Archived news and commentary: October 20 - 26, 2003

2003/12/29 - 2004/01/04
2003/12/22 - 2003/12/28
2003/12/15 - 2003/12/21
2003/12/08 - 2003/12/14
2003/12/01 - 2003/12/07
2003/11/24 - 2003/11/30
2003/11/17 - 2003/11/23
2003/11/10 - 2003/11/16
2003/11/03 - 2003/11/09
2003/10/27 - 2003/11/02
2003/10/20 - 2003/10/26
2003/10/13 - 2003/10/19
2003/10/06 - 2003/10/12
2003/09/29 - 2003/10/05

Sunday, October 26, 2003

News and commentary:

"A crucifix hangs on a wall of an elementary school in Naples, Italy..."
(AP Photo/Salvatore Laporta, 2003/10/26)
"A crucifix hangs on a wall of an elementary school in Naples, Italy, in this photo taken on Oct. 23, 2003 and made available Sunday, Oct. 26, 2003. The crucifix has long hung in classrooms across Italy, with generations growing up to the sight of this powerful Christian symbol. But a court ruling this weekend banned the cross from one school, setting off controversy in this secular but culturally Catholic nation."

"Storm over Italy crucifix ruling" (BBC News, 2003/10/26)
"A controversy has erupted in Italy over a court ruling ordering a state kindergarten to remove crucifixes from its classrooms.
A judge in the central town of L'Aquila upheld a complaint by an Italian Muslim leader, Adel Smith.
The ruling has re-opened a bitter debate about religious symbols.
Italy's Justice Minister said he would order an inquiry into whether the decision conformed with Italian law. ...
The president of a Muslim group, Adel Smith, initially suggested that a symbol from the Koran should be displayed alongside the crucifix in his children's classrooms.
When this was denied, he took his complaint to the courts.
The judge ruled that the crucifixes showed "the unequivocal desire by the state, when it comes to public education, to place the Catholic religion at the centre of the universe", in disregard for other religions.
The school has 30 days to carry out the judge's order and remove the crucifix. ...
But the ruling has shocked the Roman Catholic Church.
"You cannot remove a symbol of the religious and cultural values of a people just because it can offend someone," said a leading prelate, Cardinal Ersilio Tonini.
A number of government ministers were similarly outraged.
"It is unacceptable that one judge should cancel out millennia of history," said Labour Minister Roberto Maroni."

"Wolfowitz Escapes Deadly Baghdad Strike" (Charles J. Hanley, AP/The Guardian, 2003/10/26)
"In a daring strike, insurgents attacked the heart of the U.S. occupation Sunday, unleashing a barrage of rockets against the Al Rasheed hotel, where U.S. officials live and where visiting Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was staying. Wolfowitz escaped, but an American colonel was killed and 15 people were wounded. ...
Scores of American officials fled the hotel in pajamas and shorts after the 6:10 a.m. assault, in which a rocket battery on a timer, wheeled into a nearby park, hit the hotel with eight to 10 missiles. Holes pockmarked the Al Rasheed's modern, concrete facade, and windows were shattered in two dozen rooms.
Wolfowitz, who appeared shaken as he addressed reporters at the convention center across the street where most officials fled, vowed the attack would not deter the United States in its mission to transform Iraq.
"There are a few who refuse to accept the reality of a new and free Iraq," he said. 'We will be unrelenting in our pursuit of them.'"

"Report: Capitol Was Sept. 11 Attackers Fourth Goal" (Reuters, 2003/10/26)
"The U.S. Capitol Building, not the White House, was the fourth target of the Sept. 11 attackers, a German magazine reported Sunday citing results of interrogations of suspected al Qaeda leaders.
Der Spiegel said also planning for the attacks on New York and Washington in 2001 began as early as 1996, but plans hatched in 1999 to use four planes in the attacks were temporarily halted because only two pilots could then obtain U.S. visas. The operation, code-named "Porsche 911" by its perpetrators, was finalized in July 2001, the magazine said.
"The Porsche is ready to start," it cited Mohamed Atta, the Egyptian-born student who piloted one of the two hijacked planes that destroyed the World Trade Center, as saying.
Another hijacked plane hit the Pentagon, while a fourth crashed in Pennsylvania before it could reach its target in Washington. Around 3,000 people died in the attacks.
Spiegel magazine said its report was based on transcripts of the U.S. interrogation of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused mastermind of the attacks, and Ramzi bin al-Shaibah, the man suspected of coordinating them. ...
According to Spiegel, Sheikh Mohammed first suggested in 1996 an attack on the headquarters of the CIA using a chartered jet but this was rejected by al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden as not being spectacular enough. Sheikh Mohammed later suggested a 10-plane attack, it added."

"Muslim paranoia: Enemies made us impotent!" (Mark Steyn, Chicago Sun-Times, 2003/10/26)
Steyn on the "vanishing penis hysteria" in Sudan: "It is, in that sense, the perfect emblematic tale of Islamic victimhood: The foreigners have made us impotent! It doesn't matter that the foreigners didn't do anything except shake hands. It doesn't matter whether you are, in fact, impotent. You feel impotent, just as - so we're told - millions of Muslims from Algerian Islamists to the Bali bombers feel "humiliated" by the Palestinian situation. Whether or not there is a rational basis for their sense of humiliation is irrelevant.
One of the things I'd feel humiliated about if I lived in the Arab world is that almost all the forms of expression of my anti-Westernism are themselves Western in origin. ...
Even Islamic fundamentalism, though ostensibly a rare example of a homegrown toxin, has, as a practical matter, more in common with European revolutionary movements than with traditional expressions of Islam - an essentially political project piggybacking on an ancient religion to create the ideology of choice for the world's troublemakers.
There's something pathetic about a culture so ignorant even its pathologies have to be imported. But what do you expect? The telling detail of the vanishing penis hysteria is that it was spread by text messaging. You can own a cell phone, yet still believe that foreigners are able with a mere handshake to cause your penis to melt away." (See also: "Panic in Khartoum: Foreigners Shake Hands, Make Penises Disappear" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 593, 2003/10/23))

"Deadly Denial" (Daniel Pipes, New York Post/danielpipes.org, 2003/10/26)
"In its attitudes toward Jews, the Muslim world today resembles Germany of the 1930s - a time when state-sponsored insults, caricatures, conspiracy theories and sporadic violence prepared Germans for the mass murder that followed.
The same might be happening today. Wild accusatory comments like Mahathir's have become banal. Against Israelis, violence has already reached a rate approaching one death per day over the past three years. Outside Israel, violence against Jews is also persistent: a Jewish building blown up in Argentina, Daniel Pearl's murder in Pakistan, stabbings in France, the Brooklyn Bridge and LAX killings in the United States.
These episodes, plus calling Jews "apes and pigs," could serve as the psychological preparation that one day leads to assaulting Israel with weapons of mass destruction. Armaments chemical, biological and nuclear would be the successors of Auschwitz, Buchenwald and Dachau. Millions of Jews would perish in another Holocaust.
As in the 1930s, the world at large - including the U.S. government - again seems not to note the deadliness of processes now underway. Anti-Jewish rhetoric and violence are decried, to be sure, but with little sense of urgency and even less of their cumulative impact.
Condoleezza Rice and other top-ranking officials need to recognize the power and reach of the anti-Jewish ideology inculcated among Muslims, then develop active ways to fight it. This evil has already taken innocent lives; unless combated it could take many more."

"What do Arabs think about the Holocaust? Arabs Sign Guest Book at Holocaust Exhibit" (Mordechai Kedar, IMRA, 2003/10/26)
"The SNP Museum in the Slovak town Banska Bystrica recently hosted a traveling exhibit of photographs of women, Jewish and non-Jewish, maltreated in Auschwitz and elsewhere during the Holocaust period. Here is the translation of a page of the guest book, containing the entries of four Arab visitors dated September 7, 2003 (copy of original page available):

1. This exhibit testifies to the quality of organization and handling [of the mission]. From a historical perspective, what Hitler did to the Jews is exactly what they deserve. Still, we would have wished that he could have finished incinerating all the Jews in the world, but time ran out on him and therefore Allah's curse be on him and on them.
(-) Khaled al-Zahraya from Saudi Arabia, 07.09.03

2. This is a museum showing a restaurant [specializing in] Jewish meat, which is what they deserve. Sons of apes and pigs. The day after the attempt to murder Ahmad Yasin.
'Umar al-Da'm, Yemen 07.09.03

3. Ibrahim al-'Arimi, Sultanate of Oman
The most beautiful sights of Jews.
(-) 07.09.03

4. I say what they all say, and will just add that they [Jews] are cursed in this world and the next.
Madih, Yemen. 07.09.2003"

"Radical Islam Gains a Seductive New Voice" (David Rohde, The New York Times, 2003/10/26)
Rohde on Mahathir's speech: "The acceptance of such conspiratorial views may strike Americans as despicable or even laughable, but they reflect the influence of Islamic radicals on the worldviews of millions of Muslims. Conveyed with ease and authority via the Internet and satellite television, anti-American and anti-Semitic conspiracy theories abound, not only in Muslim countries but across the world.
Many of these theories are spread by radical groups that adhere to an ideology loosely known as political Islam. Stridently anti-Western and antimodern, political Islam portrays itself as the strongest ideological counter to democracy and capitalism.
Radical Islamists do far more than simply declare that President Bush and Israel, for example, are evil. Political Islam is a sophisticated mixture of fundamentalism and nationalism that can foment acts of violence against Western targets. But for its followers, it is a romantic liberation movement — a militant ideology with Marxist echoes that combines Islam's powerful call for social equality with a critique of Western corporate imperialism and the corrupt Muslim elites who benefit from it.
The growing voice of political Islam suggests that the United States faces a much more nebulous enemy in its war on terrorism than a movement of religious zealots. It is an ideology that persuades some alienated young Muslims, whether deeply religious or not, to join what they see as an epic struggle against an evil empire." (See also: "Jews rule the world: Mahathir" (news.com.au, 2003/10/16))

"A Cultural Scorecard Says West Is Ahead" (Emily Eakin, The New York Times, 2003/10/26)
An article on Charles Murray's "Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts and Sciences, 800 B.C. to 1950":
"At a moment of considerable East-West tension, when the phrase "clash of civilizations" has rarely had greater currency, Mr. Murray has issued what he says is a mathematically precise global assessment of human achievement, a "résumé" of the species in which Europeans like Shakespeare, Beethoven and Einstein predominate and in which Christianity stands out as a crucial spur to excellence. Equally provocative, he maintains that the rate of Western accomplishment is currently in decline.
"As I write, it appears Europe's run is over," he asserts. "In another few hundred years, books will probably be exploring the reasons why some completely different part of the world became the locus of great human accomplishment. Now is a good time to stand back in admiration. What the human species is today it owes in astonishing degree to what was accomplished in just half a dozen centuries by the peoples of one small portion of the northwestern Eurasian land mass." ...
Using 34 reference works in four languages, Mr. Murray produced inventories for eight fields — astronomy, biology, chemistry, earth sciences, physics, mathematics, medicine and technology — as well as a combined index ranking scientists from all disciplines. In all, Europeans and North Americans account for 97 percent of scientific accomplishment."

"Iraq Survey Fails to Find Nuclear Threat" (Barton Gellman, Washington Post, 2003/10/26)
"According to records made available to The Washington Post and interviews with arms investigators from the United States, Britain and Australia, it did not require a comprehensive survey to find the central assertions of the Bush administration's prewar nuclear case to be insubstantial or untrue. Although Hussein did not relinquish his nuclear ambitions or technical records, investigators said, it is now clear he had no active program to build a weapon, produce its key materials or obtain the technology he needed for either.
Among the closely held internal judgments of the Iraq Survey Group, overseen by David Kay as special representative of CIA Director George J. Tenet, are that Iraq's nuclear weapons scientists did no significant arms-related work after 1991, that facilities with suspicious new construction proved benign, and that equipment of potential use to a nuclear program remained under seal or in civilian industrial use."

"Rockets Hit Baghdad Hotel Where Wolfowitz Staying" (Carol Giacomo, Reuters, 2003/10/26)
"Anti-American guerrillas blasted the Baghdad hotel where U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was staying with a barrage of rockets on Sunday, but the No. 2 Pentagon official survived unharmed, U.S. officials said.
A defiant Wolfowitz vowed that the United States would not be cowed into abandoning Iraq after the brazen attack that he said may have killed one American.
Up to 15 people were wounded in the strike that is a setback for the Bush administration, undermining its insistence that the United States is winning the guerrilla war in Iraq.
The blast of the rockets hitting the Rashid Hotel at about 6 a.m. (0300 GMT) echoed across the city as a clear, rapid series of explosions. Several guests were thrown from their beds by the impact."

"Report: El Al missile threat real" (The Jerusalem Post, 2003/10/26)
"The missile threat that diverted an El Al flight from Toronto to Montreal Thursday was gaining weight Sunday as Canadian police traced the origins and destination of a German-made rocket launcher.
The Calgary Sun reported that the equipment found among 14 caches of weapons entered Canada at a postal plant between April 2001 and March 2003.
The rocket shoulder launcher can be outfitted with heat-seeking missiles, and officials have said that a heat-seeking missile was to be used in the attack." (See also: "El Al plane diverted second time" (Adrian Humphreys, National Post, 2003/10/25) and "El Al flight to Toronto threatened" (Adrian Humphreys and Stewart Bell, National Post, 2003/10/24))

Added in archive:
"Anti-Israel activists at Durban were funded by Ford Foundation" (Edwin Black, JTA, 2003/10/16)

Saturday, October 25, 2003

News and commentary:

"The Destruction of the USA..."
(Anna Bunny, Belligerent Bunny Blog, 2003/10/25)
From "Solidarity with Saddam" (Anna Bunny, Belligerent Bunny Blog, 2003/10/25), with pictures from the D.C. "anti-war" rally: "The Destruction of the U.S.A. is a necessary condition for Peace..."

"Polio and rumors spreading in Nigeria" (Glenn McKenzie, AP/The Seattle Times, 2003/10/25)
"Squeezing droppers into the mouths of tearful toddlers, health workers launched an emergency drive yesterday to vaccinate Nigerians against polio, an effort impeded by rumors among Muslim fundamentalists that the vaccine was part of a U.S. plot to spread AIDS and render Muslims infertile.
Teams raced to immunize 15 million African children at immediate risk as a spreading outbreak — Nigeria has 192 known cases — threatened efforts to eradicate the disease.
"The Western world has never wished Muslims well," said Yakubu Husseini, a 20-year-old teacher coming out of Friday prayers in the northern city of Kano. "Why should they expect us to believe that vaccines they make these days are not another frontier to wage war against Muslims?" ...
In Kano, where state officials said yesterday they were delaying the vaccine drive without explaining why, a group of men leaving the city's main mosque discussed the decision.
"Allah knows better than all Western powers combined," said Ya'u Kabir, a 26-year-old Muslim theology student. 'He has guided the Muslim community since the time of old. This he did without immunization. We do not need it.'"

"Dozens of Canadians join Jihad terror camps" (Stewart Bell and Michael Friscolanti, National Post, 2003/10/25)
"There has been a slow but steady procession of Canadian Muslims to jihad over the past decade, many of them via the terror training bases of eastern Afghanistan, where recruits were indoctrinated into radical anti-Western ideology and taught how to make explosives and chemical weapons. ...
While they make up only a tiny minority of the Muslim population, Canadian jihadis have nonetheless caused significant damage.
They have attacked allied soldiers, participated in plots to kill hundreds of civilians and sullied Canada's international reputation along the way.
None of them has ever faced any criminal charges in Canada for terrorist activities.
The worst they have suffered at the hands of Canadian authorities is deportation to their homelands, or extradition to other countries that want to lock them up."

"A War in three takes" (Bret Stephens, The Jerusalem Post Literary Querterly, from the Fall 2003 issue)
Reviews of three books on the battle for Baghdad, including "Salam Pax: The Clandestine Diary of an Ordinary Iraqi": "For real courage and integrity, we turn to the last of our insta-books, Baghdad Blog by the pseudonymous, anonymous, Salam Pax. ...
About a month after the war’s end, Salam tells the story of a conversation with a taxi driver, who bewails the looting and chaos and the lack of basic services — so unlike the good old days of Saddam.
"This is usually my cue for going into rage-mode," Salam writes.
"We Iraqis seem to have very short memories… I ask them how long it took for us to get the electricity back again after the last war? Two years… Hussein Kamel used to literally beat and whip people to do the impossible task of rebuilding.
"Then the question that would shut them up: ’So, dear Mr. Taxi Driver, would you like to have your Saddam back? Aren’t we just really glad that we can now at least have hope for a new Iraq? Or are we Iraqis just a bunch of impatient fools who do nothing better than grumble and whine?"
That is the question. It's worrying that it has to be asked. But it is a sign of hope that, in Salam Pax, we have found an Iraqi who thinks to ask it. Every word he writes serves as a fitting rebuke to those who took to the streets and airwaves convinced that bringing democracy to Iraq was a hopeless enterprise. A man like Blair could ask for no better evidence that this was a war worth fighting." (See also: "A Post From Baghdad Station" (Salam Pax, where is raed, 2003/05/07))

"Al Qaeda's New Base" (Jeffrey Bell, The Weekly Standard, from the 2003/11/03 issue)
"At a time when even nuances of Iraq reconstruction policy become flashpoints for bureaucratic infighting, causing competing leaks to spring from almost every precinct of the administration's foreign policy apparatus, the most consequential policy struggle of all is playing out in virtual silence. That is the debate over what to do about the fact that, for the first time since the fall of the Taliban regime in late 2001, major elements of al Qaeda seem to have acquired a new home. The address is eastern Iran.
This fact, and the nature of the debate surrounding it, was revealed in a thoroughly reported front-page article by Douglas Farah and Dana Priest in the October 14 Washington Post. According to a consensus of American, European, and Arab intelligence officials, the article said, the "upper echelon" of al Qaeda - including a favored older son of Osama bin Laden and the group's de facto secretary of war and secretary of the treasury - "is managing the terrorist organization from Iran." ...
It would be foolish, of course, to minimize either the difficulties, or the paramount importance, of bringing peace and self-government to post-invasion Iraq and Afghanistan. But it would be at least equally foolish to minimize the danger to these efforts posed by a reconstituted and revitalized al Qaeda, newly headquartered in the Islamist rogue state that sits between Iraq and Afghanistan." (See also: "Bin Laden Son Plays Key Role in Al Qaeda" (Douglas Farah and Dana Priest, The Washington Post, 2003/10/14))

"The Right Fight Now" (Tom Donnelly and Gary Schmitt, The Washington Post Outlook, from the 2003/10/26 issue)
"Although the Bush administration can rightly point to successes in reconstructing Iraq since Saddam Hussein's regime was toppled, the fact remains that unless the security situation in Iraq is brought under control and the insurgency there decisively defeated, those successes can never be made permanent and the president's larger hopes for a stable, democratic Iraq will never be fulfilled. ...
As currently employed in Iraq, the American military can prevent the insurgents from winning. But the insurgents do not have to win; they simply have to avoid losing. Their goal is not to change the facts on the ground as much as to change American perceptions of the viability of the president's vision for Iraq. That country's rejectionists are aiming at what they perceive to be the greatest U.S. weakness: sensitivity to public opinion, especially with a potentially bitter presidential campaign looming. Hence, a successful counterinsurgency strategy must aim to win, and not just to hold on.
Winning is a political matter as well as a military one. The commitment of Iraqis to democratizing their country is based upon the belief that coalition forces will make it safe to conduct this unprecedented experiment. For them, an end to Hussein's regime must also mean an end to fear. If they don't see the coalition winning decisively against the insurgents, they will start planning for their own security by creating or expanding their own existing militias. If that happens, a stable, unified Iraq might become a very distant goal indeed."

"El Al plane diverted second time" (Adrian Humphreys, National Post, 2003/10/25)
"An Israeli passenger jet again steered clear of Toronto's airport yesterday, the same day an Israeli report said the security concern is a plot by al-Qaeda to take down El Al's popular Tel Aviv to Toronto flight.
"Information received by Israel was that the al-Qaeda organization intends to harm El Al Flight 105," the daily newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth said yesterday, quoting unidentified officials in Israel. ...
David Collenette, the Minister of Transport, said it is possible future El Al flights through Toronto will be rerouted.
"In terms of future flights, that is certainly something that we will work with security forces and El Al to determine," Mr. Collenette said.
"I want to assure travellers there is not a problem with travelling to Pearson, to Toronto. But it was specific to that flight.... As for subsequent El Al flights, that's something we will have to deliberate, considering the various intelligence that we receive, and we're working with others on that." (See also: "El Al flight to Toronto threatened" (Adrian Humphreys and Stewart Bell, National Post, 2003/10/24))

Friday, October 24, 2003

News and commentary:

"Death of a Princess" (Christopher Dickey, Newsweek, 2003/10/24)
Dickey on the belief in "much of the Middle East and Africa" that Princess Diana was murdered because she was dating a Muslim Egyptian: "But the mysteries conjured around the incident are fascinating nonetheless. They tell you so much about the power of conspiratorial thinking, and especially the effect it can have in that penumbral chasm, so full of unspoken suspicions and fears, that divides the West from the Muslim world.
No, I'm not reading too much into it. The centerpiece of one grand conspiracy theory about Diana's death, the supposedly compelling motive without which it makes no sense, is quite simply, race: The Princess of Wales, divorced mother of the future king of England, was dating a Muslim Egyptian. Therefore she was murdered.
In much of the Middle East and Africa, this is taken as a given, and has been since before any evidence of any kind was presented anywhere. ...
But for those who believe in conspiracies almost as a matter of faith, the worries, neuroses, mistakes, accidents that are part of all our lives — they only get in the way. There's got to be a grand design, whether based on race, or greed, a sinister protocol, an evil cabal, or some secret utterly beyond our ken. Otherwise how could you explain your own helplessness?" (See also: "The September 11 X-Files" - News and commentary on conspiracy theories regarding the September 11 attacks and the war on terror.)

"Footprints of a nuclear deal" (Anwar Iqbal, UPI, 2003/10/24)
More on the alleged nuclear pact between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan: "UPI's Arnaud de Borchgrave, who broke the story from Islamabad earlier this week, said Friday, "I knew that denials would rain down from both countries. They were hardly in a position to confirm a secret understanding 48 hours after it had taken place. Besides, denials from both countries about many major events that subsequently turned out to be correct news reports are fairly routine. The late President Zia ul-Haq denied repeatedly during his 11 years in power that Pakistan was involved in a nuclear weapons program. Saudi officials have also denied time and again that they were funding Pakistan's madrassas (Koranic schools) to the tune of several billion dollars since 1989 where several million young Pakistani boys have been taught only the Koran by heart -- and to hate America, Israel and India. Despite all the adverse publicity, the Saudi clergy is still funding them today."
A U.S. State Department study last year reported that senior Saudi officials had discussed the prospect of nuclear weapons cooperation with Pakistan.
The report, published in the department's strategic journal the U.S. Foreign Policy Agenda, said although "Saudi Arabia does not have weapons of mass destruction, it did ... buy long-range CSS-2 ballistic missiles from China."
"Very senior Saudi officials have held conversations with officials involved in the Pakistani nuclear program, and possibly with similar officials in other countries," said author Anthony Cordesman, a former Pentagon official who wrote the report for the State Department." (See also: "Pakistan-Saudi trade nuke tech for oil" (Arnaud de Borchgrave, UPI, 2003/10/20) and "Weapons of Mass Destruction: The New Strategic Framework" (U. S. Department of State, July 2002))

"Iraq donors pledge at least $13bn" (BBC News, 2003/10/24)
The donors' conference in Madrid III: "A summit of international donors has raised at least $13bn in pledges, mainly in grants, to help towards the reconstruction of Iraq.
With $20bn already pledged by the United States, the $33bn total falls short of the estimated $56bn needed to rebuild the war-torn country.
But organisers are pleased with the outcome of the conference in Madrid. ...
The pledges included:

• $5bn from Japan in grants and loans
• $500m from Kuwait
• $500m from Saudi Arabia in loans plus $500m in export credits
• $232m from Italy
• $812m from the European Union
• $290,000 from Slovakia
• $24.2m from China
• $3bn-$5bn from the World Bank
• $4.35bn over three years from International Monetary Fund"

"The Event of the Age" (Victor Davis Hanson, National Review, 2003/10/24)
"For some reason or another, a series of enormously important issues — the future of the Middle East, the credibility of the United States as both a strong and a moral power, the war against the Islamic fundamentalists, the future of the U.N. and NATO, our own politics here at home — now hinge on America's efforts at creating a democracy out of chaos in Iraq. That is why so many politicians — in the U.N., the EU, Germany, France, the corrupt Middle East governments, and a host of others — are so strident in their criticism, so terrified that in a postmodern world the United States can still recognize evil, express moral outrage, and then sacrifice money and lives to eliminate something like Saddam Hussein and leave things far better after the fire and smoke clear. ...
Yet here we stand, a little more than six months later, with a country that was the worst in the Middle East evolving into the best. We are witnessing nothing less than the revolutionary and great moral event of the age, and when it comes to pass, a reborn democratic Iraq will overturn almost all the conventional wisdom, here and abroad, about the Middle East, the nature and purpose of war in our age, the moral differences between Europe and America — and the place in history of George W. Bush.
No wonder the current hysteria looks likely to increase in the months ahead."

"Malaysian road map" (Caroline Glick, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/10/24)
Glick on the "road map" outlined in Mahathir's speech: "For his fellow Islamic heads of state and leaders, Mahathir is not a madman but a sage. Speaking of Mahathir's speech, Egypt's foreign minister Ahmed Maher said, "I think it was a shrewd and very deep assessment of the situation." Maher added, "I hope the Islamic countries will be able to follow this very important road map."
Given the standing ovation that Mahathir received at the conference, as well as the daily diet of anti-Semitism broadcast and published throughout the Islamic world, it seems safe to say that the views he enunciated are more or less mainstream in the Islamic world today. Because of this, it is important to understand the "road map" set out by Mahathir in his address and assess its ramifications for Israel's future.
In his 4,200 word homily, Mahathir restated his long-held belief that the Islamic world needs to modernize. For this he has long been touted in the West as a moderate and a reformist. Yet unlike states such as South Korea or Singapore, which view modernization as a goal in and of itself, Mahathir views it as a means to a larger pan-Islamic end. That end is the defeat of the West by the Islamic world.
And the shortest path to eventual victory is the destruction of Israel. Victory goes through Israel, in Mahathir's view, because although the US and Europe are the true targets, they will only accept Islam as their master after their current master, the Jews, are destroyed." (See also: "Jews rule the world: Mahathir" (news.com.au, 2003/10/16))

"A Crime of the Young Stalks France's Urban Wastelands" (Elaine Sciolino, The New York Times, 2003/10/24)
"This world is not like France." A terrifying report from the Paris suburb Vigneux-sur-Seine on gang-rapes:
"The boys were patient, standing in line and waiting their turn to rape.
Their two victims, girls of 13, were patient, too, never crying out, at least that is what the neighbors said, and enduring the violence and abuse repeatedly over five months. ...
"I've heard too many of these stories, and it's become unbearable," said Samira Bellil, 30, a gang-rape victim, whose book, "In Gang-Rape Hell," was a best seller in France last year. "The word of the boys is often believed. So the trauma is not just the violence but the torment that comes if a girl comes forward and breaks the silence. We have to stop taking sides with the wolves."
Ms. Bellil was gang-raped at age 14. She had fallen in love, and agreed to have sex with her boyfriend. Three of his friends were waiting outside. They kicked and beat her and gang-raped her throughout the night. She waited before reporting the rapes, and did so only after three of her friends told her that they too had been raped by one of her attackers. ...
The neighborhood butcher, from Algeria, talked about the suburb as a world apart. "If a girl goes out, she's going to get into trouble, especially with Arabs and blacks, because they are not used to seeing girls outside," he said. "The boys have needs. Where I come from, it's not normal that a girl goes out at night. If I tell my sister not to go out, she obeys me. This world is not like France." ...
After one of the girls spoke out, said Mr. Le Mehaute, the lawyer, "she couldn't go out anymore."
"People spat on her. There was tremendous psychological damage. Both girls felt humiliated, dirty."
The girl's 39-year-old father became so depressed after the truth was disclosed that last summer he hanged himself. The girl had tried but failed to kill herself the year before by slashing her arms. Both girls were harassed so mercilessly that have since moved away from the project. One lives with relatives, the other in state-run housing." (See also: "Girls Terrorized in France's Macho High-Rise Ghettos" (Catherine Bremer, Reuters, 2003/02/28) and "The Barbarians at the Gates of Paris" (Theodore Dalrymple, City Journal, from the Autumn 2002 issue))

"Syria, Long Ruthlessly Secular, Sees Fervent Islamic Resurgence" (Neil MacFarquhar, The New York Times, 2003/10/24)
An article on the "dramatic religious resurgence" in Syria: "In the face of threats from the United States and Israel, Syria seeks to forge nationalist sentiment with any means possible, experts believe, including fostering the very brand of religious fundamentalism that it once pruned so mercilessly.
"This is an attempt at mobilization," said Abdul Razzak Eid, a well-known political writer in this historic city, the country's second largest, 210 miles north of Damascus. "They want to create an aggressive feeling against the Americans."
It is, he and others note, a dangerous game. Experiments at fostering fundamentalist movements to counter some perceived threat can backfire.
"There is no overt political Islam," Mr. Eid said, "but they are building a base, and the moment they have the chance, they will act to become fanatic, extremist movements."
Syria, of course, knows about extremist movements. Increasingly violent skirmishes with the Muslim Brotherhood prompted President Hafez al-Assad to move against them in 1982, sending troops to kill at least 10,000 people and smashing the old city of Hama.
Hundreds of fundamentalist leaders were jailed, many never seen alive again."

"Rumsfeld pushes 'new sense of urgency'" (Bill Gertz, The Washington Times, 2003/10/24)
An interview with Donald Rumsfeld: "The memo was intended to "inject a sense of urgency" into top leadership, Mr. Rumsfeld said.
"It is human nature to have your mind focused by fear or necessity for a period — necessity is the mother of invention and fear focuses the mind. Both are true — and then time passes," he said. "And there's a danger that that sense of urgency can ease and relax."
The memo was meant to inspire war fighters and defense officials to consider what is lacking. Mr. Rumsfeld said he hopes they will start asking themselves: "Are there things we aren't doing that we might be doing?"
He said that creating a post for an undersecretary for intelligence and merging agencies into the Homeland Security Department were bold steps, but more can be done.
Mr. Rumsfeld suggested a "21st-century information agency in the government" to help in the international battle of ideas, to limit the teaching of terrorism and extremism, and to provide better education, he said." (See also: "Rumsfeld's war-on-terror memo" (USA Today, 2003/10/22))

"U.S. Indicts Prominent Muslim Here - Affidavit: Alamoudi Funded Terrorists" (Douglas Farah, The Washington Post, 2003/10/24)
"One of the nation's most prominent Muslim activists was indicted yesterday on money laundering and fraud charges hours after authorities unsealed an affidavit alleging that for years he helped fund al Qaeda and other terrorist groups.
Abdurahman Alamoudi, whose efforts gave Muslim Americans unparalleled access to the White House and Congress, was not formally charged with supporting terrorism. Instead, the 18-count indictment accused Alamoudi of the less serious offenses of taking hundreds of thousands of dollars from Libya, designated a state sponsor of terrorism by the State Department, and attempting to hide its origin and purpose from U.S. authorities. ...
That document alleges that hundreds of thousands of dollars were moved through charities run by Alamoudi to groups that supported terrorism. Members of one group that received $160,000 from an Alamoudi-run charity in 2000 were implicated in the foiled December 2000 Millennium plot by al Qaeda to blow up Los Angeles International Airport and Seattle's Space Needle."

"Iraqi official says limited German, French help won't be forgotten" (CNN.com, 2003/10/24)
The donors' conference in Madrid II: "A top Iraqi official attending an international conference on raising funds to rebuild Iraq warned Thursday that France and Germany's limited donations would not be forgotten.
Ayad Allawi, the current head of Iraq's U.S.-appointed governing council, said he hoped German and French officials would reconsider their decision not to boost their contributions beyond funds already pledged through the European Union.
"As far as Germany and France are concerned, really, this was a regrettable position they had," Allawi said. 'I don't think the Iraqis are going to forget easily that in the hour of need, those countries wanted to neglect Iraq.'"

"Arabs 'Balking' On Funds for Iraq" (Glenn Kessler and Keith B. Richburg, The Washington Post, 2003/10/24)
The donors' conference in Madrid I: "Even the United Arab Emirates, one of the countries hosting a two-day donors' conference that opened here Thursday, has not yet signaled how much it will provide, the sources said.
"Yes, they are balking," one U.S. official said of the Arab states, as the American side continued to press hard for a breakthrough. Without Saudi participation, he said, it would be difficult to create a "snowball effect" among Arab donors. The Saudis are the " 'big brother' of the Gulf, [but] they have not helped in a constructive fashion," the official said.
Of the Arab countries, only Kuwait so far has announced it will make a substantial contribution, frustrating U.S. officials who want the conference to show broad support in the Arab world for the U.S. effort in Iraq."

"El Al flight to Toronto threatened" (Adrian Humphreys and Stewart Bell, National Post, 2003/10/24)
"An Israeli airliner flying to Toronto from Tel Aviv was diverted from Pearson International Airport after a credible security threat was received during the plane's 12-hour flight.
Yesterday morning's El Al Flight 105 - a Boeing 767 with 193 people on board - was diverted to Montreal's Mirabel airport for safety reasons because the threat against it was specific to the plane's arrival at Toronto airport, officials said.
There were reports last night that a missile threat was made against the airliner, but authorities refused to discuss the nature of the security risk."

Note: FrontPageMagazine has posted my translation of an article on Muslim Jew-hatred in Sweden, which is kind of cool as I am a regular reader of the site and want the article to be read: "Anti-Semitism Skyrocketing in Sweden" (Sverker Oredsson and Mikael Tossavainen, FrontPageMagazine, 2003/10/24)
See also: "Silence surrounds Muslim Jew-hatred" (Sverker Oredsson and Mikael Tossavainen, Dagens Nyheter/Watch, 2003/10/20)

Thursday, October 23, 2003

News and commentary:

"Miss Kabul in Manila"
(HindustanTimes.com, 2003/10/23)
"Miss Afghanistan Vida Samadzai leads other Miss Earth candidates during a press preview in Manila on October 23, 2003. Samadzai is among contestants from 60 countries vying for the Miss Earth title in the final next month."

"Afghan beauty queen makes history" (BBC News, 2003/10/23)
"Afghanistan is to compete in a beauty contest for the first time in more than 30 years and almost two years after the fall of the oppressive Taleban regime.
Vida Samadzai, 25, who has lived in the United States since 1996, will compete alongside 60 other women from across the world for the Miss Earth title in Manila, the Philippines, contest organisers said.
Ms Samadzai, or Miss Afghanistan as she will be known in the competition, will take part in all sections of the contest, including the swimsuit section.
It is a sharp contrast to the beliefs of the former Taleban regime, which demanded that women wear coverings, or burqas, from head to toe whenever they went out in public."

"Arafat's volatile investigation" (Khaled Abu Toameh, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/10/23)
An interesting and revealing article about Arafat's investigation of the killing of three Americans in the northern Gaza Strip last week: "For the first time in many months, Arafat and the PA have found themselves under unprecedented pressure from the US and the European Union to arrest those responsible for the deadly bombing. Arafat told one of his aides earlier this week that he couldn't understand why everyone was so interested in the deaths of three Americans at a time when Palestinians are being killed almost on a daily basis. ...
Meanwhile, the Palestinian media, which is controlled almost entirely by Arafat and his entourage, is telling the Palestinians that there is no doubt that Israel and the Jews were behind the killing of the Americans. Several articles, editorials and cartoons appearing in Palestinian newspapers since the attack have spared no effort in explaining to the readers that Israel was behind the attack. Their reasoning: Israel is trying to drive a wedge between the Palestinians and the Americans.
Arafat reportedly shares this "conspiracy theory." A senior Fatah official who met with him over the weekend said Arafat repeatedly claimed that "Israel and the Jews" were behind the attack because they "want to turn the Americans and the rest of the world against me." Arafat, according to the official, went on to explain that he was certain that Palestinian collaborators working for Shin Bet and Mossad had planted the roadside bomb that killed the three Americans.
"He said he will do everything to capture those who carried out the attack in order to prove to the US and the world that they are Israeli agents," the official added. 'He's convinced that [Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon is responsible. He still believes that the Israeli security services killed Yitzhak Rabin and [tourism minister Rehavam] Ze'evi. He's a real believer in conspiracies.'" (See also: "Palestinians: Israel behind Gaza attack" (Khaled Abu Toameh, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/10/16))

"Galloway expelled from Labour" (Matthew Tempest, The Guardian, 2003/10/23)
Even if it really was a "political show trial", shouldn't that be just fine with someone who supported the Soviet Union and was the chairman of the Great Britain Iraq Society?: "George Galloway has been expelled from the Labour party after being found guilty of four of the five charges of bringing the party into disrepute. ...
The charges faced by Mr Galloway were that:
· he incited Arabs to fight British troops
· he incited British troops to defy orders ...
· he incited Plymouth voters to reject Labour MPs,
· he threatened to stand against Labour
· he backed an anti-war candidate in Preston. ...
At the opening of the tribunal yesterday, Mr Galloway dubbed it a "political show trial", saying it was more appropriate to the regime of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad than to modern day Britain. ...
Mr Galloway told Abu Dhabi TV that the war in Iraq was illegal and urged British troops not to obey "illegal orders".
And he asked: 'Why don't Arabs do something for the Iraqis? Where are the Arab armies? We wonder when the Arab leaders wake up? When are they going to stand by the Iraqi people?'" (See also: "Saddam and me" (Simon Hattenstone, The Guardian, 2002/09/16))

"Palestinian gunmen kill suspected collaborators, display bodies" (AP/The Jerusalem Post, 2003/10/23)
"Masked Palestinian gunmen killed two Palestinian men suspected of collaborating with Israel on Thursday before displaying their bodies in the central square of the Tulkarem refugee camp, witnesses and Palestinian security officials said. ...
A source in Al Aqsa said the men had been kidnapped and interrogated by Islamic Jihad, but that the two groups had carried out the killings together "to share the honor." ...
Just after daylight Thursday, the two suspected collaborators were taken into an alley and shot at close range, said a witness who asked not to be identified.
The bullet-riddled bodies were then dragged to the central square and propped up for camp residents to see, witnesses said. The bodies were displayed for about 15 minutes around 7 a.m., a time when residents are heading to work and children are on their way to school."

"Are Suicide Bombings Morally Defensible?" (Richard Wolin, The Chronicle Review, from the 2003/10/24 issue)
A must-read critique of Ted Honderich, here on his book "After the Terror": "Written in an offhand, chatty style, its main point — unarguable, as far as it goes — is that first-world nations bear responsibility for third-world nations' impoverishment. Yet the lines of clarity — and reasonability — quickly blur when Honderich attempts to define the nature of that responsibility and its consequences. At issue, in his view, is not just political responsibility for the deleterious economic consequences of American-backed globalization policies on the part of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Trade Organization, but also a direct moral responsibility allegedly shared by all Westerners. What makes that argument problematic is its blanket refusal to acknowledge any indigenous causes of third-world poverty, be they geographic, climatological, regional, sociological, or political. Rather than promote intelligent reflection on the causes of global social injustice, Honderich is interested in playing a simple blame game. Because Westerners (or at least a good number of them) live affluently, while most third-world denizens languish in squalor, the former are by definition morally culpable exploiters.
Further suspicions about Honderich's acuity surface when one searches for the connecting link between his nominal topos — third-world misery — and his 9/11-inspired title. He endorses the perilous view that, under certain circumstances, the 2001 terrorist attacks could be construed as a justifiable response to global impoverishment. In various passages, he apotheosizes Osama bin Laden as the avenging angel of the wretched of the earth. Since the attackers proceeded without a reasonable expectation that their crimes "would work to serve a justifying end," their actions remain condemnable.
Conversely, had the perpetrators reason to believe that, in Honderich's words, "the killing of several thousand people would in due course serve the end of the principle of humanity," their actions would have passed the Honderich test of justifiable political homicide." (Note: Found via the excellent Arts & Letters Daily. See also: "German publisher drops book supporting Palestinian terrorism" (AP/The Jerusalem Post, 2003/08/07), "Suicide Bombers and Professors" (Edward Alexander, The Jerusalem Post/FrontPageMagazine, 2003/01/14) and "A Philosopher in the Trenches: Interview with Ted Honderich" (Paul de Rooij, The Palestine Chronicle, 2002/12/04))

"20 Years Since Beirut Marine Massacre" (Walid Phares, FrontPageMagazine, 2003/10/23)
"It was in Beirut, October 23, 1983. One man, with one truck, blew himself up at the entrance of the buildings where hundreds of US Marines were sleeping. Another suicide terrorist repeated the massacre against the Drakkar, where the French force had established its camp. Evidently, the attackers were not two frustrated men who chose to express their discontent with colonialism, as Western leftist intellectuals would have us believe. The men who massacred the Marines and the Fusiliers were two fingers in a hand at the service of a mind. There was a plan. They were the tools. And behind those tools there was an architect. ...
The perpetrators of the October terror attacks were under Imad Mughniya, Hizbollah's chief terrorist. And he was under the dual sponsorship of the Syrian and Iranian intelligence services. Baathists and Khumanists were in a joint venture, not just to eject US influence from the Eastern Mediterranean, but to pre-empt the stabilization of Lebanon, and of the establishment of a democratic, multiethnic and terrorist-free Republic in that little country.
Déjà vu?
Yes, a bloody reminder of a similar alliance that aims nowadays to destabilize the developing Iraqi government, and bring down this other attempt at a multiethnic and democratic republic in Mesopotamia. This is the same crowd aiming at the same ideals with the same tools."

"The Mullahs and the Bomb" (Gary Milhollin, The New York Times, 2003/10/23)
"Under Tuesday's deal Iran, too, will shift into neutral, while keeping its nuclear potential intact. It won't — for the time being — operate its newly constructed centrifuges, which are needed to enrich uranium to weapon grade. But the deal won't stop Iran from building more centrifuges to augment the limited number it now has, thus adding to its future ability to enrich uranium. Nor does the agreement bar Iran from completing the factory that produces the uranium gas that goes into the centrifuges. Nor does it prevent the building of the heavy water reactor or, indeed, the resumption of enrichment in the future. Thus the agreement could insulate Iran from international censure without hampering its nuclear progress in any way. ...
The only chance for a solution to the Iran nuclear problem, short of war, is for a united West to apply relentless economic pressure. That means quickly closing any gap between Europe and the United States. It may be possible to convince Iran that the costs of building nuclear weapons exceed the benefit of having them. Unlike North Korea, Iran has large trade interests that really matter. However, unless the rest of the world is willing to put those interests at risk, it will probably soon have to live with a new nuclear power in the Middle East." (See also: "Iran Will Allow U.N. Inspections of Nuclear Sites" (Elaine Sciolino, The NewYork Times, 2003/10/22))

"Starving North Korea kills 'foreign' babies" (Richard Spencer, The Daily Telegraph, 2003/10/23)
"Pregnant North Korean refugees repatriated after being rounded up in China have their babies forcibly aborted or killed after birth, according to a report that adds more horror to what is known of the Stalinist state's gulags.
Evidence from a number of women who have escaped from the prison camps of the North Korean dictator, Kim Jong-il, reveals a pattern of infanticide, principally due to concern that babies conceived outside the country might not be "ethnically pure".
The report, by the United States Committee for Human Rights in North Korea, a cross-party monitoring group, cites evidence from eight former inmates.
One described how a guard took a baby away from a woman married to a Chinese and put him in a box nearby. A doctor then explained that since the country was short of food, it should not have to feed the children of foreign fathers. When the box was full of babies, it was taken away and buried, she said. It was not clear whether they were alive or dead at the time." (See also the full report: "The Hidden Gulag: Exposing North Korea's Prison Camps" (HRNK, 2003/10/22) and "North Korea's Gulags" (Claudia Rosett, The Wall Street Journal, 2003/10/22))

"Egyptian Government Weekly: Treason and Deception are in the Blood of the Jews" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 594, 2003/10/23)
"Sheikh Mansour Al-Rifa'i 'Ubeid, formerly Egypt's Under Secretary for Religious Affairs in charge of mosques and the Koran, wrote an article in the religious weekly Aqidati, which is published by the official Egyptian daily Al-Gumhuriya. The article titled "Treason and Deception are in Their Blood," attacks Jews. The following are excerpts from the article:
'The Jews lived their whole lives in a nest of corruption, propagating vile and fighting virtue. Therefore, Allah - through the Prophets - cursed them throughout time because they constantly propagated treason, be it their way of life and their way of dealing with people... They worship and venerate money, using it to breed depravity and to raze values. ...
Indeed, trickery is in the nature of the Jews, and they will never [be able to] get rid of it, therefore we have to be wary of them when we deal with them in commerce or anything else. There is venom in the serpent's son [i.e. the Jew] and he spits it on friend and foe alike. No Jew knows a beautiful friendship, but only his own interest. That is why they abrogated agreements and covenants and did not honor a friend's right.'"

"Panic in Khartoum: Foreigners Shake Hands, Make Penises Disappear" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 593, 2003/10/23)
Another imperialist Zionist plot is revealed: "During September 2003, mass hysteria spread through Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, which was ultimately quelled by police intervention and statements made by the health minister. The panic was caused by rumors of foreigners roaming the city and shaking men's hands, making their penises disappear. ...
Ja'far Abbas, a Sudanese columnist living abroad, expounded further on the matter in two articles, one in the Saudi daily Al-Watan and the other in Al-Rai Al-A'am. In his Al-Watan article, Abbas wrote: "Even though what I write today will harm 'tourism' in Sudan, I consider it my duty to warn anyone who wants to come to Sudan to refrain from shaking hands with a dark-skinned man. Since most Sudanese are dark-skinned, he had better avoid shaking hands with anyone he doesn't know…"
Focusing on the report of the Sudanese man who lost his penis after contact with a comb, Abbas wrote: "No doubt, this comb was a laser-controlled surgical robot that penetrates the skull [and passes] to the lower body and emasculates a man!!"
"I wanted to tell that man who fell victim to the electronic comb: 'You jackass, how can you put a comb from a man you don't know to your head, while even relatives avoid using the same comb?!'"
In conclusion Abbas wrote: 'That man, who, as it is claimed, is from West Africa, is an imperialist Zionist agent that was sent to prevent our people from procreating and multiplying…'"

"Palestinians support armed struggle even after statehood - poll" (Janine Zacharia, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/10/23)
"Fifty-nine percent of Palestinians believe that Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad should continue their armed struggle against Israel even if Israel leaves all of the West Bank and Gaza, including East Jerusalem, and a Palestinian state is created, a new survey shows.
Similarly, 80 percent of Palestinians say that, under those circumstances, the Palestinians should not give up the "right of return." ...
Nintey-six percent of Israeli Jews say the people who piloted the planes on September 11 were terrorists, while 37 percent of Palestinians share that view.
Slightly more than one in four - 26 percent - of Palestinians believe Israelis planned the 9-11 attacks.
Forty-two percent of Palestinians and 61 percent of Israeli-Arabs stated that they support the people who are attacking Americans in Iraq. Zero percent of Israeli Jews said they did." (See also: "Landmark Survey of Israelis, Israeli-Arabs & Palestinians: Profound Palestinian Distrust of and Dislike for America" (IMRA, 2003/10/23): "- 42% of Palestinians and 61% of Israeli-Arabs stated that they 'support' the people who are attacking American troops in Iraq right now. Zero percent of Israeli Jews hold that view.
- 36% of Palestinians believe that the United States poses the greatest threat to world peace; 51% stated that Israel poses the greatest threat to world peace.")

"Official: Rumsfeld 'Livid' Over Memo Leak" (FOX News, 2003/10/23)
"The Oct. 16 memo, written to four top aides — Myers, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, Joint Chiefs of Staff Vice Chairman Gen. Peter Pace and Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Doug Feith — was splashed across the front page of Wednesday's USA Today.
"It boggles my mind how a memo to four people ends up on the front page of a newspaper," a senior defense official said.
The memo raised eyebrows not because it appears to contradict the defense secretary's publicly optimistic statements about successes in the war on terror, but because it reveals some of Rumsfeld's concerns about whether the Defense Department has the capacity or will to fight the war." (See also: "Rumsfeld's war-on-terror memo" (USA Today, 2003/10/22))

Wednesday, October 22, 2003

News and commentary:

"Atrocities, American Style" (H.D. Miller, Travelling Shoes, 2003/10/22)
"Found under the heading "The Picture Which Shames US Army" over at the Aljazeera site.

A secretly taken picture of an American soldier frisking an Afghan child has shocked human rights campaigners across the world.

The picture was given to Aljazeera.net by the Islamic Observation Centre to highlight the plight of children in Afghanistan. It will now be shown to delegates and discussed at the Washington Conference on Civil Liberties in America on Saturday, 25 October.

Taken by a strategically placed camera, and using a telephoto lens, the undercover photographer snapped a four-year-old child having his clothing searched by a heavily armed US soldier. The child and his friends were playing in the village of Zermit in Paktika when American soldiers, hunting for Taliban fighters, arrived.

So that's the best they can come up with? With all of claims of American atrocities, the best they can come up with is a single picture of an American soldier gently frisking a small, bemused-looking boy? ...
This is an almost comic level of hyperbole, but, thankfully, nearly all that the critics of American actions in Afghanistan have left is hyperbole and mock outrage." (See also: "The picture which shames US army" (Yvonne Ridley, Aljazeera.net, 2003/10/17). Note: Found via James Taranto, who has more on Ansiri and Ridley: "As we read the al-Jazeera story, we were struck by the familiarity of some of the names. "Ansiri, spokesman for the centre which is a human rights organization"? That would be Yasser Ansiri, director of the London-based Islamic Observation Centre. As we noted in October 2001, Ansiri - whose name is also transliterated al-Siri or al-Sirri - has been described as "the mouthpiece of al Qaeda in Britain." He sought asylum in Britain after fleeing Egypt, where he had been convicted and sentenced to death for a bomb attack that killed a 12-year-old girl. Scotland Yard arrested him in October 2001 on suspicion of involvement in the Sept. 9 assassination of Ahmad Shah Masood, a Northern Alliance leader, but a judge ordered his release in May 2002.
Then there's the byline: Yvonne Ridley. Ridley, as we noted in August 2002, was a reporter for London's Sunday Express whom the Taliban captured in Afghanistan days before the country's liberation. She made what the left-wing Independent called "the extraordinary claim that Western intelligence agencies tried to get her killed to bolster public support for the air strikes on Afghanistan" - and then she converted to Islam.")

"Rumsfeld's war-on-terror memo" (USA Today, 2003/10/22)
The full text of Rumsfeld's leaked private memo on the "Global War on Terrorism":
"The questions I posed to combatant commanders this week were: Are we winning or losing the Global War on Terror? ...
Are the changes we have and are making too modest and incremental? My impression is that we have not yet made truly bold moves, although we have have made many sensible, logical moves in the right direction, but are they enough?
Today, we lack metrics to know if we are winning or losing the global war on terror. Are we capturing, killing or deterring and dissuading more terrorists every day than the madrassas and the radical clerics are recruiting, training and deploying against us?
Does the US need to fashion a broad, integrated plan to stop the next generation of terrorists? The US is putting relatively little effort into a long-range plan, but we are putting a great deal of effort into trying to stop terrorists. The cost-benefit ratio is against us! Our cost is billions against the terrorists' costs of millions.

Do we need a new organization?

How do we stop those who are financing the radical madrassa schools?

Is our current situation such that "the harder we work, the behinder we get"?

It is pretty clear that the coalition can win in Afghanistan and Iraq in one way or another, but it will be a long, hard slog.
Does CIA need a new finding?
Should we create a private foundation to entice radical madradssas to a more moderate course?
What else should we be considering?"

"Report: UN Security in Iraq Dysfunctional, Sloppy" (Evelyn Leopold, Reuters, 2003/10/22)
"A chilling report of the August bombing of U.N. offices in Iraq says some lives might have been saved if a "dysfunctional" and "sloppy" U.N. security system had heeded advance warnings and followed its own rules.
The probe by an independent panel, released Wednesday, blames the security apparatus in New York and in the field as well as top management for lapses before the Aug. 19 attack on U.N. offices in Baghdad that killed 22 people and injured 150.
"The main conclusion of the panel is that the current security management system is dysfunctional," said the 40-page report by former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari, appointed by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to lead the investigation.
"The observance and implementation of security regulations and procedures were sloppy and noncompliance with security rules commonplace," the report said.
The probe also confirmed allegations made by U.S. officials - that the United Nations in Baghdad had refused protection because it was uncomfortable with U.S. tanks and other security measures, wanting to distance itself from the occupation.
Consequently, U.N. officials asked the U.S. military to withdraw heavy equipment from the compound in the Canal Hotel, dismantle an observation post on the roof and remove obstacles and concertina wire from the access road where an orange flatbed truck approached and exploded, the report said."

"Threatening children" (Zeyad, Healing Iraq, 2003/10/22)
Zeyad on "resistance" in Baghdad: "I heard some very distressful news today. Someone has been writing graffiti all over Baghdad threatening to kill children who accept the new schoolbags that are to be gifted to them by UNESCO for the new school season. Also warning that any hand waving to the infidel Americans will be cut.
Are these people sane? I mean what are they thinking? Is this our latest form of 'resistance'? Threatening our own children for getting some shiny new schoolbags. I am trying very hard to understand. This so called resistance is getting hated more and more by Iraqis everywhere. I'm sure this will only add to that scorn exponentially. They are losing any sympathy they may have had earlier. The terrorists have turned out to be MUCH dumber than I thought."

"Hamas militants holding severed leg of Israeli soldier" (AP/Ananova, 2003/10/22)
Symptomatic and sickening sacrilege, found via Little Green Footballs: "A family of Hamas militants is still holding the severed leg of an Israeli commando killed four months ago in an explosion during a raid on the family's house in the Gaza Strip.
The office of the Hamas spiritual leader, Sheik Ahmed Yassin, says the al-Ghoul family is free to do what it wants with the remains, including opening negotiations with Israel for its return.
Israeli military sources said they were in contact with the soldier's family and with Palestinian officials.
The Palestinians have made no demands and there are no negotiations for the return of the body part, the military said.
According to Jewish religious law, all parts of the body must be properly buried.
After the June 27 battle, Hamas released footage of the aftermath, showing a destroyed house and a masked gunmen standing beside a badly mangled lower leg.
In a newspaper interview with Yassin published in the Palestinian Authority's Al Hayat al Jadida, the Hamas leader said the family targeted in the raid still had the limb. Yassin's office confirmed the report."

"Anti-Semitism Tolerant?" (Donald Luskin, National Review, 2003/10/22)
"'Anti-Semitism with a purpose.'
Sounds like a sick play on a Madison Avenue advertising slogan. But it's no joke. It was a subhead attached to Paul Krugman's Tuesday column for the New York Times. In it he rationalized the violently anti-Semitic remarks by Malaysia's prime minister Mahathir Mohamad as being symptoms of the failure of the Bush administration's foreign policy. ...
But the storm is just getting started. So far no one has revealed the ties between Krugman and Mahathir, or pointed out how Krugman appears to have been personally complicit in Mahathir's anti-Semitism. ...
In a November 8, 1998, article for — yes — The New York Times Magazine, Krugman dealt with, among other things, the impact of currency speculators in precipitating economic crises of the type that rocked Malaysia between 1997 and 1998. Once again he wrote of Mahathir's anti-Semitism — but in 1998 he didn't refer to it as "inexcusable." He agreed with it:

When the occasional accusation of financial conspiracy is heard — when, for example, Malaysia's Prime Minster blames his country's problems on the machinations of Jewish speculators — the reaction of most observers is skepticism, even ridicule.

But even the paranoid have people out to get them. Little by little, over the past few years, the figure of the evil speculator has reemerged.

And who's the example of the "evil speculator" given in the very next sentence? George Soros — a Jew.
This is sickening. And it gets worse." (See also:"The Return of Dr. Mabuse" (Paul Krugman, The New York Times Magazine/pkarchive.org, 1998/11/08), "Jews rule the world: Mahathir" (news.com.au, 2003/10/16) and "Listening to Mahathir" (Paul Krugman, The New York Times, 2003/10/21): "Not long ago Washington was talking about Malaysia as an important partner in the war on terror. Now Mr. Mahathir thinks that to cover his domestic flank, he must insert hateful words into a speech mainly about Muslim reform. That tells you, more accurately than any poll, just how strong the rising tide of anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism among Muslims in Southeast Asia has become. Thanks to its war in Iraq and its unconditional support for Ariel Sharon, Washington has squandered post-9/11 sympathy and brought relations with the Muslim world to a new low.")

"North Korea's Gulags" (Claudia Rosett, The Wall Street Journal, 2003/10/22)
"The latest hallucination of geopolitics has it that if only we can make North Korea's Great Leader Kim Jong Il feel safe from the fate of Saddam Hussein, maybe he'll stop testing missiles and making nuclear bombs. So the experts - whose ranks have now swelled to include, alas, even President George W. Bush - have been scrambling for ways to make Kim feel more secure. Bad mistake. Even in the exquisitely complex realms of geopolitics, there comes a point at which right and wrong really do matter. Ensuring the safety of monsters is not only an invitation to even more trouble ahead, it is also wrong. Before Mr. Bush says another word about security for North Korea's regime, before any more policy makers suggest any more deals to gratify Kim Jong Il's deep appetite for his own ease and longevity, there's a report the entire civilized world needs to read - released today by the Washington-based U.S. Committee for Human Rights in North Korea. In landmark depth and detail, this report documents the filthiest of all Kim's backroom projects: North Korea's vast system of political prisons, which underpin Kim's precious security right there in his own home. ...
This new report, titled, "The Hidden Gulag: Exposing North Korea's Prison Camps," tells us how. It pieces together much of what we know from scattered sources already, and adds in-depth interviews with 30 North Koreans who have experienced the prison camps firsthand, some as prisoners, some as guards. And it sums up the findings - complete with a "Glossary of North Korean Repression" and a set of recommendations on how we might challenge North Korea's Kim on this absolutely indefensible, utterly inhuman aspect of his system." (See also the full report: "The Hidden Gulag: Exposing North Korea's Prison Camps" (HRNK, 2003/10/22). Also: "See No Evil, Stop No Evil" (Anne Applebaum, The Washington Post, 2003/10/22))

"IAF footage refutes claims of massacre in Gaza" (Margot Dudkevitch, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/10/22)
The "massacre" that wasn't, part 491 — and counting. In fact, it's about time that the charade of this much-abused consequence of "impartial" journalism is put to a end. As it is now, the rule that both sides should have their say on equal terms leads to the spectacle of Baghdad Bob, which of course has its charms, but makes a mockery of the overriding aim of journalism — to report the truth.
In practice the exploitation of this "impartiality" gives the Baghdad Bobs of the world a huge advantage in the frantic newscycle. The "democratic" side is by nature rather vague when the attack is making headlines as they wait for reports and confirmations. Which leaves the "lying" side free to deny, spin and lie at leisure. Which in its turn often means that the "hot" version of the news will be based on a lie. And when the true version finally is made known, the incident is already considered "old" news. As a result, millions of viewers and readers will connect this particular attack with the initial Palestinian allegation of a "massacre".
I'm not saying that the Baghdad Bob version of events should be "censored" or not reported, but if a source or side is repeatedly known for telling blatant lies and untruths, a clear-cut caveat lector should be the self-evident rule:

"Twenty hours after the IAF helicopter rocket attack on a vehicle containing Hamas terrorists in the Nuseirat refugee camp on Monday night, which was described by the Palestinians as a massacre and by MIK Ranan Cohen as a "blitz", the air force released footage that clearly shows there were no Palestinian civilians in the street when the two rockets hit the car despite Palestinian reports claiming otherwise. ...
The picture shows the main road in the camp with two vehicles traveling a distance apart along it. The helicopter monitors the movement of the terrorist's car, which is the second vehicle seen on the film and shows the first Hellfire missile directly hitting it.
The driver loses control, crashes into a tree and the car disappears, hidden by a building, but is seen seconds later traveling in reverse. There are no people on the streets and no other vehicles when the car comes to a halt.
An ambulance is then seen passing the damaged vehicle as it continues along the road. Only after the ambulance is a distance away does the air force pilot release the second rocket which hits the vehicle and clearly shows three bodies lying in the street.
For at least two and a half minutes after the attack the footage shows the thermal images of one or two other people in the area but not close to where the vehicle that was hit.
On Monday night following the attack Palestinians claimed eight people were killed and over eighty wounded. Palestinian media reports claimed that air force helicopters fired one rocket which hit the car and then a second rocket into a crowd that had gathered around the burning vehicle."

(See also: "At least 11 Palestinians killed in day of war in Gaza" (Margot Dudkevitch, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/10/20). For more on this "extreme disparity in veracity", see also: "Unfair and Unbalanced" (Joshua Muravchik, The Weekly Standard/AEI, 2003/09/15). Also: "Of Missiles and Videos" (HonestReporting, 2003/10/22): "The media lent immediate credence to Palestinian claims that two missiles were fired — the first hit the car, and the second was purportedly fired into a "crowd of people," causing a "massacre of civilians":
Reuters: "One missile fired by a helicopter gunship hit a car and another slammed into a crowd of people by the road, prompting angry protests and calls for revenge, witnesses said. 'It's a massacre. They slaughtered civilians with no mercy,' one protester at the scene said."
Another Reuters report didn't even attribute the claim to a witness, passing it off as established fact: 'In one attack on a refugee camp, a helicopter gunship chasing suspected militants in a car fired a missile into a crowd of people, killing seven civilians.'")

"IDF: Saudis seeking nukes from Pakistan" (The Jerusalem Post, 2003/10/22)
"Saudi Arabia is seeking nuclear warheads from Pakistan for its land-based missiles, according to OC Intelligence Maj.-Gen. Aharon Ze'evi (Farkash). ...
Committee chairman Yuval Steinitz said the committee has received a number of reports on Iran, but that this is the first time it has heard a report on Saudi Arabia.
The information, he said, is consistent with details he heard last month in Washington from experts speaking before the Senate, who said that Saudi Arabia has long-range missiles that are useful to them only if armed with nuclear warheads.
"There is an assumption that Saudi Arabia financed the Pakistan nuclear plant and that there is a tacit understanding between the two countries that, if Iran becomes nuclear, Saudi Arabia will be provided with some nuclear warheads from Pakistan," said Steinitz.
'I don't know how accurate this is. I do not know if it is really going to happen. We do not know for sure that there is such an attempt. Even if there are such intentions, then I am quite confident it would be prevented by the US.'" (See also: "Pakistan-Saudi trade nuke tech for oil" (Arnaud de Borchgrave, UPI, 2003/10/20))

"Iran Will Allow U.N. Inspections of Nuclear Sites" (Elaine Sciolino, The NewYork Times, 2003/10/22)
"Iran agreed Tuesday, after months of resistance, to accept stricter international inspections of its nuclear sites and to suspend production of enriched uranium, which can be used to develop nuclear weapons.
But Tehran gave no indication when it would suspend uranium enrichment or sign, ratify and carry out an additional agreement under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty of 1968 that would allow surprise inspections of its nuclear installations.
The accord was completed in Tehran during an unusual visit by three European foreign ministers, Dominique de Villepin of France, Jack Straw of Britain and Joschka Fischer of Germany."

Note: Evan Coyne Maloney's revealing and deeply disturbing video on a pro-Palestinian conference and rally at Rutgers University, "When Protesters Attack", is now available in different formats - for some reason I couldn't view the QuickTime-version.
See also his written report: "When Protesters Attack" (Evan Coyne Maloney, Brain Terminal, 2003/10/16:) "And it wasn't just the protesters lobbing linguistic bombs my way; by this point, I had become a favorite subject of the speakers as well. They pointed me out and announced to the crowd that I was a "small-minded" "agent provocateur," a "Zionist," a "fascist," an "arrogant" "grinning idiot" and even 'an agent of the [Israeli secret police].'"
Also: "Protesting the Protesters" (Evan Coyne Maloney, Brain Terminal, 2003/02/15)

Tuesday, October 21, 2003

News and commentary:

"A Brief History of The Imminent Threat Canard" (Stefan Sharkansky, Shark Blog 2003/10/21)
A revealing collection of quotes on "The Imminent Threat Canard": "Al Gore September 23, 2002

President Bush now asserts that we will take preemptive action even if the threat we perceive is not imminent. ...

President George W Bush, State of the Union speech January 28, 2003

Some have said we must not act until the threat is imminent. Since when have terrorists and tyrants announced their intentions, politely putting us on notice before they strike? If this threat is permitted to fully and suddenly emerge, all actions, all words, and all recriminations would come too late. Trusting in the sanity and restraint of Saddam Hussein is not a strategy, and it is not an option. ...

Robert Scheer in the Los Angeles Times March 4, 2003

The second lie was that Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction represent an imminent threat to U.S. security. ...

So there you have it a nutshell. The administration was criticized before the war for not making a case that Iraq was an imminent threat, denied at that time that war was based on the supposition of an imminent threat, and was criticized after the war for having lied that Iraq was an imminent threat."

"UN Assembly Orders Israel to Halt West Bank Wall" (Irwin Arieff, Reuters, 2003/10/21)
144 countries order Israel to stop trying to hinder massacres by suicide bombers. The only ones on Israel's side are the United States, the Marshall Islands and Micronesia: "The U.N. General Assembly overwhelmingly approved late on Tuesday a resolution demanding that Israel halt construction of a barrier cutting deep into Palestinian West Bank lands.
The vote was 144-4 with 12 abstentions, with the United States and Israel voting 'no' along with the Marshall Islands and Micronesia. ...
The vote capped six hours of haggling between European Union and Arab governments over the text of the measure, which initially had been drafted by Palestinian U.N. envoy Nasser al-Kidwa and took a harsher line against Israeli actions.
In the end, all 15 EU nations agreed to sponsor the compromise, which said the barrier was "in contradiction to international law" and demanded that Israel "stop and reverse" its construction in Palestinian lands."

"U.S. Develops New Theory on Pearl Slaying" (AP/ABC News, 2003/10/21)
"American authorities investigating the killing of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in Pakistan now believe that he was slain by the hand of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.
Authorities, who had previously cast doubt on reports of Mohammed's role, now have new information that leads them to believe he killed Pearl, said one U.S. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The official declined to detail the evidence.
The U.S. acknowledgment of Mohammed's suspected role was first reported in Tuesday's editions of the Journal.
However, three senior Pakistani officials involved in the Pearl case said Tuesday they could not confirm suspicions that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was Pearl's killer."

"The second American civil war: What it's about: Part II" (Dennis Prager, Town Hall, 2003/10/21)
"In part one, I described nine areas of major conflict between the Right and the Left in American life, a conflict that rivals the First Civil War in intensity, though thankfully not in violence. Here in part two, I describe 15 others. ...
The Left regards American nationalism as dangerous, is more comfortable celebrating world citizenship and prefers that America follow the lead of international organizations such as the United Nations. The Right celebrates American nationalism, distrusts world organizations, prefers that America lead humanity and regards the United Nations as largely a moral wasteland. ...
The Left believes that the greatest danger to mankind, as former Vice President Al Gore wrote in his book "Earth in the Balance," is the threat to the environment. The Right believes that the greatest danger to humanity is, as it always has been, human evil. ...
The Left believes that labeling any enemy of the United States "evil" is wrong. It was wrong when President Ronald Reagan labeled the Soviet Union an "evil empire," and it was wrong when President George W. Bush labeled Iran, Iraq and North Korea an "axis of evil." The Right believes that not labeling such regimes "evil" is a sign of moral confusion and appeasement. ...
The fact is that this country is profoundly divided on virtually every major social, personal and political issue. We are in the midst of the Second American Civil War. Who wins it will determine the nature of this country as much as the winner of the first did." (See also: "The second American civil war: what it's about" (Dennis Prager, Town Hall, 2003/10/14))

"The Natural History of Bush-Hating" (Keith Burgess-Jackson, Tech Central Station, 2003/10/21)
"The most hated person in the United States today (dare I say the world?) may be our president, George W. Bush. I did not vote for President Bush - I voted for Ralph Nader the past two times - and hold no brief for him. On some issues I agree with him and on others I disagree. I like to think that I am a fair-minded and honest critic. How do I know that he is hated? I read newspapers and magazines (see, e.g., Jonathan Chait, "The Case for Bush Hatred," in a recent issue of The New Republic); I watch public-affairs programs on television (cable as well as network); I visit Internet websites (including blogs); and I talk to people (friends, colleagues, students, neighbors). The depth and breadth of animosity toward President Bush astounds me. It is also dismaying, for it distracts attention from matters of principle and policy in which all of us have a stake. ...
Let me illustrate these points with a prominent columnist. As most readers of TCS know, Paul Krugman writes a semiweekly column for The New York Times. ...
Third, he systematically questions President Bush's motives. If the president says he did X for reason Y, Krugman says it was really for reason Z. Awarding a contract to Halliburton cannot possibly be legitimate; it must be a case of cronyism. Reducing taxes cannot be based on principle (e.g., that people are entitled to the fruits of their labor; that self-sufficiency is intrinsically good); it is calculated to "secure a key part of the Republican party's base," namely, the wealthy. To read Krugman is to see only corruption and deceit on the part of the president and his staff. It's not that the president's good intentions go awry, mind you. That would be a legitimate criticism. The president has bad intentions."

"The Dark Art of Interrogation" (Mark Bowden, The Atlantic, from the October 2003 issue)
Bowden on coercion and torture: "We hear a lot these days about America's over powering military technology; about the professionalism of its warriors; about the sophistication of its weaponry, eavesdropping,