Archived news and commentary: June 17 - 23, 2002

2002/06/24 - 2002/06/30
2002/06/17 - 2002/06/23
2002/06/10 - 2002/06/16
2002/06/03 - 2002/06/09
2002/05/27 - 2002/06/02
2002/05/20 - 2002/05/26
2002/05/13 - 2002/05/19
2002/05/06 - 2002/05/12
2002/04/29 - 2002/05/05
2002/04/22 - 2002/04/28
2002/04/15 - 2002/04/21
2002/04/08 - 2002/04/14
2002/04/01 - 2002/04/07

Sunday, June 23, 2002

News and commentary:

"Intelligence Officers Read Between the Enemy Lines" (Greg Miller, Los Angeles Times, 2002/06/23)
A report from the U.S. detention center at Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan: "The interrogation sequence itself can be unsettling. Prisoners are shorn of their hair, outfitted in prison jumpsuits and kept isolated. They are led to the interview "booths" with hoods over their heads and with military police clutching their arms. Wearing leg irons and with hands cuffed behind their backs, they sit down at the edge of a table, waiting for the interrogator and, in most cases, translator to enter the booth. Armed MPs guard the entrance to the room. The opening moments of the interview are carefully scripted, usually unproductive, and yet unfailingly intense for both sides. One interrogator likened the adrenaline surge that accompanies entering the booth to the rush football players feel at kickoff."

"Al Qaeda Says Bin Laden Is Well, and It Was Behind Tunis Blast" (Neil MacFarquhar, The New York Times, 2002/06/23)
"Suleiman Abu Ghaith, a spokesman for Al Qaeda, claimed in an audio recording broadcast late Saturday that the organization carried out the bloody April attack on a synagogue in Tunis and threatened renewed operations in the United States and elsewhere. "Our security and military bodies are now monitoring, investigating and observing new American targets, other than the targets that were monitored before, which we will attack shortly in a way that will delight all Muslims," Mr. Abu Ghaith said... He claimed the campaign in Afghanistan had largely failed to dent the organization. "We believe that we are still in the beginning of the war and this is only one round of this war," the spokesman said in the group's first such tape released in some two months. ...
"I would like to assure the Muslims that Sheik Osama bin Laden is in good health and all the rumors about Sheik Osama's illness and being wounded in Tora Bora are devoid of any truth," Mr. Abu Gaith said, adding that the same was true of Dr. Ayman Zawahiri, the Egyptian surgeon who is Mr. bin Laden's main lieutenant."

"The Bible and the Apocalypse" (Nancy Gibbs, TIME, 2002/06/23)
"For evangelical Christians with an interest in prophecy, the headlines always come with asterisks pointing to scriptural footnotes. That is how Todd Strandberg reads his paper. By day, he is fixing planes at Offutt Air Force Base in Bellevue, Neb. But in his off-hours, he's the webmaster at raptureready.com and the inventor of the Rapture Index, which he calls a "Dow Jones Industrial Average of End Time activity." Instead of stocks, it tracks prophecies: earthquakes, floods, plagues, crime, false prophets and economic measurements like unemployment that add to instability and civil unrest, thereby easing the way for the Antichrist. In other words, how close are we to the end of the world? The index hit an all-time high of 182 on Sept. 24, as the bandwidth nearly melted under the weight of 8 million visitors: any reading over 145, Strandberg says, means "Fasten your seat belt." ... A Time/CNN poll finds that more than one-third of Americans say they are paying more attention now to how the news might relate to the end of the world, and have talked about what the Bible has to say on the subject. Fully 59% say they believe the events in Revelation are going to come true, and nearly one-quarter think the Bible predicted the Sept. 11 attack."

"How European Union Aid Goes for War" (Jacky Hogi, Maariv/IMRA, 2002/06/23)
"Newly translated documents captured during Operation Defensive Shield describe how the PA diverts foreign aid money for terrorism and corruption. Each month the PA receives millions of dollars in foreign aid. The EU provides $9 million and the Arab states $45 million, according to a decision by the Arab League of October 2000. A part of these funds goes directly to the armed militias of Fatah. The salaries of all PA workers - from clerks to police and security forces - are listed in dollars but paid in shekels. The official exchange rate is 16% lower than the going market rate. The PA pockets the difference, to use however it wishes, without the donor states realizing that their funds are being diverted for other purposes. The PA pays $40 million in salaries each month - half goes to the security forces. The exchange rate difference brings in an estimated $6.4 million every month, which is believed to go directly to the Al-Aqsa Brigades and the local, Fatah-run, weapons and ammunition industries."

"Syria as world leader" (The Jerusalem Post, 2002/06/23)
"And so the theater of the absurd goes on, as a country that unabashedly violates the UN Charter by occupying fellow UN member Lebanon and ignoring UN sanctions on Iraq by buying its oil, not to mention harboring terror organizations like Islamic Jihad, whose role in masterminding, manufacturing and micromanaging suicide bombings is famous worldwide and lauded by Damascus is being allowed to play arbiter in global conflicts. ... Last week, when the US ambassador blasted Syria for its support for terrorism, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan came to Syria's defense, claiming that Shara was "obviously... against the killing of innocent civilians, but raised the question of the helplessness of the Palestinians, and indicated that they are not the only ones guilty of harming civilians." This celebration of cynicism should be considered intolerable even by UN standards. Syria, rather than sitting in judgment of the world from the high perch of the presidency of the Security Council, should be standing in the dock of the accused and treated as an outlaw state."

 

Saturday, June 22, 2002

News and commentary:

"Effort to ban anti-Islam book fails in France" (The Washington Times/hss.fullerton.edu, 2002/06/22)
"PARIS — A French judge yesterday refused an "anti-racism" group's request for an immediate ban on Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci's new book, which argues that the September 11 attacks shows the true face of Islam.
The Movement Against Racism and for Friendship Between Peoples, also known as MRAP, had asked Judge Herve Stephan to ban the book, "Rage and Pride," saying its contents are an incitement to racial hatred.
Judge Stephan said he saw no point in an urgent ban, because the book had already sold 45,000 copies in France since its publication last month and nearly a million copies in Italy. He referred the case to another court, which is scheduled to hear it July 10.
MRAP, which was founded in 1949 and calls itself a democratic organization, also named French publisher Editions Plon in its complaint. Its leader, Mouloud Aounit, insists that the group believes in freedom of expression. He argues that the book is "racist delirium" that "incites racial violence." ...
Miss Fallaci said she reserves the right to sue MRAP for branding her book "racist." She said she has been receiving death threats.
In addition to MRAP, two other anti-racism groups have complained about the book and asked that a disclaimer be included in every French copy instead of a ban.
The judge refused this plea as well."

"Iraq's tortured children" (John Sweeney, BBC News, 2002/06/22)
An interview with Ali, "who used to work for Saddam's psychopathic son, Uday." Ali's daughter was tortured by the Iraqi secret police:
"The star witness against the government of Iraq hobbled into the room, her legs braced with clumsy metal callipers. "Anna" had been tortured two years ago. She is now four years old. ... So the secret police came for his wife. Where is he? They tortured her. And when she didn't break, they tortured his daughter. "When did you last see your father? Has he phoned? Has he been in contact?" They half-crushed the toddler's feet. Now, she doesn't walk, she hobbles, and Ali fears that Saddam's men have crippled his daughter for life. ... Ali talked about the paranoid frenzy that rules Baghdad - the tortures, the killings, the corruption, the crazy gangster violence of Saddam and his two sons. And the faking of the mass baby funerals. You may have seen them on TV. Small white coffins parading through the streets of Baghdad on the roofs of taxis, an angry crowd of mourners, condemning Western sanctions for killing the children of Iraq. ... Ali gave us the inside track on the racket. There aren't enough dead babies around. So the regime stores them for a mass funeral. They used to collect children's bodies and put them in freezers for two, three or even six or seven months - God knows - until the smell got unbearable. Then, they arrange the mass funerals. The logic being, the more dead babies, the better for Saddam. That way, he can weaken public support in the West for sanctions. ... While we were in the north of Iraq, the chairman of the Great Britain Iraq Society, Labour MP George Galloway, was in Baghdad. He popped up on Iraqi TV and bared his soul. "When I hear the word Iraq," he said, "I hear someone calling my name." I don't. When I hear the word Iraq, I hear a tortured child, screaming."

"Bomb Saddam?" (Joshua Micah Marshall, The Washington Monthly, from the June 2002 issue)
Marshall on how "the obsession of a few neocon hawks became the central goal of U.S. foreign policy": "Perle's case for invading Iraq, which mirrors that of other hawks, is basically an escalating series of true or false propositions that leads inexorably toward massive military confrontation: Do you believe that Saddam Hussein is an evil tyrant who would use weapons of mass destruction against us or our allies if he got them? Check. Do you believe he is trying to acquire nuclear or biological weapons and the means to deliver them? Check. If so, doesn't it stand to reason that he will eventually succeed in getting them? Check. Aren't we then obligated to stop him? Check! Sooner, rather than later? Check!! The trouble is that this is a syllogism--one conspicuously short on details about Iraq, geopolitics, or anything else. And yet the logic is still pretty compelling, an impression that only grows when you talk to his critics. While they can point to an endless number of pitfalls and hurdles that the hawks either gloss over or ignore, they're less able to break apart the tight chain of reasoning that gets the hawks on their war footing."

"Conspiracy Theory Grips French: Sept. 11 as Right-Wing U.S. Plot" (Alan Riding, The New York Times, 2002/06/22)
"In the book, "L'Effroyable Imposture," or "The Horrifying Fraud," Thierry Meyssan challenges the entire official version of the Sept. 11 attacks. He claims the Pentagon was not hit by a plane, but by a guided missile fired on orders of far right-wingers inside the United States government. Further, he says, the planes that struck the World Trade Center were not flown by associates of Osama bin Laden, but were programmed by the same government people to fly into the twin towers. What really interests him, though, is what he sees as the conspiracy behind these actions. He contends that it was organized by right-wing elements inside the government who were planning a coup unless President Bush agreed to increase military spending and go to war against Afghanistan and Iraq to promote the conspirators' oil interests. To achieve their goals, the theory goes, they blamed Osama bin Laden for Sept. 11 and later broadened their targets to include the "axis of evil," centered on Iraq. ... Further, confident that this conspiracy theory will endure, Mr. Meyssan and Carnot have just published a 192-page annex, with new documents, photographs and theories. They call it 'Le Pentagate.'"

"Why Terrorists Love Criminals (And Vice Versa)" (Mark Almond, The Wall Street Journal, 2002/06/22)
"The rhetoric of extreme Islam has become the dystopian ideology of our age. A century ago it was a potent mixture of Marxist and Nietzschean denunciation of bourgeois hypocrisy. It fed the self-righteousness of a criminal subculture that came to see revolution as justifying theft and worse, much worse, because the victim was the beneficiary of an unjust society and the criminal its true victim. ... At the dawn of the 21st century, the contemporary alliance between fanaticism and criminality offers similar challenges faced by czarist authorities in Russia a hundred years ago. The West, however, has obvious advantages. For all that Islamic extremists seek to draw on the well of psycho-criminal resentments existing in our societies, the depth of our democracies' political legitimacy is vastly greater than Nicholas II's regime. Terrorists are fish out of water in the West. The criminal underworld may offer them a few recruits and some cover, but they cannot come up for air into ordinary society, which reviles them, their terrible deeds and sinister ideology."

 

Friday, June 21, 2002

News and commentary:

"Arafat to Haaretz: I accept Clinton's plan; peace is possible" (Akiva Eldar, Haaretz, 2002/06/21)
"Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat yesterday issued a call for "no more war," declaring that he accepts the proposal first made by former U.S. president Bill Clinton as a framework for a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians. In an interview with Haaretz, Arafat used the same phrase that U.S. President George W. Bush recently used - "Enough is enough" - and said he supports the initiative of Sari Nusseibeh, Hanan Ashrawi and other Palestinian intellectuals who published an advertisement against the suicide bombings. ... Yesterday's interview was the first time Arafat has declared his acceptance of the Clinton proposal."

"The killing mantra" (Diana West, The Washington Times, 2002/06/21)
West on MSNBC's Alan Keyes program showing subtitled clips from Palestinian-controlled television: "The Palestinian Authority may blindly blame Israel for creating a generation of suicidal maniacs, but it is the PA itself that has helped nurture - if such a word applies - such taboo-breaking evil through its relentless propaganda machine. ... It starts with state-sponsored sing-alongs for the romper-room set - ditties about blood-drenched soil and warriors of jihad. It continues with shows featuring girls in party dresses delivering bloodthirsty harangues: "When I wander into the entrance of Jerusalem, I'll turn into a suicide warrior! I'll turn into a suicide warrior! In battle-dress! In battle-dress! In battle-dress!" And it goes on through the seemingly continuous loop of government-broadcast sermons. From one tele-imam comes, "Bless those who wired themselves, putting the belt around his waist or his sons, and who enter deeply in the Jewish community and say, 'Allah is great.' " Or: "Wherever you are, kill these Jews and these Americans who are like them and support them." ... We hear of the need to reform the PA, from its terror-abetting "security" forces to its corrupt apparatchiks, but the subject of dismantling its poisonous propaganda machine isn't mentioned. As de-Nazification was once required, "de-martyrfication" is one of today's most urgent challenges." (See also: "Transcript for Monday, June 17, 2002" (MSNBC, 2002/06/17), a full transcript of the "Alan Keyes is making sense" show.)

"The Real Nazis" (Jonah Goldberg, National Review, 2002/06/21)
"The Palestinians are the Arab world's Sudeten Germans. The "liberation" of their coreligionists and ethnic brothers is used as a utopian carrot guiding brainwashed donkey after brainwashed donkey to murder and suicide. I am not saying that Arabs or Muslims generally are Nazis or Nazi-like. That would be absurd. But I am saying that the Arab world is the only place left on this planet which bears a reasonable resemblance to Germany in the 1930s, with the open and accepted dissemination of Nazi-like ideas and ambitions. ... But there's something more to it. In the West, in America, in "civilized" circles, there's a deep desire to deny the obvious out of shame or some other form of moral laziness. Sometimes the motive is to preserve Third World peoples as victims of the West. To these people "power" - specifically "Western" or colonial power - defines Nazism. But this is absurd. Power does not make you Nazi-like; if it did, America would be a Fourth Reich already - and again, it's not. No, what makes you Nazi-like is the worship of power, particularly the power to murder, especially when you don't have it. You don't have to commit genocide to be a Nazi; you just have to want to commit genocide. Does anyone doubt that if given the chance, there would be countless Arab groups or governments who would leap at the opportunity to wipe out all of the Jews? One need only take their word for it."

"Watch What You Say" (Nicholas D. Kristof, The New York Times, 2002/06/21)
"Dr. Shaikh is one of several hundred people facing execution in Pakistan from this modern Islamic Inquisition. Many are religious minorities who sometimes are sentenced to death simply for using the standard greeting of the Islamic world, "as-salaam aleikum." That means "peace be with you," but militants say the phrase is reserved for Muslims. ... Abdul Rashid Ghazi, a thoughtful, well-educated imam in Islamabad, asked me why the fuss over Dr. Shaikh, one man, when America has killed thousands in Afghanistan. I replied that blasphemy raises a larger concern for Islam itself: like Christianity in the Middle Ages, the Islamic world today suffers from a stultifying closed-mindedness and intellectual rigidity that impoverishes Muslim countries and in some cases endangers their neighbors. Fundamentally, Pakistan's biggest problem today is not India but this close-mindedness. Pakistan has an industrious and often entrepreneurial people, a well-educated elite, a modernizing leader who could be another Ataturk - and mullahs who try to block discussion about emerging from the Middle Ages."

"The New Suicide Bombers: Larger and More Varied Pool" (James Bennet, The New York Times, 2002/06/21)
"Hamas and Islamic Jihad continue to conduct devastating attacks. But since early this spring, most of the attacks have been conducted by more secular groups, by Fatah-linked organizations like the one that sent Ms. Ahmed. The range of recruits to suicide missions continues to broaden in often bewildering ways. This week, Israel's forces arrested a 12-year-old Palestinian boy its intelligence had identified as planning an attack. Dr. Iyad Sarraj, a Palestinian psychiatrist in Gaza City, has watched the trend toward suicide bombing with growing alarm. He said that having grown up with the idea of suicide attacks, Palestinian children were equating death with power. ... "Once you create such a culture," Dr. Sarraj said, "you create something automatic." But like many Palestinians, he said even he could not challenge the social acceptance of this ideal by directly criticizing the martyrs themselves. "You can say, 'I condemn terror, I condemn killing civilians,' but you can't say, 'I condemn martyrs,' because martyrs are prophets."

Note: I'll be away over the weekend, celebrating Midsummer, which means that Watch will not be updated until Monday. Have a nice weekend!

Thursday, June 20, 2002

News and commentary:

"Church supports martyrdom" (Nissar Hoath, Gulf News, 2002/06/20)
"Martyrdom by Palestinian men and women is part of intifada, which serves their struggle against Israeli atrocities and cannot be separated from their liberation movement, said a visiting official of the Orthodox Church in occupied Jerusalem and the Holy Land. Addressing a packed crowd at the Zayed Centre for Coordination and Follow-Up in the capital, Father Dr Attallah Hanna, official spokesman of the Orthodox Church in Jerusalem and the Holy Land, said last night he supported martyrdom by Palestinian men and women to fight for their just rights. ... "Some freedom fighters adopt martyrdom or suicide bombing, while others opt for other measures. But all these struggles serve the continued intifada for freedom. Therefore, we support all these causes. ... It is the Israeli Zionist regime that is committing genocide in Palestine by killing innocent women and children. Palestinian people have the right to defend themselves from the Israeli barbarism and atrocities," Father Attallah said."

"Does Poverty Cause Terrorism?" (Alan B. Krueger & Jitka Maleckova, The New Republic, 2002/06/20)
""Any connection between poverty, education, and terrorism is indirect, complicated, and probably quite weak. Instead of viewing terrorism as a direct response to low market opportunities or lack of education, we suggest it is more accurately viewed as a response to political conditions and long-standing feelings of indignity and frustration (perceived or real) that have little to do with economics. ... The evidence that we have assembled and reviewed suggests that there is little direct connection between poverty, education, and participation in or support for terrorism. Indeed, the available evidence indicates that compared with the relevant population, participants in Hezbollah's militant wing in the late 1980s and early 1990s in Lebanon were at least as likely to come from economically advantaged families and to have a relatively high level of education as they were to come from impoverished families without educational opportunities."

"Europe and Africa's Hatred of America" (David Harsanyi, Capitalism Magazine, 2002/06/20)
"'If this country doesn't get help, doesn't get the sense of a new beginning,' said the faux humanitarian and rock star Bono on his recent fact-finding trip to Ghana with US Treasury Secretary, Paul O'Neill. "You (Americans) come back in five years and they'll be throwing rocks at the bus." Ironically, when the first Dunkin' Donuts opens it's doors in Accra, Ghanaians will undoubtedly grumble about the hegemonic ambitions of the United States and the loss of their unique cultural heritage. Dollars they desire; free-market capitalism they dread. ... When Bono, an Irishman, whose band U2 has sold over a hundred million albums the past 20 years and could probably buy Ghana, tries to convince the United States that aiding Africa with additional billions of American dollars is a moral imperative, he has no interest in importing what comes with, namely our culture and political morality. In fact, Bono warns us that Africa will hate us if we don't unconditionally transfer untold amounts. While that may be true, history has also proven that if we do give, they'll hate us anyway."

"Top Muslim Extremist Believed Dead" (CBS News, 2002/06/20)
"In the Philippines, military sources say a top Abu Sayyaf leader linked to scores of kidnappings is believed to have been killed in a firefight with government troops. Abu Sabaya has been the most visible of the Muslim extremist group's commanders. He would often call up local media with demands and statements taunting the government. The military has said it was hot on his trail after a June 7 rescue attempt left two of the group's last three hostages dead. Military sources say a marine and special warfare amphibious group off the southern island of Mindanao intercepted a boat with armed men. The troops came under fire and shot back. The five-minute exchange left three suspected Abu Sayyaf rebels dead and four others captured. However, the sources say Sabaya's body was not immediately recovered."

"Report: Five Israeli Settlers Killed" (Mark Lavie, AP/Yahoo! News, 2002/06/20)
"Suspected Palestinian infiltrators took over a house in a Jewish settlement near Nablus on Thursday, killing five Israelis and wounding eight others, settlers and rescue workers said. Israel Radio said the dead included a mother, three of her children and a soldier who was shot when the military stormed the house. One of the infiltrators was killed in an exchange of fire. A second jumped out the window and exchanged fire with soldiers. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine claimed responsibility. ... A neighbor, Rinat Cabra, said there were seven children in the family living in the house, and that the father was not home. ... On Thursday, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat condemned attacks against Israeli civilians, but Palestinian officials have always differentiated between Israelis inside Israel and those who live in the West Bank, claimed by Palestinians for a state."

"English translation of Al Quds ad against targeting civilians "in Israel" paid for by European Union" (IMRA, 2002/06/20)
As IMRA notes, the statement undersigned by 55 "prominent Palestinians" limits its objection to attacks within the "green line", which leaves out, for example, this weeks massacres. As James Taranto points out, the statement "doesn't express any moral objection to massacring Jews, arguing instead that it's a self-defeating tactic." Also notable is the allegation that the Israeli military targets "children and the elderly": "Due to the dangerous situation under which the Palestinian people are living and as part of our national responsibility, we, the undersigned, seek to wish that those who stand behind the military operations targeting civilians in Israel reconsider their policy and refrain from recruiting young Palestinians for the purpose of mounting military attacks. ... We believe that military operations do not contribute to the development or accomplishment of our national project that calls for freedom and independence. On the contrary, the operations increase the number of the enemies of peace on the Israeli side and offer excuses to the government of Israel, headed by Sharon, to escalate its military aggression against Palestinian children and the elderly, and against Palestinian cities and villages. ... The positive and negative features of a military operations is defined by whether political goals are achieved and not by the operations as a standard onto themselves."

"Messages intercepted by U.S. on Sept. 10 revealed" (CNN.com, 2002/06/20)
"Messages intercepted by U.S. intelligence one day before the Sept. 11 attacks came from telephone conversations between people in Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia, sources said Thursday. The conversations were in Arabic, but officials are not sure who was talking. One of the intercepts said, "The match begins tomorrow." The other said, "Tomorrow is zero hour." The intercepts however, were not translated and analyzed until Sept. 12 - one day after the attacks."

"Moratinos denies PA misused EU funds for terrorism" (Herb Keinon, 2002/06/20)
"European Union Middle East envoy Miguel Moratinos said yesterday EU funds are not being misused by the Palestinian Authority and channeled to fund terrorism, a claim immediately refuted by Minister-without-Portfolio Dan Naveh. Naveh, in his dossier on PA Chairman Yasser Arafat's involvement in terrorism, last month wrote that "Arafat and his men used the funds donated to them by other countries, including the European Union, to finance terrorist activity." Moratinos, at a press briefing in Tel Aviv, said the EU took the charges seriously and conducted an investigation. "We came to the conclusion that the money was used properly, and not for terrorism," he said. ... Naveh responded to the denials saying, "Unfortunately, I view this European position gravely. It is very sad that the European Union does not recognize the facts that were presented to it." ... EU lawmakers meeting in Brussels agreed yesterday to unblock 18.7 million euros in aid to the Palestinians that was held up over charges that some money was going to fund terrorism, but demanded "full transparency" in how it is spent. ... Regarding the settlements, Moratinos called them a "cancer" that will make it impossible to reach a solution unless they are 'operated on.'"

"Terror Suspects Debated Issue of Killing Muslims" (Nicolas Marmie, AP/The Washington Post, 2002/06/20)
"Three al Qaeda operatives plotting a terror attack in Morocco argued over whether it would be noble to blow up a cafe even if it meant taking Muslim lives, according to a Moroccan government report. ... The three men, all citizens of Saudi Arabia, were caught in May and arraigned in a Moroccan court on Monday. They are suspected of plotting to sail a dinghy loaded with explosives from Morocco into the Strait of Gibraltar to attack U.S. and British warships. The suspects - Zuher Hilal Mohamed Tbaiti, Hilal Jaber Alassiri and Abdallah M'Sefer Ali Ghamdi - also discussed blowing up a cafe in central Marrakech and plotted a suicide attack against the national bus company, according to the report, which was issued by the Justice Ministry. Tbaiti and Alassiri squabbled over targets to attack, it said. Alassiri rejected the idea of blowing up the cafe because Muslims would be killed. Tbaiti believed such losses were 'justified by the nobleness of the operation.'"

"Arabic Panic" (Martin Kramer, Middle East Quarterly, from the Summer 2002 issue)
After September 11 Middle Eastern studies in the U.S. have received massively increased funds. Kramer argues that given "what goes on in some Middle East centers, perhaps the government should pay them, like farmers, not to produce anything.": "Middle Eastern studies have been in deep crisis for years. The field has been decimated by the impact of Edward Said's post-colonialism and cut off from the American mainstream by the influx into faculty ranks of ideological radicals and activist immigrants. The most outlandish theories have flourished in this hothouse. Shelves have filled with works exalting the democratic potential of Islamist movements, even those that use terrorism. ... In the meantime, the new levels of funding are here to stay. Whatever the long-term outcome of the new subsidy, its immediate effects are not in doubt. The Title VI bonanza will reinforce the authority of an otherwise failed establishment. Rather than ponder what has gone wrong, they will pat themselves on the back. They will spend their September 11 windfall to add new turrets to their ivory towers, which function more like minarets, and from which they will broadcast a muezzin's call on behalf of Islam."

"A Guarantee of More Violence" (Charles Krauthammer, The Washington Post, 2002/06/20)
"The reason innocents are dying every day is not because of the occupation but because the Palestinians believe they can get (as Hezbollah got in Lebanon) land without peace. And why should they not believe it? The State Department wants to give them exactly that. The way out of the Middle East morass, Colin Powell has urged the president, is to give the Palestinians a "light at the end of the tunnel" by giving them their own "interim" or "provisional" Palestinian state - even as the massacres continue, like the blowing to bits of 26 Jerusalemites in two consecutive suicide bombings this week . This rewarding of terrorism is not just a moral scandal. It is disastrous diplomacy. What does this provisional state say to the Palestinians? You can reject the state you were offered two years ago, start a war, murder daily and then be re-offered a state - this time without even having to be asked to make peace. For an American foreign policy whose major objective is stability and nonviolence (if for no other reason than to give us freedom of action elsewhere in the region to fight terrorism), one could not devise a worse policy. If two years of blood-letting gives the Palestinians an interim state - without even a simple cease-fire, let alone a real peace - what possible disincentive do they have to continue the violence?"

"The Palestinian State Mistake" (Fred Barnes, The Weekly Standard, 2002/06/20)
"The bloody terrorist attacks on Israel this week, one killing 20 people, the other 7, should be a signal to President Bush. The State Department recently persuaded him that Palestinian conduct would improve and terrorism would cease if only Palestinians had real hope of statehood. ... If the prospect of a significant shift by Bush in favor of the Palestinians doesn't prompt better behavior, what will? Answer: nothing. It's obvious now that terrorism against Israel is an ingrained part of Palestinian conduct. Polls show the Palestinian people both support terrorism - especially suicide bombings - and back the destruction of Israel as a nation. In the face of this, Arafat has done practically nothing to reform and nothing at all to change public opinion among Palestinians. And there's no evidence he's cracking down on terrorists. All this ought to be a lesson to Bush. Whatever concessions might be made to Arafat and his regime are highly unlikely to bring about reform and a softening toward Israel - quite the contrary."

"Terror with an olive branch" (Shahar Smooha, Haaretz, 2002/06/20)
An article on a study of the Web-based rhetoric of terror groups, made by Prof. Gabi Weiman and Dr. Yariv Tzfati: "The researchers, who sum up their findings in an article to appear in an upcoming issue of Rand, the American think tank's journal, decided to examine the Web-based rhetoric of terror groups and found that almost all the groups either hide their violent activity or make no mention of it. The reason, they believe, is that the terrorist groups perceive the general Western public, but particularly Internet users, as educated and liberal. So, they emphasize those subjects that Western democracies would find sympathetic. Government actions against terrorism, like harming freedom of speech, arrests without trials, and torture, contradict the basic values of Western democracies, and are emphasized at the sites. ... "The similarity between the terrorist rhetoric on the Internet and other media is the wealth of propaganda techniques, transferring the guilt to the other side and justifying the use of violence," says Weiman. "The difference is that terrorist rhetoric on the Net is much more pacifist and liberal, and uses terms that we found more on the Internet than elsewhere." Weiman says that "the terrorists assume that the Net carries its own non-violent message of freedom of speech, liberty, open globalization, and certainly not violence, so they adapt themselves to the nature of the medium and the audience."

 

Wednesday, June 19, 2002

News and commentary:

"Suicide Bombing Kills 7 in Israel" (Mark Lavie, AP/Yahoo! News, 2002/06/19)
"A suicide bomber jumped out of a car, dashed past two policemen and ran to a bus stop before blowing himself up and killing at least six other people Wednesday evening. More than 35 people were wounded. The blast - the second in Jerusalem in two days - was claimed by the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, according to the Al Manar television station in Lebanon. The station is run by the Islamic group Hezbollah. ... The car sped away, disappearing into Palestinian neighborhoods in east Jerusalem, the source added. ..."Zionists, leave our land because we will not stop our operations as long as there is an occupation," said the statement attributed to the Al Aqsa group, which is linked to Arafat's Fatah movement."

"The Palestinian H-Bomb: Terror's Winning Strategy" (Gal Luft, Foreign Affairs, from the July/August 2002 issue)
"As little as a year ago, suicide bombings were seen as a gruesome aberration in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, an expression of religious fanaticism that most Palestinians rejected. But in recent months a new, unsettling reality has emerged: the acceptance and legitimation of the practice among all Palestinian political and military factions. Increasingly, Palestinians are coming to see suicide attacks as a strategic weapon, a poor man's "smart bomb" that can miraculously balance Israel's technological prowess and conventional military dominance. Palestinians appear to have decided that, used systematically in the context of a political struggle, suicide bombings give them something no other weapon could: the ability to cause Israel devastating and unprecedented pain. The dream of achieving such strategic parity is more powerful than any pressure to cease and desist. It is therefore unlikely that the strategy will be abandoned, even as its continued use pushes the Middle East ever closer to the abyss."

"Think Again: Yasir Arafat" (Dennis B. Ross, Foreign Policy, 2002/06/19)
Dennis B. Ross was the lead negotiator on the Middle East peace process in the first Bush and both Clinton administrations: "Is there any sign that Arafat has changed and is ready to make historic decisions for peace? I see no indication of it. Even his sudden readiness to seize the mantle of reform is the result of intense pressure from Palestinians and the international community. He is maneuvering now to avoid real reform, not to implement it. And on peace, he does not appear ready to acknowledge the opportunity that existed with Clinton’s plan, nor does he seem willing to confront the myths of the Palestinian movement. ... Those who say Arafat cannot carry out his security responsibilities because Israeli military incursions have devastated his capabilities fail to recognize that Arafat didn’t act even before Israelis destroyed his infrastructure. In the 20 months leading up to May 2002, he never gave unequivocal orders to arrest, much less stop, those who were planning, organizing, recruiting, financing, or implementing terror attacks against Israelis. Whether one thinks - as the Israelis believe recently captured documents demonstrate - Arafat directs the violence or that he simply acquiesces to it, the unmistakable fact is that he has made no serious or sustained effort to stop the violence."

"A Brief History of Yasir Arafat" (David Brooks, The Atlantic, from the July/August 2002 issue)
"Yasir Arafat claims that he was born in Jerusalem, but he was actually born in Cairo. He claims to belong to the prominent Jerusalem family of Husseini, but he is at best only distantly related to it. ... He claims to have disabled ten Israeli armored personnel carriers in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, but Israel didn't even have ten APCs in the sector he was in. ... Obviously, Arafat is a congenital liar. But there's more to it than that: his lies are all designed to create an aura of romance around himself and the Palestinian people. Arafat is the most bizarre political leader in the world today, in that he has obliterated all considerations of ordinary living and has fused himself completely with his cause. He's never had anything like a regular home life. He has no interest in comforts, possessions, or normal pleasures. He has no interest in social issues, books, or cultural matters. Aburish says that Arafat has been to a restaurant exactly once in the past forty years. The life of total political commitment has turned him into a surpassingly strange creature, and he has a rapacious hunger to possess the Palestinian cause entirely by himself."

"Jihad Conquests - Islamism today" (Bat Ye'or and Andrew Bostom, National Review, 2002/06/19)
"The ideology of jihad was formulated by Muslim jurists and scholars, including such luminaries as Averroes and Ibn Khaldun, from the 8th century onward. A recent Harvard commencement speech notwithstanding, these voluminous writings establish unequivocally the notion of jihad as a war of conquest. For example, Ibn Khaldun (d. 1406) stated, "..the holy war is a religious duty, because of the universality of the Muslim mission and the obligation to convert everyone to Islam either by persuasion or by force..." ... The contemporary relevance of this ideology is also clear, and disturbing. ... Sheikh al-Qaradawi, an Egyptian cleric and the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, reaches an enormous audience during his regular appearances on Al Jazeera. During a January 9, 1998 interview, Sheikh al-Qaradawi observed that Islamic law divided the People of the Book - Jews and Christians - into three categories: 1) non-Muslims in the lands of war; 2) non-Muslims in lands of temporary truce; 3) non-Muslims protected by Islamic law, that is to say, the dhimmis. The sheikh had thus summarized the theory of jihad in a few words. Now, as we see from countless calls for jihad and daily world events, this ideology still impregnates current thinking and conduct."

"False Hopes" (Victor David Hanson, National Review, 2002/06/19)
"For many of our most powerful and affluent, who have lost their faith in God and have no belief in a soul, humanism is instead the real religion. The last measure of their sense of worth is found in feeding as many poor or solving as many disagreements as possible. Like Christian missionaries of the past, a great many of our intellectuals, professors, diplomats, and journalists find moral solace in the belief that they are refined and chosen folk, evolved far beyond force, and adept at using instead their expertise and learning to lift up the ignorant - and in showing the "other" that they at least are aware of the world's cruel capriciousness in lavishing largess upon a lucky few such as themselves. These are all noble sentiments, and often to be welcomed - but in a time of war they are perilous to the very safety of the republic. For such caring people the stakes now are no longer the salvation of their eternal souls, but rather a more immediate and daily sense of feeling good about themselves, and assuaging the depressing thought that Americans - due to greed or oppression rather than their singular know-how, tolerance, and hard work - have more cars, computers, and clothes than they can possibly use while most of the world seeks a glass of water without bacteria."

"The "Banality of Evil" and The Political Culture of Hatred" (Paul Hollander, FrontPageMagazine, 2002/06/19)
"Rarely in history has the relationship between belief and behavior been so clear as in the actions of the Islamic suicide pilots and bombers fortified and reassured as they had been by conceptions and personifications of evil defined with great clarity and held unhesitatingly. There was nothing banal, impersonal, dispassionate or detached about their behavior. A pure, burning hatred of the evil eagerly embraced motivated them as well as certain specific, if peculiar but deeply felt beliefs in other-wordily rewards. ... In numerous Arab countries and communities a hate-filled political culture evolved which enshrines violence as a sacred mission directed at the designated objects of hate. In these settings virulent hatred is inculcated from an early age; it is disseminated by the mass media, in schools and places of worship and sanctioned by both religious and political authorities. ... Whatever the ingredients or sources of such hatred - material deprivation, lack of education, frustration, resentment, sense of inferiority, the scapegoating impulse - it has become the dominant force fuelling political conflict and violence. Its "root cause" is not poverty but relative deprivation or frustrated expectations and the overpowering but comforting belief that others are responsible for one's misfortune."

"Bush to Propose Palestinian State Soon" (Karen DeYoung, The Washington Post, 2002/06/19)
"President Bush plans in the coming days to propose the establishment of a Palestinian state with provisional boundaries, most likely in September, with negotiations over permanent borders to be completed within three years, U.S. and diplomatic sources said. In a much-anticipated speech outlining his Middle East policy, the president will propose that the plan be adopted at an international conference, tentatively set for September, provided measurable progress has been made in revamping Palestinian security forces and reducing violence against Israeli civilians, the sources said."

"Israel to seize PA land after every suicide bombing" (Aluf Benn et al., Haaretz, 2002/06/19)
"As IDF forces entered the West Bank cities of Jenin, Nablus and Qalqilyah overnight in response to the Jerusalem suicide bombing that killed 19 and wounded 70 Tuesday, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's extended inner cabinet early Wednesday approved a tough new military policy under which the army would seize Palestinian Authority territory in response to every future terror attack. ... But the senior ministers approved what was viewed as a major change in military policy, centering on wide-ranging IDF operations in the West Bank. "Israel will respond to every terror attack by capturing Palestinian Authority territory, which will be held for as long as the terror continues," the Prime Minister's Office said in a statement. "Additional terrorist attacks will bring about the capture of additional territories," the statement said, adding that Israel would soon seize PA land in response to the Tuesday Jerusalem bombing."

"How beautiful it is to kill and be killed" (Mohammed Najib, The Jerusalem Post, 2002/06/19)
An article on the farewell note left by Mohammed Ghoul, before yesterday's devastating suicide bombing: "Stymied twice before, "This time, I hope I will be able to do it," Ghoul wrote in a farewell note found yesterday. Ghoul, who had just begun a master's program in Islamic studies at a nearby university, dated the letter Saturday and went to see relatives one last time. ... In his note, Ghoul said he'd tried twice before to stage attacks, but didn't explain why he'd failed. "How beautiful it is to make my bomb shrapnel kill the enemy. How beautiful it is to kill and to be killed not to love death, but to struggle for life, to kill and be killed for the lives of the coming generation," Ghoul said." (See also: "Jerusalem Explosion Leaves 20 Dead" (Steve Weizman, AP/Yahoo! News, 2002/06/18))

 

Tuesday, June 18, 2002

News and commentary:

"Scholar warns West of Muslim goals" (Uwe Siemon-Netto, UPI, 2002/06/18)
"A leader of the small worldwide Muslim reform movement warned the West Tuesday against wishful thinking as the U.S. government promotes an intensive dialogue with Islam. "The dialogue is not proceeding well because of the two-facedness of most Muslim interlocutors on the one hand and the gullibility of well-meaning Western idealists on the other," said Bassam Tibi, in an interview with United Press International. ... According to Tibi, the quest of converting the entire world to Islam is an immutable fixture of the Muslim worldview. Only if this task is accomplished - if the world has become a "Dar al-Islam" - will it also be a "Dar a-Salam," or a house of peace. Tibi appealed to his co-religionists to "revise their understanding of peace and tolerance by accepting pluralism." Furthermore, he said, Muslim leaders should give up the notion of Jihad in the sense of conquest - as opposed to Jihad as an internal struggle of the individual. ... In an article in the prestigious Hamburg weekly, Die Zeit, Tibi, gave anecdotal evidence of how daunting a task this dialogue with Islam can be. The bishop of Hildesheim in Germany paid an imam a courtesy visit in his mosque. The imam handed the Catholic prelate a Koran, which he joyfully accepted. But when the bishop tried to present the imam with a Bible, the Muslim cleric just stared at him in horror and refused to even touch Christianity's holy book."

"An Interview with the Mother of a Suicide Bomber" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 391, 2002/06/18)
Excerpts from an interview with Umm Nidal, the mother of the suicide bomber Muhammad Farhat, published in the London-based Arabic-language daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat: "Jihad is a [religious] commandment imposed upon us. We must instill this idea in our sons' souls, all the time... ... This is an easy thing. There is no disagreement [among scholars] on such matters. The happiness in this world is an incomplete happiness; eternal happiness is life in the world to come, through martyrdom. Allah be praised, my son has attained this happiness. ... The atmosphere to which Muhammad was exposed was full of faith and love of martyrdom. I maintain that a man's faith does not reach perfection unless it attains self-sacrifice… ... When the operation was over, the media broadcast the news. Then Muhammad's brother came to me and informed me of his martyrdom. I began to cry, 'Allah is the greatest,' and prayed and thanked Allah for the success of the operation. I began to utter cries of joy and we declared that we were happy. The young people began to fire into the air out of joy over the success of the operation, as this is what we had hoped for him." (See also: "Gunman's Mom Sends Wishes in Video" (Jamie Tarabay, AP/Yahoo! News, 2002/06/17))

"Key Figure in Sept. 11 Plot Held in Secret Detention in Syria" (Peter Finn, The Washington Post, 2002/06/18)
"A key figure in the Sept. 11 plot who fled Hamburg, Germany, last October has been held in secret detention in Syria after being first arrested in Morocco and expelled to Damascus with U.S. knowledge, according to German and Arab intelligence sources. The debriefing of Mohammed Haydar Zammar, a German citizen of Syrian origin who has told his interrogators that he recruited key hijacker Mohammed Atta, is an extraordinary example of the way Sept. 11 has redefined U.S. engagement with regimes it once vilified. ... According to Arab intelligence sources, the Syrian debriefing of Zammar, 41, is providing the United States with critical information on the genesis of the plot to attack New York and Washington as well al Qaeda's structure and possible plans."

"Saudi Arabia arrests terror suspects" (John R. Bradley, AP/Salon, 2002/06/18)
"Saudi Arabia announced its first al-Qaida-related arrests since Sept. 11 and said Tuesday that it was holding 11 Saudis, an Iraqi and a Sudanese man who told authorities he had fired a surface-to-air missile at a U.S. military plane taking off from a Saudi air base. The arrests were announced by the official Saudi Press Agency, which linked the suspects to Osama bin Laden's network and said they were planning to use explosives and missiles in other terrorist attacks in the kingdom. The agency provided only sketchy details, and it was not clear when or where the suspects were arrested. But it was the first time since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States - carried out by 15 Saudis and four other Arabs - that the Gulf state has announced arrests linked to bin Laden, the Saudi dissident whose first cause was the overthrow of this Muslim kingdom."

"CNN chief accuses Israel of terror" (Oliver Burkeman and Peter Beaumont, The Guardian, 2002/06/18)
Ted Turner, a self-acclaimed "very good thinker", in an interview which is an exercise in moral equivalency: "Ted Turner, the billionaire founder of CNN, accuses Israel today of engaging in "terrorism" against the Palestinians, in comments that threaten to lead to a further decline in the news network's already poor relations with the Jewish state. "Aren't the Israelis and the Palestinians both terrorising each other?" says Turner, who is vice-chairman of AOL Time Warner, which owns CNN, in an exclusive interview with the Guardian. "The Palestinians are fighting with human suicide bombers, that's all they have. The Israelis ... they've got one of the most powerful military machines in the world. The Palestinians have nothing. So who are the terrorists? I would make a case that both sides are involved in terrorism." ... Mr Turner also admits that he was wrong to call the September 11 hijackers "brave" in a speech in Rhode Island that sparked outrage. "I made an unfortunate choice of words," he says, adding that his ownership of the Atlanta Braves baseball team meant the word was never far from his mind. 'Look, I'm a very good thinker, but I sometimes grab the wrong word...'"

"'Mainstream' Muslims?" (Daniel Pipes, New York Post/danielpipes.org, 2002/06/18)
"FBI directors don't make a habit of breaking bread with organizations their agents may soon be investigating, perhaps even closing. Robert S. Mueller III, however, is about to make precisely this blunder: On June 28, he is scheduled to deliver a lunch talk to the American Muslim Council. Mueller accepted this invitation, his spokesman Bill Carter explains, because the FBI regards the AMC as "the most mainstream Muslim group in the United States." ...
In 2000, Abdurahman Alamoudi, the group's longtime executive director, exhorted a rally outside the White House with "We are ALL supporters of Hamas. Allahu Akhbar! ... I am also a supporter of Hezbollah." ...
Its apparent patriotism aside, AMC harbors an intense anti-Americanism. "Let us damn America," Sami Al-Arian, a featured speaker at recent AMC events, has declaimed. Alamoudi, the longtime executive director, has dilated on the agony of living in a country he loathes: 'I think if we are outside this country, we can say oh, Allah, destroy America, but once we are here, our mission in this country is to change it. There is no way for Muslims to be violent in America, no way. We have other means to do it. You can be violent anywhere else but in America.'"

"Jerusalem Explosion Leaves 20 Dead" (Steve Weizman, AP/Yahoo! News, 2002/06/18)
"A Palestinian man detonated nail-studded explosives on a Jerusalem bus crowded with high school students and office workers Tuesday, killing himself and 19 passengers in the city's deadliest suicide attack in six years. Forty people were wounded. The blast tore through the bus just before 8 a.m., sending bodies flying through windows and peeling off the roof and sides. The attack came as President Bush prepared to make a major Mideast policy statement. Many of the passengers were students at a nearby high school. Education Minister Limor Livnat said seven students were among the dead and wounded. ... The Islamic militant group Hamas claimed responsibility and identified the assailant as Mohammed al-Ghoul, 22, from the Al Faraa refugee camp near the West Bank city of Nablus."

 

Monday, June 17, 2002

News and commentary:

"The Rough Beast Returns" (Todd Gitlin, Mother Jones, 2002/06/17)
"Wicked anti-Semitism is back. The worst crackpot notions that circulate through the violent Middle East are also roaming around America, and if that wasn't bad enough, students are spreading the gibberish. ... It should therefore trouble progressives everywhere that the students at San Francisco State are neither curious nor revolted by the anti-Semitic drivel they are regurgitating. ... The German socialist August Bebel once said that anti-Semitism was "the socialism of fools." What we witness now is the progressivism of fools. It is a recrudescence of everything that costs the left its moral edge. And, appallingly, it is this contemptible message the anti-Semitic students at San Francisco State chose to parrot. ... A Left that cares for the rights of humanity cannot cavalierly tolerate the systematic abuse of any people - whatever you think of Israel's or any other country's foreign policy. Any student movement worthy of the name must face the ugly history that long made anti-Semitism the acceptable racism, face it and break from it. If fighting it unremittingly is not a "progressive" cause, then what kind of progress does progressivism have in mind?"

"Bomb-Making 101" (Dan Harris, ABC News, 2002/06/17)
"A chilling 3 ½-hour videotape obtained by ABCNEWS features what the Israeli military calls "Bomb-making 101" for Palestinian militants. The tape starts with a masked man - who says he's a member of the military wing of the Islamic militant group Hamas - giving a brief lecture on the importance of waging holy war against the Israelis, and the heavenly rewards awaiting those who make and explode bombs. And then the lesson begins. ... As the tape continues, the bomb-maker says: "Now my brother fighters, we put the shrapnel in the case … It's better to use ball bearings than nuts." They're more deadly and destructive, he explains. Then come the explosives: specifically, nitroglycerin. This is one ingredient that is hard come by - it's usually smuggled in from Egypt or stolen in Israel. "We can only fit 7 kilos," the bomb-maker says as he loads the explosives into the bomb casing. "We were hoping to include more." There wasn't enough room."

"Egyptian academics open debate on eliminating Israel" (AP/Jordan Times, 2002/06/17)
"Even as their government takes a leading role in international effort to negotiate with Israel in pursuit of a peaceful way out of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, Egyptian academics and intellectuals opened discussions Sunday on eliminating the Jewish state. "We should probe ways on how to bring that date sooner rather than later," Salah Abdul Karim, deputy head of Egypt for Culture and Dialogue, told the opening session of a seminar dubbed "After the Demise of Israel." ... "We should fight this racist pocket (Israel) planted in the heart of the Arab nation," said Abdel Karim, whose Egypt for Culture and Dialogue, a group of Islamic and leftist activists, organised the seminar in Cairo. Mohammed Hesham, a professor at the state-run Helwan University who presented the participants with a paper on "Zionist racism: A history with no future," argued that Israel will disappear "like the racist regime in South Africa." Others said action was needed. "This entity will not collapse on its own, we should escalate its downfall," said Adel El Gogri, a columnist at the opposition Al Ahrar daily."

"Gunman's Mom Sends Wishes in Video" (Jamie Tarabay, AP/Yahoo! News, 2002/06/17)
"In a farewell video taped before Mahmoud el Abed embarked on a suicide attack, he sat holding hands with his mother, who prayed for him to become a "martyr" as she conferred her blessing. ... It is customary for suicide attackers to make farewell videos, but the inclusion of the assailant's mother was unusual. In most cases, mothers and fathers are not informed because recruiters fear the parents will try to stop a planned attack. But Naima el Abed was right at her son's side, encouraging him. When news arrived Sunday that her son had died in a shooting attack that killed two Israeli soldiers near a Jewish settlement in the Gaza Strip, she celebrated by ululating and clapping her hands. ... "Our children are in heaven, their children are in hell," Naima el Abed said Sunday at her son's funeral. ... "This is the best day of my life. God willing, you will become a martyr and you will be successful. May every bullet hit its target," Naima told her son in the video." (See also: "Palestinian Mothers - Their Increasing Support In Sending Their Sons On Suicide Attacks" (IDF, 2002/06/16): "This attack followed the same pattern as other recent attacks carried out by Hamas, including the ritual of the terrorist's mother being photographed and expressing approval of her son's imminent death.")

"Iraq accused of smuggling nuclear arms parts on aid flights" (Michael Evans, The Times, 2002/06/17)
"Iraq is smuggling nuclear-related equipment banned by the United Nations on board aircraft that have been flying relief aid to Syria, intelligence agencies believe. Baghdad has sent more than 24 planes to Syria, carrying humanitarian aid to help victims of a dam collapse that flooded villages and agricultural land. ... Intelligence agencies trying to monitor flights in and out of Baghdad believe that the Iraqis took advantage of the disaster to smuggle banned equipment back on the return journey. Some intelligence reports indicate that one of the returning planes was filled with spare parts for sensitive so-called “flow-forming machines”, which are used to produce components for uranium-enrichment systems. Enriched uranium is a key component of nuclear weapons. ... Other equipment also flown back to Baghdad was believed to include tank parts and spares for the Iraqi Air Force. The Iraqi aircraft landed in Damascus without checks because the focus had been on helping the victims of the dam disaster."

"Powell's Trial Balloon" (William Safire, The New York Times, 2002/06/17)
Safire argues against the idea of a provisional Palestinian state: "Here's my advice: Don't step into this trap. It's a lose-lose idea.
1. Statehood, even if qualified as provisional or interim, confers a degree of sovereignty. That means control of borders, the ability to make treaties, and to import arms from Iraq and by sea from Iran.
2. Partial statehood would give Arafat control of an airport. A plane loaded with fuel or explosives could hit a major Tel Aviv building within three minutes, too quickly for Israeli jets to scramble. Ritual condemnation would follow.
3. Any form of statehood would limit Israel's ability to search out bomb factories and arrest terrorist leaders. What is now a tolerable sweep into disputed territory would be denounced in the U.N. as invasion pure and simple. That would trigger European economic boycotts and draw Arab allies into a wider war.
Why, then, offer Arafat's autocracy this pre-emptive prize? State Department Arabists claim it would show "movement" away from solid Bush support for Israel and, in the still-dovish Shimon Peres's phrase, offer a "political horizon" to Palestinians. But some of us see recognition of an unreformed P.L.O. as offering a taste of triumph to jihadists from Netanya to New York."

"The problem is with the people" (Evelyn Gordon, The Jerusalem Post, 2002/06/17)
"Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has had some success in convincing the Bush administration that Israel cannot make a deal with Yasser Arafat. Yet in the process, he has fostered a dangerous illusion: that "painful concessions" will be possible once Arafat is gone. Unfortunately, nothing could be further from the truth - because, as a senior Palestinian official aptly put it two weeks ago, "the problem is not Arafat, but the Palestinian people as a whole." The international template for an Israeli-Palestinian agreement would bring a Palestinian state within easy shooting range of Israel's major population centers: Tel Aviv is all of 18 km. from the West Bank, while the border would run right through Jerusalem. In short, terrorists would no longer even have to enter Israel: They could fire rockets, or even spray bullets, at Jewish civilians from any rooftop in east Jerusalem or numerous Palestinian towns along the Green Line. Thus, unless the Palestinians are willing to live in peace, such a deal would turn all of Israel into a deathtrap. And too many Palestinians evince no such willingness. ... A peace deal would undoubtedly change some Palestinians' minds, but an entire culture cannot be radically altered overnight. It will take at least a generation of intensive effort - by schools, the media and other institutions - to eradicate this cult of hatred. And until it is eradicated, a Palestinian state can never be a safe neighbor for Israel."

"Don't Go Wobbly" (Margaret Thatcher, The Wall Street Journal, 2002/06/17)
"The proliferation of weapons of mass destruction has fundamentally changed the world in which we and our children will live. ... At the rate at which nuclear, chemical and biological weaponry and missile technology have been proliferating we must expect that at some point these weapons will be used. This is quite simply the greatest challenge of our times. We must rise to it. ... I have detected a certain amount of wobbling about the need to remove Saddam Hussein - though not from President Bush. ... It is, of course, right that those who have the duty to weigh up the risks of particular courses of action should give their advice - though they would be better to direct their counsel to the president not the press. But in any case, as somebody once said, this is no time to go wobbly. Saddam must go. His continued survival after comprehensively losing the Gulf War has done untold damage to the West's standing in a region where the only unforgivable sin is weakness. ... It is clear to anyone willing to face reality that the only reason Saddam took the risk of refusing to submit his activities to U.N. inspectors was that he is exerting every muscle to build WMD. We do not know exactly what stage that has reached. But to allow this process to continue because the risks of action to arrest it seem too great would be foolish in the extreme."

"At Dawn in a New Diplomatic Era" (Robert L. Bartley, The Wall Street Journal, 2002/06/17)
"In the annals of world affairs, June 2002 will go down as the most epochal month in half a century, since the early months of 1947 with the Truman Doctrine and containment policy marking the dawn of the Cold War. A new era formally opened on June 1, when President Bush proclaimed a doctrine of military preemption in his speech to graduating cadets at West Point. The old era formally closed last Thursday, with expiration of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty the president had renounced six months earlier. ... In such a dangerous world "If we wait for threats to fully materialize, we will have waited too long." Rather, "we must take the battle to the enemy, disrupt his plans, and confront the worst threats before they emerge. In the world we have entered the only path to safety is the path of action." So Americans must "be ready for preemptive action when necessary to defend our liberty and to defend our lives." ... In the new era, there will surely be issues to be debated and compromises to be struck, but we can expect that President Bush's doctrine of preemption against terrorist gangs and terrorist states will set the diplomatic tone of the next half-century." (See also: "Bush says US will strike first" (BBC News, 2002/06/01))

See the archive for earlier news and commentary.

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"When people accept futility and the absurd as normal, the culture is decadent. The term is not a slur; it is a technical label."

Jacques Barzun

Articles of the week

"Losing the Enlightenment" (Victor Davis Hanson, OpinionJournal, 2006/11/29)

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From the archives

Oriana Fallaci, R.I.P.

"The Rage, the Pride and the Doubt" (Oriana Fallaci, The Wall Street Journal, 2003/03/13)

"How the West Was Won and How It Will Be Lost" (Oriana Fallaci, The American Enterprise, from the January/February 2003 issue)

"On Jew-hatred in Europe" (Oriana Fallaci, dennisprager.com, 2002/04/13)

"Anger and Pride" (Oriana Fallaci, dennisprager.com, 2001/12/19)

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