KENJI GOTO (OCTOBER 23, 1967 TO JANUARY 30, 2015)

            Let us not forget Kenji Goto, a Japanese journalist who lost his life when he was beheaded by his captors from the Islamic State on January 30, 2015. We will post information about him from Wikipedia.

 

Kenji Goto People in Japan are calling Goto’s murder their 9/11. Credit Photograph by Ahmed Muhammed Ali / Anadolu Agency / Getty [PHOTO SOURCE: http://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/isis-murdered-kenji-goto]
Native name	後藤 健二
Born	23 October 1967 Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan
Died	30 January 2015 (aged 47) Near Raqqa, Syria
Cause of death	Decapitation
Nationality	Japanese
Alma mater	Hosei University
Occupation	Journalist
Years active	1991–2015
Religion	Christianity
Denomination	United Church of Christ in Japan
Spouse(s)	Rinko Jogo
Children	3
Parent(s)	Junko Ishido (mother)

Kenji Goto (後藤 健二 Gotō Kenji^?, 23 October 1967 – 30 January 2015) was a Japanese freelance video journalist covering wars and conflicts, refugees, poverty, AIDS, and child education around the world. In October 2014, he was captured and held hostage by Islamic State (ISIL) militants after entering Syria in the hopes of rescuing Japanese hostage Haruna Yukawa. On 30 January 2015, he was beheaded by his captors following the breakdown of negotiations for his release.

Biography

Goto was born on 23 October 1967 in the city of Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. After graduating from Hosei University in Tokyo in 1991, he worked for a media production company before establishing Independent Press in 1996. He also worked with U.N. organizations including UNICEF and the U.N. Refugee Agency.

Reporting from war-torn countries around the world, especially in Africa and the Middle East, he focused on the life and humanity of the ordinary citizens in difficult times. His works include books and DVDs on blood diamonds and child soldiers in Sierra Leone, the Rwandan conflict and its survivors, a teenage mother in an Estonian "AIDS village", and girls and education in Afghanistan. In 2006, he won the Sankei Children's Book Award for his 2005 book titled Daiyamondo yori Heiwa ga Hoshii (I Want Peace Rather Than a Diamond). His video reports appeared on Japanese national networks including NHK and TV Asahi.

Goto converted to Christianity in 1997, and was a member of a United Church of Christ in Japan parish in Den-en-chōfu, Tokyo.

In October 2014, Goto's wife, Rinko Jogo, had a baby, the couple's second child. He also had an older daughter from a previous marriage.

  

Kenji Goto about to be beheaded.

Kidnapping and beheading

Despite being warned three times by the Japanese government in September and October 2014, both by telephone and in person, not to return to Syria, Goto entered Syria on 24 October 2014 via Turkey to rescue a Japanese hostage, Haruna Yukawa, who had been captured by Islamic State (ISIL) militants in August. He was reportedly captured by ISIL members the following day. He appeared in a video released by ISIL militants on 20 January 2015, in which they demanded $200 million from the government of Japan for the lives of Goto and Yukawa. His mother, Junko Ishido (石堂 順子 Ishidō Junko), made a plea to ISIL to spare her son at a press conference held at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan in Tokyo on 23 January.

On 24 January, ISIL released a picture of Goto holding a photo of decapitated Haruna Yukawa. In an audiotape accompanying the picture, Goto read a message in English blaming the Japanese government for the death of his "cellmate" and claiming that ISIL would spare Goto's life and exchange him for Sajida Mubarak Atrous al-Rishawi, an attempted suicide bomber who participated in the 2005 Amman bombings. On 29 January, Goto's wife, Rinko Jogo, released a plea to his captors through the Rory Peck Trust, a UK-based organization that supports freelance journalists.

On 31 January 2015, ISIL released a video that purportedly showed Goto being beheaded. It was later revealed that he had been moved to the town of Tal Abyad near the Turkish border with Syria on 29 January in preparation for a possible exchange with al-Rishawi, but when it became apparent that the exchange would not be taking place, he was taken back to a location near the city of Raqqa in Syria, and killed on the morning of 30 January, local time.

Media coverage

Following the release of the beheading video by ISIL on 31 January, many major Japanese television outlets, including NHK, Nippon Television, TBS, Fuji Television, and TV Asahi, suspended their normal programming schedules to provide breaking news coverage on this event. Some foreign media outlets noted a rather skeptical and critical response by the Japanese public regarding the two hostages.

Remembrance

After his death, a tweet posted to Twitter in 2010 went viral. As of 8 February 2015, it had been re-tweeted more than 40,000 times. In it, Goto said, "Close your eyes. Bear it. If we become angry and yell, we are doomed. This is like prayer. Hate is not what humans should do. Judgement lies with God. That is what I learned from my Arab brothers." (目を閉じて、じっと我慢。怒ったら、怒鳴ったら、終わり。それは祈りに近い。憎むは人の業にあらず、裁きは神の領域。－そう教えてくれたのはアラブの兄弟たちだった。^?)

Bibliography

• Daiyamondo yori Heiwa ga Hoshii: Kodomo Heishi Muria no Kokuhaku (ダイヤモンドより平和がほしい : 子ども兵士・ムリアの告白^?, English translation: We Want Peace Not Diamonds: A Confession by Child Soldier Muria) (July 2005, Choubunsha Publishing), ISBN 9784811380018
• Eizu no Mura ni Umarete: Inochi o Tsunagu 16-sai no Haha Natasha (エイズの村に生まれて : 命をつなぐ16歳の母・ナターシャ^?, English translation: Born in an AIDS Village: 16-year-old Mother Natasha Trying to Stay Alive) (December 2007, Choubunsha Publishing), ISBN 9784811384740
• Ruwanda no Inori: Naisen o Ikinobita Kazoku no Monogatari (ルワンダの祈り : 内戦を生きのびた家族の物語^?, English translation: Prayers of Rwanda: The Story of a Family Surviving Civil War) (December 2008, Choubunsha Publishing), ISBN 9784811384979
• Moshimo Gakkō ni Iketara: Afuganisutan no Shōjo Mariamu no Monogatari (もしも学校に行けたら : アフガニスタンの少女・マリアムの物語^?, English translation: If I Could Go to School: The Story of Afghanistan Girl Mariam) (December 2009, Choubunsha Publishing), ISBN 9784811386119

UNIT 1012 BOOK CLUB: GANDHI UNDER CROSS EXAMINATION & GANDHI BEHIND THE MASK OF DIVINITY

            As history is one of our educational tool, we will present these two books, criticizing Gandhi, as it is not just only good to learn from history but also to look at two sides of history. We took the information from Wikipedia.

INTERNET SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gandhi_Under_Cross_Examination

Gandhi Under Cross Examination
Author	Col. G. B. Singh & Dr. Tim Watson
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Non-Fiction
Publisher	Sovereign Star Publishing, Inc
Publication date	June 2009
Media type	Print Paperback
Pages	287
ISBN	0-9814992-2-8
Preceded by	Gandhi Behind the Mask of Divinity

Gandhi Under Cross Examination is a 2009 book written by G. B. Singh and Dr. Tim Watson evaluating the iconization of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi as a civil rights protagonist.

In 1893 Gandhi went to South Africa where, according to his own account, he was thrown off of a train on racial grounds. In their scrutiny of the incident and Gandhi's statements thereafter, the authors claim that Gandhi gave divergent accounts of what happened on his journey to Pretoria. Gandhi Under Cross-examination catalogs the incidents that happened around that time and attempts to prove that the train incident never occurred. The authors have claimed that Gandhi lied about the train incident.

INTERNET SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gandhi_Behind_the_Mask_of_Divinity

Gandhi
Author	Colonel G. B. Singh
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Non-Fiction
Publisher	Prometheus Books
Publication date	April 2004
Media type	Print Hardcover & Paperback
Pages	356
ISBN	978-1-57392-998-1
Followed by	Gandhi Under Cross Examination

Gandhi Behind the Mask of Divinity is a book by US Army Colonel G. B. Singh. The book was written in biographical form nearly 60 years after the assassination of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, and challenges his image as a saintly, benevolent, and pacifistic leader of Indian independence, told through Gandhi's own writings and actions over the course of his life. The book claims that Gandhi emulated racism from the Hindu ideology of caste towards the blacks of South Africa and the Untouchables, instigated ethnic hatred against foreign communities, and, to this end, was involved in covering up the killing of American engineer William Francis Doherty.

Singh puts forward that the portrayal of Gandhi as a great leader is "the work of the Hindu propaganda machine" and Christian clergy with ulterior motives; and, furthermore, it was based on irrationality and deception which historians have failed to critically examine.

Book organization

The author, Colonel Singh, states that he spent 20 years collecting Gandhi's original writings, speeches and other documents for this research book. An earlier article by the author, Would the Real Gandhi Please Stand Up in AAH Newsletter (publication of African Americans for Humanism) had resulted in protests by an active Black group in South Africa, when a statue of Gandhi was unveiled in central Johannesburg.

The book is organized into 7 parts and 30 chapters. It starts by presenting a majority of earlier publications on Gandhi and the interactions and exposure (if any) of the authors of those publications to Gandhi and his ideology. In the first part, the author starts by explaining the reason for yet another book on Gandhi and then continues by presenting the major previous literary work done on Gandhi including the Gandhi movie in the first part of the book. The book claims that the Christian clergy first started "the Gandhi myth" – they wanted to elevate Gandhi to a 20th-century messiah and then convert him to Christianity, something that would open the floodgate for evangelizing Hindu masses.

The second part deals with Gandhi's alleged role in War against Blacks during the Bambatha Rebellion (Zulu war) followed by part 3 of the book in which the author talks about the methodology of Satyagraha used by Gandhi to uphold the status of Indians by preaching racial hatred and segregation against South African Blacks. Later parts 4, and 5 consider Gandhi's politics before and after the Boer War in South Africa, providing examples of what the author sees as racism from Gandhi towards blacks. Singh states that racism against Blacks of South Africa was an integral part of Gandhi's Satyagraha in South Africa, and he never fought for the rights of the native people. Singh further discusses how Gandhi actively encouraged the British to raise an Indian regiment for use against the Black Zulus, contrary to his image of a non-violent leader. The author also says that Gandhi had accepted the superiority and predominance of the white race, and believed that the upper-caste Indians shared with the Europeans a common Aryan heritage.

Part 6 of the book deals with Gandhi's alleged caste ideology and black Untouchables of India. This part starts with a chapter on Singh's views on Hinduism and the claim that it segregates people based on skin-color with the "Blacks ending up at the bottom as Untouchables". Singh claims that Gandhi received fierce resistance from B.R. Ambedkar as Gandhi continued to play his "racial and ethnic politics against the rights of Untouchables".

The last part of the book deals with alleged "White Murders" done during Satyagraha movements against the British which Singh contends have been ignored by Gandhian scholars. The book claims that Gandhi was involved in covering up the murder of an American Engineer William Francis Doherty during the campaign against visit of Prince of Wales, Edward the VIII. It also presents the content of original sworn on oath affidavit filed by William Francis Doherty's wife Annette H. Doherty in which she testified that Gandhi resorted to bribery to cover up the murder. Further, the book talks about Gandhi's alleged role in support of ethnic cleansing for his defense of Adolf Hitler, his "condemning" of Jews and British for not committing "collective suicide" by surrendering to the Nazis and also his condemning of Sikhs for not accepting the partition of Punjab in 1947 over their own massacre and uprooting.

Reviews

Scholarly

A comprehensive, annotated bibliography on Mahatma Gandhi-related literature briefly mentions the book as a "Highly critical account. Every move by Gandhi is interpreted by the author to be racist, which argument is very questionable”.

Dr. Baldev Singh, frequent writer on Indian politics, Punjab and Sikh issues reviewed the book and opined that the book has "exploded the Gandhi myth" and the author has brought out the truth from Gandhi's "own mouth".

Xavier William in the Midwest Book Review (2004) accused the author of mud slinging and compared it to another anti-Gandhi piece written by Khushwant Singh.

Thomas W. Clark, who reviewed the book for American Humanist Association's The Humanist, stated that most readers will find the book "overwrought and unnecessarily inflammatory". As for Singh's accusations of Gandhi destroying incriminating documents to cover up his racist views, Clark labeled them "unsubstantiated hypothesis" and "simply speculation". Clark instead recommended B. R. Ambedkar What Gandhi and the Congress Have Done to the Untouchables (1945) as a "more substantial and balanced account of some of Gandhi's shortcomings". Katie Violin of The Kansas City Star also criticized the book and stated that "Gandhi as a racist doesn't add up".

Professor Manfred Steger, author of Gandhi's Dilemma: Nonviolent Principles And Nationalist Power, wrote a review of the book in the December 2005 issue of The Historian. He stated that the author doesn't offer hard evidence for the first thesis in the book, the alleged "Hindu propaganda machine", and found Singh's "eagerness to accuse" without raising or answering relevant questions "deeply disturbing". At the same time, Steger said that the author offers "much better evidence" for the second thesis, Gandhi's racist attitude. He stated, "Perhaps one of the strongest sections of the book is the author's examination of pertinent primary and secondary literature revealing Gandhi's attitude toward black Africans during his two decades in South Africa". Steger noted that numerous other "balanced" critiques of Gandhi exist, such as the works by Ved Mehta, Partha Chatterjee, and Joseph Alter. In comparison, Steger concluded, that the book was a "one-sided attack" on Gandhi, without offering the larger, more complex picture of Gandhi's ethical and political engagements, thus turning it into a "strident polemic".

Alan Caruba, the editor of Bookviews.com, mentioned the book in its December 2004 issue, and stated "We need to remember that even great men had their flaws and Col. Singh, a career military officer and student of Indian politics, Hinduism, and of Gandhi, presents his facts in a compelling way."

In his book, Gandhi's Philosophy and the Quest for Harmony, the author Anthony Parel termed Singh's book as "scurrilous", "crude bias", and "deplorable ignorance".

Political

United States Congressman Edolphus Towns called the book "definitely controversial" but worth reading to broaden perspective on Gandhi and understand the foundations of India. Towns mentioned the book in his Congressional debate during the Proceedings and Debates of 110th United States Congress (First Session).