But then it's all really about propaganda and nationalistic fervor anyway, isn't it.

[The Associated Press - Tuesday, Oct. 16, 2001 - KABUL, Afghanistan]: -- The compound of the International Committee of the Red Cross was struck Tuesday by a U.S. bomb which destroyed wheat and other humanitarian supplies, committee officials and witnesses said. One Afghan security guard was injured.

"Two depots of the Red Cross were destroyed," ICRC security chief Mullah Rohani said as he stood before the smoking compound in northern Kabul. "We are very sad because these things belong to the people."

Afghan staff of the ICRC tried to salvage some of the goods stored in one warehouse. They covered their faces with cloth and rushed into the cloud of billowing black smoke, emerging later with blankets, medicines and tents.

A second warehouse that housed wheat was burning from the same attack.

In Islamabad, Pakistan, ICRC spokesman Mario Musa confirmed that the compound was hit Tuesday afternoon and that one security guard outside the second warehouse was injured.

He said the roof of the building was marked with the Red Cross symbol.

Also Tuesday, three farmers in the Badam Bagh area of Kabul were injured when bombs fell nearby, according to a neighborhood shopkeeper, who did not give his name.

[The Telegraph, London, 16 October]: The Israeli Army is investigating reports that its soldiers are circulating "trophy" photographs of themselves posing next to dead and sometimes mutilated Palestinians.

The revelation was followed by the discovery yesterday of a member of the militant Islamic group Hamas shot dead at his home in the West Bank town of Qalqilya in what Palestinian security sources said was an Israeli assassination.

They said Abdel Rahman Hamad, 35, had been found with bullet wounds to his head and was killed by Israeli forces as he stood on the roof of his house.

Israel Radio, citing Palestinian sources, said Mr Hamad was a member of the military wing of Hamas and may have been killed by snipers.

Also at the weekend, Israel announced it would ease a year-long blockade on Palestinian areas, and Washington pressed both sides to end their conflict so it could bolster Muslim and Arab support for its anti-terror war.

Israeli authorities said the decision to start lifting the blockade, allowing thousands of Palestinian workers into Israel, was the result of a "decrease" in violence, though sporadic gun battles have erupted in the West Bank and Gaza.

The Israeli Defence Force said it was investigating the report of soldiers taking photographs of Palestinians, but dismissed suggestions that "the phenomenon" was widespread.

"The IDF is aware of only a few singular incidents that were the initiative of individual soldiers," it said in a statement. "The IDF educates its soldiers and commanders according to the IDF spirit and in the keeping of human dignity. This is not acceptable, and has to be dealt with by punishment and through education."

The revelation, made by a group of Israeli soldiers this month, has heightened fears that young army recruits are inured to the violence they face routinely as the Palestinian uprising drags on into its second year.

The group told a Jerusalem weekly newspaper that they and their fellow soldiers often took pocket cameras on military missions and posed for pictures next to corpses of Palestinians.

It is not the first time that soldiers have taken pictures of their dead opponents. United States troops photographed the bodies of enemy soldiers during the Vietnam War. The Israeli soldiers said many of the photographs were widely distributed in military units, and appearing in such pictures had become a ritualistic "badge of honour".

A unit of the Golani brigade, serving in the Gaza Strip, privately printed a book with stories about its soldiers. The front cover showed the body of a Palestinian, killed five months ago after he infiltrated a Jewish settlement. The caption read: "Thus shall we do to the man who messes with Company B."

In another incident in the Gaza Strip, soldiers photographed a Palestinian who had infiltrated a settlement and was shot dead. A post-mortem examination showed his body had been shot at close range after death.

Yoram, 20, an armoured corps soldier, said he had seen 40 to 50 photographs of soldiers posing next to dead Palestinians.

"I remember one terrible photo of the soldiers smiling like children as they stood on the bodies with their boots, really enjoying the moment."

Slaughter of the innocent bolsters view that this is war against Islam

[The Independent, UK, 15 October 2001]: In Baghdad we had the bunker where our missile fried more than 300 people to death. In Kosovo we had a refugee column torn to pieces by our bombs. Now in Afghanistan, a village called Karam is our latest massacre.

Of course it's time for that tame old word "regret". We regretted the Baghdad bunker. We were really very sorry for the refugee slaughter in Kosovo. Now we are regretting the bomb that went astray in Kabul on Friday night; the missile that killed the four UN mine clearers last Monday; and whatever hit Karam.

It's always the same story. We start shooting with "smart" weapons after our journalists and generals have told us of their sophistication. Their press conferences produce monochrome snapshots of bloodless airbase runways with little holes sprinkled across the apron. "A successful night," they used to say, after bombing Serbia.

They said that again last week and no one - until of course we splatter civilians - suggests going to war involves killing innocent people. It does. That is why the military invented that repulsive and morally shameful phrase "collateral damage". And they are always ready to smear the reporters on the ground.

At first, Nato claimed its aircraft had not butchered the refugee convoy in April 1999. Once we found the bomb parts, with US markings, they changed their tune.

The new tune went like this: "If we killed the innocent we regret it, but why don't the reporters 'break free' of their Serb minders and see what else is going on in Kosovo?" We might be asked the same again, now we are involved in what, historically, is for us in Britain the Fourth Afghan War. What are we journalists doing giving succour to Mr bin Laden and his thugs?

There is one big difference this time round. In 1991, we had a real Muslim coalition on our side. In 1999, we so bestialised the Serbs that the death of their innocent civilians could be laid at the hands of Slobodan Milosevic, and anyway - in theory at least - we were trying to save the Albanian Muslims.

No doubt some idiot general will tell us this time round that Karam is Mr bin Laden's fault - idiot, because this is not going to wash with the hundreds of thousands of Muslims who are outraged at our air strikes on Afghanistan.

And here's the rub. In every Middle Eastern country, even tolerant Lebanon, suspicion is growing that this is a war against Islam.

That is why the Arab leaders are mostly silent and why the Saudis don't want to help us. That is why crowds tried yesterday to storm a Pakistani airbase used by the American forces.

It reveals a dislocation of thought among Arabs about the crimes against humanity in New York and Washington, a disturbing disconnection that allows them to condemn the atrocities in America without reference to America's response - and condemn the response without reflecting on the carnage on the other side of the Atlantic.

The Muslim world now sees innocent Muslims who have died in Western air strikes on Afghanistan. If Karam turns out to be as terrible as the Taliban claims, all of Mr Blair's lectures and denials that this is a religious war will be in vain.

The Prime Minister can now only reflect upon the irony that an obscurantist sect that smashes television sets and hangs videotapes from trees is now using television and videotape for its own propaganda.

JERUSALEM (Reuters - 14 October ) - Israeli forces killed an Islamic militant Sunday, dealing a blow to Washington's drive to get Israel and the Palestinians to end a year-long conflict that threatens regional support for its anti-terror war.

Israel renewed an internationally condemned track-and-kill policy to shoot dead Abdel Rahman Hamad, a member of the Hamas group, whom it said was involved in a suicide bombing at a Tel Aviv disco in June in which 21 people were killed.

Hamas threatened retaliation for the killing, which Palestinians branded an assassination.

Palestinian security sources said Hamad, 35, was killed by Israeli forces as he stood on the roof of his house in the city of Qaqilya, near Israel's border with the West Bank.

The killing was carried out only hours before Israel was expected to announce the easing of a military blockade of Palestinian areas after citing a ``decrease'' in violence since a cease-fire was reaffirmed on September 26.

The United States and other major world players have urged a revival of Middle East peacemaking to bolster Muslim and Arab support for the anti-terror war that President Bush launched after the September 11 suicide plane attacks on New York and Washington.

``Israel will pay a very heavy price for this act,'' a senior Hamas official, Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi, told Reuters after Hamad was killed.

``We will definitely respond very painfully.''

Palestinian cabinet minister Saeb Erekat said the killing ''reflects the determination of the Israeli Prime Minister (Ariel Sharon) to sabotage every effort that is being exerted'' by the Palestinians to uphold a cease-fire.

Israeli security sources confirmed Israeli forces killed Hamad. ``Israel asked the Palestinian Authority to arrest him and he wasn't, even though his name was on a list of wanted men,'' one security source said.

Israel has tracked and killed dozens of Palestinian militants it says took part in attacks against Israel. It calls the policy self-defense but has faced worldwide condemnation.

Late last month, Israel pledged to stop such killings as the two sides tried to give new impetus to a U.S.-backed truce-to-talks plan. But after Palestinian gunmen killed two Israelis at a Jewish settlement in the Gaza Strip on October 2, Israel's security cabinet gave the armed forces a green light to take ``all necessary action'' to thwart attacks.

At least 625 Palestinians and 175 Israelis have been killed since a Palestinian uprising against occupation erupted in September 2000 after peace talks stalled.

Saturday, Israel said it would ease its blockade of Palestinian areas and allow thousands of Palestinian workers back into the Jewish state.

Tens of thousands of Palestinian laborers worked in Israel before the Intifada, or uprising began. The closure dealt a near death blow to the already fragile Palestinian economy and has been branded by Palestinians as collective punishment.

Sharon's spokesman Raanan Gissin said Israel had agreed to ease the blockade to ``move...negotiations forward.'' An announcement would be made Sunday, Gissin said.

Israel says the travel restrictions were needed to prevent bombers and other attackers from entering its territory.

An Israeli source said the government would also consider pulling troops out of a Palestinian neighborhood in Hebron that they reoccupied on October 4 following a shooting attack on Jewish worshippers at a shrine in the West Bank city.

A withdrawal would depend on Palestinian guarantees to end gunfire at Israeli targets in Hebron, divided into Palestinian and Israeli zones under an interim peace deal in 1997, the source said.

Sporadic gunfights have flared up through the West Bank and Gaza Strip despite cease-fire efforts.

``If we see no measures are taken against these terrorists and there are casualties...we will exercise our right to self-defense just as the United States is doing in Afghanistan,'' Gissin said.

Israel has invoked the term self-defense to cover track-and-kill operations and incursions into Palestinian-controlled areas.

Palestinian President Yasser Arafat will meet British Prime Minister Tony Blair in London Monday to discuss the stricken Middle East peace process.

Thursday, President Bush, who until last month's suicide attacks was reluctant to become embroiled in the Middle East conflict, expressed support for a Palestinian state.

GAZA (Reuters - 12 October) - The Palestinian Authority kept a tight lid on unrest against the bombing of Afghanistan on Friday, and the United States and Britain prepared to revive stalled Middle East peacemaking.

Palestinian police briefly detained three foreign reporters covering a rally in the Gaza Strip in support of Saudi-born dissident Osama bin Laden, Washington's prime suspect in the Sept. 11 suicide-hijack attacks on the United States.

Palestinian officials said the United States and Britain -- trying to woo Arab and Islamic support for their global anti-terror coalition -- would soon begin a new initiative to end more than a year of Israeli-Palestinian fighting.

Some Arabs and Muslims say terrorism can only be wiped out when the Israeli-Palestinian conflict ends. Bin Laden has said Americans will not know peace until the Palestinians do.

The officials said Palestinian President Yasser Arafat would hold talks with British Prime Minister Tony Blair in London in the coming days about a new Middle East peace bid.

``Both the United Kingdom and the U.S. are working together to draft a position paper which would include ideas to revive the peace process and solve the final status issues,'' a senior Palestinian official said.

In London, a spokesman for Blair said it was vital to kick-start the peace process, which stalled shortly before the Palestinian revolt against Israeli occupation erupted.

``It is clear ... there is a need to reinvigorate the peace process,'' the spokesman said upon Blair's return from a three-day diplomatic tour of the region aimed at bolstering Arab and Islamic support for the alliance.

But in Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the United States did not have a plan or peace proposals, other than a return to the Mitchell committee recommendations of April.

The committee, led by former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell, called for a cease-fire, a cooling-off period and confidence-building measures leading to new peace talks.

``I don't know why people are looking for peace proposals from the United States. Clearly, we have been working on a strategy all along. ... But we're not at the point of putting forward peace proposals or anything like that,'' he said.

On Thursday, President Bush issued his strongest endorsement so far of a Palestinian state and said he would be ready to meet the parties if it would be useful.

Secretary of State Colin Powell spoke to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Friday and to Arafat on Wednesday and Thursday, Boucher said. He gave no details.

Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported Friday that Washington had shown a new initiative to moderate Arab states but had not informed Israel of the details of the proposal.

Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo said the White House was preparing a new initiative before the Sept. 11 attacks and Palestinian officials believed it was still working on that proposal.

A spokesman for Israel's foreign ministry said Israel had no knowledge of any new U.S. peace proposals.

Security was tight as thousands of Palestinian militants marched at anti-U.S. rallies in the Gaza Strip, where Palestinian police shot dead two Palestinians earlier in the week during demonstrations in support of bin Laden.

The Palestinian Authority has tried to suppress media coverage of pro-bin Laden sentiment. It barred foreign journalists from the Gaza Strip for several days this week after clashes between protesters and police.

Reporters were allowed to attend two West Bank rallies on Friday, where demonstrators chanted pro-Afghanistan slogans but did not burn Israeli and American flags.

Palestinian officials called for Bush to back up words with deeds after he said on Thursday there ought to be a Palestinian state, as long as it recognized Israel's right to exist.

Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, who reaffirmed a truce in a meeting with Arafat on Sept. 26, met senior Palestinian officials Ahmed Korei and Saeb Erekat on Friday to discuss the cease-fire, which has not fully stopped the violence.

``We told him (Peres) we need deeds not words,'' Erekat told Reuters. He said Peres promised that Israel would start easing its blockade of the Palestinian territories and carrying out other measures in the next few days under the cease-fire deal.

Palestinian police detained Ala' al-Saftawi, a political leader of the Islamic Jihad and editor of a weekly newspaper, on Friday for an editorial criticizing them, his wife said.

Meanwhile, a Palestinian security source said Israeli troops thrust some 400 meters into the Palestinian-ruled town of Deir al-Balah in Gaza, where they took over a mosque.

Mid-East Realities

www.middleeast.org

Source: http://www.middleeast.org/articles/2001/10/468.htm