Archived news and commentary: December 1 - 7, 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, December 7, 2003

News and commentary:

"Chomsky the coward" (Damian Penny, Daimnation!, 2003/12/07)
More on the latest interview with Chomsky:
"Where is the "silent genocide" you predicted would happen in Afghanistan if the US intervened there in 2001?
Mike Dudley, Ipswich

That is an interesting fabrication, which gives a good deal of insight into the prevailing moral and intellectual culture. First, the facts: I predicted nothing. Rather, I reported the grim warnings from virtually every knowledgeable source that the attack might lead to an awesome humanitarian catastrophe... ...
All of this is precisely accurate and entirely appropriate. The warnings remain accurate as well, a truism that should be unnecessary to explain. Unfortunately, it is apparently necessary to add a moral truism: actions are evaluated in terms of the range of anticipated consequences.

Here's what St. Noam actually said on October 18, 2001:

After the first week of bombing, the New York Times reported on a back page inside a column on something else, that by the arithmetic of the United Nations there will soon be 7.5 million Afghans in acute need of even a loaf of bread and there are only a few weeks left before the harsh winter will make deliveries to many areas totally impossible, continuing to quote, but with bombs falling the delivery rate is down to 1/2 of what is needed. Casual comment. Which tells us that Western civilization is anticipating the slaughter of, well do the arithmetic, 3-4 million people or something like that. ...
Looks like what's happening is some sort of silent genocide. It also gives a good deal of insight into the elite culture, the culture that we are part of. It indicates that whatever, what will happen we don't know, but plans are being made and programs implemented on the assumption that they may lead to the death of several million people in the next few months . . . .very casually with no comment, no particular thought about it, that’s just kind of normal, here and in a good part of Europe. [emphasis added]

Strictly speaking, Chomsky didn't predict a "silent genocide". He said it was already happening.
As you can see, he basically pulled "the slaughter of 3-4 million people" out of his ass, with just a casual reference to a New York Times story which made no such claim. And now, two years later, he's trying to disown his dire predictions and say other people misled him. I call that cowardice." (See also: "Noam Chomsky: You Ask The Questions" (Independent, 2003/12/04), "More sheer stupidity" (Pejman Yousefzadeh, Pejmanesque, 2003/12/06) and "Noam Chomsky Volunteers to Serve as Domestic Propaganda Chief for Taliban War Machine" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine, 2001/10/29))

"Syrian-Produced Hizbullah TV Ramadan Series' Video Clip of a 'Blood Libel'" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 623, 2003/12/08)
MEMRI also has a videoclip of these vile scenes:
"During the month of Ramadan, Hizbullah's satellite television channel Al-Manar, which is viewed worldwide, broadcasted a 30-part antisemitic Syrian-produced series titled Al-Shatat ("Diaspora"). According to a November 11, 2003 report by the Syrian daily Syria Times, it is "a Syrian TV series recording the criminal history of Zionism."
The following is a transcript of excerpts from episode twenty, which depicts Jews carrying out a 'Blood Libel,' in which a Christian child is ritually murdered and his blood is used to bake Passover matzas. ...
Joseph: "Nathan, I want to go home."
Nathan: "Of course, my dear. We'll go in a little bit."
Joseph: "Nathan, where are you taking me?"
Nathan: "Don't be afraid, Joseph. Don't be afraid."
Joseph: "Nathan, take me back!"
Nathan: "Don't be afraid, my dear, don't be afraid."
Joseph: "Nathan! Help me! Mama! Mama!"
(The men hold Joseph while his throat is slit and his blood is poured into a metal basin.)" (See also: "Syrian Produced Hizbullah TV Ramadan Series - Video Clip of Ritual Murder" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 610, 2003/11/18))

"The Saudi Connection" (David E. Kaplan, usnews.com, from the 2003/12/15 issue)
"Over the past 25 years, the desert kingdom has been the single greatest force in spreading Islamic fundamentalism, while its huge, unregulated charities funneled hundreds of millions of dollars to jihad groups and al Qaeda cells around the world. Those findings are the result of a five-month investigation by U.S. News. The magazine's inquiry is based on a review of thousands of pages of court records, U.S. and foreign intelligence reports, and other documents. In addition, the magazine spoke at length with more than three dozen current and former counterterrorism officers, as well as government officials and outside experts in Riyadh, the Saudi capital. Among the inquiry's principal findings:
Starting in the late 1980s — after the dual shocks of the Iranian revolution and the Soviet war in Afghanistan — Saudi Arabia's quasi-official charities became the primary source of funds for the fast-growing jihad movement. In some 20 countries, the money was used to run paramilitary training camps, purchase weapons, and recruit new members.
The charities were part of an extraordinary $70 billion Saudi campaign to spread their fundamentalist Wahhabi sect worldwide. The money helped lay the foundation for hundreds of radical mosques, schools, and Islamic centers that have acted as support networks for the jihad movement, officials say.
U.S. intelligence officials knew about Saudi Arabia's role in funding terrorism by 1996, yet for years Washington did almost nothing to stop it. Examining the Saudi role in terrorism, a senior intelligence analyst says, was 'virtually taboo.'"

"Hatred, European style" (Clifford D. May, The Washington Times, 2003/12/07)
May on the leaked EU study of anti-Semitism in Europe: "In such nations as France, Italy and Sweden, the study notes, "sections of the political left and Arab-Muslim groups unified" to organize demonstrations at which "anti-Semitic slogans could be heard and placards seen."
"In the extreme left-wing scene," the study adds, "anti-Semitic remarks were to be found mainly in the context of pro-Palestinian and anti-globalization rallies and in newspaper articles using anti-Semitic stereotypes in their criticism of Israel." ...
The study finds anti-Semitism has become increasingly common also among members of Europe's "peace movement," and, for good measure is sometimes "very closely tied to anti-Americanism."
The report talks, too, about "elite or salon anti-Semitism," increasingly found in the more politically mainstream European media, on European campuses and, of course, at social gatherings of "the chattering classes" where, the study observes, it is "en vogue to take an anti-Israeli stance." ...
The authors urge that, as a start, European authorities "acknowledge at the highest level the extraordinary dangers posed by anti-Semitic violence."
But, again, that recommendation comes from a report European authorities commissioned — but which they then determined should never see the light of day." (See also the report: "Manifestations of anti-Semitism in the European Union" (Werner Bergmann and Juliane Wetzel, EUMC, December 2003))

"Geneva: A Blow to Peace" (Amir Taheri, New York Post, 2003/12/07)
"It was bound to happen: a virtual Middle East peace accord in a world of virtual reality.
The so-called Geneva Accord, signed last week by Yossi Beilin, a former Israeli justice minister, and Yasser Abd-Rabbo, a former aide to Yasser Arafat, has met with a mixture of childlike enthusiasm by some and wizened cynicism by others. ...
The Geneva episode may conjure a couple of Nobel prizes for those involved. But anyone with a closer understanding of the conflict would know that such moves, far from contributing to peace, may render peacemaking more difficult. ...
The "wise men" of Geneva may not have realized it, but by ignoring normal political institutions - especially elected organs of decision-making - they may have bestowed some legitimacy on those who want the future of Palestine to be decided by unelected militants and suicide-bombers. After all, if Beilin and Abd-Rabbo can sign an accord, there is no reason why militant Jewish settlers and Hamas suicide-bombers should not have the right to tear up any accord."

"On the Ground, Straight From the Top" (Vernon Loeb, The Washington Post Outlook, 2003/12/07)
Commanders from the four major U.S. Army divisions in Iraq are asked why they think they are winning, and what they use as measures of success. Here's Brig. Gen. Mark Hertling, assistant commander, 1st Armored Division, Baghdad:
"Since Operation Iron Hammer, we have seen a drop-off in attacks against us, and we continue to see a decrease in crime (especially as we put more Iraqi Police and ICDC [Iraqi Civil Defense Corps] on the streets). We are seeing [an] upswing in the perception of U.S. forces' action in the Arab media ... and a significant increase in tips from the locals of Baghdad, and an extremely significant increase in the turn-in of unlawful weapons. ...
All these things may be due to the enemy lying low to see what we're doing; it might be due to us having significantly hurt the enemy during the operations; it could be that the thugs and criminals being paid to conduct the attacks are not up for fighting anymore. And, it might also mean that the average citizen of Baghdad is getting sick of fighting, and that same average citizen is better supporting the coalition (which we believe, from our data). Or, it might mean the enemy is gearing up for another offensive. And that's why it's important that we keep the pressure on with offensive operations and civil affairs actions, and working [with] the good people of Baghdad."

"Imam accused of gay hatred" (Ian Haberfield, Herald Sun, 2003/12/07)
Via Little Green Footballs: "Police are investigating claims that one of Australia's most senior Islamic clerics has incited his followers to attack homosexuals.
A complaint made to Victoria Police alleges the chairman of the Board of Imams, Rexhep Idrizi, was reading from the Koran when he made derogatory comments about homosexuals and said they should have "their heads chopped off".
Imam Idrizi's alleged outburst occurred before 1000 worshippers at a prayer service to celebrate the conclusion of fasting for Ramadan at the Albanian Mosque in Drummond St, Carlton. ...
But worshipper Asip Demiri, who was at the service, told the Sunday Herald Sun that Imam Idrizi had verbally attacked homosexuals.
"I couldn't believe it. I was sitting there with my son and he comes out with comments as if the Koran says it's OK to attack homosexuals," Mr Demiri said. 'He told us they should have their heads chopped off.'"

"Taking the Intifada to the Football Field" (William Lobdell, Los Angeles Times, 2003/12/07)
"What could be more American? Dozens of young men in Orange County have planned a football tournament for the New Year's weekend in Irvine.
But this gathering of Muslim American athletes on the gridiron — they say a first for Southern California — is being flagged for unsportsmanlike conduct by religious leaders dismayed by some of the team's names.
Monikers for the flag-football teams include Mujahideen, Intifada and Soldiers of Allah and are accompanied on the league's Web site, http://muslimfootball.com, by logos of masked men, some with daggers or swords. ...
"What exactly are they honoring here?" asked Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. "The continued targeting of innocent women and children by homicide bombers deserves to be condemned across the board. It's deeply, deeply disturbing." ...
But one Islamic scholar said she wonders why the team names should be controversial.
"Who cares? Why are people so sensitive?" said Yvonne Yazbeck Haddad, a professor at Georgetown University. "Intifada is something that Muslims and Palestinians all approve of. It means 'just get off my back.'"
'Is the only way we accept [Muslims] is if we devalue their faith?'" (See also: Muslim Football - The Teams: "Muslim Football Allstars, Intifada, Saracen, Soldiers of Allah, Emrullah, Mujahideen.")

"How the 45-minute claim got from Baghdad to No 10" (Con Coughlin, The Sunday Telegraph, 2003/12/07)
"Lieutenant-Colonel al-Dabbagh is not a man who is easily frightened. Having spied on Saddam's regime for British and American intelligence for more than seven years, the 40-year-old former Iraqi air defence commander lived with the constant fear that he might be caught, tortured and executed.
So when last week, shortly after I had interviewed him in Baghdad about his involvement in the infamous 45-minute claim, he received two death threats from Saddam's loyalists, his determination to describe his involvement in revealing details of the former Iraqi dictator's deployment of weapons of mass destruction remained undiminished.
The threats - one verbal and one written - warned him not to divulge any secrets about Saddam's regime, on pain of death. The week before our meeting, members of Saddam's Fedayeen had sprayed his house with machinegun fire.
"Saddam's people are doing this all the time," he said. 'That is why it is so difficult to find the weapons of mass destruction. I am sure the weapons are hidden in Iraq just like I see you now. I am concerned that the chemical and biological weapons are there.'"

"Revealed: the Iraqi colonel who told MI6 that Saddam could launch WMD within 45 minutes" (Con Coughlin, The Sunday Telegraph, 2003/12/07)
"Lt-Col al-Dabbagh, 40, who was the head of an Iraqi air defence unit in the western desert, said that cases containing WMD warheads were delivered to front-line units, including his own, towards the end of last year.
He said they were to be used by Saddam's Fedayeen paramilitaries and units of the Special Republican Guard when the war with coalition troops reached "a critical stage".
The containers, which came from a number of factories on the outskirts of Baghdad, were delivered to the army by the Fedayeen and were distributed to the front-line units under cover of darkness. ...
The devices, which were known by Iraqi officers as "the secret weapon", were made in Iraq and designed to be launched by hand-held rocket-propelled grenades. They could also have been launched sooner than the 45-minutes claimed in the dossier.
"Forget 45 minutes," said Col al-Dabbagh "we could have fired these within half-an-hour." ...
Col al-Dabbagh, who was recalled to Baghdad to work at Iraq's air defence headquarters during the war itself, believes that the WMD have been hidden at secret locations by the Fedayeen and are still in Iraq. "Only when Saddam is caught will people talk about these weapons," he said."

"Dirty Bomb Warheads Disappear" (Joby Warrick, The Washington Post, 2003/12/07)
A report from Moldova: "Originally built for weather experiments, the Alazan rockets were packed with explosives and lobbed into cities. Military records show that at least 38 Alazan warheads were modified to carry radioactive material, effectively creating the world's first surface-to-surface dirty bomb.
The radioactive warheads are not known to have been used. But now, according to experts and officials, they have disappeared. ...
Conventional arms originating in Transdniester have been turning up for years in conflict zones from the Caucasus to Central Africa, evidence of what U.S. officials describe as an invisible pipeline for smuggled goods that runs through Tiraspol to the Black Sea and beyond. Now, governments and terrorism experts fear the same pipeline is carrying nonconventional weapons such as the radioactive Alazan, and that terrorists are starting to tap in.
"For terrorists, this is the best market you could imagine: cheap, efficient and forgotten by the whole world," said Vladimir Orlov, founding director of the Center for Policy Studies in Moscow, a group that studies proliferation issues."

Saturday, December 6, 2003

News and commentary:

"More sheer stupidity" (Pejman Yousefzadeh, Pejmanesque, 2003/12/06)
"Check out the following exchange in this interview with Noam Chomsky:

Is anti-Semitism on the increase? Ricardo Parreira, London
[Chomsky]: In the West, fortunately, it scarcely exists now, though it did in the past. There is, of course, what the Anti-Defamation League calls "the real anti-Semitism", more dangerous than the old-fashioned kind: criticism of policies of the state of Israel and US support for them, opposition to a vast US military budget, etc. In contrast, anti-Arab racism is rampant. The manifestations are shocking, in elite intellectual circles as well, but arouse little concern because they are considered legitimate: the most extreme form of racism.

(Emphasis mine.) The mind boggles. Anti-Semitism "scarcely exists" in the West? ...
We only know for sure that "in contrast" to the supposedly "scarce existence" of anti-Semitism in the West, Chomsky believes that "anti-Arab racism is rampant." Not to excuse racism against Arabs, or to minimize legitimate complaints regarding anti-Arab racism, but contrasting anti-Arab racism with anti-Jewish racism with the implication that the former is more widespread than the latter, is absurd. ...
I mean, good God, the lying and the idiocy contained in Chomsky's remarks is enough to leave you slack-jawed for a week. Remind me again: How can such a charlatan foment such devotion to him, and to his principles?" (See also: "Noam Chomsky: You Ask The Questions" (Independent, 2003/12/04))

"Scientists to Excavate Iraqi Graves" (Niko Price, AP/The Guardian, 2003/12/06)
"The killers kept bankers' hours. They showed up for work at the barley field at 9 a.m., trailed by backhoes and three buses filled with blindfolded men, women and children as young as 1.
Every day, witnesses say, the routine was the same: The backhoes dug a trench. Fifty people were led to the edge of the hole and shot, one by one, in the head. The backhoes covered them with dirt, then dug another hole for the next group.
At 5 p.m., the killers - officials of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party - went home to rest up for another day of slaughter.
In this wind-swept field in the central town of Mahaweel, witnesses say, this went on without a break for 35 days in March and April of 1991, during a crackdown on a Shiite Muslim uprising that followed the first Gulf War.
"I watched this with my own eyes," said Sayed Abbas Muhsen, 35, whose family farm was appropriated by Saddam's government for use as a killing field. "But we couldn't tell anyone. We didn't dare."
The mass grave at Mahaweel, with more than 3,100 sets of remains, is the largest of some 270 such sites across Iraq. They hold upward of 300,000 bodies; some Iraqi political parties estimate there are more than 1 million."

"Egypt's Alexandria Library ends display of anti-Semitic 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion'" (AP/MSNBC, 2003/12/06)
Note how Ziedan suddenly thinks the Protocols is just a "silly" book with almost no significance, after having described it as as a "dangerous" book which "has become a holy book for the Jew, their primary law, their way of life":
"The Alexandria Library has withdrawn the first Arabic translation of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" from an exhibit after U.N. cultural officials questioned the display of the 19th century anti-Semitic tract. ...
Youssef Ziedan, who as director of the library manuscript center made the decision to display the book, noted the exhibition including the book was only open to researchers doing postgraduate studies.
"My professional view is that it is a silly book," he said. 'Its only significance is that it is the first Arabic edition of the book that has influenced the Arab mentality to a great extent.'" (See also: "Jewish Holy Books On Display at the Alexandria Library: The Torah & the 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion'" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 619, 2003/12/02))

"Taliban: Afghan Blast Targeted Americans" (AP/ABC News, 2003/12/06)
"A bomb exploded in a bazaar in this southern Afghan city Saturday, wounding about 20 people, at least three seriously, in an attack that a Taliban spokesman said targeted but missed American soldiers who shop there.
The bomb, apparently placed on a motorcycle, detonated at about 12:30 p.m. outside a hotel in the Herat bazaar in Kandahar's commercial center. ...
Two shops were completely demolished. Broken glass from the shattered hotel front and victims' blood lay around the scene, which was quickly sealed off by U.S. troops and Afghan police. All the injured appeared to be Afghans, the U.S.-led military coalition said in an e-mail from its headquarters at Bagram Air Base, north of Kabul. ...
Later, Taliban spokesman Mullah Abdul Hakim Latifi said the bombings was carried out by fighters from the hard-line Islamic movement, ousted from power by U.S. forces two years ago. Speaking with The Associated Press in Kandahar by satellite telephone, he said the Taliban bomb was meant for U.S. soldiers shopping at the bazaar, but went off later than planned."

"The hate that shames us" (Julie Burchill, The Guardian, 2003/12/06)
"So emboldened by the filthy free-for-all, the danse macabre of resurgent Judeophobia - attacks on Jews in this country have risen by 75% this year; and since 2000, there has been a 400% increase in attacks on synagogues - are the ignorant armies of darkness that even Germans are opening their yaps on a subject that you'd have thought they'd have the sense, if not the decency, to keep away from. Just a few weeks ago, a German MP was forced to resign after claiming that the Jews were responsible for Soviet army "atrocities" against the defeated Nazi state (makes you want to go back and bomb Dresden all over again, only properly this time). And in a sort of Hate version of the Eurovision Song Contest, Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis weighed in with his carefully considered view that the Jews are at the root of all evil. So, presumably, he won't be wanting the royalties from one of his most notable works, which documents the tragic love story of two young Jewish inmates of a concentration camp. Or maybe he can rejig it, to show how evil this pair were, and how they deserved what they got." (See also: "Good, bad and ugly" (Julie Burchill, The Guardian, 2003/11/29))

"Pakistan Is..." (Barry Bearak, The New York Times Magazine, from the 2003/12/07 issue)
An exhaustive report from Pakistan: '''We study in the madrasa,' said Abdul Baqi, a 27-year-old who seemed the leader. I wanted to know if he was learning any subjects beyond Islamic teachings, and when he said yes, I asked him if he could name any planet besides earth or multiply five times seven. He could not, but he had a question of his own: ''When will America be satisfied? When it kills every Muslim in the world?'' ...
''George Bush is a mullah; he is a fundamentalist, too,'' Abdul Hakim Baloch, a writer in Quetta, told me. ''I don't know how history will treat the Americans, but you are committing one of the greatest crimes of all time. Bush thinks he must destroy Babylon as the verses of his Scripture tell him. But you cannot conquer the world based on superstitions.'' ...
Much of what I heard, however, seemed to come from an inverted world, the axis spinning backward, all the essential story lines turned inside out. There is no polling data to cite, but it seems that most Pakistanis, including a great many of the college-educated, continue to believe that the World Trade Center was attacked as part of a Jewish conspiracy - and perhaps one that involved high-level cooperation from the United States government."

"Trail of Anti-U.S. Fighters Said to Cross Europe to Iraq" (Desmond Butler and Don van Natta Jr., The New York Times, 2003/12/06)
"A string of recent arrests of terror suspects has shown that Al Qaeda and groups linked to it have established a network across Europe that is moving recruits into Iraq to join the insurgency against American and allied forces, European intelligence and law enforcement officials said this week.
Over the past year, the officials estimate, the network of recruiters working in at least six European countries — Italy, Germany, France, Spain, Britain and Norway — has assisted hundreds of young men trying to get to Iraq. The network provided high quality fake documents, training, money, and infiltration routes into the country, the officials said.
They said the evidence indicated that the campaign to recruit young militant Muslims for Iraq had become better organized and coordinated in recent months. ...
Investigators in several European countries, including Italy, Germany and Britain, have focused on the participation in Iraq recruitment of a terrorist organization named Al Tawhid. The group is led by Abu Musab Zarqawi, a Jordanian who collaborated with Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan, and has been implicated by American and European intelligence agencies in recent terror attacks in Jordan."

Friday, December 5, 2003

News and commentary:

"Iraqis march against "terrorism" as bomb leaves carnage on Baghdad street" (AFP/Yahoo! News, 2003/12/05)
The second anti-terrorism demonstration in Baghdad:
"About 1,000 Iraqis, mostly Shiites, rallied in central Baghdad to condemn "terrorism" against Iraqis and US "liberation" forces Friday as four Iraqis and a US soldier died in a bomb attack elsewhere in the capital.
Dozens of children aged between five and 10 marched at the front of the protest, with flowers in their hands, under white banners proclaiming in red letters: "Children - innocent victims of terrorism," and: "Terrorism blocks any future for children".
Organiser Sabih Hassan, head of a child protection association set up since the US-led invasion, said they had all "become orphans because of terrorism".
Hassan said the march, the second here in a week, was against "all operations, including those targeting Americans".
"Our children have a vital need for peace and security."
As the protest was under way, four Iraqis and a US soldier died and at least 15 people were wounded when a homemade bomb exploded as an American convoy drove down a crowded shopping street in Baghdad." (See also Healing Iraq on the demonstration and use of quotation marks: "Latest demonstrations in Baghdad" (Zeyad, Healing Iraq, 2003/12/06): "I've decided to put quotation marks myself on the following terms: 'news organizations', 'media', 'press', 'coverage', 'reporter', and 'journalist'. F*ing morons." UPDATE: See also "Iraqis march in salute to U.S." (The Washington Times, 2003/12/06))

"An Awful Truth Sinks In" (Richard C. Paddock, Los Angeles Times, 2003/12/05)
A must-read report on Saddam's Anfal campaign against the Kurds: "For 15 years, thousands of Kurdish families waited for their loved ones to return. They believed the day would come when Saddam Hussein would fall, the prisons in the south would open and the missing would come home.
But in the eight months since the Iraqi dictator was deposed, not a single person who disappeared during the Anfal military campaign of 1988 has returned alive.
The truth was buried in the killing sands of Iraq.
With Hussein gone from power, 263 suspected mass graves have been discovered, stretching from Mosul in the north to the remote deserts of the south. Many bodies were clad in the distinctive attire of the ethnic Kurds.
For the first time, many Anfal survivors are facing an awful reality: Their missing family members were the victims of a mass extermination campaign — abetted by Kurdish collaborators — that echoes the Nazi killing machine in its efficiency and brutality. It left at least 100,000 people dead." (Hat tip: Last of the Famous International Playboys.)

"Iraq behind the cameras: a different reality" (Tara Copp, SHNS, 2003/12/05)
Via Tim Blair: "It's a little-known footnote in postwar Iraq that an unassuming Army Civil Affairs captain named Kent Lindner has a bevy of blushing female fans.
Every time Lindner checks in on the group of young, deaf Iraqi seamstresses at their factory here, the women swarm him with admiration. "I love you!" one of them writes in the dust on Lindner's SUV.
Such small-time adoration is not the stuff of headlines against the backdrop of a country painfully and often violently evolving from war. So on this day, when Lindner and his fellow soldiers are cheered as they fire the deaf workers' boss, a woman who has been locking the seamstresses in closets, holding their pay and beating them, the lack of TV cameras on hand is no surprise.
But later that night, mortars hit nearby. Cameras are rolling, and 15 minutes later folks back home instead see another news clip of Baghdad's latest violence. It's a soda-straw view that frustrates soldiers, like those in Lindner's Civil Affairs unit, who are slowly trying to stitch together the peace while the final stages of the war play out on television.
"We've got a lot of good things going on, but when I went home (on leave), people were just like 'We never hear that stuff,' " said Civil Affairs Pvt. Amy Schroeder. "That's what makes the families worry."
What Iraq looks like on TV, and what Iraq is like for the 130,000 troops living here, sometimes feels like two different realities."

"A Real War" (Victor Davis Hanson, National Review, 2003/12/05)
"Remember, even apart from all the killing in Israel and Iraq, all of the deadly terrorism since 9/11 — the synagogue in Tunisia, French naval personnel in Pakistan, Americans in Karachi, Yemeni attacks on a French ship, the Bali bombing, the Kenyan attack on Israelis, the several deadly attacks on Russians in both Moscow and Chechnya, the assault on housing compounds in Saudi Arabia, the suicide car bombings in Morocco, the Marriott bombing in Indonesia, the mass murdering in Bombay, and the Turkish killing — has been perpetrated exclusively by Muslim fascists and directed at Westerners, Christians, Hindus, and Jews. ...
We are not in a war with a crook in Haiti. This is no Grenada or Panama — or even a Kosovo or Bosnia. No, we are in a worldwide struggle the likes of which we have not seen since World War II. The quicker we understand that awful truth, and take measures to defeat rather than ignore or appease our enemies, the quicker we will win. In a war such as this, the alternative to victory is not a brokered peace, but abject Western suicide and all that it entails — a revelation of which we saw on September 11.
Despite some disappointments about the postbellum reconstruction and the hysteria of our critics, our military is doing a wonderful job. We should understand that they have the capability to win this struggle in Iraq and elsewhere — but only if we at home accept that we have been all along in a terrible war against terrible enemies."

"Zinn Speaks Out Against Iraq Occupation, Summers" (Adam P. Schneider, The Harvard Crimson, 2003/12/05)
"Bush, Saddam Hussein, Bin Laden, they are all terrorists," says historian Howard Zinn:
"Prominent liberal activist and historian Howard Zinn told a packed lecture hall last night that history proves the American occupation of Iraq is unjust.
Zinn — whose 1980 book A People's History of the United States: 1492-Present has sold millions of copies — assailed President Bush's use of Wilsonian idealism to support the occupation. ...
Zinn wrapped up his argument by accusing the U.S. government of exhibiting "a whiff of fascism."
"Bush, Saddam Hussein, Bin Laden, they are all terrorists," he said. "I want a country that has a peace with the world."
The event was a part of a nationwide campus tour by the Campus Anti-War Network and the Muslim Student Association, entitled 'Speaking Truth to Empire.'" (Note: Found via Andrew Sullivan.)

"Oldest hatred, latest chapter" (Melanie Phillips, melaniephillips.com, 2003/12/05)
"The suppressed EU report on antisemitism in Europe has now been published on the Board of Deputies website, and a powerful, sobering and important read it is. It records a wave of antisemitism across Europe in the wake of the outbreak of the present terror campaign against Israel after the Camp David talks in 2000. It says the physical attacks on Jews have been perpetrated mainly by extreme right wing groups and young Muslims mostly of Arab descent, who themselves were often victims of racism. ...
Even more significant is that it records the convergence of the radical left, the far right and Islamists in this outbreak of Jew-hatred:
'Israel, seen as a capitalistic, imperialistic power, the “Zionist lobby”, and the United States are depicted as the evildoers in the Middle East conflict as well as exerting negative influence on global affairs. The convergence of these motives served both critics of colonialism and globalisation from the extreme left and the traditional anti-Semitic right-wing extremism as well as parts of the radical Islamists in some European countries'. ...
The fact that this report was suppressed speaks volumes about the political culture that it is describing. The fact that its details have nevertheless seeped out may mean that it now will be a little less easy for the antisemitism-deniers to blame the victims for their own demonisation." (See also the report: "Manifestations of anti-Semitism in the European Union" (Werner Bergmann and Juliane Wetzel, EUMC, December 2003))

"At Least 41 Killed in Suicide Bombing on Russian Train" (Steven Lee Myers, The New York Times, 2003/12/05)
Massmurdering teenage students: "A suicide bomber triggered a devastating explosion inside a crowded commuter train in southern Russia today, killing at least 41 passengers, officials said. President Vladimir V. Putin denounced it as a terrorist act intended to disrupt parliamentary elections here this weekend.
The explosion, which occurred at 7:42 A.M., wrenched apart the second carriage of the train only moments after it left the station in Yessentuki, near the foothills of the Caucasus, not far from Chechnya.
The force of the bomb, which one official estimated to contain more than 20 pounds of plastic explosives, hurled bodies and body parts dozens of yards from the carriage.
More than 150 other passengers, many of them students on their way to schools in the resort city of Mineralniye Vodi, were wounded, some of them gravely. Officials warned that the death toll could rise yet higher."

"The Delusional Dean" (Charles Krauthammer, The Washington Post, 2003/12/05)
"Bush Derangement Syndrome: the acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency - nay - the very existence of George W. Bush. Now, I cannot testify to Howard Dean's sanity before this campaign, but five terms as governor by a man with no visible tics and no history of involuntary confinement is pretty good evidence of a normal mental status. When he avers, however, that "the most interesting" theory as to why the president is "suppressing" the Sept. 11 report is that Bush knew about Sept. 11 in advance, it's time to check on thorazine supplies. When Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-Ga.) first broached this idea before the 2002 primary election, it was considered so nutty it helped make her former representative McKinney. Today the Democratic presidential front-runner professes agnosticism as to whether the president of the United States was tipped off about 9/11 by the Saudis, and it goes unnoticed. The virus is spreading." (See also: "Dean: Bush May Have Been Tipped to 9/11 Attacks" (NewsMax.com, 2003/12/02))

"Geneva Discord" (David Bedein and Yitzhak Sokoloff, FrontPageMagazine, 2003/12/05)
"We came to Geneva in a journalistic capacity, with questions about the Geneva Initiative, after examining the text of the proposed accord. Yet none of the spokespeople of the Geneva Initiative was ready to address our serious and substantive questions about the problems in their proposal. Instead, ten Palestinian speakers stood up and cursed Israel as an "apartheid," "criminal," or "racist" state, glorifying their martyrs and praising their people in jail, regardless of their crime.
Ten Israeli speakers also spoke, all in a lethargic tone of apology.
The Palestinians brought singers to sing the "praises of their prisoners."
The contrast could not have been clearer: while no Israeli speaker mentioned any pain suffered as a result of 20,000 terror attacks perpetrated over a period of three years, the Palestinians turned a "peace" event into a plenary session to demonize and justify further discord with Israel.
The Israelis brought a rock group starring Israeli rock star Aviv Gefen who never served in the IDF and who sang about a world 'without nations and settlements.'"

"Who speaks for Israel?" (Caroline Glick, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/12/05)
"Two Jews were brutally murdered in Paris in the week that followed the torching of the Jewish day school Merkaz HaTorah in the Paris suburb of Gagny.
In an interview with Boston's Jewish Advocate, French Jewish novelist Nidra Poller says that the two murders, of a 23 year-old Jewish DJ and of a recently widowed Jewish shopkeeper, were played down by the French press. In the case of the murdered young man, whose throat was slit and whose body was mutilated, the alleged assailant, a young male Muslim, reportedly told his mother after the fact, "Now I can go to paradise. I've killed my Jew."
Poller relates that the French authorities have released the man from custody, claiming that he is insane and therefore unfit to stand trial. There have been no arrests in the case of the Jewish shopkeeper. Her ten year-old daughter and a customer, who hid in the shop's storeroom during the attack, said they saw two North Africans fleeing the scene. Nothing was stolen from the shop. The French authorities have not classified the murders as acts of anti-Semitism." (See also: "Ritual Murders of Jews in Paris" (Alyssa A. Lappen, FrontPageMagazine, 2003/12/04))

"A Tale of War: Iraqi Describes Battling G.I.'s" (Ian Fisher, The New York Times, 2003/12/05)
An interview with an Iraqi mujahideen: "'We want the world to know that Bush, the biggest criminal of all, and Blair, that monkey of the desert, will not be able to control the Iraqis,' he said. "We will not allow them to kill Iraqis. I am speaking before God, on my behalf and that of the other mujahedeen." ...
"We are not fighting for Saddam," he said. "We are fighting for freedom and because the Americans are Jews. The Governing Council," he said, referring to the body of Iraqis appointed by the Americans, "is a bunch of looters and criminals and mercenaries. We cannot expect that stability in this country will ever come from them."
"The principle is based on religion and tribal loyalties," he added. 'The religious principle is that we cannot accept to live with infidels. The Prophet Muhammad, peace be on him, said, 'Hit the infidels wherever you find them.' We are also a tribal people. We cannot allow strangers to rule over us.'"

Thursday, December 4, 2003

News and commentary:

"The Literal Left" (Christopher Hitchens, Slate, 2003/11/04)
"The truly annoying thing that I find when I am arguing with opponents of the regime-change policy in Iraq is their dogged literal-mindedness. "Your side said that coalition troops would be greeted with 'sweets and flowers!' " Well, I have seen them with my own eyes being ecstatically welcomed in several places. "But were there actual sweets and flowers?" Then again, "You said there was an alliance between Bin Laden and Saddam, and now people think that Saddam was behind 9/11." Well, the administration hasn't said there was a 9/11 connection, but there are reams of verifiable contact between al-Qaida and Baghdad. Bin Laden supported Saddam, and his supporters still do, and where do you think this lovely friendship was going? "But there's no direct link between Saddam and 9/11." ...
This is not just tiresome in itself. It convinces me that, if the Bush and Blair administrations had not raised the overdue subject of Saddam's hellish regime, nobody else was going to. Aided by occasional political ineptitude in Washington and London, the opponents of the policy have done no better than act as if Iraq had nothing to do with them and maintain that things were all right as they were, or at any rate could only be made worse by an intervention. The idea that Iraq's state and society were headed for confrontation and implosion anyway just doesn't occur to such minds."

"A Night Out With Socialists: Tariq Ali and the ISO" (Rajeev Advani, Full Context, 2003/12/04)
Advani on a lecture by Tariq Ali and three other "political neophytes" arranged by the International Socialist Organization:
"The next speaker continued with a far more robotic but equally vacuous analysis of world events. She noted, in a remarkable act of omission, that Bush's America resembles Hitler's Germany in that both consider the world divided between good and evil, both view war as peace and both view occupation as freedom, as though these three tenets wholly defined Nazism. ...
Each of these three political neophytes suffer from an identical faith: they all take Bush's economic motivations as axiomatic, and all completely obfuscate the nature of the incipient guerilla resistance and the now defunct Baathist regime. Their criticism quickly collapses into tautology, as all substantive and difficult questions are sloughed off. Are US intentions good for the people of Iraq? – no, they say, by assumption Bush’s intentions are economic, and by assumption these economic intentions favor capitalists over the people. What is the nature of the guerilla resistance? Are these fighters neo-Baathists yearning to re-establish a grotesque Islamo-fascist republic, or do they represent a broad and genuine anti-occupation force? This question was skirted entirely, perhaps because the answer would fail to pass the dominant doctrinal filters at the meeting. It is perfectly acceptable for a pastor or priest to sermonize on topics of morality without first proving the existence of God, but quite another thing when a movement masquerading as a logical opposition to occupation finds it too must rely on faith to justify its premises." (Note: Found via Andrew Sullivan.)

"Malvo sketches depicted 'jihad'" (Andrea F. Siegel, The Baltimore Sun, 2003/12/04)
"Hoping to shed light on what they believe was an insane mind, defense attorneys for sniper suspect Lee Boyd Malvo presented a judge yesterday with dozens of sketches that the teen-ager scribbled in his jail cell while awaiting trial for last fall's sniper attacks - crimes that Malvo depicted in his art as "jihad" in America.
Filled with rambling anti-American messages and hand-drawn images of Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein and a mix of characters from The Matrix movie, the drawings offer an eerie glimpse of Malvo and the possible motivation behind the sniper siege that spread terror around the nation's capital.
"I would take you out at your dinner table. ... You will not escape, America. Not now, not ever," Malvo wrote on one sketch, which shows the cross hairs of a rifle superimposed over a police officer. Another sketch shows cross hairs aiming at the White House. ...
While the letters and drawings express a wide range of militant sentiments, the most recurring theme is that of jihad - or holy war - against America.
"We did not start this flame, we merely picked up the torch," he wrote on the drawing showing bin Laden near a police officer in a rifle's sights. 'Ye shall all die! Every last one.'" (See also the drawings: "Malvo Case Defendant's Trial Exhibits" (Fairfax County, December 2003))

"Geneva is a blueprint for war, not peace" (Jeff Jacoby, The Boston Globe, 2003/12/04)
"The international applause greeting the so-called Geneva Accord — the unofficial Israeli-Palestinian "peace" agreement formally presented in Switzerland this week — is a vivid illustration of the world's contempt for the Jewish state. It is also historically alarming. For the fervent acclaim the accord has drawn resembles nothing so much as the jubilation that greeted the Munich Accord of 1938, when Neville Chamberlain agreed to the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia in order to placate Adolf Hitler. ...
All the cheering in Geneva notwithstanding, the Beilin-Rabbo plan is a blueprint not for peace but for a cataclysmic war. It would force Israel back to what the late Abba Eban called the "Auschwitz" borders of 1949. It would compel the ethnic cleansing of tens of thousands of Jews. It would create a 23d Arab state by jeopardizing the existence of the world's only Jewish state. It would put Arafat and the Palestinian dictatorship in position to accomplish at last the goal they have never abandoned: the liquidation of Israel."

"Troops Demoralized by Bush Turkeygate Scandal" (ScrappleFace, 2003/12/04)
"American military morale hit an all-time low this week in the wake of revelations that President George Bush didn't serve a display turkey to hungry troops during his surprise visit to Baghdad last week. Political experts have already dubbed the episode 'turkeygate', and predict that the effect of this latest Bush administration scandal will be even more devastating than the outing of Valerie Plame.
"When I went home after dinner that night, I wrote a letter to my wife about how proud I was to fight for liberty," said an unnamed Army staff sergeant, "but when I learned that not a single soldier ate the display turkey, even though the president was photographed holding it, my faith in democracy was shattered."
Another soldier added, 'We suddenly realized that we're risking our lives to defend a lie. He mocked us with the pretty bird, then served us the common steamtable turkey. What good is freedom, if you can't trust your leaders?'" (See also: "The Bird Was Perfect But Not For Dinner" (Mike Allen, The Washington Post, 2003/12/04): "The bird is so perfect it looks as if it came from a food magazine, with bunches of grapes and other trimmings completing a Norman Rockwell image that evokes bounty and security in one of the most dangerous parts of the world.
But as a small sign of the many ways the White House maximized the impact of the 21/2-hour stop at the Baghdad airport, administration officials said yesterday that Bush picked up a decoration, not a serving plate.")

"Ritual Murders of Jews in Paris" (Alyssa A. Lappen, FrontPageMagazine, 2003/12/04)
"After a European Union poll found that nearly 60% of Europeans consider Israel the greatest threat to world peace, the British Broadcasting Corp. on November 26, asked if anti-Semitism is really increasing. ...
But the BBC gave the final word to Vienna's Edward Serotta. The increasingly "shrill" debate often "paints the entire European continent as a cesspool of hatred for Jews," griped the Central Europe Center for Research and Documentation director. "One prominent Jewish leader recently said the climate was just like 1933 - this is absolutely absurd."
Oh really? Serotta made this bizarre claim precisely a week after two Paris Jews were brutally murdered and disfigured — because they were Jewish. ...
Sebastian Sellam, 23, was a popular disc jockey at a hot Parisian night club called Queen. At about 11:45 p.m. on Wednesday November 19, the young man known as DJ Lam C (a reverse play on his surname) left the apartment he shared with his parents in a modest building in of Paris' 10th arrondissement near la Place Colonel Fabien, heading to work as usual. In the underground parking lot, a Muslim neighbor slit Sellam's throat twice, according to the Rosenpress interview. His face was completely mutilated with a fork. Even his eyes were gouged out.
Following the crime, Rosenpress correspondent Alain Azria reported, Sellam's mother said the Muslim perpetrator mounted the stairs, his hands still bloody, and announced his crime. "I have killed my Jew. I will go to heaven," he reportedly said."

"The other side of radical Islam" (Syed Saleem Shahzad, Asia Times, 2003/12/04)
An interview with Syed Munawar Hasan, the leader of Pakistan's largest Islamist political party:
"ATol: "You reckon that there are so many contradictions between the West and the Muslim world, is there any chance of reconciliation and dialogue between the two civilizations?"
Munawar: "There is none. The basic concepts of both civilizations are in total contrast with each other. When I say this I do not address Western civilization as Christianity. I speak of a man-made system completely devoid of divine guidance. Our concepts of God, human beings, the universe, are totally in contrast with the concepts of the Western world. We cannot segregate human lives into private and public, our lives are ruled by divine guidance, not by man-made rules based on his own prejudices and specific mindset characterized by its own dilemmas and shortcomings. Our concept of the universe is not materialistic, and the result of an 'accident'. Instead, it was a very well thought out process envisaged by the creator of the universe with a plan. So these basic concepts have made the difference between ours and Western approaches." (Note: Found via Andrew Sullivan.)

Wednesday, December 3, 2003

News and commentary:

"Terror 101" (Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball, Newsweek, 2003/12/03)
An article on "the close relationship between Saudi government officials and an international network of mosques and schools — some of which, Western intelligence officials say, have become breeding grounds for terrorism.":
"The German school, the King Fahd Academy in Bonn, provoked an uproar two months ago when German television reporters infiltrated its classrooms and videotaped a teacher inciting a holy war "in the name of Allah" and advocating martial-arts training — including the use of crossbows — for young students. Local German officials announced their intention to shut the school down after receiving intelligence reports that Muslim militants from throughout Germany — some of them with suspected terrorist connections — were flocking to the area to send their children to the academy.
But after expressing its own alarm, the German government quickly changed its tune. German Interior Minister Otto Schily recently praised the King Fahd Academy as an "important cultural institution" and denounced the media campaign against the school as a threat to Saudi-German relations.
The reason for the change, sources tell Newsweek, was hardball diplomatic pressure from Riyadh. ...
The Saudis pledged to curb extremism and fire any radical teachers. But they also quietly passed along another message to Schroeder: that schools attended by the children of German diplomats and businessmen in Saudi Arabia could face similar harassment or even closure if the King Fahd Academy was shut down. As a result, the Schroeder government promised to back off any plans to close the King Fahd Academy for "foreign-policy reasons," a German official told Newsweek."

"Know your enemy" (The Guardian, 2003/12/03)
Exactly. When they for some reason presented the news and the quote on the 15-minute version of Swedish television news, the news anchors laughed knowingly and I really couldn't see the foot in the mouth at all:
"Donald Rumsfeld can be criticised for a lot of things. But the US defence secretary's use of English is not one of them. The Plain English Campaign has shot itself in the foot this week by giving Mr Rumsfeld its annual Foot in Mouth award for this comment, delivered at a press conference earlier in the year:
"Reports that say something hasn't happened are always interesting to me," Mr Rumsfeld said, "because, as we know, there are known knowns, there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say, we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns - the ones we don't know we don't know."
This is indeed a complex, almost Kantian, thought. It needs a little concentration to follow it. Yet it is anything but foolish. It is also perfectly clear. It is expressed in admirably plain English, with not a word of jargon or gobbledygook in it. A Cambridge literary theorist, US Air Force war gamer or Treasury tax law draftsman would be sacked for producing such a useful thought so simply expressed in good Anglo-Saxon words. So let Rummy be. The Plain English Campaign should find itself a more deserving target for its misplaced mockery." (See also: "The Foot in Mouth award" (The Plain English Campaign, December 2003))

"Suicide bombers caught on their way to Yokneam school" (David Rudge and Margot Dudkevitch, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/12/03)
"Three days after Syrian President Bashar Assad called for renewed talks with Israel, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, whose offices are in Damascus, sent two suicide bombers to attack Israeli schoolchildren in Yokneam and more Israelis in the northern city of Beit She'an.
A senior security official told Channel 1 TV news Wednesday night that Islamic Jihad headquarters in Damascus issued the order to its Jenin cells to carry out the attacks. ...
The terrorists, Munir Shkadeh Mohammed Rabiah, 23, from Gaza and Morad Zeitoun, 20, from Jenin, are both member of the Palestinian national security forces.
A source in the Shin Bet told the Jerusalem Post that the two left Jenin in the morning and set out for Bardaleh where they planned to cross into Israel. "They told investigators that they had chosen the location as there is no security fence preventing them from entering Israel," the source said."

"Irag's Disney: Cartoonist eyes a theme park" (Amir Taheri, The Wall Street Journal/Benador Associates, 2003/12/03)
Supersaddam. From an interview with Ali Mandalwai, an Iraqi exile who has returned:
"One day in 1989 a gang of "awesome individuals, wearing dark glasses," called to take him for a meeting with Uday, Saddam's eldest son, a notorious psychopath. Everyone knew someone who had not returned from a similar interview.
What Uday wanted to discuss, however, surprised Mr. Mandalwai.
"He wanted me to turn Superman into an Arab hero, with a moustache, looking like Saddam Hussein," Mr. Mandalawi recalls.
In the English version the famous "S" would stand for Saddam. In the Arabic version it would be replaced with the Arabic letter "Kh" for the word "khariq" (the piercer)."

"Prison officer sacked for bin Laden 'insult'" (David Sapsted, The Daily Telegraph, 2003/12/03)
Dhimmi Watch, indeed: "A prison officer was sacked for making an allegedly insulting remark about Osama bin Laden two months after the September 11 attacks, an employment tribunal heard yesterday.
Colin Rose, 53, was told he had to go because, although he did not know it, three Muslim visitors could have heard his "insensitive" comment about the world's most reviled terrorist.
The assistant governor at Blundeston Prison, near Lowestoft, Suffolk, gave him a ticking off at the time. But he was sacked after a six-month investigation.
Mr Rose, a former Coldstream Guardsman with a 21-year unblemished record in the Prison Service, is claiming unfair dismissal.
The Norwich hearing was told that on Nov 15, 2001, he threw some keys into a metal chute at the prison gatehouse. When someone said it sounded as if he had thrown them so hard that they were going through the tray at the bottom of the chute, Mr Rose said: "There's a photo of Osama bin Laden there."
Peter McKinnon, another prison officer, told him to be quiet because two Asian women wearing headscarves and an Asian man were at the window of the gatehouse.
The investigation never discovered whether the visitors heard the comment.
Andrew Rogers, the assistant governor, told the tribunal: "I am not sure whether Mr Rose saw the visitors.
'I took offence at the comment. If the visitors had heard the comment, they might have taken offence, too.'"

"Escape from the Planet of the Apes" (Merde in France, 2003/12/03)
"French State TV openly supports antisemitism and France's Gayssot hate speech laws aren't worth a damn. This past Monday evening during France3's prime time entertainment show 'On ne peut pas plaire à tout le monde' ('You Can't Please Everybody') French comic Dieudonné, dressed up like a rabbi, made reference to 'the americano-sionist axis' and made a Nazi salute while yelling 'Heil Israel'. But is it not the nature of comics to ape humanity? It is important to keep in mind that 'On ne peut pas plaire à tout le monde' is broadcast on French state TV which is paid for in part by French taxpayers. When a state financed TV station in a given country constantly runs rank anti-American, antisemitic propaganda of this sort during prime time entertainment shows, can one reasonably think that the country in question is a friend and ally? Does Chiraq think we are stupid?"

"How 'Don't Tell' Translates" (Anne Hull, The Washington Post, 2003/12/03)
How about banning openly stupid policies instead?: "Confronted with a shortage of Arabic interpreters and its policy banning openly gay service members, the Pentagon had a choice to make.
Which is how former Spec. Glover came to be cleaning pools instead of sitting in the desert, translating Arabic for the U.S. government.
In the past two years, the Department of Defense has discharged 37 linguists from the Defense Language Institute for being gay. Like Glover, many studied Arabic. At a time of heightened need for intelligence specialists, 37 linguists were rendered useless because of their homosexuality."

"Attacks by Arabs on Jews in France Revive Old Fears" (Elaine Sciolino, The New York Times, 2003/12/03)
"The boys hide their skullcaps under baseball caps. The girls tuck their Star of David necklaces under their sweaters. Their school in this middle-class suburb east of Paris has been scorched by fire and fear, and those are the off-campus rules.
Early one Saturday in November, unidentified vandals set fire to the new two-story wing of the Merkaz Hatorah School for Orthodox Jews that was set to open as an elementary school in January. ...
They say the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the American occupation of Iraq have morphed into a battleground for French Arab Muslims to attack Jews. "We Jews in France are paying the price for the events on the ground in the Middle East that are seen from morning to night here on satellite television," said Marc Aflalo, a printer who proudly wears a skullcap and whose three children go to Merkaz Hatorah, a private school of 800 elementary and high school students.
If a Jew goes into an Arab Muslim neighborhood, he says, 'You have to carry an umbrella to protect yourself from the stones that fly.'"

Added in archive:
"Inside story of how Washington is losing its bottle" (Andrew Neil, The Scotsman, 2003/11/30)
"Nine Red Herrings: How the Western 'Left' has Misread Iraq" (Ben Illin et al., marxist.org, 2003/04/28)

Tuesday, December 2, 2003

News and commentary:

"Boots on the Ground, Hearts on Their Sleeves" (David Brooks, The New York Times, 2003/12/02)
"Soldiers in all wars are called upon to be heroes, but our men and women in Iraq are called upon to define a new sort of heroism. First, they must endure the insanity of war, fighting off fedayeen ambushes, withstanding the suicide bombings and mortars, kicking down doors and searching homes.
But a day or an hour or a few minutes later, they are called upon to enter an opposite moral universe. They are asked to pass out textbooks, improvise sewer systems and help with budgets. Some sit in on town council meetings to help keep the discussions on track. Some act like foundation program officers, giving seed money to promising local initiatives. ...
Most of all, you see what a challenging set of tasks they have been given, and how short-staffed they are. And yet you sense that in this war, as in so many others, the improvising skill of the soldiers on the ground will make up for the cosmic screw-ups of the people up the chain of command.
If anybody is wondering: Where are the young idealists? Where are the people willing to devote themselves to causes larger than themselves? They are in uniform in Iraq, straddling the divide between insanity and order."

¨"'FATHER - they know what they do'"
(Palestinian Intifadah Images, Yale University Library)

"Yale Library Joins Intifada?" (Martin Kramer, Sandstorm, 2003/12/02)
"While I am indulging my bias against Yale, I wonder why Palestinian propaganda posters are featured at the website of the library's Near East Collection. Is it because the posters are such outstanding and rare holdings? (The stuff looks pretty commonplace to me.) Or is it because of the politics of the collection's curator and chief faculty advisor, both of whom signed the extremist Yale divestment petition against Israel? Just wondering."

"Dean: Bush May Have Been Tipped to 9/11 Attacks" (NewsMax.com, 2003/12/02)
Via Little Green Footballs: "It looks like ex-congressional nutball Cynthia McKinney has picked up some new support for her conspiracy theory that President Bush had advance word of the 9/11 attacks – from none other than Democratic presidential front-runner Howard Dean.
Dean said on Monday that President Bush is withholding documents related to 9/11 because they may show he knew what was coming.
"The most interesting theory that I've heard so far – which is nothing more than a theory, it can't be proved – is that he was warned ahead of time by the Saudis," Dean told a caller to Washington, D.C's "Diane Rehm Show," according to a transcript obtained by Opinion Journal.com.
"Now, who knows what the real situation is?" the presidential conspiracy theorist cautioned."

"Abizaid of Arabia" (Sydney J. Freedberg Jr., The Atlantic, from the December 2003 issue)
A profile of John Abizaid: "This past July, a week after taking charge —as the chief of what the military calls Central Command — of all U.S. forces in the Middle East, the four-star Army general John Abizaid stepped over the line. He deliberately used the loaded word "guerrilla" to describe the escalating Iraqi resistance to U.S. occupation —something his civilian superiors had gone out of their way to avoid. Reporters pounced, even as soldiers quietly applauded Abizaid's candor. The Administration let it go —testimony to Abizaid's standing in the Pentagon, where he is said to be one of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's favorite officers.
And not only Rumsfeld's. To a remarkable degree Abizaid is admired by his fellow officers, many of whom have said outright that he is uniquely suited to oversee the increasingly complex and bloody occupation of Iraq. Indeed, Abizaid's entire life seems to have prepared him to be the military proconsul of an Arab country in chaos. But now the question is whether he can step up from a career of triumphs in smaller arenas to take on the nation-building challenge of the decade."

"This is Saddam's terror machine, not armed resistance" (Amir Taheri, The Times/Benador Associates, 2003/12/02)
"These terror attacks are not political. Their instigators — the Fedayin, guerrilla fighters loyal to Saddam's old regime — do not present any political demands. ...
What we are witnessing is terrorism — and strong policing is the only way to combat it. The coalition and the Iraqi Governing Council had much success in dealing with the explosion of ordinary crimes and lawlessness which Baghdad suffered in the immediate aftermath of liberation. That success was achieved through the organisation of Iraqi police units and by setting up neighbourhood watch networks that supply the information needed for crime prevention and detection. What the coalition needs — and has failed to establish — is a counter-terrorism force that can hunt down the remaining Fedayin and the criminal gangs that work with them. This is not a task for the conventional war machine which the coalition has assembled.
Though the fallen despot may not be personally in charge, the attacks bear the hallmark of Saddam's leadership. As always, he has embarked on a course that looks tactically promising but is bound to be ruinous for him at the long-term strategic level. The coalition has no choice but to persevere until what is left of Saddam's terror machine is broken."

"Finishing the Job - I" (James Taranto, Best of the Web Today, 2003/12/02)
"Jimmy Carter thinks that if he had been re-elected in 1980, he could have solved the Middle East problem. The New York Times reports Carter employed an interesting turn of phrase in making the argument. He said: 'Had I been elected to a second term, with the prestige and authority and influence and reputation I had in the region, we could have moved to a final solution.'" (See also: "Informal Peace Plan for Mideast Is Unveiled in Geneva" (Elaine Sciolino, The New York Times, 2003/12/02))

"Palestinian Baby Born in Bethlehem Draws Crowds" (Reuters/Yahoo! News, 2003/12/02)
A Palestinian miracle: "A baby born in Bethlehem is drawing crowds by the thousands. Palestinians in the West Bank town revered by Christians as Jesus' birthplace have been thronging to the adjacent Aida refugee camp for a glimpse of the 11-day-old infant many are calling a "miracle baby."
The boy has gained attention for being born with a large birthmark across his cheek that roughly forms in Arabic letters the name of his uncle, Ala, a Hamas militant killed by Israeli troops after he was alleged to have planned a suicide bombing.
The family, devout Muslims, called it a divine message of support for the Palestinians against Israel, though some local Christians preparing for subdued Christmas observances have quietly dismissed it as lacking any religious significance. ...
The security source said the baby's uncle, who was shot dead eight months ago, was suspected of masterminding a bombing that killed 12 people on a Jerusalem bus in November 2002. ...
When local Muslim clerics learned of the baby's birthmark, they announced it on mosque loudspeakers. The family said several thousand people had converged on the house since then."

"Jewish Holy Books On Display at the Alexandria Library: The Torah & the 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion'" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 619, 2003/12/02)
More on the exhibited copy of the Protocols: "Recently, a manuscript museum opened at the new Alexandria Library, which was renovated by the Egyptian and Italian governments via UNESCO. In the November 17, 2003 issue of the Egyptian weekly Al-Usbu', correspondent Jihan Hussein reportedthat the museum had added "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion" to the display case of the holy books of the monotheistic religions, next to a Torah. ... The following is an interview with the museum's director, Dr. Yousef Ziedan, in which he explains why he decided to add the "Protocols" to the exhibit:
'When my eyes fell upon the rare copy of this dangerous book, I decided immediately to place it next to the Torah. Although it is not a monotheistic holy book, it has become one of the sacred [tenets] of the Jews, next to their first constitution, their religious law, [and] their way of life. In other words, it is not merely an ideological or theoretical book.
Perhaps this book of the 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion' is more important to the Zionist Jews of the world than the Torah, because they conduct Zionist life according to it… It is only natural to place the book in the framework of an exhibit of Torah [scrolls].'" (See also: "Protocols of the Elders of Zion, courtesy of UNESCO" (Stefan Sharkansky, Shark Blog, 2003/11/25))

"Hating George Bush, and loving it" (Wesley Pruden, The Washington Times, 2003/12/02)
"Hating George W. Bush has become the squalid pastime of some of our Beautiful People. Some of them are gathering tonight at the Beverly Hilton in Hollywood at the invitation of Laurie David, wife of the man who created the television show "Seinfeld," for something called "Hate Bush 12/2 Event."
"This is the most important meeting you can attend to prevent the advancement of the current extremist right-wing agenda," Mzz David wrote. ...
But you don't have to go to Hollywood to join the orgy. Internet sites are abuzz with hate. One of them keeps a "body count" of all the folk George W. and his family have put on ice over the years. Too bad that Owney Madden and Lucky Luciano, Frank Costello and Joey Gallo are still dead. They could take notes. Only last week the airwaves were awash with the hot scoop that it was Lyndon Johnson who presided over the Kennedy assassination, but one particular Internet site tells us no, the evildoing knave of Dallas was really George H.W. Bush, who also did in Hale Boggs, the Louisiana congressman who was a skeptical member of the Warren Commission. Mr. Boggs died when his plane crashed in the Alaskan wilderness and was never found. Now it turns out that the elder Mr. Bush arranged the plane crash."

"Terrorism is a beast to be killed, not fed" (Mark Steyn, The Daily Telegraph, 2003/12/02)
"For two years now, it's been apparent that increasing numbers of us are living in entirely self-created realities. For example, when I switched on the TV last Thursday, I saw President Bush being warmly received at Thanksgiving Dinner in Baghdad. By contrast, Wayne Madsen, co-author of America's Nightmare: The Presidency Of George Bush II, saw a phoney stunt that took place not at dinner time but at the crack of dawn. ...
"The abysmal and sycophantic Washington and New York press corps seems to have completely missed the Thanksgiving breakfast dinner". Chalk that up to the fact that most people in the media never saw a military chow line or experienced reveille in their lives. So it would certainly go over their heads that troops would be ordered out of bed to eat turkey and stuffing before the crack of dawn."
Mr Madsen's column, entitled "Wag the turkey", arose, it quickly transpired, from reading too much into a typo in a Washington Post story and an apparent inability to follow complex technicalities like time zones.
But, when Brian O'Connell wrote to Mr Madsen pointing out where he'd gone wrong, the "investigative journalist" stuck to his guns: "It's all a secret of course, so no one will ever know," he concluded, darkly." (See also: "A Stopped Clock Is Right Twice a Day" (James Taranto, Best of the Web Today, 2003/12/01) and "Wag the Turkey" (Wayne Madsen, CounterPunch, 2003/11/28))

"John le Carré is Mr Angry now that Smiley's day has gone" (Daniel Johnson, The Daily Telegraph, 2003/12/02)
"Poor old John le Carré. First he lost his theme – the Cold War – and now he is losing his audience. Those who listened to the end of the embarrassing interview he gave to Jim Naughtie yesterday on the Today programme must have squirmed, as I did, when le Carré compared himself to Victor Klemperer, the great diarist who survived the Holocaust, and compared the Americans, by implication, to the Nazis. ...
Having "appointed the state of Israel as the purpose of practically all policy", the neo-cons will not stop their "war machine" from wreaking havoc "until they have quelled the world". This American junta's "minstrel" is Tony Blair, who apparently lied to his country out of a sycophantic desire to impress the Americans, than which there is "no bigger sin". ...
When le Carré declares, "I'm waiting for the real Americans to come back", paraphrasing Victor Klemperer on the Nazis, he oversteps the bounds of permissible prejudice. And when he tells the BBC that it is "obscene" that he cannot discuss Israel without being accused of anti-Semitism, some listeners may wonder whether it is not anti-Semitism itself that is obscene, rather than the censorship of which le Carré imagines himself a victim.
It is his voice we hear in Absolute Friends: "Tell the new zealots of Washington that in the making of Israel a monstrous human crime was committed and they will call you an anti-Semite." Someone should tell le Carré that anti-Semitism is the hatred that has come in from the cold." (See also: "The United States of America has gone mad" (John le Carré, The Times, 2003/01/15))

"Over the cuckoo's nest" (Arnaud de Borchgrave, The Washington Times, 2003/12/02)
"Why don't moderate Muslims speak up in favor of President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair when they resolve, "to crush global terrorists who hate freedom"?
One of Pakistan's most respected former army chiefs supplied a chilling explanation last week: because the "terrorists" are the "freedom fighters" of a "Muslim world facing unprecedented oppression and injustice."
Obstreperous is the way the Pakistani media refer to retired Gen. Aslam Beg. Harum-scarum would be more accurate. Mercifully, his finger is not anywhere near Pakistan's nuclear trigger. But it could be tomorrow or the next day should President Pervez Musharraf fall victim to a seventh attempt on his life.
In a lengthy e-mail, Gen. Beg said the Bush-Blair "strategy to combat global terrorism" is "a declaration of total war on freedom movements and it is the Muslim world that will be at the receiving end."
The anti-coalition resistance in Iraq and Afghanistan, as seen by Gen. Beg, is "a new reality emerging — a surging tide of their elan and vitality." By the standards of Pakistan's coalition of six politico-religious parties that govern two of Pakistan's four provinces, and hold 20 percent of the seats in the federal assembly, Gen. Beg is a moderate." (See also: "Bush-Blair bravado" (Mirza Aslam Beg, Daily Jang, 2003/11/25))

"Paris Jewish pupil beaten up by Muslims" (Michel Zlotowski, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/12/02)
Compare with EU's position in the two articles below. Perhaps the attackers really should be seen as "potential victims"? Or perhaps it didn't even happen?:
"A Jewish pupil attending a highly rated Paris secondary school was repeatedly beaten up by Muslim fellow pupils.
The headmaster filed a lawsuit against the two aggressors.
The 11-year old Jewish boy, whose name was not released, was repetitively verbally abused and beaten by two Muslim pupils of the same class.
"We'll finish Hitler's job," they reportedly yelled at him. The headmaster moved the Jewish boy to another class within the 1,800 pupils secondary school. The victim is currently under tranquilizers, according to the French weekly 'Le Journal du Dimanche.'"

"EU envoy: Anti-Muslim sentiment on rise" (Tovah Lazaroff, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/12/02)
Outrageous denial of the day: "European Union Ambassador Giancarlo Chevallard said Monday that while he can't say whether there has been an increase in European anti-Semitism, there has definitely been an increase in anti-Muslim and anti-Arab feeling.
He admitted there is "anti-Israeli policy" in Europe. "There is a lot of difficulty comprehending the route of the [security] fence and expansion of settlements," he said.
But when asked whether he believes there has been an increase in anti-Semitism, or whether it is just anti-Israel expression, Chevallard said, "I have no answer for you."
He said that while he is not "ready to agree" that there has been an increase in anti-Semitism, anyone who goes to Europe can feel that there has been an increase in anti-Arab and anti-Muslim feeling."

"EU anti-Semitism report leaked to 'Post'" (Tovah Lazaroff, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/12/02)
"The rise of anti-Semitism in Europe is linked to the escalation of the Middle East conflict, concluded a 112-page report commissioned by the European Union and exclusively obtained by The Jerusalem Post on Monday night.
The report was leaked to the Post by CRIF, the umbrella body of French Jewry, and by the European Jewish Congress.
"The local Jewish population is closely associated with the State of Israel and its politics. It can be said that the native Jews have been made 'hostages' of Israeli politics. Here anti-Semitic, anti-Israeli, and anti-Zionist motives are mixed together," it said. ...
"Anti-Semitic incidents in the monitoring period were committed above all either by right-wing extremists or radical Islamists or young Muslims, mostly of Arab descent, who are often themselves potential victims of exclusion and racism;" but the report also noted that that 'anti-Semitic statements came from the pro-Palestinian left.'" (See also: "EU body shelves report on anti-semitism" (Bertrand Benoit, Financial Times, 2003/11/21))

Added in archive:
"War after the war" (George Packer, The New Yorker, from the 2003/11/24 issue)

Monday, December 1, 2003

News and commentary:

"A Palestinian teacher tells children to wave Islamic Jihad flags..."
(Reuters/Jerry Lampen, 2003/12/01)
"A Palestinian teacher tells children to wave Islamic Jihad flags and shout slogans against the Geneva Accord, during a gathering of groups who oppose to the agreement, in Gaza City, December 1, 2003." (Note: Found via Little Green Footballs.)

"Armchair Provocateur" (Peter Bergen, The Washington Monthly, from the December 2003 issue)
"Laurie Mylroie: The Neocons' favorite conspiracy theorist":
"In what amounts to the discovery of a unified field theory of terrorism, Mylroie believes that Saddam was not only behind the '93 Trade Center attack, but also every anti-American terrorist incident of the past decade, from the bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania to the leveling of the federal building in Oklahoma City to September 11 itself. She is, in short, a crackpot, which would not be significant if she were merely advising say, Lyndon LaRouche. But her neocon friends who went on to run the war in Iraq believed her theories, bringing her on as a consultant at the Pentagon, and they seem to continue to entertain her eccentric belief that Saddam is the fount of the entire shadow war against America. ...
Mylroie declined to be interviewed for this article "with regret," so the only chance I have had to talk with her came this past February, when we both appeared on Canadian television to discuss the impending war in Iraq and Saddam's putative connections to terrorism. As soon as the interview started, Mylroie began lecturing in a hectoring tone: "Listen, we're going to war because President Bush believes Saddam Hussein was involved in 9/11. Al Qaeda is a front for Iraqi intelligence…[the U.S.] bureaucracy made a tremendous blunder that refused to acknowledge these links … the people responsible for gathering this information, say in the C.I.A., are also the same people who contributed to the blunder on 9/11 and the deaths of 3,000 Americans, and so whenever this information emerges they move to discredit it." I tried to make the point that Mylroie's theories defied common sense, as they implied a conspiracy by literally thousands of American officials to suppress the truth of the links between Iraq and 9/11, to little avail."

"The Geneva hate-fest" (Melanie Phillips, melaniephillips.com, 2003/12/01)
"Astounding, ignorant, malevolent and morally bankrupt outpouring from ex-US President Jimmy Carter at the Geneva 'accords' stunt today. Apparently, global terror is all the fault of America and Israel. No mention of the little matter of 9/11. No mention of the Palestinian terror which alone is responsible for Israel's military activity. Instead, Carter blames the victims and excuses mass murder!
The man's remarks, as reported, are scarcely credible from someone who once led the free world, even as a rubbish President. Viz: 'Bush's inordinate support for Israel allows the Palestinians to suffer'. What's Bush's 'inordinate support for Israel' got to do with the human bombs, the incitement to Jew-hatred, the rejection by the Arabs of offer after offer of a state for the Palestinians? The Palestinians are suffering because a) they have been used as pawns for decades by the Arab states waging annihilatory war against Israel by proxy and b) because they are now engaged in or supporting a terrorist war against Israel. Yet to Carter, it is not the Israelis who are suffering, but their attackers! ...
Geneva was a manipulative farce from the start. Today it morphed into a legitimation of terror. 'Palestinian General Zuheir Manasra defended both Palestinian uprisings as legitimate struggles for Palestinian independence... Both Palestinian and Israeli speakers criticized the government of Israel. Neither criticized the Palestinian leadership.'" (See also: "Carter slams Israel, Bush in Geneva speech" (Gil Hoffman and Herb Keinon, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/12/01))

"Geneva ceremony becomes forum for slamming Israel" (Gil Hoffman, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/12/01)
"A ceremony launching the Geneva Ininitiative in a Swiss convention center on Monday became a festival of anti-Israel bashing. ...
"The road map's first basic phase has been substantially rejected as the Israeli government has ignored mild American objection and continued to colonize Gaza and the far-reaches of the West Bank and to build an enormous barrier wall on Palestinian land," Former American President Jimmy Carter said. ...
"A wall is being built through the heart of Palestinian land to ensure that the occupation will continue," Abbed-Rabbo said. "They hope that the separation wall and the annexation of Palestinian land will be the solution in place of a peace agreement.
But by doing this, Israel will become an Apartheid state. This is an alternative we will never accept."
One Palestinian speaker called Sharon a "fascist."
Another called the fence 'a Berlin wall that separates Palestinian land into bantustans.'"

"World Figures Back 'Geneva' Middle East Peace Plan" (Robert Evans, Reuters, 2003/12/01)
As Charles Krauthammer noted last week, "It is Lucy and the football all over again, and the same chorus of delusionals who so applauded Oslo — Jimmy Carter, Sandy Berger, Tom Friedman — is applauding again.":
"World leaders past and present gave strong backing Monday for an unofficial Middle East peace plan denounced as treacherous by both Israeli officials and Palestinian militants.
As its authors, self-proclaimed moderates from both sides of Palestinian-Israeli divide, launched the plan at a packed ceremony in Geneva, senior figures from around the globe called it a ray of hope in one of the most intractable of conflicts. ...
"The only alternative to this initiative is sustained and growing violence," former president Jimmy Carter told the audience, which included large numbers of Israeli and Palestinian supporters specially flown in for the launch." (See also: "Geneva Sellout" (Charles Krauthammer, The Washington Post, 2003/11/28))

"U.S.: 54 Iraqis Killed in Samarra Battle" (Sabah Jerges, AP/Yahoo! News, 2003/12/01)