For years Democrats have SOUNDLY condemned any attempts by the White House or GOP to use bin Laden images to suggest that Democrats are soft on terrorism. But now a Democrat does just that — and there is silence from many Democrats.
So in 2008 if some Republicans use the same “Vote for us or die” suggestion and Democrats condemn them, people need to keep in mind that the use of these tactics — coming on the eve of a vote so the other campaign really can’t mount a quick response — has now been validated by many Democrats who applaud or look the other way when anything is used to help their side win.
Are the pro-Obama forces seriously trying to get their troops outraged over this latest ad from Hillary Clinton? Just because it contains a ten-second sequence of presidential crises (Depression, Pearl Harbor, gas crisis, Katrina, etc.) and flashes a half-second clip of Osama bin Laden as part of it? Spare me. Are Democratic political ads no longer even allowed to mention the fact that the next president is going to have to deal with the war on terror?
I politely disagree:
1. If you go back and look at the blog, progressive talk show, etc. outrage during the Bush administration there has been one constant. Democrats of all types soundly condemned any use of bin Laden footage or a suggestion that if you didn’t vote for the Republicans your life might be in danger. Now it appears in an ad for a Democrat — and it’s no longer something to condemn.
2. It isn’t only Obama forces that could react this way. The last time I belong to a political party, I registered as a Republican in California to vote for John McCain in the 2000 Republican presidential primary. A new book on Arnold Schwarzenegger quotes me and describes me as a typical California independent voter. If it’s wrong when one side does it, it’s wrong when the other side does it. Not all independent voters react this way (independent voters are not monolithic) — but this one does.
We just posted at WORLDMEETS.US something that anyone interested in global affairs simply must watch.
Nearly every year at the annual Arab Summit, Libyan despot Muammar Qadhafi gives a speech to the collected rulers of the Arab world who in stony-faced silence, sit and listen to him. Invariably - it is absolutely priceless.
March 24th, 2008 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
Is it curtains for the bluff and bluster game played by President ex-General Pervez Musharraf and his mentor in the White House, President George W. Bush, for the past eight years? The first important decision the new Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani took after being elected as prime minister was to order the release of the Chief Justice of the highest court, Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry.
Justice Chaudhry and his family had been confined to his house since Musharraf declared a state of emergency in November last year and sacked 60 senior judges ahead of a Supreme Court ruling that could have invalidated his re-election as president. More here…
Now both Musharraf and Bush appear as pathetic caricatures extolling the virtues of democracy after working overtime to crush any dissidence to the totalitarian rule of Musharraf. The Pakistani president fearing that his days were numbered has started a media campaign that he would love to work with the new government and “promote democracy”.
If one reads carefully the US administration’s recent press release, it would appear that counter-terrorism is not really the main issue in engaging the Pakistan government!!! Imagine Musharraf was being promoted by the US government for eight years and given billions of dollars for the so-called “war-on-terror”.
Here is what the White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said: “We look forward to working with the new government in Pakistan. There’s lots of different areas where we can cooperate - not just counter terrorism, but across the board.”
The US State department Spokesman Sean McCormack said: “This (Gilani becoming PM) was the selection of the Pakistani political leadership and people. (Obviously…Bush & Co are still trying to somehow ensure that dictator Musharraf contiues as president.) We look forward to work with Gilani and his government. Beyond that, I don’t know that there’s much more to add other than our congratulations to his election as prime minister.” What a way to greet the return of democracy in Pakistan!!!
Why is the US administration not talking about seeking the new Pakistan government’s support for “war-on-terror”, or capturing al-Qaeda leaders or Osama-bin-Laden? Are these not the real issues? Or were these used as camouflage to ensure the survival of Musharraf all these years for some extraneous reasons?
These are serious matters which have not found proper space in the US media/blogs for some strange/unknown reasons, and may have long term impact on the US and its media’s standing/credibility in the world.
To give one example of the US backing dictators, who are despised by their people, and how this boomrangs: “The new Pakistan prime minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, a former house speaker who until two years ago was jailed under what he claims were politically motivated charges, beat the pro-Musharraf candidate for the premier’s slot, Chaudhry Pervez Elahi, by 264 votes to 42.”
But 4,000, well, that one seems to give us pause. For some reason the sight of three zeros makes us turn our necks long enough to pay attention, ask more questions and continue to find few real answers.
So here’s my question on the anniversary of this 4th set of three zeros: Was it worth it?
And more broadly, how has the Bush administration demonstrated that this war has:
been worth the cost in lives,
been worth diverting attention and resources away from domestic issues,
been worth diverting our attention away from other foreign policy issues,
and made us any safer?
The only tangible benefits seem to be that a bad dictator is gone and people have been freed. Fair enough. These are good things.
But Saddam was a bad guy who had no ties to al Qaeda. And, forgive me for being cruel, but it’s not up to us to make sure the entire world is free. If that were the case, we would have started with Darfur, not Iraq.
Another fact that seems to get missed in all these discussions…our intelligence estimates say that al Qaeda is stronger than ever before.
This is why more and more Americans don’t accept the premise that, if we stay there, things are going to get fixed and, if we leave, everything is going to go south. What we’re all starting to collectively realize is that the longer we’re in Iraq, the more chances there are for things to go wrong both there AND here. And what a continued presence in Iraq will most likely result in is we’ll have less say in how we’ll ultimately exit the country. Because we will exit at some point. We all know this. The only way we can control our own destiny here is to set realistic timetables and stick to them.
And yes, al Qaeda will claim victory, but I say let them think they’ve defeated us. Let them believe we’re tucking our tail between our legs. Let them put out their inane little videos. People, just because they say it doesn’t make it true.
Does anybody think if we pull out of Iraq that we’re going to stop tracking down al Qaeda heavies? Does anybody believe the broader fight against the Islamic extremists is going to stop? In fact, now we can start this shadow war in earnest and allocate our vast resources to that fight instead of continuing to throw billions down a hole in Iraq. Can you imagine how many top al Qaeda we could have captured by now using those resources that lay at the bottom of that hole?
Also, is it just me or have we forgotten that we won the war against Saddam and Iraq? Seriously, it was won. Saddam was defeated. We just haven’t been able to secure peace. The difference between those two things is very significant, and I think most of us are accepting the reality that there’s no way we’ll be able to stem the insurgent violence completely. So the fact that Bush and McCain continue to say that withdrawal means “defeat” just shows you how ass backwards our current foreign policy reasoning has become. Again, we all know we have to get out of Iraq at some point, so who’s truly setting us up to fail, the “Defeatocrats” or the “Republican’ts”?
It’s time to go. The sooner the better. Otherwise, we’ll be meeting back here in about a year and talking about the lives that were forever changed between now and 5,000.
What can be gleaned from the fact that on the fifth anniversary of the Iraq War, President George W. Bush and his ‘alter ego’ Osama bin Laden both gave speeches? Patrik Etschmayer writes for Switzerland’s Nachrichten, ‘Bush once again showed how brilliant he is at ignoring the reality of his own mistakes and giving the truth a whole new twist … This speech - which was an absolute denial of reality and self-deception - was not out there on its own for long, but was soon accompanied by one from his alter-ego on the Dark Side, when Osama bin Laden reportedly spoke again … Bin Laden’s message carries more than just a warning for Europe. It also shows that even for bin Laden, Bush is a man whose time has run out. … Both are voices from the crypt - but it seems that it will be bin Laden’s voice that will be heard the longest.’
By Patrik Etschmayer
Translated By Patrik Etschmayer
March 20, 2008
Switzerland - Nachrichten - Home Page (German)
It’s the fifth anniversary of the starting shot of the second Iraq War, and right on cue, two of the undead have chosen to speak. First, George W. Bush gave his speech on the anniversary of this enterprise; and from the other, reports are that Osama Bin Laden too has spoken once again.
Bush went first, however, and once again showed how impressive and brilliant he is at ignoring the reality of his own mistakes and giving the truth a whole new twist.
A wonderful example for his mental somersaults can be found early in the speech, when Bush says the following about the defeated Iraqi army and regime: “When the Iraqi regime was removed, it did not lay down its arms and surrender. Instead, former regime elements took off their uniforms and faded into the countryside to fight the emergence of a free Iraq.”
What he didn’t say was that the army and security forces had in fact surrendered, and then were released by the Americans - with the effect that in the aftermath, hundreds of thousands of unemployed soldiers and police - still armed - were ready to organize resistance to the occupiers.
Of the fact that the U.S. Army also failed to secure huge caches of Iraqi army weapons, which were then cleared out by insurgents in the tremendous power vacuum that existed at the time … not a word was mentioned.
Nor was any mention made of the non-existent weapons of mass destruction (the alleged existence of which was the main reason for the war), the fact that al-Qaeda only appeared in Iraq after the invasion, and that for four years the U.S. administration ignored every voice that criticized its actions in Iraq - and in the case of the generals that dared to speak up - it silenced them.
The perhaps too-late U-turn in Iraq, which in recent times has at least brought a degree of calm, was mentioned this way: “So we reviewed the strategy - and changed course in Iraq.” Four botched-up years of ineptitude rolled up into one sentence, which makes it sound as if some real achievement has been accomplished.
READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, along with continuing translated foreign press coverage of the Iraq War anniversary.
See the full video (with an accompanying text article) from here. Many key graphs, see this post for the text of the speech. Here is where he makes the Day One promise:
When you have no overarching strategy, there is no clear definition of success. Success comes to be defined as the ability to maintain a flawed policy indefinitely. Here is the truth: fighting a war without end will not force the Iraqis to take responsibility for their own future. And fighting in a war without end will not make the American people safer.
So when I am Commander-in-Chief, I will set a new goal on Day One: I will end this war. Not because politics compels it. Not because our troops cannot bear the burden- as heavy as it is. But because it is the right thing to do for our national security, and it will ultimately make us safer.
In order to end this war responsibly, I will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. We can responsibly remove 1 to 2 combat brigades each month. If we start with the number of brigades we have in Iraq today, we can remove all of them 16 months. After this redeployment, we will leave enough troops in Iraq to guard our embassy and diplomats, and a counter-terrorism force to strike al Qaeda if it forms a base that the Iraqis cannot destroy. What I propose is not - and never has been - a precipitous drawdown. It is instead a detailed and prudent plan that will end a war nearly seven years after it started.
The World Beyond Iraq
Fayetteville, NC
March 19, 2008
As Prepared for Delivery
Just before America’s entry into World War I, President Woodrow Wilson addressed Congress: “It is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war,” he said. “…But the right is more precious than peace.” Wilson’s words captured two awesome responsibilities that test any Commander-in-Chief - to never hesitate to defend America, but to never go to war unless you must. War is sometimes necessary, but it has grave consequences, and the judgment to go to war can never be undone.
Five years ago today, President George W. Bush addressed the nation. Bombs had started to rain down on Baghdad. War was necessary, the President said, because the United States could not, “live at the mercy of an outlaw regime that threatens the peace with weapons of mass murder.” Recalling the pain of 9/11, he said the price of inaction in Iraq was to meet the threat with “armies of fire fighters and police and doctors on the streets of our cities.”
At the time the President uttered those words, there was no hard evidence that Iraq had those stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. There was not any evidence that Iraq was responsible for the attacks of September 11, or that Iraq had operational ties to the al Qaeda terrorists who carried them out. By launching a war based on faulty premises and bad intelligence, President Bush failed Wilson’s test. So did Congress when it voted to give him the authority to wage war.
Five years have gone by since that fateful decision. This war has now lasted longer than World War I, World War II, or the Civil War. Nearly four thousand Americans have given their lives. Thousands more have been wounded. Even under the best case scenarios, this war will cost American taxpayers well over a trillion dollars. And where are we for all of this sacrifice? We are less safe and less able to shape events abroad. We are divided at home, and our alliances around the world have been strained. The threats of a new century have roiled the waters of peace and stability, and yet America remains anchored in Iraq. Read the rest of this entry »
Having run through a series of rationales for the Iraq war that would have daunted a less arrogant man, George Bush finally settled on a real keeper in the fifth year of the Forever War: It was necessary in order to bring down the very terrorists who launched the 9/11 attacks.
While it took some time to debunk the earlier rationales, this one was an instant classic, a whopper so big and transparently false that it beggared belief.
This, of course, was because the Al Qaeda insurgents who have bedeviled the star-crossed American occupation were a product of the occupation itself and had only a tangential connection to Osama bin Laden and the men who flew jetliners into the World Trade Center, Pentagon and a farm field in Western Pennsylvania.
But we can thank the president for one thing: The phony connection between Al Qaeda in Iraq and 9/11 invites another and one that I offer with circumspection as we slouch into the sixth year of the war.
What Bin Laden was not able to do on that fateful morning and in the years since, Bush has done for him in some respects.
At first glance, that statement may seem shockingly inapt until you consider:
* Bush’s ability to play on America’s fears far better than The Bearded One ever could.
* Bush’s penchant for divisive politics has further exacerbated social divides in America.
* Bush’s pathalogical inability to level with Americans has further undermined their faith in goverment.
* Bush’s economic policies have exacerbated troubling long-term economic trends and helped plunge America into recession.
* Bush’s war has further destabilized arguably the most volatile region in the world.
* And Bush’s actions, including advocating torture and casting aside international treaties and conventions, have brought great shame on America.
This is just one of the allegations in Roger Faligot’s book, The Chinese Secret Services: From Mao to the Olympic Games. This specialist in intelligence retraces the history of the ties between the Middle Kingdom and al-Qaeda. According to this review of the book from Le Matin of Switzerland, the author writes, ‘The first negotiations with Osama bin Laden’s entourage are alleged to have been held in 2006 in Pakistan’s Baluchistan Province … What has China promised to prevent a suicide bomber from blowing himself up during the finals for the 100-meter dash? And most importantly, what confidence can we give any commitment undertaken by Osama bin Laden? The answer will come next August in Beijing.’
By Ian Hamel
Translated By James Jacobson
February 23, 2008
Switzerland - Le Matin - Original Article (French)
Tomorrow, the word “Guoanbu ” will be as familiar as CIA, KGB or General Intelligence . China has not only become a great world power, it has also erected the most important secret services in the world. They comprise two million spies who scrutinize your acts and gestures, especially if you’re an athlete, a sports journalist or an opponent of the upcoming Olympic Games in Beijing. For the latter, China has also established a center for special intelligence equipped with a budget of $1.3 billion.
Security has become a national priority in the Middle Kingdom, which dreads nothing more than dramas like the one that occurred in Tiananmen Square in 1989 ; demonstrations by Beijing’s Uyghur opponents (a Muslim minority from West China ); or protests by the Tibetans, during the global festival of sport next August. In The Chinese Secret Services. from Mao to the Olympic Games, China expert Roger Faligot reveals that General Chen Xiaogong, the new coordinator of military intelligence, negotiated with al-Qaeda to prevent terrorist attacks during the Olympics.
MAO’S GRANDSON
There relationship between China and the Islamist movement are long-standing. At the end of 1979 beginning with the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union, the Chinese decided to help the Mujahideen. Beijing provided Simonov sub-machine guns and Kalashnikov assault rifles, which have the advantage of using the same ammunition as Russian weapons. Within the Chinese Embassy in Islamabad, there is a military attaché named Kong Jining. This commander, who supplied the Islamists with weapons of war, was none other than Mao Zedong’s grandson.
“The choice of such an agent shows the importance that the Chinese placed on operations in Afghanistan. These good relations have continued with the Taliban. At the end of 2001 …
With Pervez Musharraf on the electoral ropes, US policy has morphed from Bush’s approach to Barack Obama’s in unilaterally taking out an al Qaeda commander in Pakistan’s tribal area.
Last July, Obama was criticized for saying, ““If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act, we will.”
Now, according to a highly sourced report in the Washington Post, the CIA has done just that. In a Tom Clancyish operation, missiles from a drone aircraft killed Abu Laith al-Libi, a senior al Qaeda commander who had been eluding the CIA’s dragnet.
“It was the first successful strike against al-Qaeda’s core leadership in two years,” the Post reports, “and it involved, U.S. officials say, an unusual degree of autonomy by the CIA inside Pakistan.
“Having requested the Pakistani government’s official permission for such strikes on previous occasions, only to be put off or turned down, this time the U.S. spy agency did not seek approval. The government of Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf was notified only as the operation was underway, according to the officials, who insisted on anonymity because of diplomatic sensitivities.”
Six months ago, Obama was denounced by other Presidential candidates as naïve and pooh-poohed by then White House Press Secretary Tony Snow.
“I’m confident,” President Bush harrumphed, “that with actionable intelligence we will be able to bring top Al Qaeda to justice. We’re in constant communications with the Pakistan government.”
Not this time. In the light of elections in Pakistan and back here, change seems to be literally in the air.
February 3rd, 2008 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
A new book by a former CIA officer, and now a senior fellow at the Philadelphia-based Foreign Policy Research Institute, “explodes many myths” about terrorists, and “provides an unsettling account of how al-Qaeda has evolved from the organisation headed by Osama bin Laden into an amorphous movement — a ‘leaderless jihad’.”
The Economist says: “Mr Marc Sageman has unusual credentials: a former CIA officer, he is also a forensic psychiatrist and a counter-terrorism consultant. He published the first version of his theory three years ago in an influential book, ‘Understanding Terror Networks’. His aim, to put the study of this new kind of terrorism on to a scientific footing, has not changed. But al-Qaeda has, and the task of analysing it has become more complex.
“…Like others, Mr Sageman believes the Iraq war, which appeared to legitimise the idea of a rapacious West in conflict with Islam, was a spectacular own-goal for America. Unless that idea can be successfully countered, he says, America may find itself confronting not just a terrorist fringe but a substantial segment of the Muslim world, which would intensify and prolong the conflict to disastrous effect.
“A successful hearts-and-minds campaign, on the other hand, would stiffen moderate spines and help take the glory out of jihadism; eventually, ‘the leaderless jihad [would] expire, poisoned by its own toxic message.’ It is an optimistic conclusion, given all that has gone before…”
January 25th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
A police intelligence officer looking into assassinations in Lebanon was killed in a targeted bomb attack — continuing the cycle of politically motivated murders.
One question now being asked: was Al Qaeda behind the killing? Or could it really be Syria? Or is there a convergence of bloody interests at play there?
A car bomb killed a police intelligence officer involved in the investigation of assassinations in Lebanon, in an attack in a Christian suburb of Beirut on Friday.
Police chief Brigadier-General Ashraf Rifi named the officer targeted in the blast while on his way to work as Captain Wisam Eid. A bodyguard and two other people were also killed.
January 15th, 2008 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
I partially agree with Carlotta Gall, whose writings I admire, who recently wrote an interesting article, along with David Rohde, in the New York Times titled ‘Pakistan Struggles Against Militants Trained by Agency (Pakistan’s ISI)’.
Her write-up from Islamabad states: “Pakistan’s premier military intelligence agency (ISI) has lost control of some of the networks of Pakistani militants it has nurtured since the 1980s, and is now suffering the violent blowback of that policy, two former senior intelligence officials and other officials close to the agency say.”
(An earlier NYT report adds: “The Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate is, according to some, Pakistan’s shadowy equivalent of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). According to others, it is in effect a shadow government, one that has used its ties to drug dealers and Islamic extremists to stir up trouble not only in Pakistan but in Afghanistan and the Kashmir region of India as well.”) More here…
However, Pakistan had not taken a unilateral stand on this issue. (I quote from the NYT again: “The ISI was formed in the early days of Pakistan’s independence, but took on greater importance as the rivalry with India and tensions over Kashmir rose in the 1960’s. Its role increased sharply after the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, when the United States pressed Pakistan to support the guerilla war that eventually led to a Soviet withdrawal. In the civil wars that followed, the ISI backed the Taliban, which came from the Pashtun-speaking region on Pakistan’s border. For another article on ISI pl click here…
I partially agree with Carlotta’s NYT story that the ISI has become a Frankenstein’s monster, along with the Islamist militants it is in league with. However, one cannot overlook the fact that President Musharraf, or whoever heads the government in Pakistan, has to please (or had been pleasing) a number of players. It is a balancing/blackmailing game - and you have to be more clever than a fox to do it. The top guy in Pakistan has to humour the White House, the CIA, the Al-Quaeda, Islamist militants of different hues, powerful drug dealers, political/military challenges within the country…and what have you!!!
It is no coincidence that the present Chief of the Pakistan Army, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, who was handpicked by President Pervez Musharraf to succeed him, previously led Pakistan’s premier military intelligence agency ISI. (See photo above of Musharraf and Kayani: courtesy Anjum Naveed/Associated Press)
I wrote a post recently grudgingly admiring President Musharraf. Please click here to read the post… Although I have sympathy for him, but I also fear that he may not be able to ride two tigers for long and the old adage may come true sooner than later …. ‘You can fool some people sometimes, but you can’t fool all the people all the time’. But then some believe that so long his present mentor in the White House is there, Musharraf has nothing to worry.
January 11th, 2008 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
Ed Morrissey in his blog takes note of the US officials’ current rhetoric about covert intelligence and military operations in the tribal areas of Pakistan, and the strong reaction this evoked from President Pervez Musharraf who said that he would consider such a step by US troops as “invasion of his country.”
Well said, General (oops Mr) Musharraf!
Mr Musharraf by now should know the dangers of riding a wild tiger. However, in this verbal duel between Washington and Islamabad the first round definitely goes to the latter. Let’s see who ultimately wins…for the US troops were not exactly invited by the leaders in Iraq and Afghanistan, or given a red carpet welcome either.
But then the world seems totally reconciled to the non-stop adventurism of the current US administration; and the leaders of other powerful nations appear almost helpless/impotent in the face of this challenge.
An agency report states: “President Pervez Musharraf warned that U.S. troops would be regarded as invaders if they crossed into Pakistan’s border region with Afghanistan in the hunt for al-Qaeda or Taliban militants, according to an interview published Friday.
“The New York Times reported last week that Washington was considering expanding the authority of the Central Intelligence Agency and the military to peruse aggressive covert operations within the tribal regions.
” ‘If they come without our permission, that’s against the sovereignty of Pakistan. I challenge anybody coming into our mountains,’ he (Musharraf) said in the interview in the garrison city of Rawalpindi. ‘They would regret that day.’
Even Mr Musharraf’s detractors would grudgingly admire his guts. The President of Pakistan knows that he is riding a wild tiger whose abode is…(The White House…or did I hear you say the tribal areas???). In the history of Pakistan there have been strong leaders (both military and civilians). However, there is no instance of a leader who could survive much longer after dismounting the tiger!
The US threat is a matter of serious concern not only for Pakistan but for the entire international community. President Musharraf should realise now that it is better to make amends with one’s own rivals/enemies within the country than regret friendship with someone far away in a different country who sooner than later could turn into a bully…or worse.
Have the people of Iraq defeated al-Qaeda - and didn’t Americans have anything to do with it? According to this op-ed article from Iraq’s Al-Zawraa newspaper, ‘After four years of resistance, courage and sacrifice by our Iraqi people in the fight against al-Qaeda and its offshoots, success has been achieved … With gold letters, Iraqis have marked their place in the annals of history.’
By Salman Daud Alhafezi
Translated By Jenny Oliver
December 28, 2007
Iraq - Al-Zawraa - Original Article (Arabic)
The Takfiri gangs (Sunni Extremists ) who came across the border like a swarm of locusts after the regime toppled, have tried to turn Iraq into a place controlled by titans and tyrants and a headquarters for the dissemination of their ideology and myths - myths which came not from Allah.
With coercion, murder, displacement and bombings, they sought to bring the Iraqi people to their knees. In their sick fantasies, they imagined that they could claim Iraq as their own Islamic nation. After four years of resistance, courage and sacrifice by our Iraqi people in the fight against al-Qaeda and its offshoots, success has been achieved in reducing hostilities. With gold letters, Iraqis have marked their place in the annals of history. Read the rest of this entry »
Does the murder of Benazir Bhutto ‘mark the culmination of the war on terror which
began on Sept. 11, 2001?’ According to this analysis by one of France’s leading historians, Alexandre Adler, the Pakistani military is up to its old tricks, appearing not to realize that ‘its chances of survival are directly linked to victory for the democrats and to a closer relationship with India.’
The Chronicle of Alexandre Adler
Translated By James Jacobson
December 29, 2007
France - Le Figaro - Original Article (French)
With the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, we have reached the culmination of the war on terror which began on September 11, 2001. Still harboring on its territory the two main leaders of al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, it isn’t surprising that Pakistan has again taken center stage.
The quick and apparently anxious way General Musharraf joined with the Americans after September 11th indeed allowed Islamabad to avoid offering any clear answer on the involvement of its army and secret services in the attack on New York. Still later, the strategic nature of the country and the facilities granted the FBI and CIA to hunt down the men of al-Qaeda - certainly offered without pleasure - has continued to immunize Pakistan’s military junta vis-à-vis the United States. Still, behind the smiles of command, George W. Bush has continued to strengthen cooperation with India for the purpose of intimidating the Pakistani army. In turn, this decidedly unreliable army high-handedly refused to accept Washington’s offer of lifting the embargo on F-16’s in favor of an alliance with increasingly-friendly China. Read the rest of this entry »
Was it Benazir Bhutto that was the primary target her assassins - or was it relations with the United States in general? According to this op-ed article from Switzerland’s 24heurs, ‘the target is democracy in Pakistan. Or more simply: the goal is to destabilize a government allied with the United-States. Allied with the wicked West.’
By Foreign Desk Editor Andrés Allemand
Translated By Sandrine Ageorges
December 28, 2007
Switzerland - 24 heurs - Original Article (French)
Who profits from a crime? This is the unavoidable question in the aftermath of the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. Should we listen to some of her supporters who already see a Machiavellian plot by President Pervez Musharraf to dispose of his main rival in legislative elections on Jan. 8 - and why not - since this justifies his hold on power with a new “security” coup d’état? Or should we instead adhere to hear the President’s speech, which blamed the perpetual war against Islamist terrorism?
Clearly, the crime benefits the partisans of chaos. It wasn’t their first attempt. This year Pakistan broke a sad record: the number of suicide bombings. They killed nearly 800 people in the last twelve months, although most haven’t been publicized. Just yesterday, while the death of Benazir Bhutto was the central focus of the media, Nawaz Sharif - another former prime minister and a candidate in the presidential election - survived gunfire during his own election rally.
The target is democracy in Pakistan. Or more simply: the goal is to destabilize a government allied with the United-States. Allied with the wicked West. A government that resists, as much as it can, the advance of Islamic radicalism, which is no longer satisfied administering the “tribal zones” along the Afghanistan border or the thousands of madrasas - the Koranic schools which manufacture Taliban. Remember: in early July, the fundamentalists stormed the Red Mosque, in the heart of Islamabad.
Why did the terrorists want so badly to eliminate Benazir Bhutto? Because, according to one of France’s leading writers and philosophers, Bernard Henry Levy, her very existence posed a threat to everything they stand for - including the proper place of a woman.
“It is a woman, first of all, that they have killed. A beautiful woman. … the exact opposite of those shamed women, hidden and damned creatures of Satan, who are the only women tolerated by those apostles of a world without women … Behind the remains of this great lady, there should be the greatest possible number of heads of State, making her funeral a silent demonstration of the world’s adherence to the values of democracy and peace.”
By Bernard Henry Lévy*
Translated By James Jacobson
December 28, 2007
France - Liberation - Original Article (English)
It is a woman, first of all, that they have killed.
A beautiful woman.
A visible woman - an even conspicuously, dramatically visible woman. A woman for whom it was a point of honor not only to hold meetings in one of the most dangerous countries in the world, but to do it with her face uncovered – the exact opposite of those shamed women, hidden and damned creatures of Satan, who are the only women tolerated by those apostles of a world without women.
With Daniel Pearl, they killed a Jew.
With commander Massoud [of the Afghan Northern Alliance ] , they killed a moderate Muslim, a literate man and a free spirit. With Salman Rushdie , they tried for years to kill a man who dared to say that being human sometimes means to choose one’s destiny.
Well with BB, Benazir Bhutto, they killed a bit of all of this. But they also killed a woman, this woman, who was an intolerable provocation. It was the radiance of her unveiled face, nude, defenseless and magnificently eloquent - they killed her, because it was this woman, because it was her face - at once powerless and with a force that can’t be replicated, because she lived her destiny as a woman who refused the looming curse against the human face of all women, according to these new fascists who call themselves jihadists; thus they killed the one who was the very embodiment of the hope, spirit and will of democracy, not only in Pakistan, but in the lands of Islam in general.
Pervez Musharraf was a counterfeit adversary of al-Qaeda. He pretended to fight them while he played his double game with his occult alliances - his way of keeping his stock of terrorists under his elbow and releasing them one by one in dribs and drabs, all according to the needs of the alliance with his great and complicated American friend - he did their bidding under the table.
Benazir, if she had won, what can one say? If she had lived, simply lived, she wouldn’t have ceased saying at the risk of her own life, her very being, her very presence, that she was their resolute, absolute, irreconcilable adversary; for these people she was a threat - more than just a political one, an ontological one; she would have left them nowhere to hide. They knew this and they killed her.
I am reminded of an afternoon on December 2002 in London, when I investigated the death of Daniel Pearl - and therefore this powder keg, the rear-base for al-Qaeda, even though the forward base was already in Pakistan; Pearl was beautiful, yes; and incredibly courageous in his will to return - whatever the cost - to that country which had already uprooted Benezir’s two young brothers and her father in events redolent with the air of a Shakespearian tragedy. [All were killed under suspicious circumstances during Benazir Bhutto’s two terms as Pakistan President].
Is Iran now confronting some blowback of its own, due to its intervention in Iraq since the U.S. invasion? According to this op-ed article from Iraq’s Kitabat newspaper, ‘Any Iraqi Shiite who doesn’t frankly and publicly reject Iran’s interference is an Iranian agent, a traitor and a coward.’
“My Shiite brother, today it is your duty before Allah the Exalted One, before your own conscience and in the face of history … to publicly and frankly declare your rejection of Iran’s criminal interference in Iraq. … It is this that has destroyed our nation and has resulted in the murder of our sons.”
By Khadir Taahar
Translated By James Jacobson
December 25, 2007
Iraq - Kitabat - Original Article (Arabic)
My noble and heroic Iraqi Shiite brothers, who have endured adversity, tragedy detention camps and communal graves …
I, a fellow Iraqi Shiite, address you as someone who shares your worries and grief, and like you, dreams of a free and dignified life within our beloved Iraq … I address you in the hope of preserving our rights and interests, we, Iraq’s Shiite sons, before they are stolen by the agents and proxies of Iran.
With all regret, I find myself compelled to use this sectarian and un-Iraqi language. Perhaps one can be forgiven, since the reasons are so compelling and the catastrophe so great. After the destruction our nation has suffered and the division of its people into sects and nationalities, it has become nearly impossible to restore Iraq’s shattered national unity. With the devastation that has undermined the very notion of citizenship, all that was left was to defend our narrow, sectarian interests. One must be realistic, even if we reject this reality!
My Shiite brother, today it is your duty before Allah the Exalted one, before your own conscience and in the face of history … to publicly and frankly declare your rejection of Iran’s criminal interference in Iraq. It is this that has destroyed our nation and has resulted in the murder of our sons, for it is Iran - with the help Syria’s Baath regime - which supports the remnants of the Baath Party and al-Qaeda; it is Iran which supports the Shiite militias and factions; and it is Iran that has caused the mass murder and destruction that has befallen Iraq.
My Shiite brother, prove your patriotism and your honor by rejecting Iran’s underhanded, filthy interference in Iraq by taking part in mass demonstrations across the country, and publicly declare your opposition to Iran’s despicable conspiracies against our nation.
Boycott all Iranian goods and hinder their import into Iraq; boycott all Iranian institutions and tear the offensive images of Iran’s clerics from the walls of Iraq’s cities.
</