India/Kashmir: Licking the Feet of Modi
On the disgusting support of some Gulf States' monarchs for India’s racist government
By Michael Pröbsting, International Secretary of the Revolutionary Communist International Tendency (RCIT), 30 August 2019, www.thecommunists.net
We could observe an utterly repulsive phenomenon in the last weeks. The right-wing extremist Indian government succeeded in winning support of some regimes for its barbarous crackdown against the people of Kashmir. Some cases are not particularly surprising such as a few small neighboring states which want to appease Delhi.
Likewise, the dumbass in the White House announced that there was no need for him to intervene because Indian Prime Minister Modi “feels he has the situation under control". Unsurprisingly, Modi tweeted jubilant: "Excellent meeting with @POTUS @realDonaldTrump! We had useful discussions on bilateral matters. Looking forward to expand cooperation as large democracies for the benefit of our citizens and global peace and prosperity."
What is this? Unintended self-mockery in Reality TV?! Surely, Hitler also “felt” in 1939 that he had Poland “under control”!
It is however particularly disgusting to see that some so-called “Muslim” states have also joined the pathetic caravan of Modi glorifiers. We are talking about the Gulf state monarchs of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) as well as of Bahrain.
These regimes like to pretend supporting the global Muslim umma and, on some occasions, they ritualistically shed some crocodile tears for the “brothers and sisters in Kashmir”.
When Modi abolished the semi-autonomous status of Kashmir on 5 August, he faced a global outcry of protest. But not all did so. The UAE ambassador to India, Ahmad al-Banna, lent public support to Modi’s unprecedented and historic attack on the Kashmir people. He characterized the issue as an "internal matter" of India and said: "We expect that the changes would improve social justice and security and confidence of the people in the local governance and will encourage further stability and peace." (https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/news/2019/8/7/%E2%80%8Buae-backs-indias-move-to-abolish-kashmirs-special-autonomy)
However, Dubai’s praise for Modi did not end with such diplomatic support. It went further and it invited Modi for a state visit where he received the UAE's highest civilian award! Bahrain did the same and its kind awarded Modi with the “King Hamad Order of the Renaissance”. In short, the worst oppressor of Muslim people has been awarded for his crimes by the self-proclaimed defenders of the Muslim umma!
One feels immediately reminded to the scandalous proposal in 1939 to award the Nobel Peace Prize to Adolf Hitler, the bloody dictator of Nazi Germany!
In short, we have seen in the past weeks a disgusting spectacle where “Muslim” traitors are licking the feet of Modi while he is transforming Kashmir into a huge concentration camp, arresting thousands of activists and starving and isolating millions of Muslims!
The reasons for this scandalous support of Modi by these Gulf states tyrants are as simple as they are soberly calculated. India is an important trade partner – the Gulf countries’ annual trade with India is about $100bn, making Delhi an important economic partner. In addition, India is a growing market which offers profitable investment opportunities for the greedy Gulf capitalists.
For the same capitalist reason, we note as an aside, did a number of so-called “Muslim” states recently sign an outrageous letter to the United Nations in which they expressed their support for the barbarous policies of China’s regime against its Muslim Uyghur minority. (See on this our article “37 Signatures Are Worth a Thousand Words”, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/asia/37-states-defend-china-s-treatment-of-uyghurs/)
The Gulf monarchs’ “faith” is only for public display which shall conceal their real nature as greedy, profit-driven tyrants. Is it surprising that they are hated by their own peoples, which is why they have been able to stay in power for decades only by the undisguised methods of a bloody dictatorship?! When the Arab Revolution began eight years ago, the popular masses in Bahrain joined the struggle for freedom. It was only due to the brutal military invasion of the Saudi army in March 2011 that the king was able to stay in power.
We conclude by repeating what we have said many times: one must not judge political forces by their self-proclaimed ideologies and religious beliefs. The Indian government pretends to represent the “largest democracy in the world” while it is raping the people of Kashmir. The U.S. always claimed to defend the principles of freedom which did not stop it from occupying and oppressing the peoples in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Stalin claimed to be a communist but oppressed the people, killed hundreds of thousands of oppositional communists, and deported ethnic minorities like the Crimean Tatars and Chechens. China is headed by a “Communist” party and, at the same time, is home to the largest number of capitalist corporations and billionaires in the world. Shamefully, this regime continues to be hailed by numerous Stalinists and Castro-Chavistas globally.
We see the same with the so-called “Muslim” states in the Gulf region like Saudi Arabia and the UAE which are hailing Israel and pressurizing the Palestinian people to capitulate to the Zionists.
One must not judge any regime or political force by their words but by their deeds, by their concrete positions in the liberation struggles of workers and oppressed people. And here, we see that these “socialist” and “Muslim” regimes are uniformly on the side of the exploiters and oppressors!
We repeat once more: All socialists, all democrats, all righteous people must support the struggle of the Kashmiri people for freedom. Kashmir is our second Palestine! Their liberation is our liberation!
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We refer reader also to other documents of the RCIT on this issue which are collected in a special sub-section on our website: https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/asia/collection-of-articles-on-the-liberation-struggle-in-kashmir/