TRAVELS to the RESTRICTED ZONES of MAUNGDAW,

BUTHIDAUNG AND RATHEDAUNG TOWNSHIPS,

RAKHINE STATE, MYANMAR, by RICK HEIZMAN

by Rick Heizman, June 28, 2018, San Francisco

The three townships of northern Rakhine State, namely Maungdaw, Buthidaung, and
Rathedaung have never been open to tourism - as well, tourists know nothing about the
area, and it is the most distant corner of the distant and little visited Rakhine State. On
August 25, 2017, the Bengali Muslims (some people who don’t understand the political
construct of the false identity might call them ‘Rohingya’) launched a furious jihad upon the
indigenous Rakhine Buddhists, the Hindu minority and tribal ethnicities. Once again, the
world news was on this area where essentially nobody - not even seasoned Burma travelers
have been - except me. Not only have I spent the last 37 years goin back and forth to Burma
(as it was known then) but I started going to Rakhine State in 1996 - 22 years ago. More
recently, I am the only foreigner that has been allowed to travel into the restricted townships,
on my own, and I have been in there twice, with full freedom and access, and with no
restrictions, and no minders. I know that many journalists and reporters are stupefied as to
how I got permission to get in to that restricted area, and why the government lets me in, but
nobody else. It's actually very simple.

Have any of the indignant reporters and journalists done any school projects in Rakhine
State? Or, any kind of projects for the benefit of the Rakhine Buddhist people?

Have any of the other reporters and human rights workers, etc., done anything positive for
the Rakhine Buddhist culture?

NO! Of course not!

The only thing that all of them do for the Rakhine Buddhists is to demonize them,
dehumanize them, refuse to listen to them, disparage them, not acknowledge their true
history, etc.

I have built schools in Rakhine State and other humanitarian and educational projects there
for many years. For 22 years I have been going to Rakhine State. I am known and respected
by the people there. And in any new introduction I can list all of those positive points, and
invariably they have heard of me and will do anything they can for me. And, there is very
good reason why they block all of the other riff raff - because they don’t know them, and
they have done nothing positive for the true indigenous peoples, in fact, a quick search will
show all of the negative things they have done - so why should they be allowed in? They
have had too many ignorant zealots come in, and then twist and mold their ‘findings’ into an
anti-Buddhist, anti-truthful, pro-Muslim, pro-fake news, media screed.

1
LEAVING SITTWE AND ARRIVING IN MAUNGDAW
We (myself and a guide whom I have
known for 10 years) left for Maungdaw
in the early morning, first by taxi to a
jetty for an hour, then by boat for a few
hours to the southern tip of the
Maungdaw peninsula, where we met
our car and driver. With my
documentation and passes I got
through the checkpoints easily. The
southern tip of the peninsula is
technically in Rathedaung Township,
however, geographically speaking, by
being on the west side of the Mayu
Mountains it is essentially southern
Maungdaw Township. It will take about five hours of driving to get to the town of Maungdaw,
the largest town in Northern Rakhine State, and we will stop at various villages on the way,
arriving in town at dusk just before the curfew. There is only one road up to Maungdaw town,
and it is dirt, except when one is about 10 miles from Maungdaw.

THE FIRST VILLAGES

The first villages we drove by were all attacked August 25 - providing they were Buddhist -
by the Bengalis from their, now abandoned, villages. The guys I was traveling with pointed
out to me the police posts that were targeted, which ones police were killed, and which ones
were set ablaze that night, and over the next weeks. I interviewed people who told of the
horrors they faced, not only in 2017, but 2016, 2012, and many other times since 1942 (more
about that specific year later). We were still many hours from Maungdaw, and we had to
judge our time so that we made it into the town before dark and curfew.

INN DIN VILLAGE

In the next area of villages, we stopped at Inn Din Village,
where the 10 Bengali Muslims were killed. I met and
interviewed U Maung Ni’s wife. U Maung Ni was the Buddhist
villager that was killed in the morning of August 25 in Inn Din. I
learned many things from the villagers that really shot down the
Reuters version of the killings. Example: Reuters made the
point that there was no attack in the early predawn morning by
the Muslims, and that the nearest village where there was an
attack was 4.5 miles north at Kyauk Pan Du. Well, many villager
told me that they were awakened at 3 AM by the muffled
sounds of many many gunshots and explosions, coming from
The wife of murdered U Maung Ni
the south, 1.5 miles away, in Gwa Son, which had the biggest

2
police outpost in that area. In that part of the world there is no instant news, so people didn’t
know, until later in the morning, of the massive surprise attacks by the Bengali Muslims.
Reuters also conveniently didn’t mention the reason why the Inn Din Muslims did not attack
the Buddhists that early morning - as they had prepared to do. And, if they had attacked the
Buddhists it would have been devastating - 90% of the population of the 5 villages that
made up Inn Din were Muslim - roughly 4000 Muslims and 400 Buddhists. The reason they
didn’t attack was that just the day before Aug 25th,
on Aug 24th, the top Mawlawi (Imam) of Inn Din was
arrested for ‘inciting violence against the Buddhists’
as he had been doing for a year, by broadcasting
calls from his mosque loudspeakers to ‘Cut the
heads off the Buddhists’, ‘All you Rakhine men will
die, and your wives will be ours’, You don’t believe in
Allah , so you must die’, etc. So the Muslims couldn’t
attack, or they would never see their hate-mongering
imam again, but they were so riled up that they
Inn Din kids

murdered U Maung Ni as he was walking

through some forest to attend to his
buffalo. And by afternoon that day they
couldn’t restrain themselves anymore, and
started rampaging through the 2 small
Buddhist villages, causing the Buddhists to
flee quickly for the big walled monastery.
Only then the Buddhists were starting to
learn what had happened during the early
morning, and that the bridges on both
sides of Inn Din has been blown up by the
Bengalis, and Inn Din was effectively The monastery and temple compound walls
isolated. Then a few days later some Buddhist
men captured 10 Muslims running from using
bombs to ambush troops trying to get to Inn Din. They called for security forces to came and
get the 10 prisoners, but they couldn’t because the 2 bridges across raging streams were
down. Reuters painted those 10 Bengalis as innocent angels, when in fact, they were
heartless killers under the boot of Islamic terrorism and agenda.

KYAUK PAN DU VILLAGE

Four and half miles further up the road we stopped in Kyauk Pan Du, which was a major
supply depot for the Muslims. This is where many secret hidden underground bunkers were
discovered, some by myself, which held weapons, explosives, mines, bombs etc. It helps to
show the long-term systematic planning that the Bengali Muslims had. Villagers there will
happily take us to see newly discovered bunkers.

3
As we continued northward, I noticed the
hundreds of abandoned Bengali fishing boats
(the ones with the sharply upturned ends)
littering the beaches here, because that was an
easy way for Bangladeshi Bengalis to illegally
swarm into Rakhine State - they sailed over with
their boats packed with - not fish - but
Bangladeshis - who then become ‘Rohingya’
just by landing in Rakhine State. It is rather odd
that Bengalis / Bangladeshis actually were
swarming in huge numbers into the very place
where they claim a long, never-ending, savage genocide was going on. Everywhere else on
earth people try to escape genocide, but Bengalis are migrating INTO a supposed genocide.
Well, they are not very smart, they have some of the lowest literacy and education levels of
anybody around them. However, they are quite sly at lying, giving fake stories, making-up
fake atrocities, yelling ‘Allahu Akbar!’ as they are slaughtering infidels and shouting
‘genocide’ when they themselves are the ones trying again and again to carry through a
wanton genocidal ethnic cleansing.

AH LEI THAN KYAW

As we continue we will get to the site of Ah Lei Than Kyaw, which until 1942, was the biggest
Buddhist monastery complex in Maungdaw Township, about twelve miles south of
Maungdaw town. During the 1942 Maungdaw massacre when 30,000 Buddhists were
slaughtered in Maungdaw town alone, and hundreds of Buddhist villages were set on fire,
many Buddhists around Ah Lei Than Kyaw fled to what they thought was the safety of the
huge Buddhist complex there. Twenty thousand armed Bengali Muslims raided the Ah Lei
Than Kyaw police station and brutally killed all the policemen, who had surrendered to them,
and then set off to kill all the Rakhine men from the villages.

Thousands of Bengali Muslims (nobody on earth used the term ‘Rohingya’ then) surrounded
the complex, yelling ‘Allahu Akbar!’ praises of their god, and set it ablaze, hurling bundles of
dry hay over the walls to make an inferno. Every soul in there was incinerated - more than
500 Buddhist women, children, elders, young Buddhist novices, and Buddhist monks who
were taking refuge inside the monastery complex.

The Muslims wanted the villages, the fertile land, and the fishing grounds of the Buddhists -
and they believed that it is not wrong to kill the Buddhists, in fact, their faith claims that the
‘idol-worshipping polytheists’ should be killed, and their property and women are to be taken
by Muslims, and Allah will be pleased. Buddhists never settled there anymore, there is
nothing of the Buddhist presence there, the Muslims built a large village over the ruins,
obliterating any Buddhist reference, and Ah Lei Than Kyaw became a large UNHCR supply
depot, with the UNHCR headquarters of the area - which of course, assisted only the
Muslims and not the Buddhists. Now, it is burned and abandoned - Karma at work.

4
There is one old and gnarled tree that marked a
corner of the former compound according to old
survivors of the 1942 genocidal massacre against the
Buddhists.

I and our team offered prayers at, for the thousands

of Buddhists that have been slaughtered there, in Ah
Lei Than Kyaw, and the surrounding area.

MRO REFUGEE CAMPS

Soon after, we stopped at some Mro tribal refugee camps near
the road. Mro are an indigenous ethnicity that traditionally only
lived deep in the mountains however they are too afraid to live in
the mountains now because the Bengali Muslims kill them so
frequently and easily so they cannot live in the mountains until
the Bengali Muslims are completely gone. There have been
steady killing of Mro and other tribal people throughout the
years. In one particularly heinous episode a group of 8 or 9 Mro
were shot and hacked to death on Aug 4, 2017 - the number
discrepancy is because one woman killed was 8 months
pregnant, and they weren’t sure how to count that.

THIRI KONE BOUNG, SAYA MAUNG CHAN THA

After that we drove by a Buddhist village named Thiri Kone Boung - pictured here, on fire. I
was particularly outraged when Human Rights Watch used this photo, in a report in June
2012, without permission, which it got off the internet, which is taken by somebody I know,
and intentionally distorted every fact about it for their deceitful propaganda. The text is
meant to fool and manipulate the reader into thinking that he or she is looking at a Bengali
Muslim village set on fire by the bad bad Buddhists. BUT, THE TRUTH IS THAT THIS IS A
BUDDHIST VILLAGE - THAT HAS
BEEN TORCHED BY THE
MUSLIMS - and it is named Thiri
Kone Boung Village of Maungdaw
Township.

AND, those people in the photo are

Bengali Muslims that were chasing
Buddhists out of the village, who
ran up a hill, where this photo was
taken by a Rakhine Buddhist man
from nearby Sara Maung Chan That
Village. 

5
THE MOST EGREGIOUS ELEMENT OF THIS CRIMINAL DECEIT IS THAT A BUDDHIST MAN
IS BEING MURDERED AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PHOTO WHERE YOU SEE THE GROUP
OF MEN.

Of the group of Buddhists who had to run for their lives, some were caught in the village and
hacked to death with swords, the others ran to this hill, with Bengali Muslims chasing them,
and sometimes catching a person and killing them. One man that was caught was a popular
and dedicated schoolmaster, well-liked even by his Muslims students, whom he let ride his
motorcycle. His name is Saya Maung Chan Tha, and his fellow teachers were among those
on the hill who had to endure watching in horror as their leader was being hacked to death -
by his young students, whose Islamic brainwashing was complete. Maung Chan Tha’s wife
was also wounded severely, but managed to escape. I interviewed her.

Human Rights Watch was very deliberately trying to make people hate the Buddhists with
this vile and malicious Crime Against Humanity, by dehumanizing the Buddhists. Most of us
know that this violence is NOT what Buddhists would typically do, but it IS what very many
Muslims to in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Europe, and the Americas.

ARG CAMP
About 6 miles from Maungdaw we turned off the road at a certain unmarked place. This is
the camp of U Ba Aye’s relief group, where they have a workshop and eating and sleeping
quarters. There is a very large Muslim village named Du Chi Yar Tan, just a quarter mile away
and there are other Bengali Muslim villages surrounding the camp. At the camp there is
always somebody at the lookout, and at night they have night guard shifts every 90 minutes.
There are swords positioned around the camp, in case of attack, which has happened a few
times. U Ba Aye and his members have no guns, and they don’t want them, unless the
Bengalis start using guns against them. U Ba Aye lived in Japan for some years, and learned
some samurai swordsmanship. He showed us some good defensive stances and moves.
The most important thing is not to run - because then you have no defense. Two of U Ba
Aye's men were hacked to death when they were caught with nothing to protect themselves
with. The camp has repelled a couple of attacks with their skills. 5 men in imposing defensive
postures held off 50 or so Bengalis with swords who turned and ran when confronted by U
Ba Aye’s greatly outnumbered but skillful men. These days it is much safer because most of
the Bengalis are gone - but after losing two guys it is better to not let one’s guard down.

THE COURT BUILDING

Then, shorty before entering the town we passed
the unfinished new large court building for
Maungdaw Township. This is where on the night
of August 24, 2017, a Hindu family of 12 was
driving home very late when they had to stop
because of so many Bengalis, strangely, on the
road. As Bengalis peered into the car they
shouted, “HIndus! Kill them! Cut off their heads!”
6
The driver screeched over to the big empty building under construction which they could see
in the moonlight. All 12 of them scrambled into the building that they though was empty and
they could hide, but immediately gunfire killed 6 of them, and wounded 2 others, and 4 kids
ran in panic until they got to a nearby village police outpost just as it was coming under
attack. The family, nor anyone, didn’t know that ARSA made that building a command center
for the Aug 25 early morning attacks which were about to begin when the Hindu family drove
up. Police, under attack, scrambled to the empty building, which the Bengali terrorists had
just abandoned, and found 2 of the 8 Hindus badly wounded but alive, and bought them out
and got them to Buthidaung hospital, an hour away. They were not going to risk taking them
to Maungdaw hospital, a half mile away, which itself could be attacked at any minute. All of
this was done at the same time as police were under attack in the darkness.

MAUNGDAW TOWN
Finally we got into town just before curfew. Our hotel is in a Buddhist section of town. The
hotel was bare bones but we just slept there anyway. Food was good. There is a lot to do in
Maungdaw, but the next day we will drive far away, and then back.

GOING NORTH to KHA MAUNG SEIK

The next morning we left while it was still dark, because it will take us 4-5 hours each way to
drive an often rutted dirt road to Kha Maung Seik - the site of the Hindu massacres.

Now that Amnesty International has come out (belatedly) with a report that charges the
Bengali Muslims with this massacre and many other attacks and killings it is amazing to see
the responses from the ‘Rohingya lobby’.

Kha Maung Seik is a cluster of 5 villages, 2 of which are (or were)

Hindu. It was the one and only place where I had 2 Burmese
soldiers with me. That was because only 24 hours prior to my
arrival there, and only about half a mile away, a group of 6
Buddhists villagers fishing in the small river was attacked by
Muslims waiting in ambush. 5 of them got away, but one didn’t,
and it was a miracle that he (barely) survived. He was slashed
and hacked, with major wounds on his arms, legs, and head,
and then one Muslim
plunged his sword
into his chest, and
lucky for the victim,
the blade got caught between two ribs - so much
so the Muslim tried but couldn’t get his sword
out, and they fled. The Buddhist man, wounded
as he was, had to pull the heavy sword out of his
ribs himself, and then his comrades returned and
carried him to the police outpost (where they

7
gave me two soldiers) and he was transported 5 hours on that bumpy dirt road to Maungdaw
Hospital. I visited the man in the hospital when I returned to Maungdaw that evening. He
looked like a mummy, he had so many bandages. His tearful wife and kids were there with
him, so thankful that he survived.

So the troops were with us for the hour that we walked around there, one stayed about 100
feet in front of us, and the other walked about
100 feet behind us - guns at the ready. This
area is quite close to the border, and one
week before, an army truck was ambushed as
it hit landmines on the road, as well, there
have been a lot of ambushes of villagers out
there.

Walking around the Hindu villages is eerie,

you know that something terrible has
happened there. And then, a mile away is the
historic Hindu temple, which was also
vandalized.

SOUTH BACK TO MAUNGDAW TOWN

Now we had to judge our time carefully in order to get back to Maungdaw town before
curfew. There was time for some stops, for sure.

BRIDGES
There are many of these types of wooden
bridges in Maungdaw, Buthidaung and
Rathedaung. Many of them were blown up
during the Aug 25, 2017 attacks. That was
during the middle of the monsoon, which dumps
more rain on Rakhine State than any other state.
With so many bridges blown up, there were
many villages trapped, and often the army was
stuck, not been able to cross many points with
rivers raging. As well, the Bengali Muslims laid
thousands of landmines. It was pointed out to
me which bridges were blown up.

MORE MRO CAMPS

We stopped to visit more Mro refugee camps, and talked to more
Mro people, who had more horrible incidents with the Bengali
Muslims, who really seem to despise the simple gentleness of the
Mro.
8
MUSLIM VILLAGES
Then, we stopped and talked to some Muslim
villagers who stayed, and did not flee to
Bangladesh, because their villages did not join in
on the surprise multiple attacks of Aug 25, 2017. As
they will tell you the Burmese Army actually had to
defend those Muslim villages from the ARSA
militants, who would have massacred their own
Bengali Muslims and torched their villages!

I know many of the journalists who so arrogantly

demand to be let loose there won’t believe it until
they themselves hear it - and then they will still not believe it! This is one main reason I am
allowed in, and others are not. Can you imagine the reactions of Phil Robertson, Matthew
Smith, Maung Zarni, Nay San Lwin, Simon Billingness, Kirt Mausert and others, if they did
interviews like this? They would destroy those interviews so fast, and all reference to them,
and never mention those interviews to anybody!

MAJUHIDEEN HEADQUARTERS 1950s

As we continued south we stopped at a

great view of the highest part of the Mayu
Mountains. There is some fascinating
history here. The headquarters of the
Mujahideen Army - which the Bengalis
formed in 1948 when their ultimatum to
declare the region an Islamic State was
delivered to and rejected by the brand-
new government of Burma - was an
impregnable fortress about 3/4 of the way
up the cliffs. The notorious leader of the
mujahideen (previous to that he was a member of a robber gang) was Bo Cassim, who
waged war against any and all infidels. Under Cassim’s leadership the Mufhaideen controlled
most of Arakan, by 1950 he had grown so strong that he attacked Maungdaw town itself, on
two occasions. As executor of the Mujahid plan to drive out the Arakanese population and
make way for Muslim immigration into the districts of northern Arakan, Cassim committed
innumerable excesses. He burned villages, abducted women, robbed people for money and
other valuables, and created a ring of terror in the area in which he operated. In 1951, when
he suffered reverses at the hands of the Government, he even took reprisals on the Muslim
population, who he suspected of having gone over to the Government side. At that time, he
was condemned publicly by the Muslim Organization of Maungdaw, the Jamiat-Ulema, who
urged the Union Government to crush him as quickly as possible.
In November 1954, the impregnable fortress headquarters was finally captured.

9
 From Burma’s newspaper THE NATION - Nov 9, 1954
‘OPERATION MONSOON’ SMASHES MUJAHID HQ ON MAYU RANGE
REBEL COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF KILLED IN FIERCE BATTLE

In a major offensive designated “Opera4on Monsoon” now being launched in Arakan, Burma, Army
troops have succeeded in smashing the Mujahid headquarters on
the western slopes of the Mayu range, killing the Muslim rebel
commander, Colonel Shiba Rashid, and the Buthidaung Regional
Commander, Colonel Abad.

Colonel Shiba Rashid, who was formerly one of the Mujahid’s

Regional Commanders, was promoted to succeed the notorious
Bo Cassim, when the later was arrested in ChiIagong.
“Opera4on Monsoon” began on November 1, when Army units
started a two-pronged drive along the eastern and western
slopes of the Mayu Range, one column taking off from
Buthidaung and the other other from Maungdaw.

First objec4ve of the Maungdaw column was Point 1440 which

was aIacked at 7 AM on November 1. The Mujahids put up fierce resistance here. Despite heavy
shelling from the Government side, the troops could make a liIle headway against the rebels who
were well dug-in in bunkers. The strong point finally fell at 2:53 PM aZer an eight-hour baIle.

When the troops entered the mountain hideout they found six well-constructed barracks, heavy
for4fica4ons, plen4ful food supplies, and five new cases of rifle and tommy gun ammuni4on
containing some 7000 rounds.

The following day, November 2, saw dawn aIacks on Mujahid camps along the western slope of the
Mayu Range. Points 714, 308 and 385 fell to the advancing army units in quick succession.

The final blow of the offense was struck on November 7 when the eastern and western columns
converged on the Mujahid headquarters near the northern end of the Mayu Range.
In this stronghold about 150 of the rebels were holding out, behind a baIery of heavy machine guns,
which from the height of the encampment, commanded all approaches. “Opera4on Monsoon” troops
had to call in the aid of mortars to silence the guns before they could take the posi4on.
Launching their assault at 7:30 AM they hoisted the union flag over the place four hours later.

(Notice, the term ‘Rohingya’ had not yet been invented, and therefore was not used.)

BACK IN MAUNGDAW TOWN

We barely made it back into Maungdaw by curfew, but we did. We cleaned up, ate, talked,
thought, wrote, and then slept well. The next day we were busy all day (as usual) just around
Maungdaw town and nearby places.

10
VISITED PHOTOGRAPHER / VIDEO MAN
I met cameraman - U Hla Shwe - who
took the only video of the sudden
launch of Jihad here in Maungdaw on
June 8, 2012. He is a fun, fascinating
and energetic man. He shot this video
of the Muslims pouring out of the
mosque and swarming in 3 directions
killing Buddhists, starting fires, and
terrorizing Buddhists to flee. And, it
was systematically planned - I have the
evidence of that planning. Also, he took
the video from his fathers home where
the Muslims were throwing rocks at the
windows of the Buddhist family and
trying to break down the door to barge
in and massacre everyone.

I went to the exact same locations that the

videos were taken from, and talked to Buddhists
who were terrified that day, and numerous times
in the past, when Bengali Muslims would launch
a pre-planned attack with the goal of eliminating
and killing all remaining Buddhists, and any other
infidels they find.

These two videos, taken by U Hla Shwe, were

also used in a very devious manner by Al-
Jazeera, Human Rights Watch, AFP and others. I
made a video which exposed the subliminal
brainwashing techniques that Al-Jazeera used
and then passed on to other media to broadcast.
Basically, they would show about 2 seconds of each clip while the announcer was saying
such things as, ‘Buddhist mobs rampaging through the streets…’ and ‘Buddhist violence
against the Muslims…’. They know that as a 2 second clip is shown, much of the Western
world will not recognize that those are Muslim mobs, and Muslims violently throwing rocks
at Buddhists. So, they are were intentionally shaping public opinion to see the Buddhists as
the aggressors, and thereby foment a hatred towards them. This kind of subliminal
brainwashing goes on in various parts of their media. Western media will then re-broadcast
Al-Jazeera’s manipulated media, usually not knowing the sinister nature of the broadcasts,
although in cases such as Human Rights Watch they would absolutely know of it, approve it,
and may even be part of creating the deceit.

11
SHWE ZARR BRIDGE
We headed over to Shwe Zarr - an outer
part of Maungdaw town - where there is a
bridge - the Shwe Zarr Bridge. It was right
here, at the bridge, where a wanton
genocide of Buddhists by Bengali Muslims
was thwarted.

In 1988, on the anniversary date of the 1942

genocidal massacre of Buddhists in
Maungdaw - May 13 - the very violent and extreme Islamic terrorist group called the
Rohingya Liberation Organization (RLO) led tens of thousands of Muslims, which were to
march into Maungdaw and slaughter all Buddhists. They first destroyed a large Buddhist
Monastery and began to burn the wards populated by fleeing Buddhists, but they were
stopped at the Shwe Zarr bridge from entering the main parts of the town.

There were only a handful of Burmese troops at the bridge, with not even enough bullets to
stop the huge mob. The mob halted at one end of the bridge and the troops opposed them
but knew they didn’t even have enough bullets to fire warning shots. As the mob prepared to
storm over the bridge one sharp-shooter soldier fired a single shot high into a coconut tree,
and a coconut fell down onto the head of one of the Muslim leaders, most likely killing him.
The mob freaked out and ran away and their genocidal plan was thwarted.

SHWE ZARR HINDUS

A few minutes from the bridge is a beleaguered Hindu
village surrounded by swelling Muslims villages. The
Hindus there were thrilled to see us, and they told us
their terrifying experiences and their fears. They
showed us their temple, which has been ransacked so
many times by the Muslims that they cannot even
have statues of their deities anymore - because they
are smashed so often, and they can’t afford to buy
new ones.

So, in the temple they only have pictures

of the deities and tiles of their deities.
And, even still, mobs of Muslims will
barge into the village, break into the
temple, destroy what they could, and
shit and pee on everything. Disgusting.

12
VARIOUS BUDDHIST TEMPLES AND MONASTERIES
There were various Buddhist temples and monasteries
around to stop at, I listened to the monks and asked
questions, was shown beheaded Buddha statues, saw
bullet holes in the buildings, etc. It is amazing - the deep
hatred that Muslims have concerning statues, images,
and any depictions of Buddha, Krishna, Shiva, Jesus,
actually any ‘idol’. Why do they have to destroy the idols
of other people with other faiths? The supremacism
rampant in the Quran, and that which the shouting angry
Mawlawis (Imams) smother their mosque attendees with is certainly NOT the best religion in
the world, as they insist it is.

NEXT DAY - CROSS THE MAYU MOUNTAINS TO BUTHIDAUNG

The next morning we drove across the steep Mayu Mountains to Buthidaung. It’s not so far,
and the road is quite good, probably the best stretch of road in the whole area. The jungle
cover on the quite steep mountains is amazing. And, more amazing is the recounted stories
that Buddhists tell of entire village populations having to climb over these mountains to the
‘safety’ of Buthidaung, during times of Muslim slaughters, especially the 1942 massacre.
Looking at the sheer mountains one wonders how the heck people got across. I have heard
some vivid and hair-raising accounts
of those desperate treks across the
May Mountains.

In 1942, in the wake of the wanton

genocidal massacre of 30,000
Buddhists in Maungdaw, by Bengali
Muslims, there were tens of
thousands of Buddhists fleeing to
Buthidaung for safety, or so they
thought. The distance is not long -
about 30 miles - but it is up and
down a formidable mountain range -
The Mayu Mountains - which are
extremely steep and jungle covered.
13
Large groups of several hundred people each would have to walk and climb with old people,
women and children in the middle, and men and boys walking on the outside, displaying
swords, knives, or clubs to keep the Muslim killers at bay. The Buddhists would shout, “Let
us pass through, we don’t harm you, we are leaving here, don’t kill us, just let us go.” Even
with that being said, sometimes large groups of Muslims would attack a group and
overwhelm it, killing everyone they could.

Coming down from the mountains to Buthidaung, at the

foot of the mountain, there was a large Muslim village that
the Buddhist refugees would have to pass through. The
path went by this mosque, now old and ruined.

(It was ruined by a cyclone in 2010, and abandoned).

The Muslims at this village said such things as, “Welcome,

we are friendly, don’t be afraid of us. You are almost to the
town of Buthidaung, but rest here for awhile, eat some
food with us, we are your friends. Put your things down
here, you don’t need weapons right now, put your things
down and come eat with us, you must be so hungry.
Come in to the mosque, where we have food.”

The Rakhine people are simple honest Buddhists and they

did as was suggested. They put down their goods and
weapons, and walked into the mosque, and yes - there
was food. The hungry and exhausted Buddhists were
eating the food, and then all of a sudden many Muslims
ran in with knives and swords and killed everyone.

Everyone, except one 17 year old boy who escaped the carnage. His name is U Shwe Tha
Aung, and it was from him that I know of this tragedy. He died last year at 92 years old. He
said the experience never left his mind - everyday, for the rest of his life, he recalled every
detail of the horror.

BUTHIDAUNG
Buthidaung is a pleasant town right on the picturesque Mayu River. We went around the
town to Buddhist monasteries where I interviewed many victims of the Bengali Muslims -
hearing again and again about the terrifying sound of Bengali Muslims yelling, ‘Allahu Akbar!’
‘Cut the heads off the Buddhists’, ‘All you Rakhine men will die, and your wives will be ours’,
You don’t believe in Allah, so you must die’. And then, as the yelling got louder the Buddhist
or Hindu village was invaded by hundreds of Muslims, with weapons, many of whom were
wearing black masks. Terrified villages recounted how they had to flee in the chaos and
darkness, with kids, babies, and elderly. Villagers who were caught by the Muslims were
most often hacked to painful death. Villagers usually ran to the nearest security outpost,
where the security forces would do their best to protect them as they themselves came
under attack. Other villagers had to run into the Mayu mountains and hide for days, or even a
week or more, with no food, no clean water, no cooking pots, until security forces could find
them and escort them out to safety. And, other villagers were trapped, with bridges blown up
14
by the Muslims, and landmines laid by the Muslims, they couldn’t go in any direction until
being rescued by security forces.

I was shown the place on the Mayu river

where a ship with hundreds of Buddhists
- mostly women and children - capsized
and sank drowning most of them. They
were fleeing the 1942 massacre at the
time and piled into the ship which then
capsized, trapping the victims within.
Nobody blames it on the Muslims
directly, but indirectly it was because of
the Muslim madness and violence.

RATHEDAUNG
We went by river boat to Rathedaung town - a
very pleasant town on the other side of the
Mayu River, several hours by boat. There is a
nice steep hill in the town with Buddhist
pagodas, caves and monasteries all over it.

Buddhist have been, and still are, the majority

in Rathedaung, unlike Maungdaw and
Buthidaung where Muslims have become a
majority because of the terror, supremacism
and violence of the Muslims. I heard many
more stories, spanning recent events to 1942 events, and did more interviews.

GUDAUNG VILLAGE
We then took a small boat across the
river and down about 5 or 6 miles to a
fantastic place called Gudaung Village,
where the awe inspiring (at least for all
non-Muslims) Gudaung Buddhists caves
are - which should be (along with several
other sites) a UNESCO protected cultural
treasure - which along with the
astonishing amount of Buddhist relics,
ruins, artifacts, and statues to be found
up and down this land - convincingly
proves the very deeply-rooted Buddhist
nature of this land. In Arakan there are
numerous Buddhist caves, which are unique only to Arakan - a distinctive style, and they
need to be recognized and protected (primarily from Muslim destruction) as treasures of
humanity.

15
However, besides the glories of the caves, there is a tragic side to Gudaung. On June 19,
2012, the large village was attacked by Bengali Muslims, which left 10 Rakhine Buddhists
dead, and in pieces.

Hundreds of Bengali Muslims came across the

fields from their very large village. Some of
them reached part of Gudaung and set it
ablaze. Many men and boys had to stand in
front of the village and try to prevent the
Bengalis from reaching the village and starting
more fires.

The Muslims were yelling such things as,

“Allahu Akbar!” (Allah is the Greatest),
“Maug Kara Hiri” (Cut the Heads off the Buddhists), “This is Islamic land, you are infidels, go
away or we kill you.” Buddhist boys and men had to grab anything to use as a weapon, and
even if they had no desire to fight, they had to protect their women, children and elderly, as
well as the village. For hours mobs of Muslims tried to break through the Buddhist lines of
defense, with their swords, and tried again and again to burn the village. Those who could
not fight - old people, women, and children - had to flee for temporary safety to the back of
the village. Finally some security forces came from Rathedaung, and the fighting was stopped.

But then, towards the end of the day, the Buddhists realized that ten
men and boys were missing. Some of them wanted to search for them
immediately, but the policemen said “No, it is too dangerous now, in the
approaching darkness.” The next day they searched all around, with the
policemen, for protection. Finally they went to the very large Muslim
village, where the aggressors had come from, to search. They noted that
the village had a moat around it, with water, mud and broken glass in it.
After they entered the village, with the security forces, they found a fresh
grave, under a Muslim house, with parts of the bodies of their missing
people. Then they found another grave, also under a Muslim house, and
then another.

All of the 10 missing men and boys were dead,

hidden, and buried under the houses of the Bengalis.
Many of the heads were cut off, and many arms and
legs were cut off. Some graves had no heads, and
some had several heads - it was completely horrific.

The villagers of Gudaung cannot comprehend why

those Bengali Muslims follow such an evil death cult -
Islam. It is incomprehensible to them - and to most non-Muslims of the world.

16
BACK TO SITTWE
We took another 2 hour boat ride, and then a vehicle for another hour or two, and arrived
back to Sittwe. It was truly an eye-opening experience, a discovery of truth and fact.

Rick Heizman June 15, 2018

facebook.com/rick.heizman @rick135b7 scribd.com/rheizman arakan-reality.smugmug.com

17
18