Headlines:
- East Turkestan: Shop Owners Forced to Sell Alcohol to Weaken Islam
- “Israeli” Soldiers Call ‘Breaking the Silence’ Report on Gaza War a ‘Total Lie’
- Yemen’s Five-day Ceasefire Backed
East Turkestan: Shop Owners Forced to Sell Alcohol to Weaken Islam
Authorities in northwestern China’s Xinjiang region have ordered shop owners and restaurateurs in a mainly Muslim Uyghur village to sell alcohol and cigarettes or face closure of their establishments, despite a public backlash against the products discouraged by followers of Islam, an official source said.
Last week, authorities in Laskuy township, in Hotan (in Chinese, Hetian) prefecture’s Hotan county, issued an announcement in the town seat of Aktash village that “all restaurants and supermarkets in our village should place five different brands of alcohol and cigarettes in their shops before [May 1, 2015].”
In addition to directing owners to create “eye-catching displays” to promote the products, the April 29 announcement stated that “anybody who neglects this notice and fails to act will see their shops sealed off, their business suspended, and legal action pursued against them.”
Perhat Rozi, chairman of the Political Law Committee of Laskuy township’s party leadership, refused to comment on the announcement, but Aktash village party committee secretary Adil Sulayman told RFA’s Uyghur Service that the new policy was part of an effort to undermine Islam in the area.
“We have a campaign to weaken religion here and this is part of that campaign,” he said.
Sulayman said that abstention from alcohol and cigarettes had become common in Aktash and other parts of Laskuy, with some 70-80 percent of people between the ages of 16 and 45 refraining from drinking and smoking, and while there is no official rule within the Muslim Uyghur community against selling the products, doing so was considered “taboo” for religious reasons.
‘Weaken Religion’ campaign: Sulayman said authorities in Xinjiang—where China has launched a series of “strike hard” campaigns in the name of fighting separatism and terrorism—viewed non-smoking Muslim Uyghurs as adhering to “a form of religious extremism.”
He said that as the seat of Laskuy, Aktash was meant to serve as an example to all residents of the township, and his village party committee did not raise the issue of a potential public backlash against the decree when it was first proposed by party leadership.
“We have more than 60 restaurants and stores in our township and I was told that all of them began stocking alcohol and cigarettes within three days of the announcement, but I didn’t inspect the businesses myself,” Sulayman said.
“Our village is the key village—we have to implement the ‘Weaken Religion’ campaign effectively … Religious sentiment is increasing and this is affecting stability.”
As the targets of “strike hard” campaigns, Uyghurs complain of pervasive ethnic discrimination, religious repression, and cultural suppression by China’s communist government. [Source: Radio Free Asia]
Those who think they can weaken the rise of Islam are blind. Despite the severe crackdown on the Uyghur Muslims, these measures will not diminish their love for Islam and their perseverance in adhering to the Shariah rulings.
“Israeli” Soldiers Call ‘Breaking the Silence’ Report on Gaza War a ‘Total Lie’
IDF soldiers from various units who fought in last summer’s war between the Jewish entity and Hamas in the Gaza Strip called a recent report by NGO Breaking the Silence a “total lie.”
The soldiers spoke to the Jewish entity’s Channel 2 to tell their side of the story, and to counter the testimonies compiled by Breaking the Silence.
Another soldier, Lt. Oren (a pseudonym), was a platoon commander in the 7th Brigade during the previous Operation Cast Lead, which began in late 2008. The Breaking the Silence report claimed that one of the tank commanders in Oren’s platoon carried out a “revenge attack” by targeting civilian houses in Gaza.
Oren refuted the claim, saying “this nonsense about ‘fire on the house that you want for revenge’ is simply a total lie.” He said that any “revenge” incident might have occurred after Armored Core Capt. Dmitri Levitas (26) was killed in battle, but that the Breaking the Silence testimony “simply is not true.”
“While it’s true there was heavy [IDF] fire, this fire was directed at positions from which we were being fired upon, or suspicious locations,” he recalled.
Oren said, “They knew where the majority of the tunnels were located and where there were no civilians … Every shell was fired only after going through the proper procedure in which we had been trained long before the Operation.”
Channel 2 said many more soldiers and high ranking officers stepped forward to present a very different story from the one conveyed in the Breaking the Silence report, emphasizing the IDF’s strict adherence to international law — which sometimes goes beyond the requirements of the Law of Armed Conflict – and the caution the army exercised to prevent Palestinian civilian deaths.
Breaking the Silence offered a response to the interviews, saying, “In the book that was published this week, testimonies of dozens of soldiers and officers who served in Protective Edge are presented… Among all of the testimonies that have been published in the last few days by those other than us, not a single one of them disproved the central point related to the policy of indiscriminate fire which led to the harm of innocent civilians,” the statement read, even though the Channel 2 testimonies seemed to indicate otherwise. [Source: The Algemeiner]
The Jewish entity recognizes no rule against Muslims. The usurper enemy takes advantage of their media to spin their narrative without being held to account by an international court.
Yemen’s Five-day Ceasefire Backed
Yemen’s Shiite rebels and their allies in the country’s armed forces have said they would accept a five-day humanitarian ceasefire to allow aid to reach civilians after more than a month of daily Saudi-led airstrikes. The ceasefire, scheduled to begin Tuesday, would help ease the suffering of civilians who increasingly lack food, fuel and medicine since the bombing campaign began on March 26.
However, all sides in a conflict that has seen the exile of president Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi have warned they will retaliate if the ceasefire is broken.
Col Sharaf Ghalib Luqman was quoted as saying rebels in the armed forces agreed with the ceasefire, warning against any violation of the truce. The Houthis earlier issued their own statement saying they will cooperate with the ceasefire.
On Saturday, the Saudi-led coalition’s spokesman, Ahmed Ali Asiri, also warned that the ceasefire will be cancelled if the rebels violated it.
The conflict in Yemen has killed more than 1,400 people since March 19, according to the United Nations. [Source: Irish Independent]
They are trying to start a war between Sunnis and Shiites, but the consciousness of the Ummah will break the game soon.