It's "New Imperialism" says leading British MP
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It's "New Imperialism" says leading British MP

October 21, 2001

CIA TOLD TO DO 'WHATEVER NECESSARY' TO KILL BID LADEN QUICKLY

APPROACHING WINTER, MUSLIM REGIMES, and TENSION AT U.N. PUSHING U.S. HARD

"THIS WAR MAY NEVER END" SAYS AMERICAN VICE-PRESIDENT

MID-EAST REALITIES - MER - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington, DC - 10/21/01: Much pressure is building at the United Nations to not open itself to still more charges of being complicitous in "genocide", not to mention to do something to stop being seen as "an extension of the American State Department" (the actual private words of a senior U.N. official). While much of the Western world, especially the American "homeland", continues to believe the carefully crafted "war time" propaganda statements coming from the White House, Pentagon, and State Department (as well as from #10 Downing), there are others who recall that two of the highest ranking U.N. officials resigned a few years ago in protest over the "genocide" they believed the U.N. had become complicitous to in Iraq -- on the scale of more than 1 million civilians killed, 5000 babies dying needlessly monthly, and an advanced country reduced to begging. Echos from Rwanda and the Balkans still reverberate at the U.N. as well. And now the warnings are that if a major new food and relief program is not begun within weeks the Anglo-American crusade now underway could result in millions of dead Afghanis by next year, most by famine and disease. Some of the world's best international aid organizations are using a possible figure of 7.5 million!

WE WILL NOT BE SILENCED

MPs MUST BE FREE TO SPEAK OUT AGAINST THIS ABSURD AND POTENTIALLY DISASTROUS WAR

By George Galloway, Member of Parliament for Glascow

[The Guardian - UK- Saturday October 20, 2001]: In exile in Switzerland, shortly before the Russian revolution, Lenin opined that "there are decades when nothing happens; and there are weeks when decades happen". We are, it seems, living through such weeks. It is hard to remember a time when political instability, civil strife and the roar of bombs and missiles have so scarred the international landscape. Governments like Norway's fall, others like Australia's cut and run for a khaki election. General Musharraf, Pakistan's self-appointed military strongman, admits he's forcing through a policy rejected by 83% of his compatriots. General Sharon's Israeli government, riven between hawks and superhawks, now appears to have embarked on a doomsday option, possibly including the assassination of Arafat, following the slaying of the world's least attractive "tourism" minister.

The "soft centered" European governments are beginning to squirm and the Labour benches in the British parliament are turning queasy at the slaughter of the world's poorest by the world's richest. Coalition comrades, India and Pakistan, are shelling each other across the line of control in Kashmir. Aid agencies are in "emotional" revolt and, like Mary Robinson, are having to be ordered back into their box by Clare Short. Muslim streets are burning from Gaza to Jakarta. In the House of Commons, former defence ministers, Labour rightwingers like Gwyneth Dunwoody and MPs with large Muslim electorates have swollen the ranks of the usual suspects - those like me, who have opposed all the wars of the new imperialism.

Internationally, the coalition is shakier still. The Arab League, echoing Nato leaders, has declared that any attack on an Arab country will be regarded as an attack against all of them. The Saudis, having denied the US use of their bases and declined a visit by Tony Blair, are now questioning the basis of the whole campaign - even openly doubting the involvement of Bin Laden in the crimes of September 11.

Meanwhile, the phone-in lines to Arab television stations are jammed with opponents of the war and blood-chilling threats of mayhem in revenge. Bush and Blair may not be "at war with Islam", but "Islam" is now at war with them and we will be lucky if that is not soon visible on the streets of northern English cities.

Nowhere is that more evident than in the reaction to the "Middle East fit for heroes" the Anglo-Americans are promising. The Arabs simply don't believe it. Perfidious Albion, after all, has a track record. The Palestinian tragedy was authored here in the building in which I write. During the Great War, while Lawrence of Arabia rallied the tribal hordes to support our jihad on the Turks - with the promise of Arab independence - over in Downing Street Mr Sykes and Monsieur Picot were carving up the area into British and French colonies. And in 1991, Britain and America offered the Arabs a new deal, with Israel forced to implement international legality, if they backed the fight against Iraq. Promises made and broken with a handshake.

Seldom can a western war drum have sounded more hollow. Seldom can the prattle of ministers - Labour ministers, many of whom I can still see sporting their CND badges as they shuttled around looking for safe seats in the 70s and 80s - about command and control centres, air defences and radar capabilities have seemed so obscenely stupid. The Afghans have none. The airport at Kabul is no more than a collection of shacks, whose telephones couldn't even make outgoing calls. And the statement, delivered by our defence secretary with all the gravitas of Captain Mainwaring, that we had achieved "air-superiority" over Afghanistan - over a Flintstones-style air force which couldn't even leave the ground - will live forever as one of those stories you really couldn't make up.

So what are the "allies" bombing? The four UN mine-clearing staff, the shepherds and their families in the village of Khorum, the Red Cross compound in Kabul, the residents of Kandahar, the trucks full of terrified refugees. More of these human and public relations disasters will conspire to "bury" the government's message. An already restless audience here, never mind among the 1.3bn Muslims nursing their wrath, will not sit through this unequal fight with equanimity. And without a change of policy, the winter snows will soon begin to tilt this disaster into an international catastrophe.

Well, what should we do, ask the remaining subalterns of the war party's thin red line. As the Irishman famously replied: "If I wanted to get to Cork, I wouldn't have started from here." The government was repeatedly warned of the grisly consequences of its tango with Islamic fundamentalism in Afghanistan. I accused it on the eve of the fall of Kabul of having opened the gates to the barbarians and of the long dark night which would follow. Many of us have since described the rising tide of radical Islam, buoyed by our double standards towards Palestine and Iraq, and our buttressing of stooge kings, generals and 99%-of-the-vote presidents of the Muslim world - now laughably lined up behind "operation enduring freedom".

But even for those who have brought us to this terrifying cusp in world events, there were alternatives. The squeeze could have been kept up on the Taliban - three weeks is not a long time to secure extradition on a capital offence, especially without providing evidence to the country concerned. The judicious waving of carrots to tribal chiefs could well have achieved the betrayal of Bin Laden. And if military action was seen as unavoidable, the target should have been the Arab legions in the mountains, not the poor ragged Afghans they've colonised, who never invited them in - we did - and have no way of making them leave. This and a Lockerbie-type trial, in a neutral country and including Muslim jurists, would have been one way to show how "civilised" we were. Instead we've answered savagery with savagery.

On the home front, there are disturbing signs of the Downing Street general staff losing their nerve. Careless talk circulates about members of parliament being carpeted, media appearances vetted, ultimatums issued. This would be the ultimate surrender to democracy's enemies. Throughout the second world war, Aneurin Bevan subjected the line of the Churchill coalition government to excoriating criticism and withering examination - as Churchill himself had done with Chamberlain. Both would have scorned the idea of their actions being licensed by whips, as if we were circus dogs whose duty was to perform tricks for the ringmaster. I too have now been summoned to see the chief whip. Next week, over tea and biscuits at 11 Downing Street, I will have to courteously explain to my old friend Hilary Armstrong that I, for one, will not be gagged. This bombing has to stop - and the war is too important to be left to ministers and generals in conclave.

U.S. NOW INSISTS CRITICS ARE ITS ENEMIES

By George Monbiot

The US, founded to protect basic freedoms, is now insisting that its critics are its enemies [The Guardian - Tuesday October 16, 2001]: If satire died on the day Henry Kissinger received the Nobel Peace Prize, then last week its corpse was exhumed for a kicking. As head of the United Nations peacekeeping department, Kofi Annan failed to prevent the genocide in Rwanda or the massacre in Srebrenica. Now, as secretary general, he appears to have interpreted the UN charter as generously as possible to allow the attack on Afghanistan to go ahead. Article 51 permits states to defend themselves against attack. It says nothing about subsequent retaliation. It offers no licence to attack people who might be harbouring a nation's enemies. The bombing of Afghanistan, which began before the UN security council gave its approval, is legally contentious. Yet the man and the organisation who overlooked this obstacle to facilitate war are honoured for their contribution to peace. Endowments like the Nobel Peace Prize are surely designed to reward self-sacrifice. Nelson Mandela gave up his liberty, FW de Klerk gave up his power, and both were worthy recipients of the prize. But Kofi Annan, the career bureaucrat, has given up nothing. He has been rewarded for doing as he is told, while nobly submitting to a gigantic salary and bottomless expense account. Among the other nominees for the prize was a group whose qualifications were rather more robust. Members of Women in Black have routinely risked their lives in the hope of preventing war. They have stayed in the homes of Palestinians being shelled by Israeli tanks and have confronted war criminals in the Balkans. They have stood silently while being abused and spat at during vigils all over the world. But now, in this looking-glass world in which war is peace and peace is war, instead of winning the peace prize the Women in Black have been labelled potential terrorists by the FBI and threatened with a grand jury investigation. They are in good company. Earlier this year the director of the FBI named the chaotic but harmless organisations Reclaim the Streets and Carnival Against Capitalism in the statement on terrorism he presented to the Senate. Now, partly as a result of his representations, the Senate's new terrorism bill, like Britain's Terrorism Act 2000, redefines the crime so broadly that members of Greenpeace are in danger of being treated like members of al-Qaida. The Bush doctrine - if you're not with us, you're against us - is already being applied. This government by syllogism makes no sense at all. Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida have challenged the US government; ergo anyone who challenges the government is a potential terrorist. That Bin Laden is, according to US officials, a "fascist", while the other groups are progressives is irrelevant: every public hand raised in objection will from now on be treated as a public hand raised in attack. Given that Bin Laden is not a progressive but is a millionaire, it would surely make more sense to round up and interrogate all millionaires. Lumping Women in Black together with al-Qaida requires just a minor addition to the vocabulary: they have been jointly classified as "anti-American". This term, as used by everyone from the US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, and the Daily Mail to Tony Blair and several writers on these pages, applies not only to those who hate Americans, but also to those who have challenged US foreign and defence objectives. Implicit in this denunciation is a demand for uncritical support, for a love of government more consonant with the codes of tsarist Russia than with the ideals upon which the United States was founded. The charge of "anti-Americanism" is itself profoundly anti-American. If the US does not stand for freedom of thought and speech, for diversity and dissent, then we have been deceived as to the nature of the national project. Were the founding fathers to congregate today to discuss the principles enshrined in their declaration of independence, they would be denounced as "anti-American" and investigated as potential terrorists. Anti-American means today precisely what un-American meant in the 1950s. It is an instrument of dismissal, a means of excluding your critics from rational discourse. Under the new McCarthyism, this dismissal extends to anyone who seeks to promulgate a version of events other than that sanctioned by the US government. On September 20, President Bush told us that "this is the fight of all who believe in progress and pluralism, tolerance and freedom". Two weeks later, his secretary of state, Colin Powell, met the Emir of Qatar to request that progress, pluralism, tolerance and freedom be suppressed. Al-Jazeera is one of the few independent television stations in the Middle East, whose popularity is the result of its uncommon regard for freedom of speech. It is also the only station permitted to operate freely in Kabul. Powell's request that it be squashed was a pre-emptive strike against freedom, which, he hoped, would prevent the world from seeing what was really happening once the bombing began. Since then, both George Bush and Tony Blair have sought to prevent al-Jazeera from airing video statements by Bin Laden, on the grounds of the preposterous schoolboy intrigue that they "might contain coded messages". Over the weekend the government sought to persuade British broadcasters to restrict their coverage of the war. Blair's spin doctors warned: "You can't trust them [the Taliban] in any way, shape, or form." While true, this applies with equal force to the techniques employed by Downing Street. When Alastair Campbell starts briefing journalists about "Spin Laden", it's a case of the tarantula spinning against the money spider. If we are to preserve the progress, pluralism, tolerance and freedom which President Bush claims to be defending, then we must question everything we see and hear. Though we know that governments lie to us in wartime, most people seem to believe that this universal rule applies to every conflict except the current one. Many of those who now accept that babies were not thrown out of incubators in Kuwait, and that the Belgrano was fleeing when it was hit, are also prepared to believe everything we are being told about Afghanistan and terrorism in the US. There are plenty of reasons to be sceptical. The magical appearance of the terrorists' luggage, passports and flight manual looks rather too good to be true. The dossier of "evidence" purporting to establish Bin Laden's guilt consists largely of supposition and conjecture. The ration packs being dropped on Afghanistan have no conceivable purpose other than to create the false impression that starving people are being fed. Even the anthrax scare looks suspiciously convenient. Just as the hawks in Washington were losing the public argument about extending the war to other countries, journalists start receiving envelopes full of bacteria, which might as well have been labelled "a gift from Iraq". This could indeed be the work of terrorists, who may have their own reasons for widening the conflict, but there are plenty of other ruthless operators who would benefit from a shift in public opinion. Democracy is sustained not by public trust but by public scepticism. Unless we are prepared to question, to expose, to challenge and to dissent, we conspire in the demise of the system for which our governments are supposed to be fighting. The true defenders of America are those who are now being told that they are anti-American.

CIA TOLD TO DO 'WHATEVER NECESSARY' TO KILL BIN LADEN

Agency and Military Collaborating at 'Unprecedented' Level; Cheney Says War Against Terror 'May Never End' By Bob Woodward

[Washington Post - Sunday, October 21, 2001; Page 1]: President Bush last month signed an intelligence order directing the CIA to undertake its most sweeping and lethal covert action since the founding of the agency in 1947, explicitly calling for the destruction of Osama bin Laden and his worldwide al Qaeda network, according to senior government officials.

The president also added more than $1 billion to the agency's war on terrorism, most of it for the new covert action. The operation will include what officials said is "unprecedented" coordination between the CIA and commando and other military units. Officials said that the president, operating through his "war cabinet," has pledged to dispatch military units to take advantage of the CIA's latest and best intelligence.

Bush's order, called an intelligence "finding," instructs the agency to attack bin Laden's communications, security apparatus and infrastructure, senior government officials said. U.S. intelligence has identified new and important specific weaknesses in the bin Laden organization that are not publicly known, and these vulnerabilities will be the focus of the lethal covert action, sources said.

"The gloves are off," one senior official said. "The president has given the agency the green light to do whatever is necessary. Lethal operations that were unthinkable pre-September 11 are now underway."

The CIA's covert action is a key part of the president's offensive against terrorism, but the agency is also playing a critical role in the defense against future terrorist attacks.

For example, each day a CIA document called the "Threat Matrix," which has the highest security classification ("Top Secret/Codeword"), lands on the desks of the top national security and intelligence officials in the Bush administration. It presents the freshest and most sensitive raw intelligence on dozens of threatened bombings, hijackings or poisonings. Only threats deemed to have some credibility are included in the document.

One day last week, the Threat Matrix contained 100 threats to U.S. facilities in the United States and around the world -- shopping complexes, specific cities, places where thousands gather, embassies. Though nearly all the listed threats have passed without incident and 99 percent turned out to be groundless, dozens more take their place in the matrix each day.

It was the matrix that generated the national alert of impending terrorist action issued by the FBI on Oct. 11. The goal of the matrix is simple: Look for patterns and specific details that might prevent another Sept. 11.

"I don't think there has been such risk to the country since the Cuban missile crisis," a senior official said.

During an interview in his West Wing office Friday morning, Vice President Cheney spoke of the new war on terrorism as much more problematic and protracted than the Persian Gulf War of 1991, when Cheney served as secretary of defense to Bush's father.

The vice president bluntly said: "It is different than the Gulf War was, in the sense that it may never end. At least, not in our lifetime."

In issuing the finding that targets bin Laden, the president has said he wants the CIA to undertake high-risk operations. He has stated to his advisers that he is willing to risk failure in the pursuit of ultimate victory, even if the results are some embarrassing public setbacks in individual operations. The overall military and covert plan is intended to be massive and decisive, officials said.

"If you are going to push the envelope some things will go wrong, and [President Bush] sees that and understands risk-taking," one senior official said.

In the interview, Cheney said, "I think it's fair to say you can't predict a straight line to victory. You know, there'll be good days and bad days along the way."

The new determination among Bush officials to go after bin Laden and his network is informed by their pained knowledge that U.S. intelligence last spring obtained high quality video of bin Laden himself but were unable to act on it.

The video showed bin Laden with his distinctive beard and white robes surrounded by a large entourage at one of his known locations in Afghanistan. But neither the CIA nor the U.S. military had the means to shoot a missile or another weapon at him while he was being photographed.



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October 2001


Magazine



Bio and Nuclear Threats Escalate As Purposeful Leaks Proliferate to Mass Media
(October 26, 2001)
The timing of newsstories like this in the major Western media should be suspect now more than ever. For more than ever in fact governments and intelligence agencies are using the mass media by leaking things at times of convenience and more importantly with their own twists and turns.

"Stop Israel!" Pleads Israeli Professor
(October 26, 2001)
One Israeli, not invited by the naive and misguided American Jewish "liberals" to the USA, speaks up from Israel with tremendous courage and conviction. Her name is Tanya Reinhart and she deserves to be taken very seriously -- though far too many don't even know about her.

"Palestinian Statehood" - Another Grotesque Deception Unfolds
(October 25, 2001)
The political smokescreens are lifting a bit as the pressures build to go beyond mere words, yet at the same time a purposeful distorting haze is taking over. Bottom line: the kind of "Palestinian State" Yasser Arafat has maneuvered his people toward and is being cornered into implementing is a grotesque distortion of their aspirations and of what use to be meant by the term "Palestinian State."

"A Pen Bought And Sold" - A Saudi Poem Revisited - MER FlashBack
(October 21, 2001)
Change comes in the Middle East, as elsewhere, in complex ways. There is the regular daily news of course; and in the region especially it is inextricably intertwined with an ever-more-sophisticated and propagandistic journalistic establishment.

WHY AMERICA MUST STOP THE WAR NOW
(October 24, 2001)
Both of the Georges are oh so full of themselves cocky -- just the personality type so many American's truly love. One is (to the amazement of many who wonder how in the world the U.S. chooses such persons to lead it) the President of the United States.

Massacres and Devastation Escalate Further In Palestine
(October 24, 2001)
The Palestinians are essentially defenseless with their backs up against the wall, the firing wall. Their "leadership" has been so corrupted and infiltrated that the Arafat regime has hardly any credibility with its own, not to mention anyone else.

Torture Now Coming to USA?
(October 22, 2001)
Adopting the tactics (as well as the goals) of the Israelis, and the methods long taught by the CIA in Latin America as well as the Middle East, the brave new world post 11 September is changing the face of the American homeland in ways nearly all Americans would have seriously resisted just a few long weeks ago.

Millions Likely To Die in Afghanistan U.N. Warns
(October 21, 2001)
As for Afghanistan, the American CIA worked behind the scenes to bring on the Soviet invasion of 1979, then engaged the Soviet Empire in a way that brought about the near-total devastation of Afghanistan and a huge uncounted death toll.

It's "New Imperialism" says leading British MP
(October 21, 2001)
Much pressure is building at the United Nations to not open itself to still more charges of being complicitous in "genocide", not to mention to do something to stop being seen as "an extension of the American State Department" (the actual private words of a senior U.N. official).

"Comply! Resistance Is Futile!"
(October 20, 2001)
British MP (Member of Parliament) George Galloway calls it the "new imperialism" (his article coming later today). On the whole the Anglo-British press is working up quite a frenzy (with notable exceptions like The Guardian and The Independent in the UK, sometimes The Nation in the U.S.).

The "Arafat Era" Collapsing or About To Be Reborn?
(October 20, 2001)
Yasser Arafat is losing both his grip on power (extended to him by the Israelis and the Americans for the past decade since the Gulf War) and his credibility (with his own people) at the same time.

The Coming Arab Crash
(October 19, 2001)
The west's most important friends in the Arab Middle East - Fahd of Saudi Arabia, Abdullah of Jordan, Mubarak of Egypt and the PLO's Yasser Arafat - are probably the world's most vulnerable political quartet.

Saudi Amb Bandar Badly Fails, Saudi Royals in Paralysis, US Relations in Doubt
(October 19, 2001)
Prince Bandar bin Sultan's 20+ year strategy has now substantially failed. Years ago, very much behind-the-scenes of course, the very controversial and in some circles much despised Saudi Ambassador in Washington began a relationship with the some of the most conservative and militant circles in Washington, very much including those associated with the powerful Israeli/Jewish lobby.

Worse Than Worthless Wartime "Promises"
(October 18, 2001)
The list of broken and disingenuous "promises" made to the Arabs by Western political leaders is something befitting a "Saturday Night Live" parody skit -- if only they would dare!

"New Era" Says Sharon Reacting In Character to "Gandhi" Assassination
(October 17, 2001)
He had called the Palestinians "lice" and "vermin" and "cancer", and he had urged their "transfer" or "extermination". Just Monday he has tendered his resignation as Minister of Tourism, insisting that Ariel Sharon was being too moderate and too compromising.

"PALESTINIAN STATE" a la WASHINGTON and LONDON
(October 17, 2001)
As for the British, what's going on in both Palestine and Kashmir, the two most likely potential nuclear flashpoints in our world today, can be traced back directly to what the British did in these areas when they were the "Empire"

FAR RIGHT-WING ISRAELI MINISTER ASSASSINATED THIS MORNING
(October 17, 2001)
For some time now Palestinians have been warning that because of Israel's assassination of Palestinian leaders, "crossing the red line" in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, they would respond.

Red Cross Bombed in Kabul Before Presidential Red Cross Visit in Washington
(October 16, 2001)
You gotta love the chutzpa of the Americans. Today the President went a few blocks from the White House to the Headquarters of the American Red Cross -- a little photo op designed to further enlist "the children of America" in his recently announced effort to help the children of Afghanistan. But just as President Bush was getting ready to do his Red Cross pictures reports came in from Afghanistan that the major Red Cross center in Kabul, complete with large Red Cross emblem on its roof, was destroyed by American bombs.

Saudi/U.S. "Meltdown"? And Neutralizing Al Jazeera With A Firm Embrace
(October 16, 2001)
While American and British officials rush to make one TV appearance after another with continual reassurances everything is going "as planned", that's not quite the reality of the situation as this article in today's Guardian makes quite evident.

What Can We Do About Terrorism? by Lt. Col Robert M. Bowman (ret)
(October 15, 2001)
"Mr. President, you did not tell the American people the truth about why we are the targets of terrorism. You said that we are the target because we stand for democracy, freedom, and human rights in the world. Baloney! We are the target of terrorists because we stand for dictatorship, bondage, and human exploitation in the world."

Pentagon Far More Confused and Uncertain Than Americans Realize
(October 15, 2001)
The Bush administration is growing increasingly alarmed by the direction of the military campaign in Afghanistan after a week of almost continuous bombing has failed to dislodge either Osama bin Laden or the Taliban leadership.

Al-Qaeda Weekend Statement
(October 15, 2001)
This isn't really about "secret messages". Anyone with a $300 satellite dish can watch the statements in full, in Arabic, on al Jazeera; and the text is widely available on the Internet, in this case from London and the BBC!

Hundreds Dead in Nigeria
(October 14, 2001)
Hundreds of people have been killed in religious clashes after anti-U.S. protests turned violent, sources have told CNN. The demonstrations against the U.S.-led missile strikes on Afghanistan began peacefully on Friday but spiralled into a killing spree during Saturday, CNN's Lagos bureau chief Jeff Koinange said.

akistan's Benazir Opens Campaign in Washington as Pakistan Trembles Anarchy
(October 14, 2001)
Benazir Bhutto came to Washington this week to open her campaign for a third term as Prime Minister of the world's second largest, and only nuclear armed, Muslim State -- her first two terms she was overthrown, political and financial corruption was rampant, and her arranged husband remains in a Karachi prison.

Iraq Likely To Be Next "Phase"
(October 14, 2001)
A powerful coalition of "hawkish" government officials, lobbyists (especially those connected with the Israelis and the arms corporations), conservative press publications and columnists, many of the national Jewish organizations, as well as millions of Christian fundamentalists associated with Pat Robertson and his daily TV "700 Club" program, is mobilized to make sure that "America's new war" does not end with Afghanistan and al-Qaeda.

Saudi Royals Bugged, Embarrassed, Unstable
(October 13, 2001)
The following information is about to come out in THE NEW YORKER MAGAZINE on Monday and is being leaked in Washington this weekend to stir up interest and try to get publicity for the magazine and author on the Sunday talk shows tomorrow.

Attacks and Demonstrations Escalating in Arab and Muslim Countries
(October 13, 2001)
Thousands of demonstrators took to the streets in various cities in the Middle East to protest the U.S. military campaign in Afghanistan. Many more thronged to mosques for Friday prayers throughout the region and heard anti-American sermons.

Western Commando Forces Getting Ready
(October 13, 2001)
This article in The Telegraph today is a good outline of what now seems likely to be immediately ahead in Afghanistan, pushed forward by weather considerations as well as by current expectations that American-sponsored key governments in Pakistan, Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan, as well as the Arafat Regime, will all be able to weather the political storms with much expanded and mostly covert continual help from the western governments and intelligence services.

"War of the Worlds" by Mark Bruzonsky
(October 11, 2001)
In the case of America's new war, the full might of the USA is being mobilized not against the armies of other nation states, but against the fanatical descendants of a puritanical militant Islam whose calling has become relentless opposition to American hegemony and passionate assertion of their own quaintly medieval religious constructs.

Arafat Begs Israelis To Save Him
(October 10, 2001)
It's a most complicated political dance than ever at this historical crossroads. But bottom line Yasser Arafat and his regime have now, even more than before, thrown their future to the Israelis and the now omnipresent CIA...

Uri Avneri - Fronting for Arafat and for a Castrated "Palestinian State"
(October 10, 2001)
The Israeli writer and activist Uri Avneri is "on tour" in the USA on his way to Washington. It shouldn't come as a surprise that a few naive or on- the-take "peace groups" -- Jewish and otherwise -- have invited him to speak.

After Afghanistan, U.S. has Iraq, Lebanon, and Palestine in its Sights
(October 10, 2001)
In this case there should be no one saying down the road that they didn't know what was being planned. The Americans have said publicly and in many different ways right from the start of this "new war" that it wasn't going to end with Osama bin Laden, with the Taliban government, or with Afghanistan.

The "Palestinian State" Charade
(October 9, 2001)
Most of the Arab regimes, including that of Yasser Arafat, have proved themselves so co-opted and so gullible over the years that you can't blame the Americans for continuing to try their little tricks and deceptions -- just look how well, at least from their point-of-view, such things have worked in the past..

Anthrax Terrorism Now Likely
(October 9, 2001)
Federal officials suspect foul play rather than an environmental source is at the root of two Florida anthrax cases that have left one man dead and hundreds of co-workers lining up for medical tests.

Biological Attack? Inept or Demonstration?
(October 9, 2001)
Is someone sending a message that they can do it, a kind of primative, and deadly, deterrence attempt to try to protect themselves? Might this be an "inept attack" as today's TIMES in London suggests in its headline? As the third case of Anthrax in Florida is reported this morning, something seems to be up as the following reports indicate.

Bush versus bin Laden - Syria Elected to Security Council
(October 8, 2001)
It's all quite amazing really, President George W. Bush versus Osama bin Laden. On the one hand you have the most powerful man in the world commanding the full might of not only the world's only superpower but a whole entourage of Western European allies, the new Russia, and to a considerable extent at least behind-the-scenes many Arab and Muslim "client regimes".

Arafat's Army Opens Fire On Its Own - More Anthrax in Florida?
(October 8, 2001)
The Palestinian leadership rushed to distance itself Monday from Osama bin Laden while its police forces opened fire on university students protesting the U.S.-led military strikes on Afghanistan.

FBI Knocked...He's Not Home But You Can Find Him at the White House
(October 8, 2001)
Now the world will become much more confusing and dangerous, and the opponents of the American Empire will obviously be forced even deeper underground -- both literally and figuratively -- becoming even more insular and isolated among themselves leading to who knows what kind of future blowback.

US Journalist Warns: "Do not try to change the government in Afghanistan!"
(October 7, 2001)
Late friday evening one of the leading American journalists who is an expert on the Middle East and Islamic affairs was asked a question on CNN to which she immediately briefly answered...and that was that...no more was asked or answered.

"Our Friends are Killers, Crooks and Torturers"
(October 7, 2001)
Surely the British Prime Minister should know better than to try to simplify such a complex world we live in to that understandable by a third-grader. If not we have a little weekend reading Mr. Blair should be doing, starting in one of his own newspapers which we surely hope, especially now, he can find a few moments to read on a regular basis, The Independent.

History Corrected - U.S. Wanted Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan
(October 6, 2001)
The world believes that there was an invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union on 24 December 1979 and then, in response, the U.S. and Muslim countries rallied to help Afghanistan repel the invaders. Wrong...just as so much of the widely accepted history of the Arab-Israeli conflict and the actual realities of U.S. involvements in the Middle East are wrong because of the manipulation of history by various governments and intelligence agencies -- most especially the U.S. and Israel, the CIA and the Mossad.

UNCOMFORTABLE TRUTHS FOR AMERICANS TO PONDER
(October 6, 2001)
"Could it be that the stygian anger that led to the attacks has its taproot not in American freedom and democracy, but in the US government's record of commitment and support to exactly the opposite things - to military and economic terrorism, insurgency, military dictatorship, religious bigotry and unimaginable genocide (outside America)?"

MER EDITORIAL: POSSIBLE WAY OUT!
(October 5, 2001)
The government in Afghanistan, popularly known as The Taliban, has finally taken what could be a significant step. Just hours ago through its official representative in Pakistan the Afghan government has publicly offered to turn Osama bin Laden over...not to the United States, but to another Islamic country.

CANADIAN PROFESSOR TAKES ON THE U.S.A
(October 5, 2001)
"The women in the audience -- academics, union members, mental health workers and advocates for female inmates, embraced her anti-American rhetoric, repeatedly interrupting her with cheers and standing ovations."

THE CIA, ISI, PAKISTAN, AFGHANISTAN - A LITTLE HISTORY
(October 5, 2001)
Now we know that a few years ago, when President Bill Clinton was meeting privately one-on-one with the former Prime Minister of Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif, the U.S. "hired" the agents of the infamous Inter-Services Intelligence Agency (ISI) to assassinate Osama bin Laden.

NEWSFLASH: LAST MOMENT ARAB COLD FEET - RUMSFELD RUSHES TO THE REGION
(October 3, 2001)
The United States and Britain yesterday called off military strikes against terrorist targets in Afghanistan at the last minute. Washington officials say today that a severe attack of last-minute cold feet by some key Arab members of the coalition caused President Bush to postpone the operation.

WHERE DID THE TALIBAN COME FROM?
(October 3, 2001)
Osama bin Laden, arch nemesis of America today, is blowback from recent history -- the Gulf war, the permanent stationing of American forces in Arabia, and other American policies in the region, including the deceptive "peace process" fronting for Israel's brutal subjugation of the Palestinians.

BOTH SAUDIS AND PAKISTANIS CONTINUE TO ACTUALLY SAY NO
(October 3, 2001)
The American Secretary of Defense is rushing to the Middle East, goal #1 to try one more time to "convince" the Saudis that Prince Sultan Airbase and its super-modern regional control center -- just completed in fact during the summer at a cost of many billions -- is needed for the new war.

U.S. PREPARES FOR CRUSADER WAR - "OPEN-ENDED WAR WITHOUT CONSTRAINT"
(October 2, 2001)
"Drafted with a small coterie of loyal aides, mainly civilian political appointees at the Pentagon, the plans argue for open-ended war without constraint either of time or geography and potentially engulfing the entire Middle East and central Asia... The plans put before the President during the past few days involve expanding the war beyond Afghanistan to include similar incursions by special ops forces - followed by air strikes by the bombers they would guide - into Iraq, Syria and the Beqaa Valley area of Lebanon, where the Syrian-backed Hizbollah (Party of God) fighters that harass Israel are based."

READYING THE CRUSADE - ARMIES, PRESS, PUBLIC
(October 2, 2001)
Anyone with an ear tuned to Washington's politicians, lobbyists, and opinion molders can hear it quite loudly and clearly at this point. After taking down Osama bin Laden's al Queda network (said to be in some 50+ countries), after changing the government in Afghanistan, the American-led crusade (now more politely known by Colin Powell's term "campaign") will attempt to march on through the Middle East, next stop Baghdad.

BELIEVE IT OR NOT SAYS POWELL - "PALESTINIAN STATE"
(October 2, 2001)
It took them who intially talked of "crusade" nearly three weeks to figure out that all the "coalition building" wasn't going nearly as well as they keep saying in public and that doing something about all the Israeli oppression and "terrorism" against the essentially imprisoned Palestinian population would be a good idea in the post 11 September world and before the bombs start falling on Muslims here and there.

ARMY WANTS TO KILL ARAFAT SAYS PERES!
(October 1, 2001)
The situation is now so tense in Israel in dealing with the "Palestinian Authority" -- which it should be remembered the Israelis themselves created just a few years ago -- that Shimon Peres is getting more and more desperate.

DAMASCAS GATHERING OF PALESTINIANS
(October 1, 2001)
The Palestinian opposition is usually very weak and confused. Had that not been the case for some time now Yasser Arafat would never have been able to do the things he has done for so long now, especially since the Gulf War; nor would Arafat have have been able to retain power these past few traumatic years, however weakened himself at this point.

CHOMSKY ANSWERS
(October 1, 2001)
Yes, it will be very interesting to see if and how Noam Chomsky answers the at first blush surprising attacks from Christopher Hitchens, who has now not only endorsed the new war but also at least parts of the "New World Order" that underpins it.




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