Libya's Glorious Dawn

Four decades of darkness is finally surrendering to a glorious dawn in Libya. A ragtag band of rebels transformed itself into a fighting force in a mere six months and overran Moammar Gadhafi's last stronghold around Tripoli. Although pockets of resistance remain and snipers loyal to Gadhafi still abound, the swiftness with which the rebels captured most of the capital, coming as it did in the holy month of Ramadan, will surely become the stuff of legend one day. For now, however, freedom lovers everywhere can rejoice that a tyrant has fallen. A song of Yusuf Islam (formerly Cat Stevens) sums up what captive Libyans must be feeling: "Morning has broken, like the first morning. Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird."

Moammar Gadhafi's fall is more momentous than that of Hosni Mubarak. The Egyptian army saw the handwriting on the wall when Tahrir Square erupted with the unflinching resolve of ordinary Egyptians and so wisely acceded to most of their demands. The Nile revolution was peaceful. Not so the Libyan revolution. Gadhafi and his goons made sure of that. The dictator vowed to fight to the last drop of his blood to defend his throne. Of course it was the blood of his loyalists that he was willing to shed, not his or his sons'.

But as the rebels organized themselves and reclaimed their land inch by inch, aided by NATO bombing, naval blockade and American aerial surveillance, the tide began to turn. Gadhafi's initial roar dissolved into a pathetic whimper. When caught, he will most likely face justice at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. Such will increasingly be the fate of despots. Such will be the inevitable fate of Syrian dictator Bashar Assad.

The transformation of Muslim Middle East, though still incomplete, is perhaps the most significant event of the twenty-first century. Its effect will define the course of history in ways that are beyond the comprehension of even the most astute observers. But few signposts can be discerned:

1. Dictatorship in all its forms and manifestations, even the ones under the guise of democracy, is doomed. People who cowered in fear have discovered freedom from fear, a discovery that has gone viral around the world. Today’s invincible autocrat is tomorrow’s cowering prisoner. "A man can be destroyed,” wrote Hemingway, “but not defeated." The architects of the Arab revolution have proven this with their blood.

2. People in power can no longer use religion for political ends, at least not with the ease they were able to in the past. It is a fact that the overwhelming majority of Muslims killed since the Second World War have died at the hands of other Muslims. Invoking bogus threats to torture dissidents and perpetuate dynastic power will no longer work. A significant corollary of this is that more and more Muslims, particularly in the Middle East, will demand the separation of mosque and state.

3. Israel will be forced to confront reality and coexist with Palestinians in a two-state solution. The Muslim Middle East will go through yet more convulsions - tribal and sectarian conflicts will probably raise their ugly heads - before the democratic rule of law, transparency, accountability and enlightened governance take hold. When that happens, and it surely will, Israel will have to recognize that it is a part of the Middle East and not an outpost of "Western Civilization" transplanted in the middle of an alien and backward region. Likewise, extremist organizations from both sides will be marginalized as the benefits of good governance and the moral high ground become evident. In September, Palestinians will seek statehood at the United Nations. The United States will dutifully cast its veto. Such myopic policies will be much harder to justify in the transformed political landscape of the Middle East. In the coming months, the United States will recognize, as it has never recognized before, that “business as usual” in the Middle East will be too detrimental to its interests to be sustainable.

It is not just in the Middle East where the wind of change is blowing. People are rising up everywhere against corruption, injustice and state-sponsored violence. Consider how Anna Hazare, a little-known 74-year-old ascetic and Gandhi-disciple has catalyzed Indians to launch massive protests against corruption in the "world's largest democracy." We are witnessing such scenes everyday, aided by social media, and feel empowered to take our own stand against injustice and oppression.

The world’s epicenter of courage and commitment is now at the Green Square of Tripoli, newly and appropriately renamed Martyrs’ Square. Libyans are determined to rebuild their shattered nation on their own terms. They have made possible what was unthinkable only six months ago. Even though their dawn is tinged with the red of blood, there is no doubt that their land will soon be bathed in the bright sunshine of freedom.

Justice for Syrians

Self-restraint and God-consciousness are the essence of fasting for Muslims in Ramadan, a month in which thirst and hunger can become a source of salvation for the believer. As one of the five pillars of Islam, fasting is mandatory for the rich and the poor, the young and the old, the ruler and the ruled.

Given this, Muslims and indeed, people of conscience everywhere, are trying to fathom the brutality and the bloodshed occurring in Syria now, in which a regime is waging an all-out war against its own people.

On the eve of Ramadan this year, tanks and troops of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad besieged the city of Hama, killing more than 200 people. The son seems determined to repeat what the father – Hafez al-Assad – did in 1982 when his military killed at least 10,000 people in that city in crushing a revolt.

The anti-government uprising began on March 18 when Syrians, emboldened by the Arab Spring, took to the streets to denounce the four decades of autocratic rule by the Assad dynasty. The Damascus regime first tried to blame foreign conspirators. When that didn’t work, it began fanning the flames of religious and ethnic conflicts. The sectarian plot fizzled as well when it became clear that members of all religious, ethnic groups and clans – Sunnis, Alawites, Kurds, Shias – were united in ousting Assad and his cronies. Protesters calling for national unity held up banners that read, “We are all Syrians and together we demand the ousting of the regime.”

Zagloul, a Syrian-American and a Silicon Valley executive, has just returned from a two-month trip to Damascus. I asked him about the mix of protesters in Syria. “I saw no sectarian divide,” he confirmed. “People from all walks of life and every ethnic background are participating.” He is hopeful that by the end of Ramadan, some dramatic changes for the better will occur in Syria. But he also knows that the situation is dire and the future uncertain.

Dictators resorting to “business as usual” have been helpless against the onrushing tsunami of Internet activism. Live videos and descriptions of the violence in Syria can be found on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and other social media outlets.

Yet the truth is that the forces of Bashar Assad, led primarily by his two ruthless brothers, Maher and Rifaat, are killing with impunity Syrians in Hama, Homs, Deir al-Zour, Damascus and other cities. They are apparently convinced that international outrage against their atrocities will be no more than lip service. Protesters in the flashpoint city of Hama carried poignant banners that read “Your silence is killing us!”

But activity is beginning to replace passivity. Gulf Arab States – Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates – have called for stronger sanctions against the Assad regime. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain have recalled their ambassadors from Syria. King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia has demanded that Bashar Assad “stop the killing machine and end the bloodshed.”

One can argue that the Gulf States are not paragons of freedom themselves and so their call for reform in Syria smacks of hypocrisy. But that would be the wrong stand to take at this juncture when Syrians are dying by the thousands. We must not give in to political or ideological considerations and support any step to stop Assad’s killing machine.

Feras is a marketing consultant in Silicon Valley. He is following the ominous developments in the country of his birth with mounting anxiety. “I have an 85-year-old aunt in Hama,” he told me. “She has never stepped out of her home in the last ten years. But she was forced to flee with her two daughters to a border town when troops began their indiscriminate shelling. On hundred and forty-five of them were packed into a single bus.”

Although Feras has known of Assad’s campaign of terror, the “Ramadan Massacre” has shocked him. “All he cares about is power and his preference for bullets over basic rights.” But Feras is convinced that Syrians have reached a point of no return. “They have nothing to lose. They will win their freedom or they will die. Let’s pray it is the former.”

Feras fervently hopes that the United States, Europe and Middle-Eastern countries will freeze Syria’s assets, just as they did Libya’s. “But the situation is much more complicated in Syria, so NATO-led bombing, as in Libya, is not an option at this time. What will work is international pressure and isolation of the Assad regime.” He is in contact with sources inside Syria. “Every Friday after the Jumah prayers, and after the nightly Ramadan prayers, people gather to plan and organize protests. It is spreading all over, to Damascus, Aleppo, Homs and other cities.”

“Is there a unified opposition party?”

“Syrians have not known freedom for several decades. In Egypt, in spite of the authoritarian regimes, people had well-formed opposition groups with a history of organized protests. Not so in Syria, and so the logistics and the coordination will take some time. But it will happen.”

Human rights groups calculate that over 2,000 Syrians have been killed so far since the pro-democracy demonstrations began in March, not including those who have been tortured but somehow managed to survive. The United Nations Security Council has issued a toothless statement condemning the use of force against civilians but without any threat of sanctions. It also urges “all sides to act with restraint,” as if the protesters are equally to blame for the deaths.

The Council must impose tough sanctions against Syria and lay the groundwork for a war crimes investigation on Assad and his goons for the International Criminal Court in Hague. Likewise, the United States, the European Union, Turkey and the countries that consume Syrian oil – Germany, Italy, France and the Netherlands – must step up pressure on Assad. He has lost all legitimacy and he must go. As Feras put it, “Nothing less will be acceptable to Syrians, particularly after the Ramadan Massacre.”

Nesbo's Norway

An extremist decides that multiculturalism is diluting Norway’s “pure” race and undermining its Christian character and so goes on a rampage. He belongs to a small group of fascists who cannot escape from the prison of Norway’s past and wreaks vengeance on those he considers responsible for selling his country’s soul to the unwashed hordes of immigrants, particularly Muslim immigrants.

Is this a description of the 32-year-old Norwegian Anders Behring Breivik who took the lives of at least 92 people in Oslo and in the island of Utoya?

No, it is the description of the antagonist in Norway’s bestselling writer Jo Nesbo’s 2000 thriller, The Redbreast.

Sometimes the true state of a country is reflected more in the fiction of its perceptive writers than in the facts of its textbooks. Norway is a progressive country that often hosts weighty international conferences, the Oslo Accord of 1993 between Palestine Liberation Organization and Israel being one. Any threat of terrorism in that Nordic country is attributed to “Islamic extremists” and “radical Islam,” simply because it is the easy thing to do. A 2011 report on terrorism concluded that “the far-right and the far-left extremist communities do not represent a serious threat to Norwegian security.”

Don’t these pundits read their fellow Norwegian Jo Nesbo’s books? Can’t they at least allow for the possibility of lethal currents of extremism flowing beneath the placid surface of its seemingly peaceful society?

Harry Hole, the protagonist in Nesbo’s thrillers at one point asks, “what is it with our country?” The cerebral detective is frustrated by the vicious racism he encounters among officers in Oslo’s premier police academy and among obtuse politicians, and his inability to do anything about it.

Now Anders Romarheim, a fellow at the Norwegian Institute for Defense Studies says, “It was international jihadism we feared. What we have now is more painful in terms of a re-evaluation of ourselves.”

When news broke of the horrific killings in Oslo and Utoya, some in the media immediately floated possible links to Muslim extremist organizations, just as they did during the Oklahoma City bombings in 1995. After 9/11, this became so ingrained that we shuddered at the occurrence of mayhem anywhere, reflexively thinking that Muslims were responsible and thanking God when that turned out to be false.

I felt an enormous relief when Mehtab Afsar, the Secretary-General of the Islamic Council of Norway said, “This is our homeland, this is my homeland. I condemn these attacks, and the Islamic Council of Norway condemns these attacks, whoever is behind them.”

It is estimated that there are anywhere from 80,000 to 100,000 Muslims in Norway, about 2% of a population of 5 million. They are mostly Pakistanis, Filipinos, Albanians, Somalis, Turks and Moroccans. Right-wing organizations regularly post virulent and hysterical articles with titles such as “Is Norway Becoming Muslim?” and “Norway is Under Attack by Islam!” Like extremists everywhere, they are in the minority but because of their singular focus on hate and violence, they can cause damage vastly out of proportion to their numbers.

The majority of Norwegians reject the homegrown terrorists and their nihilistic agenda but where they were indifferent to their shadowy presence before, they will now have to be particularly vigilant.

I do not support the labeling of Anders Breivik as a Christian fundamentalist. He is a fundamentalist, a fanatic, a racist, a brother to fundamentalists, fanatics and racists of all persuasions everywhere. That’s who he is and that’s how he must be viewed, and that’s how the Norwegian court must judge him when he stands trial for the cold-blooded murders.

There is too much violence in the world today and no society, culture or nation is exempt from it, as John Nebo’s complex thrillers emphasize. It lies dormant until it suddenly explodes and then horror and shock numb us, forcing us to reevaluate our easy opinions.

For Norwegians who have lost their children to Breivik’s carnage, we offer our prayers and condolences. The sunshine has gone out of their lives and although time is supposed to heal everything, it can rarely heal the anguish of parents who have lost their loved ones to the violence of madmen. Still, we say to them, “We are with you in your sorrow. May peace and acceptance find their way into your hearts and may your children find eternal peace in the presence of their Creator.”

Songs of Rabindranath Tagore

In the charming, leafy town of Pleasanton in Northern California, Bengali-speaking Bay Area residents and their guests recently celebrated the 150th birth anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941). There were discussions and documentaries on his life and writings by scholars and professors as well plays and dance dramas (snippets from Shyama, Chitrangada, Chandalika), but for me the draw were the songs. We listen to 'Rabindra Sangeet' all the time but the pleasure of listening to live performances in America is rare. You don't miss the chance when the opportunity arrives.

I came to listen to two of today's leading exponents of Tagore songs. One is from Bangladesh (population 190 million) and the other from West Bengal (population 90 million). As long as there is a single person left in the world whose mother tongue is Bengali, Tagore songs will continue to be sung and listened to. With 250 million and growing, there is no danger of Rabindra Sangeet disappearing anytime soon.

In the program over a recent weekend, the prelude to the main events contained many Tagore songs by local artists as well. I was stunned by their quality. One in particular (Mitali Bhawmik) sang some of the more intricate Tagore songs ('Ananda Dhara Bohiche Bhubane', to name one) with such panache that we rose as one to applaud her. We listened to two songs sung in a modern 'fusion' style by young women to appeal to today's youngsters. The first was a duet: "Ay Tobe Shohochori Hate Hate Dhori Dhori." The other was "Pran Chay Chokkhu Na Chai." The rousing renditions, accompanied by some nifty dance moves, showed how Tagore's music could translate to a contemporary context without losing its magical appeal.

Finally, on Saturday night, Rizwana Choudhury Bonya of Bangladesh took the stage. "Those of you who are from West Bengal where Rabindranath was born (capital - Kolkata) inherited the poet and his creations," she began before presenting us with a bouquet of Tagore songs. "Those of us who are from Bangladesh had to earn Rabindranath." As someone born in Bangladesh, I thought that was as succinct a statement as one could make about the two Banglas.

The songbird then began to sing, opening with "Ogo Tomar Chokkhu Diye." In no time we were transported to a magical world of love and devotion. The inimitable words and lyrics of Rabindranath came alive in her mesmerizing voice. She began with "Ogo Tomar Chokkhu Diye" and chose a combination of familiar and not-so-familiar songs, although the audience began clamoring for the familiar ones midway through the program. "Chinno Patar Bhasahai Toroni Eka Eka Kori Khela" was one of them. She had the audience singing two songs with her: "Jodi Tor Dak Shune Kao Na Ashe" and "Shokhi, Bhabona Kahare Bole." Audience participation is a way to keep the legacy of Tagore alive at the grassroots. She ended with "Kichui To Holona." If you want a glimpse into Tagore's genius, consider that Rabindranath composed this haunting song when he was only 20. The pathos is heartbreaking.

The thing with Rabindra-Sangeet is that anyone can sing them, or at least several of them, but it takes an artist of rare talent to sing them well and elevate them to works of art. Trained in Shanti Niketan under the late great Kanika Bannerjee, she has become the epitome of Tagore songs, the touchstone by which other Tagore singers are measured. When her program ended two hours later, we knew we had just been rewarded with an unforgettable experience.

The following night, it was Srikanata Acharya's turn. This Kolkata artist is known for his versatility. He is as much at home with Tagore songs as with modern Bengali songs. In this, he seems to be following in the footsteps of the late Hemanta Mukherjee who dominated the Bengali music scene for almost half-a-century. Srikanta paid homage to all the artists of the past who brought Tagore's music to the masses, artists such Pankaj Mallick, Shanti Dev Ghosh, Hemanta Mukherjee, Kanika Bannerjee, Suchitra Mitra, Dwijen Mukherjee and Debabrata Biswas. He forgot to mention Chinmoy Chatterjee, an unintentional oversight surely, considering that he frequently sings many Tagore songs ("Prem Eshechillo Nisshobdo Charane," "Tumi Shondhar Meghmala," "Mon Je Bole Chini Chini") often associated with Chinmoy.

Srikanta has a full and expressive voice that helps him interpret Tagore songs with the fluidity they deserve. He introduced many of the songs with recollections by those who were with Rabindranath at the moment of their creation. These included "Jete Jete Ekla Pothe Niveche Mor Bati," and "Gram Chara Oi Rangamatir Poth," among others. He sang until almost midnight and we savored every moment. I have heard him on CDs and YouTube but a live performance where you see and listen to the artist is an unforgettable experience.

Rabindranath had himself observed that even if all his poems, essays, novels, short stories and dance dramas were forgotten, he would still probably be remembered for his songs. How true! And of his songs, he made this supremely democratic statement: "Don't ask who I am presenting my songs to. They lie in the dust by the roadside for anyone to pick up and honor."

And so we do, so we do.

Literature's Enigmatic Encounter: Tagore and Ocampo

In September of 1924, Rabindranath Tagore received an invitation to attend Peru’s commemorative centennial celebration. A hundred years before, led by Simon Bolivar, Peru had defeated Spanish Colonial forces to become an independent nation. Peruvians wanted the Bengali Nobel Laureate to participate in the festivities marking the historical event.

Tagore, 63, had recently returned to India from an exhausting four month trip to China and Japan. He needed rest but with wanderlust in his blood, the poet found the invitation from Peru irresistible. With family members and friends to give him company part of the way, Tagore sailed on the ship Haruna-Maru from Colombo for Europe. The Diary of the Westbound Traveler is a work from this period, along with several poems he composed on the Haruna-Maru.

From France, with Leonard Elmhirst as his secretary, Tagore boarded the Andes bound for Argentina. He had met the idealistic Elmhirst in the United States in 1920. Moved by Tagore’s vision of rural development, Elmhirst had raised money from wealthy American patrons and came to Shantiniketan the following year to organize Rabindranath's village projects.

Tagore fell ill on the Andes within a few days and became bedridden. But the poems kept flowing from his pen – “Stranger,” “Absent-Minded,” “Hope,” “Wind,” “Dream,” “Sea,” and many others. After three weeks at sea, on November 6, the ship docked at Buenos Aires. Flu had severely weakened the poet; further traveling was out of question. Without prolonged rest he would be risking his life, doctors told him. Reluctantly, he had to give up on the invitation from Peru.



The year 1914 was one of the darkest in Victoria Ocampo's life. Two years before, at the age of twenty two, she had married the man of her dream, anticipating a life of respect and love and free from dogma and prejudice. She had reasons to dream, for in Monaco Estrada she thought she had found a sensitive, handsome young man who considered her an equal and approved of her passion for literature and art. Although born into wealth and privilege, she was not immune to the prevailing social custom where women were treated as chattels, a legacy of Spanish Colonialism that was sustained and supported by Argentina's Catholic Church. For a woman yearning to break free from male injustice meant social ostracism and disgrace. The strong willed and impulsive Victoria had felt like a captive even in her parents’ home. Life with Estrada promised freedom and creativity.

Barely had her honeymoon begun when Victoria’s dream was shattered, for the man of her dream turned out to be as just as tyrannical and chauvinistic. She had traded one form of captivity with another. For over a decade Victoria would live through this loveless and sometimes violent marriage, fearful of hurting her parents, until finally one day she summoned the courage to obtain a legal separation.

In 1914, however, she had begun to despair of life. With no one to turn to and none in whom to confide her sorrow, she came across a copy of André Gide’s French translation of Gitanjali, a collection of poems by a Bengali poet named Rabindranath Tagore who had won the Nobel Prize for literature the year before. The depth and beauty of what she read stunned Victoria. The ray of hope emanating from those poems pierced the darkness around her. The spiritual energy in such lines as

... Oh, dip my emptied life into that ocean, plunge it
Into the deepest fullness. Let me for once feel
that lost sweet touch in the allness of the universe ...

lifted her above her personal tragedy. In the illuminating biography, Victoria Ocampo Against the Wind and the Tide, the author Doris Meyer quotes Victoria many years later to describe the effect Tagore's poetry had on her:

"I remember the moment and the exact spot where this took place. I was leaning against a white marble fireplace in a room upholstered in light gray silk. The house no longer exists. Neither do those I was afraid of hurting, or those who were hurting me. Nor does the poet who was bringing me the gift of tears, as not even the closest friend would have been able to do. The images which now live only in my memory will cease to exist together with it, as easily, as irrevocably as all that has preceded them into nothingness.

But the Gitanjali over which I was weeping will remain. "

Not knowing who he was and separated by barriers of language and culture, Tagore nonetheless became her spiritual companion. She had found hope, a reason for living.


That Tagore would pass through Buenos Aires on his way to Peru became known in Argentina in September of 1924. The possibility of meeting in person the poet who had saved her a decade earlier from mental and spiritual abyss could be a momentous event in her life. In preparation, she began reading as much of Tagore's translated works as possible. She had help, for in one of those mysterious ways in which an artist can touch the souls of receptive readers in distant shores, Tagoré had become a major literary figure in South America at the time, due mostly to the translations of his work in Spanish by a remarkable literary couple named Juan Ramón and Zenobia Camprubi, who translated twenty-two books by Tagore between 1914 and 1922. The translations also influenced other major literary figures, including José Ortega y Gassett, a leading Spanish intellectual of the time, Gabriela Mistral and Pablo Neruda in Chile, and Octavio Paz in Mexico.

When the Andes arrived at Buenos Aires on November 6, no one was more prepared to receive Tagore on Argentinean soil than Victoria Ocampo.


Complete rest in Buenos Aires upon embarkation, the doctors had advised Tagore, but where? Victoria was quick to seize the opportunity. Renting a villa named “Miralrio” (River View) in the suburb of San Isidro, not far from the Villa Ocampo where she lived, and selling a diamond tiara as payment, Victoria offered its peace and solitude to Tagore and Elmhirst. Gratefully they accepted. Victoria’s own household staff was to care for Tagore but she was too shy and awestruck to reside in the rented villa herself.

For two months, Tagore convalesced at San Isidro, his home away from home. The villa was situated on the bank of the River Plate and the view from its balcony was spectacular. In Victoria’s own words:

I had instinctively led Tagore to that balcony immediately upon his entering Miralrio, certain that if he was to take anything away on leaving it, it would be this: the memory of the landscape that would meet his eyes morning and evening, with its changing light. That landscape was the only gift worthy of him.

The flowing river and the lush trees and flowers of San Isidro healed Tagore’s body and nourished his spirit. The three of them, Tagore, Victoria, and Elmhirst, took long walks along the bank of the Plate. In Victoria, Rabindranath saw a woman of uncommon beauty and kindness, whose intelligence, sensitivity and spiritual yearning left the deepest impression in the poet. He was thirty years older than her; the odes he wrote to her "Guest," "Fear," and "Last Spring", to name only three were suffused with tenderness and poignancy. Yet there was also a certain tension between the three, as suggested by Elmhirst in a letter written to his fiancée in England:

Our hostess (V.O.) was quite – next to the poet himself – the most difficult person I ever came across … Besides having a keen intellectual understanding of his books, she was in love with him – but instead of being content to build a friendship on the basis of intellect, she was in a hurry to establish the kind of proprietary right over him which he absolutely would not brook … she was a bundle of prides, intellectual, aristocratic, and physical, against which, and their ferocious hold upon her nature, she was constantly at war. For her, then, I was either bridge or barrier, obstacle or convenience as occasion turned out …

During the Tagore birth centenary in 1961 in India, Victoria herself wrote of her relationship with Tagore: “Little by little he partially tamed the young animal, by turns wild and docile, who did not sleep, dog-like, on the floor outside his door, simply because it was not done.”

After two months at San Isidro, Tagore began to feel restless. Driven by an imaginary sense of duty that he was to regret later, he and Elmhirst left Buenos Aires on January 4, 1925 for Europe on board the Julio Cesaro, in staterooms arranged for them by Victoria. But Tagore could not forget her. Memory of Victoria continued to haunt and inspire him in his later years. He composed at least two songs around her: I know you, O maiden from a faraway land! Your dwelling is across the sea ... and On the green bank by the blue sea, I have seen the incomparable while passing by ... From the Julio Cesaro, he wrote to her: “… I believe that your love may help me in my fulfillment … I have lost most of my friends because they asked me for themselves, and when I said I was not free to offer myself, they thought I was proud. I have deeply suffered from this over and over again – and therefore I always feel nervous whenever a new gift of friendship comes in my way. But I accept my destiny and if you also accept it we shall forever remain friends.” And on the eve of his death in 1941, sixteen years after bidding farewell to Victoria in Buenos Aires, he wrote:

"How I wish I could once again find my way to that foreign land where waits for me the message of love! The dreams of yesterday will wing their way back and, fluttering softly, build their nest anew. Sweet memories will restore to the lute its lost melody ... Her language I knew not, but what her eyes said will forever remain eloquent in its anguish. "

Neither could she forget him. Tagore had invited her to visit him in India but time and distance proved insurmountable. Nevertheless, she corresponded regularly with him, meeting him once more in Paris in 1930 where she organized an exhibit to introduce to the art world Tagore’s unusual drawings and sketches she had discovered at San Isidro. She followed India's struggle for independence with keen interest, exchanging lively ideas with him about how to expel the British Raj from the subcontinent. Through it all, she always gratefully acknowledged his deep, steadying influence on her.

Victoria Ocampo went on to become a leader in the movement to secure women’s rights in her country and emerged as a star in the literary circles of Latin America. As an ardent feminist she was clearly ahead of her time. As essayist translator, her work has been compared to the leading twentieth century women of letters. In 1931 she founded the Spanish literary magazine Sur (South). As its editor, guiding spirit and financial backer, she transformed it into the foremost magazine of its kind in Latin America. Through its pages, she launched the career of Jorgé Luis Borges and introduced to her countrymen such writers as Gabriela Mistral, T. S. Eliot, Octavio Paz, André Gide, Aldous Huxley, Albert Camus and many others. By publishing neglected writers and taking on unpopular subjects, her name became synonymous with literary integrity and freedom of thought. She was jailed in 1953 for lashing out against the regime of Juan Peron. International pressure forced the dictator to release her from prison after twenty six days. In 1977 she was elected to the Argentine Academy of Letters, the first woman to be accorded the honor.

The reputation of Argentina’s “Queen of Letters” has grown steadily since her death in 1979 at the age of 88. It is likely that Victoria Ocampo will be remembered long after another Argentine, Eva Peron, has become a footnote in that country’s history.

Tagore composed sixty one poems on his voyage to and from South America in 1924, including twenty six in Argentina that are considered among the most lyrical and evocative of his poems. To these were added sixteen more that he had composed earlier that year and the collection was published as Puravi, which means ‘Easterner’ and is also the name of an evening raga in Indian classical music. To whom did Tagore dedicate Purabi? To “Vijaya,” the Bengali name he chose for the woman “who filled my days abroad with grace and beauty,” Victoria.

Two Movies

You have to have the patience of a tree to enjoy “The Tree of Life.” That’s the problem in this enigmatic and “cosmic” movie. Normally we don’t go to the theater to test our patience; we go mostly to have a good time. It can be a thriller, a comedy, a tragedy, a whatever, as long as it engages and surprises us, makes us laugh or maybe even cry.

But “The Tree of Life” that won the Palme d’Or Prize this year, the top honor at the Cannes Film Festival, doesn’t quite fit any category. It is too arty for its own good and the viewer is left wondering if director Terrence Malick isn’t trying too hard to impress with big ideas.

The story itself is actually quite moving. It follows the ups and downs – mostly downs - of the O’Brien family in the small town of Waco, Texas, in the 1950s. The father (Brad Pitt) is a stern and humorless patriarch who looks down on his three sons because he feels they do not measure up to him. They are not macho enough, intelligent enough and gifted enough. He is, of course, tragically oblivious of his own fundamental failings. The mother (Jessica Chastain) clings to the idea that love alone can conquer all and tries to bring a sense of normalcy to her children’s upbringing with grace and sweetness. When the middle child dies, she looses her poise. “Lord, why? Where were you? Who are we to you? Answer me?” her character asks in whispered voice-overs.

While life at home for the three kids is a fearful drill of taking orders from the father (“Don’t call me dad, call me father”), outside is an idyllic world of grass and sky and stream and meadows and friends. These impressionistic snippets are redolent of universal childhood and Malick captures them with sensitivity. What makes them also poignant is the tension at home.

At the ritualistic family dinner, one of the children cannot take the father’s overbearing behavior anymore and asks him to “keep quiet.” “What did you say?” screams the father. He grabs the child and locks him in a room. “You have turned my children against me,” he shouts at his wife. “You undermine everything I try to do.” The hunter is defending himself by claiming to be the hunted!

The wife has had enough. She retaliates by pushing him away. He immobilizes her with a viselike grip and releases her only when convinced that the last ounce of her resistance has sipped away.

But the father is not a one-dimensional character. He has the capacity for tenderness, even if not realized. As he prepares to play the piano one day, his middle son begins to strum on a guitar in the porch. The father hesitates, shocked by the musical gift of his son, and refrains from playing until the son has finished strumming. What makes the scene heartbreaking is the father’s inability to express his love and admiration. He simply cannot bring himself to say, “Son, that was lovely. Play for me more.”

All this would have made a touching, growing-up story of childhood, sadness, tragedy and ultimate redemption but Malick sandwiches it between heavy symbolism and metaphors that seem to take up the bulk of the movie’s 2 ¼ hours. We are treated to an interminable stretch of the creation of the universe, volcanoes, waves, dinosaurs, planets, asteroids and everything in between, just in case you miss the point that the director deals with heavy-duty ideas of chance, life, morality and mortality. The cinematography is gorgeous (I kept thinking it was the movie version of the great photographer Ernst Haas’s book, The Creation), but what’s the point? Just get on with the story, I wanted to tell Malick, and let us decide what to make of the impenetrable, big questions of life.

I will still recommend this movie because it shows what a father ought not to do to be a good father. Although “The Tree of Life” is a period piece from mid-20^th century, it is shocking how many fathers in our days are still stuck in that mindset. Fatherhood is fraught with tension, indifference, arrogance and often, downright cruelty. With Father’s Day coming up this Sunday, “The Tree of Life” is a movie a father should give as a gift to himself, to become the antithesis of the character portrayed by Brad Pitt.

*

“Midnight in Paris” is a delightful ode to the Jazz Age Paris of the 1920s when heavyweights of literature, painting, movies and music took up residence in the City of Light. It is Woody Allen’s most imaginative work to-date and connects the past to the present to put our preoccupation with money and fame in context. Unlike Allen’s recent movies, heavy with ambiguity and symbolism and the dark currents flowing in the human heart, “Midnight” is a beguiling movie to savor for its romance, charm and humor.

Gil is a disillusioned Hollywood screenwriter (Owen Wilson) who travels from Southern California to Paris with his fiancée Inez (Rachel McAdams) with the idea of settling down there. He is fed up with Hollywood. He has no desire writing scripts on-demand by tyrannical conglomerates. He wants to put the finishing touches to a novel that he dreams will set the literary world on fire when published. He wants this to happen in the artistic center of the Universe - Paris.

His fiancée, of course, has other ideas. Inez is as materialistic as they come, an epitome of conspicuous consumption. Ditto her parents who are also visiting Paris. The clash of the couple’s opposing life-view must be resolved, but how?

Walking back to his hotel alone one night, Gil loses his way in the alleys of Paris. At the stroke of midnight, a magical kind of taxi pulls up as he sits exhausted by the pavement. Its passengers invite him to join them. He is hesitant but buoyed by their enthusiasm, gets in. He is brought to a soiree where he runs into … Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Cole Porter and Ernest Hemingway. He has traveled across time and arrived at the Paris of 1920s!

The seamless way in which Allen does this is itself magical. As the midnight encounters continue on subsequent nights, Gil meets Picasso, Gertrude Stein (who promises to review his manuscript), Matisse, Salvador Dali, T.S. Eliot, Luis Bunuel, Man Ray and many others. Allen leavens the story with parodies of these famous characters. His parody of Hemingway, clipped sentences and all (“No subject is terrible if the story is true and if the prose is clean and honest”), is particularly hilarious.

Stein approves of Gil’s novel and that decides the issue for him. He will settle in Paris to pursue his literary muse. Inez throws a fit but only for a few minutes. She adjusts, the quintessential material girl, and banishes Gil from her life.

The movie ends on a happy note, though, and you find making a mental note to yourself: “I am going to have to see this movie one more time.”

Apple's Ascendance

For Steve Jobs, each Apple product - iPod, iPhone, iPad, iAnyThing - must not only be a marvel of technology but also a work of art. This confluence of function, design, aesthetics, software and hardware has captivated consumers around the globe and transformed Apple into the most valuable technology company in the world.

At the recent Worldwide Developer Conference in San Francisco, the visionary chiel of Apple unveiled another service – iCloud - that is likely to increase the company's lead over competition.

After some failed attempts, Apple has perfected the technology to eliminate the need for manually synchronizing content to smart devices. iCloud will allow users to store content - music, photos, backups, contacts, calendars, email and ebooks - on Apple’s remote servers (“cloud”) and have it automatically pushed to their iPhone, iPad, iPod and Mac or PC via WiFi.

iCloud is free. Each user gets 5GB of free storage, more than plenty for most consumers. More storage will require an annual subscription.

The term “automatically” is a critical differentiator. Apple users will not need to manually upload content to iCloud; it will happen, well, automatically. This is where Apple leapfrogs over its competitors. Both Amazon and Google have announced their own cloud services but they require manual uploading, a boring and time-consuming process that looks primitive compared to Apple’s.

The only “restriction” for iCloud to work seamlessly is that the devices will have to belong to the Apple ecosystem, that is, all the ‘i’ devices across the Apple universe. The company has ensured it by integrating iCloud technology into its operating systems – the iOS for the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad, and the Mac OS for its laptop and desktop computers. All Apple devices will be able to “talk” to the cloud. Users will be able to move content to and from the cloud no matter where they are, as if they are communicating with their local hard drives. iCloud will also automatically backup all your mobile devices.

Will this lock current and future users into Apple products? Steve Jobs certainly hopes so. iCloud will become available in September with the release of iOS 5.

What does iCloud do to the current state of consumer technology? It profoundly disrupts it. As Jobs said: “We’re going to demote PC and Mac to just be a device. We’re going to move the digital hub, the center of your digital life, into the cloud.” The Post-PC world is upon us.

One company that Apple has completely overshadowed is Microsoft. Every time Apple releases a product or a service, Microsoft comes across as a plodding behemoth and a weak imitator. When Apple launched its wildly successful iPod in 2001, Microsoft followed with Zune in 2006 but withdrew it from the market in 2010. It was a no-contest: Zune was inferior to iPod in every way. When Apple introduced the iPhone in 2007, it took Microsoft 3 years before releasing a competitive product, Windows Phone 7. But the Microsoft phone is a distant third after the iPhone and Google’s Android phones. Microsoft’s purchase of Skype in May for $8.5 billion has left many industry analysts scratching their heads.

In May of 2010, Apple surpassed Microsoft as the world’s biggest technology company based on market value, after Apple almost went out of business in 1990. Apple now has a market value of about $320 billion, more than the combined value of Microsoft ($200 billion) and Intel ($115 billion)! The only other company in the world that has a greater market value is ExxonMobil ($390 billion), the oil company. Industry experts are speculating that Apple may overtake ExxonMobil in the near future.

While for the last 10 years, Microsoft stock has been stuck at about $25 a share, Apple’s stock soared from $11 a share in 2001 to its current value of $330, a rise of over 3000%!

The bulk of Microsoft’s revenue continues to be generated by its two cash cows, the Windows operating system and the Office suite. But as the digital hub moves from the PC to the cloud, and as the iPad relentlessly cuts into the sale of Windows PCs, the top technology company of the ‘80s and the ‘90s appears to be six or seven steps behind Apple.

There is no one with the vision and business acumen of Steve Jobs at Microsoft. Bill Gates, his closest competitor, left Microsoft in 2008, and while the current CEO Steve Ballmer is a talented manager, he is no Bill Gates and certainly no Steve Jobs. Recently, when a respected money manager asked Steve Ballmer to step down and pass on the torch to someone else, Microsoft stock immediately went up. Microsoft sorely needs a new vision and a new style of thinking at the top to regain the glory of its yesteryears.

Apple is on a roll. How long can this last? Just as empires rise and fall, so do technology companies. Today’s colossus is tomorrow’s also-ran. Yet Jobs seems to have found a way to keep reinventing Apple. He is currently battling pancreatic cancer but the vision he has laid out for his company and the creativity he has unleashed among his engineers will probably help Apple continue its dominance in mindshare and market share for several years to come.

As our gadgets become smarter and smarter, do we run the risk of becoming dumber and dumber? After all, if our smart devices can do our work for us and even think for us, what is left for us to do other than to scroll screens and push buttons for titillation and entertainment? Sure, we can create documents and post opinions and search databases and look up references and be connected to each other and to the cloud 24x7, but will our creativity be sucked out of us in that mode of mostly passive consumption? Smart devices may give us instant access to the world’s storehouse of knowledge but unless we set aside time for reflection and assimilation, it is difficult to see how intelligent gadgets can help produce a Fermi or a Tagore.

Justice in an Imperfect World

In a perfect world, justice delayed is indeed justice denied, but we live in an imperfect world and, therefore, justice delayed sometimes has to be considered as justice served.

Such is the case with Serbian commander Ratko Mladic, architect of the slaughter of 8,000 children, women and men in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica in 1995. Sixteen years after committing genocide and crimes against humanity, Mladic was arrested in Serbia on May 26 and now awaits extradition to the International Criminal Tribunal at The Hague in the Netherlands.

Srebrenica has become synonymous with mass murder and ethnic cleansing, comparable in intensity to Nazi atrocities against the Jews during World War II. Together with Radovan Karadzic, currently awaiting his own trial for crimes against humanity, Mladic demanded that his troops use rape as a weapon of war. The siege of Sarajevo that the two orchestrated lasted from 1992-1995 and took the lives of an estimated 10,000 Roman Catholic Croats and Bosnian Muslims. The cruelty was unrelenting, the savagery unmatched.

Mladic was driven by a sense of himself as a savior of his people and as the avenger of historical events that took place almost two centuries ago when Ottoman Turks ruled what is now Serbia. The death of his 23-year-old daughter by suicide in 1994 only increased his thirst for revenge.

Mladic’s arrest, and that of Karadzic in July 2008, sends a strong signal to the world’s despots that their days are numbered, that the long arm of international law will eventually flush them out from any dirty corner of the world they may be hiding in, and bring them to justice.

This is particularly important for Arab tyrants who, for decades, have been torturing and imprisoning their people at will while looting the national treasury for supporting their sybaritic lifestyles.

The Tunisian dictator Ben Ali fled the country when his people rose in revolt against him in January this year. Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak and his sons were arrested in April for corruption, crimes and using deadly violence against protesters.

As long as the rule of law, and not vengeance, dictates the fate of these modern-day pharaohs, there is reason for optimism, although much remains to be done in a region where hereditary monarchy and oligarchy seems to have become the norm.

Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi has been killing Libyans with impunity since he seized power in 1969. He has never tolerated the slightest dissent and deployed spies and secret police to subjugate his people. Since the uprising against him in February, he has killed thousands of Libyans with the help of mercenaries. He has gone into hiding as NATO targets him and his sycophants in and around Tripoli. International Criminal Court prosecutor Luis-Moreno Ocampo is seeking arrest warrants against Gadhafi, his son Saif al-Islam and spy chief Abdullah al-Sensussi for crimes against humanity.

In Yemen, President Ali Abdullah Saleh refuses to bow to people’s will, adamantly clinging to power that he has held for 32 years. Hundreds of Yemenis have been killed and undoubtedly more will die in the coming days.

The situation is grimmest in Syria where Bashar Assad has let loose shadowy, mafia-style gunmen to kill protesters. The gunmen openly shoot people they think are a danger to Assad’s regime. They confiscate and grab whatever they like, be it cars, houses, or even women. So far, Assad’s loyalists and security forces have killed over 1,000 Syrians.

The similarity between Assad and Mladic is frightening. When the Syrian uprising began in March in the southern city of Dar’a, Assad ordered his troops to lay siege to the city, as Mladic did in Sarajevo, shutting off electricity, water and telephones. The army arrested schoolchildren who scrawled ant-government graffiti on walls and imprisoned hundreds of young men simply because of their age. There's also precedent in the family. Hafez Assad, Bashar Assad's father, laid siege to the city of Hama in 1982 and killed some twenty thousand Syrians as the world stood silently by.

Luis-Moreno Ocampo must urgently seek arrest warrants also against Bashar Assad and his brother Maher Assad, head of the elite Republican Guard. His troops continue to fire indiscriminately on peaceful protesters and funeral marchers in Syrian cities.

What these despots never anticipated was the reach of social media. Confronted with Twitter, Facebook and the likes, they appear frustrated even as the killing goes on. When government-appointed goons fire on protesters, the image is instantly broadcast across the globe. When a prisoner is tortured, the act is caught on camera and becomes instant news.

A young, web-savvy generation has found in technology an enabler that aids their revolution. They have lost their fear. There is no stopping them now as they fight and die for freedom and justice.

Generals and dictators who commit genocide against their perceived enemies or their own people cannot escape justice. It may take decades or it may take months, but they will have to account for what they have done and pay the price in courts of law. That is the new reality.

Rabindranath Tagore

Today is the 150th birth anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), the Bengali poet whose protean genius enthralls millions of Bengali-speaking people to this day. That he has been largely forgotten in the West after he won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1913 for Gitanjali (Song-Offerings) is a cause for sorrow, for his poems and songs remain a timeless source of inspiration.

When Tagore was born in Kolkata, India, the American Civil War had just begun. Leo Tolstoy was reaching the heights of his powers as a novelist. James Clerk Maxwell had published his electromagnetic equations. The world was in the throes of a dramatic transformation. Tagore's contributions to literature and the vision he articulated for a world where tyranny had no place and freedom was everyone's birthright hastened this transformation.

Tagore went on to create a body of work greater in scope and power than Gitanjali, His true genius bloomed after he won the Nobel Prize, a fact unique in the history of literature.

A significant amount of Tagore's work is infused with a vision of greatness he saw possible in his native land, a confluence of civilizations due to Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, Skihs, Jains, Paris, Christians, Mongols, Dravidians and Aryans. India, as he saw it, was greater than the sum of its parts, a vision that continues to challenge India of today.

Britain in Tagore's time ruled India with an iron hand. But the rulers were becoming nervous. A young activist named Mohandas Gandhi had returned from South Africa in 1915 to lead the nationalist movement. becoming a proponent of Satyagraha (eagerness for truth, otherwise known as passive resistance) to British rule. Although Tagore and Gandhi differed on methods by which to achieve independence, both believed fervently in regenerating their people people by curbing their communal instincts. Both believed that India's hope lay in forging unity among people of different races and religions.

Politics did not interest Rabindranath but that did not keep him from boldly opposing British tyranny.

When government troops led by English officers opened fire on a political gathering in Amritsar in 1919, killing 379 Indians and wounding scores of others, Tagore renounced the knighthood England had bestowed on him four years earlier. As a poet, he felt it was the strongest statement he could make to draw world attention to the crime.

It cost him friendships in the literary circles of Europe and popularity even in America, but he considered this act one of the high points of his life. It was also during this time that he composed some of his most powerful poems against tyranny and injustice. "Question" is a poem that stirs deep emotions in its impassioned plea for understanding sorrow and tragedy in a world meant to be just and filled with grace.

When Gandhi was imprisoned without trial in 1932, he condemned it. In a letter to England's Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald, he warned that the British were closing the door on peaceful negotiations with India.

Tagore was self-taught. Attempts by his parents to educate him in schools completely failed. Young Rabindranath found conventional classrooms suffocating. In 1901, he founded an experimental school at Shantiniketan (Abode of Peace) near Kolkata, free from traditional restrictions. Classes were held in open air and joy in learning was the priority.

By 1921, the school had evolved into Vishwa-Bharati (World) University where students from all over India came to study. Tagore saw in it a model of his vision, of an India greater than the sum of its parts. It is a testimony to Tagore's ideal that funding for the University came from both Hindus and Muslims. A frequent visitor to Shantiniketan was a young politician named Jawaharlal Nehru, whose only daughter, Indira Gandhi, was then a student at the World University.

Tagore did not live long enough to see the end of the British Raj and the partition of the sub-continent along religious lines in 1947, He died six years earlier, still nurturing vision of a harmonious India, as riots were flaring.

In "The Religion of Men," a set of lectures delivered at Oxford in 1930, Tagore said: "Freedom in the mere sense of independence has no content, and therefore no meaning. Perfect freedom lies in a harmony of relationship."

From Jalabad to Abbottabad and Back

The distance from Jalalabad, Afghanistan, to Abbottabad, Pakistan, is 158.9 miles, or approximately 160 miles. Let's say that half of this distance lies in Afghanistan and half in Pakistan.

This means that the four AH-60 Black Hawk stealth choppers (if published reports are to be believed) that the SEAL commandos used to kill Osama Bin Laden flew for half of 320 miles, that is, 160 miles round trip inside Pakistan.

Typical speed of these choppers range from 140-160 mph. Using the lower limit as the average speed of the choppers over mountainous terrain at night implies that they flew in Pakistan's airspace for just over an hour. Add 40 minutes to that for the operation itself, an additional 10 minutes to destroy the damaged helicopter, and the total time the commandos spent in Pakistan amounts to no more than 2 hours.

Did U.S. forces jam Pakistani radars? Who knows, but the fact is that 2 hours is too long for a country not to be aware that its airspace has been violated. Pakistan's intelligence service and the army probably were complicit in the operation. If so, that was a good thing. After all, if Pakistani forces killed bin Laden or got into a confrontation with the commandos in the terrorist's compound, it would have been disastrous for the Muslim nation.

All's well that ends well. The terrorist mastermind has been eliminated. Al-Qaida has received a debilitating blow. The world is safer. And Muslims can go about toppling dictators in the Middle East for tyranny to end, freedom to triumph and an Arab renaissance to begin.

On the Death of Bin Laden

Justice must be served because, unlike revenge, justice is a moral imperative. Without justice, there can be no peace, no progress and no closure.

With the commando raid in Abbottabad that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden, there is now a sense of closure, not just for the families of the victims of the 9/11 attacks but for Muslims as well. The violent ideology of bin Laden and al-Qaida held Muslims captive for a decade and created existential difficulties for them. With the demise of the terrorist mastermind, Muslims, especially American Muslims, heaved a huge sigh of relief.

Tahir Anwar, the Imam of the South Bay Islamic Association of San Jose, California, struggled with words to express his relief. “It is actually beyond relief,” he said. “Beside killing thousands of innocent people, Bin Laden damaged our religion and society. Other than a few extremists, his message of violence never resonated with Muslims. He was a marginal figure who inflicted tremendous suffering on people. I am happy that the head of the snake has been cut-off and there is now one less evil person on earth.”

The Quran is clear on the question of justice. “O you who believe! Stand out firmly for justice, as witnesses to Allah, even as against yourselves, or your parents, or your kin, and whether it be against rich or poor, for Allah can best protect both.” (4:135)

Dr. Rajabally, a frequent speaker in Islamic conferences who also runs a shelter for abused Muslim women and victims of domestic violence in the San Francisco Bay Area, hopes for two developments to occur in the wake of bin Laden’s death. First, that the recruitment of the vulnerable to fanatical causes around the globe will stop and second, that the U.S. government will treat American-Muslims as an ally in the fight against terrorists and not subject them to racial profiling and similar indignities. “Islam is for justice,” said Rajabally. “Bin Laden committed injustice on a global scale. He gave Islam and Muslims a bad name. He treated Muslims who did not agree with his violent methods – the overwhelming majority of Muslims – as his number one enemy. We are grateful that justice has been finally served.”

Bin Laden was no martyr. He created a personality cult out of his feral fantasy and unbounded egotism, even as America helped create the monster that he became. Many impressionable young Muslims unfortunately fell under his sway only to undermine their faith and waste their lives. Bin Laden preached an ideology of violence in the name of Islam that was rooted not in theology but in ruthless political ambition.

The Arab Spring that is currently transforming the Middle East is proof of how insignificant bin Laden had become. One could argue that he still wielded some influence among the Arabs but after the Tunisian uprising, he became completely irrelevant. While he tried to channel Muslim anger against U.S. foreign policy for his own political hegemony, the revolutions by Tunisians, Egyptians, Libyans, Yemenis and Syrians are signs that Muslims are taking responsibility for their own condition instead of blaming others for it. In that context, ideologues like bin Laden lose all credibility.

American-Muslims were heartened by President Obama when he said “… the United States is not, and never will be, at war with Islam … Bin Laden was not a Muslim leader; he was a mass murderer of Muslims. Indeed, al-Qaida has slaughtered scores of Muslims in many countries, including our own. So his demise should be welcomed by all who believe in peace and human dignity.”

In spite of these considerations, I must confess to being disturbed by the raucous celebration that broke out when bin Laden’s death was announced. How can the death of a human being, no matter how vile, be a cause for celebration and exultation? What should have been a somber occasion turned into a festival with street-dancing and fist-pumping. There is something morally repulsive and spiritually eroding in taking pleasure in the death of a human being.

With the bin Laden "event" behind him, Barack Obama has all but ensured a second-term for himself as president of the United States. Unless something goes horribly awry, and this president has proved extraordinarily lucky in everything he has done so far to make that possibility remote, look for Obama to deliver his second inaugural speech in January of 2013.

Now that bin Laden is dead, America must get out of Afghanistan and Iraq fast. Unlike George Bush, Barack Obama can claim that the mission has indeed been accomplished. There is no need to linger in those countries anymore. What should have been a war on ideas after 9/11 became two viciously polarizing wars of death and destruction, costing thousands of lives and trillions of dollars. Only in withdrawal can come the ultimate closure.

Wael Ghonim is the 30-year-old revolutionary who helped harness the power of social media to mobilize Egyptians and hasten the downfall of Hosni Mubarak.

Addressing Muslims in the San Francisco Bay Area on a recent visit, Ghonim reflected on his experience and on the unfinished revolutions currently sweeping the Arab Middle East.

“While a small fraction of Egyptians was living the good life, most Egyptians were living without dignity for decades,” said Ghonim, currently on leave as a Google Middle East marketing manager. “That’s what finally forced the Tahrir Square revolution on 25th January. For years, Mubarak and his family and cronies kept stealing the country’s assets while torturing dissidents. Many Egyptians were surviving by eating out of street-corner trash.”

But Ghonim’s message was one of hope and optimism. He believes that the new Egypt will be fundamentally different from the old. But it will require patience, vigilance and more sacrifice, because the battle for a life of dignity and freedom for Egyptians is far from over.

“We need to shock the world one more times,” he said, “by showing that the fall of a dictator can be followed by a government of transparency, accountability and the rule of law. Even if it takes Egypt 2-3 years to succeed, it will send a strong signal to dictators and oppressors everywhere that they can be overthrown by people power.”

The striking thing about the Tahrir revolution was that there was no hero and no leader to lead the masses. Egyptians led themselves. “People often look to leaders to tell them what to do. If the recent events in Egypt have taught us anything, it is that we don’t need leaders for revolutions to succeed.”

In Tahrir Square, Ghonim did not see anyone engaging in self-promotion. Young Egyptians used the Web to harness the wisdom of the people, even as Mubarak’s regime tried to block Internet access. Physicians treated the wounded. Volunteers cleaned the streets. People kept vigil against government goons. Women fed the hungry and cared for the sick. Christians and Muslims joined hands. There was a unity of purpose.

Until the revolution, Egyptians were fatalistic. They were resigned to the Mubarak clan ruling Egypt forever. It all changed in January when, inspired by Tunisians, Egyptians threw away the yoke of fear and took charge of their own destiny.

There is now the urgent need for Muslims in the West to help Egypt move forward. One way, suggested Ghonim. would be for us to sponsor rural areas. “Economy is the priority now. If a laborer, farmer or taxi-driver begins to feel that the revolution has not brought any change to his life, if he still has difficulty feeding his family, he will say, ‘This has done nothing for me. We might as well go back to the old way.’ If you can teach, contribute money, donate useful and usable tools, offer healthcare, if you can help modernize 10-15 Egyptian rural villages through focused effort, that will make a big difference.”

Tourism is another area where Muslims can contribute. There will be fairs and celebrations throughout Egypt in June. Ghonim appealed to Muslims to visit Egypt in the summer and see firsthand the country’s transformation. It is the kind of economic stimulus Egypt urgently needs. One out of 9 Egyptians depends on tourism for livelihood. Over 1 million Egyptians have lost their jobs during the revolution. “We cannot let the unemployed channel their frustration into anti-revolutionary activities.”

To Washington, Ghonim had this to say: You have to align your interest with your values. Dictators dangled stability in front of you while denying people their rights and freedom. You went along with this. Unless there is a fundamental change in your policy, you will lose us. There are signs that changes are occurring but they have to be long-term and based on respect and justice.

“I believe in people, not governments,” said Ghonim. Governments don’t want to change but people do. The Internet is a powerful catalyst for change and people must learn to leverage its tools to bring about the changes they seek.

The military may yet complicate the transition to democracy in Egypt. As the young activist sees it, as long as people are engaged, are not distracted by frivolous pursuits or consumed by partisan politics, those in power will have to respond to the wishes of the people. Otherwise the leaders will turn into tyrants and society will atrophy.

It is important for people to take responsibility instead of waiting to be told what to do, Ghonim said. “Many of you asked me how you can help Egypt and other countries. I have given you some ideas but you can use the Internet to figure this out yourself. Do your homework. Don’t ask for guidelines. I am just 1 of 10 million Egyptians. I don’t consider myself a leader. I don’t believe I have done anything remarkable. It’s the people, all of us, united by a common purpose, who made the revolution possible. We have a long way to go but what we have shown is that each one of us can be an agent for change.”

While Tunisians, Egyptians, Yemenis and others have been brave, the bravest so far, according to Ghonim, have been the ragtag Libyan rebels. Without heavy weapons and with hardly any training, they have taken on the army of a mad and ruthless despot and gaining ground every day, inch by inch.

Ghonim is not motivated by revenge or retribution but he is insistent that the main perpetrators responsible for Egypt’s economic, political and social decline be brought to justice, starting with Hosni Mubarak. “We have to set an example so that future leaders will think twice before abusing the law and doing whatever they please.”

Ghonim asked Muslims not to suffer from “conference syndrome.” This is where Muslims attend well-meaning seminars and conferences, listen to speakers flush with oratorical exuberance, feel inspired, then go home and … do nothing. “Let’s reduce the volume of talk and increase the amount of action. We don’t have to tolerate tyranny and we don’t have to wait for leaders. We can change our own conditions if we have the courage to believe in ourselves.”

Libyan-Americans Urge U.S. to Recognize Libyan Opposition

Libyan-Americans are urging President Obama to recognize the Libyan opposition's National Council as the legitimate representative of Libyans. “I don’t know why our government is dragging its feet,” asks Faraj in frustration. “France, Italy and Qatar have recognized the rebels. Why not America?”

Faraj is an electronics engineer in Silicon Valley, California. He came to America as a student from Libya in 1978. After graduation, he couldn’t return home because of threats on his life by Muammar Gadhafi’s security squad. He had been outspoken in denouncing the dictator.

“Libya used to be a peaceful, prosperous country,” said Faraj. “But now it's probably the most backward country in the world.”

As an example, he cites a visit to Libya by Shaikh Zaid of United Arab Emirates in the early ‘70s. While touring a hospital, the Shaikh exclaimed, “I wish we had a hospital like this in the Emirates! We and Saudi Arabia are 20 years behind Libya!”

"Now the fact is Libya is 40 years behind UAE and Saudi Arabia!"

So what explains this descent?

“One word: Gadhafi. He controls all the oil money. In the 40+ years of his rule, Libya earned trillions of oil dollars nut hardly any of it went into building infrastructure or schools or hospitals. Gadhafi distributed wealth to his family, relatives and cronies and created a police state. He put his sons in charge of security. Libyans were forced to accept his dictatorship. Those who didn’t, he killed them or jailed them.”

Faraj described how Gadhafi sent hit squads to Rome, Paris, London, even to the United States, to kill Libyans who opposed him from abroad. “When he took over power in the 1969 coup, Gadhafi made it clear that Libyans must support him if they expected to live. Otherwise, he would kill them or imprison and torture them. No in-between.”

Other Libyan-Americans in the Bay Area agree with Faraj. “Libyans will absolutely not accept either Gadhafi or his sons remaining in Libya,” said Mufta, also an engineer. “They must leave, or they will be captured and put on trial.”

“It’s just a matter of time,” said Yusuf, a student who was born here, grew up in Libya, and returned to the United States a decade ago. “Benghazi is the capital of Free Libya. It’s terrible that people are dying in Misrata, Ajdabiya and other cities but Gadhafi’s days are numbered. He has killed his own people. He has committed crimes against humanity. He will be called to account, God willing.”

Yusuf doesn’t like the "rebel" label. “Rebel has a negative connotation. Those fighting Gadhafi are freedom fighters. They are the pro-democracy force in Libya.”

Faraj has family in Libya. His cousin was among the first killed in February when Gadhafi’s snipers from rooftops began shooting at people as they streamed out of mosques after Friday’s congregational prayers.

What about Gadhafi’s boast that he will not leave Libya and die fighting if it comes to that?

“Gadhafi is a coward,” said Faraj. “When he sees rebels advancing on Tripoli, he will try to flee with his family.”

Many Western analysts and pundits are predicting that if Gadhafi falls, Libya will degenerate into a civil war because of the “tribes with flags” that comprise the country.

Mufta seethes with anger at this analysis. “Yes, Libya has many tribes but it’s not as if they don’t have a national identity. They are united in putting Libya above tribal affiliations. After decades of Gadhafi’s oppression and misrule, it will take time to undo the damage and work out a national agenda but it will happen. Western analysts are wrong and arrogant to think we cannot bring about and sustain democracy on our own.”

The ragtag Libyan rebels have proven to the bravest among Arabs fighting to rid their countries of tyrants. Without training or weapons, they have taken on a regular army. They have suffered heavy casualties from indiscriminate shelling by Gadhafi’s forces (two foreign journalists – Tim Hetherington and Chris Hondros - have also been killed) but they are holding their own. They have even driven back Gadhafi’s forces from Misrata in recent fighting.

What can hasten Gadhafi’s downfall?

Faraj and Mufta identify two urgent issues. “First, the United States should immediately recognize the National Council as the legitimate representative of the Libyan people. Second, give the rebels the heavy weapons they need so it’s a level playing field. They can finish the job themselves.”