American nuclear scientists tell Bush to ratify test treaty
Julian Borger, The Guardian, August 1, 2002
The US National Academy of Sciences issued a report yesterday strongly backing US ratification of the comprehensive test ban treaty (CTBT), in a rebuff to the Bush administration's policy of shelving the agreement.
The report was compiled over two years by a panel that included some of the country's leading nuclear scientists and the former commander of US forces in the Pacific, Charles Larson. It addressed the major security concerns raised by the Senate when it refused to ratify the treaty in 1999, and on each issue judged that the US would face "a more dangerous world" without the treaty.
Blair is jumping the gun in backing Bush's war on logic
Hugo Young, The Guardian, August 1, 2002
If President George W Bush goes to war against Iraq, the ensuing conflict will be without a close modern precedent. Each of the main western wars of the last 20 years, however controversial, was perceivable as a response to manifest aggression. The Falklands war in 1982 was one such case, the 1991 Gulf war another. The military actions in Bosnia and Kosovo were conducted for the defence of ethnic groups facing aggression at the heart of Europe. Each had a measure of international approval.
A war to unseat Saddam Hussein would proceed on a different basis, encompassed in the seductive word "pre-emptive". The attack would be unleashed to stop Saddam doing something he has not yet started to do with weaponry whose configuration and global, or even regional, potency is hard to determine but might be serious. The Pentagon civilians pressing the case envisage a gratuitous attack - one not preceded by an act of aggression - by one sovereign country on another to get rid of a leader who happens to worry and enrage them.
Iraq: Why not do nothing?
Marc Lynch, Christian Science Monitor, July 31, 2002
War supporters respond to doubters with a seemingly irresistible argument: What is the alternative? Do you really want Mr. Hussein to get weapons of mass destruction and give them to terrorists or threaten his neighbors? This objection is far less overwhelming than it may appear. Most commentators seem too cowed by the array of politicians and pundits favoring war to make the obvious response: Do nothing.
The view from Baghdad
Graham T. Allison, Washington Post, July 31, 2002
As preparation for war against Iraq intensifies, the time has come to pause and consider the view from Baghdad. Conclusions from such an exercise are not comforting. But to strike without thinking seriously about what Saddam Hussein could do to us would be irresponsible.
America forced me out, says UN human rights commissioner
Oliver Burkeman, The Guardian, July 31, 2002
The UN's outgoing human rights commissioner, Mary Robinson, says she was prevented from continuing in the job because of pressure from the US, which she has accused of neglecting human rights during the war against terrorism. "I am not somebody just to walk away," Ms Robinson said. "If I had been hard-pressed, I would have stayed, [but] there seems to have been strong resistance from just one country."
UN keeps damning report on Afghan massacre secret
David Usborne, The Independent, July 31, 2002
The United Nations went into abrupt reverse yesterday and said it no longer intended to release a report compiled by a team of UN officials who visited the site where a US warplane attacked a wedding party in Afghanistan on 1 July. The change of tack by the UN was apparently the result of pressure from within its own hierarchy, particularly in Afghanistan itself, and from the US not to release the report that allegedly contradicts claims made by the US about the circumstances of the attack.
In attacks on Bush, Kerry sets himself apart
James Dao, New York Times, July 31, 2002
Secretary of State Colin L. Powell was cruising through a Senate hearing on arms control, charming his Democratic adversaries and deftly parrying their questions, when Senator John Kerry, a Democrat from Massachusetts, took the microphone.
In the aggressive style he honed as a prosecutor two decades ago, Mr. Kerry unleashed a barrage of criticism against President Bush's nuclear arms treaty with Russia, saying it "neutered" previous pacts and included a "huge contradiction." Twice, he interrupted a clearly irritated Mr. Powell in midsentence.
For many Democrats, the war on terrorism has made that kind of frontal assault on Bush foreign policy seem risky, if not politically suicidal. But not for Mr. Kerry. A decorated Vietnam veteran and potential presidential candidate, he has lustily attacked the administration on policies like trans-Atlantic relations, Pentagon spending, Middle East negotiations and even Mr. Bush's greatest triumph, Afghanistan.
Weapons inspections were 'manipulated'
Carola Hoyos , Nick George and Roula Khalaf, Financial Times, July 29, 2002
Rolf Ekeus, head of United Nations weapons inspections in Iraq from 1991-97, has accused the US and other Security Council members of manipulating the United Nations inspections teams for their own political ends. The revelation by one of the most respected Swedish diplomats is certain to strengthen Iraq's argument against allowing UN inspectors back into the country.
War on Iran is the new nightmare
Simon Tisdall, The Guardian, July 31, 2002
Is Iran next after Iraq? Iranians have good reason to wonder as the Bush administration refines bellicose plans for "regime change" in Baghdad. If George Bush can seriously contemplate an all-out invasion of the next-door neighbours, then Tehran's theocrats must ask what Washington has in store for them. After all, they meet Bush's fatuous "rogue state" criteria with ease.
Experts say U.S. strategists lack a plan for how to handle post-Saddam Iraq
Warren P. Strobel, San Jose Mercury News, July 31, 2002
Picture U.S. troops advancing up the monumentally wide boulevards of central Baghdad, greeted joyously by throngs of Iraqis who have just overthrown Saddam Hussein and his dictatorship.
What then?
Getting rid of Saddam, as President Bush has pledged to do, may not be easy. But it could be a walk in the park compared with what follows, according to experts on Iraq, U.S. officials and Iraqi dissidents.
The 'inside-out' solution to the problem of Saddam
Rupert Cornwell, The Independent, July 30, 2002
Maybe, just maybe, this week will provide a few answers to some of the myriad questions about US policy towards Iraq. The basic assumption is not in doubt. President George Bush wants to get rid of Saddam Hussein. To achieve that end, he is prepared to use, as he put it at a press conference on 8 July, "all the tools at our disposal" – economic, diplomatic, financial and military". But the how, the when, the "what happens afterwards" are as unclear today as when this administration started to train its sights upon Baghdad, even before 11 September.
'UN must sanction' Iraq strike
John Hooper in Berlin and Richard Norton-Taylor, The Guardian, July 31, 2002
The leaders of Germany and France highlighted the gap now separating Britain and the US from some of their closest allies on policy towards Iraq yesterday, saying they could not support an attack without a UN mandate. At the end of talks in the German city of Schwerin, Chancellor Gerhard Schröder and President Jacques Chirac insisted that clear UN approval was necessary. They reiterated their position amid the growing evidence that George Bush and Tony Blair have agreed in principle on an invasion, perhaps before the year is out.
Selling out to set stage for an attack on Iraq
Dusko Doder, Baltimore Sun, July 30, 2002
Reports that the Bush administration is prepared to write off the more than $4 billion that Turkey owes the United States could not be a clearer sign that the president's plans for a "regime change" in Iraq are moving into high gear.
Easing Palestine's humanitarian crisis
Peter Hansen, New York Times, July 30, 2002
A consensus has emerged in the Middle East, among people of otherwise widely divergent views, on one point: something must be done for ordinary families in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. They face a crisis of such dimensions that it threatens everyone in the region.
The madness of war with Iraq
General Sir Michael Rose, This Is London, July 29, 2002
Merely crying "Havoc!" and letting slip the dogs of war is no substitute for clear thinking or the development of a welldefined military strategy. Yet the evidence of the last few days seems to be that we are heading for an assault on Iraq without - on either side of the Atlantic - anything like enough open debate about the moral justification or military practicality of doing so. If we in the West were confident that our reasons for going to war were sound, we would be getting the UN's agreement before doing so. But it seems we're not.
Is it possible that Mr Blair will not back President Bush over Iraq?
Donald Macintyre, The Independent, July 30, 2002
If there was nothing to talk about at present on Iraq, Tony Blair and King Abdullah II of Jordan would not have discussed it yesterday. That simple fact is part of what fuels the entirely reasonable call for the issue to be debated widely now – a call best expressed by Baroness Williams of Crosby last week when she complained with incontestable logic that it was always too early to debate a war until it was too late. Part of the deep anxiety that she reflects concerns precisely the question of whether Mr Blair's reluctance to engage in such a debate means that he will support the United States whatever it eventually decides to do.
Profound effect on U.S. economy seen in a war on Iraq
Patrick E. Tyler and Richard W. Stevenson, New York Times, July 30, 2002
An American attack on Iraq could profoundly affect the American economy, because the United States would have to pay most of the cost and bear the brunt of any oil price shock or other market disruptions, government officials, diplomats and economists say. Eleven years ago, the Persian Gulf war, fought to roll back Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, cost the United States and its allies $60 billion and helped set off an economic recession caused in part by a spike in oil prices. For that war, the allies picked up almost 80 percent of the bill. Today, however, as the Bush administration works on plans to overthrow Saddam Hussein, the United States is confronting the likelihood that this time around it would have to pick up the tab largely by itself, diplomats said. Unless the economic outlook brightens, the government could well find itself spending heavily on the military even as the economy recovers falteringly from last year's recession.
Papers outline a terror detainee's case
Benjamin Weiser, New York Times, July 29, 2002
Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the government is believed to have detained about two dozen people under the material-witness law. Because such proceedings are almost always secret, little is known about the detainees or their cases.
But now, new court documents have helped bring one of the cases into focus. The documents reveal that a man — identified only as a foreign citizen jailed for more than nine months — contends that his rights have been violated because he is being detained for listening to someone else's political views.
The unimportance of being Colin Powell
Jim Lobe, AlterNet, July 29, 2002
Colin Powell has been reduced to little more than a figleaf used to cover the excesses of the most radically unilateralist administration since World War II. So why does he stay?
Learning to love Big Brother
George W. Bush channels George Orwell
Daniel Kurtzman, July 28, 2002
Here's a question for constitutional scholars: Can a sitting president be charged with plagiarism?
As President Bush wages his war against terrorism and moves to create a huge homeland security apparatus, he appears to be borrowing heavily, if not ripping off ideas outright, from George Orwell. The work in question is "1984, " the prophetic novel about a government that controls the masses by spreading propaganda, cracking down on subversive thought and altering history to suit its needs. It was intended to be read as a warning about the evils of totalitarianism -- not a how-to manual.
Granted, we're a long way from resembling the kind of authoritarian state Orwell depicted, but some of the similarities are starting to get a bit eerie.
Iran rifts deepen as tension mounts
Jim Muir, BBC News, July 29, 2002
Political tensions are rising in Iran, so much so that some Tehran-based diplomats are openly wondering how much higher the pressure within the Islamic regime can get without serious consequences.
IS THIS WHY THE U.S. OBJECTS TO INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL LAW?
US accused of airstrike cover-up
Dumeetha Luthra, The Times, July 29, 2002
American forces may have breached human rights and then removed evidence after the so-called wedding party airstrike that killed more than 50 Afghan civilians this month, according to a draft United Nations report seen by The Times. A preliminary UN investigation has found no corroboration of American claims that its aircraft were fired on from the ground, and says there were discrepancies in US accounts of what happened. If the findings are upheld by a second, more detailed, UN investigation, they will cause huge embarrassment to the Pentagon.
Powell's predicament
John Gershman, Foreign Policy in Focus, July 26, 2002
As Secretary of State Colin Powell prepares to embark on an extended trip through Asia, he is no doubt reflecting upon the difficulties he faces in an administration that has granted the Pentagon pride of place in defining and shaping U.S. policy in the region. Awash with funds and a global mandate to combat terrorism, the Pentagon has marginalized Powell and the State Department, entrenching itself as the dominant player in Asia after September 11th. A reflection of this weakness is that Powell's trip is being met with more enthusiasm in the region than in Washington, where his trip is largely being greeted with a yawn.
Heavy words or heavy actions: Stop U.S. weapons sales to Israel
Frida Berrigan, World Policy Institute, July 26, 2002
It is time to cut off the flow of weapons to Israel, which is the top recipient of U.S. military aid at $3 billion a year. According to a November 2001 Congressional Research Service report, "Israel: U.S. Foreign Assistance," American aid to Israel in the past half century has totaled a whopping $81.3 billion. The F-16 fighter plane used in the attack [on Gaza] was manufactured in the United States by Lockheed Martin and is one of more than 200 F-16s in the Israeli arsenal. They have another 106 on order from the Maryland-based manufacturer. Given that Israel is one of the United States' largest arms importers, it should be investigated whether the 1,000-lb bomb is from the U.S. as well.
The U.S. Arms Export Control Act prohibits U.S. weapons from being used for non-defensive purposes. And there is nothing defensive about dropping a 1,000-lb bomb on a densely populated neighborhood in order to kill one man. Given Israel's violation of U.S. law and the subsequent killing of innocent civilians, it is time for President Bush to take some "heavy handed action" of his own, action that will "contribute to the peace," in the administration's words.
U.S. exploring Baghdad strike as Iraq option
David E. Sanger and Thom Shanker, New York Times, July 29, 2002
As the Bush administration considers its military options for deposing Saddam Hussein, senior administration and Pentagon officials say they are exploring a new if risky approach: take Baghdad and one or two key command centers and weapons depots first, in hopes of cutting off the country's leadership and causing a quick collapse of the government.
Blair warned: Iraq attack 'illegal'
British government legal experts say UN mandate is needed for action
Peter Waugh, The Independent, July 29, 2002
Tony Blair has been told by the Government's own lawyers that British participation in an invasion of Iraq would be illegal without a new United Nations mandate.
The advice, which is highly confidential, has led the Foreign Office to warn Downing Street that a fresh UN resolution could be the best means of ensuring Russian and moderate Arab support for any attack against Saddam Hussein.
Senior government sources say the Prime Minister has also received conflicting legal opinion from law officers that current UN resolutions could offer sufficient cover for any military action. But the very fact that even one part of Government has been told an attack could be illegal will delight the many Labour MPs worried that Mr Blair will unilaterally back an American assault.
There should be no war in Iraq without more jaw-jaw
Menzies Campbell, The Guardian, July 29, 2002
The daily beat of the Washington drum gets louder and more insistent. It is assumed that Britain will answer the president's call to arms against Iraq. Every troop movement or redeployment by the UK Ministry of Defence is interpreted by commentators with urgent and inevitable significance. But before Bush comes to shove, the British government owes the people of the UK a clear explanation of the reasons why British forces may be asked to put their lives at risk.
The perilous search for security at home
Alison Mitchell, New York Times, July 28, 2002
The ambitious plan to collapse 22 agencies and tens of thousands of employees into a new homeland security behemoth is nothing less than a project to transform American society. The question, as Congress and President Bush wrangle over the details, is into what?
Risk assessments
Reviews by Peter L. Bergen, Washington Post, July 28, 2002
The real threat posed by violent Islamists is mostly in their own backyards. Wars caused by radical Islamists in Afghanistan during the 1990s destroyed Kabul and killed tens of thousands of people. During the same decade, Algerian Islamists unleashed a civil war causing the deaths of as many as 100,000 of their fellow citizens. And these are but two examples. Undoubtedly, al Qaeda and other violent Islamist groups do threaten Westerners, but it is important to calibrate the threat. On the scale of the challenges posed to the West by Nazism or communism, militant Islam barely registers.
Bush won't press end to Israeli settlements
Peter Slevin, Washington Post, July 28, 2002
As President Bush develops his latest approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the administration does not intend to make a significant effort to curb the continued expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, one of the most troubling irritants to Palestinians.
The White House routinely calls on the Israelis to stop settlement activity, but U.S. officials have concluded that there is nothing to be gained in further pressing Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, an impassioned promoter and defender of a settler population that has grown by two-thirds during the past decade.
Is terror worse than oppression?
Ahmed Rashid, Far Eastern Economic Review, August, 2002
Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf has profited from the American view that the world's greatest threat today is terrorism. But within his country there is growing anger that U.S. support is allowing his military regime to delay the promise of democracy.
Some top military brass favor status quo in Iraq
Thomas E. Ricks, Washington Post, July 28, 2002
Despite President Bush's repeated bellicose statements about Iraq, many senior U.S. military officers contend that President Saddam Hussein poses no immediate threat and that the United States should continue its policy of containment rather than invade Iraq to force a change of leadership in Baghdad. The conclusion, which is based in part on intelligence assessments of the state of Hussein's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and his missile delivery capabilities, is increasing tensions in the administration over Iraqi policy.
Kurds savor a new, and endangered, golden age
John F. Burns, New York Times, July 28, 2002
In this Iraq, the United States and Britain are hailed as liberators, for the daily patrolling of Kurdish skies that has cost the two countries nearly $10 billion to maintain. When children here wave at aircraft tracing vapor trails high above, they are saluting the powers that banished, with the no-flight zone, the terrors of Mr. Hussein. But the Kurds also fear that they are powers now pushing them toward a new confrontation that could threaten all they have gained.
Sharon accused of shattering ceasefire
Graham Usher, The Observer, July 28, 2002
New details of a proposed ceasefire deal - and an end to suicide bombing attacks on Israeli civilians - approved by all the main Palestinian factions have emerged amid Palestinian accusations that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon deliberately approved the bombing of a Gaza apartment block to prolong the conflict.
Bush set to flout test ban treaty
Peter Beaumont, The Observer, July 28, 2002
America's nuclear weapons laboratories have begun preparations to test a new generation of arms after strong signs that the Bush administration may be about to pull out of the landmark Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
Amid renewed evidence that pro-nuclear hawks are increasingly holding sway, the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration is increasing funding for nuclear weapons research and testing programmes. The funding would allow the US to be ready to return to underground tests within 12 months - a requirement of the US Nuclear Posture Review, which was unveiled by the Bush administration this year.
Israel, the US and the world: a conflict of perceptions
Paul Rogers, Open Democracy, July 24, 2002
While much of the world views Israel as militarily aggressive, inside the country the sense of encirclement and threat prevails. This conflict of perceptions helps to fuel Israel’s extensive weapons purchase and upgrade projects, reinforcing the country’s intimate defence connections with the United States.
Bush and Blair agree terms for Iraq attack
Simon Tisdall and Richard Norton-Taylor, The Guardian, July 27, 2002
Tony Blair has privately told George Bush that Britain will support an American attack on Iraq if Saddam Hussein refuses to accept resumed UN weapons inspections. President Bush's "understanding", based on conversations with the prime minister, is that he can count on Mr Blair, according to well-placed Bush administration officials. The agreement between the leaders comes as diplomatic, military and intelligence sources revealed details of a new plan for the invasion of Iraq, which could take place sooner than had previously been presumed. The plan involves a slimmed-down force of around 50,000 troops, which could be deployed within a matter of days. It had been widely assumed that the US could not deploy sufficient numbers of troops needed for the task before the end of this year at the earliest. Now senior officials are saying a sudden military strike could be launched as soon as October.
Toothless in Gaza
John Jones, The Guardian, July 27, 2002
Israel's "targeted killing" of the head of the military wing of Hamas in Gaza this week unleashed a storm of protest, for the missile fired into a densely packed residential block at midnight killed not only Salah Shehada but also 15 other people, including nine children, and injured some 150 others. The result could hardly have been unexpected.
The Bush administration and other governments have criticised the attack for the effect it would have on the tottering "peace process". Far from being the "major success" that the Israelis claim, many argued, Israel may be sowing dragon's teeth for a future harvest of suicide bombers. As usual, the discussion has focused on the political and military effectiveness of Israel's action. But what of its legality? Even if Israel could solve its problems by killing wanted Palestinians and innocent Palestinian civilians alike, what of the rule of law? And if attacks like this are illegal under international law, what are the implications, in particular now that the international criminal court (ICC) has been established, for possible prosecutions?
The terrorist motel
Jim Crogan, LA Weekly, July 26, 2002
What happened at the nondescript roadside motel outside Oklahoma City was just a fleeting encounter during the twisted cross-country odyssey of the terrorists who would carry out the September 11 attacks. Mohamed Atta, alleged leader of the plot, and two companions wanted to rent a room, but couldn't get the deal they wanted, so they left. It was an incident of no particular importance, except for one thing. The owner of the motel remembers Atta being in the company of Zacarias Moussaoui, the so-called "20th hijacker," who was arrested prior to September 11 and now faces conspiracy charges in connection with the terror assaults.
See also An Oklahoma mystery
Making enemies make friends
Simon Tisdall, The Guardian, July 25, 2002
Pentagon war planners, White House strategists and Washington's European allies can be forgiven for exhibiting little interest in the mechanics of POW handovers. But placed in the context of widely-anticipated American military action against Saddam Hussein's regime in Baghdad, the prospect of a thawing in relations between Iraq and Iran gains a perhaps disturbing importance. Since the Iraqi foreign minister, Naji Sabri, visited Iran last January, there have been a series of indications that the old enemies may be moving towards some kind of limited rapprochement - or at least, greater mutual understanding.
The societal costs of surveillance
Michele Kayal, New York Times, July 26, 2002
[T]he recent brainstorm by the Justice Department to enlist couriers, meter readers, cable installers and telephone repairmen to snoop on people's private lives for anything "suspicious" dredged a cold and until now forgotten feeling from the pit of my stomach. Many have objected that such a program would violate civil liberties and basic American principles. But stoking people's fear to set neighbor upon neighbor, service worker upon client, those who belong against those who don't, does something more: it erodes the soul of the watcher and the watched, replacing healthy national pride with mute suspicion, breeding insular individuals more concerned with self-preservation than with society at large. Ultimately it creates a climate that is inherently antithetical to security.
Worker corps to be formed to report odd activity
Adam Clymer, New York Times, July 26, 2002
Brushing off Congressional complaints about creating a "snitch system," Attorney General John Ashcroft said today the administration would go ahead to form a corps of truck and bus drivers, port workers, meter readers, letter carriers and others to report suspicious activities around the nation.
Europe can overrule US on Iraq, Mideast
William Pfaff, Boston Globe, July 25, 2002
Sooner or later the European powers will have to deal with the consequences of US unilateralism, and if the European public feels strongly about Iraq (and indeed about the Israeli-Palestine situation), now could be the best occasion to act.
The fundamental reason that NATO will not be destroyed is that the United States needs NATO more than Europe does.
NATO no longer serves to protect Europe from any threat. The threat is gone. NATO provides the indispensable material and strategic infrastructure for US military and strategic deployments throughout Europe, Eurasia, the Middle East, and Africa.
It's a horror story, period
Gideon Samet, Ha'aretz, July 26, 2002
[R]eports from every direction add up to a stream of proofs that show that along with the women and children, a genuine opportunity to break the cycle of terror and retaliation was buried in Gaza. If that's true, the prime minister, along with two other ministers and a small group of senior army officials, behaved repulsively.
Challenging ignorance on Islam:
A ten-point primer for Americans
Gary Leupp, Counterpunch, July 24, 2002
People with power and influence in the U.S. have been saying some very stupid things about Islam and about Muslims since September 11. Some of it is rooted in conscious malice, and ethnic prejudice that spills over into religious bigotry. But some is rooted in sheer historical and geographical ignorance. This is a country, after all, in which only a small minority of high school students can readily locate Afghanistan on the map, or are aware that Iranians and Pakistanis are not Arabs. As an educator, in Asian Studies, at a fairly elite university, I am painfully aware of this ignorance. But I realize it serves a purpose. It is highly useful to a power structure that banks on knee-jerk popular support whenever it embarks on a new military venture, at some far-off venue, on false pretexts immediately discernable to the better educated, but lost on the general public. The generally malleable mainstream press takes care of the rest.
Protecting the homeland
Ten ways to keep America safer without trampling on immigrants
Alisa Solomon, Village Voice, July 24, 2002
As Congress rushes to close the deal on the Department of Homeland Security before its August recess, the Voice consulted experts in security, migration, and civil rights and immigration law for suggestions on what the U.S. could do to improve security and preserve America as a nation animated by immigrants, reverence for constitutional protections, and commitment to civil liberties.
These experts agree that fortress-America police tactics are not the only means—indeed, are not the surest means—of safeguarding America's people and ideals. They propose a panoply of more democratic and more effective methods. Here are 10 of them.
Just the facts, Mr Ashcroft
Jean AbiNader and Kate Martin, Washington Post, July 25, 2002
The Senate Judiciary Committee needs to question Attorney General John Ashcroft closely today as to whether his crucial terrorism investigation is really aimed at finding terrorists or simply at sweeping up thousands of Americans in an ineffective, and probably unconstitutional, dragnet.
Rather than build investigations based on what is known about al Qaeda and the hijackers, the attorney general has directed the roundup and jailing of hundreds of individuals and compilation of dossiers on thousands of individuals and groups -- a dragnet targeted at the Arab American, Muslim and immigrant communities. While no one of any rational persuasion denies that Arab Muslim males perpetrated the horrific terrorist acts of 9/11, that fact hardly serves as justification for the racial profiling that characterizes initiatives coming out of the administration.
Of babies and butchers
Sharon's bomb explodes in his face
Lead Editorial, The Guardian, July 25, 2002
The man principally to blame for the carnage that attended Shehada's killing is Ariel Sharon. Israel's prime minister long ago declared his determination to hunt down the perpetrators of terrorist attacks. He hailed Monday's hit as a "great success" despite the civilian toll of 14 dead and 160 wounded. It was Mr Sharon, with defence minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, who personally authorised the strike and, specifically, the means employed- an F-16 armed with a one-ton bomb. And it was Mr Sharon who initially opposed issuing an apology or even an expression of regret as the scale of civilian casualties became clear.
U.S. halts overtures to Iran's Khatami
Glenn Kessler, Washington Post, July 23, 2002
The Bush administration has abandoned hopes it can work with President Mohammad Khatami and his reformist allies in the Iranian government and is turning its attention to appealing directly to democracy supporters among the Iranian people, administration officials said. The policy shift, which scuttles a five-year effort in which the United States tried to explore ways to work with Khatami and encourage a reform agenda in Iran, follows an intensive review within the administration over whether to adopt a harder line toward a government President Bush has labeled part of the "axis of evil."
Palestinians urge trial of Israeli leaders
Evelyn Leopold, Reuters, July 25, 2002
Taking their case to the UN Security Council, Palestinians called yesterday for Israeli leaders to be tried for war crimes after Monday's deadly missile strike on Gaza City. Following international criticism of the attack that killed a wanted Hamas leader and 14 others, including nine children, Palestinian UN observer Nasser al-Kidwa said the world needed to stop Israeli actions, whether on the ground, in the political sphere, or in the courts.
Israelis row over bombing blame
Suzanne Goldenberg, The Guardian, July 25, 2002
Israeli government and military officials yesterday tried to blame each other for the one-tonne bomb dropped on Gaza City which killed a Hamas commander and 10 children. The internal debate on Israel's strategy of assassinating Palestinian militants raged as rescue workers in Gaza pulled the body of a four-year-old boy from the ruins, the 16th victim - and 10th child - killed in the attack on the Hamas militant, Sheikh Salah Shehada. Much of the debate focused on charges by Israel's political establishment of faulty military intelligence.
Misusing the military
Editorial, New York Times, July 24, 2002
Some Bush administration officials would like to clear the way for American military forces to play a larger role in protecting the home front from terror attacks. That's not a step to be taken lightly. The idea of military forces roaming the nation enforcing the laws sounds like a bad Hollywood script — or life in a totalitarian society.
US threatens to block torture convention
Oliver Burkeman, The Guardian, July 25, 2002
The United States opened a new rift with its European allies yesterday about global standards of justice and human rights by threatening to block an international convention against torture which might allow foreign observers to visit US jails and the Guantanamo Bay naval base, where suspected al-Qaida fighters are held.
Civil rights commissioner under fire for comments on Arabs
Lynette Clemetson, New York Times, July 24, 2002
Leaders of some Arab-American and civil rights group called for the removal today of a conservative member of the United States Commission on Civil Rights after he made comments that the groups say suggested tolerance for interning Arab-Americans in the effort against terrorism.
The Martial Plan
James Ridgeway, Village Voice, July 24, 2002
Are we headed toward martial law? Last week Peter Kirsanow, a Bush appointee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, said in Detroit that he envisions a situation in which the public will demand internment camps for Arab Americans. If terrorists attack the U.S. for a second time and if "they come from the same ethnic group that attacked the World Trade Center, you can forget about civil rights," he said.
Ashcroft's terrorism policies dismay some conservatives
Neil A. Lewis, New York Times, July 24, 2002
Many religious conservatives who were most instrumental in pressing President Bush to appoint John Ashcroft as attorney general now say they have become deeply troubled by his actions as the leading public figure in the law enforcement drive against terrorism.
Palestinian ceasefire plan lies buried in the rubble of Gaza
Stephen Farrell, The Times, July 24, 2002
Western diplomats believe they were within hours of clinching an unprecedented Palestinian commitment to end suicide bombings when Israel launched its missile strike on Gaza on Monday night. The Times has learnt that a Palestinian declaration containing an unconditional commitment to end suicide attacks on civilians was finalised hours before the attack. It was to have been made public yesterday but has now been postponed indefinitely.
See also Israeli attack hits peace efforts Ben Lynfield, Christian Science Monitor, July 24, 2002
From a 'pinpoint' operation to massive casualties
Amos Harel, Ha'aretz, July 24, 2002
The truth is Israel has been playing with fire for quite some time. It seems something very basic has gone wrong in the decision makers' judgment. In light of the horrifying terror attacks on Israeli citizens and the urgent need to prevent further attacks, a kind of apathetic indifference to the possibility of Palestinian casualties has set in. The decision to drop a heavy bomb into a residential neighborhood was the natural consequence of previous moves. This time, it simply turned out much worse.
Civilian deaths in Afghanistan
Will truth again be a casualty of war?
Editorial, Sarasota Herald-Tribune, July 23, 2002
The humanitarian conventions of the civilized world insist that warring nations at least try to distinguish the innocent from the enemy. It is not always possible to do so, but the attempt must be made.
Is the U.S. military making an adequate attempt? Are the fatalities in the Afghan villages unavoidable? Are they militarily necessary? Have the deadly attacks achieved any headway against Osama bid Laden or his minions?
The American public deserves the truth, because in a democracy it is ultimately the people who direct military policy. As a nation, we cannot divorce ourselves from our military's successes or failures, because in the end they are our own.
Questions on Bush's war on Iraq
James Carroll, Boston Globe, July 23, 2002
We Americans find ourselves in the extraordinary position of witnessing our government's slow but certain movement toward a major war with Iraq. Such open maneuvering, with clear statements of intention from the Bush administration, the leaking of war plans from the Pentagon, and the acquiescence of Congress, could not have happened when US power was balanced, and therefore checked, by the Soviet Union, nor when that power was mitigated by Washington's regard for world opinion. Now the only conceivable check on the sole superpower is the will of its own people, manifest through politics, which is why we must urgently take up the subject.
Israel threatens to hit Syria
The Sunday Times and AFP (via The Australian), July 22, 2002
Israeli plans call for a swift air attack to destroy a tank brigade in southern Syria that contains about 90 to 100 tanks. This would be followed by an artillery assault and perhaps, according to unconfirmed reports, a few days' occupation with helicopter-borne special forces. Supporters of the plan say putting pressure on Syria to curb Hezbollah is more effective than a direct attack on the organisation, which could respond by launching Katyusha rocket attacks on Israel. Given Israel's military supremacy, they expect Mr Assad to get the message.
Swaddled in a flag, a dead child is held aloft on another bloody day in Gaza
Justin Huggler, The Independent, July 24, 2002
We found them in the morgue, the victims of Israel's air strike on Gaza, tiny bodies lying on slabs that were too big for them. The Palestinians opened the refrigerators to show us the bodies. In refrigerator after refrigerator, there were the bodies of children.
Federal tipster plan gets green light despite opposition
Karen Branch-Brioso, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, July 22, 2002
The Justice Department is forging ahead with establishing a network of domestic tipsters -- despite being dealt what may be a deathly blow to the plan: House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Texas, inserted last week a ban on the program in the bill to form a new Homeland Security Department.
Evidence against suspect from 9/11 is called weak
David Johnston and Philip Shenon, New York Times, July 20, 2002
Since December, when the government indicted Zacarias Moussaoui as the first man charged in the Sept. 11 attacks, an unusual gulf has opened between what prosecutors have charged in court and what investigators are saying privately about what they can prove about him. Prosecutors have charged that Mr. Moussaoui played a direct role in the Sept. 11 hijackings, and some officials have said they believe he was supposed to be on one of the four planes. But investigators now say the evidence is not so clear. In fact, they say they believe he may been in the United States to take part in a different plot.
FORTRESS EUROPE JOINS FORTRESS AMERICA AGAINST THE REST OF THE WORLD
Satellites to keep watch on refugees
Severin Carrell, The Independent, July 21, 2002
A new network of satellites will be used by the European Union to track the movements of refugees and asylum seekers as part of the crackdown on illegal immigration into western Europe. Refugee rights groups were alarmed by the move, claiming that it signalled a further hardening of Europe's borders against refugees and migrants which has been supported by Tony Blair and many other EU leaders. Officials in the European Commission and the European Space Agency are now drawing up detailed plans to extend the use of satellites originally designed for tracking coastal erosion, air pollution and climate change for security and policing operations.
How the TIPS system will work ;)
Hello and good day to you, fellow American! You've reached the automated voice response system for TIPS.
Please choose from one of the following options:
- If you'd like to report suspicious behavior by a co-worker, press 1
- If you'd like to report suspicious behavior by a friend, press 2
- If you'd like to report suspicious behavior by a family member, press 3
- If you'd like to report suspicious behavior by yourself, press 4
Is Iraq a true threat to the US?
Scott Ritter, Boston Globe, July 20, 2002
Does Iraq truly threaten the existence of our nation? If one takes at face value the rhetoric emanating from the Bush administration, it would seem so. According to President Bush and his advisers, Iraq is known to possess weapons of mass destruction and is actively seeking to reconstitute the weapons production capabilities that had been eliminated by UN weapons inspectors from 1991 to 1998, while at the same time barring the resumption of such inspections.
I bear personal witness through seven years as a chief weapons inspector in Iraq for the United Nations to both the scope of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs and the effectiveness of the UN weapons inspectors in ultimately eliminating them.
While we were never able to provide 100 percent certainty regarding the disposition of Iraq's proscribed weaponry, we did ascertain a 90-95 percent level of verified disarmament. This figure takes into account the destruction or dismantling of every major factory associated with prohibited weapons manufacture, all significant items of production equipment, and the majority of the weapons and agent produced by Iraq.
See also CNN interview with Scott Ritter.
What rules do we play by?
Abner Mikya and Anthony Lake, Boston Globe, July 22, 2002
Not since the beginning of World War II, when America was shaken out of its international isolation, have so many of our friends and allies so seriously questioned our international policies. Their concerns and criticisms, widely reported, focus on a central point: our refusal to apply to ourselves the rules we push on others.
Who would have confidence, they seem to ask, in a sheriff who appears to believe that because he does, after all, wear a white hat, the laws of the town don't apply to him? Why, in such circumstances, shuld they believe that he is acting on their behalf, and in the interest of the town's laws? No wonder the American sheriff has recently had such trouble raising posses to confront our real and growing international threats.
Saddam fights back!
How the Iraqi leader might reply to President George Bush's sabre-rattling
Eric Margolis, Toronto Sun, July 21, 2002
American President George Bush has been demanding a "regime change" in "evil" Iraq, which he plans to invade. Saddam Hussein's possible reply, from Baghdad:
"My fellow Iraqis, it's time for a 'regime change' in the United States. President George W. Bush must go!
"Bush is a danger to Americans, and to the whole globe. America has become a 'rogue state' that threatens world peace and stability. Oh, my brothers, America is the nexus of evil!
Informant fever
Editorial, New York Times, July 22, 2002
If, starting next month, your neighbors begin showing unexpected interest in your travel plans, your cable TV repairman asks what magazines you subscribe to and the pizza delivery boy starts trying to draw you out about your views on the Middle East, it could be that everyone is just getting a lot friendlier. But it is more likely that you are being engaged by some of the early participants in the Terrorism Information and Prevention System, or TIPS. The Bush administration plans to enlist millions of Americans to spy on their fellow Americans, and to feed that information into a centralized database. This ill-considered domestic spying program should be stopped before it starts.
THE SETTLEMENTS
Spreading the secret
Gila Svirsky, Israel Insider, July 15, 2002
One of the best-kept secrets in Israel is that most Israelis are fed up with the occupation, and just want to get out. According to June's findings by Mina Zemach, Israel's foremost pollster, 63% of Israelis are in favor of "unilateral withdrawal." In fact, 69% call for the evacuation of "all" or "most of" the settlements.
Sharon's stealth plan
Jackson Diehl, Washington Post, July 22, 2002
Following the same tactics he has employed for a quarter-century, Sharon has been asserting in public that he accepts Bush's diplomacy -- and meanwhile is quietly overseeing a plan of settlement construction designed to make any two-state solution impossible. Since Sharon took office less than 18 months ago, 44 new settlement sites, including more than 300 units, have been established in the West Bank -- including nine in the past three months. In contrast, the previous Israeli government under Ehud Barak thickened existing Israeli settlements in West Bank border areas, but did not allow new outposts.
Despite a budget crisis caused by the continuing bloodshed, Sharon's government is pouring new money into the program: The new budget calls for $64 million in subsidies this year to induce Israelis to move to settlements, plus $19 million in funding for settlement development. That doesn't count the nine roads Israel is building for use by settlements, at a cost of $50 million, or the border fences being constructed around greater Jerusalem -- fences that are advertised as security measures but will have the practical effect of roping off new tracts of land for settlement expansions. On June 20 -- four days before Bush's peace initiative speech -- tenders were announced for the construction of 957 new units in the settlements.
Kazakhs' season of repression
President of key U.S. ally puts critics on trial, in jail
Robert G. Kaiser, Washington Post, July 22, 2002
This is a summer of political tension and repression in Kazakhstan, an oil-rich republic four times the size of Texas that occupies much of the vast steppe south of Siberia. At a time when Kazakhstan's economy is booming and its relations with the world's great powers, including the United States, are improving, [President] Nazarbayev has turned against his critics and opponents with a harshness that has surprised many Kazakhs and foreign diplomats here.
The situation in Kazakhstan is sensitive for the United States, which has long considered this country an important future source of oil and more recently a key ally in the war on terrorism. The United States signed an agreement with Kazakhstan this month to allow use of this country's major airport for emergency landings by U.S. warplanes operating over Afghanistan, whose northern border is just 300 miles away.
Comfort to the enemy
Lead Ediorial, The Guardian, July 22, 2002
If Iran is forced into an alliance of expediency with Iraq on the basis of the well-tried principle that my enemy's enemy is my friend, the Bush administration will only have itself to blame. The prospect of a self-defence pact between these two long-standing Middle East antagonists grows less unlikely as the US, even as it pounds its anti-Saddam war drums, steps up pressure on Tehran. Washington already maintains economic sanctions on Iran. It opposes the EU's proposed trade and cooperation pact, has demanded that Russia cut its nuclear power development assistance, and is reportedly seeking to penalise eight Chinese companies said to be selling arms to Iran.
Go on, call Bush's bluff
Hans von Sponeck, The Guardian, July 22, 2002
During the 17 months of the Bush administration just about everything has gone wrong for the US government in preparing the public for military strikes against Iraq. Convincing friendly governments and allies has not fared much better. Acts of terrorism against US facilities overseas and the anthrax menace at home could not be linked to Iraq. Evidence of al-Qaida/lraq collaboration does not exist, neither in the training of operatives nor in support to Ansar-al-Islam, a small fundamentalist group which allegedly harbours al-Qaida elements and is trying to destabilise lraqi Kurdistan. In the aftermath of the carnage of September 11, the political landscape in the Middle East has changed dramatically. Years of US double standards in dealing with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict have taken a heavy toll. The Arab, Turkish and Kurdish public in the area is wary of facing more turmoil, suffering and uncertainty.
WINNERS OF THE AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL UK MEDIA AWARDS FOR 2002
A Gaza diary
Chris Hodges, Harper's Magazine
It was in Gaza, where I lived for weeks at a time during the seven years I spent in the Middle East, that I came to know the dark side of the Israeli Defense Force. During the first Palestinian uprising, begun in December 1987 and ended in 1993 with the Oslo peace accords, the army had little interest in crowd control. It fired live rounds at boys hurling rocks. And on a few occasions the Israeli soldiers, angered at the coverage, turned their weapons toward groups of photographers and cameramen. They shot rubber bullets into their legs—doing it with a self-congratulatory arrogance that came to define the occupation for me.
The killing fields
Christine Toomey, Sunday Times Magazine
An edge of hysteria and despair has crept into [Major Joseph] Blair's voice. He is exhausted. He has spent six hours cataloguing a series of abuses that took place at a military training facility known by opponents as the School of Assassins. It sounds as if the scene described might have happened in some obscure corner of a Latin American country where few dare to challenge a man in uniform. It did not. It took place in 1987 at the heart of America's military establishment. The class was held at an academy called the School of the Americas (SOA), located at Fort Benning, the infantry HQ of the United States Army, in rolling hills on the outskirts of Columbus, Georgia.
Flaws in U.S. air war left hundreds of civilians dead
Dexter Filkins, New York Times, July 21, 2002
The American air campaign in Afghanistan, based on a high-tech, out-of-harm's-way strategy, has produced a pattern of mistakes that have killed hundreds of Afghan civilians. On-site reviews of 11 locations where airstrikes killed as many as 400 civilians suggest that American commanders have sometimes relied on mistaken information from local Afghans. Also, the Americans' preference for airstrikes instead of riskier ground operations has cut off a way of checking the accuracy of the intelligence.
Citizen snoops wanted
Andy Newman, New York Times, July 21, 2002
Eli Rios Jr. is just the kind of guy Uncle Sam wanted on the front lines of Operation TIPS, the Justice Department's ill-fated plan to encourage meter readers, truck drivers, cable guys and other workers whose jobs routinely take them through the nation's neighborhoods to report signs of terrorism to a national hotline. A tough-talking, sharp-eyed mail carrier who has worked the streets of Brooklyn for 32 years, Mr. Rios said he sees more than his share of suspicious activity in the course of his job. Like what? "That's none of your business what I see," Mr. Rios said as he waited for an elevator in an office building in downtown Brooklyn Friday morning. "We live in America. We don't live in Russia."
Bush's war on terrorism is floundering
Dan Plesch, Foreign Policy in Focus, July 18, 2002
President Theodore Roosevelt said famously about power, "Speak softly but carry a big stick."
But the Bush administration's policy of "strike first" is more like "Talk loudly and get in everyone's face." For America's allies, the new Bush Doctrine of attacking people before they attack us, known as "first strike," is another example of a bull-in-a-china shop approach to world affairs.
Americans are right to expect clear and aggressive leadership against its foes in the world--and there's a good deal to be said for Texan frankness. But the problem is that this "take on the world" approach is ineffective. Behind the hype, there's a long list of failures to tackle key issues, and not much prospect of improvement.
US wary of Pakistan intelligence services' links to al-Qa'ida
Robert Fisk, The Independent, July 21, 2002
The FBI is becoming almost as distrustful of its Pakistani counterpart as the CIA is of the warlords across the border in Afghanistan.
West pays warlords to stay in line
Jason Burke and Peter Beaumont, The Observer, July 21, 2002
Britain and the United States are secretly distributing huge sums of money to persuade Afghan warlords not to rebel against their country's new government. The Observer has learnt that 'bin bags' full of US dollars have been flown into Afghanistan, sometimes on RAF planes, to be given to key regional power brokers who could cause trouble for Prime Minister Hamid Karzai's administration.
Annan warns Israel on "collective punishment"
Reuters, July 20, 2002
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has warned Israel that destroying Palestinian homes and deporting relatives of suicide bombers amounts to collective punishment of the Palestinian people. While Annan "has repeatedly condemned suicide bombings and upheld Israel's right to defend itself, the secretary-general wishes to make clear that self defence cannot justify measures that amount to collective punishments," spokeswoman Hua Jiang said.
The US in the Middle East: playing into the enemy's hands?
Paul Rogers, Open Democracy, July 17, 2002
The next phase of US strategy in the Middle East entails nurturing connections with regional elites, support for Israel’s hardline control of the Palestinians, and regime change in Iraq. From Washington, it looks a perfect scenario; but is it equally so for al-Qaida?
Bring on the Hashemites
Pepe Escobar, Asia Times, July 20, 2002
Relatively subdued but still defiant, Saddam Hussein showed up wearing a neat suit on Iraqi television to celebrate the 34th anniversary of the Baath Party's grip on power - and to reassure Iraqis in no uncertain terms that he does not fear the "evil forces" trying to unsettle him (you can only answer American-made demonology with Iraqi-made demonology).
Meanwhile, in London, notorious rhetoric contortionist Tony Blair was telling Parliament there's no need for a United Nations resolution to justify an attack on Iraq - although the operation must be in accordance with international law. This obviously means once again that the UN is worth nothing. So why should Saddam listen to it?
U.K. ARMS INDUSTRY PROFITS FROM GLOBAL STRIFE
Britain doubles arms sold to Israel
Richard Norton-Taylor, The Guardian, July 20, 2002
The [British] government approved a sharp increase in arms sales to Israel last year, despite its military activities in the occupied territories, according to the annual report on weapons exports published yesterday. Britain also approved large increases to Pakistan, involved in a bitter dispute with India over Kashmir, and to countries with poor human rights records, including Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Indonesia.
Israel to deport families of militants
Suzanne Goldenberg, The Guardian, July 20, 2002
The Israeli army imposed a harsh new form of collective punishment on the Palestinians yesterday, rounding up 21 relatives of suspected militants for exile and blowing up their homes. The army's plans to deport family members of Palestinian militants from the West Bank to Gaza were condemned by human rights organisations who said it was illegal under Israeli law and could deepen criticism of Israel in the international community.
SECURITY THROUGH EXECUTIVE POWER
COMMENT -- What are being called 'bureaucratic constraints' are the checks and balances at the heart of the Constitution. Government in a democracy functions within constraints - that's what makes it a democracy. How long will it be before this administration openly declares that it needs to be let off the constitutional leash in order to effectively combat terrorism?
Bush's powers in security plan challenged
Nick Anderson, Los Angeles Times, July 18, 2002
President Bush's attempt to design a Department of Homeland Security unfettered by the usual constraints of Washington bureaucracy is drawing sharp criticism in Congress from lawmakers leery of an executive power grab.
Sharon's war on moderate Palestinians
H.D.S. Greenway, Boston Globe, July 19, 2002
If one needed further proof that Israel's Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's real intentions are not just the suppression of terrorism but the relentless termination of Palestinian national aspirations, you need look no further than the recent closing of the offices of Sari Nusseibeh, the Palestinian representative for Jerusalem.
The trail of political Islam
Gilles Kepel, Open Democracy, July 3, 2002
In the mid 1990s, when I was Visiting Professor at Columbia University, a rather simple question arose which, in spite of its simplicity, was still unanswered at the time: "Why did Islamist movements succeed in seizing power in places, such as Iran, whereas in the majority of cases, such as Algeria, they failed?"
I hoped that, by addressing this question, we would be able to find some clues to understanding Islamism, a subject that produces more value judgments than cool analysis. There are a number of writers hostile to the movement; a number who have become favourable to it; some who say that it is the embodiment of the identity of the Muslim people; and others who argue that, precisely for that reason, it should either be encouraged or fought against.
I was interested in being able to find a device which would allow me to analyse these movements in social and cultural terms, just as I might have analysed social democrat, fascist, communist or liberal movements.
British reservists called up in build-up for Iraq
Michael Smith, The Telegraph, July 19, 2002
The Ministry of Defence is planning a mass mobilisation of key reservists beginning in September, heightening expectation that the United States and Britain are stepping up preparations for an attack on Iraq. British troops have also been pulled out of Nato's ACE Mobile Force rapid reaction corps and British involvement in a large number of exercises has been cancelled or scaled down to leave troops ready for the attack on Iraq. The Prime Minister has strongly backed the idea of a pre-emptive strike on Iraq and refused to commit the Government to a vote in the House of Commons on the deployment of British forces.
U.S. values will be on trial with Moussaoui
Justice is crucial even for a lunatic filled with hate
Jonathan Turley, Los Angeles Times, July 19, 2002
Ultimately, justice is defined by restraint. It is the restraint exercised over mob and arbitrary forms of justice. It is the restraint that affords presumptions of innocence for the least popular or least deserving defendant. It is the restraint that is tested every day by Moussaoui. However, trials are never about the defendant exclusively. They are a measure of the society that claims the right to hold and punish those who violate the law.
We shouldn't make Arafat the issue
Senator Chuck Hagel, Washington Post, July 19, 2002
The most powerful force for the future of the Middle East is the next generation of Arabs and Muslims. America cannot afford to stand by and allow these young people to grow up hating us. Nor can Israel.
We are now faced with a unique moment to reach out to this generation and build a future with them. That is perhaps the surest thing America can do to help provide a secure future for Israel and hope for the Palestinian people. To do this, the United States must avoid policies that isolate us in the world community. We face both opportunity and risk, but there is no other option.
Young Palestinians need to see their future in a peaceful, fully functioning state with economic opportunities and democratic institutions. If they do not, and instead see violence and destruction as the only way forward, the long-term consequences will be great. We could lose the next generation of Arab and Muslim youth and the future of the Middle East to radical politics and anti-Americanism.
Such a development would destabilize our allies, including Israel, and threaten relationships vital to America's global interests.
This is all the more reason why we cannot hold the Middle East peace process hostage by making Yasser Arafat the issue.
From Left and Right, critics assail Sharon's West Bank clampdown
Molly Moore and John Ward Anderson, Washington Post, July 19, 2002
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's month-long military clampdown on Palestinian cities and villages in the West Bank faced growing criticism from across Israel's political spectrum today after two deadly Palestinian attacks in as many days. The attacks, which killed 11 Israeli residents and settlers, prompted renewed debate about how Israel can best protect its citizens, with hard-line nationalists urging an even tougher crackdown and proponents of a negotiated peace calling for the resumption of talks with the Palestinians.
The domino effects of need
Editorial, Los Angeles Times, July 18, 2002
The countries that promised so much aid so many months ago need to pay up.
In the last four months, more than 1.2 million refugees have returned from neighboring countries to Afghanistan, nearly triple the number originally expected. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees calls it one of the largest and fastest voluntary migrations in history. Hundreds of thousands more are expected before the snow falls. Then there are the hundreds of thousands who found shelter elsewhere in the country but want to get home, moving from Kandahar to Mazar-i-Sharif or Spin Buldak to Jalalabad. The influx has forced the U.N. refugee agency to cut back on provisions. A family of six entitled to 330 pounds of wheat a month ago now gets 220 pounds. Blankets and tarpaulins are gone, so families receive only plastic sheeting. Donors had promised the U.N. agency $271 million for refugee assistance. More than $50 million that was pledged has yet to arrive, and far more is needed for the unanticipated influx.
Thousands of Iranians rally against Bush comments
Parisa Hafezi, Reuters, July 19, 2002
Tens of thousands of Iranians chanting "Death to America, death to George Bush" took to the streets on Friday in an official demonstration of defiance against what they view as U.S. interference in Iran's affairs. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called the rally to show popular opposition to President Bush's statement last week voicing support for reform in Iran.
Your neighbor is watching
Peter Y. Sussman, AlterNet, July 18, 2002
Operation Snitch is coming next month to a neighborhood near you. The government doesn't call it that, of course. The administration's program has been christened, more benignly, Operation TIPS -- the Terrorism Information and Prevention System. But the national snooping network, despite reassuring noises from the Justice Department and the Homeland Security chief, will be anything but benign.
The new war on freedom
Gore Vidal, AlterNet, July 18, 2002
This past spring marked the anniversaries of three landmark events which paved the way for the further erosion of our personal freedoms we face today.
French sources: U.S. to attack Iraq 'soon'
Amir Oren, Ha'aretz, July 19, 2002
The U.S. operation to topple Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein will take place in the coming months, even before November's Congressional elections, according to high-level sources in the French government following talks with American decision-makers and professionals in Washington. The French assessment is based, in part, on what National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice told new French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin this month. Rice emphasized U.S. President George W. Bush's determination to topple Saddam "soon," according to the French sources.
Pentagon hawks hasten Iraq attack
Martin Sieff, UPI, July 18, 2002
Speaking on a PBS network documentary about Iraq last week, Richard Perle, the former assistant secretary of defense in the Reagan administration who is also immensely influential with civilian Pentagon hawks in the current administration one, confidently predicted that when President George W. Bush gives his State of the Union message next year he would have "good news" to give the American people about Iraq.
For almost all the American people, the best news they could be given about Iraq would be that they did not have to go to war against it. But that clearly was not what Perle was thinking at all. By "good news" about Iraq he mean the elimination of Saddam and his government by the U.S. armed forces.
THE KURDS
Homeless and friendless
Owen Bowcott, The Guardian, July 19, 2002
The war against terrorism has been hard going for the Kurds. One of the world's largest ethnic groups not to have a home state, they form a minority - and face varying degrees of intolerance - across the Middle East, in Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria.
The west's twin campaigns against al-Qaida and Saddam Hussein threaten to undermine the Kurds' nationalist aspirations. Pressure from Washington on the protected Kurdish enclaves in northern Iraq to provide frontline fighters to remove "the butcher of Baghdad" has been widely reported. So far, the Iraqi Kurds have hesitated to compromise their precarious autonomy in order to satisfy the Bush administration's enthusiasm for a new world order.
A plea for a greater European role in world affairs
William Pfaff, International Herald Tribune, July 18, 2002
A note of frustrated anger is now audible in European criticism of the Bush administration's foreign and economic policies. American defiance of what Washington likes to call "the rest of the world" was the subject most discussed in this year's weeklong Papandreou Foundation seminar in Greece, bringing European government and international institution officials together with U.S. academics and observers. Idealistic European internationalism and legalism were argued against the market fundamentalism, aggressive nationalism and exceptionalist convictions of the current government in Washington.
U.S. held 600 for secret rulings
Tamara Audi, Detroit Free Press, July 18, 2002
More than 600 immigrants nationwide have been jailed and subject to secret immigration hearings since Sept. 11, according to new Justice Department statistics. The numbers, in a department letter written to U.S. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., are the first accounting of the magnitude of closed-door legal proceedings conducted as part of new, sweeping anti-terrorism laws, civil rights advocates said Wednesday. The numbers, they say, raise questions about how well the government has targeted its terrorism probe and whether hundreds of people have been deported without due process.
A matter of time
Simon Tisdall, The Guardian, July 18, 2002
Those committed to violence in Israel and Palestine should look at Northern Ireland this week and also take a moment to pause and think. Just as at various times, over various issues, Britain has apologised to Ireland, the US to the formerly enslaved of Africa, Japan to Korea and China, and the Germans to almost everybody, so, too, will Arabs and Israelis one day apologise to each other for all the harm that they have done. When that day comes, people will surely once again look back and wonder why it took so long and what was the point of all the bloodshed, the purpose of all the tears.
LIFE UNDER CURFEW
'If you see a tank, just leave the car and run for it'
Justin Huggler, The Independent, July 19, 2002
Trouble often flares when the curfew falls. Sometimes, children throw stones at the soldiers. Sometimes the soldiers open fire. Two children were killed last month when an Israeli tank fired a shell into a crowd as curfew fell.
Congress presses on Iraq plan
James Dao, New York Times, July 18, 2002
Concerned that the United States is rushing headlong toward a full-scale military confrontation with Iraq, many Congressional Democrats and a growing number of Republicans are urging the Bush administration to provide a public accounting of its plans. The Democratic-controlled Senate Foreign Relations Committee plans to hold hearings on Iraq before leaving for the summer recess in early August, and the Republican-controlled House International Relations Committee intends to do the same in late August or September, Congressional officials said today. Congressional officials said the White House had expressed reservations about taking part in the hearings because President Bush had not yet decided how to achieve his stated goal of removing President Saddam Hussein from power. But a senior administration official said no decision had been made.
Ex-U.S. officials warn that U.S. policies threaten repression
Linda Deutsch, Associated Press, July 16, 2002
Former Secretary of State Warren Christopher and former FBI and CIA chief William Webster challenged administration policies dealing with terrorism suspects Tuesday, and Christopher warned that secrecy threatens to lead America down a path to repression.
Strange bedfellows
Eliahu Salpeter, Ha'aretz, July 18, 2002
Fundamentalist Christian activists in America are setting up a campaign called "Stand With Israel" that is intended to work in concert with AIPAC, the main pro-Israeli lobby in the U.S. B'nai B'rith in Canada has formed an alliance with Christians for Israel to encourage the Ottawa government's support for Israel. And the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews is poised to allocate a significant share of its $30 million annual budget toward a pro-Israeli publicity blitz and provision of financial aid to Jews wishing to immigrate to Israel. Fundamentalist circles claim that George Bush's pro-Israel stand derives from his being a born-again Christian.
Postal Service won't join TIPS program
Randolph E. Schmid, Associated Press, July 17, 2002
The Postal Service has decided not to take part in a government program touted as a tip service for authorities concerned with terrorism, but which is being assailed as a scheme to cast ordinary Americans as "peeping Toms." "The Postal Service had been approached by homeland security regarding Operation TIPS; however, it was decided that the Postal Service and its letter carriers would not be participating in the program at this time," the agency said in a statement issued Wednesday.
Many views of justice
Ellis Henican, Newsday, July 17, 2002
[Stanley] Cohen is a lawyer. In some circles, he just may be the most hated lawyer in New York. This is only partly because Cohen is Jewish. It is also because, in the past few years, this Jewish lawyer has been representing angry Palestinians, militant Arabs and adamant Muslims - the kind of people Israeli officials often call "terrorists." "To their way of thinking, I must be a self-hating Jew," he says. "Or an anti-Semite. Maybe both."
DEREGULATION
COMMENT -- Deregulation was the economic panacea that proved to be a poison. Now the Bush administration wants to deregulate itself. Isn't that another name for being above the law?
No free pass for Pentagon
Editorial, Los Angeles Times, July 17, 2002
Times staff writer Esther Schrader reported this week that administration officials say the Pentagon is the tip of the spear in the movement to relieve executive branch agencies of oversight considered unnecessary and burdensome. But the requirements did not spring up out of thin air. Congress needs to monitor the executive branch, especially with an agency as powerful as the Defense Department. Civilian control of the military is one of the fundamental principles of this country. With a military budget of nearly $400 billion this year, the Pentagon needs more scrutiny than ever.
See also Defense seeking greater latitude
'Godless Americans' plan march on nation's capital
Rick Docksai, CNSNews.com, July 15, 2002
Atheists, secularists and humanists from across the United States are planning a "Godless Americans March on Washington" this fall to protest what they see as the growth of religion in U.S. culture and government, especially since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
For more information, go to Godless Americans
Unilateralism revisited
John B. Judis, The American Prospect, July 18, 2002
Among democratic politicians and political consultants, the accepted wisdom is that George W. Bush has been successful in foreign policy but a flop in domestic policy. This assessment is based more on polling than personal conviction, although some would-be presidential candidates, such as Rep. Dick Gephardt and Sen. John Kerry, have actually endorsed key parts of Bush's foreign policy. Yet when the wise men of the mid-21st century total up the pluses and minuses of this Bush administration, they may well conclude that the president's foreign-policy failings more than matched his domestic ones; and while his domestic policy was fiscally imprudent and fueled the country's financial unrest, his foreign policy was reckless and foolish and imperiled America's place in the world.
Iraq's Kurds assess risk of backing the US
Michael Howard, The Guardian, July 18, 2002
Aware that their "democratic experiment" in self-rule may stand or fall according to the nature of a post-Saddam administration, the Kurds are reluctant to gamble everything they've gained unless they know the kind of future Iraq the US has in mind. They are adamant that they will not just be "hired guns" for the west. "We have bitter memories of being sold out by the Americans on more than one occasion," says Dr Mahmoud Osman, a veteran Kurdish leader. "Now people fear being victimised once again if America does not support a democratic regime to replace the current one in Baghdad."
IRAN - THE NEXT REVOLUTION?
COMMENT -- While Washington and Europe focus their attention on Saddam, his neighbors in Iran may be on the brink of another revolution. Though a popular uprising has the potential to sweep the hardline clerics out of power, Western diplomatic fumbling combined with media inattention threaten to stifle reformation in Iran if Iranians set aside their differences in response to America's military threats against the region.
Iran on the brink
Editorial, Asia Times, July 18, 2002
To no one's surprise, but to the dismay of many - mainly Europeans - the Bush administration's attention in the war on terrorism is increasingly focusing on Iraq and the removal of Saddam Hussein. Meanwhile, however, the people of another member of George W Bush's axis of evil, Iran, may well be on the verge of ridding themselves - with little US help and to marginal Washington interest - of an oppressive regime deeply implicated in the funding of terrorists.
See also Cleric's resignation raises stakes in Iran's domestic political struggle, EurasiaNet, July 17, 2002
Khamenei says U.S. given a slap by Iran unity, Reuters, July 17, 2002
Iran's reformists warn of dictatorship, BBC, July 17, 2002
"…in the fevered eye of persons who most fervently would like to drive all tincture of religion out of the public life of our polity."
Editorial, The War in Context, July 17, 2002
When the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled that recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in public schools is unconstitutional they launched a judicial attack on America. With no less resolution than on September 12, the President, Congress and the American people closed ranks to defend a sacred utterance. Was it the faith or the patriotism of most Americans that the court had more greatly offended?
Invading Iraq: Would the public go along?
Ann Scott Tyson, Christian Science Monitor, July 17, 2002
Plans for a US invasion of Iraq are being drawn and redrawn. News reports of a likely military push against Saddam Hussein unfold daily. And the American public almost uniformly agrees with President Bush in viewing the Iraqi regime as "evil." In fact, many believe Mr. Hussein poses a greater danger than Osama bin Laden. But the effort to unseat Hussein faces important hurdles with the American public, with prospective allies overseas, and even in some quarters of the military. In recent polls, when weighing whether Washington should use military force to unseat Hussein, the public becomes more tentative in its backing, diverging from the drum-beating rhetoric of Mr. Bush.
No state for Iraqi Kurds, Wolfowitz assures Turks
Associated Press, July 17, 2002
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz met with Turkish leaders today to gather support for possible military action against neighboring Iraq. Wolfowitz met with Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit as well as Defense Minister Sabahattin Cakmakoglu, the chief of staff and other top military officials. Wolfowitz sought to allay one of Turkey's chief concerns about any attempt to overthrow Iraqi President Saddam Hussein -- that it would lead to the creation of a breakaway Kurdish state in northern Iraq. Turkey has fought for 15 years against Kurdish rebels within its borders and does not want the conflict to flare up again if Iraqi Kurds achieve statehood after Hussein's fall.
See also Kurds are "freedom fighters" in Iraq, "terrorists" in Turkey by Tariq Ali.
Report tracks intelligence failures
MSNBC, July 17, 2002
U.S. spy agencies made catastrophic mistakes ahead of Sept. 11 by not directing enough time, money and agents to collecting data on terrorists, a House intelligence subcommittee has concluded in a classified report. "The headline is that it was an intelligence failure," subcommittee Chairman Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., told NBC News on Wednesday. "But the fact of the matter is, Congress has a share of the blame."
Ashcroft vs. Americans
Editorial, Boston Globe, July 17, 2002
Operation TIPS - the Terrorism Information and Prevention System - is a scheme that Joseph Stalin would have appreciated. Plans for its pilot phase, to start in August, have Operation TIPS recruiting a million letter carriers, meter readers, cable technicians, and other workers with access to private homes as informants to report to the Justice Department any activities they think suspicious.
This is not an updating of George Orwell's ''1984.'' It is not a satire on the paranoid fantasies of right-wing kooks who see black helicopters swooping across their big sky. It will be a nationwide program run by Attorney General John Ashcroft's Justice Department. If it is allowed to start up and gather steam, it will begin in 10 cities and then expand everywhere, enrolling millions of Americans to spy on their neighbors.
Russia slams military action on Iraq
Reuters, July 16, 2002
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Ivanov says Moscow will oppose any military action against Iraq, saying fears over weapons of mass destruction can be eased through diplomacy.
Facing the 'real' enemy in the Arab Middle East
Ehsan Ahrari, Asia Times, July 13, 2002
The September terrorist attacks on the United States triggered a debate over "why they hate us," involving the Arab Middle East as well as the entire Muslim world. On the Arab side, the same question was asked at the popular level. However, since free debates are not allowed in authoritarian systems, the international community did not get the real flavor of that debate.
US in talks rift over Arafat's future role
Brian Whitaker, The Guardian, July 17, 2002
The United States failed to head off disagreements about the future of Yasser Arafat yesterday at a meeting of the "quartet" of Middle East mediators in New York. Despite the secretary of state, Colin Powell, saying before the meeting that he would be "more than willing" to consider an alternative plan to kick Mr Arafat upstairs, America and the other members of the quartet - the UN, EU and Russia -publicly disagreed at a press conference after the meeting. "We all have our respective positions. The UN still recognises Chairman Arafat and we will continue to deal with him until the Palestinians decide otherwise," said Kofi Annan, the UN secretary general. Igor Ivanov, the Russian foreign minister, added: "It is only for the Palestinians to decide who they want to have as their leaders. It is the sovereign right of the Palestinian people."
Bush's Wilsonian veneer
Anatol Lieven, Financial Times, July 14, 2002
[T]he credibility of Mr Bush's "Wilsonianism" is undermined by the hostility of many in the administration to nation-building. This hostility has been reflected in relative political, military and financial indifference to Afghanistan now the Taliban and al-Qaeda's forces in the country have been defeated. The suspicion is that, once the Bush administration has used the pretext of creating democracy to smash a regime it dislikes, it will be uninterested in the future of that democracy.
Heavy pressures on a fragile peace
Ahmed Rashid, Far Eastern Economic Review, July 18, 2002
It's been a bad month so far for Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai as he struggles to maintain the support of the restive and sensitive Pashtun community for his multi-ethnic government. The assassination on July 6 of Abdul Qadir, a leading moderate Pashtun warlord and a key supporter of Karzai's plans, could prove the most damaging blow, but the president's influence with the Pashtuns was also hurt by another deadly attack on Pashtun civilians by United States military forces hunting for forces of the former ruling Taliban and the Al Qaeda terrorist network. And Karzai's apparent inability to influence the Americans is straining his own ties with the U.S.
Washington is drooling at the prospect of 'Iraq jackpot'
Joseph Samaha, The Daily Star (Beirut), July 15, 2002
From Washington's perspective, Iraq is a big prize ripe for the picking. All the Americans have to do is decide when to go for it. The fall of Iraq, it is widely believed in the US capital, would open up rich opportunities for America in the wider Middle East and secure its interests in the region for years to come.
Afghanistan war "to last for years"
Agence France-Presse, The Courier Mail, July 16, 2002
The US campaign in Afghanistan would last for years with more than half of the Taliban leadership still intact, Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said yesterday. Mr Wolfowitz told US troops at this US coalition air base that the campaign against Al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters would "continue as long as it takes" as he drew a parallel with the decades-long face-off against the Soviet Union. "It's going to be a long struggle. Maybe not as long as the Cold War, but it does not hurt to think (in terms of) the Cold War."
Arms and the warlords
Jonathan Steele, The Guardian, July 16, 2002
A United Nations-mandated international security assistance force (Isaf), with 5,000 foreign peacekeepers, was deployed to Afghanistan after the Taliban collapse. But the United States insisted it remain in Kabul. Although the Afghan government and senior UN officials would like to see Isaf extended to other regions, Washington blocks this. Now pressure is mounting for change, after the recent loya jirga, or grand tribal council, showed that the regional warlords carry undue political weight. Senior US senators from both parties last week called for an extension of Isaf. A Washington thinktank, the Henry L Stimson Centre, said Isaf - headed by Turkey - should be quadrupled to 18,500 troops and deployed to seven other cities besides Kabul.
Underworld where terror and security meet
Rory McCarthy, The Guardian, July 16, 2002
Pearl's disappearance and eventual murder provoked international outrage and signalled the emergence of a new Islamist threat in Pakistan. His case exposes the troubling links between Pakistan's infamous state intelligence service and the underground militant movement.
Don't blame relativism [PDF document]
Stanley Fish, The Responsive Community, Summer issue, 2002
Are you now or have you ever been a postmodernist?
No one is asking this question quite yet. But if what I've heard and read in the past months is any indication, it's only a matter of time before people who say things like "there are no universal standards of judgment" or "there is more than one way to see this crisis" will be asked to turn in their washroom keys, resign their positions, and go join their terrorist comrades in some cave in Afghanistan. This new version of "America, love it or leave it!" is directed at a few professors of literature, history, and sociology who are being told that they are directly responsible for the weakening of the nation's moral fiber and indirectly responsible for the attack a weakened nation has suffered.
A U.S. watchdog for civil liberties
Christopher Edley Jr., Washington Post, July 14, 2002
It is becoming increasingly clear that while reorganizing and mobilizing for homeland security, we also need to construct a practical means of addressing wartime threats to civil liberties and civil rights.
The line-drawing between security and liberties carries three distinct risks: Officials and judges may draw a line in a place we come to regret. Or they may not fully disclose where they have drawn it. Or, finally, wherever the line is drawn, government agents may violate it, without our having much of a chance to detect, correct and punish the abuses. There are things Congress can do now to address these risks of failure to disclose and comply.
WOLFOWITZ'S WORLD
U.S. 'justified' in Afghan air raid
Associated Press, Fox News, July 15, 2002
The U.S. government was justified in an air raid that likely killed innocent Afghan civilians because the strike was aimed at enemy targets where "bad guys" were hiding, deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said Monday. [...] "We have no regrets about going in after bad guys and there were some there."
Defense seeking greater latitude
Ester Schrader, Los Angeles Times, July 15, 2002
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld is pushing a series of sweeping proposals that would weaken congressional oversight of the Pentagon and give the military more freedom to manage itself than ever before. The Pentagon has proposed eliminating requirements for filing hundreds of reports on its activities to Congress every year. Pentagon officials also are drafting proposals to ban strikes by contract workers, eliminate federal personnel rules protecting civilian workers at the Pentagon and bypass environmentalists in Congress. Some proposals are more provocative. They include allowing the Pentagon to send its initiatives directly to Capitol Hill before other agencies could review them. Once there, the legislation would require Congress to vote quickly, with only limited debate.
Nagy visit on Iraq sanctions takes Denmark by storm
Norbert Payne and Coilín ÓhAiseadha, CommonDreams, July 15, 2002
While US plans for the production of Gulf War II rumble on relentlessly, the Danish campaign to abolish the sanctions against Iraq was given a huge boost by the visit of Professor Tom Nagy at the start of June. Here, Nagy presented unshakeable documentation for how the sanctions have been applied to ban the import of water purification equipment and chemicals, thus provoking epidemics of diseases such as cholera, hepatitis and typhoid fever.
[Note -- On July 1, Denmark assumed presidency of the European Union for the next six months.]
See also The secret behind the sanctions by Thomas J. Nagy, The Progressive, September, 2001
Pakistan tribes shun US search
Elizabeth Neuffer, Boston Globe, July 12, 2002
While American troops scour Afghanistan for the remnants of Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda and the Taliban, a parallel hunt is going on just across the border in Pakistan's tribal areas - and stirring up substantial resistance. For the first time since Pakistan became a nation in 1947 its troops are carrying out operations in the North West Frontier Province, heart of the self-governing tribal area along Afghanistan's border, as well as in other border provinces. And that has sharply divided the tribesmen here, so defiant of interference that no outsider, from the ancient Moguls to the modern British, has ever been able to rule them.
US planning to recruit one in 24 Americans as citizen spies
Ritt Goldstein, Sydney Morning Herald, July 15, 2002
The Bush Administration aims to recruit millions of United States citizens as domestic informants in a program likely to alarm civil liberties groups. The Terrorism Information and Prevention System, or TIPS, means the US will have a higher percentage of citizen informants than the former East Germany through the infamous Stasi secret police. The program would use a minimum of 4 per cent of Americans to report "suspicious activity".
Democrats take aim at Bush's foreign policies
Dan Balz, Washington Post, July 15, 2002
After months of hesitancy, leading Democrats have begun to challenge President Bush directly on his conduct of foreign affairs, offering pointed criticisms of his policies on the Middle East, U.S. relations with key allies and even the war in Afghanistan.
It maddens his foes, but Bush is a lucky President
Rupert Cornwall, The Independent, July 13, 2002
Eat your hearts out, Bush-haters in Britain, Europe and beyond. It just ain't happening. This past week, the first of George W's 57th year on this planet, has been his worst as President by far. But, somehow, the good ship "moral clarity" sails on. The avidly awaited crash in his popularity simply refuses to materialise.
'Distraction' that takes the heat off al-Qa'ida
Robert Fisk, The Independent, July 15, 2002
How better to distract Pakistan's army from supporting America's "war on terror" than by promoting, yet again, a war in Kashmir?
Whether or not the mysterious "Hindu" holy men who turned into mass murderers in the slums of Jammu on Saturday night were Islamist gunmen, a suspicion is growing in Pakistan that supporters of Osama bin Laden would be happy to provoke another crisis with India if it relieved the pressure on al-Qa'ida along the Pakistan-Afghan frontier.
Iraqi opposition leaders warn US and Britain not to invade
Kim Sengupta, The Independent, July 15, 2002
Iraqi exiles expected to participate in a future government of their country warned yesterday that an invasion by American and British troops would bring widespread destruction without removing Saddam Hussein. Opposition leaders stressed that a large-scale offensive by Washington and its allies would not be supported by opponents of the Baghdad regime, either inside or outside Iraq.
Massacre in Kashmir slum renews fear of war
Rory McCarthy, The Guardian, July 15, 2002
India and Pakistan descended again into hostile recriminations last night after suspected Islamic militants killed 27 Hindus in a Kashmir shanty town. The attack on the outskirts of Jammu was the most serious atrocity since the dangerous military standoff between the two countries raised the spectre of a nuclear war less than two months ago. India and Pakistan still have a million soldiers stationed along their border on high military alert.
The choice is to do nothing or try to bring about change
Hilary Rose and Steven Rose, The Guardian, July 15, 2002
The carnage in the Middle East continues; today a suicide bomber, tomorrow an Israeli strike on Palestinians with helicopters, missiles and tanks. The Israelis continue to invade Palestinian towns and expand illegal settlements in the occupied territories. Ariel Sharon refuses to negotiate while "violence" (ie Palestinian resistance) continues. Our own government sheds crocodile tears at the loss of life while inviting a prime minister accused of war crimes to lunch and providing his military with F16 spare parts.
Yet every rational person knows that the only prospect of a just and lasting peace lies in Israel's recognition of the legitimacy of a Palestinian state and the Arab world's acceptance of a secure Israel behind its 1967 borders. That is what every peace plan proposes. But how to get from here to there? Is there anything that ordinary citizens, that is civil society, can do to bring pressure to bear to compel our governments and international institutions to move the peace process forward?
Light trigger-fingers in tanks
Gideon Levy, Ha'aretz, July 14, 2002
Far more damaging than bulls in a china shop, Israeli tanks have for some weeks been prowling the streets of the Palestinian cities in the West Bank, wreaking destruction and also occasionally killing innocent civilians. There are not many other cities in the world - Grozny comes to mind - in which tanks have the run of the streets and fire shells into population centers.
SHARON AND THE SETTLERS
The Zambish factor
Sara Leibovich-Dar, Ha'aretz, July 14, 2002
Ze'ev Hever, the secretary-general of Amana, the hands-on settlement arm of Gush Emunim ("Bloc of the Faithful" movement), speaks with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon several times a day. Once a week, sometimes more, he pays a nighttime visit to the Prime Minister's Office.
In the 1980s, Hever, known by his nickname, "Zambish," was imprisoned as a member of the Jewish underground terrorist organization, and he is still considered one of the extremists among the settlers' leadership. He is also one of the people closest to the prime minister. He has no official position in the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) and he loathes publicity - his forte is operating behind the scenes. His friends describe him as a "shadow man" and take pride in the huge influence he wields on developments in the territories and in the decisions made in the Prime Minister's Bureau. "When he speaks, everyone listens quietly," says Uri Elitzur, editor of Nekuda, the journal of the Yesha Council of settlements.
Beware Bush's summer charm offensive
Ian Davis, The Observer, July 14, 2002
Since the US defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, dropped the reference to "national" in what the Clinton administration termed National Missile Defence, the possibility of expanding the missile defense system to protect "friends and allies" has been repeatedly mooted. With the Bush administration promising to have a system in place by 2004, and the hawks firmly in control of policy formulation, the United States is now openly pushing the concept of a "global" missile defence system. The path has been further smoothed by last month's demise of the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, which prohibited foreign participation in US missile defence plans.
Blair and Bush plan Iraq war summit
Kamal Ahmed, Jason Burke and Nick Pelham, The Observer, July 14, 2002
Tony Blair is preparing for a 'lightning visit' to meet President Bush at a specially - convened war summit, as America continues to press for a military invasion of Iraq. In a move that will heighten speculation that the US is in the final stages of planning an assault against Saddam Hussein, a date in the autumn for the summit at Camp David has been put forward.
War clouds gather as hawks lay their plans
Jason Burke and Ed Vulliamy, The Observer, July 14, 2002
World leaders appear to be in deadly earnest over warnings that Saddam must be deposed by force. But some in the US are asking why a blueprint for the conflict was leaked at the moment when sleaze scandals hit a new peak.
One (constitutionally illiterate) nation under God
The Constitution can't protect our rights if we don't understand them
Jamin B. Raskin, TomPaine.com, July 11, 2002
On the spectrum of constitutional abuses in John Ashcroft's America, the God-infused Pledge of Allegiance is surely not the gravest. But courts take cases as they come, and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals' explosive decision in June ruling the pledge unconstitutional was built on a brick wall of Supreme Court precedent.
U.S. peacekeepers given year's immunity from new court
Serge Schmemann, New York Times, July 13, 2002
The Security Council today concluded an unusual wrangle between the United States and many other members, unanimously adopting a resolution that effectively gives American peacekeepers a year's exemption from prosecution by the new International Criminal Court.
The US and the world: 'us' and 'them' in perpetual contest?
Paul Rogers, Open Democracy, July 10, 2002
As the increases in US defence spending begin to take effect, we are starting to see the longer-term effects of 11 September on the US military posture. Some of the changes are in evidence in other countries and they are joined by another factor that complicates US defence thinking – the resolute determination of the Russian arms industry to rescue itself from collapse by a vigorous arms export policy.
State Department detains reporter over leaked Saudi cable
Howard Kurtz, Washington Post, July 13, 2002
State Department officials detained a young National Review reporter for questioning at the daily briefing yesterday after he asked about a classified cable involving embarrassing problems with U.S. visas in Saudi Arabia.
America is conspicuously absent
John R. Van Eenwyk, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, July 14, 2002
If there is no officially sanctioned international tribunal to investigate and to adjudicate war crimes -- in other words, when justice cannot prevail -- individuals will assume the role themselves.
In tough times, a company finds profits in Terror War
Jeff Gerth and Don Van Natta Jr., New York Times, July 12, 2002
The Halliburton Company [whose former CEO is Vice-President Dick Cheney], the Dallas oil services company bedeviled lately by an array of accounting and business issues, is benefiting very directly from the United States efforts to combat terrorism.
From building cells for detainees at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba to feeding American troops in Uzbekistan, the Pentagon is increasingly relying on a unit of Halliburton called KBR, sometimes referred to as Kellogg Brown & Root.
Although the unit has been building projects all over the world for the federal government for decades, the attacks of Sept. 11 have led to significant additional business. KBR is the exclusive logistics supplier for both the Navy and the Army, providing services like cooking, construction, power generation and fuel transportation. The contract recently won from the Army is for 10 years and has no lid on costs, the only logistical arrangement by the Army without an estimated cost.
Pashtuns losing faith in Karzai, U.S.
Pamela Constable, Washington Post, July 13, 2002
Afghanistan's Pashtuns, the country's dominant ethnic group, say they are beginning to lose faith in President Hamid Karzai and to fear that the U.S. military campaign here is working against them.
U.S. foreign policy: Shaping global affairs
Tom Barry, Foreign Policy in Focus, July 10, 2002
September 11 and America's post-trauma syndrome have done what foreign policy reformers have long sought - injected global affairs into America's mainstream consciousness. Unfortunately, this new international consciousness has been shaped by the Bush administration's largely military response to terrorism and is supported by a groundswell of public anger, fear, and jingoism. In less than six months, many of the modest foreign policy (and domestic) gains of the previous decade - liberalization of Mexico-U.S. migration, cuts in military spending, declassification of documents, limitations on U.S. involvement in Colombia, increased human rights and environmental conditionality to U.S. aid, negotiations with Iran and North Korea, progress on ending the embargo on Cuba - were rolled back.
What have the 9/11 investigators overlooked?
Janet McIntosh, Christian Science Monitor, July 11, 2002
The USA is widely loathed, but our leaders never fully grasped that before last September. Shortly after the attacks, President Bush claimed to be "amazed" that anyone hates America, because "I know how good we are." This naivete is a failure of "intelligence" not the kind the FBI and CIA specialize in, but a lapsed ability to see the global political landscape from any perspective outside one's own.
Osama bin Laden: Now you see him, now you don't
Tai Moses, AlterNet, July 11, 2002
The familiar, expressionless countenance of Osama bin Laden, the world's most wanted man, has occupied a slot on the F.B.I's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list for nearly a year now. He gazes out from the upper left-hand corner, looking less like a terrorist than one of the B-list celebrities on Hollywood Squares.
George W. Bush probably wishes he could bump Osama down and over a few squares, perhaps to Carlos the Jackal's old chair. For not only is Osama far from being apprehended and thus dismissed from the list, U.S. intelligence sources admit they don't have a clue where he is or even if he's dead or alive - a fact that so embarrasses Washington the messages coming from the administration are increasingly schizoid.
Bush should invade Wall Street, not Iraq
Bill Berkowitz, WorkingForChange, July 11, 2002
Since September 11, the president has been able to maintain his unusually high standing in the polls, mainly due to the American people's ongoing support for his "war on terrorism." Never mind that the "war on terrorism" has had some pretty rough going the past several months: Osama bin Laden is still out there somewhere and errant bombs continue to slaughter dozens of innocent civilians. Despite these setbacks, the "war on terrorism" is still a winning issue for the president. Enough so that Bush advisor Karl Rove has all but advised Republicans to run in November on the "war on terrorism."
If the president has an Achilles heel, however, it is his all-too-cozy relationship with America's corporate elite—the one-percenters. Tax cuts for the rich, the proposed abolishing of the estate tax, which clearly would benefit the richest among us, are issues that have not really interested the American people. However, messing with working people's livelihoods and their retirement funds is another thing altogether. Bush's feeble handling of the substantive consequences arising out of the epidemic of corporate misconduct might finally be what Democrats have been waiting for.
Whoops, our bad
David Corn, Working For Change, July 11, 2002
With the most recent event - the worst known case of civilian casualties of this war - the Pentagon, once again, tried at first to duck responsibility and to explain away the slaughter. But as more information became available about the attack in Kakrak, it became harder for the Defense Department to hold the line. A look back at its changing story is instructive.
America aloof
Editorial, New York Times, July 12, 2002
The United States does not rule the world, and the administration needs to think more creatively and strategically about how this country works with the rest of the planet. A dash of humility might be a help, too.
The fence at the heart of Palestine
Ilan Pappe, Al-Ahram, July 11, 2002
In the middle of last month, Israel began building a fence to separate itself physically from the West Bank. Among my friends on the Israeli left, there are those who received this news with great enthusiasm. These are the same friends who were convinced that the Oslo process would inevitably lead to a lasting and comprehensive peace. Now, they are rejoicing again, because they believe that this separation is the first step that will ultimately lead to the creation of an independent Palestinian state. In their eyes, the fence will serve as demarcation of the future border between Israel and Palestine.
If they are right, and the planned fence is indeed meant to delineate these boundaries, then Palestine -- the geopolitical entity for which the PLO had been struggling ever since its inception -- is probably lost. For in that case, the fence will virtually complete the process which was begun by the Zionist movement in 1882, and has been continued vigorously by Israel since 1948 -- the process of de-Arabising the land of Palestine.
One-way street
Edward Said, Al-Ahram, July 11, 2002
Even by the terribly low standards of his other speeches, George W Bush's 24 June speech to the world about the Middle East was a startling example of how an execrable combination of muddled thought, words with no actual meaning in the real world of living, breathing human beings, preachy and racist injunctions against the Palestinians, an incredible blindness, a delusional blindness, to the realities of an ongoing Israeli invasion and conquest against all the laws of war and peace, all wrapped in the smug accents of a moralistic, stiff-necked and ignorant judge who has arrogated to himself divine privileges, now sits astride US foreign policy. And this, it is important to remember, from a man who virtually stole an election he did not win, and whose record as governor of Texas includes the worst pollution, scandalous corruption, the highest rates of imprisonment and capital punishment in the world. So this dubiously endowed man of few gifts except the blind pursuit of money and power has the capability to condemn Palestinians not just to the tender mercies of war criminal Sharon but to the dire consequences of his own empty condemnations. Flanked by three of the most venal politicians in the world (Powell, Rumsfeld, and Rice), he pronounced his speech with the halting accents of a mediocre elocution student and thereby allowed Sharon to kill or injure many more Palestinians in a US endorsed illegal military occupation.
Suicide bombings: deadly to Israelis, but how self-destructive to the Palestinian cause?
Bradley Burston, Ha'aretz, July 12, 2002
Amid a blistering Amnesty International report on Palestinian militancy - openly denouncing attacks on Israeli civilians as murder and "crimes against humanity" - and heated White House condemnations of "homicide bombings," can international pressure change minds in the West Bank and Gaza Strip over the political efficacy of the bomb belt?
Warlords could seize control in Afghanistan - UN
Stephanie Nebehay, Reuters, July 11, 2002
Afghanistan could slide back under the control of warlords if it fails to receive the aid it urgently needs, a top U.N. official warned on Thursday. Kenzo Oshima, U.N. under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, said that $777 million was needed up to the end of this year to finance requirements including food and shelter for returning refugees, as well as police and army salaries.
War against what?
Brendan O'Neill, Spiked, July 2, 2002
The more the war drags on, the more trouble US leaders seem to have pinpointing what America is fighting against. The war has moved from focusing on bin Laden to focusing on 'evil dictators everywhere'; from 'destroying terrorism' in Afghanistan to 'rebuilding hope' across the third world; from bombing terrorist camps in Afghanistan to a 'first strike' policy that will target 'over 60 nations' to keep international terrorism in check. One left-wing US commentator argues that 'what started as a war against one man... has turned into a war against the world'.
Gorbachev: I fear Bush and Blair war plan
Oonagh Blackman, Daily Mirror, July 11, 2002
Mikhail Gorbachev last night branded George W Bush and Tony Blair a threat to world peace. The former Russian president said US and British plans to attack Iraq and topple Saddam Hussein would wreck the international coalition against terrorism.
West sees glittering prizes ahead in giant oilfields
Michael Theodoulou and Roland Watson, The Times, July 11, 2002
President Bush has used the War on Terror to press his case for drilling in a protected Arctic refuge, but predicted reserves in Alaska are dwarfed by the oilwells of the Gulf. Anthony Cordesman, of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said that the issue for the US was as much the security of the Gulf as access to particular oilfields. "You are looking down the line to a world in 2020 when reliance on Gulf oil will have more than doubled. The security of the Gulf is an absolutely critical issue."
U.S. plans massive invasion of Iraq
Richard Sale, UPI, July 10, 2002
President George W. Bush and his advisers are reviewing plans for a massive, full-scale military conquest of Iraq, composed by Central Command under Gen. Tommy Franks, that would require five ground force divisions numbering 200,000, two Marine Corps divisions, and 15 wings of U.S. fighters and bombers, key administration officials told United Press International. These officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Britain is expected to provide as many as 25,000 troops for a total on-the-ground force of 250,000 men.
Who wants this war?
Michael Kinsley, Slate, July 10, 2002
It was amazing to read the Pentagon's detailed plans for an invasion of Iraq in the New York Times last week. The general reaction of Americans to this news was even more amazing: Basically, there was no reaction. We seem to be distant observers of our own nation's preparation for war, watching with horror or approval or indifference a process we have nothing to do with and cannot affect.
A strange kind of freedom
Robert Fisk, The Independent, July 9, 2002
The most astonishing – and least covered – story is in fact the alliance of Israeli lobbyists and Christian Zionist fundamentalists, a coalition that began in 1978 with the publication of a Likud plan to encourage fundamentalist churches to give their support to Israel. By 1980, there was an "International Christian Embassy" in Jerusalem; and in 1985, a Christian Zionist lobby emerged at a "National Prayer Breakfast for Israel" whose principal speaker was Benjamin Netanyahu, who was to become Israeli prime minister. "A sense of history, poetry and morality imbued the Christian Zionists who, more than a century ago, began to write, plan and organise for Israel's restoration," Netanyahu told his audience. The so-called National Unity Coalition for Israel became a lobbying arm of Christian Zionism with contacts in Congress and neo-conservative think-tanks in Washington.
See also U.S. Christians find cause to aid Israel - evangelicals financing immigrants, settlements
We need to talk about the war on Iraq before it begins
Hugo Young, The Guardian, July 11, 2002
The fiercest debates about war usually take place after the slaughter has begun, and sometimes only when it's over. Vietnam crept up on Kennedy, and then Johnson, and even in 1965 when their private deliberations concluded with American military intervention, the public argument was nugatory. The mainstream media gave it near-total support. Somewhat later, opinion turned, and war fury both ways dominated the whole of politics. By then it was too late to save anyone from catastrophe. The case of modern Iraq is different. We can see war coming.
U.S. bid for exemption from International Criminal Court rebuffed
Thalif Deen, Inter Press Service, July 10, 2002
The United States appeared isolated Wednesday in seeking -- and failing to secure -- exemptions for its U.N. peacekeepers from the jurisdiction of the nascent International Criminal Court. At a meeting of the Security Council, the 15-member European Union, a traditional U.S. ally, and the 114-member Non-Aligned Movement rejected the U.S. request to shield its citizens from the Court, which has entered into treaty force and is expected to open its doors early next year.
Israelis close main office at Palestinian university in Jerusalem
Molly Moore, Washington Post, July 10, 2002
"The closing of [Al-Qud University President] Nusseibeh's offices exposes the true nature of this government -- systematic destruction of any possible political solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict," Moria Shlomot, director of the Israeli anti-war group Peace Now, said in a statement.
The offices were shut down because of "suspicion that they operated under the auspices of the Palestinian Authority and on its behalf," said a spokesman for the Jerusalem superintendent of Israeli police. "According to the law, the P.A. is not allowed to operate in the boundaries of the state of Israel."
Nusseibeh, who recently was criticized by some Palestinians for being a signatory to a newspaper advertisement denouncing suicide bombings by Palestinians, was at a conference in Greece when, at 9 a.m., about 60 police surrounded the two-story office building that houses the administration of the multi-campus university, Diliani said.
"They sealed off the area around the university and declared it a military zone, with nobody allowed in or out," said Diliani, who has worked for the university four years. "They were changing locks, taking computer hardware, files and file cabinets without even looking inside."
Israel's closure policy
An ineffective strategy of containment and repression
Amira Hass, Journal of Palestine Studies, Spring 2002
This article examines the Israeli policy of closure from its introduction in 1991 through its consolidation under Oslo, when its devastating potential was heightened by an intermeshing with Oslo II's division of the occupied territories into zones of Israeli and Palestinian control. The author argues that closure, first applied as a military-bureaucratic preemptive security measure, crystallized with Oslo into a conscious political goal: demographic separation without meaningful political separation. Despite the absence of an organized Palestinian resistance to closure, the reasons for which are explored here, a spirit of resilience and defiance has enabled the population to bear up under closure's intensification during the present uprising, when virtually all movement is banned and the territories are under siege.
Circumventing courts to bypass democracy
Moshe Gorali, Ha'aretz, July 9, 2002
Three [Israeli] Supreme Court verdicts of recent years have become controversial precisely because of their enlightened attitude toward Arabs - the ruling against holding Lebanese hostages as "bargaining chips" in the Ron Arad case; the prohibition against the Shin Bet shaking Palestinian prisoners; and the Kadan-Katzir verdict prohibiting the state from discriminating between Jewish and Arab citizens in allocating state land.
Such decisions should be simple - what court in a democracy would uphold torture, hostage taking, or racial discrimination?
Look who's prejudiced
Nicholas D. Kristof, International Herald Tribune, July 10, 2002
Since Sept. 11, appalling hate speech about Islam has circulated in the United States on talk radio, on the Internet and in particular among conservative Christian pastors - the modern echoes of Charles Coughlin, the "radio priest" who had a peak listening audience in the 1930s of one-third of America for his anti-Semitic diatribes.
America shouldn't fear the international court
Chris Patten, International Herald Tribune, July 10, 2002
The United States was fully engaged in the Rome conference that prepared the court. It sought all sorts of assurances, and it got them. For example: The International Criminal Court is complementary to national courts. It would have had nothing to say, for example, about the sorry business a couple of years back involving indecent assaults by U.S. troops in Okinawa. Not only did this involve what might be called "common crime" rather than crimes against humanity but the United States itself took appropriate action.
The international court will not be retrospective.
Investigations can proceed only after a pretrial chamber has determined there is a reasonable basis for action. Under Article 16 of the court's statute the UN Security Council can decide to block prosecutions for fixed periods. In short, the United States demanded elaborate safeguards, and it got them. But in a pattern that has become wearily familiar in other contexts such as the Kyoto climate change treaty, it then revoked its intention to sign. This technique carries serious long-term risks. Why should people make concessions to America if the United States is going to walk away in any case?
The welcome is going sour
Selig S. Harrison, International Herald Tribune, July 10, 2002
Mounting anger over civilian casualties inflicted by U.S. forces is not the only reason why anti-American sentiment is growing in Afghanistan. More than 120 Afghan villagers were inadvertently killed or wounded by a C-130 gunship on June 30 in Oruzgan Province, a stronghold of the 10 million Pashtun tribesmen who are Afghanistan's largest ethnic group. But even before the Oruzgan tragedy, the Pashtun goodwill earned by the United States for sweeping away the Taliban had been replaced by resentment after U.S. pressure to block the re-emergence of a Pashtun-dominated regime at the recent loya jirga, or grand council, held in Kabul.
U.S. deported 131 Pakistanis in secret airlift
Diplomatic issues cited; no terror ties found
Steve Fainaru, Washington Post, July 10, 2002
In a highly unusual airlift involving hundreds of U.S. immigration officers, the Justice Department secretly chartered a Portuguese jet to deport 131 Pakistani detainees who had been held for months at INS detention facilities around the country. A majority of the detainees, a Pakistani official said, had been arrested under a Justice Department program to locate and apprehend immigrants who have ignored previous deportation orders and who came under scrutiny after the Sept. 11 attacks. None of the detainees appeared to have links to terrorism, U.S. officials said.
The man who wasn't there
How Louis Freeh escaped responsibility for 9/11
Joshua Micah Marshall, Slate, July 9, 2002
For more than a month, congressional committees have been investigating America's recent track record on intelligence and counterterrorism. Members of Congress have heard from Robert Mueller, the current chief of the FBI, and George Tenet, the current chief of the CIA. They've heard from former heads of these agencies, such as William Webster. They've taken testimony from a star-studded array of other intelligence and counterterrorism worthies. But along the way, it somehow hasn't occurred to any of the committees doing post-9/11 investigations to call up Louis J. Freeh, the man who headed the FBI—the country's primary domestic intelligence and counterterrorism agency—from 1993 to June 2001, the most critical eight years in question.
The human cost of war
Leela Jacinto, ABC News, July 9, 2002
Days after President Bush expressed his sympathies over the "tragedy" of the July 1 bombing raid , Sultan — who currently works as a program coordinator for the New York-based Women for Afghan Women -— and a number of other activists addressed a small gathering of protesters outside the White House. Her demands were simple: an investigation into all the reported cases of civilian casualties in Afghanistan and for the U.S. government to set up a trust fund to assist families of innocent victims of U.S. bombings in Afghanistan. "I find myself asking that in this age of information, don't we want to know the successes and failures of the war?" she says. "And why don't we want the people to know?"
Bush threatens future of peacekeeping
Jim Lobe, AlterNet, July 9, 2002
The ongoing test of wills over the future of U.N. peacekeeping mission in Bosnia within the Security Council has turned into a watershed event -- one that may decisively shape the United States' relationship with the rest of the world.
Rebel groups reject CIA overtures down on the farm
Julian Borger, The Guardian, July 10, 2002
Deep in the bowels of the US state department, not far from the cafeteria, there is a small office identified only by a handwritten sign on the door reading: The Future of Iraq Project. Such is the ramshackle reality lying beneath the Bush administration's pronouncements on regime change in Baghdad. There is little doubt that the Pentagon is devising invasion plans in deadly earnest, but the parallel effort to build a political alternative has been half-hearted to say the least. In fact it is in retreat on several fronts.
If Afghanistan goes down
Editorial, Washington Post, July 9, 2002
It is not clear who killed Abdul Qadir, one of Afghanistan's vice presidents, but the message from Saturday's assassination is obvious enough. Afghanistan's post-Taliban political order remains fragile; it is threatened by all the forces that may lie behind the killing: ethnic tensions, rivalries between the provinces and the center, the opium trade. The United States and its allies need to recognize that, without stronger efforts to stand behind Hamid Karzai's interim government, the opportunity to stabilize Afghanistan will be fumbled.
'Jews-only' law sparks firestorm
Bradley Burston, Ha'aretz, July 9, 2002
"If we are not already totally an apartheid state, we are getting much, much closer to it," said former cabinet minister and leftist Meretz party founder Shulamit Aloni.
"We are also moving farther and farther away from the founding document of the state of Israel," she said, in a reference to the nation's 1948 Declaration of Independence, which pledged "development of the country for the benefit of all its residents" and "complete social and political equality to all its citizens, regardless of religion, race, or gender."
Documenting the massacre in Mazar
Genevieve Roja, AlterNet, July 8, 2002
A documentary film by Scottish filmmaker Jamie Doran titled "Massacre at Mazar" offers eyewitness testimony and film footage of human remains and mass graves of what may be damning evidence of mass killings at Sherberghan and Mazar-I-Sharif in Northern Afghanistan.
The massacre allegedly took place in November 2001, when Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum of the Northern Alliance took control of Kunduz, and accepted the surrender of about 8,000 Taliban fighters that included al-Qaeda, Chechens, Uzbeks and Pakistanis. Almost 500 suspected al-Qaeda members were taken to the Qala Jangi prison fortress (where a revolt would eventually leave one CIA agent dead and make John Walker Lindh a household name), while the remainder of the prisoners -- about 7,500 -- were loaded in containers and transported to the Qala-I-Zeini fortress, almost halfway between Mazar-i-Sharif and Sherberghan Prison. Human rights advocates say that close to 5,000 of the original 8,000 are missing.
FBI raids immigrants' stores
David B. Caruso, Associated Press, July 9, 2002
About 75 stores have been searched by investigators hoping to discover financial backing for terrorist groups, said a law enforcement official, speaking on the condition of anonymity. The raids have taken place in several cities over the past two weeks, including Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Atlanta and New York. Dozens of foreigners, mostly from Pakistan, have been detained or questioned. The shop owners have been asked about their accounting practices and whether they send money to any foreign organizations on a regular basis. They also are asked whether they support al-Qaida or know anyone who does, officials said.
Immigration attorney Neil Rambana, who is representing three Pakistani men and a woman from Nepal arrested in a raid at the Governor's Square mall in Tallahassee, Fla., said the FBI and INS were on a "fishing expedition." "There is no proof and no one has presented any evidence that would put these people under suspicion," Rambana said. "This was all about abusing people's rights in the hopes that there were a few guilty people among them."
Racism debate flares in Israel
Tracy Wilkinson, Los Angeles Times, July 9, 2002
The government of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has endorsed a proposed law that would allow Jews to bar Arab citizens of Israel from purchasing homes or living in many Israeli communities, a move that has touched off a divisive national debate.
The attempt to legalize "Jews-only" towns was swiftly criticized by numerous Israeli politicians and human rights groups, who said it was a discriminatory and racist proposal. Supporters praised the bill for protecting what they called the essence of Zionism.
The debate goes to the heart of Israel's existential contradiction: How can it be both a Jewish state and a democratic state?
CEMENTING ILL-WILL
Ties binding U.S. to Arab world are weakened
Howard Schneider, Washington Post, July 8, 2002
Among the universities that it was hoped would send recruiters back to the Middle East this fall, "no one has registered," said Sohair Saad, educational information director at the training group Amideast, which helped sponsor the MBA tour. Students, she said, are expressing less and less interest in studying in the United States. "We're scared of them, they are scared of us," she said of the current attitude toward the United States. "This is very unfortunate."
No wedding and too many funerals
Bill Berkowitz, WorkingForChange, July 5, 2002
The "war on terrorism" is failing. The challenge is to find other ways of dealing with state- and organizationally-sponsored terrorism. For now, money is flying down the rat-hole called Bush's "war on terrorism."
I'm not the first to say this and nor will I be the last: The United States and its allies are making one holy heck of a mess of the "war on terrorism." Errant bombs continue to slaughter civilians. Coalition troops continue to pursue, and not find, remnants of al-Qaeda and Taliban troops.
Minister suspended over 9/11 service
AP, July 9, 2002
A minister with the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod has been suspended for participating in an interfaith service at Yankee Stadium for the families of those killed in the Sept. 11 attacks.
Kurdish leaders reluctant to join U.S. move against Saddam
John F. Burns, New York Times (via IHT), July 9, 2002
As the United States considers ways of accomplishing President George W. Bush's call for an end to Saddam Hussein's rule in Iraq, Washington's goal of a "regime change" in Baghdad is running into strong reservations from Iraqi Kurdish leaders who would be crucial allies in any military campaign.
ONE NATION UNDER GOD - AYATOLLAH SCALIA WON'T LET DEMOCRACY UNDERMINE HIS FAITH
From Justice Scalia, a chilling vision of religion’s authority in America
Sean Wilentz, New York Times, July 8, 2002
"The reaction of people of faith to this tendency of democracy to obscure the divine authority behind government should not be resignation to it, but the resolution to combat it as effectively as possible," [Scalia] said in Chicago.
New Afghan exodus looms
Owen Bowcott and Alan Travis, The Guardian, July 9, 2002
A fresh exodus of Afghan refugees could be triggered as early as next month if the UN agency assisting the resettlement of 2 million people runs out of funds and is forced to suspend its aid programme, western donor nations are being warned.
Israel accused of 'racist ideology' with plan to prevent Arabs buying homes
Eric Silver, The Independent, July 9, 2002
Opposition was growing last night to a plan by Ariel Sharon's government to build public-sector housing within Israel exclusively for Jews. Left-wing and Arab MPs denounced as "racist" Sunday's cabinet decision to back a private member's bill barring Arabs from buying homes in "Jewish" townships, built on state-owned land. Israel has about 1 million Arabs, nearly 20 per cent of the population. Shulamit Aloni, a veteran civil rights campaigner and former minister, said: "If we are not an apartheid state, we are getting much, much closer to it." Yossi Sarid, who succeeded her as leader of the Meretz party, added: "The Israeli Arabs are not guests here. They are citizens with equal rights." Azmi Bishara, of the Arab Balad party, said: "Racism has become an official ideology of the state of Israel."
Middle Eastern gulf separates EU and US
Brian Whitaker, The Guardian, July 8, 2002
When continents drift apart they usually move so slowly that nobody notices, but since George Bush became president the Atlantic has widened perceptibly. In the pre-Bush era, disputes between Europe and the US could often be passed off as differences of nuance rather than substance. What is emerging now, however, particularly in relation to the Middle East, is a fundamental difference of approach that will be hard to ignore or resolve.
FLAG-FLYING IS EASIER THAN SUSTAINING DEMOCRACY
After 9/11, patriotism's up, but not presence at the polls
Brian Faler, Washington Post, July 8, 2002
"What the citizenry was asked to do was to return to normalcy, consume material goods and invest in the stock market -- hardly clarion calls to civic involvement."
Reality gap in Afghanistan
Despite rosy reports, women's rights remain wishful thinking
Belquis Ahmadi, Washington Post, July 8, 2002
For 10 days I sat inside a tent in Kabul as one of 200 women delegates participating in the loya jirga to determine Afghanistan's future government. Given my experience, the widespread willingness to declare that assembly an unmitigated success is a mystery to me and, I would hope, to all those who put reality before rhetoric when it comes to women's rights.
The power to imprison
Philip Heymann, Washington Post, July 7, 2002
The Bush administration is claiming the power to decide alone and in secret whether Americans shall be imprisoned indefinitely to protect us against terrorism. It's that simple. The president claims the power to detain citizens as well as illegal immigrants as "combatants" until the war on terrorism is over. That war, like the war on drugs, is likely to continue indefinitely; terrorism in Northern Ireland and Israel have been facts of life for 35 years.
A detained person will not have access to a lawyer. The factual basis for calling a citizen a combatant on behalf of terrorism will generally be secret. There will be no judicial review of the grounds for finding that the citizen poses a danger of terrorism and often no trial on any criminal charges. Our most basic freedom now depends on the good faith of the administration in power -- the very situation the Founders meant most clearly to prevent. The United Kingdom, although faced with an onslaught of terrorism in Northern Ireland and in England, abandoned use of preventive detention without criminal charges in 1975.
The president's claim of such power is not bolstered by congressional support. As the Supreme Court noted in denying President Truman the power to seize the steel mills to avoid economic disruption of our war in Korea, such authorization -- or its absence -- is often critical to a president's claim of national security powers. The closest the administration can come to finding such congressional support is the resolution broadly empowering it to fight al Qaeda -- a resolution nowhere even hinting, however remotely, that extraordinary powers to seize and then indefinitely detain Americans seized in the United States (and not captured in battle) were granted or even imagined. Congress has never provided the president any support for this claim.
Interview with Tariq Ali
How Bush used 9/11 to remap the world
Counterpunch, July 8, 2002
I think that the Left, using the word in its broadest sense, is divided. Many intellectuals were panicked into supporting the 'war on terrorism'. Though a strong minority exists in the United States that opposes the new imperialism. In Europe there is a majority in Germany, Britain and Italy that is opposed to any new war on Iraq and many are now beginning to see that the US utilised 9/11 to re-map the world. So there is an opposition in the First World. In Britain at the moment 170 Members of Parliament (mainly Labour) have signed a public declaration against a war on Iraq.
Expecting Taliban, but finding only horror
Carlotta Gall, New York Times, July 8, 2002
After an American plane bombarded this village on July 1, American and Afghan soldiers surrounded the settlement and advanced at first light, searching houses and detaining people, apparently expecting to find Islamic militants, residents said today.
But as the soldiers neared the center of the cluster of mud-walled farmhouses, they found a horrifying scene, survivors said.
Women and children lay dead and wounded in and around one big house where they had been gathered for an engagement party, torn apart by cannon fire from the American attack plane, an AC-130 gunship. Survivors said they were gathering up the bodies, picking up limbs and body parts from the streets and adjoining orchard, and carrying the wounded to the village mosque, when the soldiers arrived.
FREEDOM OF THE PRESS
UK paper's Bush attack angers US shareholder
Roy Greenslade, The Guardian, July 8, 2002
The Daily Mirror editor, Piers Morgan, has vowed to go on publishing articles critical of US president George Bush despite concern from an American shareholder.
The news about the news since Sept. 11: Not good
H.D.S. Greenway, Boston Globe, July 7, 2002
There has always been a tension between news gatherers and newsmakers, and the war on terror will prove no exception. The US government will try to control and guide information about its doings, as all governments do. It has already chipped away at liberties that Americans heretofore could take for granted. Who will guard these rights if not a free press?
Stop the war before it starts
David Cortright, The Progressive, August, 2002
The Bush Administration once again is gearing up for war against Iraq. It's a war that could cause a massive loss of life and could end with the use of nuclear weapons by the United States or Israel. It's a war that is unnecessary, a war we--as progressives, as peace activists--have an obligation to oppose with all nonviolent means at our disposal.
Axis of Evil World Tour 2002
Mitchell Koss, Los Angeles Times, July 7, 2002
In 1996, I went to Iraq to report on life after the Gulf War. I've reported from Iran several times over the last decade. But it wasn't until last month that I completed the third leg of my Axis of Evil World Tour with a trip to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. In many ways, it's hard to figure what President Bush was thinking when he linked the three countries. Iran is a theocracy. Iraq is a strongman state. And North Korea is a museum piece, our last living relic of totalitarianism. Now that I've spent time in all three places, I have some ideas about how they're connected, although I'm not sure they're the links the president had in mind.
VICTIMS OF THE OCCUPATION
A cancerous situation
Gideon Levy, Ha'aretz, July 7, 2002
How would you feel if, heaven forbid, you were to fall ill with cancer but be unable to get to the site of treatments that could save your life? A case in point is Dr. Mazen Tiatana, 50, an economist who studied in Poland, is married without children and lives in the village of Abu Qash, north of Ramallah in the West Bank. He had an appointment to get chemotherapy yesterday, but once again, he didn't get there.
Britain is bypassing its own arms embargo on Israel by selling military equipment via America
Kamal Ahmed, The Observer, July 7, 2002
In a move that has split the Cabinet, the Foreign Office is set to reveal that components for F16 fighter planes will be allowed to leave the country despite being destined for aircraft already sold to Ariel Sharon's government. The move will be viewed with dismay by Arab states and anti-arms campaigners who say the arming of Israel raises tension in the area. One senior Government figure said there was a 'clear understanding' the fighter planes could be used for aggressive acts against the Occupied Territories, in direct contradiction to Tony Blair's call for peace.
Minister's killing rocks Afghanistan
Jason Burke, The Observer, July 7, 2002
Afghanistan faced the threat of new instability yesterday after a key Cabinet Minister was gunned down in broad daylight outside his office in Kabul.
US 'to attack Iraq via Jordan'
Jason Burke, Martin Bright and Nicolas Pelham, The Observer, July 7, 2002
American military planners are preparing to use Jordan as a base for an assault on Iraq later this year or early in 2003. Although leaked Pentagon documents appear to show that Turkey, Kuwait and the small Gulf state of Qatar would play key roles, it is believed that Jordan will be the 'jumping-off' point for an attack that could involve up to 250,000 American troops and forces from Britain and other key US allies.
The ticking bomb
The Western ideal of comfort and wealth holds a hollow promise for the rest of the world and provides fodder for extremists
Wade Davis, Toronto Globe & Mail, July 6, 2002
On Sept. 11, in the most successful act of asymmetrical warfare since the Trojan horse, the world came home to America. "Why do they hate us?" asked George W. Bush. This was not a rhetorical question. Americans really wanted to know -- and still do, for their innocence had been shattered. The President suggested that the reason was the very greatness of America, as if the liberal institutions of government had somehow provoked homicidal rage in fanatics incapable of embracing freedom. Other, dissenting voices claimed that, to the contrary, the problem lay in the tendency of the United States to support, notably in the Middle East, repressive regimes whose values are antithetical to the ideals of American democracy. Both sides were partly right, but both overlooked the deeper issue, in part because they persisted in examining the world through American eyes.
War on terror colors the battle for Congress
Helen Dewar, Washington Post, July 5, 2002
Despite public assertions by Republican and Democratic leaders that the war should not be exploited for political purposes, candidates seem to feel compelled to evoke the struggle, and all the patriotic symbolism it entails. Sometimes with subtlety, often without, Republicans not only portray themselves as wholehearted supporters of President Bush's policies, but also question the commitment of their Democratic rivals, frequently by harking back to speeches and votes that occurred long before last September. Democrats, keenly aware of Bush's popularity and the GOP's long-standing electoral advantage on national security issues, go out of their way in speeches and ads to emphasize their support for the war and the president's handling of it.
Deluge of hate crimes after 9/11 pours through system
Richard A. Serrano, Los Angeles Times, July 6, 2002
Mark Anthony Stroman was an easy case. A white supremacist, in the days after Sept. 11 he walked into a succession of convenience stores in the Dallas area and killed a clerk from Pakistan and another from India, and he partially blinded a third from Bangladesh. Tried, convicted and sentenced to death, Stroman voices no remorse. He recalls telling each of his victims, "God bless America."
War Inc.
Mike Ferner, Common Dreams, July 6, 2002
"So what is our mistake? We are also human beings. Treat us like human beings," says Gulalae, a 37 year-old Afghan mother living in the dust, hunger and fear of the Shamshatoo refugee camp in Pakistan. She calls Osama bin Laden an “outsider” and says that because of him, “Afghanistan is made into a hell for others.” Grim does not begin to describe the conditions Gulalae and her family endure. In one three-month period, in just one district of Shamshatoo, bacteria-related dehydration killed a child nearly every day. The misery in this refugee city is like a grain of sand on the beach of suffering that is Afghanistan. But Americans know little of it.
Aid agencies condemn Israel
BBC News, July 4, 2002
More than 30 international aid agencies working in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have accused Israel of obstructing their operations to the point that they can no longer fulfil their mandates. Their joint statement comes as concern mounts about the humanitarian impact of the Israeli-imposed curfews.
Winning friends in the Arab world
David Ignatius, Washington Post, July 5, 2002
Change won't come about unless ordinary Arabs want it themselves. If it comes at the point of an American cruise missile, many Arabs will view it as another defeat at the hands of Israel and its proxy, the United States. That would be a disaster -- a recipe for military occupation of a bitterly resentful swath of the globe. And I'm sorry, Mr. Perle, but the idea that people will rally alongside Uncle Sam once they see our troops on the ground just doesn't cut it. That's what the Israelis thought would happen in Lebanon in 1982 -- and it did, for about a week. After that, they were sitting ducks.
(For an extensive discourse promoting the neo-imperialist perspective, see Power and weakness by Robert Kagan. In contrasting American power with European weakness, he claims that "[unlike Americans] Europeans have a deep interest in devaluing and eventually eradicating the brutal laws of an anarchic, Hobbesian world where power is the ultimate determinant of national security and success." Americans, on the other hand, will do just fine sustaining such a world where American power reigns supreme. The historical burden of America (in Kagan's mind) is to operate by the double standard through which it can use brute force to protect "civilization.")
America creates its own terrors
Jill Nelson, USA Today, July 5, 2002
Lost in the cacophony of military music, flying the red, white and blue and the patriotic rhetoric that marked the celebration of Independence Day and surrounds the war on terrorism is democracy's most wonderful and critical aspect: the right to dissent.
U.S. raid on village raises hard questions
Alissa J. Rubin, Los Angeles Times, July 5, 2002
Although many questions remain about the reasons for the raid and the amount of Taliban activity in the province where it took place, there is no doubt that during the attack women and children were killed and injured; friends and fellow fighters of Karzai's were killed; and a party for an upcoming wedding came under fire. Here in Kandahar, where the majority of the severely injured were brought, the episode poses hard questions about the costs associated with the U.S. policy of hunting down every last Taliban and Al Qaeda fighter.
Bush raises the stakes in Iraq
Charles Knight, Foreign Policy in Focus, July 3, 2002
The Bush administration's enthusiasm for toppling Saddam Hussein is so single-minded that American officials are failing to recognize the effect of broadcasting publicly their intent to seek "regime change." The Pentagon's joint staff, which has the enormous task of planning any military campaign against Iraq, is forced to deal with the strategic blunder inherent in the administration's policy.
The U.S. military establishment is especially concerned about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and their potential threat to U.S. forces and allies in the region. We know that stockpiles of these weapons are far fewer than the number Iraq possessed in 1991, but residual stocks remain a real worry. Although the Pentagon believes the conventional superiority of U.S. arms can easily defeat Iraq's army, military planners know that the use of chemical or biological weapons by Iraq might result in the deaths of hundreds or even thousands of American soldiers. And then there is the possibility that the Iraqis will launch missiles with chemical warheads against Tel Aviv, provoking a nuclear response by Israel.
Israel stung by imports ruling
Suzanne Goldenberg, The Guardian, July 6, 2002
British supermarkets have been told that they must clearly identify produce on sale from the illegal Jewish settlements of the West Bank and Gaza. The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said yesterday that it told importers last week that cherry tomatoes, baby potatoes, avocados, fruit juice and flowers grown in the illegal outposts could no longer be sold under the "Produce of Israel" label. "Supermarket customers over here raised questions about produce with supermarkets, who raised it with us," it said. "Produce from these occupied territories ought not to be labelled 'Produce of Israel', because the territories are not recognised as part of Israel."
Remembering why we are Americans
Nat Hentoff, Village Voice, July 5, 2002
Right after John Ashcroft revived the FBI of J. Edgar Hoover (its headquarters, after all, is named after him), The Bill of Rights defense committee of Northampton, Massachusetts, reacted by recalling Hoover's disgraced COINTELPRO program, which serially abused the Bill of Rights:
"In the 1970s, the Senate banned COINTELPRO because of its unconstitutional character. The FBI had invaded privacy in order to disrupt lawful political activity. . . . By banning COINTELPRO, Congress declared illegal what was obviously unconstitutional. It was a major step forward for democracy in this country.
"Now Mr. Ashcroft and Mr. Bush . . . have unilaterally placed in jeopardy the right to organize peacefully and legally, [putting] our communities at risk. Who is sitting next to us at city council, church, peace, or ACLU meetings? And what will that mean to the outcome of that meeting or to our individual security?"
See also Operation Enduring Liberty by David Cole;
The cops are watching you by Robert Dreyfuss
From deterrence to pre-emption? The US military after 9/11
Paul Rogers, Open Democracy, July 3, 2002
Beyond the problems in Afghanistan, the wider implications of US security policy post-9/11 are now beginning to emerge, although they will not be made clear until the publication of the National Security Strategy, expected in the early autumn. There have been two early indications of the rigorous commitment to an independent security policy: the controversy over the UN International Criminal Court, which came into being in The Hague this week; and the issue of the treatment of the prisoners held at Guantanamo in Cuba and elsewhere.
International law seen at risk in U.S. fight with Security Council
Jim Lobe, OneWorld.net, July 5, 2002
A meeting to be held by major western nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in London next week to discuss United States opposition to the new International Criminal Court (ICC) will underline growing concerns among about how the administration of President George W. Bush sees Washington's global role.
U.S. builds up forces in Qatar
Associated Press, MSNBC, June 30, 2002
If President Bush ordered airstrikes on Iraq, this vast, remote and little-publicized base in the central Persian Gulf would be a critical hub for U.S. warplanes and their aerial pipeline of bombs and supplies. The government of Qatar is spending millions of dollars to expand al-Udeid. Over the past months, the U.S. military quietly has moved munitions, equipment and communications gear to the base from Saudi Arabia, the control center for American air operations in the Gulf for more than a decade. About 3,300 American troops are in Qatar, mostly at al-Udeid.
Afghans want informers handed over
Amir Shah, Associated Press, July 5, 2002
Enraged by an American airstrike, an Afghan governor on Friday demanded the United States hand over the Afghan men who are providing intelligence on possible al-Qaida and Taliban hide-outs in his province. Uruzgan Gov. Jan Mohammed Khan also warned that local residents could wage a "holy war" against the United States if another attack goes awry. He said the United States has wrongly attacked his province three times.
What is patriotism?
Various contributors, The Nation, July 22, 2002
Since the tragedy of September 11 and the US response, the Nation community, like the rest of the world, has tried to make sense of these calamitous events. In trying to understand what an appropriate response should be, we thought it would be useful to draw from a special issue on patriotism that we published ten years ago to celebrate both The Nation's 125th anniversary and the birthday of the nation at large. The issue invited people to address the question of just what patriotism is and ought to be.
Bitter Afghans bewail US attack
Ebadullah Ebadi and Elizabeth Neuffer, Boston Globe, July 5, 2002
Residents of this battered hamlet yesterday tallied their dead and missing from a US airstrike on Monday and angrily denied that hostile fire could have prompted the attack. Local elders estimate that more than 150 people - most of them women and children - may have been injured or killed in the attack, which they say hit a late-night wedding celebration. The Afghan government estimated 44 people had been killed.
Sisters in arms
Jonathan Steele, The Guardian, July 5, 2002
Kristina Olsen sits on the stairs of a guest house in Kabul and remembers her sister. Laurie Olsen was a passenger on American Airlines flight 11 which was flown into the World Trade Centre's north tower on September 11. "Not a day goes by that I don't think of her," she says with her head in her hands. Especially not here, on the quest for understanding that has brought her to Afghanistan. Many American families who lost loved ones in the September attacks supported their president's decision to bomb Afghanistan. Some kept their counsel.
Olsen, a nurse from Massachusetts, is one of a number of people who not only opposed the reprisals but, as time went on, felt a growing need to make their opposition public. Her trip to Afghanistan to meet the innocent victims of America's revenge strikes is the most controversial step in her journey so far. She says she came to Kabul "to learn about Afghanistan, but also because I didn't want suffering to be perpetuated".
Why I won't serve Sharon
Shlomi Segall, The Guardian, July 5, 2002
It is remarkable how easily one learns to live with occupation. When I was born, the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories was already three years old. When I became 18 the occupation was still in full force, only by then the Palestinians had had enough of it. That was the first intifada. I was there, along with many others, ready to serve as the iron fist to crush the Palestinian resistance. Elsewhere people our age contemplated going to university or travelling around the world, but I and many young Israelis found ourselves in the narrow alleys of Jebaliya and other refugee camps. We should have known better, but almost without exception we didn't.
Bush: Time to mend the crockery
Jim Lobe, Asia Times, July 5, 2002
There is indeed a growing sense in the US and abroad that despite its unprecedented power, Washington is becoming increasingly detached from an international system that it dominates, even as it pursues its global war on terrorism. "The paradox is that we need more and more cooperation, and the world's strongest nation is pulling back," noted Pierre Schori, Sweden's ambassador to the United Nations, at a recent seminar. "There will be no stability in the world without the US."
Dissent in pursuit of equality, life, liberty and happiness
Howard Zinn interviewed by Sharon Basco, Tom Paine.com, July 3, 2002
While some people think that dissent is unpatriotic, I would argue that dissent is the highest form of patriotism. In fact, if patriotism means being true to the principles for which your country is supposed to stand, then certainly the right to dissent is one of those principles. And if we're exercising that right to dissent, it's a patriotic act.
The last defender of the American republic?
An interview with Gore Vidal
Marc Cooper, AlterNet, July 3, 2002
He might be america's last small-r republican. Gore Vidal, now 76, has made a lifetime out of critiquing America's imperial impulses and has -- through two dozen novels and hundreds of essays -- argued tempestuously that the U.S. should retreat back to its more Jeffersonian roots, that it should stop meddling in the affairs of other nations and the private affairs of its own citizens.
When patriotism turns into paranoia
William Pfaff, International Herald Tribune, July 4, 2002
The historical American response to international disorder has been to strengthen and extend international law - the country's policy from the first Theodore Roosevelt government to the second Clinton administration.
The contrary policy of the Pentagon, Congress and the Bush administration seems motivated by fear, but fear of what? Of America's allies themselves? I suppose, in a sense, that is partly the case.
The administration's implicit demand is for a totally free hand in acting internationally. To put it in other language, it wants a grant of unaccountable power. No one is going to agree to that.
Fear has been the principal theme, and the justification offered, for administration policies and public statements since Sept. 11. A different America would have scorned such fear.
Life, liberty, Ashcroft
Mary McGrory, Washington Post, July 4, 2002
On the Fourth of July we celebrate the signing of one of our two most consequential documents, the Declaration of Independence, which is about "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," of which there seems to be less all the time. Two hundred and twenty-six years after the tremulous but resolute members of the Continental Congress took up their pens and scratched their names on the radioactive parchment, we have an attorney general whose most active pursuit is of the death penalty.
US seeking a 'two-tier' system of international justice
Andrew Buncombe, The Independent, July 4, 2002
The United States is trying to force a controversial plan through the UN Security Council that would give itself immunity from the new International Criminal Court, creating what some condemned as a two-tier system of justice.
'It was like an abattoir - blood all around'
Saeed Ali Achakzai, The Guardian, July 4, 2002
Eight-year-old Kako was among those woken by the bombing on Sunday night. She ran outside after hearing a loud bang. "I saw the pool in the courtyard filled with blood, there were bodies lying all around. I saw a woman without a head."
Are you a real American?
Take Tom Tomorrow's helpful quiz to find out whether you deserve the right to wrap yourself in red, white and blue.
The rogue state
John Pilger, The Mirror, July 4, 2002
In recent months, the American rogue state has torn up the Kyoto treaty, which would decrease global warming and the probability of environmental disaster. It has threatened to use nuclear weapons in "pre-emptive strikes" (a threat echoed by Hoon). It has tried to sabotage the setting up of an international criminal court, understandably, because its generals and leading politicians might be summoned as defendants.
It has further undermined the authority of the United Nations by allowing Israel to block a UN committee's investigation of the Israeli assault on the Palestinian refugee camp at Jenin; and it has ordered the Palestinians to get rid of their elected leader in favour of an American stooge.
It ignored the World Food Summit in Italy; and at summit conferences in Canada and Indonesia it has blocked genuine aid, such as clean water and electricity, to the most deprived people on earth.
Bush's war is the new Great Game
Simon Tisdall, The Guardian, July 4, 2002
How goes the war on terror? President George Bush, America's commander-in-chief, is in no doubt it is going swimmingly - and will say so today. "Our fine servicemen and women are fighting and winning the war on terror," Mr Bush will proclaim in his Independence Day address. "They deserve the gratitude of all people who cherish freedom." Gratitude will come hard to relatives of the 40 Afghan civilians "liberated" from the Taliban yoke only to be killed by the US air force this week north of Kandahar.
The eagle has crash landed
Immanuel Wallerstein, Foreign Policy, July-August, 2002
Pax Americana is over. Challenges from Vietnam and the Balkans to the Middle East and September 11 have revealed the limits of American supremacy. Will the United States learn to fade quietly, or will U.S. conservatives resist and thereby transform a gradual decline into a rapid and dangerous fall?
The United States in decline? Few people today would believe this assertion. The only ones who do are the U.S. hawks, who argue vociferously for policies to reverse the decline. This belief that the end of U.S. hegemony has already begun does not follow from the vulnerability that became apparent to all on September 11, 2001. In fact, the United States has been fading as a global power since the 1970s, and the U.S. response to the terrorist attacks has merely accelerated this decline. To understand why the so-called Pax Americana is on the wane requires examining the geopolitics of the 20th century, particularly of the century's final three decades. This exercise uncovers a simple and inescapable conclusion: The economic, political, and military factors that contributed to U.S. hegemony are the same factors that will inexorably produce the coming U.S. decline.
America is not so special that she can be allowed to shirk her obligations
Editorial, The Independent, July 2, 2002
Washington's obstinacy reflects its visceral opposition to the ICC, as a threat to the supremacy of its own judicial system. That hostility is of the same coin as America's refusal to submit to other international treaties, including those covering global warming, nuclear testing, landmines, and chemical and biological weapons. Essentially, the US is arguing that its special role in world affairs makes it a special case, entitled to different treatment.
But this reasoning simply will not do. Certainly, the US occupies a unique position, in which unchallengeable power brings unparalleled responsibilities. That, however, makes it all the more important that America should play by the international rules – above all when Washington is exhorting all and sundry to join its "war against terrorism". Many will be tempted to draw a parallel between the refusal of the US to observe international norms in its treatment of people rounded up in this "war" and its rejection of the ICC, and conclude that it sees itself as above the law.
Rise of a new imperialism
John Pilger, Sidney Morning Herald, July 3, 2002
It is nearly 10 months since September 11, and still the great charade plays on. Having appropriated our shocked and humane response to that momentous day, the rulers of the world have since ground our language into a paean of cliches and lies about the "war on terrorism" - when the most enduring menace, and source of terror, is them.
Afghan victims speak of errant attack
Associated Press, July 3, 2002
Eight-year-old Ghulam furiously sucked at an oxygen tube Tuesday as he slept on a simple hospital cot that stunk of iodine. Suddenly he awoke, crying for his parents. But Ghulam's father and mother were both killed and he was left critically injured in a pre-dawn attack Monday by coalition forces, relatives said. Afghan officials said the attack killed 40 people - including all 35 members of one family - and injured 100 more in four impoverished villages in southern Afghanistan.
Land of hype and glory
Ros Davidson, Glasgow Sunday Herald, June 30, 2002
When Samuel Johnson said that patriotism was the last refuge of scoundrels, he probably wasn't thinking of crocheted Stars and Stripes doilies or a Kate Spade bag in red, white and blue. For anyone who wants to flaunt American colours this Independence Day there's plenty more where that came from -- Ralph Lauren's limited edition flag teddy bear (a steal at £530), for instance, or Tupperware's Fourth of July dessert cups. America: A Patriotic Primer, a new best-selling children's title by Lynne Cheney, wife of vice- president Dick Cheney, is flying off the shelves in bookshops across the country. Meanwhile newspapers run adverts for Longs Drugs, a US institution: 'We will be open on July 4!' they shriek. American shops are crammed with more sentimental patriotic schlock than for any Independence Day in living memory. Inside one of Longs' huge shops, gaudy Christmas-like decorations are draped from aisle to aisle -- red, white and blue, of course -- and stacked at the front are boxes of Marshmallow Peeps: star-shaped, artificially flavoured and flecked with yet more red, white and blue.
Ramallah occupied
Uninvited guests become neighbors
Sam Bahour, Counterpunch, July 2, 2002
I am the General Manager of the Arab Palestinian Shopping Centers. We are trying to build a chain of modern shopping cetners in the midst of the Israeli re-occuption of Palestinian cities. Below are two personal accounts, one today and one from 4 days ago, of life under Israeli military curfew.
Human rights, American wrongs
Kenneth Roth, Financial Times, June 30, 2002
The most important human rights institution in 50 years [came] into being on Monday, but its future is far from assured.
The US is doing everything it can to undermine the new International Criminal Court. Unless Europe acts decisively, the cause of international justice will be imperilled.
The current battleground is at the United Nations. The Bush administration is pressing to exempt UN peacekeepers from the reach of the court. By undermining the court's universality, the exemption would severely damage its credibility.
The move is the latest manifestation of the view in Washington that international justice is only for others, not for Americans. Yet behind this breathtaking arrogance, the US administration is trying to determine how far it can push its allies. It knows that the European Union has adopted a legally binding common position to defend the letter and spirit of the court's treaty. But it hopes that bluster and threats will force European governments to back down.
IS PRESIDENT BUSH A CROOK?
Bush brushes off question about his business past
Reuters, July 2, 2002
President Bush brushed off a question on Tuesday about whether he may have benefited from a sweetheart deal as a Texas oil man more than a decade ago, saying "everything I do is fully disclosed." New York Times columnist Paul Krugman on Tuesday suggested that Bush's dealings may bear similarities to the accounting scandals at Enron Corp and other companies that have undermined faith in corporate America and dragged the stock market down.
See also Everyone is outraged by Paul Krugman
Too much collateral damage
Hans Von Sponeck, Toronto Globe and Mail, July 2, 2002
Six years of revisions to sanctions policy on Baghdad have repeatedly promised "mitigation" of civilian suffering. Yet, in 1999, Unicef confirmed our worst fears: that one child in seven dies before the age of 5 -- an estimated 5,000 excess child deaths every month above the 1989 pre-sanctions rate. Four months ago, Unicef reported that more than 22 per cent of the country's young children remain chronically malnourished, confirming yet again how limited this "mitigation" has been.
President Bush against the world
Editorial, Toronto Globe and Mail, July 3, 2002
The relentless U.S. drift toward isolationism is by now familiar. Eighteen months after President George W. Bush moved into the White House, a lengthy array of complex multilateral issues is bedevilled by a narrow, me-first U.S. foreign policy that seems to neither understand nor much care what the rest of the world thinks.
A coup in The Hague
Hannah M. Wallace, Mother Jones, June 28, 2002
Is Washington's unilateralist bent a threat to multinational organizations? Jose Bustani, ousted as director of the world's largest chemical weapons control group, certainly thinks so. When the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons was formed in 1997, it was given the sweeping charge of enforcing the international Chemical Weapons Convention, the treaty banning such arms. The man appointed to lead that mission was Jose Bustani, an experienced and widely respected Brazilian diplomat.
On April 22 of this year, Bustani was ousted from that post after an unprecedented (and some say unsupportable) vote orchestrated by the Bush White House. Now, Bustani is saying that the implications of that vote should be clear -- and chilling -- for anyone committed to true multinational action.
Homeland Security department must be open and accountable
ACLU Action Alert, June 27, 2002
The Bush Administration's proposed new cabinet-level Homeland Security Department would create an enormous agency with massive authority -- including more armed federal agents with arrest powers than any other branch of government. The President's proposal also explicitly removes structural and legal safeguards necessary to keep the agency open and accountable to the public.
Congress must reject the portions of the President's proposals that exclude the new agency from the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and whistleblower protections. It should also require that the agency have a strong and unimpeded Inspector General who can investigate alleged abuses within the agency without the veto of the department secretary. Finally, Congress should reject any proposal that the FBI and CIA be melded into this new department.
Take Action! Congress is rushing with unusual haste to pass the President's sweeping proposal. But some influential Senators and Representatives are already beginning to express concerns about the proposed agency's lack of public accountability. Insist that your Members of Congress keep the new agency open and accountable to the public.
PROPAGANDA
Group returns to wartime mission
Jane L. Levere, New York Times, July 1, 2002
The Ad Council, the public service advertising organization established in 1942 to rally support for the national effort during World War II, is returning to its original mission with a campaign that begins today. [...]
Each ad takes a different approach to the campaign's theme ["Campaign for freedom"]. During one DeVito/Verdi commercial, depicting a street lined with row houses, an announcer says, "On Sept. 11, terrorists tried to change America forever." The image then fades out and is replaced by another of the same street, with a flag flying from each home, as the announcer continues, "Well, they succeeded."
British minister snubs Americans with visit to Arafat
Ewen MacAskill, The Guardian, July 3, 2002
Britain delivered an emphatic snub to the United States president, George Bush, last night by sending one of its foreign ministers, Mike O'Brien, to meet the Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat. Mr O'Brien travelled from Jerusalem through Israeli checkpoints to meet Mr Arafat in his ruined compound in Ramallah in the West Bank. The visit was a clear sign of defiance on the part of the British government, emphasising its determination to go its own way on at least one aspect of Middle East policy: the role of Mr Arafat.
God is not in the constitution
Nat Hentoff, Village Voice, June 28, 2002
"If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox politics, nationalism, religion, or any other matters of opinion, or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein." Justice Robert Jackson
War on terror puts blocks to 'justice for all'
Marie Cocco, Newday, July 2, 2002
The war on terror unleashed an assault on the Constitution no one has yet seen fit to check. It began with the roundup and secret detention of hundreds of immigrants. They were Arabs and Muslims and not citizens at all, the public seemed to say, so why not find a way to be rid of them? Now the dire predictions of those cranky civil libertarians have become official policy. The government contends American citizens have no legal rights, so long as the president says so.
Afghans express outrage over attack
BBC News, July 2, 2002
The Afghan Government has expressed its outrage at a US military bombardment which left at least 30 villagers dead. Newly-appointed leader Hamid Karzai summoned senior US officials, including the US commander of coalition forces in Afghanistan, and "strongly advised them of the grave concern" at the incident. [...]
Foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah told reporters: "This situation has to come to an end. Mistakes can take place, human errors are possible, but our people should be assured that every measure was taken to avoid such incidents". "There is no explanation that in a country where people have suffered so much under al-Qaeda and the Taleban, they continue to suffer as the result of the campaign against al-Qaeda," he said.
Afghan civilians pay heavy price for faulty intelligence
Kim Sengupta, The Independent, July 2, 2002
The bombing of the village of Kakarak may turn out to have caused the largest number of civilian casualties yet in the Afghan war, but it is just the latest tragic mishap during attacks by American forces. Running the war in Afghanistan from headquarters in Tampa Florida, 6,000 miles away, is proving more difficult than expected – even with the aid of the most advanced hi-tech equipment deployed in combat. From the first days of air strikes over Afghanistan, there had been repeated claims of civilians killed by American warplanes. But only since the fall of the Taliban government, and the influx of the media into the country, have the allegations been investigated to any degree.
Patriot revolution?
Cities from Cambridge to Berkeley reject anti-terror measure
Dean Schabner, ABC News, July 1, 2002
Over the last three months, the Massachusetts cities of Cambridge, Northampton and Amherst and the township of Leverett, as well as the town of Carrboro, N.C., all passed resolutions that call the USA Patriot Act a threat to the civil rights of the residents of their communities.
Why we should be worried about George W Bush
Bruce Wilson, Australian Telegraph, June 29, 2002
The world outside the US is now getting used to the fact Americans have a fraudulently elected nitwit as their president, but George W. Bush excelled himself this week with a "long-awaited" definitive speech on Middle East policies that stretched even the weirdest imaginations.
The secret of the settlers' strength
Hannah Kim, Ha'aretz, July 2, 2002
It has been and still is one of the great mysteries: How is it that there is no political expression of the fact that most of the Israeli public is in favor of evacuating the settlements? Why has the state of Israel been dragged over the years into chanting the mantra of the right - Haifa is Nablus, Hadera is Hebron - until it has become a self-fulfilling prophecy? How does Ariel Sharon - yes, he too - promote policies that completely contravene the feelings of the majority of Israelis, who are ready and willing to leave the territories?
How Abd a-Samed became the 116th child killed in Gaza
Amira Hass, Ha'aretz, July 2, 2002
Abd a-Samed Shamalekh, who was supposed to start Grade 4 after the summer vacation, was the 116th Palestinian child the IDF has killed in the Gaza Strip since September 28, 2000. According to figures compiled by the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, 450 Palestinians have been killed by the IDF during the intifada as of yesterday.
See also Suffer the little children in Mideast
We can't allow US tantrums to scupper global justice
This campaign against the international court reveals a pitiful world view
Hugo Young, The Guardian, July 2, 2002
[The unacceptable face of the anti-ICC position] is ugly, brutish and self-regarding, to the point where it sees only beauty, justice and irreproachable rectitude in the mirror. This is the face of American exceptionalism, shown first by Bill Clinton's narrow-eyed aversion to the ICC, and now in the full-frontal harshness of the Bush regime, threatening to scupper both the court and, failing that, UN peace-keeping operations in Bosnia and anywhere else the US might have forces deployed on such work.
See also Europe seethes as defiant US goes its own way and
Contempt of court - US puts ideology before justice
Civilian catastrophe as US bombs Afghan wedding
Staff and agencies, The Guardian, July 1, 2002
US helicopter gunships and jets today fired on an Afghan wedding, killing or injuring at least 250 civilians, witnesses and hospital officials said. The attack occurred in the village of Kakarak in Uruzgan province, in the south of the country, where special forces and other coalition troops were searching for remaining al-Qaida and Taliban fighters.
One survivor, Abdul Qayyum, told reporters at a Kandahar hospital that the attack began shortly after midnight and continued for more than two hours until US special forces ground troops moved into the area. "The Americans came and asked me 'who fired on the helicopters', and I said 'I don't know' and one of the soldiers wanted to tie my hands but someone said he is an old man and out of the respect they didn't," he said.
Afghans often fire weapons during weddings in celebration.
Hospital officials said a number of wounded were being brought to Kandahar. Most of the dead and injured were women and children.
World's silence over Sharon's military policies
Bradley Burston, Ha'aretz, July 1, 2002
The world's sudden, uncustomary silence over Israeli military policies could give Ariel Sharon unprecedented latitude - license to take far-reaching military actions, or to refrain from acting diplomatically - in what could mean license to kill the peace process.
Mideast needs new mediator
Jimmy Carter, USA Today, June 30, 2002
The United States has now joined almost all other nations in accepting the basic premises of Israeli withdrawal, peace between Arab states and Israel, and a Palestinian state. This is a notable decision, but further progress is undermined by our almost undeviating approval of Israel's demands and our refusal to deal with the Palestinian leaders who are apt to be re-elected in January. The situation seems likely to fester until then, and perhaps long afterward.
A new questioning of the war
David Broder, Washington Post, June 30, 2002
In San Francisco, during a taping of PBS's "Washington Week," a member of the studio audience asked the panel why we had said that support for the war remained strong, "because I don't know anyone here who favors it." The next night, at a social gathering, Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown asked skeptically, "How do you wage war on a technique?" And, he added, "How do you ever know when you have won?"
At every stop in Iowa, [would-be Democratic presidential nominee, Vermont Gov. Howard] Dean heard similar questions. Many involved not just the war itself but also its effects on personal liberty and political dissent. Attorney General John Ashcroft was a frequent target.
"Monomedia" and the First Amendment
Norman Solomon, FAIR, June 27, 2002
Beginning early last fall, a function of monomedia was to let us know that massive U.S. bombing of Afghanistan was wise, prudent and just. After all, it was a necessary safety measure to protect ourselves as a nation!
But on June 16 a front-page New York Times article, citing "senior government officials," reported that the Pentagon's killing spree in Afghanistan did not make Americans any safer: "Classified investigations of the (Al) Qaeda threat now under way at the FBI and CIA have concluded that the war in Afghanistan failed to diminish the threat to the United States, the officials said. Instead, the war might have complicated counterterrorism efforts by dispersing potential attackers across a wider geographic area."
Such a flat-out conclusion -- about 180 degrees from the trumpeted rationale for spending billions of our tax dollars to kill thousands of people in Afghanistan -- might seem to merit more than a few dozen words. But the Times did not belabor the point. The assessment, while prominent, was brief and fleeting. It seemed to cause little stir in American news media.
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