The migrant ship mishap in Libya

A few days ago, a migrant ship carrying 90 people traveling illegally to Europe capsized near Libya, the point of departure for illegal entrants to Europe. It had mostly Pakistanis who wanted to escape poverty, injustice and unemployment in their country to the so called promised land of Europe to start a so called better life than what they had back home. The latest news in this saga is there have recovered some bodies and saved only 4 of them now. Besides they have arrested the human trafficker whose brother lives in Libya and son lives in Italy who are all involved in it. Another report said that nearly 600,000 people have used to route to try to enter Europe Illegally. As you may read news, many have died trying to reach the promised land and those who have reached successfully are leading a miserable life as the doors of Europe have been shut and they are living in bad conditions in Greece, the major point of entry to Western Europe.

As I have written before, the welcoming mat for the illegal immigrants especially the ones who are the so called economic migrants has been pulled back. During the new wave of migrants, the civil war in Syria and Afghanistan were welcome as they had nowhere to go but during this wave some of the economic migrants from other countries like Iraq, Pakistan, Libya, some North Africans and others also tagged alone and were lucky to reach the promised land and they were somewhat welcomed. Now that the wave has subsided due to the increasing hostility of the citizens of the host countries, people are still trying to go there despite the fact that the situation is dire in those countries too with racial and ethnic hatred and Islamophobia but I guess that the people who are trying to reach there seems to think that it is better to be in Europe than to die a worse death in their own countries.

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Cape Town, South Africa Water Woes

I have reading about the water woes of one of the richest cities in Africa and it at times an interesting but also very frightening read. Actually the cause is attributed to as much as nature but mostly it is human made. For the last three years, Cape Town has been receiving much less rain resulting in drought like condition. Their reservoirs have been down so low that the local government has given a name for when the water will shut down it is called “Day Zero”. This is the day when the water will no longer be provided to people and only essential services will get water. Right now with increasing monitoring, they are reducing the amount of water being provided through selective water pumps. People are brushing and washing and whatever they are using water it gets recycled to flush and given to lawns. Water is being transported from other less drought areas and now they are moving fast with desalination plants and other measures which will take time to materialize.

But despite the efforts, the rainy season which starts from April is all the hope that is being pinned on which is a big if since for the last three years, they have inadequate or no rain at all. These are dire predictions even for one of the richest cities of Africa and it can a showcase for other rich cities where there fight is on to conserve water like in the South and western United States. The water usage in the U.S. is 80 to 100 gallons per person per day which is 5 times what Cape Town citizens are getting right now and it will be reduced further if rains don’t come in the rainy season. I just shudder to think how people will be able to cope with the resultant shutdown of this essential commodity.

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The U.S. threat to the Palestinian aid

If the announcement to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem was not enough, now the U.S. has threaten to cut off aid to them via the United Nations program if they don’t end their boycott of peach talks with Israel. First the cut off amount was USD225 million and now it is also another amount of USD65 million. Since the U.S. is the biggest contributor to this program to help Palestinian refugees, there will obviously be crisis of major proportion. These programs help the Palestinians people to go on with their daily lives and the cut off or the threat of it will definitely mean hardship for them. The Palestinian leadership has refused to bow down to pressure of this sort and is adamant in their boycott of the whole peace process and the U.S. being part of it.

So my question is who is going to replace all this aid. Although some Muslim countries have come forward to help them (including Kuwait with a paltry $900k as reported) , I have not read anywhere that the rich Muslim countries will replace this aid with their own pledge to contribute whatever the shortfall in funds the Palestinians will need. This is the crux of the problem as Muslims are so much deeply divided among themselves that they don’t have much time or sympathy to help their Muslim brothers and sisters in need. If the Muslims and Arabs in particular don’t help their Palestinians Muslims in need, why would the Non Muslims care about them helping? 

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The resurgent Kabul attacks

Recently there has been resurgent of attacks in Kabul killing more than hundred people and showing the continued threat of Taliban and Islamic State (IS) strength despite the presence of Afghan and thousands of NATO forces trying to maintain peace in the country.  The attacks came in within a week’s time and show the utter failure of the U.S.  trained Afghan forces and the intelligence apparatus they are responsible for. This war has become the longest war in U.S. History and despite what the candidate Trump said during election campaign, this war has now become his war as he has authorized sending more troops and give the go ahead to pursue Taliban wherever they operate which is also in Pakistan. The U.S. being frustrated in its effort to bring peace to Afghanistan is lashing out at Pakistan despite the fact that Pakistan is also a victim of terrorism and may not have that kind of leverage with the Taliban to end the war.

Even if Pakistan does have the leverage, the increasing presence of IS militants is also complicating the peace process in the country. The U.S. relying on India to increase its presence in Afghanistan is also not likely to materialize as Pakistan sees much threat in this scenario and also India does not want to send its troops and get bogged down in a country which dislikes foreigners be it Pakistan or India. The best scenario for the U.S. is to cut its losses and leave Afghanistan as the war will not likely be a win for the U.S. But here is the problem, a recent study suggests that Afghan forces will crumble in a matter of months if the U.S. leaves but it will have to leave to make the Afghans realize that it is in their own benefit to bring peace to the country if they want to get rid of the perpetual cycle of violence they are in now.

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