Archived news and commentary: August 12 - 18, 2002

2002/09/23 - 2002/09/29
2002/09/16 - 2002/09/22
2002/09/09 - 2002/09/15
2002/09/02 - 2002/09/08
2002/08/26 - 2002/09/01
2002/08/19 - 2002/08/25
2002/08/12 - 2002/08/18
2002/08/05 - 2002/08/11
2002/07/29 - 2002/08/04
2002/07/22 - 2002/07/28
2002/07/15 - 2002/07/21
2002/07/08 - 2002/07/14
2002/07/01 - 2002/07/07

Sunday, August 18, 2002

News and commentary:

"Terror on Tape" (CNN.com, 2002/08/18)
"A large archive of al Qaeda videotapes obtained by CNN in Afghanistan sheds new light on Osama bin Laden's terror network, revealing images of chemical gas experiments on dogs, lessons on making explosives, terrorist training tactics and previously unseen images of bin Laden and his top aides. The archive includes 64 videotapes that span more than a decade and provide new insight into al Qaeda's planning, tactics and mindset. ... Among the most frightening scenes in the collection of tapes are those of testing of a poison gas on three dogs. The disturbing images show the dying moments of the defenseless, enclosed animals. ... "It's probably extremely significant, if not profound," said John Gilbert, a chemical weapons specialist and arms control expert who advises the U.S. government. 'I know there's been a lot of speculation about the state of technology, and how far they may have advanced toward having a usable chemical weapon. The fact that they were able to repeat tests or demonstrations on this tape indicates that they clearly have a way to produce a predictably lethal chemical.'"

"The Death Convoy of Afghanistan" (Babak Dehghanpisheh et al., Newsweek, from the 2002/08/26 issue)
"But stories of a deeper horror came from the prisoners themselves. However awful their conditions, they were the lucky ones. They were alive. Many hundreds of their comrades, they said, had been killed on the journey to Sheberghan from Konduz by being stuffed into sealed cargo containers and left to asphyxiate. Local aid workers and Afghan officials quietly confirmed that they had heard the same stories. They confirmed, too, persistent reports about the disposal of many of the dead in mass graves at Dasht-e Leili. ... The dead of Dasht-e Leili - and the horrific manner of their killing - are one of the dirty little secrets of the Afghan war. The episode is more than just another atrocity in a land that has seen many. The killings illustrate the problems America will face if it opts to fight wars by proxy, as the United States did in Afghanistan, using small numbers of U.S. Special Forces calling in air power to support local fighters on the ground."

"Ex-Aide Accuses Arafat of Corruption" (Laurie Copans, AP/Yahoo! News, 2002/08/18)
"A former treasurer of the Palestine Liberation Organization, who fled to London last week, accused Yasser Arafat of transferring millions of dollars of international donations into a personal account, according to interviews published Sunday in Israeli newspapers. The ex-treasurer, Jawad Ghussein, 71, alleged that Arafat moved up to $8 million to his personal account every month and was aware of the widespread corruption, the newspaper accounts said."

"Fighting an unholy war" (Ben Barber, The Washington Times, 2002/08/18)
"Without openly gloating, Arab officials are saying in so many words, "I told you so." They know what it is like to live with assassins stalking their leaders, police, foreign tourists, journalists and anyone else they don't like. ... After the fundamentalist Islamic Salvation Front won the first round of 1991 elections, the Algerian army suspended the voting. That unleashed a decade of massacres by the Armed Islamic Group (GIA) and the Salafist Group for Call and Combat, a smaller radical group. Both are on the State Department's list of terrorist organizations. ... The GIA and the Salafists method of killing was indeed terrifying. They would enter a village or apartment block, seize everyone they could find and then methodically slit their throats, one by one. An Algerian official said the Islamists believe that anyone who is not with them deserves to die, along with their families. A recent GIA statement by its head, as quoted by Agence France-Presse in June, followed a massacre of 24 peasants: 'We will continue to destroy their harvests, to take their goods, to rape their women, to decapitate them in the cities, the villages and the deserts. Neither truce, nor dialogue, nor reconciliation, nor security, but blood, blood, destruction, destruction.'" (See also: "Algeria: new leader of hardline GIA vows more 'blood, rape'" (AFP/Softcom, 2002/03/31), for more on the statement by GIA's new leader, Rachid Abou Tourab.)

"If We Must Fight . . ." (Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Washington Post, 2002/08/18)
"Ultimately what is at stake is something far greater than Iraq: It is the character of the international system and the role in it of what is, by far, the most powerful state. Neither the White House nor the American people should ignore the fact that America's enemies will, whatever happens, do everything possible to present the United States as a global gangster. Yet without a respected and legitimate law-enforcer, global security could be in serious jeopardy. America must thus walk a fine line in determining when, in what circumstances and how it acts as such in initiating the use of force."

"Kidnapped by the Times" (Charles Krauthammer, The Washington Post, 2002/08/18)
"Not since William Randolph Hearst famously cabled his correspondent in Cuba, "You furnish the pictures and I'll furnish the war," has a newspaper so blatantly devoted its front pages to editorializing about a coming American war as has Howell Raines's New York Times. Hearst was for the Spanish-American War. Raines (for those who have been incommunicado for the last year) opposes war with Iraq. ... Then there are the constant references to growing opposition to war with Iraq - in fact, the polls are unchanged since January - culminating on Aug. 16 with the lead front-page headline: "Top Republicans Break with Bush on Iraq Strategy." ... How can one possibly include Kissinger in this opposition group? He writes in the very article the Times cites: "The imminence of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the huge dangers it involves, the rejection of a viable inspection system and the demonstrated hostility of Hussein combine to produce an imperative for preemptive action." There is hardly a more succinct statement of the administration's case for war." (See also: "Top Republicans Break With Bush on Iraq Strategy" (Todd S. Purdum and Patrick E. Tyler, The New York Times, 2002/08/16) and "Steps on the way to ousting Saddam from Iraq" (Henry Kissinger, HoustonChronicle, 2002/08/09))

 

Saturday, August 17, 2002

News and commentary:

"Guile, Gas and Germs: Syria's Ultimate Weapons" (Dany Shoham, The Middle East Quarterly, from the Summer 2002 issue)
The first of two articles examining Syria's chemical and biological weapons: "Syria today is a prominent member of the chemical and biological weapons (CBW) club, and it is not a junior member either. As early as 1992, the U.S. Defense Department ranked Syria as the sole Muslim state possessing a "chemical systems capability in all critical elements" for chemical weapons. And in recent years, Syria has added biological weapons to its store - weapons with far more strategic value than chemical weapons. Budgets are also there, and in plenty. The picture of poverty that is drawn for the Syrian army's conventional ordnance is misleading. Syria spends between $1 billion and $2 billion annually on its ballistic and CB capabilities, an enormous share of the Syrian military budget."

"The Prof Who Can't Count Straight" (Joshua Muravchik, The Weekly Standard, from the 2002/08/26 issue)
Muravchik on Marc Herold's seriously flawed study of civilian casualties in Afghanistan: "In mid-July, the center-right Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, arguably Germany's most respected newspaper, commented that in contrast to U.S. government reticence on the subject, "a study published in January by the University of New Hampshire speaks of nearly 4,000 civilians killed since October 2001. Since then, the number is said to have reached 5,000 victims. This would mean more people have been killed in Afghanistan than through the attacks in NY on Sept. 11." The same comparison was drawn in Der Spiegel some months back, and that magazine recently reiterated Herold's claims. ... From these four versions [of civilian casualties at Chowkar-Karez], Herold concluded that the toll was 52 to 93, in other words, the Taliban version and up. Indeed, this is the "method" for all his research. Notwithstanding reports from Afghan journalists after the Taliban's ouster that under its rule they were forced to doctor reports of civilian casualties ("We could not tell the truth," one told AP), Herold's "dossier" contains a graph whose civilian casualty count, for every week of the war, exceeds Taliban claims." (See also: "Annabel Croft can't take on Accrington Stanley" (Mark Steyn, The Daily Telegraph, 2002/01/19))

"NASA plans to read terrorist's minds at airports" (Frank J. Murray, The Washington Times, 2002/08/17)
"Airport security screeners may soon try to read the minds of travelers to identify terrorists. Officials of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration have told Northwest Airlines security specialists that the agency is developing brain-monitoring devices in cooperation with a commercial firm, which it did not identify. Space technology would be adapted to receive and analyze brain-wave and heartbeat patterns, then feed that data into computerized programs "to detect passengers who potentially might pose a threat," according to briefing documents obtained by The Washington Times. NASA wants to use "noninvasive neuro-electric sensors," imbedded in gates, to collect tiny electric signals that all brains and hearts transmit. Computers would apply statistical algorithms to correlate physiologic patterns with computerized data on travel routines, criminal background and credit information from "hundreds to thousands of data sources," NASA documents say."

 

Friday, August 16, 2002

News and commentary:

"The Saudis' Bad Press" (James Taranto, The Wall Street Journal/Best of the Web Today, 2002/08/16)
Taranto quotes two articles from Arab News: "For example, Nourah Abdul Aziz Al-Khereiji writes: "Is the vainglorious and headstrong United States taking the world to total destruction? Blind US actions against Arab and Muslim countries will undoubtedly halt global economic progress causing untold miseries the world over. ... Hasn't the US proven itself to be a terrorist country by resorting to methods of terrorizing peace-loving people in various parts of the world? Isn't its unilateral attempt to redraw the map of the Middle East an act of international terrorism?" ... Then there's Israel Shamir, who writes anti-Semitic screeds from Israel. In his latest, he suggests America and Britain were on the wrong side in World War II, faulting them for having dropped bombs on "Germans and French, for offending Jews." Offending? He refers to the "Judeo-American cult, probably the most violent and war-prone since Genghis Khan" and claims that "your average American Jew values his Jewish-ness well above his American-ness." Shamir concludes with the observation that "there are many good Jews, in Israel and in the US alike." How very reassuring." (See also: "Extension of terrorism by other means" (Nourah Abdul Aziz Al-Khereiji, Arab News, 2002/08/16 [?]) and "Take the money and run" (Israel Shamir, Arab News, 2002/08/16))

"Kids' Terror Camp" (Marsha Kranes, New York Post, 2002/08/16)
Kranes on a photo from a Palestinian "Terror Camp": "Summer camp is deadly serious business for these Palestinian youngsters. They've been spending the past three weeks being trained in guerrilla warfare and other military and terrorist tactics by members of Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement. Here, in the village of Salem, near the city of Nablus in the West Bank, some of the 60 youngsters at the camp demonstrate what they've learned - using mock guns to attack a model of a Jewish settlement."

"Brent Scowcroft is Wrong: We Must Attack Saddam" (Daniel Pipes and Jonathan Schanzer, FrontPageMagazine, 2002/08/16)
"'Don’t Attack Saddam,' Brent Scowcroft implored President George W. Bush in the Wall Street Journal on Thursday. ... Here are two main holes in Scowcroft’s argument: Saddam only seeks weapons of mass destruction (WMD), he says, to "deter [America] from intervening to block his aggressive designs" and will not use them. Whence does he get such an idea? Saddam assuredly will use them if circumstances make this useful to him. For a start, note that he is the only ruler in power today who actually has deployed WMD, and he has done so often. During the 1980-1988 war with Iran, he showered chemical gases on Iranian soldiers. He also turned chemicals on his own Kurdish population. ... In a yet more worrisome development, Khidhir Hamza, former head of Saddam’s nuclear weapons development program and another defector from Iraq, estimates Saddam will need two to three years "to get the fissile material program going" for nuclear weapons production. "The bomb design and hardening," he says, "will probably take another year." Thus, Saddam will likely have gone nuclear by 2006, and one must count on his using them. This prospect makes a preemptive attack soon not only advisable but urgent." (See also: "Don't Attack Saddam" (Brent Scowcroft, The Wall Street Journal, 2002/08/16))

"Muslims 'must defend Saddam'" (Anton La Guardia, The Daily Telegraph, 2002/08/16)
"Radical Islamic leaders in London yesterday told Muslims around the world that they had an obligation to rise up against Britain and America if there was an attack on Iraq. The declaration was issued by hardline Islamists after a chaotic day in which they tried to charge journalists a £30 "admission fee" to hear their pronouncement. ... Their declaration said: "We strongly believe that the hostile policies and the immature and irresponsible statements from US politicians, suggesting a crusade against Islam and Muslims, can only lead to a deepened desire for retaliation." The statement was issued by fax after their press conference turned into a stand-off between Sheikh Omar's devotees and journalists unwilling to pay the "admission fee". "We can live without you," said Sheikh Omar Bakri Muhammad, who heads a group called al-Muhajiroun, when confronted with this display of infidel stubbornness. "You cannot live without us." Anjem Choudary, a senior lieutenant of Sheikh Omar, said: "We are doing you a favour by bringing you most of the Muslim personalities in Britain." The £30 fee, he said, was a "small price" for the honour of speaking to them."

 

Thursday, August 15, 2002

News and commentary:

"With Unyielding Faith" (Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff, Shark Blog/Die Zeit, 2002/08/15)
Stefan Sharkansky's translation of an article from Die Zeit on the allegations that Middle Eastern terrorism is subsidized by EU aid money: "EU External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten disputes all of the allegations in the strongest terms. Standing before the European Parliament Foreign Affairs Committee on June 19 he said that the EU Commission had "painstakingly examined" all of the Israeli government's documents. They found "no proof, I repeat, no proof that European aid funds were used for anything other than their intended purpose". ... This view of Arafat is borne of an unyielding faith in his goodness. The EU cries "no proof!" yet generously disregards the plethora of direct and circumstancial evidence. The EU is acting like the wife who assiduously overlooks the stranger's lipstick on her husband's collar and doesn't believe that she's been betrayed until there's a private detective with an incriminating videotape standing at the door." (See also the first article: "Arafat Bombs, Europe Pays" (Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff and Bruno Schirra, Shark Blog/Die Zeit, 2002/06/12) and "Unbeugsame Gutgläubigkeit" (Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff, Die Zeit, August 2002))

"Saudi Arabia gives US the cold shoulder" (Michael Evans, The Times, 2002/08/15)
"Relations between the United States and Saudi Arabia have deteriorated so far that the Saudi Arabians are no longer considered allies, senior diplomatic sources said yesterday. Saudi Arabia, once the indispensable cornerstone of US policy in the Arab world, has refused to co-operate with the war on terrorism or support President Bush's plans to overthrow President Saddam Hussein. According to the sources, it has handed over no Intelligence of any value about the al-Qaeda terrorist organisation, which has roots in Saudi Arabia. The final "stab in the back" for Washington was the decision to ban American bombers from attacking Iraq from Saudi airbases. That has soured relations to such an extent that the country from which America launched its 1991 invasion of Iraq is now being excluded from discussions about a post-Saddam era."

"Camille Returns" (Camille Paglia, andrewsullivan.com, 2002/08/15)
From the second part of Andrew Sullivan's e-mail interview, including reader questions, with Paglia: "At first I disdainfully rejected the idea that we are engaged in a global clash of civilizations - Islam versus the West. It seemed impossible and medieval. I saw Arab culture as richly informed by its brilliant past, with its interplay between Bedouin stoicism and Moorish cultivation. But as a chain of suicide bombers steadily blew up buses and restaurants in Israel over the past year, my sympathy for the Palestinian cause has gradually diminished. War, declared or undeclared, justifies attacks on military targets. But the massacre of civilians - in the World Trade Center or at a Jerusalem market - is barbarism. What kind of state could be formed by people who tolerate and cheer such atrocities? When moderate factions are so feeble, who can believe that a Palestinian state would not be the staging area for missile attacks on Israel?" (See also: "Rage in the Middle East" (Camille Paglia, Salon.com, 2000/10/25): "Many Americans, myself included, have wondered for years why our safety and security are compromised by an inflexible foreign policy that has set the entire Muslim world against us. From the 1988 destruction of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, to the 1993 bombing of New York's World Trade Center, the American mainstream media has been in denial, blaming those heinous acts of terrorism on small cadres of madmen funded by outlaw regimes - as if the attacks were unrelated to decisions made in Washington.")

"The U.S.-German Conversation" (Claudia Winkler, The Weekly Standard, 2002/08/15)
"For the past week, a U.S.-German debate over the war on terrorism has been raging in the German press. Here, almost no one has noticed. Similarly, almost no one paid attention back in February, when the Institute for American Values, a small New York think tank specializing in family issues, published "What We're Fighting For: A Letter From America," signed by 60 intellectuals of mostly neo-con persuasion. (Think Fukuyama, Huntington, Galston, Putnam, Weigel.) Some Germans, however, did notice, and they responded in May with a letter of their own. Its 103 signatories are, loosely speaking, pacifist intellectuals or peace-movement activists - a more mainstream group in Germany than in the United States, given Germany's very different intellectual history. Now the Institute for American Values' comeback, published on August 8, is making front-page news and prompting comment in newspapers across Germany. The original American letter was a fairly sophisticated 20-page reflection on basic political values, separation of church and state, just-war theory, and the provocation of September 11. It concluded that war is justified against the "organized killers with global reach [who] now threaten all of us." The German reply is entitled "A World of Justice and Peace Would Be Different." It rejects the very concept of "just war" as "an ill-starred historical concept" and calls the killing of civilians in the American assault on Afghanistan 'mass murder.'" (See also: "What We're Fighting For: A Letter from America" (Institute for American Values, 2002/02/12), "A World of Justice and Peace would be Different" (Propositions Online, 2002/05/17) and "Is the Use of Force Ever Morally Justified?" (Propositions Online, 2002/08/08))

"Mandela to observe Fatah leader's trial" (Jonathan Steele, The Guardian, 2002/08/15)
A major embarassment to Mandela rather than Israel: "In a major embarrassment to Israel, Nelson Mandela has agreed to observe the trial of a Palestinian leader formally indicted yesterday on charges of murder and terrorism. A lawyer for Marwan Barghouti, a member of the Palestinian legislative council and secretary general of the Fatah movement in the West Bank, revealed he had been in South Africa last week to invite the former president to the trial. "He said he was enthusiastic about coming," Khader Shkirat said. He quoted South Africa's most famous political prisoner as saying: 'What is happening to Barghouti is exactly the same as what happened to me. The government tried to de-legitimise the African National Congress and its armed struggle by putting me on trial.'" (See also: "Mandela to join 'Free Baraghouti' campaign" (The Jerusalem Post, 2002/08/15): "Palestinians parliamentarians announced Thursday the formation of an international committee to work for the release of Fatah leader Marwan Baraghouti, including Former South African President and long-time political prisoner Nelson Mandela. ... According to the Palestinian announcement, the committee is to include Mandela, Nobel winning Portuguese author, Jose Saramago, and prominent Palestinian-American professor Edward Sa'id.")

"Bitter Circus Erupts as Israel Indicts a Top Fatah Figure" (Serge Schmemann, The New York Times, 2002/08/15)
"Marwan Barghouti, the most prominent Palestinian leader to be brought before a civilian Israeli court, made clear at his indictment on terrorism charges today that he intends to turn his public trial into a political duel with Israel. Waving his handcuffed hands in his first appearance since his capture on April 15, Mr. Barghouti shouted in Hebrew (a language he learned during his previous incarcerations in Israeli prisons), "I have charges against the Israeli government!" As television cameras and radio microphones recorded the proceedings, he continued, "I have a charge sheet with 50 clauses against Israel for the bloodshed of both people!" ... Israel's basic case is that Mr. Barghouti, as the West Bank leader of Fatah, Mr. Arafat's core political movement, was responsible for terror attacks carried out by Fatah's secretive and deadly Aksa Martyrs Brigades. The charge sheet, which she did not read out in court, specifically cites 37 attacks in which 26 people were killed and scores wounded." (See also: "West Bank Fatah chief Barghouti charged with murder" (Baruch Kra, Haaretz, 2002/08/14))

 

Wednesday, August 14, 2002

News and commentary:

"Bush in the hot seat over flooded Europe" (Cape Times/IOL, 2002/08/14)
Guess who's to blame for the flooding in Europe?: "As thousands flee flooding in central Europe, many people in Germany are convinced they know where to put the blame for the catastrophe - on United States President George Bush's refusal to sign the Kyoto climate accords. ... "Monsoon rains are sending our rivers over their bands as the Alpine glaciers are receding at an alarming rate and it is all due to global warming and the failure of the Kyoto accords due to Bush's refusal to sign," a television reporter told viewers. ... The leftist Tageszeitung said the floods proved once and for all that "Bush is not omnipotent. He has made a big mistake." The Heidelberg newspaper Rhein-Neckar Zeitung said: 'The final decision on long-term climate policy rests with the US. The Bush administration has put the issue at the bottom of its agenda and that is truly a man-made catastrophe.'"

"Support for Homicide Bombers May Be Dwindling" (Jennifer Griffin, Fox News, 2002/08/14)
"Atta Sarasara has lost everything. First his 16-year-old son, Hazem, blew himself up in Jerusalem. Then the Israeli army blew up the Palestinian man's home as a result - to discourage future suicide bombers. Sarasara is angry with not just the Israelis, but also with the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades for preying on impressionable teenagers and giving his son a bomb. "They used a child. He was very kind, handsome, smart. They used him," Sarasara said. ... Israel has demolished the family homes of 21 bombers in recent days. Palestinian spokesmen say this only increases the bombers' willingness to attack Israel, but in at least two cases this week, fathers prevented their sons from volunteering. One man turned his son over to the police in Tulkarem, while another in Nablus shot his son in the leg."

"Saudi King Vacations in Luxury" (AP/Yahoo! News, 2002/08/14)
"Saudi King Fahd moved on to the next phase of his summer vacation Wednesday, taking his 12-aircraft entourage from Switzerland to Spain, where he has a mansion on the Mediterranean coast that is a replica of the White House. Dozens of luxury limousines and buses were on hand at Malaga airport to escort the monarch and his entourage to his residence in the southern resort of Marbella, the Spanish news agency Efe reported. ... Marbella city officials estimate that the Saudis will spend $6 million per day during their stay. The last visit, in 1999, generated $70 million for the local economy."

"Global warmth for U.S. after 9/11 turns to frost" (Ellen Hale, USA Today, 2002/08/14)
"Here in Britain, the United States' staunchest friend, snide remarks and downright animosity greet many Americans these days. It's not just religious radicals and terrorists who resent the United States anymore. ... "My sense is that much of the rampant anti-Americanism we see now is very much linked to a war with Iraq and the Israel-Palestine issue," says Mary Kaldor, a London-based scholar on international relations. In the popular Straw Poll BBC radio show July 26, Kaldor debated with Washington Post reporter T. R. Reid whether "American power is the power of the good." She argued that the U.S. role as the sole superpower was a danger to the rest of the world. At the end of the program, 70% of the studio audience said it agreed with her. ... New Yorker Julia Magnet, a journalist who just moved to London, found that out when she decided to throw a Fourth of July party for British friends. Between grilled sausages and chocolate cake, her friends launched an attack on Bush and the United States. They called Bush a "homicidal maniac" and "stupid" and the United States the 'world's biggest terrorist.'"

"West Bank Fatah chief Barghouti charged with murder" (Baruch Kra, Haaretz, 2002/08/14)
"Israel Wednesday charged Marwan Barghouti, the detained leader of Fatah's Tanzim militia in the West Bank and a firebrand leader of the Palestinian uprising, with murder, incitement to murder, attempted murder, conspiracy, membership in a terrorist organization acting as an accessory to murder, and activity in a terrorist organization. The indictment, filed in the Tel Aviv District Court, branded Barghouti an "arch-terrorist whose hands are bloodied by dozens of terror actions." ... Raising his handcuffed hands in speaking to reporters before the hearing Wednesday, Barghouti said in Hebrew "The uprising will be victorious." Continuing in English, he said 'I am a peaceful man. I was trying to do everything for peace between the two peoples. I believe the best solution is two states for two peoples.'" (See also: "Charge-sheet against Marwan Bin Khatib Barghouti" (IMRA, 2002/08/14))

"Israel: Arafat Worth $1.3 Billion" (Celean Jacobson, AP/Yahoo! News, 2002/08/14)
"Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has amassed a personal fortune of about $1.3 billion, Israel's military intelligence chief told parliament. The claim was dismissed Wednesday by Palestinian Authority officials as an Israeli attempt to discredit Arafat. Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip live in increasingly deteriorating conditions, and Arafat has repeatedly made appeals for international aid. ... Arafat's new finance minister, Salam Fayad, has been trying to carry out some reforms and weed out corruption, but Israel's chief of military intelligence, Maj. Gen. Aharon Zeevi, told parliament's defense and foreign affairs committee Tuesday that he believed about $1.3 billion remained under Arafat's exclusive control."

 

Tuesday, August 13, 2002

News and commentary:

"Part I: Terror attacks brought drastic decision: Clear the skies" (Alan Levin et al., USA Today, 2002/08/13)
Two articles on "the four most critical hours in aviation history" - the grounding of all flights over America on Sept. 11: "But as he listens - as Ong, in hushed tones, tells of a passenger dead and a crewmember dying, of the jet's erratic path and intruders in the cockpit - Marquis realizes that Ong can do little. The flight has been hijacked. As Marquis, 45, considers what he can do, air traffic controllers at the FAA's Boston Center reach the same conclusion. Flight 11 has stopped talking. Its pilots don't respond to calls; its transponder signal has disappeared. Worse, controllers report hearing a man with a strange accent in the cockpit. "We have some planes," he says through an open mike. "Just stay quiet and you will be OK." Could more hijackers be out there? In the FAA's command center in Herndon, Ben Sliney learns of the radio transmission. The words will haunt him all morning. "We have some planes." Some? How many?" (See also: "Part II: No one was sure if hijackers were on board" (Marilyn Adams et al., USA Today, 2002/08/13))

"Al Qaeda's Fantasy Ideology" (Lee Harris, The Wall Street Journal, 2002/08/13)
"For want of a better term, call the phenomenon in question a fantasy ideology - by which I mean political and ideological symbols and tropes used not for political purposes, but entirely for the benefit of furthering a specific personal or collective fantasy. ... The terror attack of 9-11 was not designed to make us alter our policy, but was crafted for its effect on the terrorists themselves: It was a spectacular piece of theater. The targets were chosen by al Qaeda not through military calculation - in contrast, for example, to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor - but entirely because they stood as symbols of American power universally recognized by the Arab street. They were gigantic props in a grandiose spectacle in which the collective fantasy of radical Islam was brought vividly to life: A mere handful of Muslims, men whose will was absolutely pure, as proven by their martyrdom, brought down the haughty towers erected by the Great Satan. What better proof could there possibly be that God was on the side of radical Islam and that the end of the reign of the Great Satan was at hand?"

Note: I'm going on a short vacation and will not be able to update the site until Monday, August 19.

 

Monday, August 12, 2002

News and commentary:

"PA minister: 'Jews live by scheme and deceit'" (Michael Freund, The Jerusalem Post, 2002/08/12)
"Palestinian Authority Communications Minister Imad Falouji made anti-Semitic remarks in an appearance on official PA television late last week, Palestinian Media Watch revealed Monday. "Israel does not recognize the basis of the negotiations," Falouji said in an August 8 broadcast. 'That is because Jewish nature is in control of that state and does not sanction peace or stability... The Jewish nation, it is known, from the dawn of history, from the time Allah created them, lives by scheme and deceit.'"

"Iraq: U.N. Weapons Inspections Over" (Salah Nasrawi, AP/Yahoo! News, 2002/08/12)
"Baghdad's information minister rejected the need for a resumption of U.N. weapons inspections in Iraq, saying Monday inspectors had finished their work four years ago when they left the country in advance of U.S. and British air strikes. Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf told the Arabic satellite television Al- Jazeera in an interview that the Bush administration was "confused" and was making inspections into an issue in an attempt to use them as a tool in the latest showdown between Washington and Baghdad. ... "This is a lie," he said of Washington's insistence Iraq still possesses weapons of mass destruction. "Inspections have finished in Iraq." Though Iraq feels the job is done, it was not clear whether al-Sahhaf's remarks were intended as a final rejection of any return of weapons inspectors, as demanded by the United States and the United Nations."

"BBC World Disservice" (Andrea Levin, The Jerusalem Post, 2002/08/12)
"One striking gauge of the bias is the discrepancy in treatment of Palestinian versus Israeli spokesmen by BBC interviewers. Deep indulgence is routinely afforded Palestinian officials, while Israelis who defend the actions of their government are often verbally pounded in hostile, aggressive interviews. ... [BBC's Alex] Brodie's questioning [of Nabil Shaath, the PA's Minister for Planning and International Cooperation] in the August 7 segment contained almost comical sycophancy. In one query, the reporter tossed this tough challenge: "[T]he Israelis are going to want you and your forces to take Hamas and Islamic Jihad and the others head-on. That's politically impossible for you, isn't it?" Shaath agreed; 'This is impossible.'"

"The Saudi Way" (Simon Henderson, The Wall Street Journal, 2002/08/12)
"A Jan. 9 story in U.S. News & World Report, entitled "Princely Payments," provided a lead which few have followed up. Two unidentified Clinton administration officials told the magazine that two senior Saudi princes had been paying off Osama bin Laden since a 1995 bombing in Riyadh, which killed five American military advisers. A Saudi official was quoted as saying, "Where's the evidence? Nobody offers proof. There's no paper trail." I followed the lead and quickly found U.S. and British officials to tell me the names of the two senior princes. They were using Saudi official money - not their own - to pay off bin Laden to cause trouble elsewhere but not in the kingdom. That is "the Saudi way." The amounts involved were "hundreds of millions of dollars," and it continued after Sept. 11." (See also: "Princely payments" (Linda Robinson and Peter Cary, usnews.com, 2001/01/14))

Added in archive:
"UN Report on Jenin" (HonestReporting, 2002/08/09)
"'I tracked Iraq's biological weapons'" (BBC News, 2002/08/08)
"Exposing Al Qaeda's European network" (Charles M. Sennott, The Boston Globe, 2002/08/04)

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)

"Allah’s England?" (Daniel Johnson, Commentary. November 2006)

"'Sex in the Park': The latest doings of the Danish imams" (Henrik Bering, The Weekly Standard, 2006/11/18)

"Narcissism on Stilts" (Harold Evans, New York Sun, 2006/11/16)

"Terrorists are recruiting in our schools, says MI5 boss" (Philip Johnston, The Daily Telegraph, 2006/11/10)

› AOTW Archive



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)

Weekly archive

2006/12/04 - 2006/12/10
2006/11/27 - 2006/12/03
2006/11/20 - 2006/11/26
2006/11/13 - 2006/11/19
2006/11/06 - 2006/11/12
2006/10/30 - 2006/11/05

› From 2001/09/11 -



Monthly index

December 2006
November 2006
October 2006
September 2006
August 2006
July 2006

› From September 2001 -



Author index

› Ajami, Fouad - Johnson, Paul
› Kagan, Robert - Ye'or, Bat



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