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BLEAK CONCLUSIONS FROM THE HISTORY OF A PEOPLE.
The Rejection
by Benny Morris

What are the Palestinians after? There are two basic interpretations of their actions in the past three years, which began with their rejection of the Barak-Clinton compromise proposals and the launching of the ongoing terroristic and guerrilla assault on Israel known as the Aqsa Intifada. According to one view, the Palestinians are conducting a rebellion against a repressive military occupation and their aim is to establish a peaceful Palestinian state alongside Israel in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, which comprise 22 percent of historic Palestine. According to another view, they aim to destroy Israel and replace it with a Palestinian Arab (and perhaps Islamic) state in all of historic Palestine, "from the river to the sea." In this view, ejecting Israel from the territories is merely a stage on the road to Israel's liquidation, which, like the ultimately successful Islamic assault on the medieval Crusader kingdoms, may take several centuries.

To judge from the declarations in English of their secular Fatah-dominated leadership, headed by Yasir Arafat, the Palestinians have strived since 1988 for a Palestinian state alongside Israel: the "two-state solution." To judge from the statements of some of these same Fatah leaders (including Arafat) in Arabic, and from the pronouncements by Hamas and Islamic Jihad, they seek Israel's destruction and replacement by an Arab (or Islamic) state. Why the forked tongue of most of the Fatah leaders? Perhaps they really aspire to a two-state solution but feel that they must appease their people with rejectionist pronouncements, so as to assure their hold on the leadership and their room for maneuver in the continuous struggle against the rejectionists and the Islamicists in their midst. Perhaps, like the Islamicists, they really intend to destroy Israel but feel that they must dupe sympathetic Israelis and Western supporters of Israel who might be antagonized by a frank rejectionism.

TNR Online | The Rejection (1 of 4) (print)

Excellent collection of links and quotes about the ties between the groovy Iraqi Government and real, live, terrorists.

example:
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It now transpires that Saddam was hoping to take advantage of Abu Nidal's presence in Baghdad to persuade him to use his considerable expertise in terrorist techniques to train al-Qa'eda fighters.

Sean LaFreniere - Connecting the Dots

John O'Farrell
Friday April 18, 2003
The Guardian

The Baghdad branch of Neighbourhood Watch has been completely overwhelmed this week. "If you notice anyone behaving in a vaguely suspicious manner, please contact the police immediately," say their little signs on the lamp-posts, but these were all brazenly nicked, along with everything else in the city that wasn't nailed down.

As the war stumbled to a confusing and chaotic end, lawlessness swept across the country as thousands of people helped themselves to computers, stereos and other electrical goods. Such is the state of anarchy in the country that many of them haven't even sent off the little guarantee postcards yet.

Western leaders have been reluctant to condemn the looters, perhaps because the clamour for material goods is partly what this war was all about: bringing western-style consumerism to a former Islamic "socialist" republic. With sufficiently aggressive advertising, within a few weeks the rioters will become vaguely dissatisfied with that Sony Playstation they seized and will feel the urge to go out and loot Playstation 2 with integral DVD player.

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | John O'Farrell: The thieves of Baghdad

The "Guernica" Myth
You may have heard the story about how Colin Powell forced the U.N. to cover Picasso's "Guernica" while he made the case for war in Iraq. It isn't true.
by Claudia Winkler
04/16/2003 1:00:00 PM

...

Early this year, as the Iraq drama was playing out at the United Nations, the press corps covering the Security Council swelled. The usual press stakeout, where ambassadors routinely take reporters' questions outside the Security Council, simply couldn't hold the numbers--expected to reach 800 for Powell's address on February 5. So the Secretariat moved the stakeout down the hallway.

As over 200 cameramen were setting up, they complained that the background at the new location didn't work for them. Powell would be speaking in front of the tapestry, of which only indecipherable shapes would be visible. Couldn't a plain background be provided, like the white wall the cameramen were used to outside the Security Council chamber, which is ornamented only by the words Security Council / Conseil de Securite in brass letters?

The temporary solution, provided by the Secretariat, was a U.N.-blue backdrop. Said the British diplomat, "The Secretariat did it, to meet the visual requirements of the TV guys."

It was only afterwards that comments were heard about the unfortunate symbolism of blocking out "Guernica." As a result of these, the Secretariat moved the press stakeout to a third location halfway between the first two. Now cameras could take their choice: They could pan across "Guernica" and some flags to the speaker, standing in front of the blue backdrop against the plain white wall, or they could content themselves with the usual head shot.

Nothing in this account is the teeniest bit implausible. By contrast, everything about the claim that "American officials" or "Powell's handlers" "demanded" this "censorship"--and that a Dominique de Villepin-friendly U.N. instantly provided it!--fails the laugh test. Yet expect the suppression of "Guernica" by the Bush administration to enter the settled leftist lore of the Iraq war.

The 'Guernica' Myth

Battleground God

Can your beliefs about religion make it across our intellectual battleground?

In this activity you’ll be asked a series of 17 questions about God and religion. In each case, apart from Question 1, you need to answer True or False. The aim of the activity is not to judge whether these answers are correct or not. Our battleground is that of rational consistency. This means to get across without taking any hits, you’ll need to answer in a way which is rationally consistent. What this means is you need to avoid choosing answers which contradict each other. If you answer in a way which is rationally consistent but which has strange or unpalatable implications, you’ll be forced to bite a bullet.

Battleground God

Here's a great story detailing the history of Saddam Hussein. Feel free to forward to anyone who says that Bush is worse than Saddam..

=darwin

quoted:
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Tales of the Tyrant
by Mark Bowden

What does Saddam Hussein see in himself that no one else in the world seems to see? The answer is perhaps best revealed by the intimate details of the Iraqi leader's daily life

The Atlantic | May 2002 | Tales of the Tyrant | Bowden

France became a major military supplier to Iraq after 1975 as the two countries improved their political relations. In order to obtain petroleum imports from the Middle East and strengthen its traditional ties with Arab and Muslim countries, France wanted a politico-military bridge between Paris and Baghdad.

Between 1977 and 1987, Paris contracted to sell a total of 133 Mirage F-1 fighters to Iraq. The first transfer occurred in 1978, when France supplied eighteen Mirage F-1 interceptors and thirty helicopters, and even agreed to an Iraqi share in the production of the Mirage 2000 in a US$2 billion arms deal. In 1983 another twenty-nine Mirage F-1s were exported to Baghdad. And in an unprecedented move, France "loaned" Iraq five SuperEtendard attack aircraft, equipped with Exocet AM39 air-to- surface missiles, from its own naval inventory.

...

Iraqi debts to France were estimated at US$3 billion in 1987.

1Up Info | Iraq | Arms from France | Iraqi Information Resource

quoted:
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Asked "Do you support or oppose the U.S.' taking military action in Iraq to remove Saddam Hussein from power," 63 percent said they favor and 32 percent said they oppose, a result that surprised even the pollsters.

"The stereotype that one would have of the Bay Area would be that it is one of the hotbeds of the anti-war movement," said Mark DiCamillo, director of the Field Poll, based in San Francisco. "For a poll to show strong support of the war here -- that's major news."

FIELD POLL: 63% in Bay Area support war to remove dictator

as a fan of the Mcrib Sandwich, I am shocked and amazed by the following:

quoted:
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Natick, Mass. -- Despite military chow's lousy reputation, many products that Northern California grocery shoppers buy every day have come from innovations created for the battlefield.

M&Ms were invented so World War II fighters could enjoy chocolate that didn't melt in the heat of the Pacific. Similarly, tins of processed Velveeta cheese and Spam became prominent parts of the American diet after thousands of World War II soldiers survived on the processed food.

Freeze-dried coffee and soup mixes, chopped and formed meat and lightweight backpacker entrees all have come from military needs. So did something called "retort packaging," a heat and water process much like canning that keeps plastic pouches of food shelf-stable for years. Even McDonald's boneless McRib sandwich came from technology developed by the Department of Defense's Combat Feeding Directorate.

Right at home in the market / How M&Ms, Spam and Velveeta made it to the table

quoted:
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But now the crews operating over Iraq from the Ali Al Salem airbase in northern Kuwait are about to go to the opposite extreme and use "inert bombs".

These are basically blocks of concrete shaped as bombs and painted blue to identify them as non-explosive if they are discovered still intact after the war.

Great accuracy

But they will be laser-guided 1,000lb blocks of concrete, capable of destroying a tank or artillery piece, but without causing a devastating explosion that would put civilians at risk and shatter surrounding buildings.

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Tornadoes to drop 'concrete bombs'