The BBC's decision to discontinue [Robert Kilroy-Silk's ] daily talk show pending an investigation into his article for last week's Sunday Express, in which he vilified the whole Arab world as a bunch of "suicide bombers, limb amputators and women oppressors", will be welcomed in all communities where his bigoted pen has drawn ire...

But it will be the nation's Muslims who have most to celebrate. For over a decade, it is they who have borne the brunt of the presenter's rabid rants ... "Muslims everywhere behave with equal savagery. They behead criminals, stone to death female -- only female -- adulteresses, throw acid in the faces of women who refuse to wear the chador, mutilate the genitals of young girls and ritually abuse animals," he wrote for the Daily Express in 1995...

Continue Reading...

Attention all passengers thinking of taking another BA223 to Washington. Mr. Michael Howard is your main man. "I believe that red tape, bureaucracy, regulations, inspectorates, commissions ... came to help and protect us -- but now we need protection from them," he says, as one core belief among many. Just so. Now protect us from the department of homeland security.

Got a tip? Apparently. Got a specific steer or an arrest warrant? Apparently not. There are intercepts that spread alarm, but orange is still the colour of very general intelligence -- following the lead set by CIA director George Tenet, who explicitly believes that if you think something may be up, but don't know what it is, then you press every alert button in sight so that al-Qaida thinks you know more than you do and backs away. The result -- happy Christmas, happy New Year! -- is a constant warning bell ringing, a continuous cringe of public apprehension turned to weariness by repetition. But is it any longer good politics?...

Continue Reading...

Abdul Zahir's day starts with morning visits to a number of mosques in the Pakistani border area with Afghanistan, where the faithful gather for the first of their five daily prayer sessions. And once his morning session is over, he goes to some of the many madrassas (religious schools) in the area, or shows up at social gatherings, such as weddings, if there are any taking place.

Abdul is unflagging in his rounds because he has an almost missionary zeal: to find recruits for jihad ... waged by the Taliban in Afghanistan. Himself blinded in one eye from action in Afghanistan, Abdul tells prospective recruits: "You might fight at the front line, or you might stand guard at night. You can cook for other Islamic warriors, or you can be a male nurse ... everything is welcome because the jihad has started." ...

Continue Reading...

This White House gets what it wants -- even from the Queen of England ... No other U.S. president has stayed inside the royal compound, and she has met 11 of them in her time...

Clearly ... her first impression of Bush [has been improved]. In 1991, Bush famously appeared wearing cowboy boots at a White House dinner given by his father for the Queen and cheerily informed her of the inscription on the heels: "God save the Queen." A frosty frown appeared on the royal brow, an eon passed, many feet shuffled all around. Convinced that understatement or sarcasm would be lost on the man standing before her, the Queen asked bluntly: "Are you the black sheep of your family?" Bush replied in the affirmative and shot back: "Who's the black sheep in your family?"...

Wonder what infuriated her more -- Bush's boorishness or the abundance of black sheep in her family.

This time the Queen ... had to receive him with the highest pageantry, even as her subjects were screaming "bloody murderer" next door.

Continue Reading...

The 17,000 or so remaining Jews of Istanbul are living proof that Jews and Muslims can coexist in harmony. It is a bond that has endured more than 1,300 years of trials and tribulations and held fast every time. Theirs is one of the great anomalies of Jewish history -- a happy story...

Happiness isn't supposed to last, but in Istanbul it has lasted more for more than five centuries. Even as the empire shrank in the late 19th century, Jews continued to pour into Constantinople fleeing persecution by Cossacks, Persians and the new, Christian Balkan nations ... They were closer to their Muslim overlords than any of the Christian populations of the empire ... One Jewish pasha almost had himself made king of Cyprus. Jewish women, too, were key players in the harem, from which the sultan sired his heirs; Jewish hawkers were Istanbul's bush telegraph. Even now, close to the grand bazaar in Istanbul, a mosque and a synagogue share the same building...

Continue Reading...

Bombarded by brutal television and newspaper images of carnage caused by a midnight explosion at the housing compound of Al-Muhaya, on Riyadh's desert outskirts, many were united in condemning the second deadly attack in their capital in six months.

"What Islam is this? They are terrorists," said Hamdan Youssef, a 39-year-old businessman...

Fury that the attacks targeted innocent people during Ramadan was the single unifying factor across the Kingdom. "Whoever committed this terrible act is not a Muslim," Ghazi Hadda said...

Khaled Batarfi, managing editor of Al-Madinah newspaper, summed up saying the militants were losing the battle for the "hearts and minds" of ordinary Saudis.

"This was their main battle. In the past they would pretend to be against Americans, Christians -- whoever they perceive to be the enemy. Now their enemy is the same people whose approval they seek."

Continue Reading...

With the downing of a U.S. Chinook helicopter in Iraq on Sunday claiming the lives of at least 16 soldiers ... there is renewed focus on the nature of the resistance movement in Iraq.

As resistance in Iraq intensifies ...there has been much speculation on the role of foreign jihadis. The New York Times reported on October 28, "Bush administration officials have estimated that the number of foreign fighters in Iraq is between 1,000 and 3,000, but civilian and military officials here [in Baghdad] say they doubt there are anywhere near that number."

European intelligence sources have confirmed to Asia Times Online that well before and during the U.S. invasion on Iraq, Arabs, Afghans, Pakistanis and other nationals had tried to reach Iraq, but that most were netted in Iran and thrown into custody.

Thus, to date, global jihadis have been unable to establish settled and safe travel routes into Iraq, and within the country foreign fighters appear not to have established defined pockets of resistance.

Continue Reading...

The audacious attack on the Rashid hotel shows the "growing confidence, sophistication and creativity of anti-coalition militants in Iraq", an adviser on security matters to the U.S.-led administration said yesterday.

"This attack was well-planned and executed. It seems that these guys, most of them former regime loyalists, are now networking with each other and perhaps outside agents, passing weapons and know-how," said the adviser. "They are operating in small groups, but you don't have to be big to be effective"...

The ability of the Iraqi resistance to strike at will at the heart of the U.S.-led administration in Baghdad is causing deep unease among American military commanders in Iraq, and political embarrassment for Bush administration officials who have repeatedly claimed that the coalition is winning the war against the guerrillas.

The barrage of rockets that slammed into the hotel was fired from a launcher positioned on a mobile generator. The attackers had fled the scene after being approached by Iraqi guards, who could do nothing to prevent the rockets from launching.

Continue Reading...

It should not come as a surprise if many in the Islamic world of 1.3 billion hold to the conviction that the current U.S.-led war against terrorism is one that is being waged against Islam. For them, statements given by American officials stand as a glaring proof.

Repeatedly, deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence Lieutenant General William G. Boykin described such a war with religious overtones. ...Boykin once said of his dealings with a Muslim fighter in Somalia: "My God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God, and his was an idol."

Despite Boykin's apology for his recent remarks, the official reaction only inflamed the issue further. When asked about Boykin's comments, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said: "We're a free people. And that's the wonderful thing about our country."

Continue Reading...

For centuries, pillage by invading armies was a normal part of warfare: a way in which to reward badly-paid or unpaid troops for risking their lives in battle.

Nowadays, at least in more civilized countries, we do not let armies rampage for booty. We leave the pillaging to men in suits, and we don't call it pillaging any more. We call it economic development.

Today, the men in suits are gathering at Olympia, in London, for a two-day conference and exhibition entitled Doing Business in Iraq. Protesters will be gathering outside.

The event, which is sponsored by the U.S.-Iraq business council, is one of a series being held in different parts of the world over the coming 12 months...

This fits in neatly with plans announced in June by Paul Bremer, the head of Iraq's provisional authority, to sell off the country's state-owned industries (excluding, for the time being, oil, gas and minerals) and turn it into a U.S.-style capitalist wonderland.

Continue Reading...

Hanadi Tayseer Jaradat, who killed 19 people in an attack on a Haifa restaurant on Saturday, was the fifth woman to carry out such an attack since the current intifada began.

Jaradat was just days away from qualifying as a lawyer when she left home at 0730 -- earlier than usual -- on Saturday.

Her family says she did not tell anyone where she was going and they assumed she was on her way to the law office in Jenin where she worked.

Instead, Jaradat went north to the bustling Israeli seaside town of Haifa, managing to slip through the cordon thrown over the West Bank by Israel as a precautionary measure for the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur.

Despite the vigilance of guards and staff at Israeli eateries, Jaradat was able to walk right into the heart of the beachfront Maxim's restaurant -- a popular family venue jointly owned by Jews and Arabs and frequented by an equally mixed clientele.

Four children were among those killed as Jaradat detonated her vest packed with explosives ...

Continue Reading...

When George Bush addressed the U.N. general assembly in September last year, his message was blunt. The U.N. must either support his campaign against Iraq or be doomed to irrelevance ... Tomorrow, when Bush returns to the general assembly, his tone is expected to be somewhat less brusque...

Has he seen the error of his ways? Hardly. If Bush has changed his tune ... it is because the cost of Iraq, in terms of American lives and American tax dollars, is beginning to have a seriously negative impact on his re-election hopes...

These and other considerations pose a strategic choice with implications stretching far beyond Iraq. Why should the international community gathered at the U.N. help Bush get out of his Iraq mess? Why not let him stew and, by withholding cooperation, possibly hasten his electoral demise?

This is indeed tempting, for another four years of Bush in the White House is an unappealing prospect...

Continue Reading...

The world will not help us; we must help ourselves. We must kill as many of the Hamas and Islamic Jihad leaders as possible, as quickly as possible, while minimizing collateral damage, but not letting that damage stop us. And we must kill Yasser Arafat, because the world leaves us no alternative...

Only now, after more than 800 Israelis have died in three years of suicide bombings and other terrorist attacks, has Europe finally decided that Hamas is a terrorist organization. How much longer will it take before it cuts off Arafat? Yet Israel cannot accept a situation in which Arafat blocks any Palestinian break with terrorism, whether from here or in exile. Therefore, we are at another point in our history at which the diplomatic risks of defending ourselves are exceeded by the risks of not doing so...

When the breaking point arrives, there is no point in taking half-measures. If we are going to be condemned in any case, we might as well do it right.

Continue Reading...

Far too little attention has focused on why the U.S. went to war ... We now know that a blueprint for the creation of a global Pax Americana was drawn up ... in September 2000 by the neoconservative think tank, Project for the New American Century (PNAC).

The plan shows Bush's cabinet intended to take military control of the Gulf region whether or not Saddam Hussein was in power ... It describes peacekeeping missions as "demanding American political leadership rather than that of the U.N." ... Finally -- written a year before 9/11 -- it pinpoints North Korea, Syria and Iran as dangerous regimes, and says their existence justifies the creation of a "worldwide command and control system".

It is clear the U.S. authorities did little or nothing to pre-empt the events of 9/11. It is known that at least 11 countries provided advance warning to the U.S. of the 9/11 attacks ... In 1999 a U.S. national intelligence council report noted that "al-Qaida suicide bombers could crash-land an aircraft packed with high explosives into the Pentagon, the headquarters of the CIA, or the White House".

Continue Reading...

Syed Saleem Shahzad interviews a Taliban fighter:

Azmatullah is tall, slim, down-to-earth and soft-spoken, in his mid-twenties, and at first glance he does not look anything like a guerrilla fighter. He is a first cousin of Mullah Razzak's, and his lieutenant [sic] in the resistance movement.

The Taliban's army was destroyed during the U.S. invasion. It is a matter of record that thousands were killed and thousands were arrested. How has the Taliban managed to regroup?

The Taliban are very much alive and everywhere ... In our land, everybody is Taliban, and from them new teams can be drawn...

This is what you say. Here in Chaman I have met several Kandaharis who say that they have not seen the Taliban for a long time.

Continue Reading...

It has been an eventful summer for Moses Blah, who entered it as Liberia's vice-president. At the beginning of June he was under arrest accused of attempting to mount a coup against President Charles Taylor. Just over two months later he is to succeed him...

One of the old guard, he will inevitably be associated with a regime that exported war and is blamed for much of the chaos in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Ivory Coast. He also shares much of his past with the man he succeeds -- the two trained in Libyan guerrilla camps in the 1980s before Mr Taylor launched his 1989 rebellion against then president Samuel Doe.

After a six-year civil war, which saw Mr Blah gain the reputation of a feared general, Mr Taylor was elected president in 1997. One campaign slogan ran "He killed my Ma, he killed my Pa, but I will vote for him." The death of Mr Taylor's first vice-president, Enoch Dogolea, in 2000 saw Mr Blah return from being ambassador to Libya to take the job.

Continue Reading...

Kate Wright and her daughter are among some 250,000 refugees in the Liberian capital, Monrovia.

She told BBC News Online how she is coping as fighting between rebels and pro-government forces nears the city centre:

We spent Sunday night in a wet and cold building along with about 50 other refugees.

It was raining heavily, we had no food to eat and there was intermittent shelling for most of the night...

Monrovia is a living hell because almost all the basic necessities are difficulty to come by.

I would like to leave Liberia and settle in another country but that is not possible now.

I have no money and I would hate to leave my children in the midst of this chaotic situation.

Everything that we owned has been looted -- even the beds. We sleep on the bare floor.

For now I am hoping that a ceasefire will hold.

We need a ceasefire to hold, it must hold to enable us to live.

The war is senseless.

They are all fighting for their own selfish interests and it is now time that common sense prevailed.

Continue Reading...

Make no mistake: U.S. President George W Bush is in big trouble.

Whereas a week ago, Americans were talking about the dread "V" word -- for Vietnam -- this week the dreaded "W" word -- for Watergate -- was back in vogue, even as the "V" word was still in use. Watergate plus Vietnam is about the worst combination for a sitting president that anyone could possibly imagine.

And the almost daily announcement on the news that another U.S. soldier has been killed in an attack in Iraq ... recalls nothing so much as the daily reminders on the evening news 23 years ago that killed the presidency of Jimmy Carter: "Day 385 of the American hostage crisis in Iran."

Short of a miracle -- such as the discovery of a cache of weapons of mass destruction in an Iraqi mountainside in circumstances that clearly indicate that it was under Saddam Hussein's control as of March 18, 2003, or the return of robust U.S. economic growth that can quickly bring the unemployment rate down to five percent -- there is probably only one way that Bush can save his presidency at this point.

Continue Reading...

The confession of George Tenet, CIA director, about being the only one responsible for the misleading information mentioned in the American President's speech regarding the weapons of mass destruction didn't come as a surprise. Indeed, it was necessary in order to contain the mounting tension, which started to threaten the president's image and that of his Republican administration in the eyes of the American public.

Although other high White House officials knew that the information about the Iraqi attempt to buy uranium from Niger was inaccurate, the choice fell on Tenet to take full responsibility in what could be considered a "fedayee" act that could turn into a suicide mission if the Congress and the Senate ask for his resignation...

Bush, along with his advisors in the White House, know all too well that Tenet is not the only one responsible for the scandal.

Continue Reading...

I have been reading with surprise the planned visit to Nigeria this month by George W. Bush ... Especially now that Nigeria is passing through a phase of trials on how democracy -- or is it "democrazy" -- is being practised by its leaders, the visit by President Bush will give the impression of an endorsement of the last general elections in the country.

Let us take a look at the process that characterised the last elections. The manipulations and intimidation of INEC by the government ensured that no voter's list was ready before the election. Not even the final list of candidates standing in the election was available before the election. Months after the elections it had remained a work-in-progress.

Obasanjo's callous disregard for the wishes of Nigerians must be noted for his legacy...

Four years of non-performance and corruption (70 percent of which is said by international monitors to originate in his own presidency) has catapulted Nigeria to number two on the list of most corrupt countries in the world.

Continue Reading...