Archived news and commentary: March 15 - 21, 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, March 21, 2004

News and commentary:

"The Florentine Boar"
(Derby Arboretum)
"This sculpture is the most significant of all the Arboretum's sculptures, frequently described in the local press as "One of Derby's best loved works of art" and is fondly remembered by thousands of Derbeians who are eagerly awaiting its promised return."

"The Boar War; Muslims angry at plan to bring back historic statue of wild pig" (Mail on Sunday/CNN Money, 2004/03/21)
"For more than 100 years it stood proudly as the centrepiece of England's oldest public park before being decapitated during a Second World War air raid.
Now a row has broken out after plans to replace Derby's historic Florentine Boar statue were abandoned for fear of offending Muslims, whose religion considers pigs to be 'unclean'.
A replica of the statue, a crouching wild boar, was intended as the jewel in the crown of a Pounds 5 million National Lottery- funded restoration of the city's Arboretum Park.
But councillors have called for the proposal to be scrapped amid sinister warnings that the statue would be vandalised or stolen.
The Florentine Boar statue stood from 1840 until 1942 when it was beheaded by a German bomb. But it was last week branded 'offensive' during a meeting of Derby Council's minority ethnic communities advisory committee.
Councillor Suman Gupta, a Labour representative for Derby's Derwent ward, told the meeting: 'If the statue is put back in the Arboretum, I have been told it will not be there the next day, or at least it won't be in the same condition.
'We should not have the boar because it is offensive to some of the groups in the area.' The park is in an area known for its large Pakistani community." (Hat tip: The Corner.)

"Turtle Bay’s Carnival of Corruption" (Claudia Rosett, National Review, 2004/03/21)
More on the Oil-for-Food scandal: "Ultimately, the big questions here are not just who profited from graft under Oil-for-Food, but the extent to which the U.N. setup of secrecy, warped incentives, and lack of accountability allowed it to supervise the transformation of Oil-for-Food into a program of theft-from-Iraqis, cash-for-Saddam, and grease-for-the-U.N. Were this a corporation, the CEO, Enron-style, would already be out the front door, and a major restructuring underway. The least that needs to come out of an independent investigation, or congressional hearings for that matter, is a clear understanding of the ways in which the U.N. Secretariat must be not simply reprimanded, but deeply reformed, starting with the introduction of complete transparency in U.N. use of public money — and proceeding to any further incentives that might be devised to ensure it will better honor the public trust." (See also: "Kojo & Kofi" (Claudia Rosett, National Review, 2004/03/10))

"Apropos Tännsjö" (Henrik Berggren, Dagens Nyheter, 2004/03/21)
A Swedish philosopher argues that terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians might be justified: "The Israelis should be collectively punished". This is a partly translation of an article in the print edition of today's Dagens Nyheter (not available on the web). Note that Torbjörn Tännsjö is a member of the medical ethics committee of the National Board of Health and Welfare:
"The philosopher Torbjörn Tännsjö has made himself heard again. Not in order to justify euthanasia, cannibalism or the nationalization of human organs. This time our own utilitarian enfant terrible has surpassed himself by arguing that terrorist attacks against civilians can be legitimate, especially if it is directed against Israelis.
The path to this repugnant conclusion is as follows, according to the moral arithmetic Tännsjö presents in the magazine Arbetaren [The Worker]:
1) There is such a thing as individual guilt. 2) Hence it follows that many people together can have a collective guilt (for example Israelis) 3) Since the punishment of individual guilt can affect innocents (for example children to long-term prisoners), we must also accept that innocents might be struck (for example Israelis that oppose the regime) when we impose collective punishments.
One might wonder why Tännsjö has chosen Israelis of all people as the example in this seminar. The Holocaust was made possible precisely because too many Europeans attributed the Jews with a collective guilt for everything under the sun. But let us not get paranoid. Tännsjö has probably as usual chosen the most provocative example to cover the weakness in his points of departure. ...
But even moral philosophers have an individual responsibility. Torbjörn Tännsjö has supplied a defense for bombs that are deliberately aimed at civilians. He has thereby crossed the border between intellectual provocation and apology for brutal terror." (Note: Torbjörn Tännsjö's article in the syndicalistic magazine Arbetaren ("The Israelis should be collectively punished") is not available online, but see also: "'Uppviglare' Tännsjö olämplig i etiska råd" (Dagen, 2004/03/19), which has a couple of examples from it [translated]: "'The Israelis carry a collective guilt and therefore the justification of what usually is called terrorism is logically consistent.' ...
"The moral assumptions that a people can carry a collective guilt is completely appropriate," writes Tännsjö, who is of the opinion that threats, terrorism and warfare in different forms are justified as long as the people who are subjected to the punishment live in a democracy. 'It's not allowed to act in the same way against dictatorships.'"
UPDATE 2004/03/23: Torbjörn Tännsjö answers Henrik Berggren in today's Dagens Nyheter: "This is what I write [in Arbetaren]: "It is not very likely that terror against civilians leads to the sort of reconsideration of motives that we have assumed here. On the contrary, in most — yes, maybe in all — cases, such actions probably work against their aims. It can also be impossible, when one executes such deeds, to limit the injuries among those who are without guilt, so the demand on proportionality really is met."
Note that Tännsjö is not against terrorism against civilians in principle. But I've changed the first paragraph in light of this "clarification". Tännsjö also recommends that people read his original article, which of course is a good idea, but I'd rather flush my money down the toilet than spend it on Arbetaren. And I really don't want to spend any more time on this kind of repugnant sophistry.)

"The store window of the Israel Government Tourist Office..."
(Stefan Söderström, Pressens Bild, 2004/03/21)
"The store window of the Israel Government Tourist Office was vandalized."

"Swedish police break up anti-Israel riot" (The Jerusalem Post, 2004/03/21)
"Several hundred anti-Israel rioters ran amok in Stockholm Sunday night, as they tried to disrupt a pro-Israel rally.
Most of them wearing Arab headdresses, or Kaffiyas, wrapped around their faces, rioters made their way towards the pro-Israel rally.
Swedish Police were expecting the rioters however, and had deployed accordingly. Mounted police and attack dogs were also on hand to deal with potential trouble.
As the anti-Israel rioters moved towards the pro-Israel camp, police moved in and the two groups clashed, with rioters throwing stones at police, Israel Radio reported.
Rioters vandalized stores and broke windows in the area, including the facade of the local Israeli tourism bureau.
Police managed to break up the riot, and arrested dozens, according to the Radio.
The pro-Israel rally went ahead as planned." (See also: "Kravaller i Stockholms city inför Israelgala" (TT/Expressen, 2004/03/21) [translated]: "'They [the rioters] seemed to focus only on hurting the police. They were armed with slingshots and two metre long cudgels and pipes of iron, says Elizabeth Zaar [press spokesman for the Stockholm police]. ... They also crushed glass which was used to hinder traffic.
The demonstrators chanted slogans such as "Sharon fascist, murderer" and "Free Palestine".
The store window of the Israel Government Tourist Office on Sveavägen was shattered. A poster on the inside was overwritten: 'BOYCOTT ISRAEL!'")

"El Justiciero" (Douglas, ¡No Pasarán!, 2004/03/21)
A translation of an interview with André Glucksmann:
"Glucksmann also gave an interview to Le Figaro yesterday. "Sleeping soundly is the slogan of every cowardice," he hissed. Here is more:
[...] In your book, West Against West, you talk of Islamism as if of a machine for "total war" against civilians...
The fantasy of a great planetary revolution, anti-Liberal, anti-Western and anti-capitalist has by turns fed the fanaticism of the nazis, the communists and the Islamists. It is their secret nihilist convergence that explains their common taste for redemptive violence. The obsessive fear common to these movements is not of capitalism but of the "spirit of capitalism" (Max Weber) and human rights which are inseparable.
In other words, as you say in your book Dostoevsky in Manhattan, Islamism is one of the many contemporary variants of nihilism. Can you explain this point?
Some commentators would have you believe that Islamism is not nihilistic because those who are mad for Allah "believe" in an absolute. Indeed: their absolute is terror. Islamism, like communism and nazism, is in fact the crowning achievement of a desire for annihilation: better to want nothingness itself than not to want anything at all. Dostoevsky and Nietzsche called that nihilism and Heidegger would call it "desire of desire." The nihilists want to rule by chaos and tyranny. They show themselves to be all the more bloody for thinking, deep down, that evil, like the devil, that other stale idea from the superstitious era, no longer exists. "May the sun burn out!" : that was how Leon Trotsky invoked the "eternal darkness." In Baghdad, Istanbul, Atocha or Jerusalem, the terrorist sacrifices to the same logic. Islamism is the local dialect of a globalized, destructive state of mind. The nihilist, be he Islamist, Bolshevik, fascist, racist or chauvinist, breaks every taboo and shrinks before nothing, like the child soldier of Monrovia who, when asked whether he might slaughter his own parent, answers, 'Why not?'" (See also: "The World of Megaterrorism" (Andre Glucksman, The Wall Street Journal, 2004/03/21))

"Clarke's Take On Terror" (CBS News, 2004/02/21)
"In the aftermath of Sept. 11, President Bush ordered his then top anti-terrorism adviser to look for a link between Iraq and the attacks, despite being told there didn't seem to be one.
The charge comes from the adviser, Richard Clarke, in an exclusive interview on 60 Minutes.
The administration maintains that it cannot find any evidence that the conversation about an Iraq-9/11 tie-in ever took place.
Clarke also tells CBS News Correspondent Lesley Stahl that White House officials were tepid in their response when he urged them months before Sept. 11 to meet to discuss what he saw as a severe threat from al Qaeda.
"Frankly," he said, "I find it outrageous that the president is running for re-election on the grounds that he's done such great things about terrorism. He ignored it. He ignored terrorism for months, when maybe we could have done something to stop 9/11. Maybe. We'll never know."
Clarke went on to say, "I think he's done a terrible job on the war against terrorism." ...
Clarke says that as early as the day after the attacks, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was pushing for retaliatory strikes on Iraq, even though al Qaeda was based in Afghanistan.
Clarke suggests the idea took him so aback, he initally thought Rumsfeld was joking."

"Afghan Minister, 50 to 100 Others Killed" (Stephen Graham, AP/The Guardian, 2004/03/21)
"Soldiers killed Afghanistan's aviation minister in the western city of Herat on Sunday, and hours of heavy factional fighting that followed killed between 50 and 100 people, a top commander said.
In Kabul, President Hamid Karzai's Cabinet convened an emergency session following Mirwais Sadiq's killing, and ordered extra troops sent from the capital to try to calm the city. Sadiq is the third leading figure of Karzai's government, and the second aviation minister, to be assassinated.
Sadiq - son of Herat's powerful governor, Ismail Khan — was shot in his car in Afghanistan's main western city on Sunday afternoon, presidential spokesman Khaleeq Ahmed said.
A top local military commander, Zaher Naib Zada, told The Associated Press his forces had killed Sadiq in a confrontation at Zada's Herat home.
Heavy gunbattles broke out between forces loyal to Khan and Zada's soldiers after the killing. Zada said between 50 to 100 total had died on both sides in the first hours of fighting."

"al-Qaida No. 2: We Have Briefcase Nukes" (AP/Yahoo! News, 2004/03/21)
"Osama bin Laden's terror network claims to have bought ready-made nuclear weapons on the black market in central Asia, the biographer of al-Qaida's No. 2 leader was quoted as telling an Australian television station. ...
In the interview with Australian Broadcasting Corp. television, parts of which were released Sunday, Mir recalled telling al-Zawahri it was difficult to believe that al-Qaida had nuclear weapons when the terror network didn't have the equipment to maintain or use them.
"Dr Ayman al-Zawahri laughed and he said 'Mr. Mir, if you have $30 million, go to the black market in central Asia, contact any disgruntled Soviet scientist, and a lot of ... smart briefcase bombs are available,'" Mir said in the interview.
"They have contacted us, we sent our people to Moscow, to Tashkent, to other central Asian states and they negotiated, and we purchased some suitcase bombs," Mir quoted al-Zawahri as saying."

"Holy War in Europe" (Reuel Marc Gerecht, The Weekly Standard, from the 2004/02/29 issue)
"Europe's jihadists are born from their imperfect assimilation into Western European societies, from the particular alienation that young Muslim males experience in Europe's post-Christian, devoutly secular societies. ...
The jihadists of Europe have drunk deeply from the virulently anti-American left-wing currents of Continental thought and mixed it with the Islamic emotions of 1,400 years of competition with the Christian West. It's a Molotov cocktail of the third-world socialist Frantz Fanon and the Muslim Brother Sayyid Qutb. Muslims elsewhere have gone through similar conversions — the United States, too, has had its Muslim jihadists and will, no doubt, produce more. And the globalization of this virulent strain of fundamentalist, usually Saudi-financed, Islam is real and probably getting worse. But the modern European experience seems much more likely to produce violent young Muslims than the American. Europe may be competitive with the worst breeding grounds in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan.
For Americans, after 9/11, this is obviously not just of academic interest. For the future of al Qaeda — if al Qaeda is to have a future where killing Americans en masse remains its transcendent raison d'être — is in Western Europe."

"The World of Megaterrorism" (Andre Glucksman, The Wall Street Journal, 2004/03/21)
"Right at the moment, fearing to confront the true culprit, a virtual culprit was caught in Spain. Mr. Aznar replaced Osama bin Laden. A magic trick — an exercise in exorcism. With no grip on the true mastermind, some voters find imaginary guilt and decide to symbolically kill through the ballots their own head of government. Illusionists arise to face the blackmailers, a consoling witchcraft dreams of itself as a worldwide antiterrorist operation. In front of the candles lighted for the victims, banners cursed the demons: In small case the Basque terrorists "ETA," then "bin Laden," in bigger letters "Bush," while the huge letters spelled "Aznar." The world is upside down. ...
But some of the protesters were still waving around the lie of a "state lie;" and numerous voters, perfectly well informed, changed their minds and chose to bow down without regrets to the blackmail of their fellow citizens' assassins. A minute of silence, followed by a night of rejoicing for the electoral winners. What a short memory. Al Qaeda — oh sorry! "the Arab resistance," to use the words of the spokesman of Batasouna/ETA — has waged its elections campaign with corpses, and the ballot box has granted its diktat. Whether we like it or not: 'Welcome to the world of megaterrorism!'"

"Guantánamo Detainees Deliver Intelligence Gains" (Neil A. Lewis, The New York Times, 2004/03/21)
A report from Guantánamo: "Military officials say prisoners at the detention center here have provided a stream of intelligence to interrogators during the past two years, including detailed information about Al Qaeda's recruitment of Muslim men in Europe.
Military and intelligence officials also said those detainees who were cooperative had provided information about Al Qaeda's chemical and biological weapons efforts, had spoken about the training of suicide bombers, and had described Al Qaeda's use of charities to raise money for its aims."

"Trapped al-Qa'eda leader is Uzbek mullah" (Massoud Ansari and Philip Sherwell, The Sunday Telegraph, 2004/03/21)
"A radical Uzbek mullah who is one of Osama bin Laden's most important lieutenants is believed to be the senior al-Qa'eda figure leading the resistance to a ferocious five-day Pakistani offensive in Waziristan, the Telegraph has learned.
As heavy artillery and Cobra helicopter gunships were deployed yesterday against an international brigade of Islamic fanatics, officials in Pakistan and Afghanistan identified Tahir Yuldash, the leader of several hundred Central Asian Islamic fundamentalist fighters, as the key figure being protected by up to 400 al-Qa'eda militants.
Yuldash, a founder of the hardline Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, teamed up with bin Laden in Afghanistan but has been based in Pakistani tribal areas since the fall of the Taliban regime in late 2001. His cordon of bodyguards is fighting the Pakistani onslaught with mortars and rocket-propelled grenades."

Saturday, March 20, 2004

News and commentary:

"I LOVE NY EVEN MORE WITHOUT THE WORLD TRADE CENTER"
(zombie, 2004/03/20)
From a very revealing collection of Photos from the rally in S.F. on March 20, 2004: "This guy's evil AND he can't think far enough ahead to fit his message of love on a sign. Quite a combination." (Hat tip: Little Green Footballs.)

"Thousands Worldwide Demand Troops Pull Out of Iraq" (Grant McCool , Reuters, 2004/03/20)
If the protesters actually bothered to check with the Iraqi people, they would find that with the "exception of former Ba'athist officials, it is practically impossible to find anyone who supports Paris' position" (see below), that a majority of Iraqis thinks that things are "better now than they were before the war" and that only 15% want the troops to pull out of Iraq (see the first major post-war survey):
"Thousands of antiwar protesters poured into streets around the globe on Saturday's anniversary of the Iraq war to demand the withdrawal of U.S.-led troops.
From Sydney to Tokyo, Madrid, London, New York and San Francisco, protesters condemned U.S. policy in Iraq and said they did not believe Iraqis are better off or the world safer because of the war.
Journalists estimated that at least a million people streamed through Rome, in probably the biggest single protest.
In London, two anti-war protesters evaded security to climb the landmark Big Ben clock tower at the Houses of Parliament, unfurling a banner reading "Time for Truth." ...
Some 3,000 people turned out in Sydney, chanting "end the occupation, troops out" and carrying an effigy of Australian Prime Minister John Howard, a staunch war supporter.
About 10,000 protesters marched in Athens, Greece, and an estimated 120,000 took part in protests across Japan."

"France's policy is still sharply criticized by Iraqis" (Rémy Ourdan, Le Monde/Watch, 2004/03/18 [2004/03/20])
"With the exception of former Ba'athist officials, it is practically impossible to find anyone who supports Paris' position in the crisis." A Le Monde report from Baghdad translated by Douglas who only could find it via Erik Svane, "because, get this: even though it appeared in today's print edition, they've already taken the link to the story off their Web site and I can't find a direct link through the usual means. It directly contradicts the paper's official views both on Iraq and Madrid, and those of France both officially and unofficially. No wonder it's now out of sight.":
"France's policy is still sharply criticized by Iraqis. Contrary to what Europeans often think, having opposed the American occupation certainly does not help the popularity of Europe, or of any country, in Iraq. ...
In this country, where traditionally people smiled and said "France good. USA bad!", they are also sharply critical of France's political line over the year that has gone by... "While the American leadership is compounding error upon error in Iraq, the Europeans and the French in particular, are even stupider because they determine their stance only in reaction to Washington. They do not take Iraq and its inhabitants into account at all," says Fakhri Kareem, editor-in-chief of the newspaper al-Mada, trying to sum up popular sentiment. "Iraqis think France doubly betrayed them, first with Saddam, then with the American occupation. France cares only about its anti-American position. It is forgetting the Iraqis. Chirac and de Villepin must understand that no Iraqi finds their position courageous... What did France do to help Iraq free itself from the dictator and then to help Iraq regain its sovereignty? Nothing!" ...
"It's the same miscommunication between Europe and Iraq after the Madrid attacks. Pacifist and anti-American Europe is celebrating the Spanish withdrawal from Iraq as if this were a great victory!" says a Baghdadi reporter ironically. 'We Iraqis think that France's and Germany's refusal to help us and the announced departure of Spain are a catastrophe. So that we can regain our senses after the terrible decades of Saddam, so that we can escape the face-off with the Americans, we need other countries today more than ever. The UN, Europe and France didn't have much credibility in Iraq to start with but they lost everything since last year by allowing Bush, whom we hate anyhow, be the only one to topple Saddam and then by failing to come to our rescue once the war was over.'"

"Bush close to imposing economic sanctions on Syria" (AP/The Jerusalem Post, 2004/03/20)
"President George W. Bush is expected to soon slap tough economic sanctions on Syria, going beyond the minimum requirements of a bill approved by Congress last year, according to congressional sources.
Congressional sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they have been told the administration plans to choose three sanctions. One would bar Syrian planes from flying over or landing in the United States. Another would prohibit new investments by US oil companies in Syria. ...
One source said the third penalty would be a ban on US exports to Syria, other than food and medicine.
The sanctions come as the administration is stepping up criticism of Syria, which it says has aggravated tensions in the Middle East by supporting militant groups."

"EuroWorried" (Gustavo de Arístegui, The Washington Post Outlook, 2004/03/21)
Gustavo de Arístegui is a Spanish legislator and parliamentary spokesman for the Popular Party of outgoing Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar:
"We now know that the attacks most likely came from Islamist terrorists, possibly with links to al Qaeda; other possible links are still being investigated. As a result, many have oversimplistically concluded that the reason is clear-cut: Spain's support for the U.S.-led war in Iraq.
I would warn against such easy syllogisms. They can lead us down a dangerous road. They can lead us to believe that any given terrorist act should be considered differently depending upon who committed it. They could even lead us, against our better instincts, to accept somehow that a terrorist group might be entitled to react violently to a nation's policy or position. Already, I sense a worrying confusion between the excuses that terrorism offers to justify itself and what people believe to be the causes of terrorism. Even as terrorist violence tore through Baghdad, Fallujah and other Iraqi cities last week, it became clear that some in Europe believe that if you feed the beast and satisfy its apparent demands, you will calm it. But the beast feeds on surrender and appeasement; it only feels sated if it obtains totalitarian power. ...
The terrorist threat will not be defused by appeasing the beast or meeting its demands. The only way to effectively fight this plague is by continuing to build a solid coalition of democratic countries around the world that will fight terrorism while respecting human rights under the rule of law. We Europeans must take terrorism out of the political debate — yesterday. And we must forget the sterile confrontation with the United States that has hampered effective action for so long. The United States is not our enemy. Terrorism is."

"Militia Sorry for Killing Arab in Jerusalem Attack" (Reuters/Yahoo! News, 2004/03/20)
"A leader of a Palestinian militant group behind the drive-by killing of an Israeli jogger apologized on Saturday after the dead man was identified as an Israeli-Arab university student.
"The fighters thought he was a settler jogging in an area full of settlers. It was a mistake and we extend our apology to his family," a leader of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, an armed group in President Yasser Arafat's Fatah faction, told Reuters.
Palestinian gunmen opened fire and killed the man on Friday night as he jogged in Jerusalem's French Hill district, near the city's Hebrew University. The al-Aqsa Brigades claimed the shooting in a statement released shortly afterwards.
On Saturday, the victim was identified as George Khoury, the son of prominent Israeli-Arab lawyer Elias Khoury. The 20-year-old was an economics student at Hebrew University."

"Hussein's Fall Leads Syrians to Test Government Limits" (Neil MacFarquhar, The New York Times, 2004/03/20)
"A year ago, it would have been inconceivable for a citizen of Syria, run by the Baath Party of President Bashar al-Assad, to make a documentary film with the working title, "Fifteen Reasons Why I Hate the Baath."
Yet watching the overthrow of Saddam Hussein across the border in Iraq prompted Omar Amiralay to do just that. "It gave me the courage to do it," he said.
"When you see one of the two Baath parties broken, collapsing, you can only hope that it will be the turn of the Syrian Baath next," he said. He has just completed another film, "A Flood in Baath Country," for a European arts channel, saying, 'The myth of having to live under despots for eternity collapsed.'" (See also: "Police fire on Kurds in fifth day of Syria riots" (Robin Gedye, The Daily Telegraph, 2004/03/18))

"Madrid Probe Turns to Islamic Cell in Morocco" (Peter Finn and Keith B. Richburg, The Washington Post, 2004/03/20)
"The investigation of last week's bombings in Madrid is focusing on a member of an Islamic cell in Tangier, Morocco, who is believed to have had contact with the lead suspect in the attacks and with at least one senior member of the al Qaeda network, senior Moroccan officials said Friday.
The officials said the militant at the center of the investigation, Abdelaziz Benyaich, a naturalized French citizen from Morocco who is in prison in Spain, met in April 2003 in Tangier with Jamal Zougam, a Moroccan who has been arrested in connection with the train bombings in Madrid on March 11 that killed 202 people and wounded almost 1,500.
The investigators also said Benyaich met on several occasions with Abu Musab Zarqawi, a Jordanian al Qaeda leader who is a prime suspect in several recent bombings directed at U.S. occupation targets in Iraq."

"Taliban warning as stronghold is pounded" (Julian Borger, The Guardian, 2004/03/20)
"The Taliban yesterday threatened to launch reprisals against US and Pakistani forces if they did not call off their pursuit of the Afghan militant movement and its al-Qaida allies in the mountains of Pakistan's South Waziristan region.
The threat came as Pakistani artillery pounded a stronghold thought to be defended by up to 400 al-Qaida and Taliban guerrillas. "They are surrounded and they are trying to break the cordon and get away," military spokesman Major-General Shaukat Sultan told a news briefing in the capital, Islamabad.
He dismissed reports that al-Qaida's deputy leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, had managed to get away. "From the cordon we have put around these places, we are certain nobody would have escaped," he said." (See also: "Musharraf: 'High-value' al Qaeda target may be surrounded in Pakistan" (CNN.com, 2004/03/18))

Added in archive:
"Gaza withdrawal worries residents" (Soroya Sarhaddi Nelson, Knight Ridder/The Miami Herald, 2004/03/14)

Friday, March 19, 2004

News and commentary:

"President Bush Reaffirms Resolve to War on Terror, Iraq and Afghanistan" (George W. Bush, The White House, 2004/03/19)
"There is no neutral ground — no neutral ground — in the fight between civilization and terror, because there is no neutral ground between good and evil, freedom and slavery, and life and death.
The war on terror is not a figure of speech. It is an inescapable calling of our generation. The terrorists are offended not merely by our policies — they are offended by our existence as free nations. No concession will appease their hatred. No accommodation will satisfy their endless demands. Their ultimate ambitions are to control the peoples of the Middle East, and to blackmail the rest of the world with weapons of mass terror. There can be no separate peace with the terrorist enemy. Any sign of weakness or retreat simply validates terrorist violence, and invites more violence for all nations. The only certain way to protect our people is by early, united, and decisive action."

"New Kosovo Violence is Start of Predicted 2004 Wave of Islamist Operations: the Strategic Ramifications" (Gregory R. Copley, Defense and Foreign Affairs Daily, 2004/03/19)
"The major wave of violence instigated in the Kosovo region of Serbia on beginning on about March 14, 2004, and escalating dramatically through March 18, 2004, is the start of the forecast series of unrest, guerilla warfare and terrorist activity planned by radical Islamist leaders in Bosnia, Albania, Iran and in the Islamist areas of Serbia, and directly linked with the various al-Qaida-related mujahedin and terrorist cells in the area.
Attempts have already been made to blame the violence on the very small Serbian population which remains in Kosovo, but this is not credible, and nor has the Serbian Government shown any enthusiasm to get involved in the situation.
Sources confirm that the violence, which began on March 17, 2004, and continued to escalate through March 18, 2004, is not an isolated expression of frustration, but, rather, part of a planned “season” of unrest designed explicitly to pull US and Western strategic focus away from Iraq, and to ensure that US and Western peacekeeping forces — which have been progressively diverted to Iraq operations and away from Kosovo and Bosnia — will need to be held in the Balkans." (Hat tip: Jihad Watch.)

"EU ministers debate terror response" (BBC News, 2004/03/19)
Responding with debates: "European Union ministers have been holding emergency talks to agree a practical response to the bombings in Madrid that killed over 200 people.
They are considering a proposal to create a single anti-terrorism official to coordinate the work of various national agencies and governments.
The ministers will also discuss calls for greater sharing of intelligence.
However observers say several states will resist the idea of creating a Europe-wide intelligence agency.
The proposals of the justice and home affairs minister will be put to a summit meeting of EU leaders next week."

"Hamas website hosted in Sweden" (Martin Lindeskog, EGO, 2004/03/19)
"A website linked to the terrorist organization Hamas has been hosted in Sweden. It has moved to a host in Russia. The security police has had this site on its radar for a long time, but hasn't done anything about it... Instead it was the Internet provider TeliaSonera that shut down the site after receiving complaints from e.g., the Jewish Community in Gothenburg.
Click here for some examples from the website. You will find excerpts from The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, fatwas, and stories by suicide bombers. I wonder who the guy is on the right side of the Hamas leader Abd al-Aziz al-Rantissi.
The web host company has received about $2650 per month from a group of Palestinian students in Lebanon. Ousama Al-Mardini has most of his customers in the Middle East."

"Crowd Storms Restaurant Over Alcohol" (Reuters/Yahoo! News, 2004/03/19)
"Some 100 Bahraini Islamists shouting "God is Greatest" stormed a French restaurant serving alcohol in the pro-Western Gulf Arab state and threatened diners with knives, witnesses said on Thursday.
One diner managed to wrest a knife away from the Islamists and stabbed one with it, causing him severe injuries, a witness said.
They said the assailants, opposed to the consumption of alcohol banned by Islam, also threw gasoline bombs at customers' cars parked outside the restaurant near the capital Manama late on Wednesday, damaging nine vehicles.
"Abound 100 young men, shouting Allahu Akbar (God is greatest), came to the restaurant carrying knives and shouted at the customers: Why do you drink?," Jahanshah Bakhtiar, owner of La Terrasse Restaurant, told Reuters."

"Muslim Veil Could Cut Cancer Risk, Doctor Says" (Reuters/Yahho! News, 2004/03/19)
Saudi Science: "Veiled women are protecting more than their modesty — they are also less prone to nose and throat cancers because their veils screen out viruses, a Canadian doctor was quoted Friday as saying.
Professor Kamal Malaker said women in Saudi Arabia, many of whom wear a full face-covering veil, suffered a low rate of the Epstein Barr Virus which causes nasopharyngeal cancer.
"The hijab (veil) is a protection against upper respiratory tract infection," the Saudi Gazette quoted Malaker as saying. "In the kingdom, nasopharyngeal throat cancer ailment is very low among women as compared to men."
"It is interesting how a very simple social custom can have a profound effect on a human's life," said Malaker, head of radiation oncology at King Abdul Aziz hospital in the conservative Muslim kingdom." (Hat tip: Little Green Footballs.)

"We Are All Kurds" (Denis Boyles, National Review, 2004/03/19)
"According to a piece in Le Nouvel Observateur, George Bush is making the war his major campaign theme. Excellent! Maybe, while we're up, the war against terror could also be directed at America's more loathsome and craven enemies, those who pretend loyalty while working for betrayal. In war, the guys who work tirelessly to get you to surrender may reasonably be called your enemies; the governments of France and Spain and Germany are not "friends with a mere difference of opinion." Looked at coldly, rationally, objectively, they're evil minions of hell because they want us to fail, and they want us to fail because, like the old Soviet Union, they know of no other way to succeed. That is not to say we should avoid looking for the root causes of appeasement. Likely candidates? Cowardice and selfishness. If this is war, then let loose the dogs of biz school! Let's make war on Old Europe, kill their economies, burn their gay Speedos and give all their women modeling contracts."

"Spaniards Capitulating..." (Charles Krauthammer, The Washington Post, 2004/03/19)
"The Socialist Party placed the blame for the attack not on the barbarians who detonated the bombs but on the Spanish government that stood with the United States in its war against the barbarians. The Spanish electorate then voted into office the purveyors of precisely that perverse view. ...
Nonetheless, Spain is just Spain. The really big prize is Europe. Which is why the most ominous development of the week was the post-Madrid pronouncements of Romano Prodi, the president of the European Commission.
"It is clear that force alone cannot win the fight against terrorism." Sounds reasonable until you hear Prodi's amplification of the idea just two days earlier. "We know that international terrorism wants to spread fear," he said. "Fear generates not so much justice but rather vengeance, which chooses war to answer the need of security. . . . We become prisoners of terror and of terrorists." In other words, making war on terror is unjust, fearful, mere vengeance and ultimately a victory for terrorism.
If not war, then what? A centerpiece to Prodi's solution to terrorism: a new European constitution. I'm not making this up: "to defeat fear we only have democracy and politics. . . . Today for us, politics means building Europe completely with its constitution and its institutions."
This is beyond appeasement. This is decadence: Terror rages and we tend our garden."

"Sweet Liberty" (Amir Taheri, New York Post, 2004/03/19)
"Some, especially in the West, are unhappy about the liberation of Iraq — not because they were fond of Saddam but because they dislike the United States and/or George W. Bush.
This has led to the emergence of two Iraqs.
One Iraq is that of the reality on the ground — a newly liberated nation is rebuilding its shattered life more quickly than postwar Germany or Japan.
There is still a great deal of violence and insecurity fomented by foreign terrorist groups allied to the remnants of the fallen tyranny. But all in all, this Iraq looks good — better than this writer expected a year ago.
The other Iraq is an issue of the domestic politics of several Western countries, notably the United States and Britain. This Iraq must look bad, real bad, so as to undermine the re-election chances of both President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair. (It may have contributed to last weekend's electoral defeat of the Spanish People's Party — whose Premier Jose-Maria Aznar was a staunch supporter of liberating Iraq.)
It is a pity, not to say a shame, that, for reasons of domestic Western political rivalries, what has been a spectacular success in liberating a martyred nation from one of the worst tyrannies of recent history is portrayed as a failure.
History will eventually forget Saddam without forgiving him. But Iraqis will never forget those who helped them regain their liberty, dignity and home."

"Voices on Iraq: one year on" (The Guardian, 2004/03/19)
Noam Chomsky & Co. on the first anniversary of the conflict. But also Yasser Alaskar, for example, who is media affairs director at the Iraqi Prospect Organisation:
"I'm feeling quite optimistic. For the first time, Iraq has a constitution that will lead to elections in January 2005, all kinds of human rights are preserved within the constitution, and on the ground you can really see things happening that are bringing democracy forward from a dream into reality. ...
Overall I believe regime change was the correct policy. After the fall of Saddam, everyone was saying how costly the war had been, with estimates as high as 20,000 for the number of people who lost their lives. But if you look at the number of lives saved, the human rights centre that counts the number who died under the Saddam regime estimates that some 70,000 lives have been saved.
But international law continues to neglect people who are repressed by their own regime and I hope the international community will be able to rectify this. I hope too that that Iraq can go on to become a democracy with the help of surrounding countries, and that the world can forgive the massive debt burden Iraq carries from Saddam's time — it's ironic that Iraq is still having to pay for Saddam's oppression." (See also: The Iraqi Prospect Organisation and "The homecoming" (Johann Hari, Independent, 2003/09/18))

"Last Week's Friday Sermon on PA Television" (MEMRI, Special Dispatch Series - No. 683, 2004/03/19)
"The Friday sermon of March 12, 2004 in the Sheikh 'Ijlin Mosque in Gaza was delivered by Sheikh Ibrahim Mudeiris, an employee of the Awqaf (Religious Affairs) ministry of the Palestinian Authority. The following are excerpts from the sermon: ...
'We, the people of Truth, reach out our hand in peace. But they accuse us of being terrorists. Terrorists, because when the Palestinian mother welcomes her martyred son, she wishes to receive him as a corpse. She does not want him to be alive. But she does not want this corpse butchered. The wish of the Palestinian mother is to see the body of her son the martyr.
Are we terrorists? We, terrorists?! We face burning rockets that leave the martyr no flesh, bone, head, or foot. When the news of the death of her son reached the martyr's mother, she said to the youths: 'I want to see my son.' They were patient with her and took him to the cemetery to be buried. She learnt of this, and went there, asking: 'Where is my son?' Her son is a pile of flesh in a container, in a small sack. She watched while they buried him, and she said: 'If only a foot remained, I would kiss it.' Allah Akbar, is she a terrorist?! A terrorist, this woman who wants to find the foot of her son so she can kiss it before he is buried?!'"

"Mass rape atrocity in west Sudan" (BBC News, 2004/03/19)
"More than 100 women have been raped in a single attack carried out by Arab militias in Darfur in western Sudan.
Speaking to the BBC, the United Nations co-ordinator for Sudan, Mukesh Kapila, said the conflict had created the worst humanitarian situation in the world.
He said more than one million people were affected by "ethnic cleansing".
He said the fighting was characterised by a scorched-earth policy and was comparable in character, if not in scale, to the 1994 Rwandan genocide.
"It is more than just a conflict. It is an organised attempt to do away with a group of people," he said.
Arab militias, backed by the government, have driven hundreds of thousands from their homes, in retaliation for a rebellion launched a year ago by two armed groups. ...
Mr Kapila said 75 people were killed in the attack on the village of Tawila at sunrise by Arab militiamen two weeks ago.
"All houses as well as a market and a health centre were completely looted and the market burnt. Over 100 women were raped, six in front of their fathers who were later killed," he said.
A further 150 women and 200 children were abducted."

Thursday, March 18, 2004

News and commentary:

"Musharraf: 'High-value' al Qaeda target may be surrounded in Pakistan" (CNN.com, 2004/03/18)
"Pakistani forces have surrounded what may be a "high-value" al Qaeda target in Pakistan near the border with Afghanistan, President Pervez Musharraf told CNN.
"We feel that there may be a high-value target," Musharraf told CNN. "I can't say who."
Two Pakistani government sources told CNN that intelligence indicates the surrounded figure is Ayman al-Zawahiri, al Qaeda's number two leader.
More than 200 al Qaeda fighters are trying to prevent his capture, the sources said.
Musharraf said the ferociousness of the surrounded fighters indicates that they are protecting someone particularly significant." (See also: "The Man Behind Bin Laden" (Lawrence Wright, The New Yorker, from the 2002/09/16 issue))

"The return of history" (Herb Keinon, The Jerusalem Post, 2004/03/18)
An interview with Francis Fukuyama: "Fukuyama said that of the US's 18 efforts at nation building, starting with the Philippines at the turn of the 20th century, only three were unqualified successes - Japan, Germany and South Korea.
And in each of the successful cases, the US kept troops in those countries for two generations.
"If you look at other cases where American forces got out in five years or less, there is not a single instance — most of which were in Latin America and the Caribbean — where you left behind anything that could be described as a self-sufficient state."
In other words, Fukuyama said, if America is to succeed in Iraq, it is going to have to stay there for 15 to 20 years, or somehow get the international community involved in order to give the US presence there greater legitimacy.
Legitimacy, which he defined neatly as the "perceived justice of a set of arrangements," will be necessary for the project to work. The Bush administration realized the importance of legitimacy, and is trying to create it by putting an Iraqi face on the occupation.
The problem, he believes, is that in the rush to do this, the US is setting up wildly optimistic deadlines for the transfer of sovereignty to the Iraqis when the conditions are not yet fully ripe. This, he believes, is a recipe for failure."

"Spain's Surrender" (Jamie Glazov, FrontPageMagazine, 2004/03/18)
An interview with Victor Davis Hanson: "As for Spain — and I say this with real remorse given their suffering and national catastrophe — not since Theodosius and the late Romans paid their annual bribe money to Attila have we seen such success in bullying and terrifying a Western nation. It is right off the pages of Gibbon in his discussion of how weak, wealthy, and fearful Westerners paid Goths and Huns before Adrianople and Chalons. And this is the beginning not the end of it, as we shall soon see.
All Americans feel terrible about the Spanish mass murder, but how can we express our solidarity when the reaction is to repudiate both us and Spaniards who were allied with us? And contrast the American example: 26 days after 9-11 we were in Afghanistan attacking the Taliban and al Qaeda; the Spaniards in 48 hours were turning out to apologize. A sad day for the West."

"Axis of Appeasement" (Thomas L. Friedman, The New York Times, 2004/03/18)
"Spain is planning to do something crazy: to try to appease radical evil by pulling Spain's troops out of Iraq — even though those troops are now supporting the first democracy-building project ever in the Arab world. ...
My dream is that the U.S., Britain, France, Germany and Spain announce tomorrow that in response to the Madrid bombing, they are sending a new joint force of 5,000 troops to Iraq for the sole purpose of protecting the U.N.'s return to Baghdad to oversee Iraq's first democratic election.
The notion that Spain can separate itself from Al Qaeda's onslaught on Western civilization by pulling its troops from Iraq is a fantasy. Bin Laden has said that Spain was once Muslim and he wants it restored that way. As a friend in Cairo e-mailed me, a Spanish pullout from Iraq would only bring to mind Churchill's remark after Chamberlain returned from signing the Munich pact with Hitler: 'You were given the choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor and you will have war.'"

"Welcome to the Titanic" (Timothy Garton Ash, The Guardian, 2004/03/18)
"This has been a terrible week for what remains of the west. After a few moments of moving solidarity — the great demonstrations in Spain, the three minutes' silence observed right across Europe - we have again tumbled into bitter disarray. That happened within months of America's 9/11, as Europeans and Americans disagreed on how to respond to the assault launched by Osama bin Laden. Now it's happened within days of Europe's 9/11. ...
They say the band carried on playing as the Titanic went down. Well, we're not holed yet; we've just been brushed by a small iceberg. But the look-outs and the crew are all staring at the bridge, where the Spanish first lieutenant is having a stand-up row with his British mate, the Italian cook is badmouthing the American engineer, and the French midshipman is admiring himself in the mirror, while much larger icebergs loom ahead."

"On the loose ... 4 Brits trained to fight our men with an AK-47" (Trevor Kavanagh, The Sun, 2004/03/18)
"Four Guantanamo Bay prisoners freed in Britain toted AK-47 rifles in the ranks of al-Qaeda or the Taliban, America claimed last night.
All four were steeped in the guerilla tactics of Osama Bin Laden — and ready to take on Allied troops. ...
All DENY any involvement with terror groups. But alarming new evidence about their true loyalties came in response to questions put by The Sun to the American administration through its embassy in London.
The detailed letter by spokesman Lee McClenny was approved by the White House.
He wrote: "One of the five trained with an AK-47 and pistol at an al-Qaeda safe house in Kabul in September 2001."
The man, he said, was a "weapons-carrying fighter" at Tora Bora, the infamous stronghold where terror chief Osama Bin Laden hid from coalition forces including the SAS.
Mr McClenny continued: 'This person was wounded in battle with Coalition forces and was subsequently captured in the Tora Bora mountains.
Two of the others trained for 40 days in September-October 2000 at a military camp in Afghanistan, learning to shoot a Kalashnikov, and observing hand grenade, landmine and rocket grenade demonstrations.
These two and a third returned to Afghanistan shortly after September 11 2001 to fight jihad with the Taliban.
They lived in caves for several weeks and were issued Kalashnikovs and ammunition.
They stayed with their unit, commanded by a known Taliban leader, for three weeks and were captured near Konduz.'" (See also: "All detainees returned from Cuba released" (Tania Branigan, The Guardian, 2004/03/11))

"Police fire on Kurds in fifth day of Syria riots" (Robin Gedye, The Daily Telegraph, 2004/03/18)
"Thousands of Kurds fought pitched battles with paramilitary police across northern Syria yesterday as rioting, in which at least 30 people have died, worsened for the fifth day in a row.
Tanks were reported on the streets of Kameshli, on the Turkish border, where security forces responded with force after rioting broke out last Friday.
The trouble began at a football match at which Kurdish fans waved posters of President George W Bush while being taunted by Syrian supporters with pictures of Saddam Hussein.
Syrian troops opened fire during a number of demonstrations by ethnic Kurds yesterday, killing at least seven people in the northern cities of Afrin and Aleppo, according to the Turkish state-run news agency." (See also:"At Least 15 Dead in Syria Soccer Riots" (AP/The Guardian, 2004/03/14) Also: FreeArabForum, for lots of info on the situation in Syria and pictures of the demonstrations.)

Wednesday, March 17, 2004

News and commentary:

"A television image..."
(Reuters, 2004/03/17)
"A television image shows Iraqis climbing through the remains of a Baghdad hotel after a powerful blast March 17, 2004. The blast ripped through a Baghdad hotel and neighboring houses on Wednesday evening, killing several people and sending flames and smoke into the night sky in the center of the city."

"Bomb Destroys Baghdad Hotel, Kills Dozens" (Jim Krane, AP/Yahoo! News, 2004/03/17)
"A huge car bomb destroyed a five-story hotel in central Baghdad on Wednesday night, killing at least 27 people and wounding 41 others, Iraqi police and the U.S. military said.
Army Col. Ralph Baker of the 1st Armored Division said rescuers were still searching for victims in the Jabal Lebanon Hotel. He said foreigners were among the guests.
Local resident Faleh Kalhan said Americans, Britons, Egyptians as well as other foreigners were staying at the hotel. ...
"It has to be a car bomb. No rocket could cause that amount of damage," said Pfc. Heath Balick of the U.S. Army's 1st Armored Division, which is responsible for security in Baghdad.
But several residents said they believed a rocket caused the destruction.
"We saw the tail of a rocket, then we saw a big flash and heard a big boom," said bystander Hashim al-Musawi."

"Purported Al Qaeda Letter Calls Truce in Spain" (Reuters, AP/Yahoo! News, 2004/03/17)
"A group claiming to have links with al Qaeda said Wednesday it was calling a truce in its Spanish operations to see if the new government would withdraw its troops from Iraq, a pan-Arab newspaper said.
In a statement sent Wednesday to the Arabic language daily al-Hayat, the Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigades, which claimed responsibility for the Madrid bombings that killed 201 people, also urged its European units to stop all operations.
"Because of this decision, the leadership has decided to stop all operations within the Spanish territories... until we know the intentions of the new government that has promised to withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq," the statement said.
'And we repeat this to all the brigades present in European lands: Stop all operations.'"

"Are they any safer?" (Douglas, ¡No Pasarán!, 2004/03/17)
"TF1 news reports that "a letter signed 'Mosvar Barayev commando,' addressed to the prime minister, threatens France with attacks if the law on secularism which specifically forbids wearing the Islamic veil in public schools is not withdrawn. Here are the main elements:

... 'On 10 February 2004, a new height was reached in the war being waged against Islam by the Coalition with the passage of a law barring the hijab from grammar and high schools and public places by the Assembée nationale. (...) We had excluded you from a certain category among your infidel brethren because of your opposition to the unjust aggression of the Crusaders in Iraq but you yourselves have taken the decision to put your names on the list of the most dogged enemies of Islam. (...)
We take France for an avowed enemy of Islam along with the rest of the Coalition and the Maghreban and Arab governments that collaborate with you and we intend to retaliate. With this hateful, discriminatory and anti-Muslim law, you have shown the whole world and all Muslims that you were well and truly on the side of the devil and we shall treat you as such until the Final Day unless you reverse your decision and comply with the will of Allah who is also your God.'"

"Attack threats over headscarf ban" (Pierre-Antoine Souchard, The Australian, 2004/03/17)
"France had received threats of a possible attack by a radical Islamic group that warns the Government's law banning headscarves from public schools makes it an "enemy of Islam", judicial sources said.
The shadowy group identified itself as the "Servants of Allah the Powerful and Wise" in a letter addressed to Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin and sent to several newspapers, the Justice Ministry said in a statement.
The group was not known to French authorities.
"A heavy offensive will take place on the grounds of the allies of Satan and we are going to plunge France into terror and remorse," the letter stated, according to Le Parisien newspaper, which received a copy."

"Saudi sets sights on 60th bride" (BBC News, 2004/03/17)
"A Saudi businessman aged 64 has just made a young girl his 58th bride and says he intends to have two more weddings to bring his total to 60.
Saleh al-Saiari, who has fathered 36 children, took a 13-year-old to be his latest bride a month ago and told a newspaper he was in "very good health". ...
The businessman, who was once a shepherd, said he would "resort to the usual draw" to choose which of his current four wives to drop.
It was not immediately clear what happened to those of Mr Saiari's wives he divorced."

"The BBC's moral nihilism" (Melanie Phillips, melaniephillips.com, 2004/03/17)
Phillips on a discussion on BBC Today: "The question for discussion was the hoary old chestnut 'what is the difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter' in the context of al Q'aeda. To discuss this riveting question, the programme had on what it coyly described as 'prominent figures from the past', which turned out to be none other than Leila Khaled, erstwhile Palestinian plane hijacker, and Danny Morrison, erstwhile Northern Ireland Republican terror detainee. ...
I kid you not. This is the BBC's idea of balance — two apologists for terror, in earnest discussion. And this is the organisation the public nevertheless still appears to trust and venerates as an icon. Is it any wonder the country is in the grip of so much appeasement, irrationality and ignorance? The fact is that the BBC has become an Augean stables of moral nihilism, responsible in large measure not merely for dumbing down the culture but leading it like lemmings towards a precipice from which it is in increasing danger of committing cultural suicide." (Note: RealAudio link of the program.)

"Another head in the appeasenik sand" (Melanie Phillips, melaniephillips.com, 2004/03/17)
Phillips on an Op-Ed by Jonathan Freedland: "But the key point is this. Since the Islamist world inverts cause and effect so that it presents its own unprovoked attacks on the west as defence, while the west's real self-defence is misrepresented as aggression, it follows that whatever the west does to defend itself will become a rallying cry for more to sign up to the jihad. The logic of Freedland's argument, therefore, is that if the west is attacked, it should do nothing to defend itself for fear of swelling the enemy's numbers. Probably appeasement is not the right word for this. The right word is surrender." (See also: "Spain got the point" (Jonathan Freedland, The Guardian, 2004/03/17))

"The family that stones together" (Barbara Sofer, The Jerusalem Post, 2004/03/17)
"The Lebanese Daily Star newspaper, in a report by Mohammed Zaatari, described 90 Iranian tourists who had arrived for a family trip to Syria. Among them were lawyers and university professors, their spouses and children.
The rule for success in family tourism is to get the kids involved. That usually means limiting lectures and maximizing activities: crawling inside an ancient tunnel instead of hearing about its construction features. And so it was on this family tour to Syria.
In an act of ultimate togetherness, the Iranian parents and children gathered to "pelt Israeli positions with stones at the Fatima Gate border during a visit to the Southern region." What fun!
Family trips engender strong memories, cherished stories told and retold at family gatherings. I cringe to imagine Iranian families sitting on a couch with their albums, reminiscing about the day they all stood together and stoned the Jews." (See also: "Iranian tourists stone Israeli positions" (Mohammed Zaatari, The Daily Star, 2004/03/06))

"We old-fashioned types believe in getting some value for what we pay..." (Stanley, Professor Bunyip, 2004/03/17)
Professor Bunyip on an interview with the self-proclaimed "Peace Professor" Johan Galtung:
"Here is some of what Australian academia's favourite Norwegian had to say:
Galtung: There is a saying in the Koran, 8:61, that when your antoagonist, your enemy, shows an inclination toward peace you should do the same. OK, there has been absolutely no inclination (to make peace)... I listen to the speeches by Mr Downer by Mr Howard, there isn't one word of any kind of compassion for the victims of that side, or any understanding of what they [Muslims] call 'trampling on Islam'. Well, go on like that, go on with that kind of talk — war on terrorism and all of that, and if you want too reprisals, you'll get it...
First, let us hear his thoughts on Bali, which Australia's dead apparently brought upon themselves.
Galtung: I don't know how you can talk about the Sari night club and the 12th of July (sic)...and not mention a word about Australian pedophiles operating in Bali, and what that might have meant for the people in that blessed island...
Having assured us that buggery breeds bombs, he returned to the theme that it is the worst kind of cultural intolerance to kill terrorists before they kill you. This meant that it was time to take another swipe at the bigots Howard and Downer..
Galtung: [their speeches are] so one-sided, so autistic, so self-righteous that it can only remind of me of one thing and that is Osama bin Laden's outpourings...
Costello, who must have heard some ripe absurdities during his days as an ALP operative, was taken aback, saying that, while he has known many people who dislike John Howard, he has never heard anybody draw a direct comparison with bin Laden.
Unruffled, Galtung immediately let Costello know that he was hearing just such an opinion.
Galtung: Osama bin Laden is more intellectual [than Howard]. He has more knowledge in his speech, if I may say so...I haven't heard one intellectual point from Mr Howard or Mr Downer.
There you have it, readers — Osama is a better, smarter fellow than a democratically elected Prime Minister, Bali's victims should have known they had it coming, and the Australians whose taxes pay his salary are pig ignorant. Isn't it nice to know we are getting get such good value for our money." (See also: "Peaceful alternatives to military action in Iraq and Afghanistan" (The University of Melbourne, 2004/03/03))

"Who knows better: the Iraqi people or Spain's new PM?" (Janet Daley, The Daily Telegraph, 2004/03/17)
Daley on the latest Iraqi survey: "Rather a different picture from the one that we get relayed to us here, isn't it? What we see of Iraq through the perspective of the anti-war media is a mess: a country that is scarcely a country at all, more a seething mass of chaotic hatred of America and its allies, in which the loathing of the entire populace constantly erupts into violence against the occupying troops (when, in fact, a majority want them to remain to help re-establish security) and repercusses through the wider world in the form of increased terrorism.
The not very subtle sub-text of much reporting on Iraq (see particularly most of the front pages of the Independent over recent months, and the idiosyncratic accounts of its star reporter, Robert Fisk) is that we have made things a lot worse for the Iraqis and a whole lot more dangerous for ourselves. ...
What is the lesson for those who truly believe in freedom for Iraqis and an end to the Islamic terrorist threat? That they must prosecute their case with far less ambivalence and apology. The anti-war lobby has not only misrepresented the state of Iraqi public opinion, but has also criminally manipulated British perceptions. It has managed to render a short, hugely successful and remarkably unbloody war that removed a genocidal tyrant into a matter for national shame." (See also: "Survey finds hope in occupied Iraq" (BBC News, 2004/03/16))

"The world's view of US" (Howard LaFranchi, Christian Science Monitor, 2004/03/17)
"A new survey of global attitudes finds the world more in tune with José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, the new leader of Spain, than with George W. Bush: Across Europe and in key Muslim countries allied with the US, publics continue to hold negative views of the US, its handling of its leadership position in the world, and the war in Iraq. ...
"The divide between the US and Europe is only getting wider," says Carroll Doherty, editor of the Pew Research Center. "It's beyond a question of America's image, it's now to the point where people want action based on their opposition to the US." ...
At a time when the US continues to wrangle with how to reach Muslim audiences and improve its image with them, the survey offers a sobering picture. Support for Osama bin Laden remains strong in countries ranging from Jordan to Pakistan - where the Al Qaeda leader is viewed favorably by 65 percent of the population.
Doherty says a "glimmer of hope" can be seen in the fact that the percentage of people "very unfavorable" to the US has fallen in all the Muslim countries surveyed since last year. In Turkey for example, it fell from 68 percent to 45 percent." (See also the survey: "A Year After Iraq War - Mistrust of America in Europe Ever Higher, Muslim Anger Persists" (Pew Research Center, 2004/03/16))

Added in archive:
"A Thousand and One Fronts" (Ulrich Fichtner, Der Spiegel, 2004/03/01)

Tuesday, March 16, 2004

News and commentary:

"Moral Nihilism" (Andrew Sullivan, The New Republic, 2004/03/16)
Sullivan fiskes the Guardian's editorial on the Madrid bombings ("We need to get beyond the them and us, the good guys and the bad guys..."):
"In Europe, there are no bad guys, even those who deliberately murdered almost 200 innocents and threaten to murder countless more. Ask yourself: If the Guardian cannot call these people "bad guys," then who qualifies? And if the leaders of democratic societies cannot qualify in this context as "good guys," then who qualifies? What we have here is complete moral nihilism in the face of unspeakable violence. Then we have the absurd canard that there is a "divide between Muslim and Christian communities." There is no such divide. There is a divide within Islam between a large majority and a small minority of theocratic, extremist mass-murderers, men and women who have killed Muslim, Christian, and Jew alike, young and old, and almost always innocent bystanders in free societies. That small minority has terrorized large populations, enslaved women, killed Jews and homosexuals, launched a war against Western civilians, taken over whole countries, and targeted individual writers and thinkers for murder. With them we need a dialogue? With them we need an unremitting, unrelenting, unapologetic war." (See also: "Homage to the dead" (The Guardian, 2004/03/13) and "The world at war" (The Sunday Telegraph, 2004/03/14))

"The Spanish dishonoured their dead" (Mark Steyn, The Daily Telegraph, 2004/03/16)
"At the end of last week, American friends kept saying to me: "3/11 is Europe's 9/11. They get it now." I expressed scepticism. And I very much doubt whether March 11 will be a day that will live in infamy. Rather, March 14 seems likely to be the date bequeathed to posterity, in the way we remember those grim markers on the road to conflagration through the 1930s, the tactical surrenders that made disaster inevitable. All those umbrellas in the rain at Friday's marches proved to be pretty pictures for the cameras, nothing more. The rain in Spain falls mainly on the slain. In the three days between the slaughter and the vote, it was widely reported that the atrocity had been designed to influence the election. In allowing it to do so, the Spanish knowingly made Sunday a victory for appeasement and dishonoured their own dead. ...
The only fighting that there is going to be in Europe in the foreseeable future is civil war, and when that happens American infantrymen will want to be somewhere safer. Like Iraq. There are strong horses and weak horses, but right now western Europe is looking like a dead horse."

"Time to Save an Alliance" (Robert Kagan, The Washington Post, 2004/03/16)
"The terrorist attack in Madrid and its seismic impact on the Spanish elections this past week have brought the United States and Europe to the edge of the abyss. There's no denying that al Qaeda has struck a strategic and not merely a tactical blow. To murder and terrorize people is one thing, but to unseat a pro-U.S. government in a nation that was a linchpin of America's alliance with the so-called New Europe — that is al Qaeda's most significant geopolitical success since Sept. 11, 2001. ...
If other European publics decide that the Spaniards are right, and conclude that the safer course in world affairs is to dissociate themselves from the United States, then the transatlantic partnership is no more.
Already there are statements by top European leaders that have the ring of dissociation. In a clear swipe at U.S. policy, European Commission President Romano Prodi commented in the wake of the Madrid attacks: "It is clear that using force is not the answer to resolving the conflict with terrorists." Terrorism, he said, "is infinitely more powerful than a year ago." So apparently Prodi accepts al Qaeda's logic, too. ...
If the United States cannot fight al Qaeda without Europe's help, it is equally true that Europe can't fight al Qaeda without the United States. If Europe's leaders understand this, then they and Bush should recognize the urgency of making common cause now, before the already damaged edifice of the transatlantic community collapses." (See also: "Spanish PM-elect vows to pull troops out of Iraq, lashes Bush" (AFP, 2004/03/15))

"Al Qaeda's Wish List" (David Brooks, The New York Times, 2004/03/16)
"There will be other aftershocks from the Spanish election. The rift between the U.S. and Europe will grow wider. Now all European politicians will know that if they side with America on controversial security threats, and terrorists strike their nation, they might be blamed by their own voters.
Many Americans and many Europeans will stare at each other in the weeks ahead with disbelieving eyes. For today more than any other, it really does appear that Americans are from Mars, Europeans are from Venus.
If a terrorist group attacked the U.S. three days before an election, does anyone doubt that the American electorate would rally behind the president or at least the most aggressively antiterror party? Does anyone doubt that Americans and Europeans have different moral and political cultures? Yesterday the chief of the European Commission, Romano Prodi, told Italy's La Stampa, "It is clear that using force is not the answer to resolving the conflict with terrorists." Does he really think capitulation or negotiation works better? Can you imagine John Kerry or George Bush saying that? ...
This is a watershed event. It will change how Al Qaeda thinks about the world. It will change how Europeans see the world. It will constrain American policy for years to come." (See also: "Spanish PM-elect vows to pull troops out of Iraq, lashes Bush" (AFP, 2004/03/15))

"Europe Faces a New Era" (Jefferson Morley, The Washington Post, 2004/03/16)
European reactions II: "Sociologist Emilio Lamo de Espinosa says Europeans have been dreaming. Writing in Le Monde (in French), Lamo says Europeans have thought they would be spared because they haven't supported the Bush administration's policies.
"When the Americans declared war on terrorism, many of us thought they exaggerated. Many thought terrorism was not likely to occur on our premises, [inhabited by] peaceful and civilized Europeans who speak no evil of anybody, who dialogue, who are the first [to] send assistance and offer cooperation. We are pacifists, they are warmongers. . . . . Don't we defend the Palestinians? Are we not pro-Arab and anti-Israeli?"
"Can we dialogue with those who desire only our death and nothing but our death?" Lamo asks. "Dialogue about what? The manner in which we will be assassinated?"
"The war against terrorism will be long and difficult," he concludes. 'It was that cretin, President Bush, who said that.'"

"News Analysis: Some in Europe see Spain's turnabout as a victory for Al Qaeda" (John Vinocur, IHT, 2004/03/16)
European reactions I: "André Glucksmann, the political essayist, who was one of the few French intellectuals to attack the Chirac line during the war and who has defended the ouster of Saddam Hussein on moral grounds, noted that Aznar's party, despite its support of the Bush administration, had a lead in the polls until the attack.
"In three days," he said, "the killers turned public opinion around. How can the murderers not come to the conclusion that they're the ones who decide and that terrorism is stronger than democracy?
"If the Socialists keep their promise to pull out of Iraq, they will be backing the terrorists' deepest conviction: that crime pays, and the greater the horror, the more effective it is. Afraid of punishing the real responsible party, Spain pointed instead at a virtual responsibility, and Aznar replaced bin Laden."
The Sunday issue of the Frankfurter Allgemeine newspaper singled out what it saw as instincts of appeasement at home and elsewhere in Europe under a thin coat of solidarity with Spain. Following this line of thinking, it said in an editorial, "the Spanish, as faithful allies of the Americans in the war in Iraq, bore their own guilt for the attack."
"This isolationist logic," the newspaper said, 'which reasons that invulnerability can be bought by keeping quiet, does not only bring shame to the victims. It fails to realize that terror's blind rage in its Islamic incarnation can reach all of the West including Germany, and cannot be softened through forthcoming policy.'"

"Survey finds hope in occupied Iraq" (BBC News, 2004/03/16)
"An opinion poll suggests most Iraqis feel their lives have improved since the war in Iraq began about a year ago.
The survey, carried out for the BBC and other broadcasters, also suggests many are optimistic about the next 12 months and opposed to violence. ...
Seventy percent of people said that things were going well or quite well in their lives, while only 29% felt things were bad.
And 56% said that things were better now than they were before the war. ...
About 15% say foreign forces should leave Iraq now, but many more say they should stay until an Iraqi government is in place or security is restored.
Looking back, more Iraqis think the invasion was right than wrong, although 41% felt that the invasion 'humiliated Iraq.'" (See also the full survey: "National Survey of Iraq - February 2004" (Oxford Research International/BBC, 2004/03/15). Also: "A Better Life" (Gary Langer, ABC News, 2004/03/15): "Iraqis divide in their rating of the local security situation now, but strikingly, 54 percent say security where they live is better now than it was before the war.")

"Bombs 'to split Spain from allies'" (CNN.com, 2004/03/16)
"A document published months before national elections reveals al Qaeda planned to separate Spain from its allies by carrying out terror attacks.
A December posting on an Internet message board used by al Qaeda and its sympathizers and obtained by CNN, spells out a plan to topple the pro-U.S. government.
"We think the Spanish government will not stand more than two blows, or three at the most, before it will be forced to withdraw because of the public pressure on it," the al Qaeda document says.
"If its forces remain after these blows, the victory of the Socialist Party will be almost guaranteed — and the withdrawal of Spanish forces will be on its campaign manifesto."
That prediction came to fruition in elections Sunday, with the Socialists unseating the Popular Party three days after near-simultaneous bombings of four trains killed 200 and shocked the nation." (See also: "Qa'idat al-Jihad, Iraq, and Madrid: The First Tile in the Domino Effect?" (Reuven Paz, PRISM, 2004/03/13))

"Six Moroccans suspected of Madrid attacks" (George Wright, The Guardian, 2004/03/16)
"Spanish police have identified six Moroccans who they suspect carried out last week's bomb attacks in Madrid, it was reported today.
According to unnamed sources cited by Spain's El Pais newspaper, five of the men are on the run, but one — Jamal Zougam — was among a group of suspects arrested on Saturday.
Spanish authorities believe the terrorists behind the March 11 attack have ties to a radical Islamist group that killed more than 40 people in suicide bombings in Casablanca last May, according to the paper.
It says police see Zougam as a "prime suspect" who is believed to have helped construct the explosive devices used in the Madrid bombings, which killed 201 rush-hour commuters and injured an estimated 1,500 more.
Citing security sources, the paper said Zougam, who was arrested last Saturday along with two other Moroccans, had been identified by two survivors of the train blasts who said they saw him before the explosions.
Also today, a French investigator told Associated Press (AP) that he has found evidence of a direct link between Zougam and Mohamed Fizazi, a spiritual leader of Salafia Jihadia, which allegedly was behind the Casablanca attack."

Added in archive:
"The Urgent Need to Study Islamic Anti-Semitism" (Neil J. Kressel, The Chronicle Review, 2004/03/12)

Monday, March 15, 2004

News and commentary:

"In Memoriam" (John, Iberian Notes, 2004/03/15)
"As you most likely know, the Vanguardia has been running short biographies of the victims of the Madrid bombings. About all we can do in their memory is get the information down in English in order to remember the 200 dead people. ...
Sanea Bensaleh, student, 13, Alcala de Henares. Sanea was born in Madrid, the daughter of Moroccan immigrants. Sanea, of course, was perfectly integrated into the community; her parents were careful that she should speak both Spanish and Arabic. She was a high school student and an only child, and was popular among her classmates.
Miriam Pedraza Rivero, office worker, 25, Entrevias. Miriam had been married for three years; she and her husband were saving for an apartment. They had planned to go on a trip to London the weekend after the bombings. She enjoyed sports and fitness and did aerobics and yoga; she was looking forward to attending the upcoming Formula One race. Her family and friends say she was cheerful and lively and very mature for her age.
Guillermo Senent Pallarola, technician, 23, Cabanillas. Guillermo and his friend David Santamaria were going to take their physical exams; they had been working as intern technicians on the high-speed train. Both were killed in the blasts. He leaves his parents and a brother."

"Arab Fighters Say Iraqis Sold Them Out to U.S." (Lin Noueihed, Reuters, 2004/03/15)
"Ahmed Abdel Razzaq went to Iraq to fight the Americans and die a martyr. He ended up in a U.S. prison camp after the Iraqis he went to defend captured and sold him for $100.
"I went to be a martyr in God's name," said Razzaq, from poor north Lebanon, where Sunni Muslim militancy runs deep.
"I went to jihad (holy war) for the Iraqis but they are all traitors; the people, the army, the Kurds. They say Saddam was bad, but the Iraqis deserve 10 Saddams."
Motivated by religious zeal or Arab nationalism, busloads of Arab volunteers crossed Syria to go to Iraq before and during the war.
Those who got home alive describe being abandoned by Iraqi minders as U.S. forces reached Baghdad, or escaping Iraqis hostile to interference as the Baath government crumbled into chaos.
Hundreds more were captured, often by Iraqi Kurds opposed to toppled president Saddam Hussein, and spent months in U.S. custody at Camp Bucca in the desert near the southern port of Umm Qasr."

"Soldiers nab Palestinian boy with bomb" (Arnon Regular and Yuval Yoaz, Haaretz, 2004/03/15)
"Israeli soldiers on Monday caught a Palestinian boy who unwittingly tried to carry a bag containing a suicide bomber's explosives belt through a West Bank checkpoint, an officer said.
"Ten-year-old Abdullah works at the checkpoint transporting luggage from one side to the other," the officer, who identified himself only as Lieutenant-Colonel Guy, told Reuters.
"[Someone] asked him to carry through a bag...and left," the officer said. "[The boy] just wanted to make money. We will release him. He's just a poor kid."
The officer said a military policewoman at the checkpoint spotted wires protruding from the bag and stopped Abdullah.
"The policewoman prevented a suicide attack [in Israel]," the colonel said. He said the explosive belt was also packed with nuts and bolts, which militants use to make bombs deadlier. It was also connected to a cellular telephone.
Army demolition experts detonated the device in a controlled blast. The colonel said the device contained seven to 10 kilograms of explosives."

"Huge Car Bomb Found Near U.S. Consulate in Pakistan" (Aamir Ashraf, Reuters, 2004/03/15)
"A huge car bomb was defused by Pakistani police outside the U.S. consulate in Karachi on Monday, just two days before Secretary of State Colin Powell visits the country.
"If this exploded it would have caused massive destruction," Karachi bomb squad officer, Munir Ahmed Sheikh, told Reuters. "God has saved us."
The vehicle, which contained a 195-gallon drum filled with chemicals including ammonium nitrate, and detonators, was towed away from the consulate to a nearby sports ground, where bomb disposal experts defused it, police said.
Police said it was too early to say who may have been involved in the latest attempt to attack the heavily guarded consulate, but Islamic militants were prime suspects."

"To Die in Madrid" (Christopher Hitchens, Slate, 2004/03/15)
"It cannot be very long now before some slaughter occurs on the streets of London or Rome or Warsaw, as punishment for British and Italian and Polish membership of the anti-Saddam coalition. But perhaps there is still time to avoid the wrath to come. If British and Italian and Polish troops make haste to leave the Iraqis to their own "devices" (of the sort that exploded outside the mosques of Karbala and Najaf last month), their civilian cousins may still hope to escape the stern disapproval of the holy warriors. Don't ask why the holy warriors blow up mosques by the way — it's none of your goddam crusader-Jew business. ...
I find I can't quite decide what to recommend in the American case. I thought it was a good idea to remove troops from Saudi Arabia in any event (after all, we had removed the chief regional invader). But, even with the troops mainly departed, bombs continue to detonate in Saudi streets. We are, it seems, so far gone in sin and decadence that no repentance or penitence can be adequate. Perhaps, for the moment, it's enough punishment, and enough shame, just to know that what occurred in Madrid last week is all our fault. Now, let that sink in."

"The Foothills of Hatred" (Lee Kaplan, FrontPageMagazine, 2004/03/15)
Kaplan on an outrageous interview with Dr. Leighton Armitage, a professor of political science in the Bus