by Ali Abunimah

CHICAGO -- Once again the world has had to confront the horror of innocent men, women and children killed by suicide bombers in the heart of Jerusalem and in Haifa. No decent person can refrain from condemning such attacks in the strongest terms. Such deeds harm not only their innocent victims, which in this case probably included Palestinian citizens of Israel, but also the just cause of Palestine.

As a Palestinian I am often challenged by the press on my views about such horrific bombings. I emphatically repeat my condemnation and state that I oppose the targeting and killing of innocent civilians regardless of whether they are Israelis or Palestinians.

Yet I wonder why no one asked how I felt when five Palestinian schoolboys were killed by a bomb planted by the Israeli occupation forces in a refugee camp in Gaza less than two weeks ago — or why Israelis and pro-Israel spokesmen, who are called for comment by the same radio and television stations that call me, are rarely asked to condemn the violence that is committed in their name.

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by Harris Sussman

It is Prince of Peace season and America is at war. Peace on earth,goodwill to men is the usual mantra and our nation is in the sixth orseventh week of bombing Afghanistan. In the Holy Land, more suicidebombers and missiles. Merry and Happy are the words on the greetingcards and tens of thousands of letters have been cross-contaminated withanthrax spores. Joy is the word in the hymns--are we singing along?

We seem to be subjects in a mass experiment in cognitive dissonance.Maybe this is the real meltdown, the Y2K disaster we were fearing.

"This is a test, it is only a test," says the Emergency BroadcastSystem recording. "For the next sixty seconds, you will hear a tonethat will be used to alert you in case of an actual emergency. Remember, this is only a test."

This morning Tom Ridge was on television explaining that hisannouncement yesterday was to "remind America one more time that we areat war."

Without these reminders we might forget.

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by Bernard Weiner

First, they came for the terrorists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a terrorist.
Then they came for the foreigners,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a foreigner.
Then they came for the Arab-Americans,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t Arab-American.
Then they came for the radical dissenters,
and I didn’t speak up because I was just an ordinary troubled citizen.
They they came for me,
and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me.

(adapted from Pastor Niemoller’s 1945 quote about the Nazis*)

I’ve been steering clear of the F-word, because too many on the Left fling that term so carelessly that it soon loses its truth-punch. But things are happening, so quickly, in this country that are taking us closer to a brand of near-fascism that is frightening in its seeming acceptance by the American populace and in its implications for the future of American democracy.

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Both Capitalists and Communists Conclude Afghanistan Better Off UnderSoviets Than Northern Alliance
by Tom Turnipseed

The Wall Street Journal, the leading global newspaper of business, is published by Dow Jones and Company who also operate the world's most widelyfollowed stock-market indicator tracking the world's largest stock market.The Workers Vanguard, is a Marxist working class biweekly of the Spartacist League of the United States, which is the U. S. Section of the International Communist League. Drawing from Cold War history and the present war in Afghanistan, both have published recent articles that agree Afghanistan was better off under Soviet control than that of the Northern Alliance.

In the December 4, 2001 edition of the Journal, Alan Cullison reports from Kabul, Afghanistan on living conditions when the Soviets were there under a heading of "Soviet-Era Vision of Afghanistan Gains New Life in Ruinsof Kabul Neighborhood." Cullison story leads with, "In the wrecked remnantsof what was once one of Kabul's most prestigious neighborhoods, American bombs have stirred a fragile and ironic hope: the revival of a Soviet-era vision of Afghanistan whose destruction Washington used to trumpet as its greatest Cold War triumph."Cullison then quotes Siarah Parlika, one of the oldest residents of the Soviet-built Microrayon neighborhood, who said, "It used to be beautiful-there was glass in our windows and we had gardens."

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by Matthew Engel

Last Friday the celebrated American pundit Charles Krauthammer wrote an article entitled Victory changes everything...? It contained the following paragraph: "The elementary truth that seems to elude the experts again and again - Gulf war, Afghan war, next war - is that power is its own reward. Victory changes everything, psychology above all. The psychology in the region is now one of fear and deep respect for American power. Now is the time to use it to deter, defeat or destroy the other regimes in the area that are host to radical Islamic terrorism."

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The Attorney General is going for broke in his fight against civil liberty
by Molly Ivins

AUSTIN -- With all due respect, of course, and God Bless America too, has anyone considered the possibility that the attorney general is becoming unhinged?

Poor John Ashcroft is under a lot of strain here. Is it possible his mind has started to give under the weight of responsibility, what with having to stop terrorism between innings against doctors trying to help the dying in Oregon and California? Why not take a Valium, sir, and go track down some nice domestic nut with access to anthrax, OK?

Not content with the noxious USA PATRIOT bill (for Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act -- urp), which was bad enough, Ashcroft has steadily moved from bad to worse. Now he wants to bring back FBI surveillance of domestic religious and political groups.

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