October 2001

U.S.nuclear threats against Afghanistan!
Posted: Wednesday, October 31, 2001

Dear friends,

I am herewith forwarding a mail that I read in "The Hindu" which says that the U.S. defense secretary has not ruled out the use of nuclear
weapons in Afghanistan!! The barbarism of this statement shocked me as it should truly shock you! I am refusing to believe that we are living in the twentieth century!

The USA has already flaunted international law by bombing innocent
Afghan people to catch a few people it believes to be those behind the terror attacks on the USA!

If the United States army has balls it has to send armed ground troops
to engage the Taliban instead of bombing innocent Afghan civilians from the air in order to catch those individuals who were former pals of the CIA and to overthrow the Taliban regime which was created by American support and funds in the first place!

But now the threat to use nuclear weapons by the U.S. defense secretary nauseates me and I really want to throw up!! I truly detest the USA and the American people for the first time in my life! The barbarism of threatening nuclear attacks against a country which has no modern army and the real possibility of nuking millions of Afghan people to their deaths just to catch a few individuals and to overthrow a regime originally created by America is cannibalistic to say the least!! This sort of cannibalism in the internet age is made possible only by the mindless, thoughtless and fascist support accorded by the ignorant and bigoted American people to their
Government!

I want you to do everything that is possible to prevent US Government
from using nuclear weapons in Afghanistan!! Please write a letter to the local newspaper, your member of parliament, senator or congressman or go out and protest!!

Stop this shameful cannibalistic threats from becoming a reality!

Please act now!

With regards,
Iniyan Elango (alias) R.S.Sridhar

The following is the report by "The Hindu":

N-weapons not ruled out?

By Sridhar Krishnaswami

WASHINGTON, OCT. 29. The Bush administration has refused to rule out
the possibility of using nuclear weapons in its campaign against
Afghanistan if the present military hardware is unable to flush out terrorists and their operational facilities from the underground tunnels and caves.

The Defence Secretary, Mr. Donald Rumsfeld, maintained in a Sunday
talk show that "the 5,000 pound bombs are going to be able to do the job of hitting the Al-Qaeda in their underground facilities. But when pressed for an answer on whether or not the U.S. would rule out the use of nuclear weapons, especially the smaller tactical nuclear weapons, he said, "I don't rule out anything".

There has been at least one person on Capitol Hill - Congressman Steve
Buyer of Indiana - who has taken the position that if the United States is unable to make much headway with the 5000 pounders to penetrate and level the cave facilities of the Al- Qaeda, the administration should think about using tactical nuclear weapons, not the larger ones in the stockpile.

During the talk show, Mr. Rumsfeld was reminded that in the Gulf War,
the U.S. had deliberately refused to rule out a nuclear strike should Mr. Saddam Hussein resort to a nuclear, chemical or biological attack.

As far as the situation in Afghanistan was concerned, Mr. Rumsfeld
would go no more than reiterating what he had said on earlier occasions. "The U.S. has historically refused to rule out the use of weapons like that," the Defence Secretary remarked.

Pak. rejects 'even the thought'

B. Muralidhar Reddy reports from Islamabad:

Pakistan on Monday rejected "even the thought" of using nuclear
weapons tactically or otherwise in Afghanistan.

"We firmly and categorically reject even the thought of using nuclear
weapons tactically or otherwise," the Pakistan Foreign Office
spokesman, Mr. Riaz Mohammad Khan, told correspondents in response to a question about a statement attributed Mr. Rumsfeld on use of nuclear weapons in Afghanistan.

News
Posted: Wednesday, October 31, 2001

Israeli state terror claims two more Palestinian victims

Al-Khalil, Oct 31, IRNA -- Israel's state terror claimed two more Palestinian lives Wednesday, bringing to four the number of Palestinians assassinated by Israeli occupation troops on the West Bank in less than 12 hours.

Palestinian sources in Nablus said Israeli occupation troops strafed the two villages of Bezaria and Burqa with heavy machinegun fire, injuring and maiming many people.

The sources said that at least two of the wounded were left to bleed to death as the Israeli army refused to allow ambulances to take the two to hospital.

The identities of the two are still unknown.

Earlier, the Israeli occupation army assassinated a businessman in Tulkarm identified as Abdullah al-Jaroushi, apparently for his Islamic
ideas. MORE

Serious anthrax case in New York as postal scare widens

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - New York suffered its first case of inhalation anthrax on Tuesday and spores were detected in three more postal facilities in the Washington area and Florida as U.S. authorities battled to find those responsible for the germ warfare attacks.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed on Tuesday that a critically ill Manhattan hospital worker had been infected with the deadliest form of anthrax, adding to fears that the germ warfare agent was spreading more widely through the mail. MORE

Bin Laden underwent treatment in July at Dubai American Hospital

Osama bin Laden underwent treatment in July at the American Hospital in Dubai where he met a US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) official, French daily Le Figaro and Radio France International reported.

Quoting "a witness, a professional partner of the administrative management of the hospital," they said the man suspected by the United States of being behind the September 11 terrorist attacks had arrived in Dubai on July 4 by air from Quetta, Pakistan.

He was immediately taken to the hospital for kidney treatment. He left the establishment on July 14, Le Figaro said.

During his stay, the daily said, the local CIA representative was seen going into bin Laden's room and "a few days later, the CIA man boasted to some friends of having visited the Saudi-born millionaire."

Quoting "an authoritative source," Le Figaro and the radio station said the CIA representative had been recalled to Washington on July 15. MORE

Rights Groups Seek Facts on Sept. 11 Detainees

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A group of 21 civil liberties, human rights and electronic privacy organizations filed a request under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act on Monday seeking information about individuals arrested or detained in America after the Sept. 11 attacks.

"We have been deeply disappointed with the government's refusal to respond to our previous inquiries and to release information that would assure the American public that this crucial investigation is being conducted with the basic protections guaranteed by our laws," Gregory Nojeim, the associate director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Washington national office, said in a statement.

Nearly 1,000 people have been detained since the attacks on the United States, and rights groups say they have had trouble getting information on those held. MORE

BBC Escapes Censure Over Broadcast

LONDON -- Britain's television watchdog said Wednesday it would not censure the British Broadcasting Corp. over a television debate on the Sept. 11 terror attacks that drew more than 200 complaints from viewers.

The BBC has conceded that it was inappropriate to screen the "Question Time" debate just two days after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Some 217 viewers complained to the Broadcasting Standards Commission about strong anti-American opinions expressed by members of the studio audience. One panelist, former U.S. ambassador to London Philip Lader, appeared close to tears after outbursts from audience members.

On Sept. 15, BBC director-general Greg Dyke conceded that the broadcast was inappropriate and apologized to offended viewers. MORE

Muslim Leader Condemns Afghan Strikes

BEIRUT, Lebanon -- In a speech at the American University of Beirut, a senior Muslim cleric with past ties to anti-American militants likened the U.S. bombardment of Afghanistan to the Sept. 11 attacks that prompted it.

Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah told an audience of about 450 that U.S. forces are "trying out their weaponry" and are killing civilians.

"What is the difference between the terrorism of those who crashed planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and what the Americans are doing?" Fadlallah said. "In both cases, innocents are being killed." MORE

Muslim clerics threaten Musharraf

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Oct. 30 (UPI) -- Thousands of Muslim clerics and their followers plan to enter the Pakistani capital Islamabad next week, and they vow to stay there as long as it takes to topple the government.

In a statement to the Pakistani press, the Afghan Defense Council said it has asked its followers to "come to Islamabad on Nov. 7 with food, tents and blankets and stay there as long as it takes to make the government change its Afghan policy. If it fails to do so, we will stay as long as it takes to change the government."

The council, an umbrella group of 19 religious parties, opposes President Pervez Musharraf's decision to back U.S. airstrikes on Afghanistan that began Oct. 7. The group also wants the Musharraf government to take back five air bases it has allowed U.S. forces to use for operations in Afghanistan and instead support Kabul's Taliban
regime. MORE

CNN Chief Orders 'Balance' in War News

The chairman of CNN has ordered his staff to balance images of civilian devastation in Afghan cities with reminders that the Taliban harbors murderous terrorists, saying it "seems perverse to focus too much on the casualties or hardship in Afghanistan."

In a memo to his international correspondents, Walter Isaacson said: "As we get good reports from Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, we must redouble our efforts to make sure we do not seem to be simply reporting from their vantage or perspective. We must talk about how the Taliban are using civilian shields and how the Taliban have harbored the terrorists responsible for killing close to 5,000 innocent people." MORE

Information Lockdown

Viewers of the old spy spoof Get Smart will remember the Cone of Silence--that giant plastic hair-salon dryer that descended over Maxwell Smart and Control when they held a sensitive conversation. Today, a Cone of Silence has descended over all of Washington: From four-star generals to lowly webmasters, the town is in information lockdown. Never in the nation's history has the flow of information from government to press and public been shut off so comprehensively and quickly as in the weeks following September 11. Much of the shutdown seems to have little to do with preventing future terrorism and everything to do with the Administration's laying down a new across-the-board standard for centralized control of the public's right to know. MORE

News
Posted: Tuesday, October 30, 2001

Lebanon hopes to draw Gulf investment away from US

BEIRUT, Oct 30 (Reuters) - Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri inaugurated on Tuesday a $150 million Saudi-managed real estate project that he hopes will mark a U-turn in Gulf investment after last month's attacks on the United States.

"The fact that this project comes after September 11 is very significant. Lebanon is resurrecting itself," Hariri said during the groundbreaking ceremony of Marina Towers, a luxury apartment complex overlooking a new $170 million marina in central Beirut.

Saudi Arabia warns over harassment

BBC - Saudi Arabia has said it will call on its citizens to return from the United States if harassment against them persists.
Following the 11 September suicide attacks, Saudi citizens living in the US have reported maltreatment and humiliation from both the public and the authorities. MORE

Israel stays put in West Bank despite U.S. demand

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel has maintained its grip on Palestinian areas in the northern West Bank in defiance of the United States as reports emerge that Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres is drafting a peace plan.

In the West Bank city of Jenin, Palestinian gunmen prepared for a deeper Israeli incursion and said they had placed home-made mines around the West Bank city and its refugee camp.

Peres said Israeli troops would leave Jenin and move away from other Palestinian-controlled cities only when Palestinians "will be ready to take over security and be in charge of tranquility".

The United States, keen to bolster Arab support for its anti-terror coalition, has demanded Israel withdraw from all Palestinian areas. MORE

Zimbabwe demands respect from EU

BBC - Zimbabwe's government has said it is ready to meet European Union demands for discussions on the country's human rights record.

But it is continuing to reject a warning from the EU that the country may face sanctions unless it stops intimidating political opponents, and allows European monitors in to observe next year's presidential election.

Foreign Affairs Minister Stan Mudenge said Zimbabwe is ready to engage the EU with an open mind but would not be dictated to.

"It is important that the international community understands that we are not going to accept the kind of ultimatums like the one we got on the subject of election observers," Mr Mudenge said. MORE

News
Posted: Monday, October 29, 2001

Four killed in French gun attack

A gunman this morning opened fire on passers by in the French city of Tours, killing at least four people and wounding about 10 others.
An assailant was captured in an underground parking lot across from the train station after he took refuge there, the region's police headquarters said.

The suspect, who injured in a scuffle with police, was taken to the hospital. Some news sources report that a second assailant evaded the police. MORE

New case of anthrax in US

A female New Jersey postal worker has become the eighth confirmed case of inhalation anthrax in the US, it was confirmed today, as health officials continued their search for evidence of contamination and thousands of Americans took preventive antibiotics.
Tom Skinner, a spokesman for the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, stressed that the New Jersey case was not a new instance of the disease, but one that had been listed as suspected anthrax. Lab tests confirmed the diagnosis yesterday, he said.

There have been 14 confirmed cases of anthrax in the outbreak, including eight inhalation versions of the disease. Six people in New York and New Jersey are being treated for the less dangerous skin form of anthrax and a number of other cases are suspected.

More than 10,000 people who may have been exposed to the bacteria have been urged to begin taking antibiotics as a precaution. MORE

Taliban claim arresting alleged CIA agent

KAVKAZ CENTER - Taliban have claimed arresting an American at Spin Buldock on the Pak-Afghan joint border.Taliban authorities say documents recovered from him shows that his name is Mazhar Ayub and he was arrested when he was entering Spin Buldock from Chamman. Qari Abdul Wakil, a Taliban official says that the arrested man has served in the U.S. army from 1971 to 1991. He has also fought during the Vietnam war. He had also worked for the CNN from 1992 to 1998. After 1998, he visited Karachi, Lahore and Peshawar where he recently worked with the UNCHR in the refugee camps.

According to NNI, Taliban official said that Ayub was giving information to the Americans and other Western countries about the Afghans. Taliban also think that his name could not be Mazhar Ayub. They recovered form him maps of Afghanistan and other information and books on Afghanistan. MORE

Iran Should Remain Neutral on Afghan Issue

TEHRAN Since the U.S. war on Afghanistan is lasting longer than expected, a difference of opinion has occurred in Iran. Some believe that Iran should lend support to the Taleban, while others think it would be unwise to take the Taleban's side and they condone what the United States is doing in Afghanistan. The TEHRAN TIMES conducted interviews with a number of experts and Majlis deputies to find out their opinions on this sensitive subject. MORE

CIA Undertakes Assassination Mission: U.S. Daily

TEHRAN The U.S. daily ***The Washington Post **, the mouthpiece of the White House, said yesterday that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was planning covert missions aimed at assassinating specific individuals. MORE

Why Saudis won't change tune

By Joseph A. Kechichian
LOS ANGELES - In its effort to curb the spread of anti-American hatred, Washington has called on Saudi Arabia to end certain activities, including financial support of extremist Islamic institutions. Less erudite critics have called on the Saudi regime to "stop lying" to the United States.

But Saudi leaders are not going to commit suicide, which is where Western demands would likely lead. Simply stated, Saudi Arabia cannot change its traditional doctrines: Doing so would mean the end of Al Saud rule - and the end of stable oil prices. Senior members of the ruling family have a "will to power" that will likely withstand the current crisis. MORE

4 women shot dead in Israel

AL-QUDS, Oct 28: Two Palestinian gunmen opened fire in the Israeli city of Hadera on Sunday, killing four women and injuring 31 others before being shot dead themselves by Israeli police, Israeli radio and television reported.

The Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the attack in a videotaped statement sent to TV stations in the West Bank town of Nablus.

It identified the two gunmen shot dead as Yussef Mohammad Ali Sweitat, 22, and Taysir Shehadeh Jabali, 23, from a refugee camp in Jenin in the northern West Bank, around 40 kms from Hadera.-AFP From Dawn.com

'War is at my Black Skin'
Posted: Sunday, October 28, 2001

JAMAICA OBSERVER - IT is wholly appropriate that Sir Vidia Naipaul should have been awarded this year's Nobel Prize for Literature. Sir Vidia, a most eloquent and gifted writer, has been a fountain of joy for those who believe that the 'end of history' has sanctified capitalism and the Mid-Atlantic way of life.

Naipaul has been at pains for four decades, to explain away the 'White Man's Burden'. He has made it his mission to explain to the Anglo-Saxon world the painful deficiencies of the lesser breeds, so granting absolution to those who may have felt guilt about mistreating the masses of humanity without the law.

My only meeting with Naipaul was 42 years ago, around the time of Jamaica's independence, when he was writing The Middle Passage. I helped shepherd him round Kingston and, unwisely, as it turned out, was responsible for inviting him to a party at a house in Trafalgar Park. There, a furious argument broke out between two of my friends, Parboosingh, the painter and Basil Keane the dentist. This row was later immortalised in The Middle Passage as one example of the 'Congolese behaviour' Naipaul found so acutely distressing.

The use of the term 'Congolese behaviour' was a giveaway. It was not only a deliberate insult to Jamaicans but to the Congolese, whose prime minister, Patrice Lumumba, had recently been murdered by the Belgians on behalf of the Americans. It was the kind of express malice which is Naipaul's signature in his dealings with his ex-compatriots in the post-colonial world.

Naipaul is, as far as I am concerned, a lifeless robot with a second-hand soul. MORE

The cocaine pile-up
Posted: Sunday, October 28, 2001

JAMAICA OBSERVER - SINCE the tragic September 11 attack on the WTC complex in New York not only have the economy of the US and those countries that rely on it as a vital trade outlet been affected, but in the illicit movement of drugs into the great market that the USA is, serious pile-ups are now occurring.

As Jamaica has established itself as one of the main trans-shipment points in the movement of cocaine from South America to the United States, at any one time there are shipments-in-waiting someplace in Jamaica ready to take off by sea or air to one of the many islands in the Bahamas or another of the outlying islands for ultimate destination, USA.

With the tightening of security worldwide and especially at the points of entry into the USA, the local handlers in Jamaica and the South American suppliers are in a panic as they attempt to figure out how to make money on goods that cannot move to their natural market.

The laws of economics apply here too. Costs are skyrocketing. Security costs both for local carriage of the goods and for gunmen; "soldiers", with high-powered weapons to do guard duty are up. MORE

News
Posted: Sunday, October 28, 2001

Nigerian Leader Breaks Silence

ABUJA, Nigeria -- Nigeria's president broke his silence about a massacre of 150 civilians by soldiers sent to put down ethnic unrest, saying on Sunday that the soldiers may have acted out of self-defense.

President Olusegun Obasanjo also said military intervention should be used only as a last resort to end growing violence in the West African nation.

Soldiers face "certain risks," he said in a state television interview. "Whatever they are taught to do or not to do, soldiers fight in self-defense." He emphasized he was not "justifying any killing."

The comments were his first on the bloodshed in Benue, a remote part of eastern Nigeria where a longtime conflict between ethnic Tivs and Jukuns has heated up in recent weeks, with tribal fighters hacking off the limbs of women and children and burning villages. MORE

Rev. Sharpton Begins Israel Trip

JERUSALEM -- The Rev. Al Sharpton, the New York civil rights activist, began a three-day visit to Israel on Sunday to show solidarity with terror victims and appeal to religious leaders to stop Mideast violence.

On Monday, he is scheduled to meet Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, dine with Jewish religious leaders and visit classmates of victims of a June 1 suicide bomb attack on a Tel Aviv disco, which killed 21 young partygoers.

"He's got a pretty full schedule meeting families of terror victims," Sharpton's spokeswoman Rachel Noerdlinger said. She added that for the moment his itinerary was focused on Israeli victims but Palestinians could also come on to the agenda. MORE

Rioting Continues in Belfast

BELFAST, Northern Ireland -- Rioting flared Sunday in a divided section of Belfast as Northern Ireland headed toward a crucial legislative vote. More than 20 police officers were injured.

Catholics and Protestants fought along Limestone Road, a common flashpoint for sectarian violence, a Royal Ulster Constabulary spokesman said.

One civilian was taken to a nearby hospital with facial injuries believed to have been caused by a pipe bomb, he added.

Several homemade grenades were thrown at police and army lines during fighting that continued all day, police said. They said 23 officers were wounded, and several security force vehicles were damaged. MORE

13 Civilian Deaths Reported in U.S. Raid

KABUL, Afghanistan -- U.S. attacks on Kabul killed at least 13 civilians Sunday, witnesses said, one day after U.S. missiles rocketed hamlets along the front line north of here, killing and maiming villagers.

American warplanes also pounded targets in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif, the Taliban stronghold of Kandahar in the south, Herat in the west and Jalalabad in the east, said the Afghan Islamic Press, a private news agency.

In neighboring Pakistan, officials said the government had turned over to U.S. officials a suspect wanted in connection with the bombing of the USS Cole last year, a Yemeni microbiology student. It was the first known arrest outside Yemen in connection with the attack, which Osama bin Laden is suspected of organizing. MORE

U.S. bombs kill 12 civilians in Kabul

KABUL (Reuters) - U.S. warplanes killed 12 civilians in air raids early today on the Afghan capital Kabul, including eight members of a family whose house was hit while they were eating breakfast.

Residents said seven children and their father died when their house was struck by what appeared to be a missile and two more people died in the neighbourhood. MORE

Gunmen kill 15 Christians in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Unidentified gunmen on motorcycles have shot dead 15 Christians at Sunday prayers in the central Pakistani town of Bahawalpur, according to police. MORE

US bombing error kills nine

BBC - A US missile fired has struck a village in Afghan territory controlled by the anti-Taleban Northern Alliance. Nine people from two families were killed when the bomb hit the village of Ghani Kheil on Saturday afternoon, according to Red Cross sources, and up to 20 were injured.

Sunday has seen fewer bombing raids, after the heaviest attacks of the air offensive so far on Saturday. The opposition had earlier called on the US to inflict heavier bombing on Taleban forces on the front lines. MORE

News
Posted: Saturday, October 27, 2001

Basque Group Lays Claim to Attacks

MADRID, Spain -- Claiming responsibility for a series of bombings, the Basque separatist group ETA hinted Sunday it was willing to lay down its arms provided Spain holds a vote on independence for the northern region.

The gesture by what is now Europe's last major group waging a violent political struggle suggests it feels cornered following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington and the Irish Republican Army's move toward disarmament last week.

Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar rejected the ETA proposal, as he has previous appeals for a referendum on Basque statehood. He said the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States made clear that showing tolerance to terrorists was "suicide." MORE

Somali Gov't. Loses No-Confidence Vote

MOGADISHU, Somalia -- Somalia's fledgling government lost a no-confidence vote Sunday, ending the tenure of the country's prime minister and his Cabinet after just 13 months.

Out of 174 legislators attending parliament Sunday, 141 voted against Prime Minister Ali Khalif Galaydh and his 84-member government, while 29 voted in favor, according to parliamentary speaker Abdalleh Derow Issak. Four abstained.

The government will remain in place until President Abdiqasim Salad Hassan nominates a new prime minister, who will then have 30 days to appoint a new Cabinet, Issak said. MORE

Atta Info Passed to US After Sept. 11

PRAGUE, Czech Republic -- The Czech government told the United States about a meeting between hijacker Mohamed Atta and an Iraqi intelligence agent only after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the interior minister said Sunday.

Stanislav Gross, whose post puts him in charge of police, said there was no reason to think too much of the meeting between Atta and Iraqi agent Ahmad Khalil Ibrahim Samir Al-Ani, who was under Czech surveillance at the time and in April was expelled from the country. MORE

Israel calls off West Bank pullout

Israel says it is postponing indefinitely a troop pullout from Bethlehem and a neighbouring Palestinian town because of continuing violence, dealing a blow to U.S. efforts to calm the conflict. MORE

Red Cross Stunned by Bombing

GENEVA -- The international Red Cross has in the past seen its aid supplies looted, its staff threatened, attacked and even murdered. But it was stunned when U.S. warplanes bombed its aid compound in the Afghan capital, Kabul -- for a second time.

"The word 'astounded' comes to mind," said Kim Gordon-Bates, spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross, Saturday. A day earlier, the United States dropped eight tons of bombs on the compound, setting fire to three of the four buildings still standing after the previous attack on Oct. 16.

Add that to the fact that its expatriate staff is in exile, visits to prisoners of war have stopped and the Afghan winter is coming fast, and the ICRC is having a hard time carrying out what it claims is vital relief work in Afghanistan.

"Afghanistan is an incredibly difficult place to work in. It's a challenge, it always has been a challenge," said Gordon-Bates, who was head of an ICRC office in Gulbahar, north of Kabul, until earlier this year. MORE

The Israeli re-conquests

AL-AHRAM - Five days and around 25 Palestinian deaths into Israel's most concerted military offensive ever against Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority, the Americans finally drew a line in the sand. "The Israel Defence Forces should be withdrawn immediately from all Palestinian-controlled areas and no further such incursions should be made," announced State Department spokesperson Philip Reeker in Washington on Monday.

Ariel Sharon initially defied the imperial decree but then started to budge, courtesy of the multi-lingual prowess of his Foreign Minister. "'Immediately' in English doesn't mean 'at once'", Shimon Peres drilled Israeli reporters in Washington on Tuesday. "It means 'as soon as possible'".

It actually means 48 to 62 hours which, according to reports in the Israeli press yesterday, is when the Israeli army will leave most -- but not all -- of the Palestinian territories it has re-conquered in the last week. MORE

US demand for immediate retreat flouted

Israel issued tough new conditions for a withdrawal of forces occupying Palestinian-ruled cities yesterday, flouting the US demand for a full and immediate retreat.
Last night, Israeli and Palestinian security officials meeting under CIA auspices at a secret location in Tel Aviv decided the first withdrawals could begin as early as today in the towns of Beit Jala and Bethlehem.

The decision was reached hours after three men were shot dead in the Gaza Strip, raising the death toll in Israel's offensive against Yasser Arafat's authority to more than 50. MORE

Khatami Stresses Distinction Between Terrorists and Freedom Fighters

TEHRAN TIMES - "We believe that since terrorism is a global issue and threatens the whole humanity, the fight against the phenomenon should be deep-rooted, global and all-out," Khatami said.

"The Islamic Republic of Iran and Austria are unanimous over the fact that there should be a distinction between those who fight for the liberation of their lands and those who cause the death of innocent people through resorting to terror," the Iranian president said in reference to the popular campaign in the Palestinian lands. MORE

Vote Heard Round the World - Lee Faces Fallout for Anti-War Stand

By Earl Ofari Hutchinson, Pacific News Service, October 26, 2001

California Congresswoman Barbara Lee's sole vote against giving President Bush full license to wage war against terrorists may haunt her in an upcoming re-election bid -- even though her base is traditionally staunchly liberal. MORE

Death of key anti-Taliban leader deals US bodyblow

THE GUARDIAN - America's campaign to overthrow the Taliban and fashion a new political order in Afghanistan suffered a severe blow yesterday when it emerged that a key opposition figure had been ambushed and executed by the Kabul regime.
Abdul Haq, once a fearsome mojahedin fighter and the scourge of the Red Army during the Soviet occupation in the 1980s, was hanged with two companions at a barracks outside Kabul. Taliban troops then peppered his body with bullets, Haq's nephew, Mohammed Yousuf, was told by reliable sources inside Afghanistan. MORE

News
Posted: Friday, October 26, 2001

Hain beats a retreat over Israeli 'atrocities'

By Anton La Guardia

PETER HAIN, the Foreign Office minister, came close yesterday to accusing Israel of committing "terrorist acts" in Palestinian areas.

Speaking to foreign correspondents in London, he said: "We are just as horrified as Arab leaders and Arab peoples about the atrocities in the occupied areas - and indeed in Israel.

"It's absolutely vital that this tit-for-tat violence stops and that people get round the negotiating table and start talking rather than fighting.

"We deplore all assassinations, all terrorist attacks, whether suicide bombs in Tel Aviv or terrorist acts in the occupied areas." MORE

US senate has just approved a $ 2.76 billion assistance for the Israeli occupation.

PALESTINE-NET.COM - Israeli occupation forces raided the village of Beit Reema (northwest of Ramallah) early this morning and massacred a number of its residents (10 people so far according to Israeli English media, 5 according to their Arabic service!). Rescue teams and the media are not allowed in. Israeli forces told the Red Cross they are 'taking care' of the victims themselves.

The Israeli forces killed six other Palestinians since yesterday (5 in Tulkarm and one on Bethlehem). Five Palestinian cities (Jenin, Ramallah, Bethlehem, Qalqilia and Tulkarm) remain partly under new occupation and curfew since last Thursday. Since the new invasion, over 35 Palestinians have been killed (some assassinated) and 100s injured. Tanks roam the streets and many buildings, schools and hotels are being used as observation and sniper positions. Some houses have been demolished.

As if friendly terror pays off, the US senate has just approved a $ 2.76 billion assistance for the Israeli occupation. MORE

Anthrax found at CIA

CNN -- Traces of anthrax have been found in a building at the Central Intelligence Agency in Langley, Virginia, where incoming mail is sorted, U.S. officials tell CNN.

The amount of anthrax detected in what officials say were highly sensitive and sophisticated tests was "medically insignificant" an official said, but the building has been closed until further testing and cleaning can be done.

Officials say 31 different sites in the mail receiving building and the CIA's main mailroom have been checked since October 23. Only one site tested positive for anthrax. MORE

Nobel laureate says US strikes on Afghanistan "as despicable" as Sept 11

Egypt's Nobel Prize-winning author Naguib Mahfouz has called the war on terrorism being waged in Afghanistan "just as despicable a crime" as the September 11 attacks in the United States.

"Of course we grieved for the thousands of innocent civilians whose lives were destroyed on 11 September. But the so-called war on terrorism is just as despicable a crime," Mahfouz said in an interview published Thursday by the English-language Al-Ahram weekly.

"A million innocent Afghans will die if the bombardment does not stop," said the author and winner of the 1998 Nobel for literature.

"While the group that carried out the September 11 attack showed utter disregard for any law or standard or decency, now we find a major world power doing the same," he said. MORE

Israelis to withdraw after Dull Blade raid

GUARDIAN UK - Israel's security cabinet decided last night to start a phased withdrawal from West Bank towns entered after the assassination of cabinet minister Rehavam Zeevi - if Palestinians observe a ceasefire agreement.

Israeli, Palestinian and US security officials are to meet today to negotiate terms.

The announcement came as UN diplomats meeting Yasser Arafat issued a statement supporting the Palestinian leader's attempts to enforce a ceasefire within the Palestinian Authority. MORE

The United Nations faces an Afghan nightmare

GUARDIAN UK
By Martin Woollacott

Asked to list the requirements for a successful United Nations operation in Afghanistan, a veteran of of the world body's efforts in East Timor and Bosnia raised a warning forefinger. "Number one - don't do it," he said. It was of course meant rhetorically. Everybody who works for the United Nations, from Kofi Annan down, knows they have no choice about taking on the mission to reconstruct Afghanistan being inexorably pushed in their direction by the United States and Britain.
But it was an expression of the perplexity and anxiety among UN officials and experts about a problem which, as another said, lies somewhere on the scale "between incredibly difficult and totally impossible". Cambodia, Bosnia, Kosovo or East Timor seem almost simple by comparison.

President Bush has declared that the UN must have a role in Afghanistan, while the US Congress facilitated the payment of outstanding American dues. However, this Republican conversion has less to do with a change of mind about either the UN or the previously scorned task of "nation building" than it has with America's interests. The US does not want to be the obvious patron of any new government in Afghanistan. That would be counterproductive, both inside the country and in the Muslim world at large. So it wants somebody else to craft an accommodation between the country's rivalrous neighbours and somebody else to help bring a transitional government into being. That "somebody else" is, naturally, the UN. While delegating these taxing functions, Washington seems committed to preserving Pakistan's primacy in Afghanistan and at the same time itself wants to exert a significant influence, at least on security issues. MORE

Concern mounts over methods of tracing the dead

By David Usborne

Confusion over what will be recorded in history as the final death toll for the World Trade Centre disaster of 11 September has deepened after the revelation by American news organisations that their estimates remained far below those still being put out by the authorities in New York.

The leading media outlets have all arrived at figures ranging between 2,600 and 2,950 for people dead or missing from the attacks on the twin towers, including the 157 passengers who died on the two hijacked aircraft. They are all far adrift of the city's estimated total of more than 4,700.

Criticism of the city's methods of counting the victims has been simmering for weeks, partly because the figures have fluctuated on an almost daily basis, sometimes wildly. At one stage, just a few days after the catastrophe, the city's official number for the dead and missing stood at 6,700. MORE

News
Posted: Thursday, October 25, 2001

UN Condemns American Bombing Afghan Mosque, Village

BBC - The Taleban have captured a senior opposition figure, Abdul Haq, close to the capital Kabul. Commander Haq had been widely expected to be a key figure in any post-Taleban administration.

A Taleban spokesman said he had been seized despite efforts by US helicopters to rescue him.

The BBC's Rahimullah Yusufzai says the arrest marks a major setback in US-backed efforts to replace the Taleban regime with a broad-based and multi-ethnic government.

In an immediate reaction, the son of Afghanistan's former king Mohammed Zahir Shah confirmed Abdul Haq's capture and asked the Taleban to spare him. "We appeal to the Taleban to spare his life," Mir Wais Zahir told Reuters news agency in Rome. "This is a blow to my father's peace plan." MORE

Terror attack link in alleged $100m fraud probe

(ft.com) US federal crime investigators are probing an alleged $100m fraud by an investment company that had its offices in the World Trade Center and exploited the September 11 terrorist attacks on the buildings to divert attention from the crime.

The US Attorney-General's Office and the US Postal Inspection Service are looking into the disappearance of three or four managers from First Equity Enterprises, the sales and accounting arm of Evergreen International Spot Trading, a foreign exchange broker for private investors.

First Equity offices in were destroyed on September 11 but no employees were killed, according to Evergreen. The company ceased operating on September 24.

Investigators are trying to locate $106m held by Equity on behalf of investors. The US fraud agencies refused to comment on their findings so far but private investigators are understood to have tracked some of the missing money to Swiss bank accounts. MORE

UN Condemns American Bombing Afghan Mosque, Village

TEHRAN TIMES - In a late reaction to Americans' massacre of Afghan civilians, the United Nation has acted upon its humanitarian goal and reported killings of civilians in attacks to mosques.

The UN said Wednesday that U.S. bombs has struck a mosque in a military compound and a nearby village during raids on the western city of Herat this week, adding to a growing catalogue of bombing blunders. MORE

Anthrax spreads reach to State Department

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Anthrax has spread its potentially fatal reach to the U.S. State Department in what the Bush administration has called an onslaught by "shadow soldiers" out to murder innocent people.

The U.S. health system and postal service were on nationwide alert on Thursday for deadly weapons masquerading as envelopes but investigators appeared no nearer to pinpointing the source of the anthrax bacteria that has killed three people, made 11 more sick and forced thousands of people to be tested or treated. MORE

Powell sees "gray areas" in defining terrorism

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell has said some groups sometimes described as terrorist might be seeking to redress grievances, gain rights or achieve freedom from oppressors.

In language that contrasts strongly with the Bush administration's previous rhetoric on terrorism, he said on Thursday that not every case would be "black and white" and that there would be "gray areas" that might need to be treated politically.

To test whether groups qualify as targets against which the United States could sustain an alliance, one would have to ask whether they have a better way to "express grievances", "change the political problem" and "gain your rights", Powell said. MORE

Eighty missing after tunnel fire

BBC - Around 80 people are still missing following the inferno in Switzerland's Gotthard Tunnel, raising fears that the number killed in the disaster could rise significantly from the 10 confirmed deaths.

Rescue workers are still battling through intense heat to try to reach the crash site, more than 24 hours after two lorries collided head-on, sparking the fatal blaze. MORE

Israel defies US with bloody raid for killers

GUARDIAN UK - Israel observed the end of mourning rituals for a slain cabinet minister by thundering into a West Bank village with tanks and attack helicopters yesterday to hunt down his assassins, killing at least five people. The Palestinians condemned the bloody night raid as a massacre.
Ambulances and journalists were being prevented from entering the village.

Twelve hours into the army's siege of Beit Rima, the Israelis said they had captured a man from the village whom they accuse of driving the getaway car for gunmen who shot dead the ultra-nationalist icon Rechavam Zeevi in a Jerusalem hotel last week.

Eleven other men, from a list of 15 militants wanted in connection with other attacks on Israelis, were also arrested and transported with black hoods over their heads to the nearby Jewish settlement of Halamish for interrogation. MORE

Naming of Hijackers as Saudis May Further Erode Ties to U.S.
Abstract: NY Times

WASHINGTON, Oct. 24 — Fifteen of the 19 men who hijacked four airplanes on Sept. 11 were from Saudi Arabia, Federal authorities have said, a disclosure that is likely to complicate an already tangled and difficult relationship between Washington and Riyadh.

The identities and nationalities of the hijackers had been uncertain since the planes crashed. But after weeks of investigation here and in Saudi Arabia, federal authorities say they are now sure.

Even before the discovery that most of the hijackers were Saudis, the attacks had exposed the hidden flaws in the relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia.

In the best of times, relations with Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil supplier, are fraught with misunderstanding, insecurity and ignorance. The Saudis have long frustrated American policymakers with their ambivalence on military matters, regional diplomacy and intelligence- sharing. Real progress is made only when the most senior officials sit down behind closed doors, and the fruits of those discussions are often not seen until years later.

During the past six weeks both governments have struggled to paper over their differences and return to the basic compact: the Saudis deliver oil, the Americans deliver the weaponry that protects the oil.

"There have been and still are two pillars of the relationship: oil and security," said one senior American official who deals with Saudi Arabia. "Oil runs the world and the Saudis are the linchpin of oil production."

Business-class suspect caught in container

BY Richard Owen In Rome And Daniel Mcgrory

ITALIAN police were investigating last night why a suspected al-Qaeda hijacker would smuggle himself halfway around the world locked inside a shipping container with its own bed and toilet.
The bizarre discovery of an Egyptian carrying a Canadian passport was made on the dockside in Gioia Tauro in southern Italy, where detectives believe they may have foiled another hijacking.

They were questioning Rizik Amid Farid, 43, about his choice of travel and why he was carrying airport maps and airside security passes for Canada, Thailand and Egypt.

Unlike most stowaways they find, Mr Farid was smartly dressed, clean-shaven and rested as he stepped from his makeshift home.

He was, his captors said, "stunned" to be found with a laptop computer, two mobile phones, cameras, a Canadian passport, other identity documents and a certificate saying he is an aircraft mechanic. MORE

Taliban Detains 100 People for Questioning

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - Afghanistan's Taliban rulers have detained more than 100 people in the southern city of Kandahar and threatened to execute anyone helping the United States, a private news agency reported Wednesday.

"As per Mullah (Mohammed) Omar's decree, anyone found working for enemies will be executed after a summary trial," the South Asian Dispatch Agency quoted Mullah Abdul Razzak, an official of the Taliban interior ministry, as saying. MORE

Vietnamese Floods Claim 357 Lives

HANOI, Vietnam -- Floods in central Vietnam and the southern Mekong Delta have claimed 357 lives, including at least 250 children, since August, officials said Thursday.

Flash floods caused by heavy rains in eight central provinces and seasonal flooding in the southern Mekong Delta have caused a combined $68 million in damage, Vietnam's flood agency said. MORE

Wounded Afghans die due to lack of proper medicare

Afghan source Mashhad, Khorasan prov. Oct 25, IRNA -- Head of the Mashhad Bureau of Afghanistan's Islamic Revolution Party Mohammad-Dawood Gilani told IRNA Wednesday that many of the injured victims of the U.S. air raids die in his country due to lack of proper medical care, particularly medicine.

According to Gilani, based on the latest news from Afghanistan, during the past week alone, at least 150 victims of the U.S.-British bombardments who had received medical treatment at Afghanistan's various hospitals and then released, died due to the inappropriate,
insufficient treatment.

The Afghan party official added, "today's (Wednesday) air raids were unprecedentedly heavy in areas around Kabul."

The areas bombed in the peripheral regions of the Afghan capital on Wednesday include Bagram, the Seyfi mountainous region, Soroubi, Kheyrkhaneh, Daar-ul-Aman, and Pol-e-Charkhi in the north of Kabul.

Gilani said that at Pol-e-Charkhi, in addition to the city, a prison and a military barracks were totally demolished during the air raids.

This Islamic Republic Party official of Afghanistan expressed regret that during the Wednesday attacks, too, some more residential areas were destroyed and at least twenty civilian Afghans got killed, while a lot more were brutally wounded.

Hundreds reported killed in Nigeria
Posted: Wednesday, October 24, 2001

LAGOS (Reuters) - Soldiers have opened fire on villagers in central Nigeria and razed four communities, killing more than 200 people, witnesses say.

The massacre began Monday afternoon in Gbeji and spread to neighbouring Vaase, Anyiin and Zaki-Bian near the place where the bodies of 19 soldiers were found hacked to death on October 12, regional government officials said. MORE

News
Posted: Wednesday, October 24, 2001

MID-EAST REALITIES © - MER - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington - 10/24: The Palestinians are essentially defenseless with their backs up against the wall, the firing wall. Their "leadership" has been so corrupted and infiltrated that the Arafat regime has hardly any credibility with its own, not to mention anyone else. Their "friends" who advocated the disingenuous "peace process" and stuffed their pockets through it have badly mislead them, used them, and even now further exploit them for their own gain -- on the "Washington Scene" such names as Zogby, Sharabi, Maksoud and Ajami come quickly to mind as do such organizations as AAI, ADC, AMC, along with Middle East Institute, Jewish Peace Lobby...and the list goes on. The Arab "client regimes" in the region are themselves cowering and impotent, themselves so terribly co-opted over the years and thus, in a more complicated way, themselves complicitous in what is happening - Cairo, Amman, Riyadh at the top of that list. And the laughable Arab and Muslim "client organizations" in the USA are so collectively pathetic they can't even manage a little protest at the Israeli Embassy a few blocks away. Having gorged themselves on cheap Arab regime money and hand-outs for so long now they too lack any credibility and following except from CNN, Al-Jazeera, and the other state-sponsored corporate media (including of course PBS and NPR) which continue to so incestuously promote them.

Some people in the post-Sept 11 world are at least asking, as a result of the terrorism, "Why do they hate us so much'? And we will have much more to say about this in the days and weeks ahead

But another "why" question also needs to be asked: Why are the Palestinians so defenseless and abandoned, how did this state of affairs come about? We'll be dealing with this even more difficult and depressing question in upcoming MER articles and commentary as well. http://www.middleeast.org/

[BBC News Online - 24 October, 2001] Reports from the West Bank say at least eight Palestinians have been killed during an incursion into a village by Israeli forces.

The village of Beit Rima near Ramallah has been sealed off since early morning when a column of Israeli tanks rolled in, firing on a Palestinian police outpost as they entered under cover of darkness.

The incursion came as Ariel Sharon's government persisted with its partial reoccupation of Palestinian-controlled territory in six towns the West Bank, including Ramallah.

A doctor in Beit Rima told the BBC by telephone that he had seen six bodies lying in the streets in the village and had heard that many more were lying in olive groves nearby.

Villagers said troops have been going from house to house searching for suspected Palestinian militants, arresting dozens of people, and army bulldozers have demolished several houses.

Israel has rejected US demands to end the reoccupation, and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said the army made "very important arrests" of Palestinians belonging to "terrorist organisations" during the night.

"We have made clear that we have no intention of remaining in [Palestinian-controlled] area A and that when we are done with our mission we will leave," Mr Sharon told parliament on Wednesday.

The army has prevented anyone from entering the village, including emergency vehicles, and some of the dead and wounded have been taken to the outskirts on military vehicles. Three Apache helicopters have been flying overhead, shooting bullets, witnesses said.

In a separate incident, six Palestinians were injured near Hebron when a vehicle they were travelling in was sprayed with machine-gun fire on a by-pass road used by Jewish settlers. Earlier, Israeli soldiers shot dead three Palestinians in Tulkarm, saying the men were about to open fire. Palestinian sources said it was an Israeli ambush.

A Palestinian was also shot and killed by Israeli soldiers in Abu Dis on the outskirts of Jerusalem.

The 25-year-old was throwing firebombs at soldiers when he was shot in the face and eye with rubber-coated steel bullets, Israel army radio reported.

Israeli defence officials quoted in the Israeli media indicated that troops might pull back in two days.

But officials continued to insist that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat must hand over those responsible for the assassination of an Israeli Cabinet minister last week.

Some reports said the US softened its opposition to the Israeli reoccupation when President George W Bush dropped in on a meeting in Washington between America's National Security adviser Condoleezza Rice and Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres.

Mr Bush called on Israel to leave Palestinian territory "as quickly as possible".

The US State Department had earlier demanded that the Israelis leave "immediately".

Mr Bush said: "I did express our concern about troops in Palestinian territory and I would hope the Israelis would move their troops as quickly as possible."

Dozens of Palestinians have died since Thursday when Israel reoccupied parts of six towns in response to the assassination of hardline Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi.

The United States fears the upsurge in Middle East violence could interfere with its coalition to defeat international terrorism by alienating moderate Arab states.

In all, more than 900 people have died in violence related to the 13-month Palestinian uprising against Israel's occupation, including more than 700 Palestinians and 175 Israelis.

Say it loud: no more support until Israel agrees to pull out

By Polly Toynbee Guardian UK

The little town of Bethlehem does not lie still in deep or dreamless sleep. Instead a Palestinian altar boy was machine-gunned to death in Manger Square when Israeli tanks stormed in and occupied six Palestinian towns, leaving many others dead in their wake. Israeli hit-squad assassinations of suspected Palestinian terrorist leaders have now reached over 40 dead.

But six days into Israeli occupation of Palestinian land, there is still no response from George Bush. A state department spokesman did call for Israeli withdrawal and behind the scenes pressure is being applied. But what is needed urgently is the same thunderous and threatening language the president applies to the war in Afghanistan. Spell it out - no more money, no more support, no sympathy for future attacks until Israel withdraws and talks start at once on building the promised independent Palestinian state.

Israel does not get the new global message, does not see how little patience its old friends have for Sharon's dangerous hard line. That is partly because the message has still not been delivered by presidential megaphone so that the whole world hears, announcing an end to the double standards of the west's treatment of Palestinians. As the war progresses in Afghanistan, the quid pro quo must come for Palestine. It will not wait: Afghanistan may not be resolved unless Palestine gets justice at the same time. MORE

UK cannabis smokers will not be arrested

By Richard Ford
THE TIMES UK - CANNABIS will be reclassified so that possession of the drug is no longer an arrestable offence, David Blunkett announced yesterday, in the first relaxation of British drug laws in 30 years.
In the surprise announcement the Home Secretary said that drug laws had to be credible, particularly to young people. He said that cannabis would be moved from a Class B drug to a Class C drug, putting it in the same category as anti-depressants and steroids.

Mr Blunkett denied that the move, which in practice will mean that cannabis smokers are unlikely to be prosecuted if caught with small amounts of the drug, was decriminalisation by another name.The maximum sentence for possession will, however, be cut from five to two years and the term for dealing in cannabis from 14 to five.

Police will no longer have the power to arrest a person found in possession of the drug. They will, however, still be able to carry out stop and searches for it. MORE

Qatar condemns US attacks on Afghanistan

TEHRAN, Oct 23 (AFP) - Qatar's foreign minister condemned Tuesday the US-led military strikes on Afghanistan as "unacceptable", after talks in the Iranian capital.

"The attacks against Afghanistan are unacceptable and we have condemned them. It is our clear position," Sheikh Hamad bin-Jassem bin-Jabr al-Thani said.

He was speaking to reporters here after a meeting between Qatar's emir, Sheik Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, and Iranian President Mohammed Khatami.

"What is happening in Afghanistan concerns the Islamic world, and we think that the culprits of the September 11 attacks, no matter who they are, should be tried justly. We think that the Afghan people should not be the victims of these attacks," the foreign minister said. MORE

US Bombing Kills 52 in Afghan Village - AIP

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - U.S. bombing has killed 52 people in a village near the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, the Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) reported on Wednesday.

The village, identified as Chakor Kariz, about 25 miles southeast of Kandahar, was bombed by U.S.-led forces on Tuesday, killing 52 people, most of them nomads, AIP said quoting unnamed sources.

There was no independent confirmation of the report but a number of civilians have been killed and wounded since the United States launched its military campaign against the Taliban and their guest Osama bin Laden on October 7.

Sanctions Have Targeted Innocent Iraqi Civilians

"Slipping Through Sanctions" (Oct. 19) was commendable but seriously failed to discuss the extent of the horror the sanctions have imposed on the people of Iraq, if not on the wealthy or on Saddam Hussein. It has been fully documented by many sources, including UNICEF, that over 500,000 children have died since the sanctions were imposed by our country. Between the 1991 bombing and the sanctions, over 1 million Iraqis have died and continue to die by the thousands every month. MORE

Israelis, Palestinians in Fierce Bethlehem Battles

By Christine Hauser
BETHLEHEM, West Bank (Reuters) - Israeli tanks and troops blasted Bethlehem and areas around it early on Wednesday as Palestinian gunmen fired heavy machineguns in the worst fighting there since Israel's incursion into Palestinian areas.

The fighting raged through the night until dawn in Bethlehem and the adjacent Aida refugee camp. The Israeli army said it was returning Palestinian gunfire from Aida toward Gilo, a Jewish settlement Israel sees as a Jerusalem neighborhood.

Its forces were in action in Bethlehem as part of an incursion into the city which started last Friday when Israel sent tanks and troops into or around six Palestinian towns.

Three Palestinians shot dead in West Bank

Israeli forces shot dead three Palestinian men in the northern West Bank town of Tulkarem overnight, Palestinian hospital sources said.

The victims were identified as Ayman Jalad, 20, Mahmoud Jalad, 21 and Saleh Assi, 23.

Five other Palestinians were said to have been shot and injured in the incident as Israeli forces continued their incursions into Tulkarem and other autonomous Palestinian West Bank towns. MORE

Greenpeace to stage peaceful
demonstrations at WTO meeting in Qatar

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates--Greenpeace will stage peaceful demonstrations during next month's World Trade Organization meeting in Qatar, the environmental group said Monday.

The Greenpeace flagship, Rainbow Warrior, is en route to the Gulf and expected to arrive in Qatar a day before the Nov. 9-13 meeting, said Remi Parmentier, political director for Greenpeace.

"The Rainbow Warrior will be a platform to ensure that those who are most directly affected by WTO decisions, and are all to often ignored, have their voices heard," Parmentier said in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates. MORE

News
Posted: Tuesday, October 23, 2001

Ex-CIA Director Confesses U.S. Supplied Iraq With Anthrax Bacteria in 80s

TEHRAN The former director of Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) confessed that the U.S. had supplied the Iraqi regime with the anthrax bacteria during 80s -- Iran-Iraq wartime.

The anthrax bacteria were available at many labs of the U.S. and were distributed among different countries including Iraq during 80s, the official news agency of Spain, EFE, quoted the ex-CIA head, James Wosely, as saying on Sunday. MORE

Mideast Militants Call for Escalating Conflict

JERUSALEM, Oct. 22 -- Militants in both Israel and the Palestinian territories appealed to their leaders today to press ahead with fighting during what is already one the most intense and sustained bouts of combat in months.

In Jerusalem, thousands of right-wing Israelis thronged the center of the city tonight, likening Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to suspected terrorist Osama bin Laden and urging Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to eliminate him.

Meanwhile, Palestinian Islamic and national political groups criticized Arafat for ordering the arrest of more than two dozen militants following the assassination of an Israeli cabinet member last week. The groups vowed to keep up attacks to drive Israeli troops out of Palestinian territories. MORE

Iraq Seeks Anthrax Tests on 2 Letters

UNITED NATIONS, Oct. 22 -- Iraqi diplomats in New York and Washington have asked American authorities to test two letters containing white powder for contamination with anthrax spores, U.S. and Iraqi officials say.

U.S. diplomats said they suspect the Iraqi government is the target of a hoax but that federal and local law enforcement authorities have not provided a definitive explanation of what was in the letters. MORE

Woman denies she consented to sex with U.S. airman

The issue is particularly sensitive in Okinawa, where women who date or go to bars frequented by U.S. servicemen are sometimes referred to as "Amejo," a pejorative term combining "American" and the Japanese word for woman,"josei."

When the defense asked her whether she considered herself to be an "Amejo", or "Kokujo," a similar term meaning women who date black men, a number of people observing the trial raised their voices to object, saying this had nothing to do with the case.

The prosecution also objected, and the judge ordered that the question be withdrawn. MORE

Earliest Evidence Of Lemurs Discovered In Pakistan, Far From Their Current Home
Posted: Monday, October 22, 2001

Source: American Association For The Advancement Of Science (http://www.aaas.org/)

A handful of tiny teeth collected in the Bugti Hills of Pakistan represent the fossil remains of the earliest known lemur, say an international team of researchers in the 19 October issue of the journal Science.
They also represent something of a mystery, since today's lemurs--primate cousins to the monkeys and apes, with a tooth "comb" jutting from their lower jaw--live only on the island of Madagascar. Scientists had previously thought that Africa must have been the birthplace of lemurs, but the new find may turn heads towards a possible Asian origin instead.

The discovery of a lemur fossil on the Indian subcontinent was "totally unexpected," says Science author Laurent Marivaux of the Université Montpellier in France.

Dubbed Bugtilemur mathesoni, the 30 million year old lemur species provides an extremely rare glimpse into the evolution of strepsirrhine primates, which consist of lemurs and their close relatives, the lorises. Although the strepsirrhines are a diverse group, there is virtually no fossil record for lemurs, making their pre-Madagascar days a paleontological blank slate.

Marivaux, Jean-Jacques Jaeger of Université Montpellier, and colleagues analyzed anatomical features on Bugtilemur's teeth to determine where it fit into the primate family tree, concluding that it was most closely related to Cheirogaleus, the modern dwarf lemur on Madagascar. Bugtilemur and Cheirogaleus share a specialized dental pattern different from other living lemurs, including other members of the dwarf and mouse lemur family.

The close relationship poses a problem for primate researchers. Current evidence indicates that Madagascar and the Indian subcontinent broke away from each other around 88 million years ago, probably long before the origin of all lemurs (around 62 million years ago), and much longer before specialized lemurs like Cheirogaleus appeared (around 46-37 million years ago).

This suggests that some type of early lemur migration probably took place after the breakup of the two land masses, but that scenario presents another puzzle: which direction did the exodus take? The answer depends on where lemurs may have first evolved. Previous research suggested that Africa was the birthplace of lemurs and lorises, and that lemurs later migrated eastward to Madagascar, perhaps hitching a ride on rafts of floating vegetation to their current island home. But the appearance of a specialized, clearly recognizable lemur like Bugtilemur at such an early date raises the possibility of an Asian origin.

Teeth from several other new primate species, including some anthropoids--the ancestors to monkeys and apes--have been recovered from the Bugti Hills site along with Bugtilemur. These fossils, along with recent anthropoid discoveries in China, Myanmar, and Thailand should renew interest in Asia as a major center for primate origins, according to the Science study authors.

"The time has come for the Asian scenario to receive more serious attention, but I think that the paleontological solution to this enigma is still in the future," says Marivaux.

Bugtilemur was recovered from a site teaming with other aquatic and terrestrial fossil specimens. Fossilized tree parts, pollen, and fruit indicate that Bugtilemur lived in an environment that probably resembled a modern tropical forest. The nearby discovery of a Baluchitherium skeleton by the Science researchers also testifies to a formerly lush landscape. Baluchitherium was one of the largest land mammals that ever lived on Earth, weighing in at close to 20 tons.

"This amazing mammal probably ate more than a ton of leaves and other things per day, and shared the same paleoenvironment and paleoconditions with the minute Bugtilemur," says Marivaux.

Marivaux says that future fieldwork at Bugti Hills, the site of paleontological investigation for the last seven years, has been postponed by the recent terror attacks on the United States.

"At the moment, we are totally dependent on the effects of current events, but we actively continue to work with our Pakistani colleagues on these exciting discoveries."

The other members of the research team include Jean-Loup Welcomme, Grégoire Métais, and Stéphane Ducrocq at Université Montpellier, Ibrahim M. Baloch at the University of Balochistan, in Quetta, Pakistan, Pierre-Olivier Antoine at the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris, France, Mouloud Benammi at the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, and Yaowalak Chaimanee at the Department of Mineral Resources, Bangkok, Thailand. This research was supported in part by Université Montpellier, the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, the Fyssen, Leakey, Wenner-Gren, Singer-Polignac, Bleustein-Blanchet and Treilles Foundations.

News
Posted: Monday, October 22, 2001

Anthrax Traces Found in CBS Office

NEW YORK –– Small traces of anthrax were found Monday in CBS anchorman Dan Rather's office, buttressing what had been an assumption: that the assistant who opens his mail encountered the spores at the network.

CBS News spokeswoman Sandra Genelius said Rather and his staff, including the assistant who has contracted skin anthrax, are still working in the office because the amount of bacteria found wasn't considered "dangerous." MORE

Hundreds of migrants said drowned off Indonesia

JAKARTA (Reuters) - Some 350 migrants from several Muslim countries drowned in the Java Sea off Indonesia at the weekend after a boat carrying them to an unknown destination sank, MORE

US 'risks making Ben Laden a hero' in Bahrain

By Lachlan Carmichael
Agence France-Presse

MANAMA - The US war on Afghanistan risks turning chief terror suspect Osama Ben Laden into a hero in the Gulf Arab state of Bahrain, which is home port for the US Fifth Fleet, Muslim clerics and others said here Sunday.
Protesters at an anti-US rally here on Friday for the first time expressed public support for Ben Laden, though others have uttered it privately in this island nation allied with the United States.

"With the American actions, they're making him a hero, a martyr," according to Adnan Ben Abdullah Al Ghattan, an Islamic court judge here in Manama.

Muslims are rallying around Ben Laden because US forces are attacking him without providing proof of his guilt in the Sept. 11 terror attacks in the United States.

Two U.S. postal workers die in anthrax scare

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two postal workers at a facility that handles mail for the U.S. Capitol have died in suspicious circumstances and two more are suffering from potentially deadly anthrax inhalation, health officials have said.

The deaths of the postal workers -- who are on the front line of the anthrax scare -- come after a spate of other bioterror attacks against U.S. media and government targets following the Sept. 11 aerial assaults on the United States.

"We have two postal workers who work at Brentwood that have expired," said Washington Health Department chief Dr. Ivan Walks, referring to the postal facility that handles mail for Capitol Hill and many other places in the Washington area. MORE

Taliban say American bombings have killed 1,000 civilians

Islamabad, Oct 21, IRNA -- The relentless American bombardment in Afghanistan has so far killed one thousands civilians, a senior Taliban diplomat said Sunday.

"The Americans are targeting civilians. Even today (Sunday) Americans rained bombs on civilians in Khair Khana locality of capital Kabul," Taliban Deputy envoy Suhail Shaheen said. "Why the so-called Western human rights groups are silent over the brutal killings of the Afghan civilians," Shaheen asked.

About the American ground attacks, he said Taliban forces had laid
down a siege around the American invading ground forces in Kandahar,
forcing them to flee in frustration in the darkness. He said that
Taliban anti-aircraft guns had hit and badly damaged a fighter plane,
which later landed in Pakistani territory. "The American fighter plane can not now take off due to the severe damages", Shaheen said.

About fighting near the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif, the
Taliban diplomat said that the opposition forces have been pushed back
up-to 15 kilometers. A huge quantity of weapons has also been seized
from the fleeing alliance forces, he said. To a question, he said supreme leader Mulla Mohammad Omar and Osama bin Laden are safe.

Bin Laden is a step ahead of foes, says opposition commander

The United States will need more than air strikes and commandos to find Osama bin Laden, a senior Afghan opposition figure who has dealt with the accused terrorist said Sunday.

"He never sleeps. He moves around all the time. Even if we recapture eastern Afghanistan, he can move into the forests and the mountains," Haji Abdul Qadir, a former governor of the eastern province of Nangahar told AFP.

"He does not have a small organisation. Where he is now -- only God knows."

Bin Laden's ability to hide is now legendary, but Qadir is one of the few Afghan opposition figures who has had close contacts with the world's most wanted man, now a "guest" of the dominant Taliban militia. MORE

FBI considers torture as suspects stay silent

From Damian Whitworth In Washington

AMERICAN investigators are considering resorting to harsher interrogation techniques, including torture, after facing a wall of silence from jailed suspected members of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network, according to a report yesterday.

More than 150 people who were picked up after September 11 remain in custody, with four men the focus of particularly intense scrutiny. But investigators have found the usual methods have failed to persuade any of them to talk.

Options being weighed include "truth" drugs, pressure tactics and extraditing the suspects to countries whose security services are more used to employing a heavy-handed approach during interrogations.

"We're into this thing for 35 days and nobody is talking. Frustration has begun to appear," a senior FBI official told The Washington Post.

"We are known for humanitarian treatment, so basically we are stuck. Usually there is some incentive, some angle to play, what you can do for them. But it could get to that spot where we could go to pressure . . . where we don't have a choice, and we are probably getting there," an FBI agent involved in the investigation told the paper. MORE

News
Posted: Sunday, October 21, 2001

Bombs Kill Eight Civilians in Kabul

By Associated Press

Oct-21 - KABUL, Afghanistan -- U.S.-led bombardment hit two homes in Kabul's north Sunday, killing at least eight civilians, including four children, neighbors said.

An Associated Press reporter at the scene in the Khair Khana residential district saw bodies of five of the dead -- three women and two small children. MORE

Hacker cries foul over FBI snooping

Burhan Wazir The Observer

The world's most infamous computer hacker, out of jail and eking a living as an actor in a television drama, has denounced the new Patriot Act - which would allow FBI and police to snoop on emails and monitor US internet activity in their efforts to counter terrorism.
Kevin Mitnick, 38, imprisoned for breaking into the computer systems of America's leading telephone companies, told The Observer that the legislation proposed in the wake of the 11 September attacks was 'ludicrous'.

'Terrorists have proved that they are interested in total genocide, not subtle little hacks of the US infrastructure, yet the government wants a blank search warrant to spy and snoop on everyone's communications,' he said. Mitnick also warned that hackers risked inordinately heavy exemplary jail sentences. 'Trust me, you do not want to be the next big winner of the scapegoat sweepstakes.' MORE

Three Palestinians killed near Bethlehem

Violence in the Middle East escalated today as gun battles flared around the biblical town of Bethlehem.
Three Palestinians were killed by Israeli gunfire, two at a nearby refugee camp and one near a hospital, Palestinians said. The Israeli military said Palestinians threw a bomb at an Israeli tank, setting off an exchange of fire. MORE

Worse Than Worthless Wartime "Promises"
Posted: Saturday, October 20, 2001

MID-EAST REALITIES © - MER - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington

The list of broken and disingenuous "promises" made to the Arabs by Western political leaders is something befitting a "Saturday Night Live" parody skit -- if only they would dare! To get just a little idea of past historical "promises" here's another great article by Robert Fisk writing in The Independent -- and we've quickly embellished his rather short list with a quick one of our own...without even beginning to exhaust all the major historical deceptions and all the false, broken, and for the most part forgotten promises of the past:

Promises list from The Independent article that follows:

1915 - T E Lawrence promises Arab independence in return for the support of leaders such as Sherif Husseyn
1917 - In a letter from Arthur Balfour to Lionel Rothschild, Britain promises a Jewish homeland in Palestine
1944 - President Roosevelt assures King Ibn Saud that the US will not allow the Palestinians to be dispossessed
1979-90 - Presidents Carter and Reagan promise to help to rebuild Afghanistan if the mujahedin expel the Soviet invaders
1991 - George Bush promises an 'oasis of peace' in the Middle East in return for Arab support in the Gulf war
2001 - Tony Blair assures Yasser Arafat of Britain's commitment to a 'viable Palestinian state', including Jerusalem

More Promises added by MER:

1918 - Promise of "Arab self-determination and independence" shatters "Paris Peace Conference"
1939 - British and Ben-Gurion promise the Palestinian Arabs there is no intention of setting up a "separate" "Jewish State"
1947 - U.N. Promises Palestinian Arabs there own independent State if they accept "partition"
1978 - President Carter promises total Israeli "settlement freeze" as key part of new Camp David agreement between Egypt and Israel
1979 - Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Minister of State of Egypt, promises in interview a Palestinian State by next year
1991 - Arabs promised if they go to Madrid Conference U.S. will insist on compliance with all U.N. Security Council resolutions
1993 - Arafat promises his people true peace and justice - Oslo, Washington, Cairo.
1993-1999 - Arafat promises ad infinitum a Palestininan State, with absolute assurances it will come about no later than the end of 1999.

As for what's going on at the moment, nearly three weeks ago Shimon Peres, in an unprecedented step, publicly warned that top officials in Israel's army were planning to assassinate Yasser Arafat and end the "Palestinian Authority" once and for all (see MER article 1 October). Today a top spokesman for Yasser Arafat made a similar public warning crying out for the U.S. to prevent it. More, much more, to come -- stay tuned!

PROMISES, PROMISES

Colin Powell tells Pakistan's General Musharraf
that he will help solve the problem of Kashmir.
Tony Blair offers Yasser Arafat the vision of a
Palestinian state. But should we take them at
their word?
-- by Robert Fisk

The Independent, UK, 17 October 2001

Tea on the lawn. Perhaps only in the old British Empire do they make black tea and milk in the same scalding pot, poured with lashings of sugar into fragile cups. The bougainvillea blasted crimson and purple down the brick wall beside me while big, aggressive black birds pursued each other over the cut grass of my tiny Peshawar hotel. At the end of my little road lies the tiny British cemetery wherein gravestones mark the assassination of the 19th century Raj's good men from Surrey and Yorkshire, murdered by what were called ghazis, the Afghan fundamentalists of their age who were often accompanied into battle - and I quote Captain Mannering of the Second Afghan war - "by religious men called talibs".

In those days, we made promises. We promised Afghan governments our support if they kept out the Russians. We promised our Indian Empire wealth, communications and education in return for its loyalty. Little has changed. Yesterday - all day long into the sweaty evening - fighter-bombers pulsed through the yellow sky above my little lawn, grey supersonic streaks that rose like hawks from Peshawar's mighty runway and headed west towards the mountains of Afghanistan. Their jet engines must have vibrated among the English bones in the cemetery at the end of the road, as Hardy's Channel firing once disturbed Parson Thirdly's last mortal remains. And, on the great black television in my bedroom, the broken, veined screen proved that Imperial history does indeed repeat itself.

General Colin Powell stood on the right hand of General Pervez Musharraf after promising a serious look at the problems of Kashmir and Pashtu representation in a future Afghan government. The US Secretary of State and the general whom we must now call the President of Pakistan spent much of their time chatting above the overnight artillery bombardment by that other old Empire relic, the Indian army. General Musharraf wanted a "short" campaign against Afghanistan, General Powell a promise of continued Pakistani support in the US's "war against terror". Musharraf wanted a solution to the problem of Kashmir. Powell, promising that the United States was now a close friend of Pakistan, headed off to India to oblige.

Vain promises have ever been a part of our conflict. In the 1914-18 war - another struggle against "evil", we should remember - it was the British who made the promises. To the Jews of the world, especially to Russian Jews, we promised our support for a Jewish homeland in Palestine. To the Arabs, Lawrence of Arabia promised independence. There's a wonderful moment in the film of the same name when Peter O'Toole, clad in an Arab gown and looking not unlike Osama bin Laden, asks General Allenby (Jack Hawkins) if he can promise Sherif Husseyn independence in return for Arab support in destroying the Turkish army. For just a brief, devastating moment, Hawkins hesitates; then his face becomes all smiling benevolence: "Of course!" he says. Did I not see that very same smile on Tony Blair's face as he clutched Arafat's hand in both of his before leading him through the door of 10 Downing Street this week?

In the end, we imposed an Anglo-French military occupation on the Arabs who had helped us and, three decades later gave the Jews only half of Palestine. "Promises", as the Palestinian academic Walid Khalidi once pointed out, "are meant to be kept." But not the kind you make in wartime.

By the Second World War, we were promising the Lebanese independence from the French if they turned against their Vichy masters. Then the French broke their promise and tried to stay on until driven out in ignominy in 1946. Two years earlier, President Roosevelt - anxious to secure Saudi oil rights from the British as the war came to an end - promised the Saudi monarchy that he would not allow the Palestinians to be dispossessed.

By 1990, after the invasion of Kuwait, we wanted the Arab and Muslim world on our side against Iraq. President Bush Senior promised a "New World Order" in which a nuclear-free - indeed arms-free - Middle East would live in an oasis of peace. Once the Iraqis were driven out, however, we called a short-lived "Middle-East" summit in Madrid and then sold more missiles, tanks and jet fighters to the Arabs and Israelis than in the preceding 30 years. Israel's nuclear power was never mentioned.

And here we go again. Scarcely three days before Mr Powell acquired his sudden interest in the problems of Kashmir, Yasser Arafat, the discredited old man of Gaza - "our bin Laden", as ex-General Ariel Sharon indecently called him - was invited to Downing Street where Tony Blair, hitherto a cautious supporter of Palestinian independence, declared the need for a "viable Palestinian state", including Jerusalem - "viable" being a gloss for a less chopped-up version of the Bantustan originally proposed for Mr Arafat. Mr Blair, of course, had no need to fear American wrath since President Bush Jnr had already discovered that even before 11 September - or so he told us - he had a "vision" of a Palestinian state that accepted the existence of Israel. Mr Arafat - speaking English at length for the first time in years - instantly supported the air bombardment of Afghanistan. Poor old Afghans. They were not on hand to remind the world that the same Mr Arafat had once enthusiastically supported the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

Why do we always play politics on the hoof, making quick-fix promises to vulnerable allies of convenience after years of accepting, even creating, the injustices of the Middle East and South-west Asia? How soon before we decide - and not before time - to lift sanctions against Iraq, and allow tens of thousands of Iraqi children to live instead of die? Or promise (in return for the overthrow of Sadam) to withdraw our forces from the Arabian peninsula? After all - say this not too loudly - if we promised and fulfilled all that, every one of Osama bin Laden's demands will have been met.

It's intriguing to read the full text of what bin Laden demanded in his post-World Trade Center attack video tape. He said in Arabic, in a section largely excised in English translations, that "our [Muslim] nation has undergone more than 80 years of this humiliation..." and referred to "when the sword reached America after 80 years". Bin Laden may be cruel, wicked, ruthless or evil personified, but he is very intelligent. I think he was referring specifically to the 1920 Treaty of Sèvres, written by the victorious allied powers, which broke the Ottoman Empire and did away - after 600 years of sultanates and caliphates - with the last dream of Arab unity. As the American Professor James Robbins has shrewdly spotted, bin Laden's lieutenant, Ayman Zawahri - shouting into the video recorder from his Afghan cave 11 days ago - stated that the al-Quaida movement "will not tolerate a recurrence of the Andalusia tragedy in Palestine". Andalusia? Yes, the debacle of Andalusia marked the end of Muslim rule in Spain in 1492.

We may sprinkle quick-fix promises around. The people of the Middle East have longer memories. Back in the mid-1990s, I used to visit the bookshops of Algiers. Out in the triangle of death around Bentalha, hundreds of innocents were having their throats slit by an Islamist group - possibly also by government forces - many of whose members had fought in Afghanistan against the Russians. In the shops I would look for books on Islam. Muslim culture, Islamic history, Koranic thought. They were all there. And on the very next shelves - the same applied, I found, in Cairo bookshops - would invariably be text books on nuclear science, chemical engineering, aeronautics and biological research.

The aeronautical texts have, of course, a fearful new resonance today. So have the books on biological research. But the reason for their concurrence, I suspected, lay in the history of Arab humiliation. The Arabs were among the first scientists at the start of the second millennium, while the Crusaders - another of bin Laden's fixations - were riding in technological ignorance into the Muslim world. So while in the past few decades, our popular conception of the Arabs vaguely embraced an oil-rich, venal and largely backward people, awaiting our annual handouts and their virgins in heaven, many of them were asking pertinent questions about their past and future, about religion and science, about - so I suspect - how God and technology might be part of the same universe.

No such long-term thought or historical questions for us. We just went on supporting our Muslim dictators around the world - especially in the Middle East - in return for their friendship and our vain promises to rectify historical injustice.

We allowed our dictators to snuff out their socialist and communist parties; we left their population little place to exercise their political opposition except through religion. We went in for bestialization- Messrs Khomeini, Abu Nidal, Gaddafi, Arafat, Saddam and bin Laden - rather than historical questioning. And we made more promises. Presidents Carter and Reagan, I recall, made promises to the Afghan mujahedin. Fight the Russians and we will help you. There would then be assistance in Afghanistan's economic recovery. A re-building of the country, even (this from the innocent Mr Carter) "democracy" - not a concept to be sure that we would now be promising to the Pakistanis, Palestinians, Uzbeks or Saudis. Of course, once the Russians were gone in 1989, there was no economic assistance. But last year, there was President Clinton, loud once more in America's promises of economic help for Pakistan, asking for a rejection of bin Laden; yet his only sense of perspective was to tell the Pakistani people that their history was - wait for it - "as long as the river Indus".

The problem, I fear, is that without any sense of history, we do not understand injustice. We only compound that injustice, after years of indolence, when we want to bribe our would-be allies with promises of immense historical importance - a resolution to Palestine, Kashmir, an arms-free Middle East, Arab independence, an economic Nirvana - because we are at war - tell them what they want to hear, promise them what they want - anything, so long as we can get our armadas into the air in our latest "war against evil".

So there was General Powell yesterday promising to deal with Kashmir while General Musharraf pleaded for a short war and while the jets went sweeping off towards Afghanistan from the Peshawar airbase.

MiD-EasT RealitieS - http://www.MiddleEast.Org / Forum

Is Anthrax Just The Beginning?
Posted: Saturday, October 20, 2001

Source: Northeastern University (http://www.northeastern.edu/)

What could be deadlier than anthrax? Try smallpox and the bubonic plague.

Jim Matthews, an associate professor of pharmacy at Northeastern University's Bouvé College of Health Sciences, says that though the use of anthrax as a bioterrorist weapon is haunting, it is not nearly as frightening as the threat of attacks using smallpox or the bubonic plague.

"Anthrax is not easily transferred, so to develop it as a weapon is difficult, and in most cases, it responds quite well to antibiotics," said Matthews. "However, what I would be more fearful and weary of is an outbreak of smallpox or the bubonic plague, caused by terrorist acts. Smallpox, for example, is contagious and there is no effective treatment available. Even as we speak, some federal officials have reason to believe that Iraq is developing it as a biological weapon."

While Matthews believes that it is important for government to focus its energies on investigating the recent bioterrorist mailings and ensuring the availability of anthrax antibiotics and vaccines, he believes it is imperative that government accelerates work on protection against untreatable viruses.

"It's great that federal officials are working to have the anthrax antibiotic, Ciprofloxacin readily available for those believed to be infected," said Matthews. ("Incidentally the only anthrax vaccine manufactured in the U.S. by Michigan-based BioPort Corporation and sponsored by the Department of Defense, is only available through the Center for Disease Control and to members of the military.")

"However, contingency plans should be in the works to guard against other bioterrorist threats such as smallpox," warns Matthews.

New
Posted: Saturday, October 20, 2001

Jewish leader slams German author for criticizing Israel

Berlin, Oct 20, IRNA -- The President of the Central Council of Jews Paul Spiegel lashed out at German author and Nobel laureate Guenter Grass for his recent criticism of Israel's policies in the occupied Palestinian territories, Paul quoted an advance report by the weekly Focus magazine here Saturday.

Spiegel accused Grass of "directly or indirectly questioning Israel's right to exist". Grass said during a recent interview with the weekly Spiegel magazine, "Israel must withdraw from occupied territories."

He added, "Furthermore the annexation and settlement of Palestinian soil is a criminal act." The Jewish leader went on to say that Grass' statements put him on "one level with the radical enemies of Israel".

The Zionist regime has faced worldwide condemnation for its murderous policies in the occupied territories.

Israeli army hits Christian neighborhoods in Beit Jala, two killed

Al-Khalil, Oct 20, IRNA -- Israeli artillery on Saturday pounded Christian neighborhoods in Beit Jala, west of Bethlehem, killing a man and a woman and injuring several other civilians.

According to local sources, Israeli tanks fired several shells at downtown Beit Jala and strafed civilian neighborhoods with machinegun fire, killing Ranya Kharoufa, 24.

Kharoufa, neighbors testified, was trying to buy milk for her family when an Israeli sniper's bullet hit her in the head, killing her instantly.

Another local Christian, identified as Mousa George Edey, was killed yesterday in similar circumstances.

Palestinian sources said 9 civilians were killed and many others were maimed in the Bethlehem district in the past 24 hours alone.

The number of Palestinians killed by Israeli soldiers since Thursday is 23 Palestinians, most of them innocent civilians.

In addition, more than 50, mostly civilians, were wounded by Israeli bullets. Meanwhile, the Israeli army bombarded the Azza refugee camp Saturday evening, killing a 15 year-old boy, identified as Yousef Ahmed Ibayat.

A medical doctor from the nearby Beit Jala hospital was also injured while trying to save the life of Ibayat. Eyewitnesses said Israeli soldiers were pinpointing their guns at doors and windows in order to inflict maximum casualties.

On Saturday, the Israeli army effectively reoccupied most of the Palestinian towns and villages in the West Bank, reversing the Oslo process, a longtime goal of Ariel Sharon.

War flares up in Southern Caucasus

Kavkaz Center - According to Tbilisi time at 14:10 on Thursday in air space of Georgia again intruded four planes without recognition symbols, as informed by press center of the Georgian Defence Ministry. According to the press center, four assault fighters Su-25 appeared in air space of Georgia from Kabardino-Balkaria made flight on Mestizh district and heights of Kodori Gorge’s and exactly after five minutes departed in opposite direction.

The press center of Georgian Defence Ministry says, that all ready for combat Air Forces of the country planes such as Su-25, this day didn’t fly above the specified heights of the mountainous district, they continue performance of scheduled tasks in the sky above Western Georgia. Exactly in 30 minutes above Kodori Gorge appeared 6 more planes, which later on departed towards Russian border. Tbilisi not without justification confirms that these were Russian planes, which already bombed gorge. It is necessary to remind, that Chechen side actually has confirmed belonging of planes, having specified on the operative data that bombers took off from Mozdok. MORE

'Everything has changed'

Graham Usher - At around 7 am yesterday two Palestinians entered the Hyatt Regency hotel in occupied East Jerusalem and shot Rehavam Zeevi, Israel's Tourism Minister and leader of the ultra-nationalist National Union bloc. Three hours later he was pronounced dead.

The PLO's Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine claimed responsibility for the attack. "The blood of Abu Ali Mustafa has to be avenged, regardless of any [Palestinian Authority] cease-fire agreement with Israel," ran the wire sent to Reuters in Beirut.

In one sense, the PFLP's statement is true. When Israeli helicopters struck Mustafa in his office in Ramallah on 27 August, by far the most prominent assassination of the 59 Israel has executed during the Intifada, PFLP leaders openly declared that Israeli political leaders were now legitimate targets for retaliation. MORE

Palestinian slain in fresh violence

Israeli tanks and troops moved 150 metres (yards) into the West Bank city of Qualqilya under cover of machine-gun fire well before dawn, killing a Palestinian in front of his house as helicopters hovered overhead, Palestinian witnesses said.

Palestinian gunmen opened fire on Israeli troops and armoured vehicles as they crossed several hundred metres (yards) into the West Bank city of Tulkarm in another early raid, Palestinian witnesses said.

The Israeli army did not immediately comment on the reports it had made another incursion Palestinian-ruled territory in the wake of Wednesday's assassination of ultranationalist Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi by Palestinian militants.

Stoking fears that the year-old conflict is spinning out of control, Israeli tanks had rumbled into Palestinian-ruled Bethlehem and six Palestinians were killed in fighting in the West Bank on Friday.

The toll since Zeevi's death is 13 Palestinians and one Israeli killed, and dozens wounded. MORE

U.S. troops die in helicopter crash

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two U.S. troops have died in a helicopter crash in Pakistan during operations connected with the U.S. military campaign in neighbouring Afghanistan, the Pentagon said.

U.S. Completes Afghan Ground Raid

By ROBERT BURNS
AP Military Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — About 100 U.S. commandos carried out a secretive ground assault in the Taliban stronghold of southern Afghanistan, opening a new phase of the war on terrorism after nearly two weeks of punishing airstrikes, U.S. officials said Friday night. Two soldiers died when a U.S. helicopter, prepared for search-and-rescue duty, crashed accidentally in neighboring Pakistan.

President Bush said American forces are ``encircling the terrorists so that we can bring them to justice.''

Officials said the commandos returned to base after several hours inside Afghanistan. There was no word on possible casualties in the raid.

60 killed in US bombing on Kabul, Kandhar

ISLAMABAD, Oct 18 (Reuters): More than 60 people have been killed in a fierce bombardment of the Afghan capital, Kabul, and the Southern City of Kandahar since yesterday morning, the Afghan Islamic Press said today quoting Taliban officials.

In kandahar, the attacks have killed 42 civilians since early yesterday, AIP quoted education minister Amir Khan Muttaqi as saying.

While the attacks were less intense today, at least five people were killed early in the morning, AIP quoted Taliban spokesman Abdul Haye Mutmaen as saying.

AIP said its reports showed that 10 people had been killed in the Qalaye Zaman Khan Eastern Suburb of Kabul. In addition, two died in Kabul’s Khair Khana district and three near Kabul’s airport, which has been a constant target of attack in the last few days.

Israeli tanks seize swath of Arafat's land

Suzanne Goldenberg in Bethlehem
The Guardian

Region on the brink as cabinet hawks urge Sharon to conquer all of Palestinian Authority in reprisal for killing of minister

Israeli tanks loomed over Bethlehem's Manger Square yesterday, underlining the predicament of the prime minister, Ariel Sharon, after launching the widest offensive on Palestinian-ruled lands since the start of the intifada.
Does he stop now, or does he embark on a war to the finish against Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority?

The tanks encircling Bethlehem and the army snipers installed in hotels in the centre of town and on the edges of a refugee camp yesterday morning put the Israeli army in commanding positions of four Palestinian cities in the West Bank. After seizing large areas of Bethlehem, Ramallah, Nablus and Jenin, the Israeli army was waiting for an order to move in and conquer all of the Palestinian Authority.

In the emotionally charged atmosphere following the assassination on Wednesday of the far-right cabinet minister Rehavam Zeevi, that is precisely what rightwing figures were urging Mr Sharon to do. After Mr Arafat's officials on Thursday rejected Israel's ultimatum to hand over Zeevi's killers - who were from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - Zeevi's fellow cabinet ministers on the far-right and the upper echelons of the Israeli army are beating the drums of war.

Yesterday, Israeli newspapers outlined war scenarios that would begin with the army invasions that have isolated West Bank cities, and would end with military strikes on electricity and telephone stations, as well as economic measures that would lead to the eventual collapse of Mr Arafat's administration. MORE

News
Posted: Friday, October 19, 2001

Russian Iranologists call for more cultural ties with Iran

Moscow, Oct 19, IRNA -- Russian Iranologists in meeting Iran's Ambassador to Russian Federation, Gholamreza Shafe'i, expressed great interest in Persian language and culture and called for development of cultural cooperation between the two countries.

Russian Iranologists are mostly university professors with high-level degrees who have compiled different essays about the Persian language and culture as well as translated Iranian well-known authors' works into Russian.

Shafe'i lauded the Russian Iranologists' efforts in introducing
Persian culture and language and said that such cultural interactions
are the best methods of upgrading dialogue among the civilizations.

Misrepresentation of Iran's Commitment to International Laws

TEHRAN In a blatant misrepresentation of Iran's commitment to international regulations, Colin Powell, the American secretary of state has said during a press conference that Iran's proposal to help American soldiers whose lives are in danger during the U.S. war against Afghanistan will help to further isolate the Talebans in their country.

***New York Times***, quoting American officials, also said in its last Tuesday's issue that Iran has proposed to the U.S. Administration that it is willing to offer humanitarian help to American forces in Afghanistan.

The spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry has announced however that no such proposal has been made by Iran to the American Administration . He elaborated that Iran, in accordance with international regulations, has only declared its willingness to help those pilots that may encounter difficulties during their flight missions over Afghanistan and if and when they have to make emergency landings in Iranian territory.

Observers believe that according to international laws, the help can be given to Taleban as a warring side as well. MORE

Anthrax alert spreads to New York Post

NEW YORK (Reuters) - An employee of the tabloid newspaper The New York Post has tested positive for skin anthrax, workers at the paper say.

A number of employees at the newspaper, owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp, were tested and one of them came back positive for cutaneous anthrax, a less dangerous form of the disease than inhaled anthrax, during a second round of tests. MORE

Mideast Clerics Decry U.S.-Led War

KHOBAR, Saudi Arabia -- Children emptied their piggybanks and a woman donated her wedding dress as a Saudi campaign continued Friday to raise millions for Afghan victims of U.S.-led attacks.

With Muslims streaming into mosques for the day of weekly prayers, clerics in this Gulf nation and across the Middle East denounced the U.S. assault and called for holy war. MORE

Anthrax Deaths Haunt Russian City

YEKATERINBURG, Russia -- On an April morning in 1979, Lazar Karsayev awoke early as usual, drank a cup of tea and walked to work at a ceramics factory. A few hours later, the fit 64-year-old was sent home with what doctors said was a bad cold.

When medics wearing biohazard suits showed up to take him to the hospital the next day, his family suspected something much worse. A few days later, they were taken under police guard to watch Karsayev's coffin -- filled with chlorinated lime and sealed in plastic -- being lowered into one of dozens of fresh graves at the edge of a cemetery. MORE

Taliban say injured Afghans are dying due to lack of medicines

IRNA -- Afghanistan ruling Taliban Wednesday said injured Afghans are dying because of the lack of medicines. "There is no medicine in Afghanistan to treat the injured," Taliban envoy Mulla Abdul Salam Zaeef told NNI news agency from an unknown destination between Helmand and Herat. MORE

Toll mounts in Mid-East clashes

BBC - Casualties have been