Nov , 2002 op eds

November 21, 2002 Opinion Editorials http://www.aljazeerah.info

Canadians feel the heat of terrorism
Toronto | Nihal Kaneira | Gulf News, 21-11-2002

Up until now, Canadians were content that Al Qaida and Osama bin Laden's major enemies were the United States and Israel. They presumed they were not in their sights, and some leaders here even boasted that Canada had nothing to worry, and that Americans had the terrorist attacks coming to them because of their misguided policies, especially the blind support of Israel and the neglect of African and Third World poverty.

Not any more. That sense of we-are-above-it-all has been shattered for good. The inclusion of Canada in Bin Laden's hit list last week has brought most Canadians down to earth with a dull thud. Suddenly, they are awfully jittery.

They are worried about smallpox that might kill them, deadly toxins that might be slipped into their water supply systems, jetliners that might crash into high rises, especially Toronto's CN Tower, and dirty bombs that might explode in downtown Ottawa or Vancouver or Montreal, laying waste thousands of lives.

How can we, they ask, take things for granted in the face of this threat anymore? The warning is real and menacing. This time it is not something that Americans cooked up to scare them into supporting their tough new border security measures.

Osama bin Laden himself has issued the threat, in his own inimitable words, and Canadians should be crazy not to realise what it portends.

To be sure, the initial panic has subsided, and they have settled back to going about their lives, doing things the way they have always been done. But to most Canadians, it all seem to feel different now, as if they have discovered they are living along a fault line and realising the ground beneath their feet is not safe anymore.

Even Arabs and Muslims, who have spent months, playing down the threat and pointing fingers at the Americans for being paranoid and overly suspicious about foreigners, have grown quiet. They too are worried.

So much so, the Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham, last week called the bin Laden tape and the threat to Canada a "wake up call," indicating that Canadians have not been seriously worried about terrorism even after September 11.

That's not surprising, considering that the intelligensia here has essentially lulled them into a false sense of security with broad hints that Al Qaida is essentially waging a war against Americans because of their globally dominant and pervasive culture and political system.

In fact, Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, came in for quite a bit of criticism from Canadian and American conservatives last September when he linked the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington to global poverty and overbearing American policies, in an interview given to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation for a documentary aired on the anniversary of September 11.

One week later, he practically repeated the assertion in a major speech at the United Nations General Assembly. The prime minister said the perceived "greed" of the United States and the western world helped plant the seed for the horrific terrorist attacks. If only we stopped abusing the poor, he suggested, such attacks might abate.

But now, with one single message broadcast over Al Jazeera Television, Osama bin Laden has changed all that. By lumping Canada in a list of countries, which he said were Al Qaida targets, he has sent a chill up the spine of Canadians who complacently believed that September 11 did not concern them.

Most Canadians are seeing ominous signs in the Al Qaida warning and believe that Canada is as much in the crosshairs of the fugitive terrorist leader as the United States. Especially when the list includes France, a long-time friend of Iraq and the Arab world and a ferocious critic of Washington; and Germany, whose chancellor vehemently rejected the U.S. position on Iraq.

"If these countries are now Osama's targets, Canada certainly is," says Srdjan Jovicic, who runs a moving business in Toronto. "The fact that a large part of our intellectual elite is more anti-American than ever apparently does not impress Osama. Not after we went to war with Americans in Afghanistan."

Retired Major-General Lewis MacKenzie agrees. "In any case, we have taken complacency to an art form," he says. "It's time to wake up."

Canadians are waking up, and they are scrambling for ways to spruce up security across the country. In that scramble, it is quite possible that the bin Laden warning will have the effect of pushing them into an even tighter embrace with the Americans.

All sorts of ideas are being bandied about, and one way or another, they are all tied to joint security with their neighbours next door.

One call is for the introduction of a new national identity card, containing biometric information such as fingerprints and iris scans to facilitate travel to the United States. Another is for beefing up immigration and border control to keep out terrorists. A third is for expediting negotiations with the United States to create a real North American security perimeter.

That means a common border with harmonised rules - equally stringent everywhere - and joint enforcement at all entry points.

The federal government is under growing pressure to boost funding for security, especially for more immigration and border control.

U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, who made a quick trip to Ottawa two days after the bin Laden warning, wasted little time joining the intense security debate in the country, saying that Canada is just as vulnerable to terrorist attacks as the United States, and urging Canadians to regard tighter border controls, not as harassment, but as a way to protect Canadian and American citizens.

He warned Canadians not to be complacent about the threat on both sides of the U.S.-Canada border. "I can assure that we are doing everything we can so that we respect Canadian citizenship and are not seen as profiling anyone, but doing what we believe is necessary to protect ourselves and to protect Canadian citizens," Powell said.

The renewed fears about a terrorist attack in Canada - U.S. intelligence has fuelled the anxiety even more by confirming that the voice on the Al Qaida tape is indeed that of Osama bin Laden - is also adding to the burdens of Canadians born in Middle Eastern and African countries.

The Al Qaida warning has not only put them on the defensive for no good reason, it has also undercut weeks of hard work by them to convince authorities here that Washington is wrong-headed to racially profile Canadian Arabs and Muslims crossing the U.S.-Canada border and that there is really no reason to be concerned.

Now they fear a new crack down in Canada and the United States trampling their civil rights as respective intelligence agencies go after dormant Al Qaida cells, lone freelancers and would-be martyrs.

They also suspect that in the face of this new threat, Canadian foreign affairs ministry would ease the pressure on U.S. law enforcement authorities to stop racial profiling of Arab Canadians and Canadian Muslims crossing to the United States on business and holidays.

Up to now the Canadian case has been built on the premise that Americans have no reason to be overly concerned about Arabs and Muslims living in Canada and that U.S. should respect them for who they are - Canadian citizens and permanent residents.

With bin Laden on the warpath against Canada, the task of allaying concerns about bona fides of Canadian Arabs and Muslims has been made doubly difficult.

Once again bin Laden and Al Qaida have dealt them a bad hand. The terror threat has complicated their lives even more.

Arms inspectors in Iraq: UN envoys or US pawns?
By Barbara Ferguson, Arab News Correspondent

WASHINGTON, 21 November 2002 — As UN inspectors arrived in Baghdad Reuters reported that the head of the team, Hans Blix, said he "could not rule out the possibility that there might be spies on his team. He added that any intelligence agents would be ordered off the group."

There is good reason for his doubts. According to a Washington Post report three years ago, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan "obtained what he regards as convincing evidence that… United States intelligence services infiltrated agents and espionage equipment… in Iraq to eavesdrop on the Iraqi military without the knowledge of the UN agency. "It used to disguise its work, according to US government employees and documents describing the classified operation," said the Washington Post article "US Spied on Iraq Via UN." http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/daily/march99/unscom2.htm)

Susan Wright, a historian of science at the University of Michigan, specializing in disarmament policy and biological warfare, spoke with Arab News about the new UN inspection team, UNMOVIC (the UN Monitoring, Verification, and Inspection Commission).

"It is well-known that UNSCOM was used for purposes that were not in the mandate, but espionage," she said, adding this was one of the complicating factors that provided the Iraq with a reason to expel the inspectors.

"A major challenge for Hans Blix, the chairman of UNSCOM’s successor, UNMOVIC, will be to avoid both the reality and the perception that his new agency is being similarly hijacked by the United States," said Wright. "Blix has said that UNMOVIC has 30 inspectors from the United States, more than any other country."

The problem is if the Iraqis detect that the UN inspection organization is being used for espionage once again, it will put Iraq in a double bind, said Wright.

"If Iraq goes along, it would know that its defenses are being scrutinized. If it resists, its resistance may be used as a trigger for war by the US government," said Wright, author of "The Hijacking of UNSCOM" in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

To avoid a crisis, Wright says the organizational lines between the mandate of the UN inspectors and the interests of individual states, especially the United States, must be kept pristinely clear.

UNMOVIC’s organizational lines are clear, she said. "Currently all the UN inspectors are full-time UN inspectors, whereas before… the lines were blurred, and in addition, the US was paying for UNSCOM, so in many ways, UNSCOM was influenced by US policy."

According to Wright, it helps that chief inspector Hans Blix is highly regarded as former director general of the International Atomic Energy Commission.

She said it is difficult to know if Iraq has been developing weapons of mass destruction (during the three-year hiatus that UN inspection teams have been out of Iraq) "especially in the biological areas, as virtually anything is dual purpose — it can be used for peaceful purposes, or for weapons.

"So without people on the ground, it is important not to come to any conclusions about whether Iraq has, or has not, been developing biological, chemical and nuclear weapons over the last few years," said Wright, editor of the newly-released "Biological Warfare and Disarmament: New Problems/New Perspectives."

Her biggest fear is that the inspectors will not be given a chance to inspect.

"Already the Pentagon says there has been a ‘material breach’ regarding the shooting at US planes patrolling the so-called no-fly zone."

Such language is ‘red flag,’ said Wright.

"‘Material breach’ is inflammatory, because it is a trigger for the US to go to war against Iraq. I think it is very difficult for the inspections to be conducted in an atmosphere when one country is already saying the Iraqis are not complying — when the inspections haven’t even gotten off the ground. And this will make the Iraqis very mad."

Wright said the inspections should be carried out "in a very orderly manner. Any decisions should be made by the UN Security Council, after they’ve received the reports from UNMOVIC." These, she said, must be considered collectively. "It is not appropriate for one country to want to influence the environment in which decisions are made."

Her greatest concern is that "some small incident will be used as an excuse" by the US to launch a war in Iraq.

"The only reason for war is as a defensive measure. We may not like Saddam Hussein, but he has not attacked another country since the Gulf War, he hasn’t even threatened another country. Iraq has also been paying enormous reparations to Kuwait which is something overlooked by the US press."

Wright said it is realistic to think that a war in Iraq "would be enormously destabilizing and plays in the hands of radicals in the Middle East. The Iraqis have lived through a war that lasted through most of the 1980s, then the Gulf War, then the horrible sanctions that mainly hurt the civilians, and then we impose another war. In the eyes of the world, this is punitive and cruel treatment," said Wright.

Afghanistan: Time for transition

By Matthew Riemer, Erich Marquardt, and Issam Nashashibi

Approximately one year after the U.S. began bombing Afghanistan for harboring and abetting those allegedly responsible for the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001, it is difficult to say whether "terrorism" has been abated or Afghanistan is more stable.

Afghanistan is suffering from a variety of perennial problems: a weakened to incapacitated infrastructure, the complete lack of a viable banking network and legitimate currency, the limited authority of the central or appointed government, and the segregation of the country into semi-autonomous regions governed by warlords.

Perhaps more so than any other factor, the largely destroyed infrastructure of Afghanistan lends itself to constant instability. Without well-maintained roads and airports, vital goods cannot be efficiently circulated within the country while imports and exports are greatly hindered or reduced to nothing. Such weaknesses also affect the service and production sectors. Workers cannot easily travel in search of jobs and provide the populace with the services they require.

The United States Department of Energy estimates that "Afghanistan's power grid has been severely damaged by years of war, and only about 6 percent of its population currently has access to electricity." To add to the lack of infrastructure, Eurasianet.org reports that only "10 percent of Afghan roads are in good working condition."

In addition, international assistance is not forthcoming. Of the $4.5 billion ($1.8 billion earmarked for 2002) in aid pledged to the newly established government of Hamid Karzai in January 2002 by a coalition of donors such as the United States, Pakistan, and Japan, only about $600 million has found its way to the beleaguered country thus far.

Perhaps in response to the desperate economy, the opium trade is also flourishing again; the Taliban had banned all poppy growing and apparently enforced this law quite well. Following the Taliban's fall from power, poppy production is increasing once again at a rate Western countries find alarming. In fact, to stem the flow of the product to Europe, British Prime Minister Tony Blair has launched a special program offering reimbursement to farmers for curtailing poppy production. However, many farmers have reported not receiving their reimbursements even after complying with the agreement.

On positive economic notes, the long awaited reconstruction of an East-West road project began in early November 2002 linking the capital, Kabul, with Herat in the northwest of the country. It is hoped that this road will greatly open up the economy. In addition, India also pledged $100 million in aid in an effort to strengthen their neighbor and increase Afghanistan's capacity to crack down on militants who may eventually make their way into Kashmir.

Yet, Afghanistan's woes lie in its inherent lack of stability, which functions as a deterrent to economic prosperity. Twenty-five years of constant bloodshed including two major invasions and ubiquitous factionalism have created the current societal ills. The ethnic jigsaw puzzle, though less diverse than that of the Balkans or Caucasus, further fragments the country into bickering and skirmishing groups with disparate agendas and little real emphasis on a peaceful solution. Ethnic tension is even apparent in the central government itself where Karzai, an ethnic Pashtun, is pitted against Tajik warlords from the north, former Northern Alliance commanders.

Such instability is the primary reason why many countries are reluctant to offer aid to Kabul. It is also the reason why private investment is low to non-existent. During the 90's, several oil companies tried striking deals with the unpredictable Taliban to no avail. UNOCAL of the U.S and Bridas of Argentina were the two biggest players who failed to seal natural gas and oil pipeline deals in Afghanistan. In the end, the country was too unstable and the Taliban were not willing to take the necessary steps to provide the security measures investors desired.

Today, the same problems exist without showing any sign of changing as the international community is already falling short on its aid obligations. This is seen as surprising to some due to Afghanistan's strategic location in the heart of a region that is quickly becoming one of the world's resource "hotspots".

Many feel that the current leadership is not doing enough to secure the country. President Hamid Karzai's rule is tenuous at best. As many have indicated, the Karzai administration ostensibly only rules Kabul while he and other cabinet members need bodyguards wherever they travel. Haji Qadir, an Afghan vice-president, was gunned down this past July and there has been more than one attempt on Karzai's life by Islamists linked to Al Qaeda and extremist groups within Pakistan.

Because of such threats, Karzai has made repeated appeals to the international community for both "peacekeeping troops" and financial aid. His calls seem to be falling on deaf ears as his country drifts off the radar screens and news broadcasts of most countries.

A stable Afghanistan, which could quite possibly be created with dedicated foreign assistance, would serve to open up further Central Asian resources to Western and Southeast Asian investors. Instability has caused a perpetual limbo in terms of foreign investment and economic development. But perhaps that is what some desire: just enough instability to prevent any significant power from taking control of this crucial resource pathway.

The United States' role is seen as vitally important, yet some analysts doubt whether Washington is sincere in its efforts. Much of the reason that Afghanistan was a haven for militants and extremists was due to the very instability and economic illegitimacy that's perpetuated to this day by reticent donors including the United States. Such critics wonder: If Washington fears another terror attack, why not make the reconstruction of Afghanistan its highest priority?

Furthermore, under such close scrutiny, the U.S. does not do itself a service by supporting figures like General Rashid Dostum who is hated by a wide swath of Central Asians and is notorious for his various methods of torture. While Dostum may have made a good bedfellow during the Afghanistan phase of the "war on terrorism", many see such support now as further evidence of Washington's reluctance to commit to a reconstructive path based on centralized government and observance of human rights.

Other countries intimately concerned with the fate of Afghanistan seem equally incapable of affecting meaningful change. Iran is in no hurry to see their neighbor to the east become Westernized and even less enthusiastic about a U.S. military presence there. Pakistan, guided by President General Pervez Musharraf, has become endeared to many Western countries since the "war on terrorism" began, much to the dismay of the Pakistani population, by its unbridled cooperation with the U.S.. Pakistan has also been utilized extensively be the U.S. military. Still, Pakistan's capacity to aid Afghanistan's resuscitation is largely a function of Washington's desire to do so.

But the formula for stability in Afghanistan has yet to be found. Whether this is due to the truly monumental task that this presents or because of the participating countries' lack of commitment remains to be seen.

Matthew Riemer drafted this report; Erich Marquardt, Issam Nashashibi contributed.

A US military commander to rule Iraq

By Firas Al-Atraqchi
Yellow Times.org

News leaks from Washington, published in the New York Times on 11 October 2002, indicate that the U.S. military is preparing for a lengthy occupation of Iraq, with a U.S. military commander running the country.

New York Times writers David E. Sanger and Eric Schmitt claim "Iraq would be governed by an American military commander -- perhaps Gen. Tommy R. Franks, commander of United States forces in the Persian Gulf, or one of his subordinates -- who would assume the role that Gen. Douglas MacArthur served in Japan after its surrender in 1945."

The plan, if executed, would ensure that:

1. The Iraqi Army would be significantly downsized;
2. The U.S. would oversee Iraq's oil fields and oil and gas production;
3. The U.N. Oil-for-Food program would be expanded to pay for the occupation of Iraq; and,
4. A war crimes court would be established to prosecute members of the Baath Party and senior commanders who are followers of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

The plan for a U.S. military commander of Iraq is being received with dismay by U.S. allies, including the Iraqi opposition, who have in recent months supported all U.S. efforts to dislodge Saddam. The new plan, however, would effectively bar them from any political influence in post-war Iraq. Political analysts have admitted that Iraqi opposition groups are apparently feeling 'shafted.'

Hamid al-Bayati, a representative of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a leading Shiite-led opposition group, recently spoke with the Associated Press. "They can't do that," he observed. "The Iraqi people will not accept it and nobody else in the region will."

A disgruntled Sharif Ali, alleged distant relative of Iraq's last king, seemed perplexed when the BBC asked him what he thought of the new occupation plan. He hesitated, seeming surprised by the question and said: "We would like to see a provisional Iraqi government in place and not a military occupation."

Ahmed Chalabi, head of the Iraqi National Congress opposition party in exile, also appeared on MSNBC's "Countdown: Iraq" show. Visibly irritated, he tried to change the focus of the discussion from the potential for a U.S. military occupation of Iraq to the need for a provisional government without U.S. military governance. He stated that it would take Iraq about 18 months to two years to draw up a constitution, after which an election based on that constitution would be held.

An Arab League source called the U.S. occupation plan "simplistic" and "entirely laughable." Other political and military analysts in North America also believe the U.S. occupation plan is as foolhardy as it is impractical. Henry Kissinger stated last week that he is "viscerally opposed to a prolonged occupation of a Muslim country at the heart of the Muslim world by Western nations who proclaim the right to re-educate that country."

The new plan does nothing to allay Arab, Russian, and European fears that this war has nothing to do with freeing the Iraqi people. It seems evident that it has everything to do with securing Iraq's easily-exploited high-grade oil and gas reserves for the United States.

[Firas Al-Atraqchi is a Canadian-based journalist with eleven years of experience covering Middle East issues, oil and gas markets, and the telecom industry.]

Firas Al-Atraqchi encourages your comments: firas6544@rogers.com

Manufacturing a massacre

By Eric Boehlert

Salon.com

Initial reports said Palestinian gunmen brazenly fired on Jewish worshipers in Hebron. The reports were wrong--but the U.S. media has yet to correct them.

The headlines over the weekend were startling, even for the Middle East, where the Israeli-Palestinian war seems trapped in escalating cycles of violence. On Friday evening in the predominantly Palestinian city of Hebron, gunmen hiding in houses and olive groves ambushed Jewish worshipers as they walked home from Sabbath prayers, spraying them with gunfire and even tossing grenades into the unarmed crowd. Israeli soldiers, who escort the worshipers every Friday night, rushed into a dark dead-end alley to try to help. After a four-hour gun battle, 12 Israelis were dead. Government officials, led by the hard-line foreign minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, quickly dubbed it the "Sabbath Massacre." The gun battle was alarming -- and made headlines worldwide -- not only because Israel's military suffered its heaviest one-day loss in years but also because of the demented idea that gunmen would open fire on unarmed worshipers as they walked home from prayer. No doubt that's what provoked outrage from Pope John Paul II, who expressed anger over the "vile attack, just as people had finished praying." Also, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan leveled one of his strongest attacks against Palestinians and the "despicable terrorist attack that killed Jewish worshipers on their way to the Sabbath Eve prayers." The American press rushed to report the gruesome details. "Ambush; 12 Israelis Murdered at Prayer," read the New York Post's Saturday banner headline. According to the Post news account, "The attack began when Palestinian snipers hiding in houses fired automatic weapons and tossed grenades at dozens of Jews on their way to one of Judaism's holiest sites." The New York Times, citing Israeli army officials, reported that "Palestinian snipers ambushed Jewish settlers walking home from Sabbath prayers." So, among others, did the Boston Globe: "Militants ambushed a group of settlers." So did Newsday: "Palestinian gunmen in the West Bank city of Hebron ambushed Jewish settlers." It's now clear that none of those initial press reports from Hebron were accurate. In truth, Jewish worshipers returning home were not fired upon by Palestinian gunmen, who instead waited until the civilians were behind settlement gates before they started shooting at Israeli soldiers. None of the worshipers died. The 12 Israelis killed were security guards or soldiers. Three Palestinian gunmen were also killed. It's one thing if the early, erroneous press accounts simply reflected confusion surrounding a chaotic event like an ambush. But over a three-day period, American news outlets had a chance to correct or at least clarify what happened in Hebron, but few of them did. With a dozen Israelis dead, the distinction between who the Palestinian gunmen shot at may seem trivial. But there is an important difference, particularly in how the world sees the conflict, between opening fire on unarmed worshipers and targeting trained soldiers, who many Palestinians see as part of an illegal occupying force. It's crucial that the press be able to make clear distinctions between armed combat and acts of terrorism against civilians, especially as the United States leads a global war on terrorism. What became clear by Saturday in Israel was that the ambush did not occur as originally described by government officials. Or as described by one self-professed witness who phoned Israel's Army Radio and, in a live interview, insisted "the group of Jews were slaughtered." His early, vivid accounts lent credence to the idea of a civilian massacre. On Monday, however, the man admitted that he'd been in Tel Aviv during the Hebron attack and had misled the media with his phony accounts. Even before the man's arrest, Amos Harel, writing Sunday in the Israeli daily Ha'aretz, declared: "What happened in Hebron on Friday night was not a 'massacre,' nor was it an attack on 'peaceful Jewish worshippers' returning from prayers. The attack actually began several minutes after all of the worshippers had already returned safely. Those killed Friday were killed in combat. All of the victims were armed fighters, who were more or less trained." The Jerusalem Post reported that the first ambush shots did not ring out until after the "all clear" had sounded on the soldiers' radios, "meaning worshipers had been safely escorted to their homes after Shabbat prayers." Speaking with the Israeli press, Matan Vilnai, a former Israeli general, told reporters over the weekend: "It wasn't a massacre, it was a battle." And in Sunday's Washington Post, which was virtually alone in putting the Hebron events in perspective for U.S. news consumers, the paper quoted the leader of the Israeli settlement in Hebron, who explained civilians were not targeted in the alley gun battle: "It was a pure military event. The worshipers had passed a quarter of an hour before." Yet many news organizations failed to clarify that point. On Saturday, the Los Angles Times reported that "Palestinian gunmen ambushed Jewish settlers." In its follow-up story on Sunday, when it was clear the paper's original dispatch was not accurate, the Times ignored any mention of settlers being attacked -- or not being attacked -- in the Hebron battle. Again and again that pattern was repeated over the weekend, as newspapers ignored or obfuscated the facts. After telling readers in its Saturday headline that 12 Israelis had been "murdered in prayer," the New York Post blurred the facts on Sunday, referring vaguely to Israelis (meaning soldiers) being ambushed. In Saturday's edition, the Boston Globe reported in the first sentence of its article that "Palestinian gunmen killed 12 Israelis and wounded 15 in an attack yesterday on worshipers." In Sunday's editions, the Globe mentioned obliquely that "no civilian worshipers were among the casualties," without spelling out that the settlers mentioned in Saturday's editions were never attacked. Even the New York Times, which probably allocates more resources to covering the Middle East than any other newspaper, seemed confused about the events in Hebron -- either that, or it was unwilling to correct its initial mistake. Like every other outlet, the paper first followed the lead of Israeli government officials and reported that worshipers had been ambushed. On Sunday the Times, still citing the Israeli army's version of events, wrote the attack was "a carefully planned assault on Jewish settlers" and went into detail about how the ambush was triggered by passing worshipers. It was not until Monday that the Times, in the 11th paragraph of its third Hebron ambush story, finally explained to readers: "The Israeli Army initially said the attack was on Jewish worshipers, but it appears to have been directed at security forces who guard settlers." Even then, the newspaper did not pursue the question of whether members of the Israeli government purposely misled reporters about the ambush for political gain. It's worth noting that the first reports of a so-called civilian massacre originated from the office of Netanyahu, Israel's newly appointed foreign minister. On Friday night, his spokesman told reporters that Jewish worshipers on their way to prayers were brutally attacked and murdered by Palestinian terrorists. The former leader of the right-wing Likud Party, Netanyahu recently joined Ariel Sharon's coalition government, but he will challenge Sharon for the prime minister's post in the January elections. It's possible that, by initially hyping the attack as the "Sabbath Massacre," Netanyahu was trying to pressure Sharon to drive Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat into exile, a provocative move Netanyahu has been advocating for months. Sharon didn't do that -- but in what some observers see as a concession to Netanyahu's far-right conservative challenge, he did approve the creation of additional, and controversial, Jewish settlements in Hebron following the ambush. No doubt the initial, false claims that Palestinians massacred worshipers helped ease the way for that move. All the more reason the press should be asking pointed questions about Hebron. salon.com

Indian Muslims — setting the record straight
By Anis Siddiqi, Special to Arab News

India is a secular country where people of all religions have been living together peacefully for ages. But since the past few years things have turned for the worse, thanks to the majoritarian communal-fascist politics. False propaganda is being spread in order to create hatred among the communities. Muslims have been the prime targets in this and there is a very well planned out machinery working in trying to defame Muslims and Islam. Whatever is being said against them has no basis whatsoever, and any right thinking person can see this.

The favorite topic these days seems to be terrorism, and it is suggested that all Muslims are terrorists and Islam teaches jihad to get rid of all non-Muslims. This is a very silly idea, considering the fact that the largest and the most powerful terrorist organization in the world these days is the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, and the LTTE is an entirely Hindu organization. Then, if you look at who have died due to terrorist attacks, it is very obvious that it has always been mainly the Muslims. A good example is Kashmir. Who are the majority of the people dying there? The Muslims. Even if you take the so-called terrorists of Kashmir into account — who are the people being killed by these groups? Again, the majority of those who have died at their hands are Muslims. According to a report, the number of Muslims killed by these organizations is three times more than Hindus.

Come to think of it, what was the first terrorist attack in free India? The answer is very simple and well known — the killing of M.K. Gandhi. And who killed him? Nathuram Godse, a Hindu who had links to the Hindu Mahasabha and the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh. And the reason that Godse killed Gandhi was that the Mahasabha and the RSS disliked Gandhi for working for peace between Hindus and Muslims.

Who is not aware of the recent Gujarat carnage? The horror of it was so bad that its intensity was felt by the whole world, much to the chagrin of those responsible for it.

This violence was also blamed on the Muslims, even though those murdered brutally were all Muslims. It was said that the Hindus only attacked out of revenge and that it was the Muslims who started it by burning the train at Godhra. The burning of the train was truly horrible and condemnable, and it should not have happened at all, but the fact is that there was violence at Godhra well before the train burning. In fact, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad members on the train had killed a Muslim man the previous week, and if revenge can be justified — as is being done by the likes of Narendra Modi and Praveen Togadia — then why not the revenge of the Muslims by the burning? Dawood Ibrahim had set off the bombs in Bombay in revenge for the riots that followed the demolition of the Babri Mosque. Then why not justify the bombing too? Or is it that revenge has justification for only one community and not for another?

The fact is that revenge is just used as an excuse to kill innocent people in an attempt to build up their own power.

Actually what is working behind their killing of the innocents is the apprehension that the Muslim population is increasing at a faster rate than the Hindu population. This again is a silly notion. True, the latest census shows that Muslims are growing at a rate of 2.71 percent per annum, while Hindus at 2.19 percent. But look at it more closely. At the rate of 2.71 percent each year, it would take nearly 400 years for the Muslims to become 50 percent of the population. Even this would only happen if India’s population goes on growing at these rates for 400 years, which means that by that time the total population would be 50 trillion! While in actuality the population will stop growing in the next 40 years or so. By that time the Muslim population would only be 13 to 14 percent of the total, just two percent more than today. Is there any possibility of the Muslims taking over at this rate?

There is also the claim that Muslims are prospering because the previous governments had pampered them. Again the claim is wrong. According to the latest census, almost half of the Muslims of the country live below the poverty line. In rural areas, more than 90 percent of the Muslims have less than two acres of land, compared to 77 percent of the Hindus. Then, even though Muslims form 11 percent of the population, they form less than 3 percent of the IAS officers. Doesn’t this prove that Muslims are one of the country’s poorest communities?

The hard-line Hindu organizations say that the Muslims got their country when Pakistan was created, so now they should leave the country. Don’t those demanding this know that huge numbers of Muslims opposed the idea of Pakistan, and the majority of the Muslims in present-day India chose to stay here? They didn’t only stay back but worked hard for their country and made a mark for themselves and for the country. Two past presidents of India have been Muslims, Zakir Husain and Fakhruddin Ali Ahmad. The present president is also Muslim, A.P.J. Abdul Kalam. He is not only the president, but also the father of the Indian defense program. Some of the best cricketers have been and are Muslims — Farooq Engineer, Zaheer Khan, Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi and Muhammad Azharuddin just to name a few. To name only a few of the great Muslim musicians, there are Bismillah Khan, Amjad Ali Khan, Zakir Husain, and the present day top musician A.R. Rehman. Some of the most famous actors and actresses have been Muslims too — Dilip Kumar, Aamir Khan, Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan, Madhubala, Meena Kumari, Mumtaz, just to name some. The list could go on for each and every field of work. Each one of them has lived in India, worked for India, and most importantly, loved India. Then is it fair to say that Muslims are against India?

As for calling Muslims aliens, can one imagine India without biryani, tandoori chicken, salwar kameez, kurta pajamas, dupattas, sherwanis, tablas, ghazals, or even Taj Mahal or Red Fort? All these things were brought by Muslims, but are now very much Indian. India looks like India because of centuries of mixing and blending of the different communities and religions. Just because some people say they are not Hindu, do they stop being Indian

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