Moon River: News and politics

Iran's War

Sat, 19 Aug 2006 23:26:22 GMT

From an article By Kenneth R. Timmerman
FrontPageMagazine.com | July 27, 2006

"...How many terrorist groups can boast an arsenal of over 10,000 long-range rockets? Only those with the backing of a sovereign state, Iran...

...Just as Hitler used Franco as his proxy in Spain to test new military techniques and equipment on the battlefield, so Iran is using Hezbollah as its proxy to do the same..."

...Hezbollah is no longer a rag-tag guerilla group, but a veritable terrorist army. “They understand complex military tactics, and are pursuing combined military operations using ground forces, missiles, intelligence, and the media,”

...Over the past six years, following Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from south Lebanon, Iran began supplying Hezbollah with massive quantities of long-range artillery rockets of a type never before used against Israel. ...

This is the “hurricane” Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad promised the world earlier this week in Tehran, in yet another “mein kampf” statement.

Now is the time to draw the line..." read all

Wafa Sultan - Truth About Islam

Wed, 16 Aug 2006 11:14:05 GMT

Arab-American Psychiatrist Wafa Sultan: There is No Clash of Civilizations but a Clash between the Mentality of the Middle Ages and That of the 21st Century

You must see/hear

English translation

Hebrew Subtitles

השמאל שלא ידע לשאול

Wed, 16 Aug 2006 05:13:05 GMT

ד"ר גדי טאוב הוא סופר ועיתונאי

בניגוד למלחמת לבנון הראשונה, שבה הפגנות השמאל נגד המלחמה תפסו תאוצה בתוך ימים, הפעם אלו נותרו סגורות במעגל המצומצם של השמאל הרואה עצמו כ"רדיקלי". האגף הקיצוני של השמאל, בסיבוב הזה, לא הוביל את השמאל כולו אלא ניתק ממנו. ההפגנות עברו מבלי להשאיר רושם רב, ולא במקרה: השמאל הזה עבר כבר מזמן לעסוק כמעט אך ורק באשמה ומצפון, ולא בהצעות פוליטיות ריאליות. הוא הפך לפסיכואנליזה מתמדת של עצמנו, ולסחורה הזאת יש אולי ביקוש כשיש לנו זמן לשכב על הספה ולהתעסק ברגשותינו - לא כשצריך לקום ממנה ולשאול מה עושים.

הישראלים לא הקשיבו הפעם למפגיני "להפסיק לירות ולהתחיל לדבר", מפני שהפעם אין מאחורי הסיסמא לא תוכנית ולא דיון בבעיות שהפכו קיומיות. איזה מין מזרח תיכון יהיה כאן אחרי מלחמת חיזבאללה? איך עונים לאיום טילים על העורף, שיכול להיות בסיבוב הבא כימי או ביולוגי? מה תעשה המלחמה למעמדה של איראן באזור? מי שאין לו הצעות קונסטרוקטיביות בשאלות הללו, פשוט לא רלוונטי.

האמת היא שמאחורי הסוג המנוון והאוטומטי הזה של שמאלנות, יש בעיקר יהירות. הוא תקף רק אחרי שניצחנו. הוא תקף רק מתוך ההנחה שאנחנו החזקים והרעים, אלא שבמקרה המסוים הזה - אנחנו לא זה ולא זה. גם אם עשינו טעויות נוראות, אנחנו לא הרעים. כל מי שעיניו בראשו מביט בגל העולה של הפשיזם המוסלמי מבית מדרשה של איראן, ולא צריך הרבה הסברים כדי לדעת מה כאן רע ומה כאן מסוכן. אבל מה שהשמאל הזה עוד פחות רגיל אליו הוא שהפעם, לא בטוח גם שאנחנו החזקים. כוחות גדולים נאספים נגדנו, והם צוברים גם תעוזה וגם נשק. היוהרה השמאלית-רדיקלית, שצמחה על רקע הכיבוש, הניחה שאנחנו תמיד גוליית. אבל במזרח התיכון החדש, קם גוליית חדש.

ארבעים שנות כיבוש יצרו מצב שבו העורף האינטלקטואלי של השמאל ה"רדיקלי" הזה הולך ונרקב. יש לו תגובה אחת לכל המלחמות, ולכן אין לו יכולת לומר דברים ממשיים על צדק. הוא לא יודע מאיפה להתחיל להבדיל בין מלחמות צודקות ללא צודקות. לא משנה איזו מלחמה זו, משוררים "רדיקלים" ינפקו לנו עוד עותק משוכתב של אותו שיר של ברטולט ברכט שהם תמיד כותבים: הגנרלים שלנו מתפעלים מיפי מדיהם בזמן שהם הורגים ילדים, וגו'.

השמאל הזה ייצר שיח מיופייף ושחצני, שכל כולו עיסוק בשאלת דימוינו העצמי ודיוקננו במראה. הנה למשל, מוסף הארץ, שהקדיש עמודים רבים לדברי סופרים ומשוררים על המלחמה. הדבר הבולט היה עליבותם של ההרהורים נגדה. יש נימוקים בעד ונגד המלחמה הזאת, אבל אלה לא היו שם. במקום זה סיפקו לנו מנה גדושה של תגובות "שמאליות" אוטומטיות ומצעד מתפייט של הרהורים על השיח של עצמנו, על אומנות, או בקיצור על דיוקננו אנו. שמעון אדף שאל "האם הפכנו לאנשים שהיה עלינו להיות?", ניר ברעם סיפר על הדיכאון שעטף אותו בקיץ שעבר, והוסיף הרהורים על איך נאומיו של אולמרט מַבנים את הזיכרון הקולקטיבי. רונית מטלון חככה בראשה נוגות על הפער שבין שפת ה"מולדת" לשפת ה"בית" ועל למה הפטריוטיות היא "הבריכה העכורה שבה משכשך הפטפטן שלקה באמנזיה". סמי מיכאל קבל על כך שהמלחמה היא ניגודה של האומנות. יצחק לאור ממש הוציא לי את המלים מהפה בכותרת "לחשוב במונחי הצד השני", אך כמובן - בלי אף מילה על מונחי הצד השני. מיטב הפסיכואנליזה הקולקטיבית שלנו.

פטור מעיסוק באחר

הנרקיסיזם הזה, הטיפשי, לא מתחיל בעיתונות ולא בהפגנות. הוא מתחיל מדעיכת העורף המחשבתי של השמאל והתנוונותו לרפלקסים. זה הנזק שחוללה הפרדיגמה החדשה המכונה "ביקורת הרב-תרבותיות". הביקורת הזאת מדברת לכאורה על האחר כל הזמן, אבל היא עסוקה בעצם לא באחר, אלא אך ורק בדימוי האחר כפי שהוא מופיע ב"שיח ההגמוני שלנו". השיח הזה נחשב למקור הבלעדי לדיכוי בעולם. התנ"ך של האסכולה הוא כמובן ה"אוריינטליזם" של אדוארד סעיד, שסיפק פטור כללי מלעסוק באחר, שכן כל עיסוק בו הופך אותו ל"אובייקט" של הידע "שלנו" (אובייקט של מזרחנות, מודיעין, מדעי החינוך ועוד'). אין אצל סעיד מילה אחת על האוריינט, רק על האוריינטליסטים; אף מילה על הערבים, רק על הערביסטים. האחר (בחסות טיעון פילוסופי רעוע על טיבו חובק-הכל של הייצוג) נעלם לגמרי, ואנחנו מצווים להתמכר לעיסוק בעצמנו ובשיח שלנו בלבד.

אבל, לא תאמינו, האחר דווקא מתקיים מחוץ לשיח שלנו. זה עשוי להיות הלם פילוסופי לאקדמאים החדשים ואני לא רוצה לזעזע אף אחד חלילה - אבל מתברר שיש כל מיני אחרים. חלק מהם, לאחרונה, הקימו בסיסי טילים, כך השמועה, שככל הנראה הוצבו מחוץ למערכי הייצוג של השיח הישראלי. אז אולי באמת כדאי שנתעניין במונחי הצד השני. ושנזכור שבצד השני יש בני-אדם. ופירוש הדבר לא שהם מלאכים מדוכאים בלבד, אלא שהם אנושיים - לפעמים טובים ושוחרי שלום, לפעמים אכזריים בצורה מדהימה. במקרה הזה כדאי להתעניין גם במונחים של האכזריים ביניהם, מפני שנוצר סביבנו עולם חדש, והרעיון שרק המערב דכאני נראה קצת חיוור מול הגל המתגבר של פשיזם מוסלמי.

אם יש או אין לנו שיח צבאי פרנואידי, זה לא אומר שלא רודפים אחרינו. הלו? מישהו שם בשמאל ה"רדיקלי" זוכר שיש עוד אנשים בעולם מחוץ לפופיק (ולשיח) שלנו?

via

why jihadis just love to fly

Wed, 16 Aug 2006 05:02:57 GMT

Aircraft are a symbol of modernity and look vulnerable. the ideal target in a holy war

FOR ALL THE time jihadi groups spend fantasising about ways to commit mass murder, there is a pretty conventional terrorist mind-set behind most of the plots that materialise.

via

Why everything is at stake.

Fri, 11 Aug 2006 17:47:39 GMT

An article by Charles Krauthammer - Charles Krauthammer is a contributing editor to The Weekly Standard.

written in 10/22/2001 !!!

EUROPE'S GREAT RELIGIOUS WARS ended in 1648. Three and a half centuries is a long time, too long for us in the West to truly believe that people still slaughter others to vindicate the faith.

Thus in the face of radical Islamic terrorism that murders 6,000 innocents in a day, we find it almost impossible to accept at face value the reason offered by the murderers. Yet Osama bin Laden could not be clearer. Jihad has been declared against the infidel, whose power and influence thwart the triumph of Islam, and whose success and example--indeed, whose very existence--are an affront to the true faith. As a leader of Hamas declared at a rally three days after the World Trade Center attack, "the only solution is for Bush to convert to Islam."

cartoon by Clay Bennett

To Americans, who are taught religious tolerance from the cradle, who visit each other's churches for interdenominational succor and solidarity, this seems simply bizarre. On September 25, bin Laden issues a warning to his people that Bush is coming "under the banner of the cross." Two weeks later, in his pre-taped post-attack video, he scorns Bush as "head of the infidels."
Can he be serious? This idea is so alien that our learned commentators, Western and secular, have gone rummaging through their ideological attics to find more familiar terms to explain why we were so savagely attacked: poverty and destitution in the Islamic world; grievances against the West, America, Israel; the "wretched of the earth"--Frantz Fanon's 1960s apotheosis of anti-colonialism--rising against their oppressors.

Reading conventional notions of class struggle and anti-colonialism into bin Laden, the Taliban, and radical Islam is not just solipsistic. It is nonsense. If poverty and destitution, colonialism and capitalism are animating radical Islam, explain this: In March, the Taliban went to the Afghan desert where stood great monuments of human culture, two massive Buddhas carved out of a cliff. At first, Taliban soldiers tried artillery. The 1,500-year-old masterpieces proved too hardy. The Taliban had to resort to dynamite. They blew the statues to bits, then slaughtered 100 cows in atonement--for having taken so long to finish the job.

Buddhism is hardly a representative of the West. It is hardly a cause of poverty and destitution. It is hardly a symbol of colonialism. No. The statues represented two things: an alternative faith and a great work of civilization. To the Taliban, the presence of both was intolerable.

cartoon by Clay Bennett

The distinguished Indian writer and now Nobel Prize winner V.S. Naipaul, who has chronicled the Islamic world in two books ("Among the Believers" and "Beyond Belief"), recently warned (in a public talk in Melbourne before the World Trade Center attack), "We are within reach of great nihilistic forces that have undone civilization." In places like Afghanistan, "religion has been turned by some into a kind of nihilism, where people wish to destroy themselves and destroy their past and their culture . . . to be pure. They are enraged about the world and they wish to pull it down." This kind of fury and fanaticism is unappeasable. It knows no social, economic, or political solution. "You cannot converge with this [position] because it holds that your life is worthless and your beliefs are criminal and should be extirpated."
Val:Y
This insight offers a needed window on the new enemy. It turns out that the enemy does have recognizable analogues in the Western experience. He is, as President Bush averred in his address to the nation, heir to the malignant ideologies of the 20th century. In its nihilism, its will to power, its celebration of blood and death, its craving for the cleansing purity that comes only from eradicating life and culture, radical Islam is heir, above all, to Nazism. The destruction of the World Trade Center was meant not only to wreak terror. Like the smashing of the Bamiyan Buddhas, it was meant to obliterate greatness and beauty, elegance and grace. These artifacts represented civilization embodied in stone or steel. They had to be destroyed.

This worship of death and destruction is a nihilism of a ferocity unlike any since the Nazis burned books, then art, then whole peoples. Goebbels would have marvelled at the recruitment tape for al Qaeda, a two-hour orgy of blood and death: image after image of brutalized Muslims shown in various poses of victimization, followed by glorious images of desecration of the infidel--mutilated American soldiers in Somalia, the destruction of the USS Cole, mangled bodies at the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Throughout, the soundtrack endlessly repeats the refrain "with blood, with blood, with blood." Bin Laden appears on the tape to counsel that "the love of this world is wrong. You should love the other world...die in the right cause and go to the other

world." In his October 9 taped message, al Qaeda spokesman Sulaiman abu Ghaith gloried in the "thousands of young people who look forward to death, like the Americans look forward to living."

cartoon by Clay Bennett

Once again, the world is faced with a transcendent conflict between those who love life and those who love death both for themselves and their enemies. Which is why we tremble. Upon witnessing the first atomic bomb explode at the Trinity site at Alamogordo, J. Robert Oppenheimer recited a verse from the Hindu scripture "Bhagavad Gita": "Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds." We tremble because for the first time in history, nihilism will soon be armed with the ultimate weapons of annihilation. For the first time in history, the nihilist will have the means to match his ends. Which is why the war declared upon us on September 11 is the most urgent not only of our lives, but in the life of civilization itself.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/000/364llkga.asp

What does Lebanon want?

Fri, 11 Aug 2006 16:20:52 GMT

an article by Robert Fulford, National Post

What Hezbollah wants?

To be Hanoi, circa 1970, or Hong Kong today? To struggle against Israel, or be a place of freedom and wealth?...

The warriors of Hezbollah, Party of God, are serious men fighting a serious war, but what inspires them? Among guerrilla gangs, they are top of the class: obedient, clever, efficient, secretive -- and of course, willing to sacrifice themselves and their families. They are not afraid of death, nor do they show pity for neighbours killed when they hide military operations among women and children. Clearly, the Hezbollah warriors are driven by much more than salaries received from Iran.

They hate Jews and, because they fear Sunni Muslims, they badly want to keep power in Shiite hands. But is that enough? Does that explain why they have been preparing for this war for so long? A cleric who interrupted his theological studies to rejoin Hezbollah in June, and who claims to be descended from the prophet Muhammad, says, "We had six years to prepare for this day."

Above all, they are patient.

Behind all this is a religious passion that's so powerful few of us can begin to grasp it. More than two decades ago, the Ayatollah Khomeini, by licensing Hezbollah as a franchise of Iran, focused the minds of a few thousand young men on the ideal of Islamic world hegemony. Like Christianity, Islam imagines itself a universal religion, which all humans will eventually embrace. Much of Christianity has abandoned that dream, but in Islam it remains vividly alive, notably among terrorist factions like Hezbollah.

Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, has said several times that he knows Israel's weak point: its belief in preserving human life. Israel has a nuclear weapon and the region's strongest air force, he says, but "in truth, it is weaker than a spider web." He believes reverence for life, combined with a hedonistic society, make it incapable of sustained war. He has large ambitions. Muhammad Al-Huni, an eminent Libyan intellectual who lives in Italy, recently wrote that Nasrallah now assumes that he "enjoys the stature of the holy men and prophets."

U.S.-based Islam expert Daniel Pipes says that radical Islam is the problem, moderate Islam the solution. But possibly the radicals are the only Muslims with a passion to shape the future. By definition, moderates take a relaxed view of religion. However fervent their beliefs, they also value families, friends, human love, and worldly satisfactions. They want peace and won't eagerly kill for Allah. If they are like most people of moderate views, they can be frightened into silence.

But Hezbollah wants an Islamic world and believes such a world to be worth killing and dying for. Recently, that way of organizing society has crept into another corner of the globe. After a 29-year separatist struggle, the Indonesian province of Aceh won the right to adopt Shariah criminal law, becoming the first region of that country (a theoretically secular state) with that privilege. The radicals have beaten the moderates, and now the moderates face a dreadful future....

So now a great religion, which once inspired enviable poetry, philosophy and architecture, has reduced itself to promoting institutionalized thuggery.

That's the world Hezbollah desires. It seems clear that the crisis in the Middle East is a struggle for a decent civilization. Given that truth, anyone arguing that the West should remain neutral looks like either a fool or a scoundrel.

Read an other article by Robest Fullford:

Lebanon according to Hezbollah, Robert Fulford, National PostPublished: Saturday, July 29, 2006

via art daily

UK foils aircraft terror plot

Thu, 10 Aug 2006 08:45:45 GMT

This is Islam and what it is capable of:

report from CNN

British police say they have disrupted an apparent plot to blow up planes in mid-flight, prompting authorities to raise the nation's threat level to "critical."

The aim of the alleged plot was to explode devices carried aboard planes in handheld luggage -- especially on flights from Britain to the United States, according to Scotland Yard.

Tehran Sends Archterrorist Mughniyeh to Rescue Hizballah

Sat, 05 Aug 2006 22:50:12 GMT

Debka file is an out-side information site, about news, politics, terror, and more. here is a summery of one of it's latest articles, dated 5 of aug 2006, I do hope western civilized world has any idea of what we are facing. this is the begining of the Islamic war against western world:

In the middle of the fourth week of the Lebanon War, the tide began to turn in Israel’s favor. DEBKAfile’s military sources report the battlefield finally responded to the effect of Israel’s air might, its tank columns, the pounding by mobile artillery and naval craft and its repeated armored infantry assaults. After losing 44 fighting men, more than 30 civilians, many thousands of wounded and billions of dollars of damage, finally, the Israeli military was given the chance to do what it does best: focus its firepower instead of spreading it out thin over too many targets.. .

Mughniyeh, wanted for a quarter of a century by the FBI for the huge bombing attacks he orchestrated on the US embassy in Beirut and American and French troops, as well as a spate of hijackings and murders, is important enough to take orders from no-one ranking lower than Iran’s supreme ruler, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Those orders come through the Revolutionary Guards commander Gen. Rahim Safavi.

Therefore, placing Mughniyeh at the head of Hizballah forces in South Lebanon confronts prime minister Olmert uncomfortably close to Iran’s supreme leader; ranges defense minister Peretz opposite his Iranian counterpart Mustafa Najer and chief of staff Lt. Gen Dan Halutz opposite Gen. Safavi, while on the warfront, Israel’s war leaders face the formidable Mughniyeh, Tehran’s secret weapon for rescuing Hizballah from collapse.

Informed circles in the West have a high opinion of Mughniyeh’s military, intelligence and tactical skills. His hand was seen in the transformation of al Qaeda’s 2001 defeat in Afghanistan into a launch pad for its anti-US campaign in Iraq and many other ventures in the terror war against America. After the death of Abu Musab al Zarqawi, Mughniyeh is rated the world Islamic terror movement’s most outstanding field commander.

Therefore, while the appointment is a measure of Israel’s belated military success in the Lebanese war, it also brings the conflict ever closer to two dangerous orbits – Tehran and al Qaeda. Mughniyeh is the only undercover agent in the Middle East who enjoys the complete personal trust of Khamenei and Osama bin Laden, on both of whom he is in a position to call for aid.

On the diplomatic front, even if the United States and France can get together on a unified UN Security Council ceasefire resolution, DEBKAfile’s military sources report that neither Iran nor Hizballah has any intention of complying with a resolution dictated by the United States, France and Israel.

Arithmetic of Pain

Fri, 28 Jul 2006 08:26:49 GMT

By ALAN M. DERSHOWITZ (Mr. Dershowitz is a professor of law at Harvard. )
July 19, 2006

There is no democracy in the world that should tolerate missiles being fired at its cities without taking every reasonable step to stop the attacks. The big question raised by Israel's military actions in Lebanon is what is "reasonable." The answer, according to the laws of war, is that it is reasonable to attack military targets, so long as every effort is made to reduce civilian casualties. If the objectives cannot be achieved without some civilian casualties, these must be "proportional" to the civilian casualties that would be prevented by the military action.

This is all well and good for democratic nations that deliberately locate their military bases away from civilian population centers. Israel has its air force, nuclear facilities and large army bases in locations as remote as anything can be in that country. It is possible for an enemy to attack Israeli military targets without inflicting "collateral damage" on its civilian population. Hezbollah and Hamas, by contrast, deliberately operate military wings out of densely populated areas. They launch antipersonnel missiles with ball-bearing shrapnel, designed by Syria and Iran to maximize civilian casualties, and then hide from retaliation by living among civilians.

If Israel decides not to go after them for fear of harming civilians, the terrorists win by continuing to have free rein in attacking civilians with rockets. If Israel does attack, and causes civilian casualties, the terrorists win a propaganda victory: The international community pounces on Israel for its "disproportionate" response. This chorus of condemnation actually encourages the terrorists to operate from civilian areas.

While Israel does everything reasonable to minimize civilian casualties -- not always with success -- Hezbollah and Hamas want to maximize civilian casualties on both sides. Islamic terrorists, a diplomat commented years ago, "have mastered the harsh arithmetic of pain. . . . Palestinian casualties play in their favor and Israeli casualties play in their favor." These are groups that send children to die as suicide bombers, sometimes without the child knowing that he is being sacrificed. Two years ago, an 11-year-old was paid to take a parcel through Israeli security. Unbeknownst to him, it contained a bomb that was to be detonated remotely. (Fortunately the plot was foiled.)

This misuse of civilians as shields and swords requires a reassessment of the laws of war. The distinction between combatants and civilians -- easy when combatants were uniformed members of armies that fought on battlefields distant from civilian centers -- is more difficult in the present context. Now, there is a continuum of "civilianality": Near the most civilian end of this continuum are the pure innocents -- babies, hostages and others completely uninvolved; at the more combatant end are civilians who willingly harbor terrorists, provide material resources and serve as human shields; in the middle are those who support the terrorists politically, or spiritually.

The laws of war and the rules of morality must adapt to these realities. An analogy to domestic criminal law is instructive: A bank robber who takes a teller hostage and fires at police from behind his human shield is guilty of murder if they, in an effort to stop the robber from shooting, accidentally kill the hostage. The same should be true of terrorists who use civilians as shields from behind whom they fire their rockets. The terrorists must be held legally and morally responsible for the deaths of the civilians, even if the direct physical cause was an Israeli rocket aimed at those targeting Israeli citizens.

Israel must be allowed to finish the fight that Hamas and Hezbollah started, even if that means civilian casualties in Gaza and Lebanon. A democracy is entitled to prefer the lives of its own innocents over the lives of the civilians of an aggressor, especially if the latter group contains many who are complicit in terrorism. Israel will -- and should -- take every precaution to minimize civilian casualties on the other side. On July 16, Hasan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah, announced there will be new "surprises," and the Aska Martyrs Brigade said that it had developed chemical and biological weapons that could be added to its rockets. Should Israel not be allowed to pre-empt their use?

Israel left Lebanon in 2000 and Gaza in 2005. These are not "occupied" territories. Yet they serve as launching pads for attacks on Israeli civilians. Occupation does not cause terrorism, then, but terrorism seems to cause occupation. If Israel is not to reoccupy to prevent terrorism, the Lebanese government and the Palestinian Authority must ensure that these regions cease to be terrorist safe havens.

Mr. Dershowitz is a professor of law at Harvard.

Talking about Mapping the Conflict

Mon, 24 Jul 2006 08:14:24 GMT

Tracking Page: Middle Eastern Bloggers on the Crisis

This active map monitors the unfolding crisis in the Middle East. The page monitors Israeli and Lebanese blogs (no blog from the lebanese side for now, but there is someone from Jordan-he calls for the deportation of all Israelies!) and aggregates their latest & most linked posts continually throughout the day, and additionally shows the most popular posts on the conflict from non-local bloggers.

Mapping the Conflict active map

I'll be adding here few interesting Lebanese bloggers:

http://cedarsawakening.blogspot.com/ Who is saying:

"For too long, minorities in the Middle East have been persecuted. The rise of Islamism is threatening to bring oriental Christians back to the dark ages. This blog calls for a political system that will offer long-term guarantees to all the Lebanese: a federation or an institutionalized consensual democracy."

and this very intensive blog:

http://lebanesebloggers.blogspot.com/

Mapping the Conflict

Sun, 23 Jul 2006 18:02:39 GMT

Tracking Page: Middle Eastern Bloggers on the Crisis

This active map monitors the unfolding crisis in the Middle East. The page monitors Israeli and Lebanese blogs (very little from the lebanese side for now) and aggregates their latest & most linked posts continually throughout the day, and additionally shows the most popular posts on the conflict from non-local bloggers.

Mapping the Conflict active map

I'll be adding here few interesting Lebanese bloggers:

http://cedarsawakening.blogspot.com/ Who is saying:

and this very intensive blog:

http://lebanesebloggers.blogspot.com/

Israel-Lebanon: Visualizing Scale

Sun, 23 Jul 2006 16:29:15 GMT

People who’ve been to Israel or Lebanon invariably impress upon just how small the region is — something that those of us living in ginormous countries find hard to grasp. Andy Carvin was curious to know exactly the scale of the distances involved between northern Israel and Beirut.

He took a screenshot of the war zone from Google Maps and overlay it with a map of part of the northeast US, using the same scale for both images. has created a video that fades between Israel/Lebanon/Syria and Massachusetts/Rhode Island;

Once you've downloaded the video, slide the scrubber back and forth so you can see the two maps overlap each other. For Americans who are used to countries being thousands of miles wide, it's quite astonishing to realize what a compact area of land is affected by the fighting. For example, the distance between Haifa and Beirut isn't much difference than the distance between Providence, Rhode Island and Lowell, Massachusetts. -andy

Watch the video

via maproom

Brought Up To Hate

Fri, 21 Jul 2006 11:44:49 GMT

Here's a link to an article, "Brought up to Hate", by Noni Darwish, an Arab Muslim whose father is an honored martyr in Egypt, Gaza and the West Bank. Nasser had him set up the Palestinian Fedayeen during the 50's in Gaza. He was responsible for the deaths of 400 Israelis. As a Muslim and an Arab who lived 30 years in Gaza and Egypt, she has an important perspective about her own religion and the poisonous culture of hatred throughout the region.

Brought Up To Hate

By Nonie Darwish
Telegraph.co.uk | February 17, 2006

The controversy regarding the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed completely misses the point. Of course, the cartoons are offensive to Muslims, but newspaper cartoons do not warrant the burning of buildings and the killing of innocent people. The cartoons did not cause the disease of hate that we are seeing in the Muslim world on our television screens at night - they are only a symptom of a far greater disease.

I was born and raised as a Muslim in Cairo, Egypt and in the Gaza Strip. In the 1950s, my father was sent by Egypt's President, Gamal Abdel Nasser, to head the Egyptian military intelligence in Gaza and the Sinai where he founded the Palestinian Fedayeen, or "armed resistance". They made cross-border attacks into Israel, killing 400 Israelis and wounding more than 900 others.

My father was killed as a result of the Fedayeen operations when I was eight years old. He was hailed by Nasser as a national hero and was considered a shaheed, or martyr. In his speech announcing the nationalisation of the Suez Canal, Nasser vowed that all of Egypt would take revenge for my father's death. My siblings and I were asked by Nasser: "Which one of you will avenge your father's death by killing Jews?" We looked at each other speechless, unable to answer.

In school in Gaza, I learned hate, vengeance and retaliation. Peace was never an option, as it was considered a sign of defeat and weakness. At school we sang songs with verses calling Jews "dogs" (in Arab culture, dogs are considered unclean).

Criticism and questioning were forbidden. When I did either of these, I was told: "Muslims cannot love the enemies of God, and those who do will get no mercy in hell." As a young woman, I visited a Christian friend in Cairo during Friday prayers, and we both heard the verbal attacks on Christians and Jews from the loudspeakers outside the mosque. They said: "May God destroy the infidels and the Jews, the enemies of God. We are not to befriend them or make treaties with them." We heard worshippers respond "Amen".

My friend looked scared; I was ashamed. That was when I first realised that something was very wrong in the way my religion was taught and practised. Sadly, the way I was raised was not unique. Hundreds of millions of other Muslims also have been raised with the same hatred of the West and Israel as a way to distract from the failings of their leaders. Things have not changed since I was a little girl in the 1950s.

Palestinian television extols terrorists, and textbooks still deny the existence of Israel. More than 300 Palestinians schools are named after shaheeds, including my father. Roads in both Egypt and Gaza still bear his name - as they do of other "martyrs". What sort of message does that send about the role of terrorists? That they are heroes. Leaders who signed peace treaties, such as President Anwar Sadat, have been assassinated. Today, the Islamo-fascist president of Iran uses nuclear dreams, Holocaust denials and threats to "wipe Israel off the map" as a way to maintain control of his divided country.

Indeed, with Denmark set to assume the rotating presidency of the UN Security Council, the flames of the cartoon controversy have been fanned by Iran and Syria. This is critical since the International Atomic Energy Agency is expected to refer Iran to the Security Council and demand sanctions. At the same time, Syria is under scrutiny for its actions in Lebanon. Both Iran and Syria cynically want to embarrass the Danes to achieve their dangerous goals.

But the rallies and riots come from a public ripe with rage. From my childhood in Gaza until today, blaming Israel and the West has been an industry in the Muslim world. Whenever peace seemed attainable, Palestinian leaders found groups who would do everything to sabotage it. They allowed their people to be used as the front line of Arab jihad. Dictators in countries surrounding the Palestinians were only too happy to exploit the Palestinians as a diversion from problems in their own backyards. The only voice outside of government control in these areas has been the mosques, and these places of worship have been filled with talk of jihad.

Is it any surprise that after decades of indoctrination in a culture of hate, that people actually do hate? Arab society has created a system of relying on fear of a common enemy. It's a system that has brought them much-needed unity, cohesion and compliance in a region ravaged by tribal feuds, instability, violence, and selfish corruption. So Arab leaders blame Jews and Christians rather than provide good schools, roads, hospitals, housing, jobs, or hope to their people.

For 30 years I lived inside this war zone of oppressive dictatorships and police states. Citizens competed to appease and glorify their dictators, but they looked the other way when Muslims tortured and terrorised other Muslims. I witnessed honour killings of girls, oppression of women, female genital mutilation, polygamy and its devastating effect on family relations. All of this is destroying the Muslim faith from within.

It's time for Arabs and Muslims to stand up for their families. We must stop allowing our leaders to use the West and Israel as an excuse to distract from their own failed leadership and their citizens' lack of freedoms. It's time to stop allowing Arab leaders to complain about cartoons while turning a blind eye to people who defame Islam by holding Korans in one hand while murdering innocent people with the other.

Muslims need jobs - not jihad. Apologies about cartoons will not solve the problems. What is needed is hope and not hate. Unless we recognise that the culture of hate is the true root of the riots surrounding this cartoon controversy, this violent overreaction will only be the start of a clash of civilis-ations that the world cannot bear.

Link to article

The real solution to the Middle East crisis

Fri, 21 Jul 2006 08:58:59 GMT

Noni Darwish is the daughter of the leader of the Fedayeen guerilla operations, Lt. Col. Mustafa Hafaz, an organization dedicated to the destruction of Israel. Hafaz who took part in the murder of dozens of Israelis, including women and children, was eventually assassinated by the Israeli Defense Forces. Darwish chose not to heed the words of Gamal Nasser—then president of Egypt—calling for revenge, and got past the culture of hatred she was exposed to throughout her childhood, which included songs with the anti-Semitic: “Arabs are our friends and Jews our dogs.”

Through a series of turning points, Darwish came to the realization that the real solution to the Middle East crisis lies in a severe reform of education as well as re-evaluation by Arabs of their religion. One of her early epiphanies was when Israeli officers were searching for her father in her home and left without harming women or children in the household. Another occasion that left a strong imprint was when her brother was injured and the choice was made by Egyptian authorities to send him to Hadassah hospital rather than to Cairo hospital. ...Darwish today states that “The true freedom fighters are the brave, moderate voices in Arab media who live in the Arab world, the brave voices of Muslim men and women who speak from inside the Arab world.” She longs for a revival of “the precious culture of exchange between Islam, Judaism, and Christianity.” In the words of Golda Meir, Darwish indicated that “peace can be achieved when the Arabs love their children more than they hate the children of Israel.”
read more

nothing demonstrates the tribalism of Arabs more than wars and conflicts

Wed, 19 Jul 2006 15:45:00 GMT

Mahmood’s Den is answering Mohammed on conflicts which have made him wake up and take notice.

Here are some of his his words:

Regarding the deafening Arab silence in condemning Israel, I think it demonstrates several important factors:

*. Nothing, absolutely nothing demonstrates the tribalism of Arabs more than wars and conflicts, even on a micro level, let alone this “huge” conflict we have on our hands now. These events crystalizes positions - unfortunately - without much thought beyond the family, tribe, sect, country. The brain ceases to function beyond those things, and of course logic has left the building quite a while ago, and if - and that’s a big if - one declares a position slightly out of those drawn and accepted lines, then that person is immediately vilified, attacked verbally and possibly physically, labeled a traitor and a sell-out, and ostracized. A lot of these people who do question accepted norms more often than now answer with their lives.

Violence, you see, is something that is built into our psyche as Arabs, if the situation does not yet demand the use of fists, then at least the floor belongs to that person who shouts loudest. Most definitely not to that person who is trying to reason and look at alternate points of view to arrive at a conclusive solution.

It is this trait, I think, more than any other that has succeeded for centuries in cowing us, in forcing us to happily accept tyrants, and has allowed us to regress rather than progress. And we really have only ourselves to blame.

One of my friend Mohammed’s conclusions is that this situation will breed more terrorists. Mohammed I agree with you; this will most certainly rub some passions raw and someone will take it upon themselves to “avenge” the Arab honour. After all, Hizballah’s birth was another Israeli incursion into Lebanon, Al-Qa’idah’s birth was the mountains of Afghanistan in response to Soviet intervention, Zarqawi et al is the result of the American insurrection in Iraq, so it is safe to assume that this conflict too will give birth to some more “freedom fighters” who will continue to perpetuate and wreak havoc in the world.

By the same token, and in the continued absence of proper educational systems in the Arab and Muslim worlds, one that values critical thinking rather than learning by rote, there is no doubt in my mind, that someone, somewhere, out of 250 millions of my Arab brothers and sisters, and the more than 1.3 billion Muslims around the world, will have read part of this post and have already decided that I too, should be ostracized for my views… Simply for asking the “wrong” questions.

ACTS OF WAR

Thu, 13 Jul 2006 17:41:06 GMT

Hezbollah launches scores of rockets into Haifa, Israel

Two rockets fired from Lebanon strike the northern Israeli port of Haifa, the Israeli military said, as the crisis over the abduction of two Israeli soldiers deepens. The firing came hours after Israeli warplanes bombed Beirut's international airport and its navy began a blockade of Lebanon's ports. CNN

this is IT may God be with US and with Lebanon

we need to eliminate those terrorist once and for all!!!

Israel is doing the dirty Work for the entire World.

Under Odysseus

Tue, 27 Jun 2006 08:05:55 GMT

War, seems like will never stop. This is an interesting blog:

The Iliad as if written in the disillusioned voice of a blogging US officer in Baghdad.

THE IRAN PLANS

Thu, 13 Apr 2006 23:41:30 GMT

Would President Bush go to war to stop Tehran from getting the bomb?

by SEYMOUR M. HERSH

Wonderfully surreal propaganda at a parade in Mashhad, Iran. The containers they are lifting were said to hold enriched uranium. photo via we-make-money-not-art

The Bush Administration, while publicly advocating diplomacy in order to stop Iran from pursuing a nuclear weapon, has increased clandestine activities inside Iran and intensified planning for a possible major air attack. Current and former American military and intelligence officials said that Air Force planning groups are drawing up lists of targets, and teams of American combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups. The officials say that President Bush is determined to deny the Iranian regime the opportunity to begin a pilot program, planned for this spring, to enrich uranium. read all

Women Say No To War

Sun, 02 Apr 2006 16:54:08 GMT

On the picture are "women and crosses and coffins on a beach in Santa Monica", a few days ago. Do pay attention to the little figure on the bottom right side to have a better perspective of this performance. via new-art.blogspot

From the Hands of Slaves

Sun, 26 Feb 2006 12:28:08 GMT

A clickable map of goods manufactured by slaves in the 21st century.

via memepool

Iconoclasm without Idolatry?

Thu, 09 Feb 2006 23:30:51 GMT

Still concerned by the findings about GOOGLE Offensive Search Results for the word "JEW" And the events that took place as a result of the comics that startled the Muslim world, i came across this article, that suggested an interesting point of view regarding this issue

.."Could sacred Jewish figures be turned into caricatures, as have Muslim figures? This may seem to be a strange question, but considering that some have said that recent depictions of Mohammad in European newspapers are not comparable to antisemitic depictions of Jews, rife with references to the Holocaust, in Arab newspapers, the question has strange relevance.". via

Israel Could Benefit From Hamas Victory

Sun, 29 Jan 2006 18:11:43 GMT

"....In the past decade the Israelis found a new, sure way to build up Hamas. They simply kept up the horrors of the occupation, driving more and more Palestinians to a desperation that only Hamas could articulate politically. And whenever Hamas declared a unilateral cessation of violence, Israel was almost sure to launch some kind of attack upon “suspected Hamas militants.” Israeli leaders knew, of course, that their violence would provoke a violent Hamas response and end the truce.

The common wisdom is that Israel wanted to build up Hamas as a counterweight to the all-powerful Yassir Arafat and his Fatah movement. No doubt it’s true. But it’s just one example of a much broader Israeli strategy: always keep the opposition divided. Israeli leaders have made that their number one principle, going back to before the Jewish state was born. That’s why they demonized Yassir Arafat and broke his political effectiveness. It’s why most Israeli leaders now are quite happy to have Hamas running the Palestinian legislature, while Fatah still dominates the executive branch.

Anything that makes it harder for Palestinians to unite politically is all to the good, Israeli leaders generally believe. Because “good,” to them, means blocking the path to a viable, vibrant, independent Palestinian state.

Of course, that’s a terribly self-destructive notion of “good.” As long as the Palestinians have no state -- or a weak, geographically patchwork state under Israel’s thumb -- the conflict will go on. Israelis will continue to die and bleed. The Israeli economy will continue to bleed from excessive military spending.

Most importantly, the Israeli national soul will continue to bleed. When a nation sends its youngsters, day after day, to be persecutors and executioners in an unjust cause, it creates a spiritual wound that can take generations to heal. In Israel, this wound is felt and openly discussed every day. But most Israeli Jews still believe that they are essentially innocent, that “the Palestinians” force them to keep up the harsh repression. The Hamas victory will only confirm that feeling and lock the two sides deeper into their entrenched views.

This is tragic, because the Hamas rise to political power has actually opened up a new and unexpected path to peace.....Now we can expect the Hamas leadership to follow the path set by the PLO. It will moderate its rhetoric and its actions. And it will join secret talks with the Israeli government. But in those talks, Israel will be forced to confront the root of the problem -- not “terrorism,” but occupation. Hamas never wavers on this point. It insists that all negotiation begin from this basic premise. In other words, it demands that all parties in the negotiation base the talks on reality rather than imagination. That’s the only way to create a just and lasting peace. ...

The Hamas victory could open the door to peace in another way, too. Israel and the U.S. are busy making pompous statements that they simply will not deal with a government that aims to overthrow another nation and relies on armed violence to do it. Suppose Hamas feels the normal pressure on a government in power to moderate its stand. Suppose it adopts the same line. Then a Hamas-led government would have to refuse to deal, for example, with China until its troops leave Tibet. It would have to refuse to deal with Morocco until its troops leave Western Sahara.

By the same principle, of course, a Hamas-led government would have to refuse to deal with the U.S. until its troop leave Iraq—and with Israel until its troops leave Palestine. If you want to see leaders who rely on violence to overthrow and dominate other nations, you need look no further than the U.S. and Israel. I hope that the Hamas PR machine can see these self-righteous U.S. and Israeli pronouncements for what they are -- softballs than an effective Hamas government can smack right out of the park. I hope they show up the U.S. and Israeli hypocrisy, early and often. But I hope that they also sincerely recognize that some day these two peoples must learn to live side by side in peace. It has to happen eventually. If not now, when? " read all

Ira Chernus is Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder and author of American Nonviolence: The History of an Idea.

apocalyptic future

Mon, 23 Jan 2006 19:18:38 GMT

Reading Thomas Freidman's OpEd in the paper today makes me wonder whether the we are living in a period just before "the flood" ...

From his article:

Friends, we are in the midst of an energy crisis - but this is not your grandfather's energy crisis. No, this is something so much bigger, for four reasons.

First, we are in a war against a radical, violent stream of Islam that is fueled and funded by our own energy purchases. We are financing both sides in the war on terrorism: the U.S. Army with our tax dollars, and Islamist charities, madrasas and terrorist organizations through our oil purchases.

Second, the world has gotten flat, and three billion new players from India, China and the former Soviet Union just walked onto the field with their version of the American dream: a house, a car, a toaster and a refrigerator. If we don't quickly move to renewable alternatives to fossil fuels, we will warm up, smoke up and choke up this planet far faster than at any time in the history of the world. Katrina will look like a day at the beach.

Third, because of the above, green energy-saving technologies and designs - for cars, planes, homes, appliances or office buildings - will be one of the biggest industries of the 21st century. Tell your kids. China is already rushing down this path because it can't breathe and can't grow if it doesn't reduce its energy consumption. Will we dominate the green industry, or will we all be driving cars from China, Japan and Europe?

Finally, if we continue to depend on oil, we are going to undermine the whole democratic trend that was unleashed by the fall of the Berlin Wall. Because oil will remain at $60 a barrel and will fuel the worst regimes in the world - like Iran - to do the worst things for the world. Indeed, this $60-a-barrel boom in the hands of criminal regimes, and just plain criminals, will, if sustained, pose a bigger threat to democracies than communism or Islamism. It will be a black tide that turns back the democratic wave everywhere, including in Iraq. via

When a Language Dies

Fri, 13 Jan 2006 08:52:21 GMT

"Cuando muere una lengua
todo lo que hay en el mundo,
mares y rios,
animales y plantas,
ni se piensen, ni se pronuncian
con atisbos, con sonidos,
que no existan ya."

"When a language dies,
all that there is in this world,
oceans and rivers,
animals and plants,
do not think of them,
do not pronounce their names,
they do not exist now."
"When a Language Dies", translated from the Aztec by Miguel Leon Portillo (English translation: John Ross)

The planet upon which we dwell is no longer the Tower of Babel it once was. Like bio-diversity, linguistic diversity is drying up at an alarming rate. Of 6000 known human languages, half are in imminent danger of disappearing, and 90% could be erased forever within a century, according to dire UNESCO reports. One language system is lost every two weeks, the United Nations cultural agency warns--five Indian subcontinent languages were irretrievably wiped out during the tsunami that obliterated islands in the Bay of Bengal earlier this year. more

via

Ariel Sharon

Fri, 06 Jan 2006 10:06:20 GMT

Fighting for his life. Today, friday morning, Sharon, was taken back into surgery.

Birth of a new Ocean

Sun, 11 Dec 2005 13:52:08 GMT

Researchers from Britain, France, Italy and the U.S. have been observing the 37-mile long fissure since it split open in September in the Afar desert and estimate it will take a million years to fully form into an ocean, said Dereje Ayalew, who leads the team of 18 scientists studying the phenomenon. The fissure, now 13 feet wide, formed in just three weeks after a Sept. 14 earthquake in a barren region called Boina, some 621 miles north east of the capital, Addis Ababa.

Dereje said that the split is the beginning of a long process, which will eventually lead to Ethiopia's eastern part tearing off from the rest of Africa, a sea forming in the gap. The Afar desert is being torn off the continent by about 0.8 inches each year.

via slashdot

Dream and Trauma

Tue, 06 Dec 2005 07:54:21 GMT

Moving Images and the Promised Lands at the The House of World Cultures in Berlin 02.12.2005 - 18.12.2005

Films, Videos, Video installations focusing on Israel

The "Promised Land" of the Bible has become a dream for some people and a trauma for others. This extensive programme of film screenings and moving image exhibition looks beyond the classified into the complex realities of contemporary Israel and its occupied territories.

Hany Abu-Assad Paradise Now

Topical documentaries, feature films and short films, some of which were premiered at this year’s festivals in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, will be presented on fifteen theme evenings. Filmmakers such as Amos Gitai, Hany Abu-Assad, and Yoav Shamir will present very personal views on their country’s present situation

Part of the focus of the programme is to examine the complexity of the land in terms of Israeli societies and subcultures, or of those who are perceived as the outsiders due to their ethnic or sexual difference. This set of references and this context provides a fresh set of positions to help the viewer into the complexity that we call Israel within the Middle East.

In the documentary, “Eshbal”, the Ethiopian migration is tackled by examining their Jewish identity but within a black diasporic reality. This reality evidently contests their `high risk` grouping by the state, providing an insight into their humiliation culminating in their final relocation in 'planeloads' to Israel during “Operation Solomon” in 1991 and, of course, the inevitable experiences of alienation. "European" Israel shows no understanding of their "archaic" ways of life, yet has no alternative to offer them either.

In the feature film, “Thirst”, the apocalyptic vision of the director, Tawfik Abu Wael, exposes the plight of a Palestinian family, living in a ghost town outside a Palestinian village with a blighted past impeding their every movement. "Israel", both as a state and an impediment to their existence, plays a constant role in their life, including the provision of running water and having to be guarded against state surveillance. If, on the other hand, contemporary classics including "terror" or "checkpoint" are examined, they are depicted from a new perspective: Would be-terrorists are portrayed within the emotional and mental torment of their suicide plight, checkpoints not only as scenes of brutality, but in all their laconic cruelty of eating up time.

The film programme is divided into 15 nights covering topics ranging from "Tradition and Fertility" to "Music Fatalities", trying to examine the multiplicity of realities in Israel. These "snapshots" include feature films as well as documentaries and art videos mirroring the aforementioned multiplicity in form as well as content. Young artist Talia Keinan films her hometown Tel Aviv through a glass of tea, with tea leaves slowly dropping to the bottom. A surreal scenery emerges that looks as much like a theatre of war as like black rain falling on a fairy tale city. Karen Russo produces a documentary on spontaneous human combustion, a phenomenon which burns people from the inside with no signs of fire to be observed. It could be read as much as a metaphor for 'living under occupation' as for such a universal human torment as - love.

The Event

via mindgap

10X10

Mon, 05 Dec 2005 19:42:09 GMT

One more interesting project of Jonathan Harris (see his phylotaxis, that i was amazed by, few posts ago...)

is an interactive exploration of the words and pictures that define the time.

(This snapshot was taken today, few hours after the palestinian bomb suicider, that killed 5 citizen in an Israeli city, one can see, that many of the little images, are the same image of a policeman, in the middle of the debris in pa\lace where the attack took place...)

The result is an often moving, sometimes shocking, occasionally frivolous, but always fitting snapshot of our world. Every hour, 10x10 collects the 100 words and pictures that matter most on a global scale, and presents them as a single image, taken to encapsulate that moment in time. Over the course of days, months, and years, 10x10 leaves a trail of these hourly statements which, stitched together side by side, form a continuous patchwork tapestry of human life.

10x10 is ever-changing, ever-growing, quietly observing the ways in which we live. It records our wars and crises, our triumphs and tragedies, our mistakes and milestones. When we make history, or at least the headlines, 10x10 takes note and remembers.

Each hour is presented as a picture postcard window, composed of 100 different frames, each of which holds the image of a single moment in time. Clicking on a single frame allows us to peer a bit deeper into the story that lies behind the image. In this way, we can dart in and out of the news, understanding both the individual stories and the ways in which they relate to each other.

10x10 runs with no human intervention, autonomously observing what a handful of leading international news sources are saying and showing. 10x10 makes no comment on news media bias, or lack thereof. It has no politics, nor any secret agenda; it simply shows what it finds.

10x10 is designed to be simple and intuitive, so you should find it easy to use. When you open 10x10, you will see a grid of the top 100 world images that hour, ranked in order of importance, reading left to right, top to bottom. Along the right edge of the screen are listed the corresponding top 100 words, one for each image.

10x10 was designed and developed by Jonathan Harris of Number27, in conjunction with the FABRICA communication research center in Italy.

Will this killings will ever stop?

Mon, 05 Dec 2005 12:28:33 GMT

Bomber kills 5 at Israeli mall

A suicide bomber killed five people and injured 35 others -- 14 seriously -- in an attack outside a shopping mall in the northern Israeli city of Netanya

CNN Report

I wonder for how long this murderers will go on, thinking, killing Innocent people is legitimate? World has to eliminate those Non human creatures and their leaders.

They are no peace seekers, and hatred is all they know.

When protecting Nature means kicking people out

Fri, 02 Dec 2005 11:50:31 GMT

To conserve wilderness areas and keep up biodiversity you may need to toss tribal people out of their homelands. Well, why not?... more»