Condemned By “Terrorism”
By Ramzy Baroud, Palestine Chronicle, November 4, 2002
“So do you condemn terrorism or not?” a young, immature journalist asked me with a mix of agitation and sarcasm. I never answered. I refused to answer. I told him that I hated the pretentious, tainted term: “terrorism“. He thought it was a poor attempt to escape this ritual condemnation of terrorism, which has now become a code, we all have to condemn if we wish to be accepted into civil societies, especially in the West. But of course, I condemn terrorism, if terrorism means the murder of innocent people for the sake of gaining political clout, to punish or to simply stress a point. I condemn all kinds of terrorism, that of a state, no matter how mighty, and that of a lonely sniper gunning down innocent men and women. But I avoid using the term. For one, I am not judge. But even if I was, I would refrain from this cultic, routine condemnation of a concept committed daily by powerful countries in the name of democracy, but it is only the powerless who receive retribution for it.

Israeli liberalism may not be dead. But it needs a lot of help
By Ian Buruma, The Guardian, November 5, 2002
Aqraba is an Arab village on the west bank of the Jordan River. These stony hills formed the heartland of the Jewish tribes in biblical times. Here they picked their olives, just as the Palestinians would today, if they could. But they cannot, because modern Jews, settled in the hills around them, won't let them. These Jews, from the US, Russia, or Israel, won't let them because they claim the Old Testament as their deed of ownership to the land. They are followers of the fanatical rabbi from Brooklyn, Meir Kahane, who advocated the expulsion ("transfer") of Palestinian Arabs from the West Bank.

How to be Named an Anti-Semite
By Dr. E.A Richards, Palestine Chronicle, November 2, 2002 
The term anti-Semite as used here is one utilized as a catch-all phrase by various activist groups such as the Zionists, Israel Firsters, The Jewish Defense League, and also by those Jews unaware of what the phrase truly implies. Many peoples of the Middle East can be classified as "Semites," but it appears that some Jews have appropriated the term to mean only Jews - which is historically incorrect. To be named and anti-Semite in the current world is easy; all you have to do is any of the following...

Electoral justice
Editorial, Arab News, November 5, 2002
Turkish election results are stunning, not so much for the clear victory of a moderate Islamic party, as for the unequivocal rejection by the voters of the crop of bickering politicians, who have failed so spectacularly to steer their country for the last twenty years. Just two parties, Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Republican People’s Party (CHP) of Kemal Dervis, (the finance minister whose resignation led to the collapse of the failing Ecevit coalition), have passed the ten percent threshold to secure parliamentary seats. Also wiped out are nine other parties, including the once-dominant Motherland (Anap) and True Path (Doru Yol) parties, whose leaders, Mesult Yilmaz and Tansu Ciller have both promptly quit politics.

The poll Sharon didn't want
By Martin Asser, BBC, November 5, 2002
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has called elections in February, eight months ahead of schedule, after failing to rebuild his parliamentary majority since the collapse of his broad-based national unity coalition last week. Early elections are an outcome Mr Sharon seemed eager to avoid, but - with only 55 members of the 120-member Knesset on his side - he had little choice.

Why Blair is an appeaser
By George Monbiot, The Guardian, November 5, 2002
Britain plays poodle partly because the US is stitching up the world's oil supplies: Tony Blair's loyalty to George Bush looks like slow political suicide. His preparedness to follow him over every precipice jeopardises Britain's relationships with its allies, conjures up enemies all over the world and infuriates voters of all political colours. And yet he never misses an opportunity to show what a trusting friend he is. There are several plausible and well-established explanations for this unnatural coupling. But there might also be a new one. Blair may have calculated that sticking to Bush is the only way in which our unsustainable economy can meet its need for energy.

Sharon or No Sharon: Zionism Stays
By Tariq Shadid, MD, Palestine Chronicle, November 4, 2002  
"When it comes to the blatant infringements on Palestinian lives, lands and human rights, it is Zionism that provides the justification, and in this respect, both Likud and Labor drink from the same well." - (PC) - When Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, Defense Minister under the right-wing government of Ariel Sharon, announced the withdrawal of his Labor party from the government, it caused anxiety both among protagonists and antagonists of the coalition, that had been ruling the state of Israel for the better part of the past two years. Some may be inclined to think, that if Sharon succeeds in creating a new coalition consisting of only right-wing parties, which are generally in favor of expelling the Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza, the chance of a major disaster for the Palestinians will increase.

Concessions to Netanyahu are more painful
By Akiva Eldar, Ha'aretz, November 5, 2002
The term "painful concessions" embodies, in two words, Ariel Sharon's entire genetic-political code since he stepped into the Prime Minister's Bureau. From the point of view of the left, a right-wing politician who offers not only concessions, but painful ones to boot, was a legitimate partner for a party prepared to forgo almost all the territories, and for Shimon Peres, who is in no rush to give up his seat in the cabinet. On the other hand, from the point of view of the right, "painful concessions" is so vague a term that it allows Effi Eitam to join the government. Eitam knows that concessions considered frighteningly painful by Sharon have no chance of even tickling the demands of the Palestinians. The more the Americans tried to sharpen the term "concessions," the more Sharon's partners from the left and right allowed him to dull them: The left received a declaration of support for the Mitchell/Tenet/Bush plan, without even a cabinet debate on the matter; and the right received declarations of support that, without a cabinet decision, were of no practical significance.