Archived news and commentary: December 15 - 21, 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 21, 2003


News and commentary:

"Person of the Year 2003: The American Soldier" (TIME, 2003/12/21)
"They swept across Iraq and conquered it in 21 days. They stand guard on streets pot-holed with skepticism and rancor. They caught Saddam Hussein. They are the face of America, its might and good will, in a region unused to democracy. The U.S. G.I. is TIME's Person of the Year."

"Ace in the hole puts Dems in quagmire" (Mark Steyn, Chicago Sun-Times, 2003/12/21)
"As for the western naysayers, let me go back to what I wrote in July, after the killing of Odai and Qusai and the Democratic Party reaction: "If they're still droning on like this on the day Rummy's passing out souvenir vials of Saddam's DNA, they'll be heading for oblivion." Well, we're not yet at the souvenir DNA stage, but the inability of a serious political party to resist the siren songs of the Noam Chomsky/Michael Moore/Euro left is showing signs of becoming terminal. Madeleine Albright's suggestion this week that the administration was holding Osama some place in order to spring him on the American public at the most electorally advantageous time is only the latest manifestation of how the fringe nutters have infected the mainstream." (See also: "Albright: Bin Laden Comments Were 'Tongue-in-Cheek'" (FOX News, 2003/12/17)

"Liberal Warfare" (Lawrence F. Kaplan, The Wall Street Journal, 2003/12/21)
"The discovery of Saddam Hussein has revealed, among other things, a liberal foreign-policy establishment utterly bereft of ideas. Responding to news of the capture, a parade of Democratic presidential aspirants and think-tank types took to the airwaves last Sunday to declare that now is the time to, as Howard Dean put it, "bring the U.N." back to Iraq. Never mind that this has been their refrain all along. Never mind, too, that the U.N. fled Iraq over the dying protestations of its representative there, and announced earlier this month that it has no intention of returning any time soon. The war in Iraq has generated a cliché industry, which, even by the standards of such industries, is distinguished by the absence of any relation to the world we happen to inhabit. ...
Rather than being a realistic assessment of the world around us or a discernible set of political values, these slogans respond to nothing more than petulance. Instead of taking the administration to task for the sincerity of its commitment to exporting democracy or questioning the wisdom of its decision to keep troop levels to a minimum in Iraq, our foreign-policy establishment has busied itself debating the semantics of empire, as if smirking passes for wisdom. It does not. This sets its members apart from their "revolutionary" counterparts on the Bush team, who, whether critics agree with their ideas or not, manifestly do have ideas. And in the war of ideas begun by Sept. 11, you can't beat something with nothing. Unless, of course, you pretend the day never happened."

"Saddam fooled me, too" (Con Coughlin, The Sunday Telegraph, 2003/12/21)
"I never expected it to end like this. Saddam Hussein, the Anointed One, the Glorious Leader, direct descendant of the Prophet, president of Iraq, chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council, field marshall of its armies, doctor of its laws, and great uncle to all its peoples, surrendering himself to American soldiers from the confines of the fetid hole that had become his final refuge. ...
On reflection, I should have known better. Saddam has always been better at portraying himself as the great heroic leader than playing out the role in real life. During his rule Iraq's propaganda machine made much of the fact that Saddam had been seriously injured during a failed assassination attempt on the then president in the late 1950s, when in fact he had suffered nothing more than a light graze.
Survival has always been Saddam's driving motivation since he first emerged in the Ba'ath party as the young gun for hire charged with eradicating its opponents, and given a choice last week between going out in a blaze of glory or surviving to fight another day, Saddam chose the latter.
Unlike his sons - and the estimated one million Iraqis who perished under his rule - Saddam sees himself as being far too important to sacrifice his own life."

"G.O.B.B.L.E. membership increases" (Tim Blair, timblair.spleenville.com, 2003/12/21)
G.O.B.B.L.E has 13 members so far, all maintaining that Bush served a plastic turkey in the face of actual reality:
"Please welcome The Nation's Matt Taibbi, The San Francisco Chronicle's Mark Morford, and author A.L. Kennedy to the Gullible Order of Bush-Bashing Leftist Evangelicals. ...
Matt Taibbi, a New York Press columnist and contributing writer at The Nation, secured his membership with this interview:

MATT TAIBBI: It was a plastic turkey.
AMY GOODMAN: Was it actually plastic?
MATT TAIBBI: Yes. Apparently it was a plastic turkey.
AMY GOODMAN: It was plastic?
MATT TAIBBI: Yes. That was actually reported in the - in another part of The Nation, in the daily outrage column online. But, yeah it was a plastic turkey, apparently. Which is even funnier. The famous shot where he's holding the big turkey, apparently that's a plastic turkey."

(See also: "A Look At Wesley Clark and the Media's "Shameful" Coverage of Bush's Trip to Iraq" (Democracy Now!, 2003/12/09) and "Alan Ramsey, King Turkey" (Tim Blair, timblair.spleenville.com, 2003/12/13))

"Secret files tell story of Iraq's 'disappeared'" (David Rose, The Observer, 2003/12/21)
An interview with Kanan Makiya: "Makiya has established the Iraq Memory Foundation in Baghdad, planned as a memorial and a vast information resource. His hope is that 'truth can help heal a society that has been politically brutalised'.
The foundation has amassed millions of files from Baathist government agencies, including the intelligence service and Special Security Organisation, the brutal network led by Saddam's late son, Qusay. One of the most dramatic finds came last month, when Makiya unearthed a web of tunnels, whose entrance lay beneath the tomb of Baath party founder Michel Aflaq, inside the Coalition Provisional Authority headquarters. It contained three million files with new insights into the regime's repression and depravity.
'There is a blacklist of schoolchildren, a register of every schoolchild in Iraq, listing their relatives and their supposed political affilitations. If a file recorded that a brother or an uncle had been executed for political reasons, that child was blighted. There was a special intelligence department that collected rumours, and tried to track their source. And we have files on the mass graves - including documents which show how the regime tried to fabricate a claim that they contained not its victims, but Baathists killed in the Shia and Kurdish uprisings of 1991.'"

"Sticks and carrots in Libya" (David Aaronovitch, The Observer, 2003/12/21)
Libya III: "For the Iraqodox this was not supposed to happen. Following the April invasion attitudes in the region were going to harden dangerously, and agreements would be more difficult to make. Here again the Prime Minister, while probably wrong on extant Iraqi WMD, was probably right on the political consequences of removing the Saddamite dictatorship. So it was a little disappointing, to say the least, to hear the estimable Menzies Campbell draw the glib conclusion from Libya that soft words inevitably trump hard action. If only the world were like that. Surely the conclusion to be drawn is that our caricatured leaders always had more than a single element in their strategy to contain the new terrorism.
I don't know whether this will help Blair. Watching former Minister Doug Henderson on News 24, as he tried to the point of parody to make out that the capture of Saddam was bad news, forced me to understand how irreconcilable the Iraqodox have become. Blair looked ill on Friday and his words were halting. The price, maybe, for comprehending what needed to be done after the twin towers fell."

"Libya's fatal blow to axis of evil" (David Pratt and Trevor Royle, The Sunday Herald, 2003/12/21)
Libya II: "The end of the threat posed to world peace and secure oil supplies by the “axis of evil” is emerging this weekend as the real prize that Tony Blair and George Bush have secured for Christmas.
Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi took the decision to renounce all weapons of mass destruction (WMD) on Friday night, but while at first it was thought this only had implications for Libya it is now clear that his decision has scuppered a secret partnership between Libya, Iran and North Korea formed with the intention of developing an independent nuclear weapon.
New documents revealed yesterday show that the three were working on the nuclear weapons programme at a top-secret underground site near the Kufra Oasis of the Sahara in southeastern Libya. The team was made up of North Korean scientists, engineers and technicians, as well as some Iranian and Libyan nuclear scientists."

"Libya spies' secret deal to reveal terrorists" (Peter Beaumont et al., The Observer, 2003/12/21)
Libya I: "Libya provided detailed intelligence on hundreds of al-Qaeda and other Islamic extremists as part of a deal to end its isolation as a pariah nation, The Observer can reveal. ...
Libya has a sophisticated network of intelligence missions throughout Africa and the Middle East, many of them a legacy of the nationalist struggles of the post-colonial period and Cold War.
In a series of extraordinary meetings, orchestrated by MI6 and involving the CIA and Libyan intelligence, which were held in Britain over the past two years, Libya agreed to hand over intelligence as well as pledging to abandon its WMD programme in return for the lifting of crippling US sanctions."

"Nuclear Program in Iran Tied To Pakistan" (Joby Warrick, The Washington Post, 2003/12/21)
"Evidence discovered in a probe of Iran's secret nuclear program points overwhelmingly to Pakistan as the source of crucial technology that put Iran on a fast track toward becoming a nuclear weapons power, according to U.S. and European officials familiar with the investigation.
The serious nature of the discoveries prompted a decision by Pakistan two weeks ago to detain three of its top nuclear scientists for several days of questioning, with U.S. intelligence experts allowed to assist, the officials said."

"In Europe, 'Secular' Doesn't Quite Translate" (Christopher Cladwell, The New York Times/FreeRepublic, 2003/12/21)
"On Wednesday, President Jacques Chirac tried to summon his fellow French citizens back to "the elementary rules of getting along." He was alluding to recent cases in which Muslim men had refused, on religious grounds, to let their hospitalized wives be treated by male doctors. "Nothing," Mr. Chirac said, "can justify a patient's refusing on principle to be treated by a doctor of the other sex."
Hospital etiquette is just one corner of a society-wide debate on religion that is obsessing France. The debate's implicit focus is Islam. ...
Confrontations between religion and secularism are arising across Europe, and evoking inconsistent responses. While most Germans register as members of a religion, the state of Bavaria banned the headscarf for teachers two weeks ago. While Britain has its established church, with the queen the "defender of the faith," it also has Muslim policewomen in veils. While Denmark has an established (Lutheran) church, it is fighting hard to keep explicit references to God out of a European constitution. While many of Italy's religious Catholics, supported by the pope, have closed ranks against Muslims who sue to remove crosses from classrooms, other Catholics have joined Muslims in opposing the Iraq war and marching in pro-Palestinian rallies.
This diversity of practice may be evidence of confusion, or it may reflect Europe's long holiday from doctrinal strife.
With that holiday over, France will be a test case for Europe."

"Rebuilding Iraq Is ... Nothing a Few Middle-Class Guys Couldn't Solve" (John Tierney, The New York Times Magazine, 2003/12/21)
"Before getting into the many reasons freedom is doomed in Iraq, consider a cheery counterexample. If you believe the political-science dictum that the bourgeoisie is the essential first ingredient for democracy, then there is at least one bit of good news in Baghdad today. Nader Hindo has come back to do business. ...
When American troops entered Baghdad, he was 29 years old and living in a Miami condo with a swimming pool and a view of the ocean - bourgeois bliss in South Beach.
Now Hindo is back in Baghdad, which starts to look like capitalism's promised land when he takes you around in his S.U.V. to show his projects. He is running an Internet service, supplying computers and satellite telephone service to three dozen hotels and businesses, plus he's negotiating to rebuild part of the national phone system. These are just his sideline businesses. He has got several bigger ventures going with his father. Together they're selling power generators to the United States Army, building materials to contractors and drilling equipment to the oil industry. They're overseeing 250 workers busy on the reconstruction of a dozen mansions, ministries and other buildings. On weekends, they scout the mountains and lakes of Kurdistan, where they're planning to build resort hotels.
Yes, resort hotels in Iraq. The country is not yet a tourist destination, but the Hindos figure it's just a matter of time."

"As a Fugitive, Hussein Stayed Close to Home" (John F. Burns and Eric Schmitt, The New York Times, 2003/12/21)
"The crucial man for Mr. Hussein was a 300-pound, middle-aged veteran of the Special Security Organization, one of the most feared organizations in Mr. Hussein's terror apparatus. It was this man's capture in Baghdad, a week ago on Friday night, that provided the breakthrough that trapped Mr. Hussein. He was caught after a dozen failed raids by American troops in Tikrit, Samarra and Baiji, Sunni Muslim towns in the Upper Tigris River Valley.
The American command has not publicly identified the informant, citing the risk to continuing military operations. But Maj. Stan Murphy, intelligence officer for the Fourth Infantry Division's First Brigade, the unit responsible for the night raid that brought in Mr. Hussein, described him as one of five top lieutenants trusted with essential tasks for Mr. Hussein. The captured informant acted as a chief of staff and appears to have been one of the only followers who knew of Mr. Hussein's whereabouts at any one time."

"Saddam 'actively involved' in directing attacks on the US forces" (Philip Sherwell, The Sunday Telegraph, 2003/12/21)
"Saddam Hussein was personally directing the post-war insurgency inside Iraq, playing a far more active role than previously thought, American intelligence officers have concluded since his capture.
Despite the bewildered appearance of the deposed dictator when he was hauled from his hiding-hole last weekend, he is believed to have been issuing regular instructions on targets and tactics through five trusted lieutenants. ...
They have put together a detailed picture of Saddam's support structure while in hiding. This enabled him to issue commands without the use of satellite phones that could be picked up by monitoring devices.
The Telegraph has also learned that millions of dollars to support the insurgency were recovered in raids on other suspected Saddam safe houses. US officials say he was in regular contact with five "enablers" - veterans of his feared security services drawn from his power base of Tikrit."

 


Saturday, December 20, 2003


News and commentary:

"My dear Saddam Hussein, my dear friend, my cutiepie..." (Plantu, Last of the Famous International Playboys, 2003/12/20)
"My dear Saddam Hussein, my dear friend, my cutiepie..."
(Plantu, Last of the Famous International Playboys, 2003/12/20)
"Former Defense minister Jean-Pierre Chevènement is giving a speach, saying "My dear Saddam Hussein, my dear friend, my cutiepie..." The empty suit behind him, nervous, is saying: 'You've got the wrong speech!!! That's the one from your last visit to Baghdad in February!'"
(See also: "Dreaming" (Merde in France, 2003/12/17): "'The Iraqi resistance is a good thing. I would have preferred that France resisted like that in 1940.' Say thanks to US' ex-ally. — Jean-Pierre Chevènement, Ex-French Defense Minister...")

"Plantu's lost cartoons" (Douglas, Last of the Famous International Playboys, 2003/12/20)
Gillison presents seven cartoons by Le Monde editorial cartoonist Plantu, covering Middle East from the Kippur War to the Gulf War. The difference between these historical cartoons and the present anti-American obsession is conspicuous and revealing:
"The Financial Times' Jo Johnson wrote in August (link now dead) that Plantu has "a good claim to being France's single most influential opinion-former." It must be said, he can be quite funny. Recent months in France saw a general silence surround France's alliance with Saddam and the terrifying reality of the Ba'th. Mention of Iraqi suffering was perceived as support for war and therefore often muted or absent. Given this and Plantu's anti-Americanism, I was astonished to see these cartoons as they decry the terror of Iraqi life and ridicule French complicity with, and support for Saddam.
I find the difference between these cartoons and present-day political discourse to be a striking indication of the way France's once healthy interest in Iraqi matters diminished slowly until the only relevant topics fit for discussion were UN sanctions and American iniquity."

"A model showing the latest design for the Freedom Tower..." (Jock Pottle/Esto, 2003/12/20)
"A model showing the latest design for the Freedom Tower..."
(Jock Pottle/Esto, 2003/12/20)
"A model showing the latest design for the Freedom Tower, the tallest at the World Trade Center site."

"1,776-Foot Design Is Unveiled for World Trade Center Tower" (David W. Dunlap, The New York Times, 2003/12/20)
"After fervent public debate over how to mend the New York City skyline and a five-month effort by competing architectural giants that was one part collaboration and two parts quarrel, the design of the first tower of the new World Trade Center was unveiled yesterday.
The torqued and tapering skyscraper, called the Freedom Tower, would rise some 70 stories, then dematerialize in its upper reaches among cables, windmills and antennas before piercing the clouds at 1,776 feet. At this height, it might be the world's tallest building upon completion in 2008 or 2009.
"We will build it to show the world that freedom will always triumph over terror and that we will face the 21st century with confidence," Gov. George E. Pataki said. 'This is not just a building. This is a symbol of New York. This is a symbol of America. This is a symbol of freedom.'"

"Herzliya" (David Warren, davidwarrenonline.com, 2003/12/20)
Warren on Sharon's Herzliya speech: "My own view is that isolating the West Bank, too, is actually the most merciful thing that can be done, for the Palestinians. ...
A Palestine deprived of options to antagonize Israel and externalize all failures must then choose between beggary and enterprise. The Palestinians themselves must eventually confront social, economic, and political problems which, once Israel is disengaged, can no longer be blamed on "the outsider". The West Bank has land as arable as any in Israel, and (after subtracting the Negev desert) no greater population density. What can they do with what they have?
For this reason, I think it is right to hope that, barring some unlikely miracle in which Yasser Arafat and his thug regime suddenly agree to disband their own terror apparatus (possibly at the cost of their own lives), the Israelis proceed with their Plan B. Separation is hardly a good solution in itself, but better than mutual destruction.
Huge pressure will be brought against the Sharon government and Israel generally, not to do what they must. Much of this pressure will come from their only real ally, the United States. On past performance, Mr. Sharon will probably cave. Yet even if he does, he will have left, as his legacy, the one real alternative to a roadmap that cannot lead anywhere." (Hat tip: Malcolm Smordin. See also: "Sharon's political 'ultimatum'" (Roger Hardy, BBC News, 2003/12/19))

"Saddam's fate must be decided in Iraq, by Iraqis" (Tony Parkinson, The Age, 2003/12/20)
Parkinson on "the appalling cynicism that has characterised this week's debate over the dictator's fate". Found via Tim Blair, who calls Parkinson "the last sane man at The Age":
"One of the more galling contributions along these lines came from leading Middle East commentator Fawaz Gerges, who told CNN: "Many Arabs would not take a trial in Iraq seriously."
Unbelievably, Professor Gerges said this with a straight face.
This comes from one of the many influential voices from the Middle East who managed to hold their tongues through all the shocking abuses of civil rights under Saddam.
Now, with the old tyrant captive, we hear pious lectures on the wrongs that may be inflicted by a vengeful people.
Where was Gerges when Saddam's Baathists were hanging Jews in Liberation Square? Where were the cries of alarm as tens of thousands of Iraqis were summarily executed?
Why weren't Gerges and others hammering down the doors of Baghdad's Palace of Torture? More recently, where have been the international protests over the many violent attacks on senior judicial figures in Iraq by Saddam's loyalists?
In short, the critics were nowhere to be seen or heard. Suddenly, as if by magic, they have rediscovered a sense of indignation.
The greatest irony here is that many of the same people who were insisting that intervention against Saddam was a breach of Iraq's sovereignty are now saying the dictator must not be tried within Iraq's jurisdiction, and that justice can only be served by taking the process outside Iraq."

"Saddam not a dictator at BBC" (The Daily Telegraph, 2003/12/20)
The Daily Outrage, via Andrew Sullivan: "'An email has been circulated telling us not to refer to Saddam as a dictator,' I'm told. "Instead, we are supposed to describe him as the former leader of Iraq."
"Apparently, because his presidency was endorsed in a referendum, he was technically elected. Hence the word dictator is banned. It's all rather ridiculous."
The Beeb insists that the email merely restates existing guidelines. "We wanted to remind journalists whose work is seen and heard internationally of the need to use neutral language," says a spokesman." (See also: "Be polite to Mr Saddam" (Nic Cecil, The Sun, 2003/12/20): "Barmy BBC bosses have banned reporters from calling tyrant Saddam Hussein a former dictator. Instead, staff must refer to the barbaric mass murderer as "the deposed former President". ...
Labour MP Ann Clwyd, who chairs the Indict group which has dossiers on the crimes of Saddam, his sons and henchmen, was astounded at the BBC's stance.
She said: 'It’s frankly ridiculous. Saddam Hussein is a despot, a murderer and a torturer. He will have to answer charges of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.'")

"Libya Vows to Give Up Banned Weapons" (Peter Slevin and Glenn Frankel, The Washington Post, 2003/12/20)
Of course, the invasion of Iraq started exactly nine months ago and the agreement is announced within a week after the capture of Saddam Hussein: "Libya will "immediately and unconditionally" allow international inspectors to enter the country to track unconventional weapons and oversee their destruction, said Bush, describing nine months of secret negotiations among U.S., British and Libyan officials.
A team of U.S. and British intelligence agents and weapons specialists made two trips to Libya, officials said, where they were allowed to visit 10 secret weapons sites, were shown chemical-warfare agents and discussed details with Libyan scientists. The Libyans said they had been working to develop a nuclear fuel cycle intended to provide fissile material for atomic weapons. ...
White House officials said they felt certain that the brewing military confrontation with Iraq influenced Gaddafi's decision to reach out. Their British counterparts acknowledged the value of strong action, but also maintained that Britain's decision to reestablish diplomatic relations with Libya in 1999 was a factor."

 


Friday, December 19, 2003


News and commentary:

"A masked Palestinian carrying a hand grenade..." (Reuters/Jerry Lampen, 2003/12/19)
"A masked Palestinian carrying a hand grenade..."
(Reuters/Jerry Lampen, 2003/12/19)
"A masked Palestinian carrying a hand grenade holds up a banner with the picture of ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein during protest over the capture of Iraqi President by U.S. forces in the Northern Iraqi city of Tikrit, in Khan Younis December 15, 2003."

"Bush, Blair: Libya to dismantle WMD programs" (CNN.com, 2003/12/19)
"Libya has tried to develop weapons of mass destruction and long-range missiles in the past, but has agreed to dismantle the programs, President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair said Friday in simultaneous televised speeches.
Bush said Libya's leader, Col. Moammar Gadhafi, had "agreed to immediately and unconditionally allow inspectors from international organizations to enter Libya.
"These inspectors will render an accounting of all nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and will help oversee their elimination," Bush said. ...
This decision by Colonel Gadhafi is an historic one and a courageous one, and I applaud it," Blair said. "It will make the region and the world more secure."
He added, 'It demonstrates, too, that countries can abandon programs voluntarily and peacefully.'" (See also statements by: Tony Blair, George W. Bush and the Libyan Foreign Ministry.)

"Saudi Columnist: 'America is a Liberator and not an Occupier… Bush will Go Down in Arab History as the Liberator of Baghdad'" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 631, 2003/12/19)
It's a pity Saudi columnist Mohammad Al-Rasheed is something of a lone voice crying in the desert:
"The jubilation in Baghdad put the Arab media to shame. America, for this brief moment at least… is a liberator and not an occupier. I can't help being smug, since what I saw gave me back some confidence in the possibility of justice in this world. I had almost lost hope. It took George Bush to give me that back. I don't agree with him on many things, and while many Americans share my stand, I'll give the man his due. He will go down in Arab history as the liberator of Baghdad, even if the whole mission in Iraq comes to nothing more than this. ...
The reality we have to face is the fact that it took Americans to relieve Baghdad of its dictator. Arab impotence recorded a new low. I might sound naive but I would like to ask where the 'freedom fighters,' 'the resistance,' 'the strugglers for the freedom of Iraq' were when that man ran amok. Having delivered Saddam, the Americans will have to deliver Iraq. Shouldn't we now be wise enough to give them at least a chance, if not a real helping hand?
We started this business of post-September 11th by jousting with the Americans loudly and virulently. We could not believe that any of our sort would behave in such barbaric ways. The truth became clearer with time. Regardless of the reason for the American intervention in Iraq, the end result couldn't have been happier for the Iraqis or more loaded with hope for other Arabs.
Dare we say Carpe Diem and actually seize the day?" (See also: "Give Them a Chance" (Mohammad T. Al-Rasheed, Arab News, 2003/12/18) and "Saudi Columnist: 'We Have Bred Monsters ... We Are the Problem and Not America'" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 617, 2003/11/30))

"Stuck on Calypso's Island" (Victor Davis Hanson, National Review, 2003/12/19)
"This war would be over far sooner if 350 million Europeans insisted on a modicum of behavior from Middle Eastern rogue regimes, rounded up and tried terrorists in their midst, deported islamofascists, cut off funding to killers on the West Bank, ignored Yasser Arafat — and warned the next SOB who blew up Europeans in Turkey, North Africa, or Iraq that there was a deadly reckoning to come from the continent that invented the Western military tradition. Indeed, European sophistication and experience, combined with real power, could be a great aid to the West in its effort to promote liberal and consensual governments outside its shores. But if they do not even believe in the unique legacy of their civilization, then why should we — much less their enemies?
So for now we should not lament that the Europeans are no longer real allies, but rather be thankful that they are still for a while longer neutrals rather than enemies — these strange and brilliant people who somehow lost their way, and no longer can distinguish between a noisy Knesset and Arafat's hangmen, much less between those racing to topple a tyrant in Baghdad and others lounging at Sebrenica."

"Killing Him Softly" (Charles Krauthammer, The Washington Post, 2003/12/19)
"The race is over. The Oscar for Best Documentary, Short Subject, goes to . . . "Saddam's Dental Exam." ...
It was a beautiful sight. But it was more than that. It was a deeply important historical moment. More than the fate of a man is at stake here. At stake is the fate of an idea, an idea of singular malignancy that has cost the Arabs not just countless innocent lives but a half-century of progress.
Hussein was the most aggressive and enduring exemplar of a particular kind of deformed Arabism, a kind that arose in the post-colonial era, appealed to the greater glory of the Arab nation and promised a great restoration. ...
Hussein's destiny is important because he was the last and the greatest of these pan-Arab pretenders, though he gave it a psychotically sadistic character unmatched anywhere in the Arab world. This stream of Arab nationalism brought nothing but poverty, corruption, despair, torture and ruin to large swaths of the Arab world. The mass graves of Iraq are its permanent monument.
This is why it was important not just to capture Hussein but to demystify him — and with him, the half-century spell that radical pan-Arabism had cast over the entire Middle East."

"Conspiracy Theories Surrounding Saddam's Capture" (Nimrod Raphaeli, MEMRI, 2003/12/19)
"An editorial in the Iraqi daily Al-Shira' titled: "The Servant has Fallen in the Master's Cage" surveys Saddam's policies from 1963 until his capture, and suggests that he implemented these policies at the behest of his American masters. ...
The last service provided by this "super servant" was to surrender as "a free service to America, and Bush in particular, in disgraceful pictures that would be used as stickers in the election campaign…." ...
The mother of all conspiracy theories is woven by Abd Al-Bari Atwan, the Editor-in-Chief of the London-based Arabic daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi — the one daily, aside from Saddam's regime dailies, which no longer exist, that has remained loyal to "President Saddam Hussein."
For Atwan, "The U.S. and its mighty propaganda machine are involved in a disinformation campaign that reaches the level of terrorism" to mislead public opinion. ...
First, the pictures distributed by the Americans about Saddam's hideout show a palm tree behind the soldier who uncovered the hole where Saddam was hiding. The palm tree carried a cluster of pre-ripened yellow dates, which might suggest that Saddam was arrested at least three months earlier, because dates ripen in the summer months when they turn into their natural black or brown color. Atwan concludes that the arrest was 'a staged show and the place of arrest [was] completely elsewhere.'"

"European Militant Network Shut Down" (Victor L. Simpson, AP/Yahoo! News, 2003/12/19)
"Authorities in Europe have shut down a network that recruited at least 200 Islamic militants to carry out attacks on U.S.-led forces in Iraq, Italian investigators told The Associated Press.
The volunteers were drawn from Muslim youths living on the fringes of society in Western Europe, with loose connections to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida and Ansar al-Islam, a militant group in northern Iraq.
One recruit from Italy may have been involved in a rocket attack on the Al-Rasheed Hotel in Baghdad in October, when the U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was staying there, officials told AP. ...
An intelligence report, for example, said recruits from Europe may have been involved in the August bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad that killed 22 people, including the top U.N. envoy, Sergio Vieira de Mello, officials said. But that report apparently has not been corroborated."

"Saddam's capture literally kills woman" (AFP/news.com.au, 2003/12/19)
"A 70-year-old woman was overcome by grief at the capture of ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and died of a heart attack after seeing pictures of the humiliating event, Jordan's Al-Rai daily said Thursday.
A relative of the woman, who was only identified by her initials, told the newspaper she broke into a fit of tears and died after she saw a dissheveled and haggard-looking Saddam in the hands of US troops.
The woman was "deeply saddened over Saddam's fate" and suffered a heart attack after seeing his images being flashed on television screens, the unnamed relative said, adding that she had been in very good health until then."

"Saddam's Arrest Brings Humiliation Debate" (Nadia Abou El-Magd, AP/Yahoo! News, 2003/12/19)
"In a telephone poll, the popular Arab satellite channel Al-Jazeera asked viewers if showing Saddam being probed by U.S. military doctors was meant to humiliate Arabs. Al-Jazeera said that of the 1,500 people who called in, 97 percent said it was.
Kuwaiti columnist Ahmed al-Robei expressed anger at such talk of a hurt afflicting all Arabs. He wrote in the pan-Arab daily Asharq Al-Awsat that the worst thing on Middle East satellite channels since Saddam's arrest was the idea of "humiliation to Arab dignity."
He added that Arabs were continuing to ignore that the Iraqi leader was a villain. "The mass graves are not enough to wake the minds of some of us. Are we people who adore despots? It is a sad question," he wrote.
He said he wondered how long Arabs would go on 'glorifying oppressors and despots and portraying them as the saviors and leaders of this (Arab) nation, which is handed over from one executioner to another.'"

"Sharon's political 'ultimatum'" (Roger Hardy, BBC News, 2003/12/19)
"In a major policy speech Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has given the Palestinians a few months to end violence and enter peace talks - or Israel would implement what he called a "severance policy".
Mr Sharon is in effect giving the Palestinians an ultimatum - negotiate now and you'll end up with more, or we will take unilateral steps you won't like, and you will end up with less.
New Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei is likely to feel that - in political terms - Mr Sharon is putting a gun to his head.
The Israeli prime minister is giving him only a few months - Mr Sharon avoided a more specific deadline - to end Palestinian violence and begin implementing the peace plan known as the roadmap.
If he fails to do this, Mr Sharon will start implementing what he calls a "severance policy" - in other words, Israel will act unilaterally to separate itself from the Palestinians." (See also: "Full transcript: Sharon speech" (BBC News, 2003/12/19) and "Palestinians scorn 'these dangerous words'" (Conal Urquhart, The Guardian, 2003/12/19): "The Palestinian prime minister, Ahmed Qureia, said he was "disappointed" that Mr Sharon was "threatening" the Palestinians, and added that if he picked up peace talks then a settlement could come "sooner than expected". "These are ultimately dangerous words, and this type of talk is simply not acceptable," he said.")

"Courts rebuke White House" (Jerry Seper, The Washington Times, 2003/12/19)
"Two federal courts yesterday rebuked the Bush administration, ruling that prisoners at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base should have access to attorneys and U.S. courts, and separately deciding that President Bush had no authority to detain an American citizen arrested on U.S. soil as an enemy combatant.
A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco described the administration's detention of 660 terrorism suspects at Guantanamo, arrested by U.S. military authorities in Afghanistan, as "running roughshod over the rights of citizens and aliens alike." ...
A separate 2-1 ruling by a three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York ordered the government to either release Jose Padilla within 30 days or charge him in a civilian court.
Padilla, a U.S. citizen who converted to Islam and took the name Abullah al-Muhajir, is suspected in an al Qaeda terrorist scheme to detonate in the United States a "dirty bomb," which spreads deadly radioactive material. ...
"The president does not have the power to detain as an enemy combatant an American citizen seized on American soil outside a zone of combat," wrote Judges Rosemary S. Pooler and Barrington D. Parker Jr., both of whom were appointed by President Clinton."

Note: Don't miss "The Saudi Hate Machine" (Erick Stakelbeck, The National Interest, 2003/12/17), in which Stakelbeck outlines the connections between Saudi Arabia's two most notorious clerics, Safar Al-Hawali and Salman Al-'Auda, the Saudi government and Al-Qaeda.

 


Thursday, December 18, 2003


News and commentary:

"'Gold Mine': Saddam Hussein's Loyalists Infiltrated U.S. Operations in Iraq" (Martha Raddatz, ABC News, 2003/12/18)
"Agents for deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein have penetrated the U.S. command in Iraq, ABC News has learned. As a result, they have the potential to undermine U.S. authority.
Among the documents found in Saddam's briefcase when he was captured last weekend was a list of names of Iraqis who have been working with the United States — either in the Iraqi security forces or the Coalition Provisional Authority — and are feeding information to the insurgents, a U.S. official told ABC News.
"We were badly infiltrated," said the official, adding that finding the list of names is a 'gold mine.'"

"Liberals for Fascism" (James Taranto, Best of the Web Today, 2003/12/18)
"Meanwhile, Ellen Ratner — who describes herself as "liberal and proud" — gushes over a visit to Syria, "a county [sic] that — while "not perfect" . . . — is beginning a new era." Christmas is a holiday there! Women wear miniskirts! You can get a job without belonging to the Baath Party! Oh sure, there are a few warts, which Ratner "pointed out to the gracious Syrians":

When I brought up the subject of torture, the editor in chief of the Baath Party newspaper said, yes, this is a problem, but it is not our biggest problem. Just like you have Guantanamo Bay and that is a problem for you, but it is not your biggest problem.

The left once apologized for communism in strikingly similar terms. But communism, evil though it was, at least was premised on a universalist vision of a better world. Why does the left now defend fascist regimes? Because they're no longer for anything; what's important is what they're against: America, Israel, "Eurocentric" civilization. The motto of today's reactionary left ought to be 'The enemy of my country is my friend.'" (See also: "Syria" (Ellen Ratner, WorldNetDaily, 2003/12/15))

"Success has a thousand fathers..." (Glenn Reynolds, InstaPundit, 2003/12/18)
"Success has a thousand fathers: But who would have guessed that one of them was Robert Fisk?

It's easy, looking at these images of Saddam's sadism, to have expected Iraqis to be grateful to us this week. We have captured Saddam. We have destroyed the beast. The nightmare years are over.

What's this "we" sh*t, white man? (Emphasis added.)" (See also: "Saddam Hussein, like Adolf Hitler, will live on for millions of people" (Robert Fisk, seattlepi.com, 2003/12/17))

"Close encounter with a US diplomat" (Al-Ahram Weekly, from the 18 - 24 December 2003 issue)
An encounter in the bizarro world between the US Ambassador in Egypt, David Welch, and Al-Ahram journalists, found via Little Green Footballs:
"Shukrallah: ... Arabs do not like tyrants because they have suffered from tyranny, but there is a sense that Saddam Hussein tried to defy the West, tried to defy the people who have been trying to humiliate and degrade us, and now he's broken down in the most humiliating way.
Welch: ...With respect to the display of Saddam Hussein, can I be honest with you here? I am stunned that you would say this. I did not see any problem with his treatment whatsoever. What is wrong with a medical examination? ...
Nyier Abdou: Whether or not you want to call it abuse, there certainly is a distinction between showing somebody in this manner and showing them in a more dignified way. I think what makes people angry is that the US fails to see how this kind of imagery will inflame people, and that they do it anyway, and that's what really makes people angry. It is a misunderstanding of what is going to convince people.
Welch: I think your moral compass has gone crazy. I think you should be looking at the Iraqi people and their reaction to this. Your reaction puzzles me to be honest. Can we move on because this is boring..."

"PA investigator of Gaza bombing its likely perpetrator - Shurat HaDin warns" (IMRA, 2003/12/18)
"Shurat HaDin - Israel Law Center Director Nitsana Darshan-Leitner has written to United States Attorney General John Ashcroft alerting him to the fact the Palestinian Security Service commander assigned to investigate the October bombing attack on American personnel in Gaza was very likely the terrorist who planned it.
Gaza Commander Col. Rashid Abu Shabak's has been entrusted by the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation with hunting down the terrorist cell responsible for the October 15, 2003 bombing which left three Americans dead. ...
According to the Shurat HaDin letter, Abu Shabak, a protege of Palestinian leader Mohammed Dahlan, has an extensive terrorist past. Abu Shabak, along with Dahlan are the leading suspects in several other Gaza terror attacks:
* On April 1, 1997, Abu Shabak is alleged by Israeli intelligence agencies to have sent Palestinian suicide bombers to target two school buses outside Netzarim and Kfar Darom in Gaza. Then, Chief of Staff Amnon Lipkin-Shahak identified the terrorists as police officers under Dahlan and Abu Shabak's direct command.
* On October 18, 2000, a busload of 40 Israeli women and children was attacked by gunfire and bombs near the Gush Katif junction in Gaza as it passed by a Palestinian police station. Israel Radio reported that Israeli intelligence has concluded that Dahlan and Abu Shabak were behind the attack.
* On November 20, 2000, Dahlan and Abu Shabak ordered the roadside bombing of a school bus outside the Kfar Darom community. Two adultson the bus were
killed, and nine other Israelis were injured, including five children. Several of the injured are American citizens. Israeli security services have identified Dahlan and Abu Shabak as the main suspects in the attack."

"Behind 'enemy' lines (I'm back)" (Roger L. Simon, rogerlsimon.com, 2003/12/18)
A report from Paris: "Or perhaps it was because I was there in the midst of the capture of Saddam… but the storied anti-Americanism now seemed almost the pathetic gesture of a failed state. To see the downcast newscaster on TV3 searching for something reassuringly cynical to say about the arrest of the Iraqi mass murderer was comical (she implied Saddam had been — unfairly? — impoverished and his capture didn’t mean much because he "only" had $750,000 in cash in the hole with him). ...
Meanwhile, they have made a devilish compact with the burgeoning immigrant population from the proche-orient (yes, I was escorted to the notorious suburbs where I was told, for my own safety, not to speak English — I didn't. I also didn't take pictures, for obvious reasons). After all, everyone wants his or her rémission — the one thousand euros a month (almost 1300 hundred dollars at present) minimum guaranteed each resident of France with many escalators for children, etc. and a (believe it on not) Xmas bonus (despite the state's militant secularity) for the unemployed. No wonder the Islamic world is descending on them en masse. Talk about deficit spending! Who's going to pay for that and how? No one says, but the implications are ominous with approximately a third of the population under sixteen already Moslem.
The reconquista could occur without a shot being fired."

"A Tigris Chronicle" (Fouad Ajami, The Wall Street Journal, 2003/12/18)
"Iraq, we must admit, has tested our resolve. We have not found weapons of mass destruction, and we may never do so. We found a measure of gratitude, but not quite enough. What we found was a country envenomed by a dictatorship perhaps unique in its brutality in the post-World War II world. We can't be sure that our labor in that land will be vindicated. There is sectarianism, and there are undemocratic habits, and a good measure of impatience. But the abject surrender of a tyrant who had mocked our will and our staying power, and whose very political survival stood as proof of our irresolution a dozen years earlier, can only strengthen our position in the Arab-Islamic world. In those unsettled lands, preachers and plotters tell about America all sorts of unflattering tales. The tales snake their way through Beirut and Mogadishu, and other place-names of our heartbreak and our abdication. It is different this time. The spectacle has played out under Arab and Muslim (to say nothing of French and German) eyes. We saw the matter of Saddam Hussein to its rightful end. We leave it to the storytellers to make their way through this American chronicle by the Tigris."

"Saddam on ice" (David Warren, Ottawa Citizen/davidwarrenonline.com, 2003/12/18)
"The capture of Saddam Hussein marks "the end of the beginning" of the terror war. Everything that, in the light of 9/11/01, obviously needed doing, has now been done. ...
That "piece of garbage waiting to be collected" in Secretary Powell's colloquial phrase — or rather, his final collection on the weekend — puts the lid on the first phase of this very strange international, and partly civilizational war. The chartable part of the conflict is finished. We enter now the unchartable part.
Contrary to the general media assumption, the Bush people are not popping champagne corks. Saddam's capture is a breakthrough against the Iraqi terrorist underground, and comes with a trove of fresh intelligence leads. In the short time since the weekend, U.S. and Iraqi troops and police have uncovered over a dozen Baghdad cells (each with up to two dozen operatives), and pulled in various Saddamite fish around Tikrit, Fallujah and Samarra (including more than 70 in one Samarra raid that is breaking news as I write this). These are significant gains against an underground whose total membership is unlikely to exceed 10,000 persons, and which is having increasing difficulty recruiting from abroad, and buying its own cover.
But while the news from Iraq is incredibly good, there is a world left to conquer. It now becomes easier to see who the irredentist enemy is: not a man, nor a regime, but an armed "Islamist", Jihadist, religious ideology. In a sense, the preliminaries are over, and the real battle for the Middle East, and for the heart and soul of Islam, has begun."

"Spare us the pity for Iraq's ex-tyrant" (Miranda Devine, The Sydney Morning Herald, 2003/12/18)
"It is awe-inspiring how many ways the anti-Bush, anti-Howard, anti-war crowd can spin bad news. No matter what good happens in Iraq, they moan about petrol queues. Saddam is caught and they focus on car bombings. Where is Osama bin Laden, they cry? Mass graves? Humph, they say: Saddam was just taking orders from the CIA.
A talkback radio caller on Monday didn't believe the dirty old guy who had been captured was Saddam, because she had personally inspected the photos in the newspaper and found the eyebrows were too bushy. You can't believe DNA tests, she said, because the Yanks are liars.
Hyper-cynicism is the gloom merchants' last line of defence, if changing the subject, shifting the blame and moral equivalence don't work against inconvenient evidence that damns their attempts to keep Saddam in power."

"Saddam and the CBC" (National Post, 2003/12/18)
"All week, millions of people in Iraq have been celebrating Saddam's capture. So what footage did CBC reporter Nahlah Ayed show us to lead off the public TV network's broadcast? Why, an angry group of Saddam loyalists, of course. Ms. Ayed then told us that, aside from more violence, "Saddam's capture seemed to make little difference to what's become the everyday here." For good measure, she added later that the former dictator's capture is militarily meaningless and, therefore, Iraq "will likely continue to witness more bombings, more killings, and more injustice."
CBC viewers were then whisked off to Washington where reporter David Halton suggested Saddam's capture had caused U.S. President George W. Bush to lapse into a characteristically "gloating" oratorical style. In conclusion, Mr. Halton informed viewers that "what some Democrats worry about" — i.e., what the CBC worries about — "is a big show trial in the fall that will remind people of Saddam's atrocities just before the presidential vote." ...
To summarize, here are the impressions a casual viewer might have taken from Monday night's CBC news: (1) Iraqis still love Saddam, and so his capture has only enraged them; (2) Despite Mr. Bush's "gloating," things will get worse; (3) Saddam's trial will be a propaganda trick engineered to re-elect a Republican president; (4) To the extent Saddam did anything bad, America was the real villain; and (5) Saddam's capture is meaningless anyway because Osama is still on the loose."

"So This Is Hissmass" (Tim Blair, timblair.spleenville.com, 2003/12/18)
"A reader letter to Joanne Jacobs, from small-town Texas:

My kindergarten daughter was informed that in the song "We Wish You a Merry Christmas," her class was to sing: "We Wish You a Merry Hissmas." This prompted her young mind to ask me what holiday Hissmas was, among other questions.

Some kind of serpent festival? International Cindy Brady Lisp Day? Joanne continues:

The mother told her daughter to tell the teacher that the family celebrates Christmas, not Hissmass. The teacher told the girl she could sing "Christmas," but to sing quietly."

(See also: "The Hissmass Spirit" (Joanne Jacobs, joannejacobs.com, 2003/12/14))

"Palestinian deported to Belgium arrested for local crime" (Gila Fine, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/12/18)
Via Little Green Footballs: "A Palestinian terrorist who was granted refuge in Belgium, following the Bethlehem Church of the Nativity seige in 2002, was arrested this week in connection with local organized crime.
Belgian police arrested in Brussels a gang of local gangsters suspected of a series of armed robberies of postal offices.. One of the men arrested, identified by the authorities only as Khalid Al N., is a Palestinian explosives expert, who was deported to Belgium in May 2002, after a five-week standoff of armed Palestinians in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.
Khalid is one of the 13 Palestinian fugitives who took refuge in the Church during Operation Defensive Shield, holding over a hundred of civilians hostage. After a lengthy siege by the IDF, an international agreement was reached whereby the fugitives agreed to leave the church and go into exile in Europe. ...
According to Belgian media sources, Khalid was heavily involved with local organized crime groups and was dealing with explosives on a daily basis. He was in possession of firearms and explosives at the time of his arrest."

"Albright's joke joins growing list of Bush theories" (James G. Lakely, The Washington Times, 2003/12/18)
"Conspiracy theories continued to sprout among Democrats yesterday in the wake of the capture of Saddam Hussein. Some Democrats expressed alarm that the party was drifting out of the "mainstream." ...
The disclosure of Mrs. Albright's remark followed by a day the charge by Rep. Jim McDermott of Washington that the Bush administration could have captured Saddam "long ago if they wanted," but held off until Mr. Bush could use it as a boost in his approval ratings. ...
One Democratic consultant, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said his e-mail box is "filled daily with conspiracy theories" about supposed Bush administration plots.
'There's no way to get away from it. To say the CIA knew where the world's No. 1 terrorist is right now and won't bring him forward, that's immoral.'" (See also: "Albright: Bin Laden Comments Were 'Tongue-in-Cheek'" (FOX News, 2003/12/17) and "You can't make this stuff up" (Andrew Sullivan, The Daily Dish, 2003/12/16))

"Iraqis Shocked, Shamed by Hussein's Sullied Image" (Alan Sipress, The Washington Post, 2003/12/18)
"Since Sunday, Baghdad has been buzzing with talk of the ousted president's surrender. Some Sunni Muslim supporters are suggesting that he did not fight because he was drugged by the CIA. Some detractors are wondering whether they could have ousted Hussein on their own. A feeling that Hussein had shamed all Iraqis by failing to stand his ground was expressed by both supporters and opponents in a series of conversations here. ...
"The CIA is all powerful," said Haidar, dressed in a leather jacket, arms crossed, next to a large carton of Nestle's chocolate bars. "We think they must have used some kind of nerve gas or drug on him. There's no way he would go in this manner." ...
Taha Abdullah, 30, a religious student at the Adhamiya's Islamic University with a white turban resting above thick, black eyebrows, suggested that the man captured Saturday might have been Hussein's double. Or perhaps the explanation for Hussein's apparent surrender was that he was secretly apprehended weeks ago, and the raid Saturday was staged to "discredit the Arab's sense of honor and manhood," he said."

"Saddam rants" (Niles Lathem, New York Post, 2003/12/18)
"A defiant, deranged Saddam Hussein is making outrageous statements to CIA interrogators, claiming his government never surrendered - and that he would win by a landslide in new Iraqi elections, The Post has learned.
Saddam is also denying that his regime committed atrocities, charging that it was Iran that launched the murderous chemical-weapons attacks on the Kurds in the late 1980s, according to U.S. officials who have been briefed on the bizarre interrogation sessions.
Refusing to acknowledge the desperate circumstances in which he finds himself, the imprisoned, egomaniacal ex-tyrant is demanding to be treated with respect, the officials said.
The Butcher of Baghdad has repeatedly insisted during this week's sessions that he is still president of Iraq and said his military and government never surrendered during the war, U.S. officials said.
At times, he's the cocky killer who balks at the simplest orders from his jailers — such as being asked to stand during some of the questioning.
"He's saying things like 'I'd like to sit down now. I'm the president of Iraq. You wouldn't treat your own president this way,'" said a U.S. intelligence official."

 


Wednesday, December 17, 2003


News and commentary:

"The Saudi Hate Machine" (Erick Stakelbeck, The National Interest, 2003/12/17)
Stakelbeck on Saudi Arabia's two most notorious clerics, Safar Al-Hawali and Salman Al-'Auda, a.k.a. as the "Awakening Sheikhs":
"Such rhetoric is commonplace for Al-Hawali — his numerous writings display a fixation with what he views as the inevitable downfall of the West. In one of his earlier works, Kissinger's Promise, Al-Hawali, much like today's anti-U.S. conspiracy theorists, framed American involvement in the Middle East as a ploy to control the region's oil resources. More recently, his 2001 book, The Day of Wrath, analyzed Biblical prophecy from an Islamist perspective. In Al-Hawali's version of end-time events, Christians and Jews will be decisively defeated in the year 2012, with Islam ruling supreme. Similarly, in an "Open Letter to President Bush," dated October 15, 2001, Al-Hawali expressed delight at the events of 9/11, which he viewed as a precursor to the coming apocalyptic Holy War between Islam and the West:

In the midst of…continuous confusion and frustration, the events of the 11th of September occurred. I will not conceal from you that a tremendous wave of joy accompanied the shock that was felt by the Muslim in the street... America will eventually pay for its enormities, because Muslims will never forget the wrongs they have suffered… Mr. President, if you destroy every country on your list of terrorists, will that be the end or only the beginning?" ...

Judging from recent accounts, it appears that the Saudi government and Safar Al-Hawali may now even be working together." (See also: "'Global Campaign Against Aggression': The Supreme Council of Global Jihad?" (Reuven Paz, haganah b'internet, 2003/05/02), "An Open Letter to President Bush" (Safar ibn Abdur-Rahmân al-Hawâlî, sunnahonline.com, 2001/10/15) and Apocalypse then and now (Mårten Barck, Watch, 2001/10/28), which has a short presentation of Al-Hawali's "The Day of Wrath" (Safar Ibn 'Abd Al-Rahman Al-Hawali, islaam.com))

"Mukhabarat Agent: Iraq had no WMD" (Matthew Gutman, The Jerusalem Post, 2003/12/17)
"Whatever Saddam Hussein's CIA interrogators manage to squeeze out him, it will not be an admission of concealing weapons of mass destruction, said a former Mukhabarat colonel who provided a rare glimpse of the inner workings of Saddam's brutal security apparatuses. ...
"In 1991 we were very close to developing a nuclear weapon, but had nothing at the time of the [March 2003] war, after so many years of [UNSCOM] inspections," said the agent, adding, "they destroyed everything." ...
A.M. corroborated information from Governing Council sources that Saddam was indeed the primary financier of the resistance. Much of the resistance, said the agent, one of whose tasks was to monitor and control the internal enemies, pinned its hopes on Saddam. Without him as a rallying point the resistance will slowly die down.
It appears that the Fedayeen Saddam, a vicious paramilitary force run by Saddam's eldest son Uday, has spearheaded the terrorist campaign using the alliances Saddam built up with terrorist groups from Ansar Al Islam to Al-Qaida to groups based in Syria as proxies."

"Dubious Link Between Atta and Saddam" (Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball, Newsweek, 2003/12/17)
"A widely publicized Iraqi document that purports to show that September 11 hijacker Mohammed Atta visited Baghdad in the summer of 2001 is probably a fabrication that is contradicted by U.S. law-enforcement records showing Atta was staying at cheap motels and apartments in the United States when the trip presumably would have taken place, according to U.S. law enforcement officials and FBI documents. ...
Ironically, even the Iraqi National Congress of Ahmed Chalabi, which has been vocal in claiming ties between Al Qaeda and Saddam's regime, was dismissive of the new Telegraph story. "The memo is clearly nonsense," an INC spokesman told Newseek.
Contacted by Newsweek, The Sunday Telegraph's Con Coughlin acknowledged that he could not prove the authenticity of the document. He said that while he got the memo about Mohammed Atta and Baghdad from a "senior" member of the Iraqi Governing Council who insisted it was "genuine," he and his newspaper had "no way of verifying it. It's our job as journalists to air these things and see what happens," he said." (See also: "Does this link Saddam to 9/11?" (Con Coughlin, The Sunday Telegraph, 2003/12/14) and "Terrorist behind September 11 strike was trained by Saddam" (Con Coughlin, The Sunday Telegraph, 2003/12/14))

"Saddam in Court: Who's on Trial?" (Martin Kramer, Sandstorm, 2003/12/17)
"With Saddam in U.S. hands, thoughts turn to his future trial. Various pundits have claimed that it won't be enough to examine Saddam's crimes. It will also be necessary to probe U.S. and Western support for his regime, during the decade of the Iran-Iraq war and the lead-up to Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait.
The late Elie Kedourie, historian and political theorist at the London School of Economics, put the issue in just the right perspective, in an interview granted in June 1992. ... The interviewer told him that a Paris-based scholar had declared Saddam to be a "creature of the West." Kedourie's reply:

I do not understand what he means by that. If he means that it was Western governments that put him in power, then that is not true. If he means that from 1980 to 1990 the American and French governments and German firms did their best to help him, this is perfectly true. But you have to look at what their intentions were....The Americans believed, mistakenly I think, that if they did not do something in order to stop Khomeini, he would sweep over the whole of the Middle East. I think there was little prospect of that, but that is what they believed and therefore they chose to support Saddam. Again, within its own terms it was a rational if mistaken calculation. ...

As usual, Kedourie shows us the way. Saddam was no one's creature. It would be an affront to justice to diminish Saddam's criminal culpability by invoking U.S. policy mistakes, however egregious. Mistakes are not crimes.
The decision that left Saddam in power in 1991 was a monumental failure, and one that history has already judged severely. But at least credit those who did organize an expedition and an armada in 2003, and who did their duty despite the criticism of feckless "allies" and the absence of "international legitimacy." Some of those who launched this expedition were party to the previous mistake and the earlier failure. By their actions this year, they have balanced the book — and then some."

"Congresswoman Invites a Terrorist" (Charles Johnson, Little Green Footballs, 2003/12/17)
"Empty-headed Democratic Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee has invited the President of Syria, a Ba'athist dictator responsible for funding, supporting, and training terrorists throughout the Middle East, whose country is listed as a "rogue state" by the US, to speak in her state of Texas...

Jackson Lee said she was so impressed with Syrian President Bashar Assad during her visit that she invited him to speak in Texas, even though his country is designated by the United States as a rogue state and a sponsor of terrorism.
"I'm sure someone will write a headline, 'Congresswoman invites a terrorist'," Jackson Lee said. "But that’s not what I'm trying to do." [Ed. note: Hey! The perfect headline!]
She said Assad showed his willingness to negotiate by meeting despite President Bush's signing on Friday of the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003, which could impose sanctions on Syria.
"He's a 39-year-old president who even gave us a picture of him and his children," Jackson Lee said.

See! He's a father! He has children! How can he be a terrorist?" (See also: "Jackson Lee says mind unchanged about war in Iraq" (Ron Nissimov, Houston Chronicle, 2003/12/16))

"Christian Boy Kidnapped, Beaten and Forced to Become Muslim" (Robert Spencer, Dhimmi Watch, 2003/12/17)
"Recruitment for jihad in Pakistan: "A 15 year old Christian boy from the province of Sind has been kidnapped and taken to an Islamic religious school where he was beaten and forced to become a Muslim." This from the Barnabas Fund.
'Zeeshan Gill was kidnapped in broad daylight on the way home from school, on 7 November. He was taken to a madrasa (Islamic religious school), where he was beaten to submission and forced to say the Islamic creed. Henceforth, his captors informed him, he was a Muslim and if he tried to run away or return to Christianity, they would kill him. He was made to fast daily. Furthermore his captors even started to give him training in the use of guns and grenades. ...
On 20 November Zeeshan was allowed to go home to collect his clothes; however the madrasa sent along an escort with him. Then four days later his captors told him that he was imminently to be sent on jihad in Kashmir, where he would have to 'spread Islam at 120kph'. His director let him go home to say his goodbyes – unaccompanied. It was at this point that Zeeshan felt able to reveal the truth to his mother, that he had been kidnapped, forcibly converted and held against his will.'" (See also: "Christian Boy Kidnapped, Beaten and Forced to Become Muslim" (Barnabas Fund, 2003/12/16))

"France to Seek Law Banning Head Scarves" (Elaine Ganley, AP/Yahoo! News, 2003/12/17)
"French President Jacques Chirac said Wednesday he will ask parliament to pass a law banning Islamic head scarves and other religious insignia in public schools, a dramatic and potentially explosive move aimed at shoring up the nation's secular tradition.
"Secularism is one of the great successes of the Republic," Chirac said in an address to the nation. "It is a crucial element of social peace and national cohesion. We cannot let it weaken."
Chirac said he would push for a law to be enacted in time for the school year that begins next autumn. Islamic head scarves, Jewish skullcaps and large crucifixes would fall under the ban.
Companies should be free to ban the wearing of head scarves and other religious signs for reasons of safety or customer relations, Chirac said."

"Albright: Bin Laden Comments Were 'Tongue-in-Cheek'" (FOX News, 2003/12/17)
"Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright insisted Wednesday that she was just kidding when she wondered aloud whether the Bush administration is holding Usama bin Ladencaptive, waiting to break him out at the best political moment.
It was a "tongue-in-cheek comment and was not intended in any other way," Albright told Fox News.
But witnesses to Albright's comment said the ambassador did not appear to be joking Tuesday when she suggested President Bush may reveal bin Laden's capture as an "October surprise"before next November's presidential election.
Albright was in the Fox News studio's green room waiting to appear on an evening program when she made the remark.
"She said, 'Do you suppose that the Bush administration has Usama bin Laden hidden away somewhere and will bring him out before the election?'" said Fox News analyst and Roll Call executive editor Mort Kondracke. 'She was not smiling.'" (See also: "You can't make this stuff up" (Andrew Sullivan, The Daily Dish, 2003/12/16))

"Truck Bombing Kills at Least 10 in Iraq" (Christopher Torchia, AP/Yahoo! News, 2003/12/17)
"An explosives-laden truck speeding toward a police station collided with a bus at an intersection before dawn Wednesday, killing at least 10 Iraqis amid a surge of violence since the weekend arrest of Saddam Hussein.
Twenty people also were injured in the attack in al-Bayaa, a poor district in southwest Baghdad, hospital officials said. Ahmed Kadhim Ibrahim, deputy interior minister, said the dead were Iraqis, and that the truck driver had planned to strike the police station.
The charred, crumpled bus lay in the intersection after the blast. Body parts were scattered in the area. A pink plastic sandal was left in the street. Two cars nearby were destroyed."

"The Bike-Path Left" (Mark Steyn, The Wall Street Journal, 2003/12/17)
"Because all the big ideas failed, culminating in 1989 in Eastern Europe with the comprehensive failure of the biggest idea of all, the left retreated to all the small ideas: in a phrase, bike paths. That's what Bill Clinton meant when he said the era of big government was over; instead, he'd be ushering in the era of lots and lots of itsy bits of small government that, when you tote 'em up, works out even more expensive than the era of big government. That's what Howard Dean represents — the passion of the Bike-Path Left ...
They loved the '90s because you never heard a thing about macho stuff like war: it was all micro-politics, new regulations for this, new entitlements for that — education, environment, "social justice." For hard-core Democrats, the whole war thing is an unwelcome intrusion on what large numbers of people had assumed to be a permanent post-Martian politics. When you're at a Dean get-together, you realize they're not angry about the war, so much as having to talk about the war. ...
Last weekend was confirmation, if you needed it, that this is not a time for micro-politics. Many independents and a critical sliver of Democrats understand that, and, in a time of war, they're not prepared to stick with the bike-path left. When you put the pedal to the full metal jacket, it's no contest."

"Saddam in Jail; Leftists Wail" (Greg Yardley, FrontPageMagazine, 2003/12/17)
A survey of how Leftists such as Michael Moore, Robert Fisk, David Corn & Co. reacted to the capture of Saddam Hussein:
"The de facto leader of this pack of ideological throwbacks, the Workers World Party-led International ANSWER, released a statement shortly after Hussein's capture. In it, they reassure their supporters that they will continue on with their anti-American organizing. In their own words, "The seizure and public display of Saddam Hussein may be a propaganda victory for imperialism, but it changes nothing fundamental about the situation in Iraq." In their fevered imagination, by overthrowing Hussein, the United States somehow "removed the essential features of sovereignty for the Iraqi people." In a century-out-of-date analysis lifted right out of Lenin's 'Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism,' the war with Iraq is portrayed as nothing more than a war of colonization. Their attitude towards the removal of the Butcher of Baghdad? They simply don't care. The Hudson Valley Activist Newsletter, produced by strong supporters of International ANSWER, spelled this attitude out clearly: "The U.S. government and mass media are beating the war drums of joy and victory over the capture of former President Saddam Hussein of Iraq, but the U.S. peace movement certainly has no cause to celebrate."
No cause to celebrate. Not a bit of cheer at the corralling of a notorious filler of mass graves, not if that happens to benefit America." (See also: "A.N.S.W.E.R. statement on recent developments in Iraq" (internationalanswer.org, 2003/12/14) and "The capture of Saddam Hussein" (mailman.lbo-talk.org, 2003/12/15))

"How to deal with irritatingly good news" (Janet Daley, The Daily Telegraph, 2003/12/17)
"Within minutes of Paul Bremer pronouncing the words "We got him" to ecstatic cheers from Iraqi journalists, there were solemn-faced experts crowding on to my television screen to proclaim that the capture was largely irrelevant, or positively counter-productive, to the present difficulties in Iraq. ...
After a further 24 hours, the media had really got their act together. The important issue was not the triumph of having taken alive, without a twitch of resistance, one of the most infamous homicidal tyrants in modern history. No, the matter over which we were to obsess was whether and how this monster could be guaranteed his civil rights. Yesterday, I heard somebody on the Today programme say something like: "Now that the euphoria is ending about the capture of Saddam, attention is turning to the question of whether he can receive a fair trial."
Oh really? Whose attention is that exactly? Just treatment under law is not an inconsequential issue, but, under present circumstances, you will forgive me if I put the establishment of stability and justice for the people of Iraq a bit higher on my list of priorities than the problems of providing the Butcher of Baghdad with a fair trial. And, I must say, if the BBC conveyed any sense of euphoria about Saddam's capture, I must have missed it. The coverage I saw on the day went straight from disconcerted disarray to cynicism, without passing through jubilation."

"Dreams of a Monster" (Daniel Chirot, The Washington Post, 2003/12/17)
"Saddam Hussein was not just a criminal who happened to get his hands on a whole country to use its army and police to feed his greed. Unlike the Mafia dons he supposedly admired, he was also an ideologue, and like other great tyrants of the 20th century, a thinker with a historical vision that resonated with many of his people and throughout his region. ...
Unfortunately Saddam Hussein's defeat does nothing to eliminate the sense of dishonor and shameful failure so widespread in the Arab countries and elsewhere in the Muslim world. Religion is seen by many of the most idealistic Arabs and Muslims as the last, best hope. Hussein's embarrassing end will certainly increase resentment of U.S. arrogance, demonstrate once more that his way was too secular, and feed the desire for revenge.
To think of radical Islamists as mere criminals or psychopaths entirely misses the point. We misjudged Saddam Hussein in his early days in power because we failed to understand his vision, and we risk making the same error if we fail to appreciate the idealism behind the new extremists. Their religious ideology will produce a new set of tyrants prepared to inflict death and destruction in order to advance their utopian dreams."

"Dreaming" (Merde in France, 2003/12/17)
"'The Iraqi resistance is a good thing. I would have preferred that France resisted like that in 1940.' Say thanks to US' ex-ally.
— Jean-Pierre Chevènement, Ex-French Defense Minister [sic], now just an ordinary scheming French politician, interview for Jeune Afrique/l'Intelligent."

"The Arab Media Reaction to Saddam's Arrest: Part II" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 629, 2003/12/17)
"In an editorial titled, "The Ghost has Departed - What Now?" the Iraqi daily Baghdad writes : 'If we look carefully at the miserable end of Saddam Hussein we will find that it started the moment the Iraqis decided that they would not fight [against the U.S. invasion]. It is not easy for an entire people to decide against fighting side by side with its leadership. Even more difficult is the decision of the armed forces whose goal is to fight for the nation and protect its sovereignty. This difficult decision was not treason, but was a reaction to treason; it was not cowardice, but was a reaction to cowardice. Iraqis, military as well as civilians, fought under the leadership of Saddam's wrongful, tyrannical, and suspicious battles from which they gained nothing but destruction, death, and waste. Saddam was cold-hearted and without conscience when he allowed the flower of our youth to perish in useless wars, and he contradicted the spirit of nationalism, Islam, and Arabism when he killed hundred of thousands of the sons of our nation without mercy in prisons and mass graves… Who is the traitor then? It is he who appeared on television disgraced and humiliated, he who has not fired a single bullet, he who has surrendered himself after he has surrendered all of Iraq to the occupiers.'" (See also: "The Arab Media Reaction to Saddam's Arrest: Part I" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 628, 2003/12/16))

"Hussein Document Exposes Network" (Bradley Graham, The Washington Post, 2003/12/17)
"A document discovered during the capture of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein has enabled U.S. military authorities to assemble detailed knowledge of a key network behind as many as 14 clandestine insurgent cells, a senior U.S. military officer said Tuesday.
"I think this network that sits over the cells was clearly responsible for financing of the cells, and we think we're into that network," said Army Brig. Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, commander of the 1st Armored Division.
Acting quickly after realizing the significance of the document, which Dempsey likened to minutes of a meeting, troops of the 1st Armored Division conducted raids Sunday and Monday that netted three former Iraqi generals suspected of financing and guiding insurgent operations in the Baghdad area."

"France and Germany Agree To Help Reduce Iraqi Debt" (Keith B. Richburg, The Washington Post, 2003/12/17)
"A special envoy from President Bush won unspecified pledges Tuesday from the leaders of France and Germany to reduce Iraq's crushing foreign debt, U.S. and European officials said. The moves appeared to signal a new willingness by two of the major antiwar nations to improve relations with the United States. ...
A joint statement issued by Bush and the European leaders said that "France, Germany, and the United States agree that there should be substantial debt reduction for Iraq in the Paris Club in 2004, and will work closely with each other and with other countries to achieve this objective. The exact percentage of debt reduction that would constitute 'substantial' debt reduction is subject to future agreement between the parties."

 


Tuesday, December 16, 2003


News and commentary:

"The hole where toppled dictator Saddam Hussein was captured..." (AFP/Mauricio Lima, 2003/12/16)
"The hole where toppled dictator Saddam Hussein was captured..."
(AFP/Mauricio Lima, 2003/12/16)
"The hole where toppled dictator Saddam Hussein was captured in Ad Dawr, near his home town of Tikrit north from Baghdad. Six hundred US soldiers nabbed the elusive Iraqi leader late December 13, after finding him hiding in a tiny hole dug under a small hut."

"Iraq Official: U.N. Failed Us and Should Help Now" (Evelyn Leopold, Reuters, 2003/12/16)
"Iraq's foreign minister accused the United Nations on Tuesday of failing his country by leaving Saddam Hussein in power for decades and appealed to the world body to assume a leading role in Baghdad immediately.
In an address to the U.N. Security Council, Hoshyar Zebari, foreign minister of Iraq's Governing Council, noted that U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan was opening offices in Nicosia, Cyprus, and Amman, Jordan, for international staff, who would commute to Baghdad.
"Your help and expertise cannot be effectively delivered from Cyprus or Amman," Zebari said. Annan pulled out foreign staff after the Aug. 19 bombing of U.N. offices in Baghdad that cost 22 lives. ...
Zebari said the United Nations had failed to help rescue Iraq from "a murderous tyranny" that lasted more than 35 years and "today we are unearthing thousands of victims in horrifying testament to that failure."
"The United Nations must not fail the Iraqi people again," Zebari said." (See also the full speech: "Security Council - 4883d meeting" (UN/spartacus, 2003/12/16))

"Fall of Iraqi regime reveals 'grim truth' that Kuwaiti prisoners were killed - UN" (UN News, 2003/12/16)
Where are professor Bring and cardinal Martino when you really need them?:
"In a new report on the fate of Kuwaitis who went missing in Iraq after the 1990 invasion of their country, Secretary-General Kofi Annan says fresh evidence suggests that most if not all were killed.
"After many years of manoeuvring and denial by the previous Government of Iraq, a grim truth is unveiling itself," he writes in a report to the Security Council released today. "The discovery of mass graves in Iraq containing the mortal remains of Kuwaitis is a gruesome and devastating development."
While holding out hope that some of the 605 missing persons could be found alive, he acknowledges that prospects are dim. ...
"The removal from Kuwait of civilians — men and women — their execution in cold blood in remote sites in Iraq, and a decade-long cover-up of the truth constitute a grave violation of human rights and international humanitarian law," he writes. 'Those responsible for these horrendous crimes, particularly those who ordered the executions, must be brought to justice.'" (See also: "'I hope Osama bin Laden is next'" (Beth Braverman, The Express-Times, 2003/12/15): "Bader Albusairi, a Kuwaiti studying at Lehigh University, said he would like to see Saddam punished for his actions toward the Kuwaiti people. Albusairi hopes Saddam will tell officials where to find Albusairi's two uncles, who are among the 600 Kuwaiti prisoners of war who disappeared during the first Gulf War.")

"'Ultimate Penalty'" (ABC News, 2003/12/16)
Excerpts from Diane Sawyer's interview with President Bush:
"SAWYER: And if he does not get the death penalty, will you be disappointed?
PRESIDENT BUSH: Well, I'm...let's just see what penalty he gets. But I — I think he ought to receive the ultimate penalty and — for what he has done to his people. I mean, he is a torturer, a murderer, and they had rape rooms, and this is — this is a disgusting tyrant who deserves justice, the ultimate justice. But that will be decided not by the president of the United States but by the citizens of Iraq in one form or another. ...
SAWYER: His daughter has said that those photos were disrespectful and humiliating to him, but he also seemed sedated, by the way.
PRESIDENT BUSH: Yeah.
SAWYER: Was he sedated? And was it designed to humiliate him?
PRESIDENT BUSH: No, I don't — first of all, I don't know if he was sedated or not. I mean, that's a question you'd ask the folks in t