It's Friday, Oops Wednesday, the 13th, and the World has Felt its Sting

It’s Wednesday, the 13th, not Friday the 13th, but the feel is the same if you’re at all superstitious. Several dramatic events today have proven once again that almost nobody is safe, and even those few who are will be attacked verbally for trying to make the rest of us as safe as possible.

1. At least 21 people have been killed and more than 100 injured in 3 simultaneous car bomb attacks in Mumbai (Bombay).  The attacks occurred at the evening rush hour when Mumbai’s streets are choked with people trying to get home after their work day. A diamond market near a quiet residential area, a gold market and a train station used by millions of people. The Indian government is asking Bombay residents to remain calm and "maintain the peace." The attacks were all near areas hit in the past by terrorist bombs. The Maharashtra State governor said "Mumbai is a prime target," because it is India’s financial capital, "...Terrorists will obviously attack where it hurts most." Indian authorities have issued high alerts for the Indian capital, New Delhi, as well as for Kolkata (Calcutta). US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is keeping her plans to arrive in India later this week.

2. The Arab League's secretary general Nabil al-Araby visited Syria president Bashar al-Assad  on Wednesday, denouncing "foreign interference" in the struggling country's affairs. The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency, SANA, said al-Araby and President al-Assad discussed a wide range of issues, including domestic reform, the agitation in Libya, and the Palestinians. Al-Araby said that he understands Syrian officials who are upset with the United States and other nations for getting involved in Syria's domestic affairs. "Al-Araby voiced the Arab League full rejection to all bids of foreign interference in Syrian Affairs, and support to the bulk of reforms made in Syria, hoping that Syria would emerge stronger given its pivotal role in the region," the SANA report said.

3. Egyptian Interior Ministry spokesman Alla Mahmoud has announced that 505 generals and 82 brigadiers were dismissed Wednesday, with 27 of them accused of killing protesters. Over 800 people were killed during the January 25 revolution. Reform of the police and punishment for those who harmed demonstrators are key demands of the protesters camping out at Cairo's Tahrir Square, where the uprising against President Hosni Mubarak and his government began. Monday, Prime Minister Essam Sharaf called for public trials for former officials accused of killing protesters. Several days earlier, he had called for the termination of all officers accused of killing protesters during the uprising that ousted Mubarak.

It there a common thread here? I’m not so sure, unless it is that there is a lot of hatred and violence in the world, most of it directed at innocent people who have little voice in what happens around them.

India’s long struggle to be safe from its difficult neighbor Pakistan, the Syrian al-Assad regime’s killing rampage as a mechanism for staying in power and the Arab League’s need to ride the fence until al-Assad is ousted, and the Egyptian military’s efforts to understand and comply with the demands of their citizens who are impatient to be truly free - all these are somehow connected in today’s violent framework of “politics of terror” that many are trying to overcome with “politics of reason.”

The road will be long and dangerous for those who engage, and it will seem at times to be a waste of life and money, but in the end, only political systems organized and supported by the people being governed will survive.