Archived news and commentary: January 16 - 22, 2006

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Sunday, January 22, 2006

News and commentary:

"Danish Imams Propose to End Cartoon Dispute" (Hjörtur Gudmundsson, The Brussels Journal, 2006/01/22)
An update on the Danish cartoon affair, with all 12 cartoons attached:
"The Danish imams, who protested the publication of 12 Muhammad cartoons ... in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten last September, have announced that they want to end the dispute. For four months the imams and their radical Muslim organizations have unsuccesfully demanded government censorship. However, despite immense pressure (also from international organizations such as the UN and the EU) the Danish government refused to call the newspaper to account. ...
“We want Jyllands-Posten to show respect for the Muslims. This can happen with an apology, but it can also happen in some other way. We will leave it to Jyllands-Posten to come up with some ideas,” said Ahmed Akkari, spokesman of the Muslim organizations. “We want respect for Muhammad restored and we want him to be described as the man he really was in history, and that he gets the respect he deserves,” Akkari stressed that Muslim organizations are still deeply opposed to the publication of the cartoons.
The Muslim organizations and Jyllands-Posten met last week to discuss the matter. “It was a good and constructive meeting. We agreed that we need to find a solution,” said Carsten Juste, editor of Jyllands-Posten. Juste stressed that the meeting was one step in a reconciliation process which the Muslim organizations and the newspaper began in December.
Some sceptics wonder whether the demands of the imams have changed fundamentally. They still insist that Jyllands-Posten admit that publishing the cartoons was wrong and make amends for it."

More on the Danish cartoon affair:
"Scholars Threaten Boycott Over Anti-prophet Cartoons" (Adel Abdel Halim, Islam Online, 2006/01/21)
"Denmark: Moderate Muslims Oppose Imams" (Hjörtur Gudmundsson, The Brussels Journal, 2006/01/19)
"Scandinavian Update: Israeli Boycott, Muslim Cartoons" (Hjörtur Gudmundsson, The Brussels Journal, 2006/01/14)
"Danish Prime Minister Shocked at Lies" (Hjörtur Gudmundsson, The Brussels Journal, 2006/01/11)
"Denmark Is Unlikely Front in Islam-West Culture War" (Dan Bilefsky, The New York Times, 2006/01/08)
"Muslim organisation calls for boycott of Denmark" (The Copenhagen Post, 2005/12/28)
"EU commissioner lashes out at Mohammed drawings" (The Copenhagen Post, 2005/12/23)
"Demonstrations in Pakistan have escalated into death threats against Danish illustrators who drew pictures of the prophet Mohammed" (The Copenhagen Post, 2005/12/02)
"Muslims march over cartoons of the Prophet" (Kate Connolly, The Daily Telegraph, 2005/11/04)
"Prophet cartoons prompt Egypt to cut off Danish dialogue" (The Copenhagen Post, 2005/11/03)
"War in France, War in Denmark" (Henrik, Viking Observer, 2005/10/31)
"Selective Muslim Silence" (Judith Apter Klinghoffer, HNN, 2005/10/31)
"Denmark arrests 4 terror suspects" (AP/CNN.com, 2005/10/27)
"death will visit Denmark" (infovlad.net, 2005/10/15)
"Holy war against newspaper" (The Copenhagen Post, 2005/10/20)
"Muslim anger at Danish cartoons" (BBC News, 2005/10/20)
"Youth reported held in Denmark for death threats over Mohammed cartoons" (Middle East Times, 2005/10/17)
"Imam demands apology for Mohammed cartoons" (The Copenhagen Post, 2005/10/06)
"Image of Muhammad" (Kurt Westergaard, Fjordman, 2005/10/05)
"Fear Pervades Danish Art Community" (Patrick, Dhimmi Watch, 2005/09/18)

"Hamas is a green tide rising" (Mitch Potter, Toronto Star, 2006/01/22)
"IRAMALLAH, West Bank- If the plan was simply to wet its toes in the churning waters of Palestinian democracy, Hamas must brace for a shock. Ready or not, the militant Islamic group now finds itself plunging head first into the deep end.
Quite possibly, it will form the government.
According to a succession of startling public opinion polls, the race for Wednesday's first truly competitive election the Palestinians have ever known is now a coin toss, with a surging Hamas in a statistical dead heat with the fragmented and corruption-riddled Fatah party founded by the late Yasser Arafat.
The most sobering numbers came Friday, in a survey of 1001 voters in the West Bank and Gaza Strip by the Jerusalem Media and Communications Centre, showing support for Fatah sliding to 32.3 per cent, with Hamas at 30.2 per cent. The balance of the electorate was either undecided or siding in small numbers with nine other fledgling Palestinian parties.
Any way it breaks down, Palestinians are about to open their 132-seat legislature for the first time to the hard fist of political Islam." (Hat tip: Jihad Watch.)

"Afghan women in the driving seat" (Sean Langan, BBC News, 2006/01/22)
"'I'm a broad-minded person,' declared the Afghan driving instructor. "But I was shocked by her behaviour."
"Really?" I asked. His female student had laughed. Was that really so bad?
"It was shameful and embarrassing," he replied. "Her character is no better than that of an animal." ...
Mamozai's Ladies' and Gentlemen's Driving School was one of the first driving schools in Afghanistan to allow women to enrol. The Taleban thought the idea of teaching women how to drive was "satanic", but Mr Mamozai's school now has more than 200 female graduates.
Even so, the women are often told to "sit up like a man" by their male instructors as they navigate the precarious back-roads of Kabul, and to "stop driving like a woman."
But then that is hardly surprising. Most of the instructors are ex-Taleban and they do not really think women should drive at all. They certainly would not allow their own wives to drive.
And yet that was not about to stop women like Roya, a young English teacher I met on the course, or Mukadas, an Afghan aid-worker and university student, from signing up.
They had experienced far worse in their lives, and nothing, it seems, was about to stop them from taking every opportunity now open to women in Afghanistan - however begrudgingly. ...
I watched as Roya walked towards the test car. A long line of men had gathered by the side of the road. As she walked slowly along the line, her head bowed down, she heard the whispers of invective and abuse.
She refused to tell me exactly what they had said, but I later found out she had been called a "prostitute", a "bitch" and an "un-Islamic whore." She failed the test. "We have freedom now," she said. 'But we are not free to enjoy it.'"

"Sympathy for al-Qaida Surges in Pakistan" (Riaz Khan, AP/My Way, 2006/01/22)
"DAMADOLA, Pakistan (AP) - Sympathy for al-Qaida has surged after a U.S. airstrike devastated this remote mountain hamlet in a region sometimes as hostile toward the Pakistani government as it is to the United States.
A week after the attack, villagers insist no members of the terror network were anywhere near the border village when it was hit. But thousands of protesters flooded a nearby town chanting, "Long live Osama bin Laden!"
Pakistan's army, in charge of hunting militants, was nowhere to be seen.
The rally was the latest in a series of demonstrations across Pakistan against the Jan. 13 attack, which apparently targeted but missed al-Qaida's No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahri.
The military still mans numerous checkpoints in the area, but it appears to be keeping a low profile so it will not inflame villagers still seething over the deaths of 13 civilians, including women and children, in the attack.
Pakistani intelligence officials believe that four top al-Qaida operatives may have also been killed in the strike including al-Qaida's master bomb maker, Midhat Mursi, who has a $5 million U.S. bounty on his head.
The men had gathered for dinner on the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Adha to plan attacks for early this year in Afghanistan and Pakistan, a senior Pakistani intelligence official said." (See also: "Afghans Protest Pakistan After Bombing" (Naimatullah Sarhadi, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/18))

"Iraqis Do It Again" (Amir Taheri, New York Post, 2006/01/22)
"There were many drawn faces on television Friday as the final results of Iraq's general election were announced. Some faces belonged to those who have prayed and worked hard to make Iraq a failure so as to get at President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Others belonged to the partisans of "benign neglect" — a philosophy according to which the West should just let "those Arabs stew in their own juices."
Let us recall some of the predictions made by those who had opposed the liberation of Iraq.
One was that democracy could not be imposed by force. Well, Iraq has shown that force can be used to remove impediments to democracy.
Another prediction was that the Iraqis, rather than learning to sort out differences through politics, were hell bent on starting a civil war. (This reporter is invited to take part in radio or TV debates about the fictitious civil war in Iraq at least twice a month.) Iraqis, however, are beginning to see democracy as an alternative to civil war and seem prepared to give it a chance.
Yet another prediction was that Shiite fundamentalist parties would sweep to victory and then, for some strange reason, hand over their country to the mullahs in Tehran. Well, we now know that the unified Shiite roster, the List 555, has won 128 of the 275 seats in the new parliament and is thus short of a majority. (In the January 2005 general election, which was boycotted by some Arab Sunni parties, the alliance won 146 seats.)
More significant, the elements most closely identified with Iran within the Shiite alliance sustained the biggest losses. The message is clear: The majority of Iraqi Shiites do not want an Iranian-style theocracy."

"For Muslim Policeman, London's a Tough Beat" (Mary Jordan, The Washington Post, 2006/01/22)
"LONDON -- When Scotland Yard community police officer Saeed Hajjaj detained a young man on theft charges recently, the man told him angrily: "You are a Muslim. You should not be working for the police."
"You are a Muslim," Hajjaj said he replied. "You shouldn't be committing a crime." ...
Still others are outright hostile. They view uniformed police officers as the most visible representatives of a government waging wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that have killed many Muslims. ...
A London police officer told him recently that his jaw had been broken by relatives as a warning to get off the force. Mahroof said the officer did not want to be publicly identified and explained that the pressure can be so intense that there are a few "closet" police officers who don't even tell their families where they work.
A uniformed Muslim officer, Mahroof said, was recently roughed up outside the Shadwell mosque by angry young men shouting: "How can you work for these people?" ...
"Don't speak to him. He is not a Muslim," a husband recently snapped at his wife, who was returning a greeting from Hajjaj.
He said it's a tiring predicament: Some people can't get beyond the fact that he is a Muslim, others seem to deny that he is one.
"Before, I really wanted to be a police officer," he said. 'Now I am doubtful. It takes a lot out of you.'"

"Pool staff bashed as youths riot" (Chris Tinkler, NEWS.com.au, 2006/01/22)
"Four swimming pool staff have been beaten in an attack in Melbourne's north.
Stunned witnesses said about 30 youths had punched and kicked staff, including a young woman, on the grass at Oak Park Aquatic Centre about 4pm yesterday.
One witness, Alex, said families had recoiled in horror at the bashings.
"I've never seen anything like it," Alex said.
"I thought, 'Not another Cronulla'.
"There seemed to be dozens of people involved, with most wading into the staff and people trying to help them.
"They all appeared to be Middle-Eastern youths."
"It was very upsetting and scary. There were hysterical children everywhere."
Nicholas Burt, leisure manager at Moreland Council, which runs the pool, said the riot had occurred after a male lifeguard had tried to calm two teenagers arguing on the grass embankment." (Hat tip: The Thin Man Returns via Tim Blair.)

"Assad says Israel had Arafat killed" (Harry De Quetteville, The Sunday Telegraph, 2006/01/22)
"The Syrian president Bashar al-Assad has caused outrage by accusing Israel of murdering Yasser Arafat.
He used what was billed as a speech on democratic reform to accuse Israel of a "methodical and organised" killing.
Mr Assad, who himself is suspected of ordering the killing of the Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri, said: "Of the many assassinations that Israel carried out in a methodical and organised way, the most dangerous thing that Israel did was the assassination of President Yasser Arafat."
He told a conference of Arab lawyers in Damascus: 'This was under the world's gaze and its silence, and not one state dared to issue a statement or stance towards this, as though nothing happened.'"

"MI5 knew of bomber’s plan for holy war" (David Leppard, The Sunday Times, 2006/01/22)
"Britain's top spies knew that the ringleader of the London bombers was planning to fight for Al-Qaeda more than a year before the July 7 suicide attacks, security sources have revealed.
MI5 bugged Mohammad Sidique Khan and Shehzad Tanweer, a second bomber, for two months as they talked about Khan’s desire to fight in what he saw as the Islamic holy war.
Agents also listened in as the men talked between themselves about Khan’s plans to return to Pakistan where he had attended a camp for British terrorists. They also spoke about engaging in crime to raise money for Islamic extremism.
However, police and MI5 officers ruled that the two men were not an “immediate risk” and did not present a “direct threat” to national security.
The detectives’ assessment was that the men were primarily involved in fraud rather than preparing to mount attacks in the near future. As a result, surveillance on them stopped, allowing the attacks that killed 52 people and injured 700 to go ahead."

"Zarqawi ‘sleeps in suicide belt’" (Hala Jaber, The Sunday Times, 2006/01/22)
"Iraq's most wanted man, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, goes to sleep every night wearing a suicide belt packed with explosives, according to a leading insurgent who met him two weeks ago.
“He never takes it off,” said Sheikh Abu Omar al-Ansari, leader of a Sunni resistance group called Jeish al-Taiifa al-Mansoura (Army of the Victorious Sect).
“He told me: ‘I would rather blow myself up and die as a martyr — and kill a few Americans along the way — than be arrested and humiliated by them’.” ...
Al-Qaeda members said the insurgent groups attending the meeting were discussing possible co-ordination of their attacks and plans to create an Islamic state. ...
The meeting led to the subsequent announcement about an umbrella body called the Mujaheddin Council, which posted a statement on the internet two weeks ago. The council claims to be representing Al-Qaeda in Iraq, the Army of the Victorious Sect and the four lesser-known Sunni groups. Other leading Sunni groups were conspicuously absent."

Saturday, January 21, 2006

News and commentary:

"Dutch Introduce Exams for Immigrants, Consider Army Drill for Youths" (Paul Belien, The Brussels Journal, 2006/01/21)
"This week the Dutch Parliament voted a bill which obliges immigrants to pass a compulsory exam. The Dutch Parliament is also in favour of a proposal to have troublesome youths disciplined and drilled by the army.
From 1 March onwards people who want to settle in the Netherlands (e.g. to join family members or to marry someone living there) will have to pass a preliminary test at the Dutch embassy in their country of origin. In this so-called “integration test” the immigrants have to prove that they have sufficient knowledge of the Dutch language and the geography, history and political system of the Netherlands. ...
Dutch Prime Minister Jan-Peter Balkenende’s government of Christian-Democrats and free-market Liberals is also considering other measures. One of these might be to establish military camps to discipline troublesome youths. There are 40,000 jobless youths in the Netherlands, who have left school without degrees. The majority of them is of foreign origin. Many become involved in criminal activities. A majority of Dutch parliamentarians, including members of the Socialist opposition, supports a plan to discipline them in military style. ...
On Tuesday Job Cohen, the mayor of Amsterdam, called for action to deal with “French situations” in his city. “There is unrest in the city,” the mayor said after talks with local authorities. The meeting was organised in the wake of several incidents involving mainly Moroccan youths which have occurred since the beginning of this year. “There is an underlying feeling whereby it would only take minor incidents to cause an outburst,” Cohen said. Cars have been vandalized, residents have been threatened, Jews and homosexuals harassed, and a police station attacked after a 17-year-old scooter rider, fleeing the police, died in a crash on 10 January."

"Scholars Threaten Boycott Over Anti-prophet Cartoons" (Adel Abdel Halim, Islam Online, 2006/01/21)
Even more on the Danish cartoon affair: "The International Union for Muslim Scholars (IUMS) threatened on Saturday, January 21, to call for a boycott of Danish and Norwegian products over the publication of controversial anti-Prophet cartoons in both Scandinavian countries.
"We urge the officials in Denmark and Norway to take a firm stance against these repeated insults to the Muslim nation and the prophet followed by 1.3 billion people across the globe," read a statement by the Dublin-based body, a copy of which was mailed to IslamOnline.net on Saturday, January 21.
"Otherwise the IUMS will be forced to urge millions of Muslims across the world to boycott all Danish and Norwegian products and activities." ...
The union asked Arab and Muslim governments to exercise all possible political and diplomatic pressures on the Danish and Norwegian governments to grind to a halt such organized anti-Islam campaigns.
The IUMS was launched in July of last year in the British capital London as an independent body and a reference for all Muslims worldwide with prominent scholar Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi as its chair." (Hat tip: Dhimmi Watch. See also: "Denmark: Moderate Muslims Oppose Imams" (Hjörtur Gudmundsson, The Brussels Journal, 2006/01/19))

"Belafonte Continues Tirade Against Bush" (Verena Dobnik, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/21)
If Belafonte really believed that Bush is "the greatest tyrant in the world" and Homeland Security "the new Gestapo", he would presumably be rather afraid of being hauled away in the middle of the night by Bush's neocon goons. But instead, of course, he is "greeted with a roaring standing ovation" for saying it. America has a rather strange version of nazism it seems:
"Entertainer Harry Belafonte, one of the Bush administration's harshest critics, compared the Homeland Security Department to the Nazi Gestapo on Saturday and attacked the president as a liar.
"We've come to this dark time in which the new Gestapo of Homeland Security lurks here, where citizens are having their rights suspended," Belafonte said in a speech to the annual meeting of the Arts Presenters Members Conference.
"You can be arrested and not charged. You can be arrested and have no right to counsel," said Belafonte.
Belafonte's remarks on Saturday — part of a 45-minute speech on the role of the arts in a politically changing world — were greeted with a roaring standing ovation from an audience which included singer Peter Yarrow of the folk group Peter, Paul and Mary, and members of the arts community from several dozen countries." (See also: "Belafonte Calls Bush 'Greatest Terrorist'" (Ian James, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/08): "Belafonte led a delegation of Americans including the actor Danny Glover and the Princeton University scholar Cornel West that met the Venezuelan president for more than six hours late Saturday. Some in the group attended Chavez's television and radio broadcast Sunday.
"No matter what the greatest tyrant in the world, the greatest terrorist in the world, George W. Bush says, we're here to tell you: Not hundreds, not thousands, but millions of the American people ... support your revolution," Belafonte told Chavez during the broadcast."
Also: "Harry Belafonte Calls Black Republicans 'Tyrants'" (Marc Morano
CNSNews.com, 2005/08/08): "Celebrity activist Harry Belafonte referred to prominent African-American officials in the Bush administration as "black tyrants" at a weekend march, and he also compared the administration to Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany. ...
Belafonte used a Hitler analogy when asked about what impact prominent blacks such as former Secretary of State Powell and current Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had on the Bush administration's relations with minorities.
"Hitler had a lot of Jews high up in the hierarchy of the Third Reich. Color does not necessarily denote quality, content or value," Belafonte said in an exclusive interview with Cybercast News Service.
"[If] a black is a tyrant, he is first and foremost a tyrant, then he incidentally is black. Bush is a tyrant and if he gathers around him black tyrants, they all have to be treated as they are being treated," he added.")

"Report says ransom money found on Osthoff" (Reuters, 2006/01/21)
"Part of the ransom money alleged to have been paid by the German government to win the freedom of Iraq hostage Susanne Osthoff last month was found on Osthoff after her release, the German magazine Focus said on Saturday.
Without citing its sources, Focus said officials at the German embassy in Baghdad had found several thousand U.S. dollars in the 43-year-old German archaeologist's clothes when she took a shower at the embassy shortly after being freed.
The serial numbers on the bills matched those used by the government to pay off Osthoff's kidnappers, the magazine said. ...
Osthoff, who converted to Islam and lived in Iraq, was seized heading north from Baghdad on November 25 by gunmen who threatened in a videotape to kill her and her driver unless Germany ended all support for the Iraqi government.
Speculation about the circumstances of her kidnapping and release has swirled in the German media since the German government announced on December 18 that she was free. ...
Osthoff herself caused a stir when she said in an interview at the end of December that she did not believe her kidnappers were criminals." (See also: "More Euros for Terror" (John Rosenthal, Tech Central Station, 2006/01/20))

"Heeding Pakistani Protest, U.N. Blocks Talk by Rape Victim" (Warren Hoge, The New York Times, 2006/01/21)
"Mukhtar Mai, the Pakistani woman whose defiant response to being gang-raped by order of a tribal court brought her worldwide attention, was denied a chance to speak at the United Nations on Friday after Pakistan protested that it was the same day the country's prime minister was visiting.
Ms. Mai had long been scheduled to make an appearance called "An Interview With Mukhtar Mai: The Bravest Woman on Earth" in the United Nations television studios, sponsored by the office for nongovernmental organizations, the Virtue Foundation and the Asian-American Network Against Abuse of Human Rights.
But on Thursday night the organizers were informed that the program would have to be postponed because of Pakistan's objections.
Ms. Mai is leaving New York on Saturday so the effect was to cancel her appearance."

"Shiite-Kurd Bloc Falls Just Short in Iraqi Election" (Robert F. Worth, The New York Times, 2006/01/21)
"The first official results in Iraq's landmark December elections showed Friday that the Shiite and Kurdish coalitions once again dominated the voting, but came up just short of the two-thirds majority needed to form a government on their own.
Sunni Arab parties won 58 of the new Parliament's 275 seats - the second-largest bloc of seats - giving them a much stronger political voice than they had before. ...
The results of the balloting, released five weeks after the Dec. 15 elections, illustrated the overall strength of the country's Shiite and Sunni religious parties and the relative weakness of more secular groups.
The list led by Ahmad Chalabi, the former Pentagon favorite who was considered a strong candidate for prime minister, did not win a single seat.
The coalition led by the former prime minister, Ayad Allawi, another secular figure and former exile leader who is favored by the White House, won just 25 of Parliament's 275 seats, making it virtually impossible for him to put together a government."

Friday, January 20, 2006

News and commentary:

"Muslims Beat Pastor After Attending Church" (Compass Direct, 2006/01/20)
"Five young men attacked and threatened to kill a Protestant church leader in Turkey’s fourth largest city after Sunday worship services January 8.
Kamil Kiroglu, 29, was beaten unconscious twice along the street after leaving his church premises in Adana at about 5 p.m. Wielding a long butcher knife, one of the unidentified attackers threatened to kill him if he refused to deny his Christian faith and return to Islam. ...
He said one of them shouted, “We don’t want Christians in this country!”
Ignoring the church leader’s confused foreign friend, the men chased and caught Kiroglu and began to strike him severely with their fists and feet. “I was trying to protect my face,” Kiroglu said, “but soon I was lying on the ground, covered in blood, and they were still kicking and beating me.”
After briefly losing consciousness, he managed to get to his feet and start running again, but again the attackers caught up with him.
“They were trying to force me to deny Jesus,” Kiroglu said. “But each time they asked me to deny Jesus and become a Muslim, I was saying, ‘Jesus is Lord.’ The more I said ‘Jesus is Lord,’ the more they beat me.”
Kiroglu saw in one man’s hands a long butcher knife, which he later learned had been grabbed from a nearby kebap restaurant. Shoving the knife against Kiroglu’s stomach, the attacker said, “I’m asking you again, deny Jesus, or I will kill you now.”
“Then I realized there was no way of saving myself,” Kiroglu said. “He was going to kill me.”
Suddenly, the Christian said, he felt two heavy blows, one on his head and the other on his spine, and everything went dark. When he regained consciousness, his attackers were gone and his friend was trying to wake him up." (Hat tip: Dhimmi Watch.)

"Iran may have received advanced centrifuges: diplomats" (AFP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/20)
Iran V: "Iran may have received three shipments of sophisticated P-2 centrifuges capable of enriching uranium, diplomats said, which could support Western claims that Tehran is hiding sensitive nuclear work.
Iran, which already has the less high-tech P-1 centrifuges, denies having received the more advanced machines, which make enriching uranium easier.
One diplomat said there were reportedly three shipments of one centrifuge each from the black-market network of disgraced Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan in 1997. ...
A second diplomat said the UN watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which has been investigating Iran's nuclear program for three years and has already found Tehran to be in non-compliance with international atomic safeguards, was actively working on the P-2 report.
Asked if it could be the "smoking gun" that confirms the West's fears, the diplomat replied: "Yes. If this is confirmed the game is over" for Iran."

"Iran's leader challenges Europe to take back Jews in Israel" (AP/Haaretz, 2006/01/20)
Iran IV: "In a new attack on the existence of Israel, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has challenged Europe to take back the Jews who emigrated to Israel, adding that no Jews would remain in Israel if Europe were to open its doors.
Ahmadinejad delivered the challenge after arriving in Syria for a two-day visit on Thursday. Addressing Europe, he asked: "Would you open the doors of your own countries to these (Jewish) immigrants so that they could travel to any part of Europe they chose?"
"Would you offer the necessary guarantees that you would provide for their security when they came to your countries and not allow another anti-Semitic wave in Europe?" he added in an apparent reference to recent attacks on Jewish cemeteries and properties in European states."

"Israel Blames Iran, Syria for Bombings" (Ibrahim Barzak, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/20)
Iran III: "Israel's defense minister accused Iran and Syria on Friday of masterminding a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv that wounded 20 people and said the militant group believed responsible would be targeted in raids. A Syrian official denied involvement.
Islamic Jihad, which is backed by Syria and Iran, claimed responsibility for bombing a fast-food restaurant Thursday. The Palestinian attacker, who witnesses said posed as a peddler selling disposable razors, walked into the restaurant and blew himself up even though most customers were sitting outside at sidewalk tables, police said.
The explosion wrecked "The Mayor's Shwarma," a restaurant specializing in grilled meat sandwiches. It is located in a rundown area of downtown Tel Aviv that has been hit repeatedly by Palestinian attackers.
After a late-night meeting with security officials, Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz said early Friday: "We have definitive proof that the financing of the terror attack ... came directly from Iran, while the planning was carried out in Syria."
He said the findings would be shared with American and European officials."

"Purported Tape of Al-Zawahri Posted on Web" (Omar Sinan, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/20)
"An audiotape from al-Qaida's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahri, was posted Friday on an Islamic Web site, but U.S. officials said the recording does not appear to have been made recently and may even date back years.
In the audiotape, al-Zawahri read a poem praising "martyrs of holy war" in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere.
The tape made no mention of a Jan. 13 U.S. airstrike in Pakistan that was targeting al-Zawahri and killed four al-Qaida leaders.
The CIA verified the voice as al-Zawahri following a technical analysis, an agency official said.
It was unclear when the recording was made, although the poem referred to Afghanistan martyrs in the period during Northern Alliance action against the Taliban that followed the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, the CIA official said."

"Iraq Election Results Show Sunni Gains" (Qassim Abdul-Zahra, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/20)
"The election commission said Friday that an alliance of Shiite religious parties won the biggest number of seats in Iraq's new parliament but too few to rule without coalition partners. Sunni Arabs gained seats over the previous balloting.
Commission official Safwat Rasheed said the Shiite United Iraqi Alliance captured 128 of the 275 seats in the Dec. 15 election, down from the 146 it won in January 2005 balloting. It needed 138 to rule without partners.
A Sunni ticket, the Iraqi Accordance Front, won 44 seats. Another Sunni coalition headed by Saleh al-Mutlaq finished with 11 seats, Rasheed said. A few other Sunnis won seats on other tickets.
That will give the Sunni Arabs a bigger voice in the legislature than they had in the outgoing assembly, which included only 17 from the community forming the backbone of the insurgency. Many Sunnis had boycotted the January vote.
Kurds saw their seat total reduced. An alliance of the two major Kurdish parties won 53 seats, down from the 75 they took in the January 2005 vote."

"Our Darkening Sky: Iran and the War" (Joe Katzman, Winds of Change.NET, 2006/01/20)
Iran II: "I personally believe that we're very likely to see at least 10 million dead in the Middle East within the next two decades, with an upper limit near 100 million. I do not believe pre-emptive action will be taken against Iran. I do, however, believe the extremist mullahs in Iran mean exactly what they say. They are steeped in an ideology that believes suicide/murder to be the holiest and most moral act possible. They have been diligent in laying strategic plans for an offensive Islamic War against Israel, America and the West. ...
It's 2006, and here we stand. "Faith without a hope" is now all that is left to us. Faith that someone will step up with a successful Hail Mary play, executed against all odds. That they will somehow avert the nightmare we in the West have so diligently allowed, with our endless appeasement, inaction, and miscalculations, to build on our watch over the last 25 years. Perhaps. ...
Are there enough of their Muslim compatriots who are prepared to stand up and avert the Grand War, judging the risk of inaction to be greater? Are there enough of us, on this side of the war, to act in time? Or do we all face The Islamic War - either now, or soon, or in an even worse future where a nuclear shield for Islamofascism enables something even more troubling?
I do not know.
As regards Iran, however, I do know this: the sword will be drawn. The only questions left as whose, and when, and where.
As things now stand, I do not believe the answers to these questions will be to our advantage." (See also: "The Case for Invading Iran" (Thomas Holsinger, Winds of Change.NET, 2006/01/19))

"US author's sales jump after Osama mentions book" (Reuters, 2006/01/20)
More on the Osama Book Club Selection of the Month:
"An unexpected endorsement from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden has resulted in a huge jump in sales for a book by a critic of U.S. foreign policy.
William Blum's "Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower" was ranked 209,000 on Amazon.com's sales list before bin Laden mentioned it in an audiotape released on Thursday. By Friday, the book was No. 30 on the Amazon.com list.
Bin Laden said al Qaeda group was preparing more attacks in the United States but also told Americans, "It is useful for you to read the book 'The Rogue State.'"
"I was quite surprised and even shocked and amused when I found out what he'd said," Blum said on Friday in an interview with Reuters Television in his Washington apartment.
"I was glad. I knew it would help the book's sales and I was not bothered by who it was coming from.
'If he shares with me a deep dislike for the certain aspects of U.S. foreign policy, then I'm not going to spurn any endorsement of the book by him. I think it's good that he shares those views and I'm not turned off by that.'"

"Al Qaeda's Olive Branch" (Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, The Weekly Standard, 2006/01/20)
In his latest audiotape, bin Laden recommends William Blum's "Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower":
"And if Bush decides to carry on with his lies and oppression, then it would be useful for you to read the book "Rogue State," which states in its introduction: "If I were president, I would stop the attacks on the United States: First I would give an apology to all the widows and orphans and those who were tortured. Then I would announce that American interference in the nations of the world has ended once and for all."
Wikipedia: "Prior to bin Laden's statement, the book was ranked at 209,000 on Amazon's sales list. By Friday it was number 30":
"Bin Laden is a savvy consumer of the U.S. media. His October 2004 videotape carefully echoed themes already familiar to Americans because of Fahrenheit 9/11. Four hallmarks of bin Laden's appeals to Westerners are tailoring his rhetoric to the leftist factions that he'd like to sway; bolstering his arguments with references to U.S. opinion polls and political developments; mocking the pronouncements of the White House; and attempting to address what he believes to be burning questions in American minds. All four characteristics are present in the new audiotape.
In the tape, bin Laden strikes a populist tone when announcing his latest offer of truce: "There are no flaws in this solution, which would prevent the flow of billions of dollars to the people of influence and the warmongers in America, those who supported the Bush electoral campaign with billions of dollars." This statement draws a divide between common Americans and the bloodthirsty war profiteers who bin Laden casts as President Bush's base. Again, bin Laden's message doesn't deviate too much from Michael Moore's." (See also: "Bin Laden Warns of Attacks, Offers Truce" (Lee Keath, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/19))

"More Euros for Terror" (John Rosenthal, Tech Central Station, 2006/01/20)
"And there is, regrettably, reason to believe that the [Iraqi] “insurgency” has lately received a substantial financial infusion… from the German government. ...
The first indications came from Osthoff herself. Asked about the conditions of her release in an interview with the German weekly Stern, she responded: “The kidnappers had an offer from the Germans. I am not permitted to tell you the exact amount. But they found it a bit low. So, they haggled some more. After all, they had to save face and cover their costs.” Note Osthoff’s remark that she is “not permitted” (“Ich darf nicht”) to reveal the exact amount, suggesting that she had been so instructed in being debriefed by German authorities following her release.
In any case, if a report from the German domestic wire service ddp is to be believed, the hostage-takers in fact did much more than just “cover their costs.” Citing information from unnamed German intelligence sources, the ddp report puts the sum of the ransom payment at “around $5 million.” According to the ddp’s sources, an envoy from Germany’s Federal Intelligence Agency, the BND, 'brought the money, divided up into smaller bills, from Berlin to Iraq, as the hostage-takers demanded. The ‘bound ‘parcel’ was of ‘considerable weight’.'"

"A Web Witness to Iranian Brutality" (Anne Applebaum, The Washington Post, 2006/01/20)
Iran I: "Enter the Web site: http://www.abfiran.org/. Click on "Omid: A Memorial," and then "Search." Enter a name -- or a religion, a nationality, an alleged crime. One by one, the stories will transfix you.
Atefeh Rajabi, a 16-year-old schoolgirl: Executed by hanging in Neka, Aug. 15, 2004, for "acts incompatible with chastity."
Azizullah Gulshani: Executed by the state in Mashad, April 29, 1982, for "promoting the dirty, non-Islamic sect of Bahaism."
Ali Akbar Tabatabai: Executed by extrajudicial shooting in Maryland, July 23, 1980, for an "unknown revolutionary offense."
Many of the entries are frustrating. There is "no information on this case," or else the information -- from official sources, exile groups, human rights groups -- is sparse. Dates are missing, photographs are missing, and although the site has English and Farsi links to nearly 10,000 political victims of the Islamic Republic of Iran, thousands more haven't even been entered yet.
But this, say Ladan and Roya Boroumand, is only the beginning: Their "Omid" Web site, named for the word "hope" in Farsi, is a living project that will expand as relatives of the victims of the Iranian Islamic regime add to it, correct it, change it. The launch today -- on the 25th anniversary of the Iranian students' release of American hostages -- is in part a bid for the support and the readers they need to expand the site further. It's also a bid for successors. "If the regime kills us," explains Ladan matter-of-factly, 'we hope someone else will take up the task.'"

"'Cool' anti-Semitism" (Caroline Glick, The Jerusalem Post, 2006/01/20)
Hollywood II: "It's official: Anti-Semitism is "in." The decision to award the Palestinian film Paradise Now the Golden Globes Award for best foreign film tells us that Palestinian terror against Israelis has become so acceptable that it is now Hollywood kitsch. The sight of the Jewish American diva Sarah Jessica Parker, of Sex in the City fame, excitedly announcing that a film which glorifies the mass murder of Jews in Israel was the big winner for 2005 only served to demonstrate how deep this trivialization of evil now runs." (See also: "Suicide bomber film wins honour at Golden Globes" (Arthur Spiegelman, Reuters, 2006/01/17))

"Imagine the scene: gay cowboys lasso oiled-up drug company baddies" (Gerard Baker, The Times, 2006/01/20)
Hollywood I: "This is Message Year in Hollywood. Fed up with the direction that America is taking — all this God, patriotism, traditional family, War on Terror stuff, America’s entertainment elite have taken the courageous decision to lead the fightback from the pool decks of Beverly Hills and the penthouses of Manhattan. Voting with their Armani tuxedos and their Isaac Mizrahi gowns, they’re going to take back their country from the warmongers and religious fanatics. ...
The Constant Gardener is a veritable frenzy of paranoia from start to finish, with the notorious Big Pharma in the villain’s role. And even some prominent liberals have recoiled a bit from the message of Syriana, that American foreign policy is driven by a noxious alliance of oil companies and foreign dictators. (Funny, isn’t it, how US entertainment companies think the motives of US corporate giants are always impure except, presumably, those of US entertainment companies?)
And having churned out all this bilious nonsense, Hollywood executives shake their heads in puzzlement as to why Americans have stopped going to the movies. Sure, it may have something to do with ticket prices and the easy availability of giant home entertainment systems. But having an 86in screen in the kitchen didn’t stop millions of people from going to see The Passion of the Christ or Narnia. Nor, lest you misunderstand me and think this is a plea for Hollywood to turn itself into the entertainment arm of militant Christianity, did it stop them going to see King Kong or Shrek?"

"'Offensive' remarks taken straight from Koran, defence says" (Sean O’Neill, The Times, 2006/01/20)
"Copies of the Koran were handed to the jurors in the Abu Hamza trial yesterday as his defence argued that some of the cleric’s “offensive” statements were drawn directly from Islam’s holy book.
Edward Fitzgerald, QC, for the defence, said that Abu Hamza’s interpretation of the Koran was that it imposed an obligation on Muslims to do jihad and fight in the defence of their religion. He said that the Crown case against the former imam of Finsbury Park Mosque was “simplistic in the extreme”.
He added: 'It is said he was preaching murder, but he was actually preaching from the Koran itself.'"

Thursday, January 19, 2006

News and commentary:

"Arab media shun al-Qaeda message" (Sebastian Usher, BBC News, 2006/01/19)
"It is the first new tape said to carry the voice of the al-Qaeda leader for just over a year.
During that time, two other figures have taken Osama Bin Laden's place as the leading voices of radical Islamic militancy.
They are al-Qaeda's number two, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and the Islamic militant leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
Both have released communications this month and both have received short shrift in much of the Arab media, giving a sense that they may be losing ground in their propaganda struggle. ...
Although al-Jazeera led with the latest messages from Zawahiri and Zarqawi - just as they have done with the tape purportedly from Osama Bin Laden - a number of other Arab broadcasters did not broadcast the material at all.
TV stations in Iraq ignored them almost completely. The criticism directed by Zarqawi at Iraqi Sunnis who participated in the recent elections drew strong criticism from Sunni politicians. ...
The growing distinction drawn in sections of the Arab media between what is seen as acceptable - some of the insurgency in Iraq, political moves by Islamist groups - and the unacceptable - Islamic militants' targeting of civilians - has been underlined by the coverage given to his latest statement and that of Zarqawi.
Al-Qaeda's propaganda war for the hearts and minds of the Arab masses is clearly facing increasing obstacles - from outright denunciation in the Arab media to studied indifference."

"Bin Laden Warns of Attacks, Offers Truce" (Lee Keath, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/19)
John Hinderaker: "It doesn't take a genius to see that things are going very badly for bin Laden and al Qaeda. Where does he turn for hope? To American opinion polls -- which, of course, he reads very selectively. Still, think how encouraging it must be to him to read about calls for withdrawal from Iraq by Congressmen like Jack Murtha. It's hard to see much daylight between Murtha's position and bin Laden's: we're losing in Iraq; the American people are tired of the conflict; Iraq is a breeding ground for terrorists; and al Qaeda is less likely to attack us if we just give up and go home. Given his isolation, bin Laden could be excused for believing that he's just one Congressional election away from salvation.":
"Al-Jazeera on Thursday aired an audiotape purportedly from
Osama bin Laden, who says al-Qaida is making preparations for attacks in the United States but offering a truce "with fair conditions."
Later Thursday, the CIA authenticated the voice on the tape as Osama bin Laden, an agency official said. ...
The voice on the tape, purported to be bin Laden, said he was directing his message to the American people after polls showed that "an overwhelming majority of you want the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq but (Bush) opposed that desire."
He said insurgents were winning the conflict in Iraq and warned that security measures in the West and the United States could not prevent attacks there.
"The proof of that is the explosions you have seen in the capitals of European nations," he said "The delay in similar operations happening in America has not been because of failure to break through your security measures. The operations are under preparation and you will see them in your homes the minute they are through (with preparations), with God's permission."
The speaker did not spell out conditions for a truce in the excerpts aired by Al-Jazeera.
"We do not mind offering you a long-term truce with fair conditions that we adhere to," he said. 'We are a nation that God has forbidden to lie and cheat. So both sides can enjoy security and stability under this truce so we can build Iraq and Afghanistan, which have been destroyed in this war.'" (See also: "Full Text of the bin Laden Tape" (AP/The New York Times, 2006/01/19))

"The Case for Invading Iran" (Thomas Holsinger, Winds of Change.NET, 2006/01/19)
"America has come to another turning point – whether our inaction will again engulf the world and us in a nightmare comparable to World War Two. This will entail loss of our freedom as the price of domestic security measures against terrorist weapons of mass destruction, though we might suffer nuclear attack before implementing those measures. The only effective alternative is American use of pre-emptive military force against an imminent threat – Iranian nuclear weapons, which requires that we invade Iran and overthrow its mullah regime as we did to Iraq’s Baathist regime. ...
Iran seems to be in a pre-revolutionary state such that its mullah regime will collapse from purely domestic reasons within a few years even if we do nothing, but by then it will have openly had nuclear weapons for several years, possibly used them against Israel and/or been pre-emptively nuked by Israel, and widespread nuclear proliferation will have started with all the horrors that will bring.
Only military force THIS YEAR can prevent this nightmare. Bombing alone won’t do it – it will only postpone things, and Iran’s mullahs won’t just sit there while we’re bombing them. War is a two-way street. They have spent years preparing for this conflict, and will try to stop Persian Gulf oil exports. There will also be an instant massive uprising by Iranian-led Shiite militias in southern Iraq. ...
The only effective way to stop the mullahs from building nukes, while minimizing our losses from their counter-attacks, is to overthrow their regime by invasion and conquest as we did against Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq."

"Denmark: Moderate Muslims Oppose Imams" (Hjörtur Gudmundsson, The Brussels Journal, 2006/01/19)
A positive update on the Danish cartoon affair. It should be added that 49 Danish Muslims published an article in Jyllands-Posten on Monday, defending the paper and protesting against the strong reactions from radicals. From an article in Svenska Dagbladet:

"'It's a problem every time an Imam sounds as if he is speaking for all Danish Muslims, because Muslims differ as much as Christians... No one should restrict the freedom of Jyllands-Posten, not regarding the prophet Mohammed either', says for example the writer Adil Erdem, member of the board in the Danish Pen-club and one of the 49 Danism Muslims protesting against being represented by indignant Muslim individuals."

"Instead of the Danish government surrendering to Muslim radicals, moderate Danish Muslims are now speaking out against the extremists. A group of Muslims in the Danish city of Århus intend to organize a network of Muslims who do not want to be represented by fundamentalist Danish imams or others who preach the Sharia laws and oppression of women. “There is a large group of Muslims in this city who want to live in a secular society and adhere to the principle that religion is an issue between them and God and not something that should involve society,” said Bünyamin Simsek, a city councillor and one of the organizers. Århus witnessed severe riots after the publication of the cartoons in the newspaper Jyllands-Posten last Autumn.
In Copenhagen, too, moderate Muslims are speaking out. Hadi Kahn, an IT consultant and the chairman of the Organization of Pakistani Students in Denmark (OPSA), describes himself as a modern Muslim living in a Western society. He says that he does not feel he is being represented by the Muslim groups. When he goes to the mosque for Friday prayers he says the imam does not say much that is useful for him. “We have no need for imams in Denmark. They do not do anything for us,” he says. According to Mr Kahn the imams are not in touch with Danish society. He says too few of them speak Danish and too few of them are opposed to stoning as a punishment." (See also: "Scandinavian Update: Israeli Boycott, Muslim Cartoons" (Hjörtur Gudmundsson, The Brussels Journal, 2006/01/14))

"Report says Indonesia killed 180,000 in E.Timor" (Reuters/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/19)
wretchard: "The problem of what to do with chaos in the Third World is the one thing to which the pop doctrines of multiculturalism and transnationalism had no answer. The system of double-accounting, where Washington news was highlighted while events resulting in hundreds of thousands of Third World deaths was relegated to the back pages was the outcome of a system which knew how to the critique the one but not the other.":
"Indonesia killed up to 180,000 East Timorese through massacres, torture and starvation during its 24-year occupation, a report to be handed to the United Nations has found, an Australian daily said on Thursday.
Napalm and chemical weapons were used to poison food and water and some victims were burned or buried while still alive, and others sexually mutilated, the Australian newspaper quoted the report saying.
It said 90 percent of the 180,000 deaths -- almost a third of the pre-invasion population -- were caused by starvation and disease, saying starvation was used as a weapon.
"Rape, sexual slavery and sexual violence were tools used as part of the campaign designed to inflict a deep experience of terror, powerlessness and hopelessness upon pro-independence supporters," the paper quoted the report saying.
The Australian said the study was a United Nations document, but it was prepared by East Timor's Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation."

"France defends right to nuclear reply to terrorism" (Elizabeth Pineau, Reuters/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/19)
BackSpin notes that Reuters suddenly has rediscovered the T-word and John J. Miller points out that the reactions would probably be somewhat more hysterical if it was Bush that used the N-word: "I'm curious: What would Chirac and his EU buddies have said if Bush was talking up the nuclear option? Something tells me that we'd have to suffer through another round of tiresome condemnations about cowboy bravado and imperial hyperpower.":
"France said on Thursday it would be ready to use nuclear weapons against any state that carried out a terrorist attack against it, reaffirming the need for its nuclear deterrent.
Deflecting criticism of France's costly nuclear arms program,
President Jacques Chirac said security came at a price and France must be able to hit back hard at a hostile state's centers of power and its "capacity to act."
He said there was no change in France's overall policy, which rules out the use of nuclear weapons in a military conflict. But his speech pointed to a change of emphasis to underline the growing threat France perceives from terrorism.
"The leaders of states who would use terrorist means against us, as well as those who would consider using in one way or another weapons of mass destruction, must understand that they would lay themselves open to a firm and adapted response on our part," Chirac said during a visit to a nuclear submarine base in northwestern France.
"This response could be a conventional one. It could also be of a different kind."
Chirac, who is commander-in-chief of the armed forces, said all of France's nuclear forces had been configured with the new strategy in mind and the number of nuclear warheads on French nuclear submarines had been reduced to allow targeted strikes.
It was the first time he had so clearly linked the threat of a nuclear response to a terrorist attack."

"Q&A: Justus Reid Weiner on Palestinian Christians" (Collin Hansen, ChristianityToday, 2006/01/19)
"Weiner is scholar-in-residence at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and recently published Human Rights of Christians in Palestinian Society."
"How has the situation for Christians in Palestinian society changed since the Oslo Accords in 1993?
Before the Oslo accords, which were intended to empower Palestinians to govern themselves, Israel was in control on a day-by-day basis in the West Bank and Gaza. People could walk the streets. The presence of soldiers and local police was sufficient that people felt secure in their houses, churches, and businesses. Sure, there was a background of knowing your place and knowing where to back off, but people lived normal lives. They worked. They taught. They studied. They conducted their family affairs.
Anarchy has taken over since 1994, when the Palestinian Authority moved in. Everyone suffers in anarchy, but the weak and those who can be targeted at little or no price suffer the worst. A lot of the attacks on Christians are not ideological. They're not intended for someone who's handing out Bibles or trying to live a Christian life or speaking to people about Jesus. People see the Christians as weak, as not having connections in the entourage first of Yasser Arafat and now of Abu Mazen, as not having the economic power they once had. If they're weak and anything goes, why not burn their cars, steal their land, harass the women? You can get away with it with the Christians. ...
The Palestinian Christians don't see any future there. If they're not sitting on their suitcases, they're already living in Berlin or Chile or Belize or Toronto or Detroit. A lot of these cities have more Arab Christians than the cities that they came from, like Bethlehem, Ramallah, Taibe, and others." (Hat tip: Dhimmi Watch. UPDATE: See also "Christians are Leaving the Middle East" (Zlatica Hoke, VOA News, 2006/01/17))

"U.S. Raid Killed Qaeda Leaders, Pakistanis Say" (Carlotta Gall and Douglas Jehl, The New York Times, 2006/01/19)
"Two senior members of Al Qaeda and the son-in-law of its No. 2 leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, were among those killed in the American airstrikes in remote northeastern Pakistan last week, two Pakistani officials said here on Wednesday.
The bodies of the men have not been recovered, but the two officials said the Pakistani authorities had been able to establish through intelligence sources the names of three of those killed in the strikes, and maybe a fourth. ...
If any or all were indeed killed, it would be a stinging blow to Al Qaeda's operations, said the American officials, who were granted anonymity because they were not authorized by their agencies to speak for attribution. They said all four men named by the Pakistani officials were among the top level of Al Qaeda's inner circle of leadership. ...
At least one of the men believed by the Pakistani officials to have been killed, an Egyptian known here as Abu Khabab al-Masri, is on the United States' most-wanted list with a $5 million reward for help in his capture. ...
Another Egyptian, known by the alias Abu Ubayda al-Misri, was also believed killed, the Pakistani officials said. He was the chief of insurgent operations in the southern Afghan province of Kunar, which borders Bajaur in Pakistan, the area where the airstrikes occurred, according to one of the Pakistani officials."

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

News and commentary:

"Afghans Protest Pakistan After Bombing" (Naimatullah Sarhadi, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/18)
"SPINBOLDAK, Afghanistan - More than 5,000 people chanting "Death to Pakistan!" marched through two Afghan border towns Wednesday to protest a suicide bombing they blame on the neighboring country.
The blast at a wrestling match on Monday killed 21 people, making it the deadliest suicide attack since U.S.-led forces ousted the Taliban in 2001. No one has claimed responsibility, and a purported spokesman for the Taliban rebels denied involvement.
"Death to Pakistan! Death to al-Qaida! Death to the Taliban!" the protesters shouted as they marched to the towering Friendship Gate that marks Waish's border crossing with Pakistan."

"Guantanamo prisoners tied to London bomb probe" (Jane Sutton, Reuters, 2006/01/18)
Michelle Malkin: "Good to keep in mind when the hysterical Gulag Card-playing crowd argues that Gitmo should be shut down and detainees all should be freed because they no longer have any intelligence value.":
"Prisoners at the Guantanamo base in Cuba provided important information in connection with last summer's London transit bombings that the United States shared with authorities in the United Kingdom, the general in charge of the prison said.
The July 7 suicide bombings by four young British Islamists on three underground trains and a double-decker bus in central London during the morning rush hour killed 52 people and wounded more than 700 others.
"After the attacks in London, there were a number of questions asked trying to understand who these people were and where they had been," Army Maj. Gen. Jay Hood, who oversees the Guantanamo detention operation, said in an interview late on Wednesday.
"A significant number of the men we're holding here, a number, have lived in London, have lived in the United Kingdom," Hood said.
'And so where we could answer their questions and provide background on movements, travels, financing, communications, means of communications, recruitment, training, that sort of thing, I think we have played an important role.'"

"U.S. Strike Killed Al Qaeda Bomb Maker" (Habibullah Khan and Brian Ross, ABC News, 2006/01/18)
"ABC News has learned that al Qaeda's master bomb maker and chemical weapons expert was one of the men killed in last week's U.S. missile attack in eastern Pakistan.
Midhat Mursi, 52, also known as Abu Khabab al-Masri, was identified by Pakistani authorities as one of three known al Qaeda leaders present at an apparent terror summit conference in the village of Damadola.
The United States had posted a $5 million reward for Mursi's capture. He is described by U.S. authorities as the man who ran al Qaeda's infamous Derunta training camp in Afghanistan, where he used dogs and other animals as subjects of experiments with poison and chemicals.
"This is extraordinarily important," said former FBI agent Jack Cloonan, an ABC News consultant, who was the senior agent on the FBI's al Qaeda squad. 'He's the man who trained the shoe bomber, Richard Reid and Zacharias Moussaoui, as well as hundreds of others.'"

"The Iran Charade, Part II" (Charles Krauthammer, The Washington Post, 2006/01/18)
Iran II: "The only sanctions that might conceivably have any effect would be a boycott of Iranian oil. No one is even talking about that, because no one can bear the thought of the oil shock that would follow, taking 4.2 million barrels a day off the market, from a total output of about 84 million barrels.
The threat works in reverse. It is the Iranians who have the world over a barrel. On Jan. 15, Iran's economy minister warned that Iran would retaliate for any sanctions by cutting its exports to "raise oil prices beyond levels the West expects." A full cutoff could bring $100 oil and plunge the world into economic crisis.
Which is one of the reasons the Europeans are so mortified by the very thought of a military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities. The problem is not just that they are spread out and hardened, making them difficult to find and to damage sufficiently to seriously set back Iran's program.
The problem that mortifies the Europeans is what Iran might do after such an attack -- not just cut off its oil exports but shut down the Strait of Hormuz by firing missiles at tankers or scuttling its vessels to make the strait impassable. It would require an international armada led by the United States to break such a blockade.
Such consequences -- serious economic disruption and possible naval action -- are something a cocooned, aging, post-historic Europe cannot even contemplate. Which is why the Europeans have had their heads in the sand for two years. And why they will spend the little time remaining -- before a group of apocalyptic madmen go nuclear -- putting their heads back in the sand. And congratulating themselves on allied solidarity as they do so in unison."

"Doing nothing in Iran is not an option" (Simon Heffer, The Daily Telegraph, 2006/01/18)
Iran I: "One can foresee all too easily a situation in which the rest of the world, unable to agree how to proceed against this menace, leaves Israel, as the stated target, feeling vulnerable. And anyone who thinks that Israel is going to allow another avowedly hostile state to build a nuclear arsenal to use against it has not been paying attention these past few decades.
Any military action against Iran, whatever it is and whoever takes it, is likely to be provocative to the wider Islamic community - but none is likely to be quite so internationally combustible as a unilateral decision by Israel to bomb - by conventional or possibly other means - Iran. This seems to leave only one feasible option, which is for a United Nations-endorsed series of air strikes on suspected nuclear installations in Iran, made after due and reasonable warning and only as a last resort. All that must be made clear - but it must also be made clear, by the united powers of the United Nations, that any insistence by Mr Ahmadinejad on pursuing his present policy will be met with such a response.
Whether this happy diplomatic state can be achieved looks, for the moment, unlikely. Our own Foreign Secretary has a distinct record of failure in this specific matter. With Tony Blair imminently preparing a reshuffle, he should ask whether Mr Straw is up to the intensely difficult job that now awaits him. The scope for British leadership on this question, given America's perceived problems in the Middle East, ought to be considerable. However, for the moment we are punching below our weight.
Indeed, the present impasse with Iran is in no small part the consequence of misguided policy by the Foreign Office, in concert with other European powers, over the past four or five years. Britain is, to all intents and purposes, at the mercy of world events, but it can still choose whether to be a spectator, or a player."

"An MP can fawn to fascists - but not miaow on TV" (Michael Gove, The Times, 2006/01/18)
Gove on George Galloway's participation in Big Brother:
"So you can fawn to fascists, work with sanctions-busters and shed tears for the collapse of totalitarianism and still be considered a worthy MP. But miaow in public and you’re beyond the pale. It’s OK to prostrate yourself before a mass-murderer, but go on all fours before Rula Lenska, and that’s it.
My sympathy for George, however, doesn’t just extend to the curious way in which he is being vilified for what must be among the very least of his sins. I also feel for him in his moments of enforced silence. Apparently George went into the BB house only to engage a wider audience in politics. Only to find after he was in that the broadcasting rules on balance required his political comments to be bleeped out because there’s no one there to counter them.
It’s understandable that George was unaware of these rules. He certainly wasn’t being naive in imagining that he could use Channel 4 as an unfettered platform for propagandising. After all, almost everyone else in the Channel 4 stable seems free to do so.
Channel 4’s spin-off, More4, has just finished a week of programs on the Iraq War that were so relentlessly anti-Blair, anti-Bush and anti-West that the new channel might as well have been called MichaelMoore4. On Channel 4 News (or Clause 4 News, as it might be renamed) Lindsey Hilsum presents a view of international affairs that does not take a genius to recognise is just a shade left of centre. And even Channel 4’s schools programmes betray a particular worldview. The series History in Action: Heroes or Villains, which is aimed at 11 to 14-year-olds studying GCSE history, is accompanied by teachers’ notes encouraging students to design posters celebrating Mao’s Long March, write a sympathetic obituary for the Communist leader Ho Chi Minh and write in defence of Yassir Arafat." (See also: "Catty Galloway 'made me cringe'" (The Daily Mail, 2006/01/13))

"Warm and Fuzzy TV, Brought to You by Hamas" (Craig S. Smith, The New York Times, 2006/01/18)
"Hey kids, it's Uncle Hazim time!
Hazim Sharawi, whose stage name is Uncle Hazim, is a quiet, doe-eyed young man who has an easy way with children and will soon preside over a children's television show here on which he'll cavort with men in larger-than-life, fake-fur animal suits on the Gaza Strip's newest television station, Al Aksa TV.
But Captain Kangaroo this is not. The station, named for Islam's third holiest site, is owned by Hamas, the people who helped make suicide bombing a household term. ...
It will eventually feature a sort of Islamic MTV, with Hamas-produced music videos using footage from the group's fights with Israeli troops. There will even be a talent search show, a distant echo of "American Idol."
But its biggest star will be Mr. Sharawi, whose radio show for children was the Voice of Al Aksa's biggest hit. ...
As he describes it, his television show, which begins in a few weeks, will teach children the basics of militant Palestinian politics - the disputed status of Jerusalem, Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and the Palestinian refugees' demand for a right to return to the lands they lost to Israel in the 1948 war - without showing the violence that Hamas's pursuit of those goals entails."

Tuesday, January 17, 2006

News and commentary:

"Hostage American reporter Jill Carroll..."
(Al-Jazeera, 2006/01/17)
"Hostage American reporter Jill Carroll appears in a silent 20-second video aired Tuesday, Jan. 17, 2006 by Al-Jazeera television, which said her abductors gave the United States 72 hours to free female prisoners in Iraq or she would be killed."

"Iraqi Captors Threaten Death of Hostage" (Qassim Abdul-Zahra, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/17)
"Hostage American reporter Jill Carroll appeared in a silent 20-second video aired Tuesday by Al-Jazeera television, which said her abductors gave the United States 72 hours to free female prisoners in Iraq or she would be killed.
The tape showed the 28-year-old reporter sitting in front of a white background and speaking, but her voice could not be heard. On the tape, Carroll is pale and appears tired, and her long, straight, brown hair is parted in the middle and pulled back from her face.
Al-Jazeera would not tell The Associated Press how it received the tape, but the station issued its own statement calling for Carroll's release. An Al-Jazeera producer said no militant group's name was attached to the message that was sent to the station with the silent tape on Tuesday.
However, a still photograph of Carroll from the videotape that later appeared on the Al-Jazeera Web site carried a logo in the bottom right corner that read "The Revenge Brigade." The group was not known from previous claims of responsibility of violence in Iraq."

"Pakistan: Terrorists Killed in U.S. Strike" (Riaz Khan, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/17)
"Pakistani provincial authorities said Tuesday four or five foreign terrorists were killed in the purported U.S. missile strike that has severely strained relations with this Muslim nation, a key ally in President Bush's war on terror. ...
Eighteen residents, including women and children, were also killed in the strike, the provincial government said Tuesday.
Pakistani intelligence officials have said the target of the attack was al-Qaida's No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahri, who they said was invited to a dinner celebrating an Islamic holiday in the village but sent aides instead.
U.S. counterterrorism officials, however, have not ruled out that
Osama bin Laden's chief lieutenant was killed.
In the first official confirmation by Pakistani authorities that militants were killed, the administration of Pakistan's semiautonomous tribal regions bordering Afghanistan said in a statement that the four or five bodies of "foreign terrorists" were taken away "by their companions."
As a result, a Pakistani intelligence official said, authorities do not know the nationalities of the foreigners killed. The provincial authorities' statement did not identify the dead militants, who it said were among 10 to 12 extremists at the dinner.
But a counterterrorism official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the subject's sensitivity, said several of those killed were believed to be Egyptian."

"The Great Train Razzia" (Nidra Poller, Tech Central Station, 2006/01/17)
"French opinion makers are against the clash of civilizations the same way they are against the war in Iraq: fervently sure of their own moral superiority. But reality has a way of its own, and the Great Train Razzia that rang in the New Year on the Côte d’Azur is a smashing illustration of the clash of civilizations.
One hundred drunk and disorderly “youths” from the “sensitive neighborhoods” outside of Marseille were let loose in a train carrying revelers from Nice to Lyon via Marseille. They vandalized the train, terrorized the passengers, stole from them, sexually assaulted several young women, made convincing death threats and, when all these wicked deeds were done, pulled the emergency brake and jumped the train on the outskirts of Marseille.
It took several days for the story to break. Apparently management of the state-owned SNCF railway system and local police officials thought they could avoid bad publicity by keeping the information to themselves. Even more surprising: no local journalist scooped the story, no eyewitnesses came forward to reveal it, the media blissfully announced that New Year’s Eve had been surprisingly calm -- only 425 cars torched and 13 gendarmes injured -- that the state of emergency was lifted.
The news broke on the 4th: 600 passengers returning at dawn from Nice to Lyon were terrorized for three hours by a gang of “youths.” As the bare details filtered through several layers of protective screening, it became clear that a major clash of civilizations…in fact a head on crash of civilizations had taken place on the 1st day of the year 2006. Joyful partygoers on the star-studded Riviera were delivered into the hands of a hundred drunken marauders.
Every official involved in the incident behaved stupidly, no one communicated, no one took responsibility, and the result would be comical if it were not so ominous." (See also: "Gang terrorizes train in France" (Marc Burleigh, AFP/The Washington Times, 2006/01/05))

"Suicide bomber film wins honour at Golden Globes" (Arthur Spiegelman, Reuters, 2006/01/17)
Robert Spencer: "Hany Abu-Assad may have been surprised, but I certainly am not. What could be more fashionable among the glitterati these days than the glorification of terrorist murderers and the hatred of our own culture and civilization?":
"Palestinian filmmaker Hany Abu-Assad was perhaps the most surprised man at the Golden Globes on Monday as his drama of suicide bombers crossing into Israel, "Paradise Now," was named the year's best foreign language film. ...
In his acceptance speech, Abu-Assad made a plea for a Palestinian state, saying he saw the Golden Globe as "a recognition that the Palestinians deserve their liberty and equality unconditionally.
Winning the Globe also gives "Paradise Now" a major boost in its fight for an Oscar on March 5. Its next hurdle is to become one of the five foreign films nominated for an Academy Award on Jan 31. No Palestinian film has ever been nominated. ...
"Paradise Now" wants the viewer to understand the mind-set that produces such acts as suicide bombings -- because, as Abu-Assad says, to understand is a first step forward. ...
Abu-Assad says he believes that impotence fuels the bombings. And his characters' words underlie that thought as they go through their daily lives in occupied territory that the film presents as an airless, hermetically sealed prison.
"Under the occupation, we're already dead ... In this life we are dead anyway ... If we can't live as equals, at least we can die as equals" are typical refrains in the film."

"Iran's Nukes, Europe's Follies" (Amir Taheri, New York Post, 2006/01/17)
"European-style appeasement has encouraged Tehran's most radical faction, helping bring Ahmadinejad to power. All the diplomatic gesticulations to follow will only compound that effect.
The Islamic Republic has had three years to prepare for whatever sanctions the Security Council might impose. It has also signed $70 billion in oil and gas contracts with China and $30 billion in arms and industrial contracts with Russia, ensuring that one or both would veto any harsh resolution against Iran.
This is one of those regimes that will not stop until they hit something hard. Why should they, when they can pursue their objectives cost-free? Soft power may work — if it is backed by hard power. Yet Europe has, once again, made it clear that it would oppose even the threat of hard power.
As things stand, all those concerned in this carnival of absurdities have reason to be happy: The Europeans get rid of the hot potato, the Bush administration finds a diplomatic fig-leaf to cover its lack of an Iran policy, the Russians sell their arms, the Chinese get their oil and gas and the Islamists in Tehran accelerate whatever mischief they might be up to in the nuclear domain.
But the problem remains unresolved. Down the road, the West may well find that it would have to use far more than the mere threat of hard power to restrain Tehran's messianic ambitions — a much costlier bill than would have been the case three years ago."

"Let's give Iran some of its own medicine" (Mark Steyn, The Daily Telegraph, 2006/01/17)
"Jack Straw has been at pains to emphasise that no military action against Iran is being contemplated by him or anybody else, but in a sign that he's losing patience with the mullahs Mr Straw's officials have indicated that they're prepared to consider the possibility of possibly considering the preparation of a possible motion on sanctions for the UN Security Council to consider the possibility of considering. ...
But, if I were President Ahmadinejad or the wackier ayatollahs, I'd be mulling over the kid glove treatment from Jack Straw and Co and figuring: wow, if this is the respect we get before the nukes are fully operational, imagine how they'll be treating us this time next year. Incidentally, the assumption in the European press that the nuclear payload won't be ready to fly for three or four years is laughably optimistic. ...
And Jack Straw's mullah-coddling is particularly unworthy in that, insofar as Iran has a strategy, the president's chief adviser, Hassan Abbassi, has based it on the premise that "Britain is the mother of all evils" - the evils being America, Australia, Israel, the Gulf states and even Canada and New Zealand, all of which are the malign progeny of the British Empire.
"We have established a department that will take care of England," said Mr Abbassi last May. "England's demise is on our agenda." Apropos the ayatollahs, England could at least return the compliment."

"Iran breakthrough may be in sight" (Fraser Nelson, The Scotsman, 2006/01/17)
"Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, said last night that his position is "very close" to that of the United States and Britain. And it appeared that he could hold the key to a resolution when Iran's ambassador to Russia, Gholamreza Ansari, welcomed an offer to move the Iranian uranium enrichment programme to Russia.
Such a move would mean Iran, which is developing a missile which could reach Israel, could not acquire enough material for a bomb. ...
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) - the UN's nuclear watchdog - was last night preparing a draft document saying it can make no more progress amid Iran's intransigence and asks the UN Security Council to take a decision.
Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the IAEA, said in a magazine interview that Iran could acquire a nuclear weapon later this year.
"If they have the nuclear material and they have a parallel weaponisation programme along the way, they are really not very far - a few months - from a weapon," he told Newsweek." (See also: "Diplomacy and Force" (Newsweek, 2006/01/23))

Monday, January 16, 2006

News and commentary:

"It's Curtains for al-Qaida" (Christopher Hitchens, Slate, 2006/01/16)
"The best news from Iraq this year would certainly be the long New York Times report of Jan. 12 on the murderous strife between local "insurgents" and al-Qaida infiltrators. This was also among the best news from last year. ...
In Washington, in public, but unquoted, Ahmad Chalabi said last fall that it would be the Sunnis who would get rid of Zarqawi. Now we read (in the Jan. 12 New York Times) of members of the Sunni "Islamic Army" directly confronting al-Qaida's gangsters on the streets of Taji, a town to the north of Baghdad, with appreciable casualties on both sides. ...
If all goes even reasonably well, and if a combination of elections and prosperity is enough to draw more mainstream Sunnis into politics and away from Baathist nostalgia, it will have been proved that Bin-Ladenism can be taken on — and openly defeated — in a major Middle Eastern country. And not just defeated but discredited. Humiliated. Is there anyone who does not think that this is a historic prize worth having? Worth fighting for, in fact?" (See also: "Local Insurgents Tell of Clashes With Al Qaeda's Forces in Iraq" (Sabrina Tavernese and Dexter Filkins, The New York Times, 2006/01/12))

"Islamic group urges Catholic school to move to Muslim faith" (Hilary Duncanson, The Scotsman, 2006/01/16)
"An Islamic campaign group has called for a Catholic primary school to be based on the Muslim faith.
The Campaign for Muslim Schools said 90 per cent of pupils at St Albert's Primary, in the Pollokshields area of Glasgow, are Muslim, yet children are having to take part in Catholic rituals like saying the Lord's Prayer and attending mass.
Osama Saeed, co-ordinator of the alliance of Glasgow's main mosques and Muslim organisations, said he could see no reason why the main faith of the school should not change.
He said: "Clearly the parents of that area find a faith school, even if it is of another denomination, preferable to a secular one. But surely it should be possible for them to have one that is relevant to their own faith.
"To move towards this would be a fantastic example of good faith - in more ways than one - on the part of the Church."
The call came just days after Scotland's most senior Catholic, Cardinal Keith O'Brien, sparked controversy by stating that Scotland's core faith was Christianity and that other faiths should recognise they were 'living in Scotland as a Christian country.'"

"Iraq: 99 Percent of Dec. 15 Vote Was Valid" (Patrick Quinn, AP/My Way, 2006/01/16)
"Iraq's electoral commission ruled Monday that more than 99 percent of the ballots from the Dec. 15 parliamentary elections are valid, opening the way for a new government to start coming together.
Final election results have been delayed by fraud complaints mainly lodged by the Sunni Arab minority, and groups looking for a political edge in dealing with the Shiite Muslim majority could still make further protests and hold up the naming of new leaders for two or three months. ...
Iraq's electoral commission announced it was throwing out votes from 227 ballot boxes because of fraud, a tiny percentage - less than 1 percent - of the total vote that shouldn't affect the overall results.
"These boxes will not have an affect on the preliminary results that we issued last month," said Adel al-Lami, general director of the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq."

"Big Security Council Members Agree on Iran" (Beth Gardiner, AP/Yahoo! News, 2006/01/16)
"Moscow and Beijing joined the U.S. and its European allies in demanding Monday that Iran fully suspend its nuclear program, while
Vladimir Putin held out hope for a compromise, saying Tehran might agree to move its uranium enrichment program to Russia.
China, Russia, France, the United States, Germany, and Britain expressed "serious concerns" about Iran's resumption of small-scale uranium enrichment, Britain's Foreign Office said.
The powers stopped short of referring the issue to the U.N. Security Council, which could impose sanctions, instead calling for an emergency board meeting of the International Atomic Energy on Feb. 2-3 to discuss the issue. The 35-nation IAEA board could itself refer the issue to the Security Council.
The stepped up diplomatic activity came nearly a week after Iran removed U.N. seals at its main uranium enrichment plant and resumed research on nuclear fuel after a two-year hiatus."

"Iran 'could go nuclear within three years'" (Con Coughlin, The Daily Telegraph, 2006/01/16)
"Iranian scientists are expected to start work this week on the highly technical task of enriching tons of uranium to a level where it could be used in the production of atomic weapons, say the latest reports received by western intelligence agencies. ...
Intelligence sources say Iran will begin feeding converted uranium into 164 centrifuges at Natanz this week. That could enable it to create enriched uranium of sufficient quality for nuclear weapons production within three years.
Previous estimates of the minimum time required had ranged from five to 10 years. ...
"Iran has spent the past 20 years scouring the world to acquire all the means of production and materials necessary for building nuclear weapons," a senior western intelligence officer told The Daily Telegraph.
'The b