African sun-sky monostich

sunlight   clearer than daylight;

there is something of a moon about it.

[Evelyn Waugh, reporting from Kenya, 1931;

you probably had to be there.]

Lifeboat ethics

One saw, the other day, the drama in Mare nostrum:  Cross and crescent, cheek by jowl, the latter dispatching the former to Davy Jones’ locker.  This is more than a fait-divers, a police-blotter incident among innumerable others:  It is a parable, and a foretoken, a metonymy.

For Italia too is a lifeboat;  and she has latterly been importing that which someday may capsize her.

Plenty more where these came from

*

Puis on se demande:   Si ces gens-là  haïssent à tel point  les croisés (pour nous servir de leur baragouin particulier), pourquoi  diable  se diriger justement vers les pays de la Croix?   Pourquoi pas vers n’importe quel pays de l’Ummah?  Ils seraient les bienvenus à  Raqqa, c’est sûr!

On a  récemment posé la questions à des immigrés subsahariennes :  pourquoi s’injecter dans des milieux où l’on ne se sent pas à l’aise, où l’on se plaint de tout, où l’on se trouve minoritaires?   Voici leur réplique:  Eh bien, ce statut minoritaire, ce n’est guère pour toujours;  patientez.

On est en train de visualiser l’auto-da-fé de la civilisation boréale …

*

Weiteres zum Thema:

Cruore spumantem

*

[Update 19 April 2015]   Au moins ils ne sont pas racistes, ces islamistes :  ils égorgent les chrétiens sans égard à la couleur de la peau.  Les associations devraient s’en féliciter.

http://www.lematin.ch/monde/ei-publie-video-montrant-lexecution-chretiens/story/14655398

An ISIL militant smashes a cross on an altar

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/19/isis-video-purports-to-show-massacre-of-two-groups-of-ethiopian-christians

http://www.zeit.de/gesellschaft/zeitgeschehen/2015-04/terrorismus-islamischer-staat-libyen-aethiopien

With video:
http://www.vocativ.com/world/isis-2/isis-video-shows-mass-beheading-of-ethiopian-christians-in-libya/?PageSpeed=noscript

*

Entretemps,  l’accueil des subsahariens est bien moins tendre en … Afrique du Sud, qu’en l’Europe bisounours:

In the message, signed by several groups, including the Patriotic Movement, Pan Local Forum, Unemployed Workers Forum and Anti-Crime Movement, Nigerians and other African foreigners were warned to leave the country.

It read partly:

“Dear neighbour from Africa and other parts of the world, we have travelled the world and have not found one country that allows the floods of humans across its borders as South Africa is experiencing. Even in war-torn parts like Syria, Ukraine, Yemen and Somali.

We were seven million people in Johannesburg city in 2011. Today, we have an estimated 13 million. In Johannesburg alone, you have taken over entire suburbs: Yeoville, Berea, Bez Valley, Turfontein, among many. You have even moved into rural parts of our country that have 80-per-cent unemployment, and there are no visible signs that you have jobs either.

We want to be proudly part of the geographic construct called Africa, but we are as different from one another as Kenyans are from Nigerians; Ivorians from Chadians, etc.

We are pleading with you to return to your home countries. Go and build up those countries so that we can all live in economic, social and political prosperity and peace as neighbours. The genocide in this corner of Africa will be far worse than what happened in Rwanda in 1994. Then the entire continent will be condemned to ashes. Is that what you want?

http://pulse.ng/gist/xenophobia-our-people-are-preparing-for-war-against-all-foreigners-attackers-id3668721.html

Residents of Wolhuter Men's Hostel in Jeppestown, Johannesburg massed outside the hostel with intent to drive foreign nationals from the area.

Remarkably, discussion of what is really going on  is far franker in the African media, than in the “humaniste de salon” press of the West.

The above article is from Nigeria;  here’s one from Zambia:

TV footage it appears these brutal acts of violence against foreigners have been carried out exclusively by black South Africans.

And when the xenophobic violence bursts forth again, it is remarkable how extreme it is. These are not incidents of people being turned away from restaurants, or bigoted words on Twitter, or the makeup of a sports team.

One reason is that such an impetus runs against the grand, orthodox narrative so well entrenched in South Africa: that racism is a problem particular to white South Africans and, to counter it, white South Africans should be the focus of attention.

We can no longer afford to exclude culture from national debate. From initiation deaths to witch killings, muti murders, patriarchy and mob killings, there is a great deal about our culture we do not discuss - certainly which we never criticise.

http://www.timeslive.co.za/ilive/2015/04/19/how-many-more-have-to-die-before-we-talk-about-why-ilive

“Muti murders”?   Now there’s a new one.  Read all about it here:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_for_body_parts

 “Muti” here is not short for “mutilation”; the word is Zulu:

     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muti

*

Two surprising statistical statements appeared in this morning’s press.  No idea how much truth there is in them, but worth following up.

* “More British Muslim men have joined ISIS  and the Nusra Front  than are serving in the British armed forces.”  (NYTimes)

*  There are at present more Africans in Europe, than there ever were Europeans in Africa, during colonialism.

*

[Update, 20 April 2015]   Well, no point belaboring.  People mostly have their minds made up, or don’t want to hear about all this;  and when minds do change, they will likely change in a rush, all at once, as the world goes toppling over some tipping-point.  Emotion, not reason, will rule.

But purely as a point of logical interest -- we take note of what is not being said -- what lies even deeper than taboo, since people are unaware even of repressing it.  Consider this map:

Notice anything?

Well of course, the floundering boats are nearly always closer to Libya than to Europe;  but nobody ever suggests that Libya has any responsibility for saving their co-religionists  just offshort (even though, additionally, Libya is responsible for launching these assault-boats against European shores).   Yet that is not what I mean -- everyone knows that Libya is a failed state and always has been.   No, I mean -- look at the map.  That's Tunisia, just to the left.

Tunisia is a reasonably well-functioning country, and indeed a tourist resort for Europeans.  Yet no-one suggests -- it never occurs to anyone to suggest it -- that Tunisia might have any responsibility, equal to or greater than that of Europeans, in rescuing their fellow-Muslims.

[Update 22 April 2015]   Mais -- rappel à l’ordre.  Ce n’est pas dans nos rayons, que de critiquer la politique comme telle.   Si la culture d’Europe désire se donner la mort, en s’africanisant -- c’est leur affaire.   Nous, en tant qu’observateur de la psychologie linguistique, on n’a que faire en la matière.   Ainsi, ne commentons que la côté “rhétorique publique”.

Donc:  Il y a un décalage entre le discours médiatique, et le vox populi.

Celui-là ne faisait guère mention de l’expérience australienne, qui a réussi, à la fois, à juguler l’afflux tiers-mondiale, et à réduite la mortalité en mer des impétrants à zéro.  En revanche, les commentateurs grand-public la signalent à haute voix.

Finally the European media had to pay attention, after Aussie PM Abbott referred to his country’s success.   The response of European politicians and talking-heads (those gleichgeschaltet to The Narrative), was flustered, and resembled the magician’s distractive patter.

A logical parable:

Elbownia is considering sending a vehicle to the Moon.   The idea is shouted down:  It would never work -- the ship would have to escape our planet’s gravity, which is impossible;  moreover the asteroids whizzing around just above the Earth’s atmosphere  would quickly bash the ship to bits;  plus the Moon has no atmosphere, so the ship would explode were it ever to arrive.

Then someone says:  But, umm, … the United States already tried it;  and it worked.

(Elbownian politicians clap hands over ears and chant LA LA LA LA ….)

 

[Update 23 April 2015]  In this whole Mediterranean melodrama, there is one thing that every faction, of whatever shade of opinion, unanimously agrees upon.   And that is, that the  “smugglers” -- the “Human Traffickers” -- are the bad guys.  They serve the convenient role of “Neo-Nazis” for Hollywood studios that want to make an international thriller without offending any group:  Just make the bad guys Neo-Nazis.  (Or, in pinch -- just German will do.  The Germans themselves will never object:  whipped curs.)  The Italian Prime Minister came up with a metaphor that has been enthusiastically embraced by everyone:  the “Traffickers” are the contemporary equivalent of … Slave Traders!   (All in unison:  Booooo, slave traders!  Kumbaya.)

That comparison is, however, nonsense.   The négriers, after all, kidnapped their victims;  whereas the would-be migrants themselves come forward and solicit the traffickers’ services.    As for the traffickers, you can’t really even call them smugglers, since their SOP is the opposite of clandestine:  Send out a rafiot;  then call the Italian sea-taxi service for free-of-charge rescue and pizza  (200 mushroom, 400 anchovies, 12 sausage -- no, cancel that last order, those were the Christians, they just got thrown overboard).  A closer historical parallel to the traffickers would would be … the Underground Railroad.   (Albeit one that charges for its services.)   Or, from another standpoint:  A sort of mirror-image of Club Med.

Francois Hollande, for his part (less imaginative, that man) calls the traffickers “terrorists”.   -- Umm… No.  How are they terrorists?  They just want to make a buck.  -- True, some proportion of their cruise passengers are likely terrorists -- ISIL has promised as much -- but that no more makes the cruise operators terrorists, than the airlines were, when they carried the 9/11 hijackers, or the shoe bomber, or the underwear bomber, etc.

[Update 24 April 2015]  Another cockeyed but widely-repeated argument from the Ostrich Lobby (as we might dub them) runs thus:  By defending your borders against the traffickers, you would actually be … helping the traffickers, see, because, see, you’d be raising the price of passage.  (High-fives among the bisounours for having thought up this one.)

Now, that is true in the same sense that, by making heroin illegal, scarce, and hard to come by, we force up its price:  If the authorities were simply to hand out heroin free to every schoolchild beginning with kindergarten, the dealers would be out of business.   An analog of this latter policy is, in fact, the program of those who say that borders are inherently a bad thing.   To which we respond, with the poet:  “Good fences make good neighbors.”

[Update 3 May 2015]  The flood continues, unabated -- nay encouraged, by stepped-up European ramassage -- 4000 and counting, in a single day.

Different publications spin the story differently.  Thus, Le Figaro (centre-right) tops its article with a brooding busful of all black adult males:

http://www.lefigaro.fr/international/2015/05/03/01003-20150503ARTFIG00056-des-milliers-de-migrants-secourus-ce-week-end-en-mediterranee.php

while CBC  (Care Bears Canada), reporting the same incidents, offers a jolly portrait of a manageable handful of only women and children, smiling, flashing peace-signs, as though enjoying a picnic at sea:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/migrants-at-sea-italy-says-3-690-rescued-from-mediterranean-in-single-day-1.3059121

Oddly, though, the readers are not fooled by this prepackaging.   Read the comments.  Taceo.

La Grande Bouffe

Certain censorious eyebrows have frowned at the self-celebrating birthday feast que s’offre Zimbabwean President-for-Life Robert Mugabe.   Featured on the menu:  expensive elephants.

This aspect of Mugabe’s fine dining  is being widely reported in the European press, including in the British Isles, but for some reason  it has been largely omitted in American media.   Similarly, Americans are in general unaware of the predilection of his fellow African dictator, Bokassa, for another succulent delicacy, long pig.

"Tastes like chicken..."

Both men are still widely revered in Africa, though scarcely outside it.

To those who objected to the high cost of the festivities, saying that it might better have been spent on Zimbabwe’s orphans, the President-for-Life gave an answer recalling that of Our Lord in similar circumstances, though turned upside-down, indicating in effect:

Orphans are but the mayflies of a day;

Me you have with you forever.

Ebola tourism

Medical tourism -- motivated often by economics, sometimes by quality of care -- has been one of the top health-stories of the past decade.   This morning I was going to post a note about an impending variant on this, called “Ebola tourism”, since the early news reports from Dallas were dominated by smileyface happytalk from the likes of the CDC;  however, by now people have wised up, and that is no longer necessary.   Still, for a glimpse of the dynamics of media-vs-the-people, check out the following remarkably clueless WaPo article, by Abby Phillip:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2014/10/01/why-hasnt-the-u-s-closed-its-airports-to-travelers-from-ebola-ravaged-countries/

then read the readers’ tart and observant comments.

Just a word, then, on the media aspects.

(1)  I subscribed to WaPo ever since moving to the area, then watched it deteriorate from year to year, and finally let the subscription lapse.  But occasionally I consult their website, for the readers’ comments.  These seem to be only lightly censored.  Often they are nothing but content-free Obama-bashing, but sometimes, as in articles relating to federal employment, the commentors are very well informed;  and in the present case, although almost none of the readers had any special expertise, still  they easily overleaped the very low bar offered by the article.

(2) As regards the information released by the government, there were curious parallels between the Dallas Ebola case and that of the White House intruder.  Both cases featured lies and/or stonewalling, of a sort that could not possibly hold good for more than a day or two.    In Dallas, the number of persons who might have been put at risk by Patient Zero  was initially reported  at around a half dozen; then eighteen; then eighty (numbers easy to confuse, to be sure);  and, as of current writing, around a hundred (unless someone innocently confused “100” with such other zero-rich numbers as “1000” or “10000”).  Additionally, the Texan spokesman at first refused to reveal the nationality of Patient Zero (thus telling us all we need to know), or to reveal his itinerary (the airlines later came clean).

One mealy-mouthed CDC spokesperson (reminiscent of the White-House assaults whitewashers) stated:

"The ill person did not exhibit symptoms of Ebola during the flights from West Africa and CDC does not recommend that people on the same commercial airline flights undergo monitoring, as Ebola is only contagious if the person is experiencing active symptoms."

And how, pray, do they know that? -- that he did not sweat (body fluid), nor throw up or have diarrhea in the john (either on one of the planes, or at one of the airports)?  They don’t;  and worse, given their proven predilection for cover-up, it is by no means a given that, if they had contrary information in their possession, they would share it.

Coming soon to a hospital near U !

(3)  Since the beginning of this slowly swelling crisis, the bien-pensant media coverage has worn two faces.

(a) As regards the threat to Africa:  This is the most deadly event since Noah’s Flood!  Man every resource -- send doctors, send nurses, send troops, spare no expense! This should be the #1 priority of the West!

(b) As regards the threat to the West:  Nothing to worry about;  way overblown; nothing to see here, move along.

As one reader commented, re an article revealing that now an NBC cameraman has been infected:

Was the journalist working as a cameraman handling bodily fluids of Ebola patients? I don't know about you folks but I am beginning to doubt that Ebola is as difficult to contract as we've been told. There are just too many bodies piling up for transmission to be as difficult as they want us to believe.

(4)  Saudi Arabia banned people in affected African countries  from attending the current hajj.  Several African counties likewise imposed travel bans against their west African sisters.  The USA has not had the courage to do so -- its will perhaps sapped by decades of spineless refusal to seal our borders against illegal immigrants.   (And don’t just blame Obama -- Dubya was even worse.)

If the Dallas outbreak were to spin out of control, then  just as with the case of the White House intruder (and sniper, and elevator-rider), it may wind up having a salutory effect, as the public finally says, Enough!

(5)  The US itself is actually not especially vulnerable to travelers bringing in Ebola:  there are no direct flights from Liberia;  the journey of the traveler to Dallas had several legs, and he could have been stopped at any one.

The flight information for the Ebola patient diagnosed in Texas will not be released by health officials because "It's just not necessary," a spokesperson at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention told ABC News.

Flights from the airport in the Liberian capital of Monrovia fly to only six destinations -- four in West and Central Africa, one flight to Morocco and one flight to Brussels, Belgium. There are no direct flights into the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport from any of those six destinations, meaning that man had to make at least one more change

http://abcnews.go.com/US/cdc-release-ebola-patients-flight-information/story?id=25890108

As it happens, his first stop was Brussels.   Had he been stopped there, he would have become Belgium’s problem:  and even less than the US does the EU have the guts to send home those who slip across their borders from abroad.  (There would even be a certain poetic justice to that, since “Brussels” is synonymous with European Union bien-pensance.)

So, now suppose that Belgium gets its man-card, and bans flights from the affected countries of West Africa.  Well, all the infected person has to do is to fly to one of the other five African destinations.   So suppose Belgium were to ban all flights from Africa.   At that point, America could largely rest easy, protected as it is by a whole ocean;  but Europe would still be in peril.  After all, many thousands of Africans enter Europe illegally every year.  Indeed, in response to pressure from the politically-correct, Italy effectively set up a trans-Mediterranean maritime “taxi service”, paid for by the smiling Italian taxpayers.   All you have to do is to make it into something that floats, then send out a distress signal (with no cumbersome temperature-checks on the Maghreb side);  the misnamed Italian “Guardia”  Costiera will rush to pick you up;  in-cruise peanuts served free of charge.  (That doesn’t mean they’ll take care of you once you hit Italy;  but they will helpfully point out the quickest route to France, and perhaps even give you a free ticket.  Once there, French taxpayers joyfully welcome the new arrivals, in anticipation of shuffling them on further to Angleterre.  But the Brits, burned by the bombings, haven’t been so welcoming of late;  and so the human cargo in Calais, sits and stews.)

Note:  That self-inflicted ferry-service is ironically named Mare Nostrum;  a more accurate title would be Mare Vestrum.   You can read about it here:

Cruori spumantem

So, if Ebola Tourism does become the next big thing, Europe will likely be ravaged long before we are.

[Update 6 Oct 2014]  France is beginning to realize its unusually high vulnerability:

http://www.lesechos.fr/monde/europe/0203832788384-le-risque-quebola-atteigne-la-france-est-eleve-1050056.php

Since, however, the current Socialist government has shown no inclination to defend the nation against various foreign plagues, it will probably do nothing now.

  

[Update 7 October 2014]  And now this, from Le Figaro:

l'Hexagone est le deuxième pays le plus à risque d'avoir un cas importé de la maladie, derrière le Ghana.

Ghana!

[Update 9 October 2014]   Likewise vulnerable is Spain, via their enclave of Melilla in Morocco.   For reasons of political correctness, Spain has refrained from erecting an adequate barrier, so that the one they have is often scaled or knocked down.  Just yesterday, over three hundred sub-Saharans assaulted the enclave at several points simultaneously (apparently coordinated by traffickers) -- some over the wall, some coming into the port on a float.   All this in the hope (which in the past has repeatedly been fulfilled) of being sent on their merry way to Spain, courtesy of the taxpayer, legality be damned, and with all the diseases they might be carrying.  Melilla itself lacks appropriate specialized hospital facilities, and has requested them, in the face of the continued refusal on the part of the Spanish government  to defend the enclave, or to allow it to defend itself.  (Indeed, just a few days ago, yet another bisounours European commission delivered a tut-tut report against the Melillian (and Moroccan) authorities  for insufficient TLC towards the invaders.

(6)  There has been some speculation that al-Qaeda or (more likely) ISIL, might dispatch ebola-infected operatives to the West.  Indeed, given their predilection for suicide ops, an istishhâdi might even deliberately court infection -- just as some have strapped on the belt, or allowed themselves to be shtupped up the keister with explosives.   Further, AQ has for years been interested in, and sometimes actively working on, poisons and pathogens -- particularly ricin, which is, however not contagious.  For certain, the current band of decapitators would have no moral qualms about such an attack.

ISIL favors maximal effect from minimalist means -- like that Tweet from Syria that set all Australia on its ear.   They could even implement such an attack (since they have a hankering for the picturesque) as a kind of “I Love You” Bug v. 2.0 : simply go around hugging and kissing every American you meet, posing for selfies.  (Les Roms in Paris have a similar scam: sidling up to tourists with a sob story about how oppressed they are, while a confederate steals your cellphone, wallet, and passport.)   Or they could imitate the mindless followers of that Indian guru in Oregon, who went around spraying pathogens on salad-bars:

     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1984_Rajneeshee_bioterror_attack

If so, that would not be the first time an alien cult had launched a bioattack in CONUS.

(7)  Just as defending against a missile once it has been launched, is much dicier than taking it out while it is still on the ground,  so too, we need to consider protecting ourselves via action closer to the source -- before the effects have radiated beyond reach.

The international transportation system has also proved to have porous screening procedures. In an indication that current safety procedures are relying heavily on the honesty of travelers and the diligence of airport workers, the chairman of the Liberian national airport authority… said Thursday that Mr. Duncan had been deceptive about his exposure to the virus when he flew out of Roberts International Airport in Monrovia on Sept. 19.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/03/us/dallas-ebola-case-thomas-duncan-contacts.html

Well, perhaps the Roberts International Airport  needs to become a bit less international for a while.

Several commentors have sighed online  that there is nothing the US can do about the Monrovia airport.   On the contrary, we could shut it down in a heartbeat, if the Liberian government refuses to do so.   In fact, we already have boots on the ground who could do it, with more on the way:

The United States has made the largest contribution and is sending 3,000 troops to Liberia to assist with healthcare logistics. It is the biggest military operation for America in Africa since withdrawing forces from Somalia in 1993.

http://www.voanews.com/content/us-troops-help-liberia-combat-ebola-/2465887.html

 

I’m not saying we necessarily should do that;  merely, that this whimpering that “there’s nothing that can be done” is pitiful.

(8)  Just happened upon this comment from an alert reader:

What is more scary, Ebola or the cdc. As we have seen so many times lately they are just another incompetent govt body now or soon will be. Are they not the same ones that allowed the prez. to ride a elevator with a three time convicted gun holding criminal.

That is true;  the President was visiting CDC in Atlanta when that contractor was allowed into the elevator.

So, the Secret-Service Scandals story and the Dallas Ebola Scandal  intersect at an additional node.

[Update 4 October 2014]  Political correctness can kill:

Federal officials flatly rejected the idea of expanding the screening of passengers arriving from West Africa, and said they would not support calls for a ban on travel to the United States from countries being ravaged by the disease.

[Update 5 October 2014]  After previous assurances that the Dallas health authorities had quarantined everyone who’d been in close contact with Patient Zero after he became fully symptomatic,  this just in:

Authorities in Dallas are looking for a man who had contact with Thomas Eric Duncan, the Liberian man diagnosed with Ebola in a Dallas hospital.

"We have our Dallas County Sheriff's Department and Dallas Police Department teams on the ground," Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins said in a statement. "We are working to locate the individual and get him to a comfortable, compassionate place where we can monitor him and care for his every need for the full incubation period."

The Dallas Morning News reports the man, who may be homeless, was in the ambulance that took Duncan to the hospital.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/10/05/353889266/authorities-in-dallas-looking-for-man-who-had-contact-with-ebola-patient

The only reason I cite that, is because it is so exactly like the sort of plot twist that the TV show “24” used to pull repeatedly out of a hat, so that the plot could go chugging forward for a full 24 episodes (as it did, back in the Golden Age) even after some situation had seemingly been resolved.  It always seemed contrived; sometimes such incidents do happen.

(You can almost film the sequel in your own head:  Cut to a dazed-looking hobo, shuffling along skid row.   A sidewalk-sitter invites him to share some Ripple.  As he puts the bottle to his lips, we notice that sweat is breaking out on this forehead, some of it dripping on to the bottle, which he hands back to his host, who takes a long swig…)

Cinematic footnote:  A similar fantasy has already been very well filmed.   The movie is called “12 Monkeys”.

L'Armée des douze singes 

Update 6 October 2014]  Slowly, slowly, they are coming around.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/10/06/epidemiologist-stop-the-flights-now/

[Update 7 October 2014]  The qualms that some leading scientists have about po-faced CDC happytalk  is finally being allowed to make it into the mainstream media.  An abundance of testimony here:

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-ebola-questions-20141007-story.html#navtype=outfit

[Update 8 October 2014] Draw your own conclusions:

(1) In Madrid, una auxiliar de enfermería (“nurse’s aide”, which the American press continues to misreport as a “nurse”) contracted ebola from a dying patient, though she had only been in his room twice -- the second time, after his death.   The details of how she got it (apparently touching her face with a glove) don’t matter in this connection;  what matters is that she was a health professional, with many years experience in the field, and working at a premier Spanish hospital, with intense media attention on the case.   In short, conditions where you would be on your best behavior.

(2)  The U.S. is sending thousands of soldiers into harm’s way in West Africa.  With few exceptions, these guys are not health workers by training, let alone with years of experience in the field.

Your assignment:  Consider the implications of these two facts.

.

“You Shall Rise”

[An update to this essay:   

Some seriously cool music from People’s Azawad]

Another fruitful Arab/African musical melange:

La musique gnawa au Maroc:
http://www.medi1.com/player/player.php?i=5739668

Nota bene  a particularly haunting melody, sung in English and Zulu, beginning ten minutes into the interview.
I don't really listen to pop music anymore;  but every so often, two cultures interweave, in a way that makes the overfamiliar  once again new and strange.

Hear that song separately, here:

“You Shall Rise”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xGFu8C0REg

and (with superb video), here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQwCCm-H-sU

The lingua franca of jihad (updated)

[Update May 2014]

In the widely-watched video, in which Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau exults in his new notoriety, and crows over the captive schoolgirls, he mixes various languages, in a rather desultory rant;  but at one point breaks into perfectly correct classical Arabic (inflectional voweling and all), when he says, pointing towards his sedentary hostages:  "By God! They will never leave our hands, until our brothers are released from your prisons."  His Arabic is better than his English (particularly in pronunciation).

Usama Ben Laden as well  used to give his public addesses in pure classical Arabic, rather than in the dialects that people use every day.

~

Mr Shekau’s behavior has, one may say, attracted its share of adverse comment.  But here is a detail whose import will escape non-specialists:

A nurse at a hospital here who saw Mr. Shekau a great deal before the summer 2009 uprising — she treated his followers, who were wounded in early skirmishes — found him menacing. “Even if you greet him he doesn’t greet you back,” the nurse said, asking not to be identified for security reasons.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/19/world/africa/a-jihadists-face-taunts-nigeria-from-the-shadows.html?hp&_r=0

Such surliness is more than impolite:  it is plainly contra-Koranic.   For in one of its well-known verses, believers are enjoined:  “When ye are greeted, reply in kind with the same greeting, or with a better one.”

~

For a wide-ranging survey of Arabic for linguistically adept non-Arabists,

written in a punchy style,  try

The Semantics of Form in Arabic,

in the Mirror of European Languages.

~

~     ~     ~

[Below, the original post from February]

A group of seven French nationals was recently kidnapped in Cameroun by Boko Haram, which has just released an interesting video of the hostages:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSx3EgStuMs

The hostages are all French, and Cameroun is officially francophone; and the local language is Hausa, with English as an official language.   Nevertheless, the captor’s speech is read in correct, classical, native-accented Arabic.  The rhetoric is stately, the syntax complex -- much like the addresses Usama Bin Laden used to give.  Moreover, the speaker refers to his group as the  Jamâ`atu ahli l-sunnati li-da`wati wa-l-jihad,  “which they nickname ‘Boko Haram’”.  There is indeed quite a contrast in feeling-tone between that mouth-filling Arabic phrase, with its careful and accurate morphological vowelings (and which means:  “Group of the Sunni people, for preaching and combat”),  and the local-language Boko Haram (basically, “bookums nogood” [*]), which by comparison sounds like pidgin.  In keeping with this, the speaker wastes no time at all denouncing the depravities of Western culture, but adorns his discourse with much stately religious phraseology.

Here classical Arabic is being used as an international koiné or lingua franca, much as French was the language of international culture and diplomacy in the eighteenth century, spoken as far east as the courts of Russia.   As such it is a step towards the kind of thinking that would be required for the re-establishment of the Caliphate, of over a thousand years ago, and which once stretched from southern Spain (al-Andalus) to the dimly-remembered lands  beyond the far rivers of the east.

[*]  It turns out that the conventional etymology of Hausa boko from English book  might be mistaken:
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303701304579549782784964904