Mumbai terror continues

The nightmare in Mumbai continues. We are now in hour 48, although the Indian television stations have been announcing "the final offensive" and "the final push" for over 24 hours -- since late yesterday afternoon. The stations regularly have announced wrong information, such as "Taj siege ended" flashed from time to time since last night, when grenades continue to go off even tonight. The crowd near the Nariman House clearly thought the siege there was over, and the rescue attempt was "successful" and over, so all kinds of people mobbed the street, but then the announcement comes that all the hostages inside were killed, and finally the police attempted crowd control, which seemed like a good idea given that later there was shooting back and forth. While it seems morbid, and the coverage is so bad, I still can't turn off the t.v.

I've gotten lots of chances to explain about the Chabad Lubavitch and different strains of Judaism, as most of the Indians are fairly clueless, and don't seem too worried or focused on the Jews at all. The Hindu fundamentalists are far more focused on the Muslims to be worried by the Jews, and in fact seem to feel like they are the allies. So, of course, the role of Pakistan and Islamist radicals emerges more and more.

The parallels with 9/11 are many, although so are the differences. I'm too tired to write about it now, but it is clear that India has entered a new era. A sad one.