Taliban : An Analysis

re fatimah 106 ( or is it the 12-head?)

``Most detrogatory comments about muslims i have read in an article by Bernard Lewis in ATLANTIC.A magazine i find mostly anti islamic than not.``

You should stick to your local mosque`s newsletter duly edited by Mullah Omar and Co. The Atlantic and similar magazines are obviously above your league of comprehension ( and grammar).

Neutral Jews like Chomsky? PLease. He is a tenured apologist for the anti-American cause for two generations. Nothing neutral about the gentleman.

``No body is forcing you to be muslim``

Glad to know that. My relationship with God needs neither affirmation nor condemnation from humans to be valid.

Israel is America`s friend. Get used to it. I for one am happy to spend my tax dollars for the preservation of the only democracy in the Middle East. If you don`t like Israel, I suggest you get your PLO pals to start a bit of democratizing in their fiefdoms.

re ylh

``Ok so coming to Rushdie... why do you think his book, the Satanic Verses was nasty. ``

It is a figure of speech, buddy. I tend to admire Mr Rushdie and received the first fatwa on `apostasy` when my letter in a S. Asian newspaper was published asking for `fair treatment ` of Rushdie in the aftermath of the Stanic Verses controversy. The book itself is less than sterling literature compared to his Children of Midnight and even The Moor`s Last Sigh.

hamid: ``arab colonialism in the garb of islamism.``

Drummed the nail on the head - Volumes SHOULD be written on that sentance. They are nothing more then Arab clones - fools... Can someone explain 2 me why the hell muslim`s eat dates???

Sameer

Thanks for the fun read - a little bit unbalanced especially in evaluating the intellectual (and consequently the economic and social) conceptions that have formed and characterize the West. The response of the West to ``Islam`` has not been formed solely by ``Islam``.

Similarly, some statements in this work are indefensible: ``...Islamic ideology is barren of intellectual backing anywhere on earth.`` Cleraly Deobandi would have a problem with this, as would readers of Dr. Shariati and the Martyr Ayatollah Beshesti -

Perhaps a better argument is the ``barrenness`` of efforts to turn the ideology of religion into a religion of ideology.

I recognize the need for brevity in your work (not in my response to it) and would suggest that that the theme of ethnicity and global upheal (especially as it relates to Liberal notions of indivigualism, economics and the complexity of increased interaction among individuals and groups - a case in point would the book ``The Pakistani Voter`` by Andrew Wilder - and the role of the State) deserves more discussion to arrive or not, at conclusions authors you cite do.

``Like the mindset of most Islamists, the Taliban ideology was a deadly concoction of moral codes and ethical behavior of seventh century Arab culture, accepted in the name of religion and fortified with delusions of grandeur and superstitious confidence in invulnerability and invincibility.`` Huh? regretable, simply not intellectually honest and disrespectful of your critical readers.

Another assertion I wish to challenge is that ``Muslims`` accepted the Taliban - is that why only Pakistan and it`s allies Saudi and UAE recognized the Taliban regime?

``...they fail to explain the resistance of the West to accept the Islamic model, since it is believed by Islamists to be most beneficial in all aspects of life and afterlife.``

``The Islamic model``? is that so? - here, again, it would have been helpful if you had developed the intellectual foundations of the West and there would not be a need to pose such a contemptuous question.

``For Pakistanis, their interests are better served by an amalgamation of rich native cultural heritage with only a sprinkle of Islamic civilization.`` And you built a case for this prescription, where? pointing out the failure of the Taliban is just that - pointing out it`s failure, it is the building of support for your prescription - OK, we understand Taliban bad, but why is your prescription good? - simply because Taliban bad? - Is this intellectually honest reasoning?

So,if the Taliban are a manifestation of the rejection of the processes of secularization and rationalization and that this rejection has led to intellectual, economic and social failure? Yes, therefore:

A intellectual foundation that is moral, ethical, rooted both tradition (Islam) and the ``modern``, which acknowledges the process of secularization and rationalization as agents of social and psychological change - and which seeks mutual accomodation and is primarily concerned with efforts to define the ``good``, the ``moral`` as societal guide posts, should be a legitimate goal of intellectuals, including Islamists? Why?

hamzad #97 you are just babbling here. Calling other people names (like thugs in this case) is the mark of low class. I must admit I thought you had more decency than that.

hamzad afaqui #98 Why does one have to run from pillar (US) to post (muslims countries) and now, per your post, to khhamba (China)? And before you learn any more Chinese, Remember the Albanians!! During the Sino-Soviet split, and throughout the cold war, they remained staunch allies of China (even had a banner proclaim that ``We and the Chinese are 700 million strong!``, of which 1 million were Albanians and the rest Chinese). And guess what - when the Albanians were being ethnically cleansed, and the allies (including the Brits, whom you elegantly refer to as baboons in your post) fought back they accidentally hit the Chinese Embassy - in Serbia!

The brotherly love of Chinese and Albanians was forgotten, as the Chinese made a fuss about having their precious embassy damaged. No one asked the Chinese, and the Chinese never cared to explain, what the hell they were doing having an embassy in a country that was busy killing their brotherly Albanians.

You may wish to reflect on this inbetween your Chinese lessons. And no reflection on the Chinese either - but a reflection on people who refuse to see the world as it is and then run around like chicken with their heads cut off (to use mullah omar`s famous phrase) when the birds come home to roost (to mix metaphors).

sameerjb says, ``Does Pakistan need common sense like love to mother and motherland or I need again to rush to Barnes and Noble or Borders Books? There is too much of Islam and too little of common sense among many Muslims.``

..... something terrible has happened to pakistan in the last ten years - we have lost our way and common sense in the pursuit of allah .... i, like all other pakistanis, had no idea what hijab was till the early nineties - we had never heard of it, never seen it and, god forbid, had never entertained the idea of wearing one ... oh sure, we had seen the black ``fashni`` burqa and the ladies from mardan and charsadda looked kind of sexy in their white chaddars and alabaster feet with bright red toe-nails...... women in peshawar and quetta did wear the taliban style ``gobi`` burqa , but the rest of the country laughed at the incorrigible pathans and rural punjabi women kept on showing a lot of leg as they harvested the wheat in their rather revealing dhotis .... in the seventies, girls from the nca and kinnaird could be seen in blue jeans and muslin kurtas with a bra straps peaking out - and nobody cared .......

......... then something horrible happened? when and how - nobody knows, but all of a sudden arab colonialism in the garb of islamism appeared on the scene .... out went khuda-hafiz and rab-rakha and in came allah hafiz and jazakallah, and with that came the curse of the arab hijab ....namaz became salat and people started naming their kids ghazzali and khuzaima and osama ..... precocious moon-faced girls whose mothers had tramped around with their bra straps showing admonish their mothers for not being ``good`` muslims .... children don`t have the foggiest idea of the indus vally civilization but can tell you all about what the bedouins ate for breakfast fourteen hundred years ago .... reasonable men and women started pretending to be arabs as they pretend to listen to arabic news on television - news in arabic on ptv ? ... now when did that happen ? ...... we used to have two minutes of baseerat, followed by a five minute english news bulletin and daffy duck .....when did the people of pakistan learn arabic ? .. since they started wearing the silly hijab? ....... oh, they even teach arabic in school and, they tell me, islamiyat is part of the core syllabus in professional colleges as well ...... where did we go wrong ? .... what happened to the pot smoking girls of nca and why are their daughters wearing silly lab coats and hijabs ? ...... in the good old days you could not fill two safs for isha prayers in any mosque, now the nimazis spill out into the street and gutters ....how and why ? maybe it was wahabi money that built the madrassas and the grand mosque in islamabad and in the process poisoned our minds; maybe it was our weak politicians and weaker military pandering to the islamists tha created this nightmare that won`t go away ... it is a scary thought but it seems while we were blowing dixie the mullahs were busy spreading this poison ........ is it too late to come back from the brink? ........ i hope so - otherwise the horrible hindoos and the moon-faced hijabans will all go up in one big radioactive bang .......

Reply #: 96

sigalph235

re fatimah #88

YLH has asid it well. Bernard Lewis is one of the most Arabophile experts of the Middle East. Even his son, Tony, admits that(and probably regrets it given that the younger Lewis is a bit more partisan to Israel).

Same with Friedman. His book `From Beirut to Jerusalem` is a scathing indictment of Israel`s policy in Lebanon. Like Bernard Lewis, Friedman is a Jew as well. That has not stopped him from attempting to be unprejudiced. Nor have the Jewish rabbis declared him or Lewis apostates. Hence lies the difference between the Jewish clerics and Islamic clerics.............``]]



Sigalph

No body is forcing you to be muslim

``There is no compulsion in religion``

I know how good Jews & Israel & Bernard Lewis & Freidman are .

Most detrogatory comments about muslims i have read in an article by Bernard Lewis in ATLANTIC.A magazine i find mostly anti islamic than not.I would also add that muslims are much less crtical of Jews like Bernard Lewis than they are of Muslims in general.

Freidman is good b/c he condemns israel is not my way of judging .I find him inaccurate ,biased in areas of knowledge ,that i am indegenious too ,So what if i am not Freidman or Bernard Lewis i can still hold myself against them when it comes to home turf.Just as he can about israel or jews or judeaism.

I never get all misty eyed ,beholden to a jew if he/she crticizes Israel or supports Palestine I never needed that endorsement from Jew in particular to feel good for myself believing what is right irrespective of that.

Iam not against jews or judeaism but dont like the arrogence of isreal which is supported by most of jews zionist .

I know many neutral jews like Chomsky,my butcher Isackson,Rabbi of local temple Shalom,but not the ones on t.v. like Bernard Lewis,Freidman Emerson,& for that matter even if they are not jews like Foud Ahjami ,etc.

They are shameless peddlers & only difference between than the vendors in 3rd world is the price & commodity they are selling

Reply #: 96

sigalph235

re fatimah #88

YLH has asid it well. Bernard Lewis is one of the most Arabophile experts of the Middle East. Even his son, Tony, admits that(and probably regrets it given that the younger Lewis is a bit more partisan to Israel).

Same with Friedman. His book `From Beirut to Jerusalem` is a scathing indictment of Israel`s policy in Lebanon. Like Bernard Lewis, Friedman is a Jew as well. That has not stopped him from attempting to be unprejudiced. Nor have the Jewish rabbis declared him or Lewis apostates. Hence lies the difference between the Jewish clerics and Islamic clerics.............``]]



Sigalph

No body is forcing you to be muslim

``There is no compulsion in religion``

I know how good Jews & Israel & Bernard Lewis & Freidman are .

Most detrogatory comments about muslims i have read in an article by Bernard Lewis in ATLANTIC.A magazine i find mostly anti islamic than not.I would also add that muslims are much less crtical of Jews like Bernard Lewis than they are of Muslims in general.

Freidman is good b/c he condemns israel is not my way of judging .I find him inaccurate ,biased in areas of knowledge ,that i am indegenious too ,So what if i am not Freidman or Bernard Lewis i can still hold myself against them when it comes to home turf.Just as he can about israel or jews or judeaism.

I never get all misty eyed ,beholden to a jew if he/she crticizes Israel or supports Palestine I never needed that endorsement from Jew in particular to feel good for myself believing what is right irrespective of that.

Iam not against jews or judeaism but dont like the arrogence of isreal which is supported by most of jews zionist .

I know many neutral jews like Chomsky,my butcher Isackson,Rabbi of local temple Shalom,but not the ones on t.v. like Bernard Lewis,Freidman Emerson,& for that matter even if they are not jews like Foud Ahjami ,etc.

They are shameless peddlers & only difference between than the vendors in 3rd world is the price & commodity they are selling

Cycle of Death - A letter from Pakistan

By Ali Ahmed Rind LA Weekly Writer

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/laweekly/20020104/lo/31287_1.html

The day after Pakistan’s interior minister denounced the Taliban and religious extremism, his brother was shot dead in downtown Karachi. The minister, Moinuddin Haider, speaking at a seminar titled “Terrorism: A New Challenge to the World of Islam,” said the Taliban’s “narrow concept of Islam was both misguided and misguiding. We would never let some hymn-reciting, illiterate religious bigots run this country.”

The following day, his brother, Ehteshanuddin Haider, patron of the Fatmid Foundation, a well-known charity in Pakistan, was killed as he left his office. The message seemed clear in tumultuous Pakistan: Taliban fighters, in retreat from Afghanistan (news - web sites), are bucking to show their presence in my country.

At his elder brother’s funeral, Moinuddin Haider was asked if he saw any connection between his own remarks and his brother’s death. He politely replied, “I am still of the belief that we should not let some illiterate zealots run the country.”

It is clear that Pakistan, a country that came into being in the name of Islam, is passing through the most dangerous times of its half-century existence.

On its eastern border, tension is building with old foe India after a December 13 terrorist attack — by Pakistan-based Kashmiri separatists — on the Indian Parliament, an attack that killed 14 people. On its western border, an unwelcoming Kabul government blames Pakistan for three decades of strife. Internally, Pakistan bears the wrath of Muslim radicals upset that President Pervez Musharraf sided with the U.S.-led coalition and could be making a compromise with India on the Kashmir (news - web sites) issue.

On top of all this, the possibility that Osama bin Laden (news - web sites) has found refuge in Pakistan adds to the quandary. Speculation about bin Laden’s whereabouts, running high for weeks, grew most intense last week when a spokesman for Afghan’s defense ministry, Mohammed Habeel, accused a pro-Taliban religious leader, Maulana Fazlur Rahman, of giving protection to the world’s most wanted man. “Attack is permissible on any country — be it Pakistan or any other — that gives protection to Osama. We support that type of attack,’’ Habeel said.

The Pakistani press contacted Maulana Fazlur Rahman, who has been detained in his hometown of Dera Ismail Khan for the past three months on sedition charges. He dismissed the allegation as a political gimmick. One of his aides said, “Though we do support the Taliban, we never had any connection with Osama bin Laden. This is part of an international scheme to pressure the Musharraf government to come down hard on religious parties, akin to the [actions of the] secular states of Egypt and Algeria, thus throwing Pakistan into the flames of civil war.”

Rahman heads Pakistan’s largest religious party — Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, the party of Muslim scholars that has been an ally of the Taliban. It has a large presence in Pakistan’s western border areas, and in the initial days of the war on the Taliban, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam organized one of the largest anti-government, pro-Taliban violent rallies in Pakistan. It was because of these demonstrations that General Musharraf’s fragile government decided to charge Fazlur Rahman with sedition, on grounds that he tried to incite the armed forces to overthrow the general’s pro-West government.

I spoke with one of my military sources about the Afghan defense-

ministry spokesman’s support of an attack on Pakistan if it is harboring bin Laden. “Kabul is playing into the hands of India,” he told me. “In times when we are facing warlike situations on our eastern border, Northern Alliance people want to settle the score with Pakistan. They hope Pakistan will meet a fate akin to that of the Taliban.”

Independent political observers do not rule out that bin Laden may have been aided by a pro-Taliban faction of one of Pakistan’s intelligence agencies. “It is no secret that Pakistan’s ruling clique is divided on the issue of the Taliban and Osama,” said Riaz Chandio, a political activist. “Therefore it is likely that while President Musharraf is helping the U.S. to capture Osama and members of the Taliban leadership, one or another head of numerous intelligence agencies is helping Osama to avoid meeting that fate.”

In late October, Osama apparently got advance warning less than three hours before the missile bombardment of Beni Hissar camp, a hideout near Kabul. It’s anyone’s guess who may have tipped him off, but some believe Pakistani sources saved him.

It is not a new phenomenon for Pakistan that the government of the day follows one policy and the intelligence agencies go the opposite way. “He may be in a safe house under the protection of one intelligence ally, watching soldiers of fortune as they hunt him in the rugged Afghan mountains,” Chandio said.

A political commentator speaks for most Pakistanis when he says that now is the time to close once and for all this chapter of Muslim radicalism and Osama-brand terror. “Though he may be dead under the debris of a cave or running endlessly for his life, he opened a wide chasm between them and us. It will be in the interests of all of us to close this chapter, better sooner than later.”

It is troubling that the game on the global chessboard does not follow rules driven by morality. We may be witnessing more turmoil in coming times. One Osama may be replaced by another, and the terror may continue.

Sigalph

From the little that I have read of Thomas Friedman`s book `From Beirut to Jerusalem` ... I must say Friedman has come across as very balanced person, though not always so otherwise.

Our own Patrick once referred me to the book `Lexus and the Olive tree`, a wonderful read, so I have followed Thomas Friedman`s work for over a year now ... it started as a project for my Economics of Japan class. Another great man, with whom my own person relationship is strained currently, is Dr.Sprachman, a jewish professor of Persian and Middle Eastern Literature. Despite our differences, I hold him to be the best professor I had at Rutgers University. Come to think of it, Noam Chomsky, Stephen Cohen (the famous Muslim-defending attorney), and some of the most amazing minds of this century have all been jews.

Ok so coming to Rushdie... why do you think his book, the Satanic Verses was nasty. It was a superb piece beyond the understanding of small minds that dot the muslim world today. Sigalph I am sure if you read it, you will see what I mean.

The Muslim society has not yet understood the concept of `fiction` and `irony`. A contract of fiction is that the writer creates a narrator and the narrator then narrates the story from his perspective. There is a divorce technically between the views of the author and the narrator since the author is just the medium for the narrator fictional as he/she maybe.

Re: sigalph235

``...Same with Friedman. His book `From Beirut to Jerusalem` is a scathing indictment of Israel`s policy in Lebanon. Like Bernard Lewis, Friedman is a Jew as well...``

And Friedman is strongly opposed to Israel`s policies of creating settlements on the West Bank

CHANGOH PAACHISTAAN.------PAKISTAAN ZINDAABAAD(in chinese).

__________________________________________________

China fully behind Pakistan in ``potentially volatile situation``



Pakistan said that China stood 100 percent behind Islamabad as it faced a ``potentially volatile situation`` with India.

Chinese Prime Minister Zhu Rongji met with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf for three hours Thursday in Beijing and assured him of China`s ``principled and everlasting support`` for Islamabad, said a Pakistani official statement.

``China considers Pakistan its very reliable and close friend and will always stand by Pakistan,`` said the statement, released after Musharraf arrived Friday in Nepal for a South Asian summit also attended by Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee.

It said Zhu ``expressed his apprehension at the potentially volatile situation that has arisen due to the assembling of Indian forces close to the Pakistani border`` and ``appreciated the restraint exercised by Pakistan.``

Pakistani spokesman Rashid Qureshi later said that ``China stood by Pakistan and still stands by Pakistan. It will support Pakistan in all eventuality.``

The statement added Zhu ``complimented President Musharraf for his diplomatic vision, leadership and quality of statemanship that he has demonstrated in the handling of the current crisis`` and ``in a gesture of extreme warmth embraced Musharraf`` as he left Beijing.

The Pakistani leader held a day of talks in Beijing before heading to Kathmandu, after India barred Pakistani airplanes from its airspace.

Poor weather conditions in China delayed Musharraf by several hours Friday, which meant that the summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) was postponed for a day until Saturday.

Musharraf`s delay also prompted the cancellation of a Saturday retreat near Mount Everest that would have been the most likely venue for a meeting between Vajpayee and Musharraf away from the media.

Vajpayee has publicly ruled out a two-way summit with Musharraf in Kathmandu, insisting that Pakistan must first crack down harder on Islamic militant groups which India blames for a December 13 attack on the parliament in New Delhi.

The two countries have since been building up forces along their common border and exchanging fire in the hotly disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir.

China is Pakistan`s key ally and Musharraf has visited Beijing twice in as many months.

perfect gentlemen.At least they has a sense of honour & respect which the British babboons lacked.

__________________________________________________

From Washington Post:

Muslims!These are the kind of THUGS you`re up against.At least it makes the real thugs(where the word originates from)who worshipped Kaali look like perfect gentlemen.At least they has a sense of honour & respect which the British babboons lacked.

__________________________________________________

When Seeing and Hearing Isn`t Believing





By William M. Arkin

Special to washingtonpost.com

``Gentlemen! We have called you together to inform you that we are going to overthrow the United States government.`` So begins a statement being delivered by Gen. Carl W. Steiner, former Commander-in-chief, U.S. Special Operations Command.

At least the voice sounds amazingly like him.

But it is not Steiner. It is the result of voice ``morphing`` technology developed at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.

By taking just a 10-minute digital recording of Steiner`s voice, scientist George Papcun is able, in near real time, to clone speech patterns and develop an accurate facsimile. Steiner was so impressed, he asked for a copy of the tape.

Steiner was hardly the first or last victim to be spoofed by Papcun`s team members. To refine their method, they took various high quality recordings of generals and experimented with creating fake statements. One of the most memorable is Colin Powell stating ``I am being treated well by my captors.``

``They chose to have him say something he would never otherwise have said,`` chuckled one of Papcun`s colleagues.

A Box of Chocolates is Like War

Most Americans were introduced to the tricks of the digital age in the movie Forrest Gump, when the character played by Tom Hanks appeared to shake hands with President Kennedy.

For Hollywood, it is special effects. For covert operators in the U.S. military and intelligence agencies, it is a weapon of the future.

``Once you can take any kind of information and reduce it into ones and zeros, you can do some pretty interesting things,`` says Daniel T. Kuehl, chairman of the Information Operations department of the National Defense University in Washington, the military`s school for information warfare.

[ PSYOPS seeks to exploit human vulnerabilities in enemy governments, militaries and populations.]

Digital morphing — voice, video, and photo — has come of age, available for use in psychological operations. PSYOPS, as the military calls it, seek to exploit human vulnerabilities in enemy governments, militaries and populations to pursue national and battlefield objectives.

To some, PSYOPS is a backwater military discipline of leaflet dropping and radio propaganda. To a growing group of information war technologists, it is the nexus of fantasy and reality. Being able to manufacture convincing audio or video, they say, might be the difference in a successful military operation or coup.

Allah on the Holodeck

Pentagon planners started to discuss digital morphing after Iraq`s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Covert operators kicked around the idea of creating a computer-faked videotape of Saddam Hussein crying or showing other such manly weaknesses, or in some sexually compromising situation. The nascent plan was for the tapes to be flooded into Iraq and the Arab world.

The tape war never proceeded, killed, participants say, by bureaucratic fights over jurisdiction, skepticism over the technology, and concerns raised by Arab coalition partners.

[ What if the U.S. projected a holographic image of Allah floating over Baghdad? ]



But the ``strategic`` PSYOPS scheming didn`t die. What if the U.S. projected a holographic image of Allah floating over Baghdad urging the Iraqi people and Army to rise up against Saddam, a senior Air Force officer asked in 1990?

According to a military physicist given the task of looking into the hologram idea, the feasibility had been established of projecting large, three-dimensional objects that appeared to float in the air.

But doing so over the skies of Iraq? To project such a hologram over Baghdad on the order of several hundred feet, they calculated, would take a mirror more than a mile square in space, as well as huge projectors and power sources.

And besides, investigators came back, what does Allah look like?

The Gulf War hologram story might be dismissed were it not the case that washingtonpost.com has learned that a super secret program was established in 1994 to pursue the very technology for PSYOPS application. The ``Holographic Projector`` is described in a classified Air Force document as a system to ``project information power from space ... for special operations deception missions.``

War is Like a Box of Chocolate

Voice-morphing? Fake video? Holographic projection? They sound more like Mission Impossible and Star Trek gimmicks than weapons. Yet for each, there are corresponding and growing research efforts as the technologies improve and offensive information warfare expands.

Whereas early voice morphing required cutting and pasting speech to put letters or words together to make a composite, Papcun`s software developed at Los Alamos can far more accurately replicate the way one actually speaks. Eliminated are the robotic intonations.

The irony is that after Papcun finished his speech cloning research, there were no takers in the military. Luckily for him, Hollywood is interested: The promise of creating a virtual Clark Gable is mightier than the sword.

Video and photo manipulation has already raised profound questions of authenticity for the journalistic world. With audio joining the mix, it is not only journalists but also privacy advocates and the conspiracy-minded who will no doubt ponder the worrisome mischief that lurks in the not too distant future.

``We already know that seeing isn`t necessarily believing,`` says Dan Kuehl, ``now I guess hearing isn`t either.``

William M. Arkin, author of ``The U.S. Military Online,`` is a leading expert on national security and the Internet. He lectures and writes on nuclear weapons, military matters and information warfare. An Army intelligence analyst from 1974-1978, Arkin currently consults for Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, MSNBC and the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Arkin can be reached for comment atwilliam_arkin@washingtonpost.com.

© 1999 The Washington Post Company

re fatimah #88

YLH has asid it well. Bernard Lewis is one of the most Arabophile experts of the Middle East. Even his son, Tony, admits that(and probably regrets it given that the younger Lewis is a bit more partisan to Israel).

Same with Friedman. His book `From Beirut to Jerusalem` is a scathing indictment of Israel`s policy in Lebanon. Like Bernard Lewis, Friedman is a Jew as well. That has not stopped him from attempting to be unprejudiced. Nor have the Jewish rabbis declared him or Lewis apostates. Hence lies the difference between the Jewish clerics and Islamic clerics.

It is a sad testament to avant-garde Muslim traits that Muslims condemned Salman Rushdie to death for writing a nasty book but cannot even bring themselves to UNRESERVEDLY condemn men who have made it their life`s mission to kill, torture, maim, and hate.

And we wonder why Islam is suspect in the West.

Interesting letter to the editor from latest TFT edition.

Mush Quotes

“Don’t bomb the Taliban, I will negotiate.”

“Ok bomb them but don’t kill them.”

“Ok kill them but make it quick.”

“Ok follow your own time-table but give me moolah or my mullahs will chew me out.”

“Ok don’t kill all of them, spare the moderate Taliban.”

“Ok kill all the Taliban but give me 28 F-16s or my people will chew me out.”

“Ok don’t give me F-16s but give me a billion dollars.”

“Ok don’t bomb during Ramadan or I’ll have to live at the Ramada Inn (Boston) for the rest of my life.”

“Ok now don’t let the NA take over Kabul.”

“Ok let them take over Kabul but let’s have a broad-based government.”

“Ok let them form their own government, but don’t ask me to let my citizens do the same.”

Javed Khan,

Los Angeles.