![\"A](\"https:\/\/patriotsforumindia.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/ohio-state-university-attack-2016-.jpg\")
<\/a>A girl is led to an ambulance by emergency personnel following an attack at Ohio<\/p><\/div>\n
Ohio Attacker Was Wrong, Rohingyas Too Have A Bloody History To Answer For<\/p>\n
Jaideep Mazumdar <\/b><\/span>– <\/span><\/span>November 30, 2016,<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Abdul Razak Ali Artan fumed against persecution of <\/span><\/span><\/span>Rohingyas <\/span><\/span><\/span>(migrants from<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Bangladesh<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2019<\/span><\/span><\/span>s Chittagong province) in Myanmar (Burma) and used that as a<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n justification to carry out an <\/span><\/span><\/span>act of terror in Ohio, USA <\/span><\/span><\/span>. He drove a car into a crowd of<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n students, staff and faculty of Ohio State University on Monday, where he was a<\/p>\n student, and then got down to attack them with a butcher<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2019<\/span><\/span><\/span>s knife, leaving eleven<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n persons injured. Artan was then shot dead by a police officer.<\/p>\n But Artan was ignorant of history. Had he studied the history of Myanmar, and of that<\/p>\n country<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2019<\/span><\/span><\/span>s <\/span><\/span><\/span>Rakhine <\/span><\/span><\/span>province that the Rohingyas populate, he would have got to know<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n how the Rohingyas themselves had massacred, raped, looted, enslaved and forcibly<\/p>\n converted the indigenous Buddhist people of Rakhine region for many decades.<\/p>\n Artan would have got to know that Rohingyas have been, since the 15th century, an<\/p>\n unwelcome presence in Rakhine. Muslims from Bengal, which was then ruled by<\/p>\n Sultans, made their first appearance in Rakhine in the first part of the 15th century. In<\/p>\n the earliest part of the 15th century, due to a line of weak Rakhine kings, its two<\/p>\n powerful eastern neighbours–the kingdoms of <\/span><\/span><\/span>Ava <\/span><\/span><\/span>and <\/span><\/span><\/span>Hanthawaddy (Pegu) <\/span><\/span><\/span>–started<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n jostling for control. Rakhine became the theatre for a <\/span><\/span><\/span>forty year war <\/span><\/span><\/span>between Ava and<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Pegu that drove out the Rakhine king <\/span><\/span><\/span>Narameikhla Min Saw Mon <\/span><\/span><\/span>(1380 to 1433)<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n from his kingdom in late 1406.<\/p>\n Saw Mon sought refuge in neighbouring Bengal and entered the service of Bengal<\/p>\n Sultan <\/span><\/span><\/span>Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah <\/span><\/span><\/span>. Saw Mon proved to be a good commander and<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n became close to the Sultan. In 1429, he convinced the Sultan to help him invade<\/p>\n Rakhine; the Sultan agreed and provided troops, mainly Afghan adventurers. The<\/p>\n attackers defeated the then rulers of Arakan, as Rakhine was known as then, and Saw<\/p>\n Mon was installed as the Rakhine king.<\/p>\n However, Saw Mon, who founded the <\/span><\/span><\/span>kingdom of Mrauk U <\/span><\/span><\/span>, became a vassal of the<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Bengal Sultan and was forced to allow thousands of Bengali speaking Muslims to<\/p>\n settle in his kingdom. He was also forced to accept the use of Islamic coins of Bengal<\/p>\n and was given an Islamic title despite being a Buddhist. Historians say that an<\/p>\n estimated 18,000 Bengali Muslims settled in Rakhine that time. Rakhine remained a<\/p>\n vassal state of Bengal till 1531.<\/p>\n But from 1531 to 1629, <\/span><\/span><\/span>Portuguese <\/span><\/span><\/span>pirates operating along Bengal<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2019<\/span><\/span><\/span>s western coast<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n (especially around Chittagong, sold many Bengali Muslim boys and girls they used to<\/p>\n capture from Bengal to rulers and nobles of Rakhine and, thus, the population of<\/p>\n Bengali Muslims in Rakhine increased further in the early 17th century.<\/p>\n Rakhine was conquered by Burma<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2019<\/span><\/span><\/span>s <\/span><\/span><\/span>Konbaung dynasty <\/span><\/span><\/span>in 1785 and following<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n persecution of the Rakhine people by the <\/span><\/span><\/span>Bamars <\/span><\/span><\/span>(the dominant ethnic group in<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Burma), tens of thousands of Rakhines fled to Chittagong province. The Bamars also<\/p>\n executed thousands of Rakhine men and deported most of the local population to<\/p>\n central Burma. Many Burmese historians quote texts and accounts of those times to<\/p>\n hold that the Bengali Muslims, who had started calling themselves Rohingyas (people<\/p>\n of <\/span><\/span><\/span>Rooingya <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/i>, as the Bengalis used to call Arakan), helped the Bamars persecute the<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Rakhines. In return, the Rohingyas received protection from the Bamars. The<\/p>\n Rohingyas<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2019 <\/span><\/span><\/span>co-religionists in Bengal also started looting and torturing the Rakhine<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n refugees, raping their women and forcibly converting them to Islam.<\/p>\n Rakhine thus became a thinly populated province by the time of the <\/span><\/span><\/span>First Anglo-<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Burmese War <\/span><\/span><\/span>(1824-1826) which resulted in the annexation of Arakan by the British.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n And then started the second, and more intense wave, of migration of Bengali Muslims<\/p>\n to Arakan. The British started bringing in Bengali Muslims to work as labourers in<\/p>\n farmlands and other trades. The population of Bengali Muslims increased<\/p>\n dramatically and by the late 19th century, they formed more than 20 per cent of the<\/p>\n population of Arakan. The fact that the British East India Company extended the<\/p>\n Bengal Presidency <\/span><\/span><\/span>to Arakan also encouraged this migration and demographic change<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n in Arakan.<\/p>\n This demographic shift caused by the unabated migration of Bengali Muslims from<\/p>\n Chittagong to Arakan triggered racial tensions between the indigenous Rakhines and<\/p>\n the settlers. Clashes started erupting between the two groups, forcing the British to set<\/p>\n up a special investigation commission led by one James Ester and Tin Tut (who<\/p>\n became independent Burma<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2019<\/span><\/span><\/span>s first foreign minister). Though the commission<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n recommended a halt to further migration and sealing the borders of Arakan with<\/p>\n Bengal, these remained only on paper since the British retreated from Arakan at the<\/p>\n outbreak of World War II.<\/p>\n And then started another bloody chapter in relations between the Muslim Rohingyas<\/p>\n and Buddhist Rakhines. The absence of the British sparked violent clashes between<\/p>\n the two groups. The British had given huge caches of arms to the Rohingyas in<\/p>\n northern Arakan to stave off the invading Japanese and act as a buffer to British India,<\/p>\n as also to take on the Rakhines who had started supporting the Japanese. In March<\/p>\n 1942, Rohingyas killed 20,000 Rakhines in northern Arakan, something that the<\/p>\n Somali-origin Artan (the Ohio attacker) who spent seven years in Pakistan before<\/p>\n migrating to the US in 2014 would have been blissfully unaware of.<\/p>\n Once the Japanese overran large stretches of Burma, they started committing atrocities<\/p>\n not only on the Rohingyas, but also the indigenous Burmese (including the Rakhines),<\/p>\n Anglo-Burmese, British and the Indian migrants settled in Burma. They all fled to<\/p>\n India; about 22,000 Rohingyas took shelter in Bengal. The British once again armed<\/p>\n the Rohingyas and organised them under a <\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2018<\/span><\/span><\/span>Volunteer Force<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2019 <\/span><\/span><\/span>to harass the Japanese.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n But the Rohingyas once again turned on the Rakhines, killing them and destroying<\/p>\n their houses, Buddhist monasteries and pagodas, raping their women and forcibly<\/p>\n converting them. Artan would also have been ignorant of this.<\/p>\n The Rakhines started harbouring a deep-seated distrust and animosity towards the<\/p>\n Rohingyas. This became more deep-seated when the Rohingyas started demanding<\/p>\n integration of Arakan with East Pakistan during the mid-1940s when two-nation<\/p>\n demand gained ground. Just before Burma gained independence in January 1948, the<\/p>\n Rohingyas appealed to Pakistan<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2019<\/span><\/span><\/span>s founder <\/span><\/span><\/span>Muhammad Ali Jinnah <\/span><\/span><\/span>to ask the British to<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n incorporate Arakan in East Pakistan. Jinnah refused, saying he did not want to<\/p>\n interfere in Burma<\/span><\/span><\/span>