From the WSJ Opinion Archives
The
Coming Mideast War?
The Ottawa Citizen's David Warren thinks the current Israeli-Palestinian violence
is a precursor to a wider war:
What we are witnessing looks like joint preparations by the Palestinian Authority, Syria, its Lebanese client, Iraq, and Iran, for war on a regional scale, against both Israel and U.S. interests. I fear we may face a major, sudden, external assault on Israel, meant to precede U.S. action against the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq, and indeed prevent the U.S. from going there by enmiring it in the defence of Israel.
This last would be a catastrophic miscalculation, but typical of the Islamist mindset, both Arab and Persian. It goes with the usual optimistic expectation that the "Arab street" will rise in the "moderate" Arab states, compelling even Egypt and Saudi Arabia to join in the anti-Israeli and anti-American fray. . . .
The problem for the Bush administration is that while it makes contingency plans for an unavoidable regime change in Iraq, it becomes increasingly aware that Saddam Hussein is no longer isolated; that there is a real risk the Americans could find themselves fighting, alongside Israel and Turkey, against all of their common enemies in the region, simultaneously. But given the constant development of weapons of mass destruction in each of these enemy states, and the constant stoking of Islamist fires, such a war might better be fought sooner than later.
There is a certain logic to this prediction, inasmuch as President Bush is serious about his Manichaean formulation of the war on terror--"either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists." The Arab world has taken the side of the terrorists, at least those who target Israel. (The Washington Times reports that the Arab League yesterday completed a draft communiqué praising the Palestinians' "heroic intifada.") For diplomatic reasons, the Bush administration has drawn a distinction between Israel's antiterror struggle and America's, but this is not sustainable given the Palestinians' palpable determination to spurn all peace overtures and the financial and other ties between anti-Israel terrorists and Iran and Iraq.
What's more, despite Arab despots' willingness to have their young men and women blow themselves up in the name of killing Jews, it's hard to imagine the dictators themselves are all suicidal. Israel alone has defeated the Arabs in three wars; a U.S.-Israeli-Turkish alliance would surely be unbeatable.
It's also true, though, that if Baghdad unleashes weapons of mass destruction, victory could come at a steep cost to Israel. The ideal outcome surely would be to topple terror-sponsoring regimes one at a time, starting with a U.S. attack on Iraq with "moderate" Arab support. Despite public statements to the contrary, there's reason to think some such support--or at least a willingness to fall into line--exists. London's Guardian reports that "the US Air Force has begun preparations to move its Gulf headquarters from Saudi Arabia to Qatar, to bypass Saudi objections to military action against Iraq." The Army also has a substantial presence in Kuwait.
Certainly it's in Saddam's interest to widen the war quickly so as to take the heat off him. Little wonder the Iraqi regime has increased its payments to Palestinian suicide bombers' families (all the while complaining that U.N. sanctions are starving Iraqi children). Warren is right at least to fear that the war will become wider and deadlier than the U.S. would prefer. If it does so, there is no doubt the right side would prevail--but if Saddam unleashes weapons of mass destruction, victory could come at a high price to Israel.
Arab
League Follies
On the other hand, reading and watching the reports on the Arab League summit
in Beirut makes it awfully hard to take the Arabs seriously as a potential foe.
They may be unified in their hatred of Jews, but otherwise they can't seem to
get their act together. The big question before the summit was whether Israel's
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon would allow Yasser Arafat to leave Ramallah and
go to Beirut, but Arafat himself ended up deciding not to go.
He wasn't the only one; Ha'aretz reports Jordan's King Abdullah II and Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak also stayed home. The Jerusalem Post says Abdullah and Mubarak bowed out "due to intelligence warnings Hizbullah"--a Lebanon-based, Syrian-backed terror group-cum-political party--"is planning a large attack during the summit." All told, another Ha'aretz dispatch reports, "10 out of 22 Arab leaders have decided not to attend the summit."
As for Arafat, he was supposed to address the summit by satellite, but its Lebanese hosts refused to air the live speech. The explanations vary; an unnamed Lebanese official tells the Associated Press that Lebanon feared "the Israelis could manipulate the satellite link and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon could appear instead and try to address the summit." More plausibly, Reuters reports that "One Lebanese source close to the government blamed 'our neighbors'--a reference to Lebanon's political mentor Syria--for obstructing the broadcast of Arafat's summit address." The snub prompted Arafat to order the Palestinian delegation to walk out.
The "Saudi peace plan," as we noted yesterday, appears to be a dead letter. Ha'aretz reports that "suddenly, alongside the Saudi initiative, other Arab states were presenting their own proposals for an unified Arab League approach to Israel. An Algerian draft, and a Moroccan draft were both circulating in Beirut, with both less moderate than the Saudi draft." The Washington Post quotes an unnamed Western diplomat, who says: "If you're looking to the [Saudi] initiative to say something unambiguous for the region and Mubarak and others don't show, it doesn't undercut it entirely, but it certainly takes some of the oomph out of it." To say the least!
Those
Moderate Palestinians
An Associated Press dispatch remarks on the absence in Beirut of "three
key moderates--the leaders of Egypt, Jordan and the Palestinians." Meanwhile,
another
AP dispatch reports that at least 15 people are dead and more than 100 wounded
in a suicide attack this evening at a hotel in Netanya, Israel, where guests
were gathering for a Passover seder. It's not clear yet if this was a "moderate"
or an "extremist" mass murder; Ha'aretz
reports that "Both the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, linked to PA Chairman Yasser
Arafat's Fatah movement, and Hamas have claimed responsibility for the attack."
Ha'aretz also brings this news on the "moderate" Palestinians:
Reserve soldiers at the Rama roadblock, north of Jerusalem, arrested an ambulance driver for the Palestinian Red [Crescent] on Wednesday morning, after discovering that he was carrying an explosive device in his ambulance.
The man said that he was transporting the explosives, which were strapped to a belt, from the area of the West Bank city of Nablus at the request of an activist from the military wing of Fatah, which is headed by Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat.
Arafat won a Nobel Peace Prize in 1994.
The
Whine Spectator
"Several hundred Muslims held an open meeting on Monday night in Sterling,
Va., near Washington, to listen to complaints of people whose homes or businesses
were among those raided" in America's anti-terror effort, the New York
Times reports. "Many said they intended to press for Congressional hearings
into police tactics and to organize rallies to call attention to abuses against
Muslims since Sept. 11."
Meanwhile, the Washington Post reports that two Arab-American men from nearby Fairfax County are under investigation:
The men, Mohammed Osman Idris and Mohammed El-Yacoubi, U.S. citizens born and raised in Northern Virginia, turned up for their Dec. 13 flight from New York to Tel Aviv and drew suspicion, the FBI says in an affidavit. The young Muslim men had paid cash for their tickets and were carrying $2,000. They had no checked baggage, no hotel reservations and no stated itinerary. Their passports were only three days old. The letter, written by El-Yacoubi's brother, is about "Jihad" and "traveling to Allah."
Idris, an Annandale resident, was charged with lying to a grand jury about why he and El-Yacoubi, of Fairfax Station, had gotten the new passports. El-Yacoubi has not been charged with a crime, and both men deny criminal intentions.
There's nothing objectionable about Arab- and Muslim American organizations advising their constituents on their civil rights. But America does face a genuine threat from Arab and Muslim terrorists, some of whom, like the Sept. 11 hijackers, almost certainly live among us. Have any of these advocacy groups balanced their civil-liberties advocacy with a call for Arab- and Muslim Americans to help investigators find the terrorists? If so, it's escaped our notice. It's legitimate to question the loyalty to America of organizations whose leaders, in times of war, emphasize their constituents' rights and ignore their responsibilities.
The
French Are So Uncivilized
"A gunman opened fire at a town hall in western Paris Wednesday, killing
eight people and wounding about 30," Reuters reports. A witness "said
the gunman was a member of France's Green party and that he started shooting
other Green representatives before opening fire indiscriminately on others in
the room."
Why would such a thing happen? It couldn't have been politically motivated; after all, the Green Party platform makes clear: "We believe that, as a matter of principle, considered diplomacy should always be favored over recourse to military intervention and violence." So the gunman's madness must be a product of French culture.
France abolished the death penalty in 1981, and, as we noted in December, the city of Paris honored an American cop killer by naming him an honorary citizen. In a country whose culture is so indifferent to innocent life, it's no wonder they have things like massacres at town-hall meetings.
The
Best of Times, the Worst of Times
"As he helped the Bush administration write its national energy report
last year, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham heard from more than 100 energy
industry executives, trade association leaders and lobbyists, according to documents
released by the Energy Department," today's New York Times reports (link
requires registration). "Mr. Abraham did not meet with any representatives
of environmental organizations or consumer groups, the documents show."
To find out why Abraham didn't meet with the environmental groups, though, you have to read today's Washington Times:
The Bush administration sought the advice of environmental groups in drafting its energy plan, but several declined to participate or suggested that Bush officials check their Web sites for information, just-released documents show.
A month and a half before President Bush's energy plan was announced, the Energy Department contacted Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, Environmental Defense, the World Resources Institute, Resources for the Future and four other groups to discuss conservation and energy efficiency.
However, an unstated number of other environmental groups rebuffed administration overtures.
Cashing
In on Slavery?
Plaintiff Deadria Farmer-Paellmann, "claiming to represent all of the United
States' 35 million African-Americans," filed the country's first lawsuit
seeking reparations for slavery, against Aetna Inc., CSX Corp. and FleetBoston
Financial Corp., among others.
Putting aside the obvious point that neither Farmer-Paellmann nor anyone else now alive has ever been enslaved in the U.S., it's hard to see how there could be any legal case against slavery as practiced in the pre-Civil War era. After all, slavery, evil though it was, was not only legal but specifically authorized by the Constitution until the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865.
Fox News quotes Manning Marable, a Columbia scholar who helped put together the list of targeted corporations: "To me it's not fundamentally about the money, it is about the truth of history and bringing the truth to light, which will promote a frank and honest discussion across the racial divide." If it's not about money, then there's an obvious way to resolve the case. The judge or jury should follow the precedent of the United States Football League's antitrust suit against the NFL: Find as a matter of law that slavery was wrong, but limit the damages to a symbolic $1.
Defining
Deviancy Down
The University of Minnesota Press plans to publish a book called "Harmful to
Minors: The Perils of Protecting Children From Sex," which opposes what
author Judith Levine calls "the ideology that it's always harmful for kids
to have sexual relationships with adults." Reports the Newhouse News Service:
But arguments have emerged in academic journals, books and online that at least some such sex should be acceptable, especially when children consent to it. . . . These academics seek to change the language, moving away from "pedophilia," which often evokes a charged negative response, particularly in light of the priest-pedophile cases challenging the Roman Catholic Church. In its place would be more neutral terms such as "intergenerational sex" or "adult-child sex."
With more research, some scholars say, it may be only a matter of time before modern society accepts adult-child sex, just as it has learned to accept premarital sex and homosexual sex.
We suspect they're wrong. Some ideas are so stupid, only an intellectual could believe them.
A
Gratuitous Smear
A Las Vegas Sun article on a Supreme Court ruling on drugs in public housing
includes this red herring:
The issue of substance abuse has touched the White House. President Bush's underage daughters were caught drinking in a Texas restaurant last year and his niece, the daughter of Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, was admitted to a drug treatment center in February after being arrested on a prescription drug charge.
This is completely unrelated to the subject of the article, which deals with illegal drugs. The only possible purpose of this aside was to smear the Bushes. It would be the equivalent of our including a reference to Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky in the preceding item about pedophilia.
Loony
Lange
Here's one of the oddest stories we've seen in awhile. David Lange, the former
prime minister of New Zealand who in the 1980s banned nuclear-powered ships
from his territory, claims that when Dan Quayle was vice president, he "announced
to the Australian cabinet at one stage" that Lange "had to be liquidated."
London's Daily Telegraph quotes Lange as saying: "I inquired of our security
sources and I was told that I shouldn't regard it as a credible threat because
the vice-president wasn't regarded as credible."
Tenured
Peasants
One G. Ross Stephens writes an angry letter to the Kansas City Star, responding
to a pro-tax cut column by Jerry Heaster:
Heaster and his colleagues, the libertarians and supply-siders, want to give all of the tax breaks to the wealthy so the crumbs from their activity will trickle down to us peasants at the bottom of the heap.
This "peasant" signs his letter with his title: "Professor Emeritus, Political Science and Public Administration, University of Missouri-Kansas City." At least he's not a professor of English; the reference to crumbs trickling is an embarrassing mixed metaphor.
Mass
Noncommunication
"A priest fed up with mobile phones ringing during Mass has installed an
electronic jammer to keep his flock in tune with God," the Associated Press
reports from Moraira, Spain. The device "transmits low-power radio signals
that sever communications between cellular handsets and cellular base-stations."
Now if only someone could come up with a way of jamming the sound of crying
babies.
Cartoon
Network Censorship
HispanicOnline reports that the Cartoon Network, owned by AOL Time Warner, has
banned the cartoon character Speedy Gonzales from its airwaves:
CN officials say the network was instructed by its owner, Ted Turner, to stop showing the Speedy cartoons because of racial stereotyping.
"The problem with [Speedy cartoons] is the references to drinking, laziness, drug use, and womanizing ('Speedy knows my sister, Speedy knows EVERYBODY's sister . . .')," according to Daniel Wineman, of the Cartoon Network Programming department, in a recent e-mail.
Fox News, however, reports that "there is a place where Speedy can still be found zipping across TV screens--and, presumably, where the crude stereotypes he embodies don't touch a cultural nerve." That place is the Cartoon Network Latin America, where Speedy is "hugely popular."
(Elizabeth Crowley helps compile Best of the Web Today. Thanks to Edward Schulze, C.E. Dobkin, Raghu Desikan, Damian Bennett, Michael Segal, Richard Belzer, Adam Sager, Aaron Gross, Yehuda Hilewitz, Ron Josephson, Randy Schwartz, David Simon, Marc Weidenbaum, Mitch Devine, Marie Bourgeois, Martin Dobkin, Brian Fennessey, Gregory Brunt, John Lott, Brian Herrick, Ann Haker, David Merrill, Dave Finley, Lisa Schell, Patrick Thomas, Shelley Taylor, Harrison Roberts, Jeannette Boot, Robert Lawrence, Mark Schulze, Rick Yarnell, Robert Paci and Jonathan Adler. If you have a tip, write us at opinionjournal@wsj.com, and please include the URL.)
Today on OpinionJournal:
- Review & Outlook: Trial-lawyer journalism doesn't deserve a Pulitzer (link requires registration).
- Pete du Pont: Greens get caught red-handed committing scientific fraud.
- John Fund: Filibusters can help the Senate GOP get things done.
- Laura Landro: How the Seattle Times smeared a cancer center.
