Archived news and commentary: January 26 - February 1, 2004

2004/03/29 - 2004/04/04
2004/03/22 - 2004/03/28
2004/03/15 - 2004/03/21
2004/03/08 - 2004/03/14
2004/03/01 - 2004/03/07
2004/02/23 - 2004/02/29
2004/02/16 - 2004/02/22
2004/02/09 - 2004/02/15
2004/02/02 - 2004/02/08
2004/01/26 - 2004/02/01
2004/01/19 - 2004/01/25
2004/01/12 - 2004/01/18
2004/01/05 - 2004/01/11
2003/12/29 - 2004/01/04

Sunday, February 1, 2004

News and commentary:

"Revisionism at the Times" (Michael Moynihan, The Politburo, 2004/02/01)
"The New York Times assigning a left-wing history professor to review a left-wing history book is de rigeur. That the reviewer’s last published book, a monograph on the fall of the Soviet Union, was "clever," according to David Pryce-Jones, but written by a Soviet "apologist" is, again, status quo. When the book in review claims that Kim Jong-Il's North Korea is an overstated evil (and that all Kim needs is a little tenderness and understanding) and that, on balance, President George Bush is "more evil" than the "Dear Leader" of North Korean, we shrug our shoulders; a typical of the tenured radical, pandering to 68’er constituents. And, after years of conditioning, we at the Politburo are not surprised when the Times positively reviews such a book. ...
In comparison to the "shrewd" Kim Jong-Il, Bush is "the greater evil," says Cumings. Again, the reviewer registers no disagreement, treating the comparison as judicious and entirely reasonable. Cumings’ brand of "scholarship" is of the Robert Thuston, David Irving variety — we love the ideology, so we support the ideologues. But because the dominant view is contra Bush — the reviewer occasionally writes for the American Prospect, for example — this apologia for mass murder and fifty years of state Stalinism is treated with seriousness." (See also: "North Korea: Another Country" (Stephen Kotkin, The New York Times/IHT, 2004/01/30) and "Revealed: the gas chamber horror of North Korea's gulag" (Antony Barnett, The Observer, 2004/02/01))

"Bomb attacks shatter Kurdish city" (BBC News, 2004/02/01)
"Two suicide bombers have attacked offices of the two main Kurdish parties in northern Iraq, killing scores of people, including top officials.
Nearly 60 deaths were confirmed after the blasts on Sunday morning in Irbil but an official said up to 140 people may have died in the packed halls.
Gatherings were marking the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha when the bombs went off in a space of five minutes.
Kurdish officials blame al-Qaeda and its allies for the attacks. ...
PUK spokesman Sabah Sabir told the BBC that the Muslim militant group Ansar al-Islam — which was expelled from northern Iraq by Kurdish and coalition forces during last year's war — was probably responsible for the bombings. ...
"On the first day of Eid we receive people and well-wishers and that's why security wasn't as tight as during the rest of the days," said Mohammed Ihsan.
'They [the attackers] took advantage of this.'"

"244 Muslim Pilgrims Die in Hajj Stampede" (Rawya Rageh, AP/Yahoo! News, 2004/02/01)
"Nearly 250 Muslim worshipers died in a hajj stampede Sunday during the annual stoning of Satan ritual in one of the deadliest tragedies at the notoriously perilous ceremony.
The stampede, during a peak event of the annual Muslim pilgrimage, or hajj, lasted about a half-hour, Saudi officials said. There were 244 dead and hundreds of other worshippers injured, some critically, Hajj Minister Iyad Madani said. ...
The devil-stoning is the most animated ritual of the annual pilgrimage and often the most dangerous. Many pilgrims frantically throw rocks, shout insults or hurl their shoes at the pillars — acts that are supposed to demonstrate their deep disdain for the devil. But clerics frown upon such action, saying it's un-Islamic.
Last year, 14 pilgrims were trampled to death during the ritual and 35 died in a 2001 stampede. In 1998, 180 pilgrims died."

"Iran Election Crisis Deepens as Lawmakers Resign" (Parinoosh Arami, Reuters, 2004/02/01)
"More than a third of Iran's parliament resigned Sunday, escalating a bitter political row on the 25th anniversary of the return from exile of the founding father of the Islamic Republic Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
A quarter of a century after Khomeini's triumphant return ushered in clerical rule, Iran's political system has been plunged into its worst crisis for years by a hard-line body's decision to bar hundreds of candidates from this month's parliamentary elections.
Lawmakers formed an orderly queue to submit the 117 typed resignation letters to parliamentary speaker Mehdi Karroubi.
In a stormy parliament session, angry deputies denounced the Guardian Council — an unelected hard-line body comprised of 12 clerics and Islamic jurists — for disqualifying more than 2,000 would-be lawmakers from standing in the February 20 ballot.
"They want to cover the ugly body of dictatorship with the beautiful dress of democracy," prominent reformist deputy Mohsen Mirdamadi said in a speech on behalf of resigning lawmakers."

"Conspiracies so vast" (Darrin M. McMahon, The Boston Globe, 2004/02/01)
McMahon wonders if we are "living in a golden age of conspiracy theory?":
"The tremendous increase in access to information (and disinformation) generated by the Internet also bears comparison to the Enlightenment's knowledge revolution and its attendant creation of virtual communities and disembodied publics. In the same way that conspiracy theories united 18th-century audiences in shared fascination and horror, conspiracy theories today are an integral part of the entertainment industry, providing a mysterious and tantalizing twist on the daily spin. At the same time they feed on a post-Watergate distrust of elites that has close analogues with Enlightened suspicion of authorities of all kinds — be they clerics, aristocrats, intellectuals, or kings. ...
Which is not to suggest that our modern fascination with conspiracies is indicative of newly enlightened times. On the contrary, conspiracy theories are often used as cover for the worst sort of scapegoating and demonization.
David Cook, an assistant professor of religious studies at Rice University, points out that many of the modern conspiracy theories that have flourished in the Middle East since the 18th century tap into even older sources — such as medieval accounts of the Jewish Blood Libel, the insidious anti-Semitic myth that the blood of Gentiles is used in the preparation of Passover matzos. Barkun notes a similar trend in Western conspiracy rhetoric, especially in America, where themes from the Protestant millennial tradition are often fused with contemporary actors and events to create lurid dramas of the coming Apocalypse and the reign of the Anti-Christ."

"Dr Kay is not the useful idiot the anti-war party claims" (Melanie Phillips, The Sunday Telegraph, 2004/02/01)
"For the fact that Saddam was actively engaged in WMD programmes, large-scale or not, shows he was indeed in breach of the UN resolutions, and was indeed the threat he had been assumed to be from his record, temperament, regional ambitions and links to terrorism.
How much ricin, after all, do you need to kill thousands of people? To listen to anti-war critics, it would seem that modest amounts of biological agent somehow don't count as WMD, or a re-started nuclear programme is no threat because it is only rudimentary.
To Dr Kay, the war was absolutely necessary because Saddam had become "even more dangerous" than had been realised, and, he said last week, "it was reasonable to reach the conclusion that Iraq posed an imminent threat". Yet virtually no one has reported these remarks. Instead, Dr Kay is being quoted out of context to sustain the charge of Government duplicity by the anti-war brigade. ...
History is constantly being rewritten over Iraq by people who were against the war from the start and have presented every development in the most malevolent light to prove that Bush and Blair took us to war on a lie. Logic, rationality and judgment have been suspended; and David Kay's testimony is but the latest casualty." (See also: "Bush's decision on war affirmed" (James G. Lakely, The Washington Times, 2004/01/27))

"Why We Didn't Get the Picture" (Bruce Berkowitz, The Washington Post, 2004/02/01)
"The ultimate irony was that Saddam Hussein — who might have put all questions to rest — was so intent on maintaining his power at home and his stature abroad that he could never let inspectors discover for themselves that his weapons programs had been shelved. He is now paying the price for what appears to have been a colossal bluff.
If any of this sounds familiar, it should. Recall the infamous "missile gap" of the 1960 presidential election. After the Soviet Union surprised the West in 1957 by testing the world's first intercontinental ballistic missile, U.S. intelligence predicted the Soviets would build them by the hundreds. ...
The recipe was the same in 1960 and 2003: Take a record of previously underestimating the enemy, combine with a secretive regime and a mercurial, bluffing strongman, mix in inadequate information and — voilà — you have a lot of chagrined officials and a huge bill."

"What Went Wrong" (John Barry and Mark Hosenball, Newsweek, from the 2004/02/09 issue)
"In February 2000, Tenet told Congress that the United States had no direct evidence that Iraq had reconstituted its WMD programs, "although given its past behavior this type of activity must be regarded as likely." Iraq had begun to rebuild parts of its chemical infrastructure "for industrial and commercial use," he said, and had also "attempted to purchase numerous dual use items."
Thin gruel. So how did the agency make the leap from suspect intentions to bold claims of existing WMD programs two years later? ...
At Central Command, this lack of hard information produced real problems. The Pentagon needed to know where Saddam's WMD stockpiles were, and what exactly was inside them, so they could plan to destroy them. After intense pressure, the CIA finally produced what one top administration official touted as "the crown jewels" — satellite photos of buildings. But the CIA admitted that it didn't know what was inside the buildings. "I'm coming to the conclusion that the agency really knew very little, but didn't feel it could admit that to anyone," says an insider deeply involved in one of the internal probes into the mess."

"Powell's Case, a Year Later: Gaps in Picture of Iraq Arms" (Douglas Jehl and David E. Sanger, The New York Times, 2004/02/01)
"Interviews with current and former senior intelligence officials, a handful of Iraqi engineers, Congressional officials involved in investigations of the C.I.A. and current and former administration officials, suggest that Mr. Powell's case was largely based on limited, fragmentary and mostly circumstantial evidence, with conclusions drawn on the basis of the little challenged assumption that Saddam Hussein would never dismantle old illicit weapons and would pursue new ones to the fullest extent possible. ...
"Our conservative estimate," Mr. Powell declared in his United Nations presentation, is that "Iraq today has a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agent" or enough, as he put it, "to fill 16,000 battlefield rockets."
To make that case, Mr. Powell unveiled before the Security Council an array of previously classified evidence on a scale not seen in that room since Adlai Stevenson appeared during the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, armed with photographs of Soviet missiles. ("This was my Adlai moment," Mr. Powell joked later.) But in retrospect, the satellite photographs and tape-recordings of intercepted communications that Mr. Powell played that day now seem to describe actions that are less fearsome than they first appeared." (See also: "A Flawed Argument In the Case for War" (Glenn Kessler and Walter Pincus, The Washington Post, 2004/02/01) and "Remarks to the United Nations Security Council" (Colin L. Powell, U.S. Department of State, 2003/02/05))

"The Shiite Surge" (David Rieff, The New York Times Magazine, 2004/02/01)
An interesting report from the Shiite heartland in Iraq: "It is a truism that the past is far more alive in the Arab world than it is in the United States or in Western Europe. This is surely the case in the Shiite areas of Iraq, where the dead sometimes seem to have a greater presence, and certainly more authority, than the living. Talk to Iraqi Shiites, and you can get the disconcerting sense that the conversation — self-evidently to them, incomprehensibly to you — is constantly shifting backward or forward in time. I can't count the number of times, during the weeks I recently spent in the Shiite cities, towns and neighborhoods of Iraq, that I was told the story of Saddam Hussein murdering Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr — only to find that in the telling, Sadr's killing became conflated with the murder of Imam Ali more than a millennium earlier."

"Civil war splits BBC as staff turn on Ryder" (David Smith, The Observer, 2004/02/01)
"Some of the BBC's biggest names are considering quitting in protest at the attitude of its acting chairman and the greatest-ever threat to their journalistic independence.
The corporation was on the brink of civil war last night as union leaders warned that Greg Dyke's resignation as director-general had split the staff from the governors.
Lord Ryder, who became acting Chairman of Governors after the departure of Gavyn Davies, infuriated many BBC staff when he tried to draw a line under the Hutton crisis, saying: 'On behalf of the BBC I have no hesitation in apologising unreservedly for our errors and to the individuals whose reputations were affected by them.'
Many at the corporation felt the apology went too far by conceding total defeat and felt greater sympathy with Dyke, who has openly criticised the Hutton report since resigning."

"Revealed: the gas chamber horror of North Korea's gulag" (Antony Barnett, The Observer, 2004/02/01)
"Over the past year harrowing first-hand testimonies from North Korean defectors have detailed execution and torture, and now chilling evidence has emerged that the walls of Camp 22 hide an even more evil secret: gas chambers where horrific chemical experiments are conducted on human beings.
Witnesses have described watching entire families being put in glass chambers and gassed. They are left to an agonising death while scientists take notes. The allegations offer the most shocking glimpse so far of Kim Jong-il's North Korean regime. ...
Defectors have smuggled out documents that appear to reveal how methodical the chemical experiments were. One stamped 'top secret' and 'transfer letter' is dated February 2002. The name of the victim was Lin Hun-hwa. He was 39. The text reads: 'The above person is transferred from ... camp number 22 for the purpose of human experimentation of liquid gas for chemical weapons.'"

"Call of History Draws Iraqi Cleric to the Political Fore" (Anthony Shadid, The Washington Post, 2004/02/01)
A profile of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani: "Sistani has explicitly refrained from pronouncements on what shape Iraq's constitution and law should take. He is described as a flexible thinker who believes that religion should adapt to time and place. Yet his edicts reveal a profoundly traditionalist view of society. In declarations on the most minute elements of personal behavior, he has said that men and women should not mix socially, that music for entertainment is prohibited and that women should veil their hair. ...
In a handwritten response to questions last year, Sistani described secularism as Iraq's greatest threat. "There is a grave danger in obliterating [Iraq's] cultural identity, whose most important foundation is the honorable Islamic religion," he said. A government that reflects the majority's will "should respect the religion of the majority, adopt its values and not conflict in any of its decisions with any of the stipulations of that religion."
"He's driven by fear," Rubaie said, fear of secularism and 'fanatic liberalism.'"

"Flights Cut on Fear Of Al Qaeda Attacks" (Sara Kehaulani Goo and Dana Priest, The Washington Post, 2004/02/01)
"Intelligence indicating that al Qaeda terrorists are seeking to release a chemical or biological agent aboard an airliner, or transport a radiological device in cargo, was one of the factors that prompted the cancellation of six international flights scheduled for today and tomorrow, senior administration officials familiar with the reports said yesterday.
The intelligence on a weapon of mass destruction remains vague, and officials remain concerned about hijackings and other methods. The use of such weapons would be a new tactic."

Saturday, January 31, 2004

News and commentary:

"From Mount Arafat, Muslim pilgrims move to Muzdalifah..."
(AP/Vahid Salemi, 2004/01/31)
"From Mount Arafat, Muslim pilgrims move to Muzdalifah, where they collect pebbles to throw at a pillar symbolically stoning the temptations of the devil, just outside the city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia, during the annual Muslim pilgrimage or hajj, Saturday, Jan. 31, 2004."

"Pakistan Removes Top Nuclear Scientist" (Sadaqar Jan, AP/Yahoo! News, 2004/01/31)
"The founder of Pakistan's nuclear program, Abdul Qadeer Khan, was removed Saturday from his position as a government adviser and told to stay home amid an investigation into allegations of nuclear proliferation.
Khan has not officially been placed under arrest, but authorities have told him to remain at home for security reasons and increased the security around him, military spokesman Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan said Saturday. ...
Khan — who had held the advisory position since retiring as head of the country's top nuclear facility in 2001 — has become a a key suspect in allegations that Pakistani scientists sold nuclear weapons technology to countries including Iran and Libya."

"Syrians call for democratic reforms in petition to Assad" (AP/Billings Gazette, 2004/01/31)
"More than half a million Syrians demanded political and economic reform in a petition to be handed to President Bashar Assad, a human rights group said Saturday.
Some 600,000 citizens, including intellectuals, lawyers and human rights activists, have already signed the document, the Committees for the Defense of Democratic Liberties and Human Rights in Syria said.
The group said it hoped for a million signatures by March. Syria has a population of around 18 million.
A copy of the petition, faxed to news organizations in Damascus, said the country has been "languishing under the duress of the emergency law since 1963, whose impacts have been extended to include all fields of public life."
Naisse, chairman of the group, told reporters the petition would be presented to Syrian authorities on March 8, 41 years after the law was introduced under the ruling Baath Party." (Hat tip: Glenn Reynolds.)

"Our Foreign Legions" (Francis Fukuyama, The Wall Street Journal, 2004/01/31)
Fukuyama on the European problem of assimilating immigrants:
"But while the French government is publicly supportive of Arab causes, it and other European governments are privately worried about future trends. Sept. 11 revealed that assimilation is working very poorly in much of Europe. Terrorist ringleaders like Mohamed Atta were radicalized not in Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan, but in Western Europe. In a revealing incident that took place shortly after the attack on the World Trade Center, a crowd of mostly second- and third-generation French North Africans booed the Marseillaise during a soccer match between the French and Algerian national teams and chanted Osama bin Laden's name. Third-generation British Muslims have traveled to the West Bank to martyr themselves in suicide operations. ...
Europeans have only recently begun to confront the problem of assimilation, and continue to suffer from a stifling political correctness in talking honestly about the issue of immigration. In 2001 the German Christian Democrats gingerly floated the concept of Leitkultur, or "leading culture," the idea that immigrants would be accepted as Germans but only if they in turn accepted certain German cultural values. The idea was immediately batted down as racist, and never raised again."

"Bring back Dyke campaign takes off" (John Plunkett, The Guardian, 2004/01/31)
"First they bombarded their outgoing director general with emails of support. Then they took to the streets in a mass show of sympathy for Greg Dyke. Now BBC staff have put their hands in their pockets to pay for a newspaper advert in protest at the fallout from the Hutton report.
The full-page advert, due to appear in the Daily Telegraph today, was paid for entirely by BBC employees, presenters and reporters, as well as outside contributors.
Among the household names who contributed were the presenter Jonathan Ross and the BBC news correspondents John Simpson and Ben Brown. ...
The advert says BBC staff are "dismayed" by the departure of the director general, Greg Dyke, who resigned after scathing criticism of the corporation in the Hutton report.
"Greg Dyke stood for brave, independent and rigorous BBC journalism that was fearless in its search for the truth. We are resolute that the BBC should not step back from its determination to investigate the facts in pursuit of the truth," the ad reads. 'Through his passion and integrity, Greg Dyke inspired us to make programmes of the highest quality and creativity. We are dismayed by Greg's departure, but we are determined to maintain his achievements and his vision for an independent organisation that serves the public above all else.'" (See also: "Judge who cleared Blair but blamed BBC is accused of 'whitewash'" (AP/Yahoo! News, 2004/01/29))

Friday, January 30, 2004

News and commentary:

"Weimar UK" (Melanie Phillips, melaniephillips.com, 2004/01/30)
"But there's a deeper and no less distressing reason why the public and the media don't believe the Hutton verdict. It's because they think that Gilligan's story was basically true (the fact that everything he said was demonstrably false is apparently nothing more than a nit-picking detail). And the reason they think that is because they think the Prime Minister did lie about the threat from Saddam and his WMD and took us to war on false pretences. That view, which defies history, evidence, logic and rationality (notwithstanding the emerging evidence about dodgy intelligence) has been pumped out by the media, who now unshakeably believe their own rubbish. And the chief offender here was none other than the BBC, whose anti-war, anti-American bias was so bad that during the hostilities HMS Ark Royal stoped listening to it in fury at the defeatist disinformation it was putting out. Yet as the Telegraph poll confirms the BBC is trusted far more than any politician. As a result, the public's minds have simply been twisted — not just about Iraq, but about the wider war on terror, the Middle East and a host of other issues. ...
In its abandonment of truth and morality, its descent into irrationality, ignorance and propaganda and its embrace of prejudice and hatred, this society is more and more resembling the Weimar republic." (See also: "Judge who cleared Blair but blamed BBC is accused of 'whitewash'" (AP/Yahoo! News, 2004/01/29))

"BBC Reporter in Weapons Probe Resigns" (Jill Lawless, AP/My Way, 2004/01/30)
"British Broadcasting Corp. reporter Andrew Gilligan, whose story about Iraqi weapons led to a feud with the British government and a judicial inquiry, said Friday he was resigning from the BBC.
In a statement, Gilligan apologized for mistakes in his May 2003 story.
"My departure is at my own initiative," he said. 'But the BBC collectively has been the victim of a grave injustice.'"

"The Intoxication of being alone against the world" (Pascal Bruckner, Le Monde/Watch, 2004/01/28 [2004/01/30])
Bruckner on the crisis between France and America:
"The problem is that contemporary France, this nation of shareholders who take themselves for heroes, has no ambition greater than itself (save confiscating the European project for her own benefit). Isolated in its splendid (in)sufficiency, obsessed with its lost grandeur, France has the contradictory wish to make history without getting its hands dirty, to enjoy the double status of disinterested spectator and lesson-giver for all.
America acts, perhaps badly, but at least it does something and sometimes gets results while France gesticulates, vituperates to hide its profound inertia. What awaits us if we continue down this path is a growing provincialism coupled with a shaggy lyricism: gilded and bloating." (Note: Translated by Douglas. See also the French original: "L'ivresse du seul contre tous" (Pascal Bruckner, Le Monde, 2004/01/28))

"Calling Iraq's Bluff" (Charles Krauthammer, The Washington Post, 2004/01/30)
"People forget that when the Bush administration came into office, Iraq was a very unstable place. Thousands of Iraqis were dying as a result of sanctions. Containment necessitated the garrisoning of Saudi Arabia with thousands of "infidel" American troops - in the eyes of many Muslims, a desecration (cited by Osama bin Laden as his No. 1 reason for his 1996 "Declaration of War" on America). The no-fly zones were slow-motion war, and the embargo was costly and dangerous — the sailors who died on the USS Cole were on embargo duty.
Until Bush got serious, threatened war and massed troops in Kuwait, the U.N. was headed toward loosening and ultimately lifting sanctions, which would have given Hussein carte blanche to regroup and rebuild his WMDs.
Bush reversed that slide with his threat to go to war. But that kind of aggressive posture is impossible to maintain indefinitely. A regime of inspections, embargo, sanctions, no-fly zones and thousands of combat troops in Kuwait was an unstable equilibrium. The United States could have either retreated and allowed Hussein free rein — or gone to war and removed him. Those were the only two ways to go."

Thursday, January 29, 2004

News and commentary:

"Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, left, awards Archbishop of Canterbury..."
(AP/Nasser Nasser, 2004/01/29)
"Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, left, awards Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. Rowan Williams the Bethlehem 2000 medal during a special ceremony at his office in the West Bank town of Ramallah Thursday Jan. 29, 2004."

"Saddam's Gifts" (Brian Ross, ABC News, 2004/01/29)
The Oil-for-Support Programme V: "George Galloway, a British member of Parliament, was also on the list to receive 19 million barrels of oil, a $90.5 million profit. A vocal critic of the Iraq war, Galloway denied any involvement to ABCNEWS earlier this year.
"I've never seen a bottle of oil, owned one or bought one," Galloway said in a previous interview with ABCNEWS.
According to the document, France was the second-largest beneficiary, with tens of millions of barrels awarded to Patrick Maugein, a close political associate and financial backer of French President Jacques Chirac.
Maugein, individually and through companies connected to him, received contracts for some 36 million barrels. Chirac's office said it was unaware of Maugein's deals, which Maugein told ABCNEWS are perfectly legal.
The single biggest set of contracts were given to the Russian government and Russian political figures, more than 1.3 billion barrels in all — including 92 million barrels to individual officials in the office of President Vladimir Putin." (See also: "The Beneficiaries of Saddam's Oil Vouchers: The List of 270" (MEMRI, Inquiry and Analysis Series - No. 160, 2004/01/29))

"Judge who cleared Blair but blamed BBC is accused of 'whitewash'" (AP/Yahoo! News, 2004/01/29)
When the truth negates the world-view of the anti-warriors it doesn't serve "the real interest of truth", which apparently is to confirm that world-view:
"The judge who probed the suicide of arms expert David Kelly was accused of a "whitewash" by much of Britain's daily press for clearing Prime Minister Tony Blair's government of wrongdoing while rebuking the BBC.
The rightwing Daily Mail said that judge Brian Hutton's long-awaited verdict, delivered Wednesday, had attracted "widespread incredulity."
"Justice?" the paper asked in a front page headline. It said Hutton's report "does a great disservice to the British people. It fails to set its story in the context of the BBC's huge virtues and the government's sore vices." ...
"We're faced with the wretched spectacle of the BBC chairman resigning while Alastair Campbell crows from the summit of his dungill. Does this verdict, my lord, serve the real interest of truth?" asked the Daily Mail. ...
In a striking front-page article, with a white space left where normally a photograph would appear, the Indepenedent asked Thursday if the Hutton report was an 'establishment whitewash.'"

"Israel Releases 400 Palestinian Prisoners" (David McHugh, AP/Yahoo! News, 2004/01/29)
"Israel released more than 420 prisoners Thursday in a long-awaited swap with the Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah in exchange for an Israeli businessman and the bodies of three Israeli soldiers.
Despite a suicide attack in Israel, the two-stage swap went ahead, starting with the release of 400 Palestinians at Israeli checkpoints in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Jubilant relatives greeted them with cheers and thanks to Hezbollah, Israel's arch enemy. Crowds waved Hezbollah flags."

"Israel promises painful response to bus bombing" (Bret Stephens, The Jerusalem Post, 2004/01/29)
"Ten people were murdered and 50 wounded when a suicide bomber exploded inside a bus on the corners of Gaza and Arlozorov streets, near the Prime Minister's residence in Jerusalem's Rehavia neighborhood at about 8:45 Thursday morning.
It was the 29th suicide bombing in the capital's history. Israel's response to Thursday's attack will be painful, Channel One reported officials as saying. ...
Yasser Arafat's Fatah-linked al-Aksa Martyrs Brigades claimed responsibility for the attack in a call to Army Radio.
The suicide bomber, identified as Ali Jaara, 24, a Palestinian Authority policeman from the Aida refugee camp on the outskirts of Bethlehem, left a note saying that he wanted to avenge eight Palestinians killed in fighting with Israeli troops in the Gaza Strip Wednesday. ...
Half the roof of the bus was lifted 12 meters in the air and was visible hundreds of meters away from the back part of the bus. On the bus itself, every window had been blown out. There were three entire human corpses inside the bus and two others lying outside."

"BBC apologises to Blair" (John Plunkett, The Guardian, 2004/01/29)
"The BBC has offered an unreserved apology to the government over the way it handled its complaint about the Andrew Gilligan story, which Tony Blair immediately accepted, adding the government could now "draw a line" under the whole episode.
The BBC acting chairman, Lord Ryder, issued the statement on behalf of the board of governors, which also confirmed the appointment of Greg Dyke's recently appointed deputy, Mark Byford, as acting director general.
Lord Ryder said the Hutton report had highlighted "serious defects in the corporation's processes".
"On behalf of the BBC I have no hesitation in apologising unreservedly for our errors and to the individuals whose reputations were affected by them," he said." (See also: "BBC apologises as Dyke quits" (BBC News, 2004/01/29): "Director General Greg Dyke has quit as the BBC's crisis deepens in the wake of Lord Hutton's damning verdict. ... Mr Dyke's decision to step down follows BBC Chairman Gavyn Davies' resignation on Wednesday, the day the Hutton report was published.")

"We always had to go to war" (John Keegan, The Daily Telegraph, 2004/01/29)
"Evidence of weapons of mass destruction would not, however, really help. The anti-war party is not so much concerned that Britain was involved in the war as that there was a war at all. Yet there was going to be a war, like it or not. The American government was determined to get rid of Saddam and was even more certain than the British that Saddam had WMD and was a danger to peace. ...
The bitter-enders have become so legalistic, however, that it seems they would prefer Saddam to have survived in the absence of a second resolution even at the expense of his monstrous dictatorship over the Iraqi people surviving as well. The legalism that pervades the European world is both baffling - and growing in strength.
Yet legalism does not work even within the context of the EU. The French and Germans shamelessly break its most binding laws and then refuse to pay the appropriate penalties. Why is it expected that a lawless dictator should change his behaviour at the behest of resolutions adopted thousands of miles away by states that either are toothless or lack the will to use force?"

"The BBC's day of infamy" (Stephen Pollard, Wall Street Journal Europe/stephenpollard.net, 2004/01/29)
"It is impossible to imagine a graver crisis for the BBC, nor one more welcome. The arrogance and mindset which characterises the BBC has, at last, been revealed in its full colours by a judge with no political axe to grind, whose conclusions cannot be denied by the BBC. ...
The BBC is an organisation which, from top to bottom, sees itself not as a neutral reporter of the news, but as a de facto opposition to whatever government happens to be in power. There is a clear left liberal bias in the BBC’s assumptions. As a body funded by a poll tax paid by every TV and radio viewer, without any alternative option – failure to pay results in imprisonment – that is simply grotesque. Lord Hutton has done the process of democracy a huge service."

"The Beneficiaries of Saddam's Oil Vouchers: The List of 270" (MEMRI, Inquiry and Analysis Series - No. 160, 2004/01/29)
The Oil-for-Support Programme IV. A translation of the article which appeared in the Iraqi daily Al-Mada, "which obtained lists of 270 companies, organizations, and individuals awarded allocations (vouchers) of crude oil by Saddam Hussein's regime":
"The following is a partial list and description of individuals and organizations that MEMRI has been able to identify: ...
Great Britain: George Galloway received 1 million barrels. Fawwaz Zreiqat received 1 million barrels. Zreiqat also appears in the Jordanian section as having received 6 million barrels. The Mujahideen Khalq in Britain received 1 million barrels.
France: The French-Arab Friendship Association received 15.1 million barrels. Former French Interior Minister Charles Pasqua received 12 million barrels. Patrick Maugein of the Trafigura company received 25 million barrels. Michel Grimard, founder of the French-Iraqi Export Club, received 17.1 million barrels. ...
Russia: The Russian state itself received 1,366,000,000 barrels."

"Lack of data got intelligence on Iraq 'all wrong'" (Bill Gertz, The Washington Times, 2004/01/29)
"Weak human intelligence-gathering capability and limited data prevented U.S. intelligence analysts from figuring out that Iraq did not have large stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, the CIA's former chief arms inspector told Congress yesterday.
"It turns out we were all wrong, probably, in my judgment, and that is most disturbing," David Kay told the Senate Armed Services Committee.
"I believe that the effort that has been directed to this point has been sufficiently intense that it is highly unlikely that there were large stockpiles of deployed, militarized chemical and biological weapons there," said Mr. Kay, who resigned earlier this month as director of the Iraq Survey Group. ...
Mr. Kay said he supported removing Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein from power because of the danger that his "totally corrupt" regime would sell weapons-related goods to terrorists or other rogue states.
"In a world where we know others are seeking [weapons of mass destruction], the likelihood at some point in the future of a seller and a buyer meeting up would have made that a far more dangerous country than even we anticipated with what may turn out not to be a fully accurate [intelligence] estimate," he said." (See also: "Transcript: David Kay at Senate hearing" (CNN.com, 2004/01/28))

Wednesday, January 28, 2004

News and commentary:

"Transcript: David Kay at Senate hearing" (CNN.com, 2004/01/28)
A transcript of Kay's opening remarks before the Senate Armed Services Committee about efforts to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq: "But I also believe that it is time to begin the fundamental analysis of how we got here, what led us here and what we need to do in order to ensure that we are equipped with the best possible intelligence as we face these issues in the future.
Let me begin by saying, we were almost all wrong, and I certainly include myself here. ...
I would also point out that many governments that chose not to support this war — certainly, the French president, [Jacques] Chirac, as I recall in April of last year, referred to Iraq's possession of WMD.
The Germans certainly — the intelligence service believed that there were WMD.
It turns out that we were all wrong, probably in my judgment, and that is most disturbing." (UPDATE: Here's a full transcript: "Dr David Kay's Testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee" (CRG, 2004/01/30))

"Ambition that blinds" (Ali, Irag the Model, 2004/01/28)
An open letter to Howard Dean: "I'm not going to comment about the rightness of the statement with more than saying that only a (blind) man would believe it and only a man blinded by his ambitions would dare to say it, but when you say such words, don't you mean in other words that the sacrifices made by the American soldiers are all in vain? And that these soldiers are not doing a service to the world, nor to Iraqis and not to America. In fact you are saying that since they didn't do the world, America or us a favour then they’re only doing a favour to GWB and his administration. ...
By statements like these you deny any honourable motives for the great job your people are doing here. How in your opinion will this affect the morality of your soldiers? Feeling that their people back at home don't support them and that they’re abandoned to fight alone in the battlefield.
And all of this for what? For staying in the white house for 4 or 8 years? Is it worth it?
And this is not directed only to Mr. Dean, it's for all the Americans who support such allegations without being aware of their consequences." (See also: "Dean: Iraqi Standard of Living Worse Now" (Nedra Pickler, AP/The Guardian, 2004/01/26))

"BBC chairman quits over Hutton"
(BBC News, 2004/01/28)

"The Hutton earthquake" (Melanie Phillips, melaniephillips.com, 2004/01/28)
"But Hutton has thrown the whole book at the BBC, for making one of the gravest allegations that can be made against a Prime Minister — that he took his country to war on a lie — on the basis of an utter falsehood. The BBC never checked whether the story was true and never retracted the lie but compounded the offence by insisting that it was true. The report leaves absolutely shredded the reputations of Andrew Gilligan, the BBC's senior mangement and its Board of Governors.
This devastating indictment goes much farther than the BBC had feared. The implications are huge. For the BBC's domestic and international reputation rests above all on trust. What marks it out from all other broadcasting organisations is that people trust implicitly that its journalism is impartial, authoritative and true. The Hutton report vapourises that reputation. Why should anyone trust anything BBC journalists say ever again after this?"

"BBC chairman to quit over Hutton" (BBC News, 2004/01/28)
BBC lied, people died: "BBC chairman Gavyn Davies is to resign in the wake of Lord Hutton's criticisms of the corporation's reports.
BBC political editor Andrew Marr said Mr Davies would tell the corporation's governors of his decision when they met at 1700 GMT. ...
Prime Minister Tony Blair said the report showed "the allegation that I or anybody else lied to the House or deliberately misled the country by falsifying intelligence of weapons of mass destruction is itself the real lie".
"I simply ask that those that have made it and repeated it over all these months now withdraw it fully, openly and clearly," he said. ...
BBC director general Greg Dyke said the corporation apologised for things which were wrong in Mr Gilligan's reports. ...
Former Downing Street media chief Alastair Campbell said: 'If the government had faced the level of criticisms which today Lord Hutton's report has directed at the BBC, there would have been resignations by now, several resignations at several levels.'"

"The Hutton verdicts" (Simon Jeffery, The Guardian, 2004/01/28)
A summary of the Hutton verdicts — here on BBC: "Lord Hutton cast doubt on Gilligan's recollection of his meeting with Dr Kelly after he lost his notes and typed up an account from memory on his computer. He said the report made "very grave allegations on a subject of great importance" and Gilligan should have put it to the MoD before going on air. He said the allegation that the 45-minute claim was not in the original dossier because it came from a single source was "unfounded", and that even if it was proved false in the future that did not mean the government knew it to be false at the time. ...
Lord Hutton said the BBC should have vetted Gilligan's story more thoroughly and described its editorial system as "defective". The governors were also criticised for failing to check more thoroughly if Gilligan's story — especially the 6.07am broadcast he later admitted was wrong — was backed up by his notes, which he said Gilligan's managers should have checked more thoroughly. On the row between the government and the BBC, he said the tone of Mr Campbell's complaints had "raised the temperature" but a desire to protect the corporation's independence was not incompatible with investigating them." (See also the full report: "Report of the Inquiry into the Circumstances Surrounding the Death of Dr David Kelly C.M.G." (Lord Hutton, The Hutton Inquiry, 2004/01/28))

"A Friendly Drink in a Time of War" (Paul Berman, Dissent, from the Winter 2004 issue)
Berman discusses the left's position on the war on Iraq with a friend:
"The left doesn't see because a lot of people, in their good-hearted effort to respect cultural differences, have concluded that Arabs must for inscrutable reasons of their own like to live under grotesque dictatorships and are not really capable of anything else, or won't be ready to do so for another five hundred years, and Arab liberals should be regarded as somehow inauthentic. Which is to say, a lot of people, swept along by their own high-minded principles of cultural tolerance, have ended up clinging to attitudes that can only be regarded as racist against Arabs.
The old-fashioned left used to be universalist — used to think that everyone, all over the world, would some day want to live according to the same fundamental values, and ought to be helped to do so. They thought this was especially true for people in reasonably modern societies with universities, industries, and a sophisticated bureaucracy — societies like the one in Iraq. But no more! Today, people say, out of a spirit of egalitarian tolerance: Social democracy for Swedes! Tyranny for Arabs! And this is supposed to be a left-wing attitude? By the way, you don't hear much from the left about the non-Arabs in countries like Iraq, do you? The left, the real left, used to be the champion of minority populations-of people like the Kurds. No more! The left, my friend, has abandoned the values of the left — except for a few of us, of course."

"The reign of the thugs" (Bassam Eid, Haaretz, 2004/01/28)
Bassam Eid is the director of the Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group: "We all know that there are several gunmen who threaten and spread fear among the Palestinians. ...
The question is what Palestinian interior minister would be daring enough to punish those responsible? Would the Palestinian interior minister be killed if he imposed a penalty upon them?
In Tul Karm, the Al-Aqsa Brigades direct and manage the city's civil and security life. They threaten, beat and kill. On October 23, 12 unemployed gunmen who joined the Al-Aqsa Brigades killed Mohammed Hilal, 22, and Samer Ofeh, 23, in the street because they were so-called collaborators.
Nablus is ruled by two armed illiterate thugs. These two people are feared by the population and control the civil life of the city.
This is an example of a further unacceptable situation where a city is governed by ignorant people who are experts only in spreading fear among civilians. Thus, the question is, who will be the loyal watchman of the Palestinians' welfare?"

"Hutton: The verdict" (Trevor Kavanagh, The Sun, 2004/01/28)
"Tony Blair is today sensationally cleared of any "dishonourable or underhand" conduct leading to the suicide of tragic scientist David Kelly.
Lord Hutton’s long-awaited report into Dr Kelly’s death also exonerates ex-Downing Street media boss Alastair Campbell.
And it makes only passing criticism of the Defence ministry headed by embattled Geoff Hoon.
But the document — top secret until it is published officially at noon today — is a devastating indictment of the BBC and its defence correspondent Andrew Gilligan.
Gilligan is effectively accused of LYING in a bombshell broadcast blaming Number Ten for "sexing up" a dossier on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.
Beeb bosses are blasted for failing to check the notes of the journalist, who was already under a cloud over his misuse of language.
And chairman Gavyn Davies, director-general Greg Dyke and the BBC board of governors are implicitly blamed for dereliction of duty to licence-payers."

"Anti-war nations 'took bribes' before war began" (Anne Penketh, Independent, 2004/01/28)
The Oil-for-Support Programme III: "Rumours had circulated for months that documents implicating senior French individuals were about to surface. Such evidence would undermine the French position before the war when President Jacques Chirac staked out the moral high ground in opposing the invasion. ...
French diplomats have dismissed any suggestion that their foreign policy was influenced by payments from Saddam. The French have always insisted their anti-war stance did not mean support for Saddam. But British diplomats suspected France's steadfast opposition to the war was driven by something other than the reasons stated by President Chirac. "Oil runs thicker than blood," is how one former ambassador put his suspicions about the French motives for opposing action against Saddam." (See also: "Iraq to Probe Alleged Saddam Oil Bribes" (Khaled Yacoub Oweis, Reuters/Yahoo! News, 2004/01/27))

Added in archive:
"Right of Reply/I do not support expulsion" (Benny Morris, Haaretz, 2004/01/23)
"Survival of the Fittest - An interview with Benny Morris" (Ari Shavit, Haaretz/FreeRepublic, 2004/01/09)

Tuesday, January 27, 2004

News and commentary:

"UN: Get Out of New York!" (Paul Johnson, Forbes, from the 2004/02/02 issue)
"What I do suggest is that the U.S. should give the UN notice to quit. ...
The place has become a mere theater of empty rhetoric and shameless deals supporting a growing tide of anti-Semitism and racism and — let us not be mealymouthed — state crime. It is a place where near-bankrupt dictatorships can sell their votes to the highest bidder.
It is also a place where well-connected playboy diplomats from the Third World can indulge in an expense-account lifestyle in one of the richest cities on earth, ignoring the pitiful poverty of their home countries and often using their diplomatic immunity to break the law. This is an insult to the dignity of the human race.
As the UN is now constituted, a far better location for it would be in a city near the gravitational center of the Afro-Eurasian landmass. There it would be close to the realities of the problems it ought to be tackling — poverty; bad, cruel and corrupt governments; international lawlessness; civil wars. The place I'd suggest is Dar es Salaam (though I can think of a half-dozen other equally suitable venues). Having UN headquarters there would hugely reduce the cost of running it and its associated activities from New York. It would also deter the playboy element that is one of the curses of the organization and help persuade both staff and delegations to take their jobs seriously.
Personally, I fear the UN is a lost cause, incorrigibly frivolous and corrupt and beyond reform. But such a move might conceivably give the UN the fundamental jolt it needs." (Hat tip: Little Green Footballs.)

"Will Germany Release an American-Killer?" (Martin Kramer, Sandstorm, 2004/01/27)
"In the next few days, Israel and Hizbullah are supposed to consummate their exchange of prisoners, bodies, and information. Germany has been the mediator in the deal. It wouldn't be the business of the United States, except now there is a report the Germans have promised Hizbullah to release a brutal terrorist, who in 1985 hijacked an American airliner to Beirut, and tortured and killed a U.S. Navy diver. ...
The report relates that Germany has "promised to release" this terrorist, Muhammad Ali Hamadei, now serving a life sentence for the June 1985 TWA hijacking, and for the murder of one of the passengers, Navy diver Robert Stethem." (See also: "Germany's 'bargaining chips' for Arad - Hezbollah operatives and Iranian agents" (Aluf Benn, Haaretz, 2004/01/27))

"Arabs, Westerners deny allegations of receiving bribes on Iraqi oil sales" (Jamal Halaby, AP/signonsandiego.com, 2004/01/27)
The Oil-for-Support Programme I: "Arabs and Westerners accused by Iraqis of receiving Iraqi oil proceeds in exchange for supporting Saddam Hussein denied Tuesday they had accepted bribes or participated in illicit deals. ...
Former French Interior Minister Charles Pasqua, among Europeans on the list, on Tuesday denied receiving bribes from Saddam.
"That's far-fetched," said the conservative hard-liner who headed France's Interior Ministry in the late 1980s and early 1990s. "First, I was never interested in oil. Second, I am not a friend of Saddam Hussein and I do not see how my name came to be in this," he told Europe-1 radio.
In Baghdad, Iraqi Oil Ministry Undersecretary Abdul-Sahib Salman Qutub said the provisional government found documents proving the alleged bribes. He threatened to 'sue those who stole the money of the Iraqi people.'"

"Iraq to Probe Alleged Saddam Oil Bribes" (Khaled Yacoub Oweis, Reuters/Yahoo! News, 2004/01/27)
The Oil-for-Support Programme I: "Iraq plans to investigate allegations that dozens of officials and businessmen worldwide illegally received oil in exchange for supporting former leader Saddam Hussein, officials said Tuesday.
Their statements came after al-Mada, an independent Baghdad newspaper, published a list it said was based on oil ministry documents showing 46 individuals, companies and organizations from inside and outside Iraq who were given millions of barrels of oil. ...
The list includes members of Arab ruling families, religious organizations, politicians and political parties from Egypt, Jordan, Syria, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Sudan, China, Austria, France and other countries.
Organizations named include the Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian Communist Party, India's Congress Party and the Palestinian Liberation Organization." (See also this Google translation of a Le Monde article (via InstaPundit): "Saddam Hussein rewarded his/her "friends" out of barrels for oil" (Le Monde, 2004/01/27): "George Gallaway, former Labour deputy with the Communes, appears in good place in the list. Its name is mentioned in six contracts and the newspaper publishes a letter of the SOMO on December 31, 1999, signed by Saddam Zbin, cousin of Saddam Hussein which managed this company and in which it asks for the ministry for oil of grant contracts to him. Apparently, this British member of Parliament was particularly well treated.")

"Sex Slave Jihad" (Donna M. Hughes, FrontPageMagazine, 2004/01/27)
"In Iran for 25 years, the ruling mullahs have enforced humiliating and sadistic rules and punishments on women and girls, enslaving them in a gender apartheid system of segregation, forced veiling, second-class status, lashing, and stoning to death.
Joining a global trend, the fundamentalists have added another way to dehumanize women and girls: buying and selling them for prostitution. Exact numbers of victims are impossible to obtain, but according to an official source in Tehran, there has been a 635 percent increase in the number of teenage girls in prostitution. The magnitude of this statistic conveys how rapidly this form of abuse has grown. In Tehran, there are an estimated 84,000 women and girls in prostitution, many of them are on the streets, others are in the 250 brothels that reportedly operate in the city. The trade is also international: thousands of Iranian women and girls have been sold into sexual slavery abroad.
The head of Iran’s Interpol bureau believes that the sex slave trade is one of the most profitable activities in Iran today. This criminal trade is not conducted outside the knowledge and participation of the ruling fundamentalists. Government officials themselves are involved in buying, selling, and sexually abusing women and girls."

"I witnessed the dead of Belsen: we must always confront tyranny" (James Molyneaux, The Daily Telegraph, 2004/01/27)
Recommended reading for Harley Sorensen: "Now, the usual response of governments is mere condemnation of an atrocity, describing an outrage as "unacceptable". Next come a string of concessions to the offender, leading to a craven suggestion that the victims must share some of the blame, and then concessions to the demands of the perpetrators. ...
Increasingly, the general public weakens in its resolve. Under the label of moderation, it is fashionable to plead for understanding; to do a Chamberlain and settle for a piece of crumpled paper in the mistaken belief that the word of dictators and terrorists can be trusted. Today, we should reflect on our responsibilities, and those of our governments, to stand up to the prejudice and tyranny that can still, today, lead to genocide. These events happened in my lifetime. They are not lost in the past; they could still happen again today."

"Thirty wanted militants said holed up in Muqata" (Haaretz, 2004/01/27)
"As Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher and Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman were due in the West Bank for talks with Yasser Arafat Tuesday over a push to end attacks against Israel, Israeli security officials said that some 30 Palestinians wanted by the Jewish state were holed up in Arafat's Muqata headquarters compound, among them the upper echelon of the militant Fatah Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, Israel Radio reported Tuesday.
It quoted the unnamed officials as saying that some of the fugitives were wanted for direct involvement in fatal roadside ambushes in the West Bank and in suicide attacks within Israel."

"Poll: Europeans 'tired of Holocaust victim games'" (Jenny Hazan, The Jerusalem Post, 2004/01/27)
I wonder how the question was formulated. "Do you think Jews should stop playing Holocaust victim games"?: "Every third European feels Jews should stop playing "Holocaust victim" games, an Italian newspaper reported Monday. ... The Corriere della Sera survey of nine European countries also found that 46 percent of those interviewed feel Jews are "different," and 71% of them urged Israel to withdraw from the territories. Nine percent of respondents do not "like or trust Jews," and 15% would prefer that Israel not exist." (See also: "Poll shows rising tide of anti-Semitism on eve of Holocaust day" (Peter Popham, Independent, 2004/01/27): "While 73.7 per cent conceded Israel's right to exist ("but its government makes bad choices"), 16.1 per cent said it "would be better if the state of Israel did not exist and the Palestinians got their land back", and 11.3 per cent agreed that "to give Palestinians their own land, it would be better if the Jews in Israel went elsewhere". The people polled were asked four questions about the Middle East conflict. Nearly one-third proved clueless. Only 6.2 per cent gave correct answers.")

"Annan Says U.N. Will Send Team to Iraq" (Pamela Sampson, AP/Yahoo! News, 2004/01/27)
"U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan announced Tuesday that the world body will send a team to Iraq to determine whether elections should be held.
"The mission will ascertain the views of a broad spectrum of Iraqi society in the search for alternatives that might be developed to move forward to the formation of a provisional government," Annan said in a statement issued in Paris.
"The mission will report to me on its return to New York," the statement said.
Annan was asked by the U.S.-led coalition and the Iraqi Governing Council to consider sending a team to examine the possibility of holding elections before the return of Iraqi sovereignty on June 30, according to a U.N. statement."

"Bush's decision on war affirmed" (James G. Lakely, The Washington Times, 2004/01/27)
"David Kay, who resigned Friday as the lead weapons inspector in postwar Iraq, said over the weekend that former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein posed an "imminent threat" to the United States, but he is "personally convinced that there were not large stockpiles of newly produced weapons of mass destruction." ...
Mr. Kay told the New York Times that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was attempting to reconstitute his fledgling nuclear program as late as 2001, and had an active program to use the deadly chemical ricin as a weapon until he was stopped by the U.S.-led invasion in March.
In an interview with National Public Radio, Mr. Kay echoed the Bush administration's claim that "in the shadowing effect of September 11," the president was right to "recalculate what risk [Saddam posed] based on the intelligence that existed."
"I think it was reasonable to reach the conclusion that Iraq posed an imminent threat," Mr. Kay said, adding that 'what we learned during the inspection made Iraq a more dangerous place potentially than, in fact, we thought it was even before the war.'"

Added in archive:
"Lo, the Poor Terrorist" (Theodore Dalrymple, City Journal, 2004/01/20)

Monday, January 26, 2004

News and commentary:

"Reem Raiyshi and her son Obida"
(AP Photo/Hamas, 2004/01/26)
"In this undated but recent image released Monday, Jan. 26, 2004, by the Hamas group in the Gaza Strip, female suicide bomber Reem Raiyshi, holds her son Obida, 3, as they pose with weapons. Raiyshi blew herself up at the major border crossing point between Israel and the Gaza Strip, on Jan. 14, 2004, killing herself and four Israelis." (See also: "Atoning for adultery with 'martyrdom'" (Abraham Rabinovich, The Washington Times, 2004/01/20))

"Dean: Iraqi Standard of Living Worse Now" (Nedra Pickler, AP/The Guardian, 2004/01/26)
The living standard of the dead: "Democratic presidential hopeful Howard Dean said Sunday that the standard of living for Iraqis is a "whole lot worse" since Saddam Hussein's removal from power in last year's American-led invasion.
"You can say that it's great that Saddam is gone and I'm sure that a lot of Iraqis feel it is great that Saddam is gone," said the former Vermont governor, an unflinching critic of the war against Iraq. 'But a lot of them gave their lives. And their living standard is a whole lot worse now than it was before.'"

"Qaeda military boss got U.S. visa despite indictment" (Caroline Drees, Reuters, 2004/01/26)
"Suspected Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed received a U.S. visa a few weeks before the attacks, despite a 1996 indictment linking him to earlier plots, but there is no evidence he entered the country, investigators said on Monday.
Staff members of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States also told a public hearing that several of the Sept. 11 hijackers were known al Qaeda operatives, traveled on doctored passports, and made false statements on visa applications that could have been spotted.
Previously, U.S. officials have said most of the hijackers came into the United States legally on "clean" travel documents.
Mohammed, the suspected planner of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, managed to exploit the visa system due to the absence of biometric data, such as electronic fingerprint scans, which would have connected him to the indictment, despite his use of a false name and nationality, the staff members said."

"Islamism brings new Jew-hatred" (Hedi Fried and Jackie Jakubowski, Svenska Dagbladet, 2004/01/26)
The first inter-governmental conference on preventing genocide is being opened in Stockholm today by the United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan. This is translated excerpts from a Swedish article criticizing Prime Minister Goran Persson for his silence on the new Jew-hatred:
"During the last three years, synagogues and schools have been torched and Jews have been attacked on the streets of Paris, Antwerpen and Gothenburg. There have been open encouragements to violence — which then have been realized.
One example is the peaceful demonstration at Norrmalmstorg in Stockholm in the spring of 2002, arranged by Liberal Ungdom [Liberal Youth] under the watchwords "Stop anti-Semitism" and "Stop Islamophobia".
The demonstration was attacked by about 50 youths who teared the banners to pieces and then burned them. Some demonstrators were physically abused. "Jew-swine!" and "Death to the Jews!" resounded in Swedish and Arabic on the square in the middle of Sweden's capital. ...
To criticize those who spread hatred in the name of Islam or to condemn anti-Semitism in Muslim environments have nothing to do with islamophobia. To forcefully condemn Islamism should be a matter of course for those who say they have learned from the ravages of earlier totalitarian ideologies.
It's both possible and necessary to make a distinction between Islam as a religion — worthy of the same respect as other main religions — and Islamism as a dangerous political ideology where Jew-hatred has a central position." (For more on the 2002 demonstration at Norrmalmstorg, see also [in Swedish]: "Bråk under demonstrationer i Stockholm" (Varg Gyllander, TT/Aftonbladet, 2002/04/18) and "Möte mot hat attackerat med våld" (Fredrik Malm, Eskilstuna-Kuriren, 2002/04/26): "Several persons mask themselves and start screaming "Are you Jews?" and "We will never stop hating you" among other things. A couple of elders who are survivors of the Holocaust are shoved around and we have to whisk them away to avoid them getting hurt. The masked activists tear our placards to pieces — placards aimed against anti-Semitism, islamophobia and hatred. The placards and banners are burned and a member of Liberal Youth who arranged the peaceful demonstration is knocked down with a thick stick."
Also: Stockholm International Forum 2004 - Preventing Genocide and "Silence surrounds Muslim Jew-hatred" (Sverker Oredsson and Mikael Tossavainen, Dagens Nyheter/Watch, 2003/10/20))

"Are Parallels To Nazi Germany Crazy?" (Harley Sorensen, SF Gate, 2004/01/26)
Sorensen proves himself crazy: "To make a comparison between Germany in the 1930s and America now, I relied on a Web site called "A Teacher's Guide to the Holocaust." The passages in quotations below are taken from the site.
"With Adolf Hitler's ascendancy to the chancellorship, the Nazi Party quickly consolidated its power. Hitler managed to maintain a posture of legality throughout the Nazification process."
Whether by chance or design, George W. Bush is the most powerful American president in modern history. Not only does he have both houses of Congress beholden to him, but the majority of the Supreme Court is acting like a quintet of Bush lapdogs. And it all appears legal. ...
In 1933, the Reichstag, Germany's parliament building, was burned to the ground. Nobody knows for sure who set the fire. The Nazis blamed communists. "This incident prompted Hitler [,then Germany's chancellor,] to convince [German President Paul von] Hindenburg to issue a Decree for the Protection of People and State that granted Nazis sweeping power to deal with the so-called emergency."
The Reichstag fire parallels the Sept. 11 attacks here, and Hindenburg's decree parallels our USA Patriot Act. ...
With Bush leading all branches of government around by the nose, there's a question whether parliamentary democracy still exists here. Certainly, concentration camps exist, if we're willing to call the lockup at Guanténamo Bay what it really is." (Hat tip: Andrew Sullivan.)

"The Region: Opiate of the Arab world" (Barry Rubin, The Jerusalem Post, 2004/01/26)
"The Arab-Israeli conflict, along with anti-Americanism, continues as the opiate of the Arab world, drugging entire societies into accepting intolerable conditions. ...
Consider three recent statements from totally different parts of the political spectrum.
The establishment: Ali Ukla Ursan, the Syrian regime's Stalinist-style intellectual bureaucrat, insists the answer to Saddam's overthrow is Arab unity in order to intimidate the US which, along with Israel, is responsible for all the world's evil.
The Islamists: The new head of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, often portrayed as a relatively moderate Islamist group, has called for a jihad against Israel and the US in Iraq to solve the Arab world's problems.
The Left: Walid Jumblatt, head of the Lebanese Socialist Progressive Party, has proclaimed Palestinian suicide bombers as the only hope for fixing the Arabs' terrible mess. ...
First, you mesmerize the people by persuading them you are their protector against a diabolical enemy. Then you pick their pockets and beat them up as they express their devotion and gratitude. Next you demand others compensate you for your alleged suffering at the hands of this supposed evil-doer.
But was "Jewish domination" the real grievance of the fascists in Germany and Europe, or was this just a good way to mobilize mass support by stoking murderous rage against someone else? Was the Soviet system really trying to help proletarians elsewhere, and was its ferocious repression caused by the "crimes" of Western liberal capitalism?" (See also: "Lebanese Member of Parliament: 'The Fall of One Jew, Whether Soldier or Civilian, Is a Great Accomplishment'" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 649, 2004/01/23))

"Is France on the way to becoming an Islamic state?" (Barbara Amiel, The Daily Tellegraph, 2004/01/26)
"France is facing the problem that dare not speak its name. Though French law prohibits the census from any reference to ethnic background or religion, many demographers estimate that as much as 20-30 per cent of the population under 25 is now Muslim. The streets, the traditional haunt of younger people, now belong to Muslim youths. In France, the phrase "les jeunes" is a politically correct way of referring to young Muslims.
Given current birth rates, it is not impossible that in 25 years France will have a Muslim majority. The consequences are dynamic: is it possible that secular France might become an Islamic state?
The situation is not dissimilar elsewhere in the EU. Europeans may at some young point in the 21st century have to decide whether they wish to retain the diluted but traditional Judaeo-Christian culture of their minority or have it replaced by the Islamic culture of the majority."

"Anti-Semitism: The French Crisis" (Michel Gurfinkiel, New York Sun/FrontPageMagazine, 2004/01/26)
"The new anti-Semitism in France has much to do with the unprecedented immigration from the Islamic world, both legal and illegal, that is currently reshaping the country. Conservative estimates — in the absence of reliable race or religion-related statistics, which are not allowed under French law - put the current Muslim population of France at 6 million. Some sources point to 8 million.
The non-Muslim population is aging and declining. Its fertility rate is said to be close to 1.4 children for every woman, just like in most neighboring European countries (e.g., Germany: 1.3; Italy and Spain: 1.2).
The Muslim population, however, is young and rising: its average fertility rate is said to be of three or four children for every woman. When it comes to the youngest age bracket - residents under the age of 25 - the overall ratio of Muslims rises significantly (25% to 30%). Moreover, there is evidence that intermarriage is common between non-Muslims and Muslims, that most interfaith families tend to associate with Islam rather than with Christianity, and that conversion to Islam in rising all over France, whereas the Christian faith and practice is plummeting. Islam may thus develop soon into a full-fledged French religion and culture, and even replace Christianity, at some point in the future, as the main religion of the land."

"Hizbullah and Israel seal controversial prisoner swap" (Nicholas Blanford, The Christian Science Monitor, 2004/01/26)
"The conclusion of a German-brokered deal to swap four Israelis kidnapped by the Hizbullah organization for hundreds of Arab detainees held in Israel will be perceived as an important victory for the Lebanese resistance group, analysts say.
Although reviled by Israel as an implacable terrorist enemy, Hizbullah has scored a propaganda coup in forcing the Israeli government to release hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, a feat even the Palestinian Authority, Israel's erstwhile negotiating partner, was unable to achieve. ...
After three years of painstaking on-off talks between the two bitter enemies, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, the secretary-general of Hizbullah, confirmed sunday that a two-phase deal had been reached in which an Israeli businessman and three soldiers will be exchanged for Lebanese, Palestinian and other Arab detainees held in Israeli jails."

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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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