Archived
news and commentary: February 25 - March 3, 2002
2002/03/25 - 2002/03/31
2002/03/18 - 2002/03/24
2002/03/11 - 2002/03/17
2002/03/04 - 2002/03/10
2002/02/25 - 2002/03/03
2002/02/18 - 2002/02/24
2002/02/11 - 2002/02/17
2002/02/04 - 2002/02/10
2002/01/28 - 2002/02/03
2002/01/21 - 2002/01/27
2002/01/14 - 2002/01/20
2002/01/07 - 2002/01/13
2002/01/01 - 2002/01/06
Sunday,
March 3, 2002
News and commentary:
"Left-wingers fall out over claims of censorship" (Stephen Robinson, The Daily Telegraph, 2002/03/03)
"Allegations of censorship are roiling through the world of Left-wing magazines as disgruntled writers say they have been muzzled in trying to challenge their editors' post-September 11 anti-Americanism. John Lloyd, a former editor of the New Statesman as well as a regular contributor, became so disgusted by the magazine's "ferociously anti-American coverage" and its savage criticism of Tony Blair for backing Washington that he wrote a letter for publication denouncing it. ... He noted that the New Statesman had a long record of getting important issues wrong, such as its past belief that Stalin was a great leader and that Hitler should be appeased. "It is now tending to follow and confirm a fashion on the Left that America is the source of world evils and that New Labour is a servile failure," he wrote.""Has the US lost its way?" (Paul Kennedy, The Observer, 2002/03/03)
"We comprise slightly less than 5 per cent of the world's population; but we imbibe 27 per cent of the world's annual oil production, create and consume nearly 30 per cent of its Gross World Product and - get this - spend a full 40 per cent of all the world's defence expenditures. By my calculation, the Pentagon's budget is nowadays roughly equal to the defence expenditures of the next nine or 10 highest defence-spending nations - which has never before happened in history. That is indeed a heavy footprint. How do we explain it to others - and to ourselves? And what, if anything, should we be doing about this?"
"A Saudi Peace Idea, Suddenly in the Spotlight" (Serge Schmemann, The New York Times, 2002/03/03)
"After rapidly gaining momentum through the Middle East and Europe since its soft launching two weeks ago, the Saudi Arabian peace idea will descend on Washington when the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, comes calling on Tuesday. At week's end, Vice President Dick Cheney will be heading for the Middle East, where, whatever his original agenda may have been, he is certain to be badgered relentlessly for some sign of American interest in the initiative, which comes during some of the worst violence to engulf the region in years.""Jerusalem bombing kills 9 bystanders" (CNN.com, 2002/03/03)
"Nine bystanders, including an 18-month-old girl, died Saturday evening when a suicide bomb ripped through a central Jerusalem street as worshippers left Sabbath services, according to Israeli police and emergency workers. At least 57 others were wounded. In an apparent response to the bombing, Israeli Cobra helicopters fired on a Palestinian weapons factory in Bethlehem, the Israel Defense Forces said early Sunday."
Saturday,
March 2, 2002
News and commentary:
"The World in 2005 - Hidden in plain sight" (Robert D. Kaplan, The Atlantic, from the March 2002 issue)
"Although the American-led anti-terror campaign may stoke the flames of fundamentalism in some places, including Egypt, the new century will ultimately see the implosion of political Islam. Because there is "no Islamic way to fix a car," as the saying goes, Islamic regimes offer only the sterile repression of the Taliban or the incompetent economic management of the ayatollahs. ... But in the shadows will lurk a philosophical tension: A world that is closer and more dangerous than ever necessitates a heightened pragmatism in U.S. foreign policy. At the same time, global elites in this interconnected world will demand a heightened idealism from President Bush if he is to have legitimacy in their eyes. Presidential rhetoric may get nobler even as American policies become more ruthless. Closing the distance between the two - through a global constabulary force and similar measures - will constitute the principal challenge for American foreign policy.""U.S., Afghan Forces Launch Major New Offensive" (Charles Aldinger, Reuters/The Washington Post, 2002/03/02)
"At least one U.S. service member and two Afghan troops were killed and others wounded on Saturday in a major attack on al Qaeda and Taliban forces south of Gardez in eastern Afghanistan, the U.S. military said. The casualties occurred as hundreds of Afghan troops backed by U.S. and other coalition ground forces and heavy American bombing moved against regrouping al Qaeda guerrillas of fugitive Osama bin Laden and Taliban fighters in Paktia Province."
Friday,
March 1, 2002
News and commentary:
"A Modest Proposal From the Brigadier" (Peter Landesman, The Atlantic, from the March 2002 issue)
"Aman, in his early fifties and now retired, is lithe and gentle-natured and seemed to me slightly depressed. He works in a small office behind Zardari House, where, as the secretary to Benazir Bhutto in Islamabad, he coordinates Bhutto's efforts to return to Pakistan and regain its prime ministership. ...
We both looked up at the painting in silence. "A rocket ship heading to the moon?" I asked.
Aman tipped his head to the side. A smirk tugged at the corners of his mouth. "No," he said. "A nuclear warhead heading to India."
I thought he was making a joke. Then I saw he wasn't. I thought of the shrines to Pakistan's nuclear-weapons site, prominently displayed in every city. I told Aman that I was disturbed by the ease with which Pakistanis talk of nuclear war with India.
Aman shook his head. "No," he said matter-of-factly. "This should happen. We should use the bomb. ... We should fire at them and take out a few of their cities - Delhi, Bombay, Calcutta," he said. "They should fire back and take Karachi and Lahore. Kill off a hundred or two hundred million people. They should fire at us and it would all be over. They have acted so badly toward us; they have been so mean. We should teach them a lesson. It would teach all of us a lesson. There is no future here, and we need to start over." ...
I asked him if he thought he was alone in his thoughts, and Aman made it clear to me that he was not.
"Believe me," he went on, "If I were in charge, I would have already done it."
Aman stopped, as though he'd stunned even himself. Then he added, with quiet forcefulness, 'Before I die, I hope I should see it.'""'Mr. Bush Don't Care'" (Victor Davis Hanson, The National Review, 2002/03/01)
"In these depressing times, such self-reliance, trust in one's own culture and history, and confidence in right as one sees that right are near-criminal offenses. Indeed, an entire vocabulary has cropped up to demonize aggressive defense of just such a rare and anachronistic belief — "unilateralism," "rejectionism," "triumphalism," "insularity," "saber-rattling," "naiveté," and so on - that Western notions of freedom, personal liberty, free critique, consensual government, religious diversity, rationalism, individualism, and open markets are not only unique in history, but, in fact, the only hope for mankind and so to be protected and advanced at all costs.""Saudi Arabia - Arab Reactions to Saudi Peace Initiative - Part I" (Inquiry and Analysis No. 86, MEMRI, 2002/03/01)
"Abd Al-Bari 'Atwan, editor-in-chief of the London Arabic-language daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi, was critical of the Saudi willingness to "break all the taboos" and normalize relations with "the Hebrew state." ... In another article, 'Atwan wrote that he wasn't certain that Prince Abdullah was aware of what full normalization meant: 'Has it occurred to him that normalization in tourism with the Hebrew state, to which he agreed, means that groups of Israelis will come to Al-Madina to conduct excavations in search of traces of their forefathers, and to hold religious festivals on their holidays in memory of the Bani Qurayza, Bani Qaynuq'a [Jewish tribes in the Arabian peninsula whom the Prophet Muhammad fought in the seventh century], just as they are doing at Djerba in Tunisia and at Abuhatzeira's tomb in Egypt?'""The Axis of Petulance" (Charles Krauthammer, The Washington Post, 2002/03/01)
"Europe knows that in the end, its security depends on our strength and our protection. Europeans are the ultimate free-riders on American power. We maintain the stability of international commerce, the freedom of the seas, the flow of oil, regional balances of power (in the Pacific Rim, South Asia, the Middle East) and, ultimately, we provide protection against potentially rising hostile superpowers. The Europeans sit and pout. What else can they do? The ostensible complaint is American primitivism. The real problem is their irrelevance."
Thursday,
February 28, 2002
News and commentary:
"Gun battles rage in West Bank" (BBC News, 2002/02/28)
"Eight Palestinians and an Israeli soldier are reported to have been killed and more than 90 wounded in gun battles in the West Bank. The clashes erupted when Israeli troops, backed by tanks and helicopter gunships, raided two refugee camps - Balata and Jenin - which the army described as "safe havens" of "terror organisations". The latest violence came after a female suicide bomber blew herself up on Wednesday night at an Israeli army checkpoint in the West Bank. It overshadowed a Saudi initiative aimed at bringing an end to 17 months of violence in the region."
Wednesday,
February 27, 2002
News and commentary:
"Many in Islamic world doubt Arabs behind 9/11" (Andrea Stone, USA Today, 2002/02/27)
"A sweeping poll of attitudes in the Islamic world shows that most Muslims don't believe Arabs carried out the Sept. 11 attacks and disapprove of the U.S. military campaign in Afghanistan. The Gallup Organization poll, released Tuesday, is the most comprehensive survey of Muslim countries taken since Sept. 11. It confirms anecdotal evidence of a huge gulf between the West and Muslim nations that existed before the attacks and remains deep. Although most Muslims condemn the terrorist attacks that sparked the U.S. war in Afghanistan, the poll shows a majority believe the campaign is morally unjustified and express a breathtaking depth of anti-U.S. sentiment."
Tuesday,
February 26, 2002
News and commentary:
"The road to Baghdad" (The Daily Telegraph, 2002/02/26)
"To the extent that there is such a thing as a common European foreign policy - which is, thank goodness, not very much - its cornerstone appears to be the protection of Saddam Hussein. Nations that were prepared, though in some cases reluctantly, to back America's war in Afghanistan, nevertheless see any move against Iraq as beyond the pale. The idea puts people like Chris Patten, Hubert Vedrine and Joschka Fischer in a great taking.""Anti-Semitic Crime Surges, Worrying French Jews" (Suzanne Daley, The New York Times, 2002/02/26)
"But for over a year, France has witnessed a wave of attacks on Jews. Increasingly, Jewish leaders are speaking out, challenging government statistics that they say minimize the problem and criticizing public officials who they say fail to denounce the mounting threats, insults and assaults directed at French Jews. Part of the current problem, they say, is that the attacks are no longer coming just from skinheads and other supporters of the far right as in the past. These days the assailants are often Arabs, who occupy the lowest echelons of this society. The increase in incidents has corresponded to the deteriorating situation in the Middle East."
Monday,
February 25, 2002
News and commentary:
"The Chosen One" (Michael Kamber, The Village Voice, 2002/02/25)
Kamber on anti-Semitism in Pakistan and the execution of Daniel Pearl: "'My father is a Jew, my mother is a Jew, and I am a Jew' are the last words Daniel Pearl uttered, an instant before his throat was slashed, according to government officials who have viewed the videotape of his murder. At least one of his captors has admitted that the kidnappers were specifically looking for a Jewish victim. Curiously, government officials and Pearl's family, as well as his employer, The Wall Street Journal, are downplaying this angle, as if drawing attention to what is clearly an anti-Jewish killing would dishonor Pearl, who was not an observant Jew. Yet his murderers are identified as members of "a fiercely anti-Semitic Islamic terrorist group called Jaish-e-Mohammed." I can only wonder about what qualifies as "fiercely anti-Semitic" in Pakistan, where anti-Semitism flows as easily as water. For several months following 9-11, the country's newspapers published frequent editorials calling for an investigation into Jewish involvement in the World Trade Center bombing. In interviews conducted while I was there, government officials would occasionally veer off into long diatribes about the Jews; fundamentalist religious leaders, who educate hundreds of thousands of children in the country's madrassas, spoke of little else. ... In such a climate, Daniel Pearl's kidnappers stripped him of his humanity; the funny, creative, fiddle-playing husband and father-to-be is lost. It is replaced with the enemy, the other, the Jew." (See also: "Filmed Execution of WSJ Reporter Sets Off Revulsion" (Brian Williams, Reuters/Yahoo! News, 2002/02/22))"The Most Politically Correct Magazine in the World" (Theodore Dalrymple, City Journal, 2002/02/25)
"If an award existed for the most politically correct publication in the world, The British Medical Journal would stand a good chance of winning it. ... A recent issue was devoted to the subject of war. The BMJ’s attitude to war is like that of President Coolidge’s to sin: it is against it. This is because war is so bad for the health. The white man has spoken. Fortunately for the world, the BMJ has discovered the causes of war. They are the same as the causes of all the other evils in the world: inequality and poverty. Just eliminate these, and universal peace will reign. It seems to have escaped the BMJ’s notice that attempts during the 20th century to achieve radical equality were not themselves entirely pacific or good for the health. Likewise, it failed to notice that famine was much more likely to be a consequence of war than its cause. And the idea that wars are fought when “individuals are motivated to fight to seek redress” for their poverty is laughable in its historical and psychological ignorance. Are Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein driven by poverty? Was General Galtieri? Do Pakistan and India fight over Kashmir because of - or is it in spite of - poverty?""Israeli president seeks Saudi talks" (BBC News, 2002/02/25)
"The Israeli President, Moshe Katsav, has said he is willing to travel to Saudi Arabia to discuss a new peace plan put forward by Crown Prince Abdullah. Alternatively, a statement by Mr Katsav's office said, the crown prince could come to Jerusalem for talks with the Israeli Government. Under the plan, Arab states would normalise relations with Israel in return for Israel's full withdrawal from the Arab land it has occupied since 1967.""Misunderstanding America" (Victor Davis Hanson, National Review, 2002/02/25)
"In contrast, the last 13 European allies I saw - French officials, British journalists, and EU bureaucrats - have uniformly voiced dissatisfaction with America. In some cases they express an almost visceral dislike of the United States. Perusal of some European magazines and newspapers reveals a similar continuum of disdain. ... Yet in the past six months, our European allies have been frittering away almost all of America's past positive sentiments toward the continent. After the European reaction to the aftermath of Sept. 11, I doubt seriously whether America would wish to intervene as we did in 1999 in Kosovo.""Why the Muslims Misjudged Us" (Victor Davis Hanson, The Wall Street Journal, 2002/02/25)
"So bewildered Americans now ask themselves: Why do so many of these anti-Americans, who profess hatred of the West and reverence for the purity of an energized Islam or a fiery Palestine, enroll in Chico State or UCLA instead of madrassas in Pakistan or military academies in Iraq? The embarrassing answer would explain nearly everything, from bin Laden to the intifada. Dads and moms who watch al-Jazeera and scream in the street at the Great Satan really would prefer that their children have dollars, an annual CAT scan, a good lawyer, air conditioning and Levis in American hell than be without toilet paper, suffer from intestinal parasites, deal with the secret police, and squint with uncorrected vision in the Islamic paradise of Cairo, Tehran and Gaza. Such a fundamental and intolerable paradox in the very core of a man's heart - multiplied millions of times over - is not a healthy thing either for them or for us, as we have learned since September 11."
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