. For our part, we would like these mistakes to be addressed. We believe they are the first people concerned with this issue because their property, their wealth and their blood are in the soil.," Sheikh Sherif said. Read more and on afrol
Monday, May 22, 2006
Somaliland: where peace and democracy make no headlines
Bashir Goth
Mention Somalia and images of famine, warlords, fratricide and Black Hawk Down will jump to one's mind. The country barely exists on the world map let alone the world agenda. Since the last central government was forced out of power more than 15 years ago, the people have been hijacked by hordes of warlords who prospered by robbing and looting international food aid meant for the millions of internally displaced and famished civilians, mostly women, children and elderly.
These thugs-turned warlords have foiled every attempt by the international community to restore peace and normalcy to the country. It is no wonder that the people of Mogadishu have come to view the equally cruel and more barbaric Islamic courts, pushing the establishment of a Taliban-like Islamic state in Somalia, as the lesser of the two evils. Tired and exhausted of 15 years of war, coercion, and being forced to flee from war zone to war zone in search of a safe place to rest, people saw the draconian rules imposed by the Islamic courts as an exceptional remedy to an exceptional situation where the bare existence of human beings let alone human dignity has come under constant threat. Just like Taliban had restored a semblance of peace and stability in Afghanistan, the Mogadishu Islamic courts have by the implementation of their strict brand of Islam brought an end to banditry and coercion and restored a peace of sorts in the areas under their control. Who cares if women are kept under the wrap, if limbs of poor burglars are chopped in public, if murderers are tied to trees and teenage children of slain victims are given the sword to hack their bodies in public squares! Well, dire circumstances call for dire and absurd methods of treatment, one may say. Only one who lived 15 years in a state of anarchy will understand why absurd and inhumane institutions like the Islamic courts look like the guardians of Eden in Mogadishu.
Compare this macabre situation with the story of Somaliland, the former British Somaliland Protectorate, which had, after gaining its independence on 26 June 1960, united with Italian Somalia in the South and formed with it the Somali Republic. Somaliland, which had reclaimed its sovereignty and abandoned the union on 18 May 1991 after the collapse of the central Somali government, had not only spared itself the apocalyptic status in Italian Somalia but has over the last 15 years restored peace and stability and embarked on a marvelous journey of building the country's executive, legislative and judicial institutions on a unique home-grown amalgam of time-tested traditional systems and western democracy.
Read more on Awdalnews,also Khaleej Times, Wardheernews, Saylac.com
Bashir Goth
Mention Somalia and images of famine, warlords, fratricide and Black Hawk Down will jump to one's mind. The country barely exists on the world map let alone the world agenda. Since the last central government was forced out of power more than 15 years ago, the people have been hijacked by hordes of warlords who prospered by robbing and looting international food aid meant for the millions of internally displaced and famished civilians, mostly women, children and elderly.
These thugs-turned warlords have foiled every attempt by the international community to restore peace and normalcy to the country. It is no wonder that the people of Mogadishu have come to view the equally cruel and more barbaric Islamic courts, pushing the establishment of a Taliban-like Islamic state in Somalia, as the lesser of the two evils. Tired and exhausted of 15 years of war, coercion, and being forced to flee from war zone to war zone in search of a safe place to rest, people saw the draconian rules imposed by the Islamic courts as an exceptional remedy to an exceptional situation where the bare existence of human beings let alone human dignity has come under constant threat. Just like Taliban had restored a semblance of peace and stability in Afghanistan, the Mogadishu Islamic courts have by the implementation of their strict brand of Islam brought an end to banditry and coercion and restored a peace of sorts in the areas under their control. Who cares if women are kept under the wrap, if limbs of poor burglars are chopped in public, if murderers are tied to trees and teenage children of slain victims are given the sword to hack their bodies in public squares! Well, dire circumstances call for dire and absurd methods of treatment, one may say. Only one who lived 15 years in a state of anarchy will understand why absurd and inhumane institutions like the Islamic courts look like the guardians of Eden in Mogadishu.
Compare this macabre situation with the story of Somaliland, the former British Somaliland Protectorate, which had, after gaining its independence on 26 June 1960, united with Italian Somalia in the South and formed with it the Somali Republic. Somaliland, which had reclaimed its sovereignty and abandoned the union on 18 May 1991 after the collapse of the central Somali government, had not only spared itself the apocalyptic status in Italian Somalia but has over the last 15 years restored peace and stability and embarked on a marvelous journey of building the country's executive, legislative and judicial institutions on a unique home-grown amalgam of time-tested traditional systems and western democracy.
Read more on Awdalnews,also Khaleej Times, Wardheernews, Saylac.com
Wednesday, April 19, 2006
When nations yearn for their tormentors
INSIDE AFRICA
BY BASHIR GOTH, Khaleej Times, 18 April 2006=
A POPULAR story says that when Hajjaj Bin Yusuf Al Thaqafi, the notorious tyrant, the butcher of many Muslims and the viceroy of the Ummayad rulers in Iraq, was about to die he wanted to do something that would make the people yearn for his reign and pray for his soul despite the atrocities and the genocides he committed against them.
He ordered that those who carried his coffin to the graveyard should take a straight path and should demolish every building, house or mosque they encountered in their way, regardless of who owned it. When the order was carried out, the affected people thought that it was Hajjaj’s successor who ordered this destruction and brought such unprecedented calamity on them. They spontaneously started cursing the new viceroy and asked God’s mercy on Hajjaj’s soul saying: “Salamullah Ala Hajjaj or May peace be upon the soul of Hajjaj.”
It is a tragedy for a nation to survive under the highhandedness of a tyrant who inflicts untold misery on it, but a far worse tragedy is when the moment of deliverance arrives, that the new saviours usher in a situation that makes the era of their predecessors’ reign like Plato’s ideal city; A situation where instead of breathing a sigh and nursing their wounds, people look back at the old days with nostalgia and yearn for its return.
Read more on:Khaleej Times, Awdalnews,Wardheernews,Somaliland.org, QaranNews,
Both Iraq and Somalia have been ruled by ruthless dictators who squeezed their nation’s resources to the last drop, building hollow military machines=
INSIDE AFRICA
BY BASHIR GOTH, Khaleej Times, 18 April 2006=
A POPULAR story says that when Hajjaj Bin Yusuf Al Thaqafi, the notorious tyrant, the butcher of many Muslims and the viceroy of the Ummayad rulers in Iraq, was about to die he wanted to do something that would make the people yearn for his reign and pray for his soul despite the atrocities and the genocides he committed against them.
He ordered that those who carried his coffin to the graveyard should take a straight path and should demolish every building, house or mosque they encountered in their way, regardless of who owned it. When the order was carried out, the affected people thought that it was Hajjaj’s successor who ordered this destruction and brought such unprecedented calamity on them. They spontaneously started cursing the new viceroy and asked God’s mercy on Hajjaj’s soul saying: “Salamullah Ala Hajjaj or May peace be upon the soul of Hajjaj.”
It is a tragedy for a nation to survive under the highhandedness of a tyrant who inflicts untold misery on it, but a far worse tragedy is when the moment of deliverance arrives, that the new saviours usher in a situation that makes the era of their predecessors’ reign like Plato’s ideal city; A situation where instead of breathing a sigh and nursing their wounds, people look back at the old days with nostalgia and yearn for its return.
Read more on:Khaleej Times, Awdalnews,Wardheernews,Somaliland.org, QaranNews,
Wednesday, March 29, 2006
Will the Arabs dare to listen to Somaliland?
BY Bashir Goth*
Mar 27, 2006 — The Arab League has the habit of leaving issues to fester until such time when surgical intervention becomes necessary from foreign powers whose interests do not necessarily match those of the Arab world.
Examples are plenty but a few recent ones include Somalia, Southern Sudan and Darfur, Iraq and the Lebanese-Syrian issue. None of these issues has come out of the blue. All of them have been fermenting and escalating for years before they have reached the bursting point. All the time, the Arabs were using an ostrich mentality and burying their heads; hoping that they one day could raise their heads to find things fixed by some divine power. It is quite perplexing how Arabs love the status quo and use all their energy and resources to ensure that things stay as they are; they do this not only because they prefer stability and peace to the turbulence and commotion that often result from change but because they also fear that any change may rock the murky waters of Arab politics and expose the Arabs inability to deal with it.
Realpolitik also seems to elude the Arab focus, while sentimentalism and empty nationalistic slogans blur the clarity of their vision. A real example of the Arabs propensity for idealism and contempt for pragmatism is their famous Khartoum Resolution of 1967 which carried the three "nos" of Arab-Israel relations at that time: No peace with Israel, No recognition of Israel, No negotiations with Israel.
It took another decade for Egypt’s Anwar Sadat to cause a political Tsunami in Arab politics and inject the first dose of realipolitik into the Arab political lexicography. Other than the masterly strike of Sadat, all other Arab attempts of realpolitik came too late when the political landscape had already changed beyond recognition and they had to face the bitter reality of opting for face saving tactics.
Now as the Arabs hold their 18th summit in Khartoum on 28-29 March 2006, one issue that calls for a masterful realpolitik decision is that of the little known country of Somaliland. By just evoking the name, one can anticipate frowns on faces of Arab politicians. More Sudan Tribune, Awdalnews Network, WardheerNews, Somaliland.org,Qarannews
BY Bashir Goth*
Mar 27, 2006 — The Arab League has the habit of leaving issues to fester until such time when surgical intervention becomes necessary from foreign powers whose interests do not necessarily match those of the Arab world.
Examples are plenty but a few recent ones include Somalia, Southern Sudan and Darfur, Iraq and the Lebanese-Syrian issue. None of these issues has come out of the blue. All of them have been fermenting and escalating for years before they have reached the bursting point. All the time, the Arabs were using an ostrich mentality and burying their heads; hoping that they one day could raise their heads to find things fixed by some divine power. It is quite perplexing how Arabs love the status quo and use all their energy and resources to ensure that things stay as they are; they do this not only because they prefer stability and peace to the turbulence and commotion that often result from change but because they also fear that any change may rock the murky waters of Arab politics and expose the Arabs inability to deal with it.
Realpolitik also seems to elude the Arab focus, while sentimentalism and empty nationalistic slogans blur the clarity of their vision. A real example of the Arabs propensity for idealism and contempt for pragmatism is their famous Khartoum Resolution of 1967 which carried the three "nos" of Arab-Israel relations at that time: No peace with Israel, No recognition of Israel, No negotiations with Israel.
It took another decade for Egypt’s Anwar Sadat to cause a political Tsunami in Arab politics and inject the first dose of realipolitik into the Arab political lexicography. Other than the masterly strike of Sadat, all other Arab attempts of realpolitik came too late when the political landscape had already changed beyond recognition and they had to face the bitter reality of opting for face saving tactics.
Now as the Arabs hold their 18th summit in Khartoum on 28-29 March 2006, one issue that calls for a masterful realpolitik decision is that of the little known country of Somaliland. By just evoking the name, one can anticipate frowns on faces of Arab politicians. More Sudan Tribune, Awdalnews Network, WardheerNews, Somaliland.org,Qarannews
Wednesday, February 15, 2006
Cartoons put a great religion to the test
By Bashir Goth
To Muslims, Islam is the religion of peace and reason. The holy Qur'an is said to be the greatest miracle given to Muhammad, the Prophet of Islam. Other prophets were given visual and tangible miracles. Jesus Christ's miracle was to raise the dead, restore the vision for the blind and heal the leper. Moses had his staff turned into an obvious serpent that dazzled the Pharaoh magicians; he also struck the sea with his rod to split it asunder, allowing him and his followers to escape the persecution of the Pharaoh. For David God made the Iron supple for him and taught him the language of the birds, while the wind was subjugated for Solomon and he also could understand the language of animals and use birds as messengers.
As for Muhammad, Muslims believe that his greatest miracle was the word, Al Qur'an, as can be seen in the first Qur’anic verses ever revealed to him:
“Read in the name of your Lord, who created, created man from a clot. Read! And your Lord is most bountiful. (He who taught) the use of the pen taught man which he knew not.” (96: 1- 5)
However, it seems Muslims today have lost their intellectual fortitude. The Muslim nation is the nation that dazzled the world with its free and powerful theological and philosophical discourse in the Middle Ages. The nation that had translated Greek and Roman knowledge, studied it with voracity and opened new vistas in the fields of alchemy, astronomy, geography, history, medicine, philosophy and great theological rhetoric. The nation that boasted of carrying the touch of knowledge in the hands of great men of learning such as Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali, Ibn Sina or Avicenna, Abu Nasr Al-Farabi or Alpharabius, Jabir Ibn Hayyan or Geber, Ibn Al Haitham and great sufists like Al Hallaj, Hassan Al Basri, Al-Ghazali, Abdul Qadir Al Jilani, Jalaluddin Rumi and Ibn Al Arabi. To say that such a nation is defeated by amateur catoons penned down by an an adventurous artist in a little known European newspaper is an insult to the core message and mammoth history of Islam. Read more on Awdalnews.com , WardheerNews, Somaliland.org,Saylac.com,Online Opinion Australia's e-journal of soical and political debate , Somalilnd Times and Ethiopian SSinformer
By Bashir Goth
To Muslims, Islam is the religion of peace and reason. The holy Qur'an is said to be the greatest miracle given to Muhammad, the Prophet of Islam. Other prophets were given visual and tangible miracles. Jesus Christ's miracle was to raise the dead, restore the vision for the blind and heal the leper. Moses had his staff turned into an obvious serpent that dazzled the Pharaoh magicians; he also struck the sea with his rod to split it asunder, allowing him and his followers to escape the persecution of the Pharaoh. For David God made the Iron supple for him and taught him the language of the birds, while the wind was subjugated for Solomon and he also could understand the language of animals and use birds as messengers.
As for Muhammad, Muslims believe that his greatest miracle was the word, Al Qur'an, as can be seen in the first Qur’anic verses ever revealed to him:
“Read in the name of your Lord, who created, created man from a clot. Read! And your Lord is most bountiful. (He who taught) the use of the pen taught man which he knew not.” (96: 1- 5)
However, it seems Muslims today have lost their intellectual fortitude. The Muslim nation is the nation that dazzled the world with its free and powerful theological and philosophical discourse in the Middle Ages. The nation that had translated Greek and Roman knowledge, studied it with voracity and opened new vistas in the fields of alchemy, astronomy, geography, history, medicine, philosophy and great theological rhetoric. The nation that boasted of carrying the touch of knowledge in the hands of great men of learning such as Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali, Ibn Sina or Avicenna, Abu Nasr Al-Farabi or Alpharabius, Jabir Ibn Hayyan or Geber, Ibn Al Haitham and great sufists like Al Hallaj, Hassan Al Basri, Al-Ghazali, Abdul Qadir Al Jilani, Jalaluddin Rumi and Ibn Al Arabi. To say that such a nation is defeated by amateur catoons penned down by an an adventurous artist in a little known European newspaper is an insult to the core message and mammoth history of Islam. Read more on Awdalnews.com , WardheerNews, Somaliland.org,Saylac.com,Online Opinion Australia's e-journal of soical and political debate , Somalilnd Times and Ethiopian SSinformer
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