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Muslims alarmed over redrawn map for Islamic world
Web posted at: 8/27/2006 3:0:18
Source ::: Internews
WASHINGTON â~@¢ Muslim circles have expressed alarm and disgust at
the publication of a redrawn map of the Islamic world in a journal
closely linked to the US armed forces.
The Armed Forces Journal, which has published the redrawn map of the
world of Islam along with a long explanatory article, is published by
the Army Times Publishing Company, a part of Gannett Company, Inc,
the world's largest publisher of professional military and defence
periodicals.
The proposed scheme places Pakistan on the chopping block. According
to the plan, "Iran, a state with madcap boundaries, would lose a
great deal of territory to Unified Azerbaijan, Free Kurdistan, the
Arab Shia State and Free Balochistan, but would gain the provinces
around Herat in today's Afghanistan -- a region with a historical
and linguistic affinity for Persia.
"Iran would, in effect, become an ethnic Persian state again, with
the most difficult question being whether or not it should keep the
port of Bandar Abbas or surrender it to the Arab Shia State.
"What Afghanistan would lose to Persia in the west, it would gain in
the east, as Pakistan's North-west Frontier tribes would be reunited
with their Afghan brethren Pakistan, another unnatural state, would
also lose its Baloch territory to Free Balochistan. The remaining
'natural' Pakistan would lie entirely east of the Indus, except
for a westward spur near Karachi. "The city-states of the UAE would
have a mixed fate -- as they probably will in reality. Some might
be incorporated in the Arab Shia State ringing much of the Persian
Gulf ... Since all puritanical cultures are hypocritical, Dubai,
of necessity, would be allowed to retain its playground status for
rich debauchees. Kuwait would remain within its current borders,
as would Oman."
The redrawn map claims to "redress the wrongs suffered by the most
significant 'cheated' population groups, such as the Kurds, Baloch
and Arab Shia, but still fail to account adequately for Middle Eastern
Christians, Bahais, Ismailis, Naqshbandis and many another numerically
lesser minorities."
It adds that "one haunting wrong can never be redressed with a reward
of territory: The genocide perpetrated against the Armenians by the
dying Ottoman Empire."
The author, Ralph Peters, argues that even those who abhor the topic
of altering borders would be well-served to engage in an exercise
that attempts to conceive a fairer, if still imperfect, amendment of
national boundaries "between the Bosporus and the Indus."
According to him, "We are dealing with colossal, man-made deformities
that will not stop generating hatred and violence until they are
corrected. As for those who refuse to 'think the unthinkable',
declaring that boundaries must not change and that's that, it pays
to remember that boundaries have never stopped changing through the
centuries. Borders have never been static, and many frontiers, from
Congo through Kosovo to the Caucasus, are changing even now. Ethnic
cleansing works."
Peter argues that for Israel to have any hope of living in "reasonable
peace" with its neighbours, it will have to return to its pre-1967
borders, with essential local adjustments for legitimate security
concerns.
He writes that the most "glaring injustice" between the Balkan
Mountains and the Himalayas is the absence of an independent Kurdish
state. There are between 27m and 36 m Kurds living in contiguous
regions in the Middle East.
He calls Iraq an unnatural state and calls for a greater Kurdish
state, which will include Turkish, Syrian and Iranian Kurds. A Free
Kurdistan, stretching from Diyarbakir through Tabriz, would be the
most pro-Western state between Bulgaria and Japan, he adds.
Iraq's three Sunni-majority provinces might eventually choose to
unify with a Syria that loses its littoral to a Mediterranean-oriented
Greater Lebanon.
The Shia south of old Iraq would form the basis of an Arab Shia State
rimming much of the Persian Gulf. Jordan would retain its current
territory, with some southward expansion at Saudi expense. For its
part, the unnatural state of Saudi Arabia would suffer as great a
dismantling as Pakistan.
--Boundary_(ID_tcRSA/nGW6tl6sk1s8ddeQ)- -
Web posted at: 8/27/2006 3:0:18
Source ::: Internews
WASHINGTON â~@¢ Muslim circles have expressed alarm and disgust at
the publication of a redrawn map of the Islamic world in a journal
closely linked to the US armed forces.
The Armed Forces Journal, which has published the redrawn map of the
world of Islam along with a long explanatory article, is published by
the Army Times Publishing Company, a part of Gannett Company, Inc,
the world's largest publisher of professional military and defence
periodicals.
The proposed scheme places Pakistan on the chopping block. According
to the plan, "Iran, a state with madcap boundaries, would lose a
great deal of territory to Unified Azerbaijan, Free Kurdistan, the
Arab Shia State and Free Balochistan, but would gain the provinces
around Herat in today's Afghanistan -- a region with a historical
and linguistic affinity for Persia.
"Iran would, in effect, become an ethnic Persian state again, with
the most difficult question being whether or not it should keep the
port of Bandar Abbas or surrender it to the Arab Shia State.
"What Afghanistan would lose to Persia in the west, it would gain in
the east, as Pakistan's North-west Frontier tribes would be reunited
with their Afghan brethren Pakistan, another unnatural state, would
also lose its Baloch territory to Free Balochistan. The remaining
'natural' Pakistan would lie entirely east of the Indus, except
for a westward spur near Karachi. "The city-states of the UAE would
have a mixed fate -- as they probably will in reality. Some might
be incorporated in the Arab Shia State ringing much of the Persian
Gulf ... Since all puritanical cultures are hypocritical, Dubai,
of necessity, would be allowed to retain its playground status for
rich debauchees. Kuwait would remain within its current borders,
as would Oman."
The redrawn map claims to "redress the wrongs suffered by the most
significant 'cheated' population groups, such as the Kurds, Baloch
and Arab Shia, but still fail to account adequately for Middle Eastern
Christians, Bahais, Ismailis, Naqshbandis and many another numerically
lesser minorities."
It adds that "one haunting wrong can never be redressed with a reward
of territory: The genocide perpetrated against the Armenians by the
dying Ottoman Empire."
The author, Ralph Peters, argues that even those who abhor the topic
of altering borders would be well-served to engage in an exercise
that attempts to conceive a fairer, if still imperfect, amendment of
national boundaries "between the Bosporus and the Indus."
According to him, "We are dealing with colossal, man-made deformities
that will not stop generating hatred and violence until they are
corrected. As for those who refuse to 'think the unthinkable',
declaring that boundaries must not change and that's that, it pays
to remember that boundaries have never stopped changing through the
centuries. Borders have never been static, and many frontiers, from
Congo through Kosovo to the Caucasus, are changing even now. Ethnic
cleansing works."
Peter argues that for Israel to have any hope of living in "reasonable
peace" with its neighbours, it will have to return to its pre-1967
borders, with essential local adjustments for legitimate security
concerns.
He writes that the most "glaring injustice" between the Balkan
Mountains and the Himalayas is the absence of an independent Kurdish
state. There are between 27m and 36 m Kurds living in contiguous
regions in the Middle East.
He calls Iraq an unnatural state and calls for a greater Kurdish
state, which will include Turkish, Syrian and Iranian Kurds. A Free
Kurdistan, stretching from Diyarbakir through Tabriz, would be the
most pro-Western state between Bulgaria and Japan, he adds.
Iraq's three Sunni-majority provinces might eventually choose to
unify with a Syria that loses its littoral to a Mediterranean-oriented
Greater Lebanon.
The Shia south of old Iraq would form the basis of an Arab Shia State
rimming much of the Persian Gulf. Jordan would retain its current
territory, with some southward expansion at Saudi expense. For its
part, the unnatural state of Saudi Arabia would suffer as great a
dismantling as Pakistan.
--Boundary_(ID_tcRSA/nGW6tl6sk1s8ddeQ)- -